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Another Whacky Theory (This time with Greek Gods!)


RamonAtila
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A hole in my theory proposal would be the connection to the Roman mythology. They had the same sets of Gods, different names. I just reaized that.

 

On a side note, which came first: naming the planet Jupiter or naming the God Jupiter? Or was it simultaneous? Maybe the Gods they spoke about were the planets? (I'm just waiting for Pavonis to persecute me for this)

 

But if my theory guess were absolutely true, hypothetically speaking, I think I understand why it would be lost in translation today. Christianity, while worshipping saints, was hypocritically against the worship of idols (even humans as idols.) 'There is no group of humans that are Gods, there is only one God.' So they were against the idea of celebrities. Then you got Hollywood so many years later and the worship of humans as idols returned. And for the first hundred years Hollywood had a hard time, because the question was: are these people there just to do their acting job and their celebrity is a by-product, or do those people want to have all this influence?(which is not how a good Christian would be?)

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I don't think that the Romans taking from the Greeks really disproves anything. It's not like we're talking civilizations that have no connection just happening to have the same gods.

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Go read literally any book on early Roman history and you'll find out why. If you going to theorize on a topic and be willing to argue it, you should at least do some basic research.

 

Something to do with Romans living in daylight centuries, an the Greeks in nighttime ones

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Yeah, but why don't the Romans have their own important people? And if they're talking about the same living people as the Greeks, why the name change?

What makes you think the Romans didn't have their own "important people?" Romulus and Remus, any one?

 

They had their own founding cultural myths. As the Republic - and later the Empire expanded, they took from other belief systems and hybrid religious and mythological systems also emerged, just like they always do. Roman adaptation of the Greek pantheon would find a later parallel in the Catholic adoptation of European paganism in late antiquity, with different names. It happens a lot in history.

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Also, while I don't think any one real life person can be attributed as the inspiration of any of the Greek gods (indeed even if they were, it would be impossible to prove it...historians can't even agree on who may have been the historical basis of King Arthur, let alone the Greek gods), Greek mythos and various deities were influenced by older civilizations. Broadly speaking, gods and goddesses like Zeus (sky\weather god), Ares (god of war), Apollo (son god), Poseidon (sea god), Hades (underworld\death god) all have their equivalents in the Ancient Egyptian, Sumerian\Babylonian, Indian, and other Indo-European myths and legends, and depending on the Greek god or goddess, were directly borrowed or influenced by a variety of those older civilizations.

For what it's worth, wikipedia has a write up about the proto Indo-European religion. It could be that they all traced a direct ancestry back to one base faith that originated in one place, or it could be that the archetypes employed are universal just as human nature itself is universal; what Jung called the "collective unconscious."
Along with the obvious similarities between Greek and Roman gods, you can also throw in the Norse gods as well, and there is an Indo European connection to all of them (as there is with Sanskit gods associated with the Indo Aryans). I think it's quite plausible that some of them are based on real people that were Proto Indo European warlords/kings/VIPs before the various IE expansions.

 

I think it's even more likely that demigods are based on real people. These folks supposedly are half god half man and I can see them getting the "half god" tag in death as a way of honoring them.

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I saw a documentary last night about how Hercules wasn't really a demi-god but actually just a mercenary with a bunch of semi-secret sidekicks who let people believe he was divine because it played up his legend and all of the monsters he fought as part of his labours weren't really monsters but people thought they were monsters anyway. It was way better than the other documentary about Hercules I saw a few months ago but really in the end they were both pretty terrible documentaries.

 

Anyway. More proof for your theory maybe?1?

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I think it's even more likely that demigods are based on real people. These folks supposedly are half god half man and I can see them getting the "half god" tag in death as a way of honoring them.

If they were based on real people, doubtless it was a tale that grew in the telling over a long time.

 

I don't think this is entirely implausible. A possible ... well, I don't want to use the word "theory" for fear of provoking a five page long flame war with some pedantic wanker over word choice, so I'll say 'idea' or 'musing' if that doesn't offend anyone, is that if this proto indo-European religion can be traced back far enough, we're looking at a time when man was NOT the apex predator. A time - most of our history, actually - that has been all but forgotten by people these days but that never the less could have had a profound impact on the way the human psyche actually works. Watch the first 10 or so minutes of that old Kubric film 2001: A Space Odyssey and imagine how profound an experience that, or something like that would have been to primitive man. Another lens through which to view the common stories of heroes who subdued serpents, wolves, bulls and so on.

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Go read literally any book on early Roman history and you'll find out why. If you going to theorize on a topic and be willing to argue it, you should at least do some basic research.

Where are you even coming from with this? Somewhere along the line you lost what I was talking about.

 

FOZZIE: It's still possible that the Gods were based on real people even though the Romans had a similar set of Gods.

ME: But why would the Romans be focusing on another empire's important people?

YOU: HULK MAD!!!

 

Maybe the Romans could change the names when referring to these 'Gods' of Greece. That is common. But how could two different sets of people that came to be referred to as Gods in their respective empires have the exact same stories and personalities...unless they were both made up.

 

That's what I was talking about. Get it straight.

 

 

 

 

Something to do with Romans living in daylight centuries, an the Greeks in nighttime ones

 

 

Ha! Everyone knows the Romans are nighttime centuries and the Greeks are the daytime ones

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...this proto indo-European religion can be traced back far enough, we're looking at a time when man was NOT the apex predator.

Reconstructions of Proto-Indo-European languages and religions still only go back to about 6000 years ago, hardly a time when humans weren't "apex predators", more like a time just before civilization emerged. Reconstructing any kind of "religion" from an era before we were the top of the food chain would require going least another order of magnitude further back in time, and that's probably not possible.

 

 

 

... well, I don't want to use the word "theory" for fear of provoking a five page long flame war with some pedantic wanker over word choice,...

 

Select your words carefully. A large vocabulary is a sign of intelligence. I look forward to the day when you will display some.

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aw, man. This topic makes me hugely happy that I missed out on all that Greek and Roman God stuff in my education (I did get to read a few Greek tragedies but that was about it). You're just living off the height of a fallen civilization when you get into this stuff. I could careless about these "Gods". I mean Ceasar was taken to be a God. Most civilizations of any consequence will develop some mythology to explain things that happen because they're the current "first world" in power and have time on their hands. Anthropology shows that many civilizations worked out some sort of model that related to explaining great events and the reason for being and entertaining god stories to instill moral compasses in their cultural fabric and identity. The Romans just co-opted the Greeks because they had the best model going for assimilating the peoples they conquered and governing them. Jews told the story that god created the world in seven days not because it was true but because they wanted to impress the learner how much powerful their god was.

 

As for religion, it depends on what your definition is and man, I don't want to get into that conversation.

 

Religion wasn't a concept when those first hunter gatherers figured out how to grow their own food and settle into one place where their lives become more stable and they could spend time explaining why the ball of burning fire passed across the sky or why it rains endlessly during monsoon season.

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I was responding specifically to this question:

Yeah, but why don't the Romans have their own important people? And if they're talking about the same living people as the Greeks, why the name change?

The transition and commonality between Greek and Roman Gods has been studied and documented for centuries. There's enough books and internet articles about it to keep one busy for an eternity.

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I don't know if the gods were based on real PEOPLE. (And my money is on Kurgan and Tex's thoughts. )

 

However... If by PEOPLE you really meant reptilian shape shifting extra terrestrials (ala Anunaki) misinterpreted by humanity as gods... Well then you might be onto something. But I think there is a tv show about it already.

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Reconstructions of Proto-Indo-European languages and religions still only go back to about 6000 years ago, hardly a time when humans weren't "apex predators", more like a time just before civilization emerged. Reconstructing any kind of "religion" from an era before we were the top of the food chain would require going least another order of magnitude further back in time, and that's probably not possible.

Perhaps. But folk memory can go back a long way, again with stories growing in the telling. Pre-modern societies were extremely slow to change, with tribal cultures remaining essentially the same over many centuries or even milennia. To say nothing of evolutionary instinct - man's ancestors lived in fear of predation for millions of years - sufficient time for instinctive fear to evolve. Civilization and technology have mitigated the reality of this fear for far less time - ten thousand years, maybe? Fear of predation never truly left the human species. I suspect this is why being stared at is a profoundly disquieting experience.

 

Select your words carefully. A large vocabulary is a sign of intelligence. I look forward to the day when you will display some.

You do read my posts?

 

Besides, intended meaning can usually be gleaned from the context of the post itself. As I've repeatedly said, were this a peer reviewed scientific journal, misuse of the word 'theory' would be misplaced. But since we're just a bunch of geeks sitting about chewing the fat, I think we can all get away with more informal use of the word. Plus, in over fifteen years of interwebs useage, I've noticed that these types of quibbles over semantics always boil down to whether we either (a) agree or not with the idea being advanced and (b) the person advancing them is popular and fits into the board's overall culture. I've never seen a flame war start over correct word usage between people all on the same team. So let's be honest with ourselves here: this is about RamonAtilla and his ideas being eccentric and unpopular. So if that's what you think, Pavonis, just come out and say it instead of hiding that sentiment behind a bunch of hair splitting over word usage.

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That's ok that's what I've come to expect from Pavonis now.

 

And Odine, everyone knows Ancient Aliens and other shows like that are for complete braindead idiots. An ancient Egyptian wanted to draw a human with the head of a dog. There's no extraterrestrial visitation meaning behind the drawing. So stupid...

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Yeah you're right, RA. An invisible monotheistic deity in the sky that created us in his/her own image, who sent his son to die for us (who was actually himself) and miraculously resurrected, and the human celebrities celebrated into polytheistic deification some thousands of years earlier who threw lightening and smashed thunder with their hammers are a much more plausible reality than reptilian shape shifting aliens. I mean THATS CRAZY TALK.

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Whether you are religious or not, you have to respect religion's role in our history and our culture.

 

I think some of Raman's posts have been a bit weird (and often incorrect), but lay off the guy. He's NEW.

 

Give the guy a fkn break. Let him have a voice.

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Perhaps. But folk memory can go back a long way, again with stories growing in the telling. Pre-modern societies were extremely slow to change, with tribal cultures remaining essentially the same over many centuries or even milennia. To say nothing of evolutionary instinct - man's ancestors lived in fear of predation for millions of years - sufficient time for instinctive fear to evolve. Civilization and technology have mitigated the reality of this fear for far less time - ten thousand years, maybe? Fear of predation never truly left the human species. I suspect this is why being stared at is a profoundly disquieting experience.

I'm skeptical of the existence, much less the quality, of "folk memory". How can we possibly verify the rate of change of prehistoric societies that literally did not record any cultural heritage stories?

 

You do read my posts?

Of course. How else would I know when you begin posting intelligent material? I look forward to the day.

 

Besides, intended meaning can usually be gleaned from the context of the post itself. As I've repeatedly said, were this a peer reviewed scientific journal, misuse of the word 'theory' would be misplaced. But since we're just a bunch of geeks sitting about chewing the fat, I think we can all get away with more informal use of the word. Plus, in over fifteen years of interwebs useage, I've noticed that these types of quibbles over semantics always boil down to whether we either (a) agree or not with the idea being advanced and (b) the person advancing them is popular and fits into the board's overall culture. I've never seen a flame war start over correct word usage between people all on the same team. So let's be honest with ourselves here: this is about RamonAtilla and his ideas being eccentric and unpopular. So if that's what you think, Pavonis, just come out and say it instead of hiding that sentiment behind a bunch of hair splitting over word usage.

Since the lay use of theory has no advantage over words like "guess", "musing", or "idea", I see no reason to co-opt a scientific term with a specific definition and abuse it for no gain. As I said before, it's as grating to me as calling a flashlight a lazer sword. And since I've already made my stance on RA's inanity abundantly clear, I'll leave the "newbie" alone to post his babbling without further comment.

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