h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

How'd this thread get on the topic of bats?

hi Esty and Coren,

Well, after you've been here a bit you'll see that the thread often takes a few swerves here and there into major topic drift.

It's also that this thread is my second home, as it is for some others, so now and then we just talk about 'stuff'. So please bear with me and feel free to ignore me and carry on as you were discussing god stuff.


toxx,

It isn't anything legal that would stop me from plugging up the hole of the bat nest. It's just that I could never do that. As I say, once I get the cats and myself vaccinated for rabies then I really don't care how many bats fly about my living room. I actually find them quite entertaining and it certainly perks the cats up - they are quite amazing animals, bats.

Saw a documentary awhle ago about a cave near here where there are thousands upon thousands of bats. And it showed how the mother bat will fly off to look for food and return and find her very own 'batling' amongst the thousands of others hanging off the cave wall.

Though this does make me wonder how the mother or mothers in this case tend to miss the mark and end up flying about in my livingroom!

Also, once in Salamanca I came across a group of people standing around this little thing lying in the street - it was a bat. And it just looked so darned cute. Like a little mouse with wings. But everyone told me to back away as it might be rabid or whatever. Poor little thing. I moved on, I have no idea what these people ended up doing to the bat, though I guess they killed it.

Anyhow . . .

I won't stop up the bat nest. Better to just take precautions about getting rabies and let the bats get on with whatever.

az

I've never seen a bat.

Coren: I probably have, but I don't remember at the moment.

At any distance you could easily think you were watching a bird. but if it's dusk and it's flying slightly erratically it's likely a bat. Don't see them often, but I've seen a few.

Noggin

Sceptic

>>it is surrounded by animals which had high symbolism for the Celts, such as the stag or the snake, though we are not always certain what the symbolism was.<<

And that includes the elephants?

I really must ask Math about the symbolism of elephants

Jez - happily stirring the Cauldron of Cerridwen

No, of course not, azahar. I've never said that...(In fact, I have been saying the opposite - people are not *born* anything, and my parents weren't Christians, so I had no parental influence that way... )

Mein Gott, it's terribly confusing around here having to swap back and forth to see who is talking with who!

Adelaide, hello please excuse me for intruding. You seem to be the only one not talking bats!

Seriously, I think there must be something that links bats with this thread. Genetically, we ain't that far removed. I wonder if they can teach US something about our source. Rabies, too?

Love to all, ed.

Hello,eddispond responds - I am not talking bats, because although we have them in NZ, they don't come near cities, and I have never seen one!
Discussion topics abound on this thread (I've been on it since 2002) most of them fascinating - it's nice to see you here...

"HS, Read India in Europe by Anwar Shaikh"

I find it a little odd that he links the Bronze Age with Celtic culture so easily, when most of the histories on Celts would not do that nowadays. From what I have seen, historians date it from the La Tene period at the earliest.

However, that doesn't invalidate all the infomraion in the essay. But it does make it the sort of essay where I'd prefer to check out all the statments made elsewhere

"I've never seen a bat."

We have a few s around here. I remember, back in the days when I tried out Wicca, lying on a patch of ground near my High Priest's home with him and my partner just watching the bats fly around.

Some 20 years ago a fairly large and very furry bat got into the attic bedroom room of the gite I was staying in, in Normandy, during the night. I didn't mind (we'd already had a hornet, which did scare me!), and it was in the days before the rabies rumours, but it freaked out my then husband considerably!

"And that includes the elephants?"

I'll grant you the elephants (or part elephants) . They are on a different panel from the figure sitting cross legged. they surround a 'goddess on wheels' figure, which is hardly a buddha!

Elephants were known of in Greece from at least Alexandrian times (around 4th century BCE), as he took his soldiers as far as India. The Gundestrop Cauldron was probably made around, or perhaps a little later than, Hannibals use of elephants crossing the Alps, and was probably made in Thrace. So why not elephants?

Jez and HS, have a look at 'CELTIC WARRIORS: The Ancient Celts of Europe' @ http://members.aol.com/skyelander/celts1.html


Alji

Must read later.

For the 'batty' ones among us, here is a link to the UK's new and only batcam: http://www.bbc.co.uk/gloucestershire/webcams/batcam.shtml

I haven't viewed it in action yet. Presumably dusk is the best time. It's lit by infra-red, but I guess they're not all that interesting when asleep!

toxx

Hello everyone

Muffins, today. Cheese and pepper ones, with lashings of unsalted, organic butter from the West Country.

Decaf , real , , and other fruit juices...

And soon I break up for five weeks holiday

But tonight I am at work until 1930 from 0830

Jez

Alji:

Whoops - I see that I defended the wrong theologian. Thank you for pointing that out, and apologies for having sounded off without reading your posting attentively.

I have heard John Scotus Erigena's writings explained simply in terms of neo-Platonism. I suppose one could argue that his Celtic roots made him more receptive to this philosophy, so if Buddhism influenced Druidry (I think that is what you are suggesting) perhaps one could *further* argue that there might be an indirect influence.

Independently, a minor clarification: according to Catholics, at least, although the soul is corrupted by Original Sin, the corruption is not complete. Mankind is still basically good, although 'prone to evil'. Luther held that corruption *was* complete, but not all Christians follow his ideas. (Luther's view was an indirect support for the Reformation doctrine of 'Sola Fide'.)

With this in mind it could be asserted although the doctrines of such as Pelagius and John Scotus Erigena on Original Sin might represent the complete opposite of the doctrine that Luther proposed centuries later, it could well be over-dramatisation to say they owe more to Buddhism than to Christianity; although they are unorthodox.

Finally, I had my birthday yesterday, and family and friends most happily combined to keep me from my computer all weekend. I would have acknowledged your correction sooner, but... *hic*

Personally I think the level of interaction and communication in the anchient world is severely underestimated.

My best example of this is the discovery of very archaic objects in places enormous distances from where they were originally made, e.g. Flint Axes and arrow heads dug up and napped in kent being dug up in china the layer of archeology they hre often found in suggests they were buried no more than one or two hundred years after their manufacture 10,000 years ago, if this is possible then I see no reason why cultural influences in the pre historic world were not as mobile.

There is also I believe some evidence that there was interaction between the builders of stone circles in northern europe and the builders of the Pyramids, 5,000 years ago. It does not seem at all remarkable to me that asian influences might well have had an impact on the development of various cultural grroups in europe by various means and at various times.

This archaic interaction may well be partly responsible for similar images turning up in different cultures, though I think it would be hard to pin down to a direct influence on a particular image or object.

It has just occured to me that it could equally be argued that there are Daoist influences both on the celts and the indigeonous peoples of America, as there is an emphasis on the role's and personalities of animals in them all, I wonder if the paralells have been researched by anyone and if there are direct links to the personification of certain animals in similar ways by different cultures.

The only reasonable example that I can think of concerns a mythical animal. However, it strikes me that Dragons are generaly regarded as the 'bad guy' in folk lore, However in Daoism they are often seen as good or bad depending on their particular attributes. The same seems to be true in Celtic Lore, e.g. the legend of the child Merlin and Vortigens Tower, the Red Dragon represents the Celts, the Yellow the Saxons, The victory of the Red is clearly represented as both the victory of the Celts over the Saxons, but more importantly the victory of percieved good over evil.

Heathen Sceptic

What is POV!!!

POV - Point Of View.

<>

In other words people can be both good and bad. True, but hardly a stunning revelation.

SD - It is certainly true that ancient trading links could diffuse artifacts and ideas over great distances. But these were not generally transported by individuals trading over these distances, but rather by networks of intermediary traders. This was certainly true of eg The Silk Road.

Noggin

Noggin

Oh no argument about that, but then for the most part the same is true today. It is perfectly possible for me to travel to Australia, see a Digerydoo buy it and bring it home with me. (Probably more ethical too)

However it is far more likely that a member of the indigenous peoples of Australia would sell his digerydoo to a trader who then sells it to an importer/exporter, who then transports it to Britain (Possibly via many other palaces and owners) who sells it to a trader who has it in his shop when I pass buy and decide to buy it.

I just think that the level of trade and interaction in the anchient world was far greater than is normally assumed, and although messages and understanding might have got a bit garbled I suspect that 'news' traveled faster than is normally realised.