"Son of Man" As Jesus From IDQ Deficiencies

While acknowledging that Jesus' usage of the term "son of man" has no consensus, this article shows how the term "son of man" was historically used to refer to mankind or Humans as a category, was never generally considered by the Jewish community to be a descriptive phrase for the Messiah, and therefore seems to be used incorrectly either by Jesus, by the authors and/or translators of the gospels as something like a personal pronoun for Jesus. In any case, presuming the Bible is the Word of God, the term still maps to two real world states fulfilling the criteria for Ambiguous Representation which is an Information and Data Quality (IDQ) design flaw.


This Article is part six of the series of articles applying Information and Data Quality (IDQ) Principles to the Bible. The purpose of the series is to show that the Bible is not a reliable or trustworthy source of information about God because it has problems identified in Information and Data Quality research as causing inaccuracy and unreliability. Links to the previous articles are listed below.

1. How Accurate is the Bible?
2. Applying Data and Information Quality Principles To The Bible
3. Applying IDQ Principles of Research To The Bible
4. Overview of IDQ Deficiencies Which Are Evident In Scripture
5. Jesus As God From IDQ Design Deficincies

A brief review of Ambiguous Representation and Mapping to a Meaningless State(1) follows.

Ambiguous representation
While it is permissible to use to a multiple datum to represent one real world state, it is not permissible to use one datum to represent two real world states. If multiple Real World states are represented by one datum there is not enough information with which to accurately represent either Real World state. This situation is called "Ambiguity". It is similar to incomplete representation because it can be considered an instance of missing information, even though one datum could incompletely represent two instances of a Real World state because it is not specific enough. It is analogous to using the term "she" in a conversation when discussing an event concerning multiple women. By not specifying which "she" is being referenced, the details of the event become unclear because the "she" being referred to is ambiguous.

Figure 1 illustrates this point by showing three instances of data represented by spheres in the column labeled RW (Real World) and two instances of Data in the D column. One instance of a Real World state is not represented by the Data in column D but instead, two instances of Real World states are represented by one instance of an information state.

Figure 1


Operation Deficiencies - Garbling: Map to a wrong state
In human terms, garbling occurs at the point of "consumption" or reading and interpretation. In Information Systems, it occurs at operation time or when the database is being accessed. Garbling occurs when a Real World state is incorrectly mapped to a wrong state in the Information System. Figure 2 illustrates this phenomena by showing two instances of data represented by spheres in the column labeled RW (Real World) and three instances of Data in the D column. One instance of an information state is not represented by or does not map back to a real world state and a Real World state in incorrectly interpreted as being represented by a valid however incorrect or unintended information state.

Figure 2


The son of man
In Hebrew, son of man can be used, generally speaking, as the word "Human". It originated in ancient Mesopotamia and was used to denote humanity or mankind in general especially when distinguishing between mankind and God (2, 3). In the Old Testament, "son of man" was used as the word "Human" would be used today. When the word "Human" is used to replace the phrase "son of man" in the Old Testament, the context retains its meaning. A list of instances where "son of man" appears in the Old Testament follows.

Old Testament instances
Numbers
-23:19
Job
- 16:18-21
- 25
- 35:6-8
Psalms
- 8
- 80
- 144
- 146
Isaiah
- 51:11-13
- 56:1-2
Ezekiel
- 2:1 - 47:6, used 97 times
Daniel
- 7:13-14
- 8:16-18

In Numbers, "son of man" is used to contrast God with Humanity showing how he is different using the example that he is above lying or repentance.

Numbers 23:19
God is not a man, that he should lie, Nor a son of man, that he should repent: Has he said, and will he not do it? Or has he spoken, and will he not make it good?

In Ezekiel, the author is addressed as "son of man" in the context of addressing him by his type of being, emphasizing the difference between the author and God.

Ezekiel 2:1-10
1 He said to me, son of man, stand on your feet, and I will speak with you.
2 The Spirit entered into me when he spoke to me, and set me on my feet; and I heard him who spoke to me.
3 He said to me, son of man, I send you to the children of Israel, to nations that are rebellious, which have rebelled against me: they and their fathers have transgressed against me even to this very day.
.....

When the Book of Daniel was written the term turned up in chapter 7 verse 13. This instance of usage is believed by some to be a reference to the Messiah, and still it is consistent with the historical and cultural usage of the term. It is a reference to a being "like a son of man" which is believed, in Judaism and depending on the interpretation, to be either an Angel or a representation of the Messiah as a Human being. In either case though, it clearly is metaphorical and is not necessarily a reference to one single person that will get dominion forever because further on in verses 18 and 27, the text clearly states that "the Saints" and "the people of the Saints" (Plural) will have dominion. This is interpreted by some to mean the people of Israel will have everlasting dominion and that the human figure was representing a group.

Below are the relevant verses from Daniel discussing the "being like a son of man" and the plurality of who are going to get Dominion. I highly recommend that the reader look up the whole passage and read it in its entirety, in context. "Ancient of Days" is accepted as a reference to God in one of his constantly changing mystical anthropomorphic states.

Daniel 7:13-8:17
13 I saw in the night visions, and, behold, there came with the clouds of heaven one like unto a son of man, and he came even to the Ancient of days, and he was brought near before Him.
14 And there was given him dominion, and glory, and a kingdom, that all the peoples, nations, and languages should serve him; his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom that which shall not be destroyed.
...
18 But the saints of the Most High shall receive the kingdom, and possess the kingdom for ever, even for ever and ever.'
...
22 until the Ancient of days came, and judgment was given for the saints of the Most High; and the time came, and the saints possessed the kingdom.
...
27 And the kingdom and the dominion, and the greatness of the kingdoms under the whole heaven, shall be given to the people of the saints of the Most High; their kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and all dominions shall serve and obey them.'

Daniel 8:17
17 So he came near to where I was standing, and when he came I was frightened and fell on my face; but he said to me, "son of man, understand that the vision pertains to the time of the end."

There is consistent usage of the term "son of man" within Daniel 7 and 8, and its usage denotes a type of Human being. In verse 8, the author is referred to as "son of man". While most Jews don't seem to generally consider 7:13 a Messianic prophesy, some do, however they do not consider "son of man" a specific title for the Messiah as Christians do or as the authors of the Gospels had Jesus use it. Most Jewish Scholars don't think it likely that Jesus would have used the Aramaic term in that way because in Aramaic it never had that meaning(3). In other words, it never mapped to the Messiah as a Real World state, it only ever mapped to the category of Human.

And though it is written that Jesus used the term to describe himself, it is not clear that he considered himself God or the Messiah. For example, in Mark 8:27-31, and John 7:26-31, Jesus has the opportunity to say clearly and unequivocally that he is the Messiah, the Christ and God on Earth, but he doesn't. Numbers 23:19 says that God is not a man that he should lie, nor like a son of man that he should repent. There is a distinction between humans and God, one characteristic of that distinction is that he would not lie. A lie is hard to define so its hard to defend a claim that Jesus was lying, however, a lie does fall into the category of deception so if nothing else, Jesus was deceptive, which is considered to be a characteristic of Satan and Humans but not of God.

Numbers 23:19
God is not a man, that he should lie, Nor a son of man, that he should repent: Has he said, and will he not do it? Or has he spoken, and will he not make it good?

Here the gospels have Jesus using the term "son of man" incorrectly and using a deceptive rhetorical persuasion technique just as Numbers said God wouldn't. Here he uses the bandwagon fallacy because who the people say he is is not relevant to who he really is, and he uses an improper appeal to authority because since the disciples have never seen a God on earth, and since they have not attempted to distinguish between Jesus and a Con Man, they are not qualified to assess. Jesus uses a rhetorical persuasion technique where he gets the "mark" to verbalize a commitment which increases the likelihood that they will defend the commitment even against disconfirming evidence and then he told them not to tell anyone which insulates them from having to defend their commitment because it decreases the amount of instances where a defense will be needed.

Mark 8:27 - 31
27 Jesus went out, along with His disciples, to the villages of Caesarea Philippi; and on the way He questioned His disciples, saying to them, "Who do people say that I am?"
28 They told Him, saying, "John the Baptist; and others say Elijah; but others, one of the prophets."
29 And He continued by questioning them, "But who do you say that I am?" Peter answered and said to Him, "You are the Christ."
30 And He warned them to tell no one about Him.
31 And He began to teach them that the son of man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders and the chief priests and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again.

According to the Authors of the Gospels, when Jesus starting using the phrase "son of man", he was using it as personal pronoun to describe himself. If anyone who heard Jesus use this term in this way challenged it or asked for clarification, it is not recorded. There is no explanation of why Jesus changed the meaning of this phrase, presuming he had the authority to do so. But presuming he had the authority to do it, a sound general principle is that "if something can be done, doesn't mean it should be done". To maintain coherence over time and to explain to knowledgeable Jews who would not be able to have contact with Jesus, an explanation of the new use of the word was warranted. As it stands now it looks like Jesus didn't understand what the term meant or he was intentionally using it in an ambiguous way or that the authors and or translators of the Gospels didn't understand how the term should be used which is one reason why there is no consensus on Jesus' usage of it to this day.

Since Jesus was supposed to be God, then the Old Testament was Jesus' Word, and he used the phrase "son of man" in the Old Testament in the traditional way and he validated the authority of the Old Testament as the Word of God by using it as a reference for his teaching (5), he is not likely to have used the phrase "son of man" in that way because it is a new mapping to a real world state creating ambiguity.

It looks like the the phrase "son of man" was misunderstood by Jesus or the original authors (or translators) of Gospel resulting in a mapping to a wrong state, or a meaningless state depending on the perspective of the critic. In any case, if Jesus was god, then referring to himself using a term which he re-defined but did not explain is deliberately ambiguous and confusing. Since it is irrational for a teacher to teach and communicate to her students using ambiguous terms and deception, it follows that it would be irrational for God to do so as well, therefore the ambiguous use of the term "son of man" was an IDQ design deficiency of Ambiguous Representation in the origin of the text.

References and Further Reading
1. Anchoring Data Quality Dimensions in Ontological Foundations
2. Wikipedia, son of man
3. JewishEncyclopedia, son of man
4. Mechon Mamre
5. How Accurate is the Bible?

"The Son of Man" As Jesus From IDQ Deficiencies

While acknowledging that Jesus' usage of the term "son of man" has no consensus, this article shows how the term "son of man" was historically used to refer to mankind or Humans as a category, was never generally considered by the Jewish community to be a descriptive phrase for the Messiah, and therefore seems to be used incorrectly either by Jesus, by the authors and/or translators of the gospels as something like a personal pronoun for Jesus. In any case, presuming the Bible is the Word of God, the term still maps to two real world states fulfilling the criteria for Ambiguous Representation which is an Information and Data Quality (IDQ) design flaw.

This Article is part six of the series of articles applying Information and Data Quality (IDQ) Principles to the Bible. The purpose of the series is to show that the Bible is not a reliable or trustworthy source of information about God because it has problems identified in Information and Data Quality research as causing inaccuracy and unreliability. Links to the previous articles are listed below.

1. How Accurate is the Bible?
2. Applying Data and Information Quality Principles To The Bible
3. Applying IDQ Principles of Research To The Bible
4. Overview of IDQ Deficiencies Which Are Evident In Scripture
5. Jesus As God From IDQ Design Deficincies

A brief review of Ambiguous Representation and Mapping to a Meaningless State(1) follows.

Ambiguous representation
While it is permissible to use to a multiple datum to represent one real world state, it is not permissible to use one datum to represent two real world states. If multiple Real World states are represented by one datum there is not enough information with which to accurately represent either Real World state. This situation is called "Ambiguity". It is similar to incomplete representation because it can be considered an instance of missing information, even though one datum could incompletely represent two instances of a Real World state because it is not specific enough. It is analogous to using the term "she" in a conversation when discussing an event concerning multiple women. By not specifying which "she" is being referenced, the details of the event become unclear because the "she" being referred to is ambiguous.

Figure 1 illustrates this point by showing three instances of data represented by spheres in the column labeled RW (Real World) and two instances of Data in the D column. One instance of a Real World state is not represented by the Data in column D but instead, two instances of Real World states are represented by one instance of an information state.

Figure 1



Operation Deficiencies - Garbling: Map to a wrong state
In human terms, garbling occurs at the point of "consumption" or reading and interpretation. In Information Systems, it occurs at operation time or when the database is being accessed. Garbling occurs when a Real World state is incorrectly mapped to a wrong state in the Information System. Figure 6 illustrates this phenomena by showing two instances of data represented by spheres in the column labeled RW (Real World) and three instances of Data in the D column. One instance of an information state is not represented by or does not map back to a real world state and a Real World state in incorrectly interpreted as being represented by a valid however incorrect or unintended information state.

Figure 6



The son of man
In Hebrew, son of man can be used, generally speaking, as the word "Human". It originated in ancient Mesopotamia and was used to denote humanity or mankind in general especially when distinguishing between mankind and God (2, 3). In the Old Testament, "son of man" was used as the word "Human" would be used today. When the word "Human" is used to replace the phrase "son of man" in the Old Testament, the context retains its meaning. A list of instances where "son of man" appears in the Old Testament follows.

Old Testament instances
Numbers
-23:19
Job
- 16:18-21
- 25
- 35:6-8
Psalms
- 8
- 80
- 144
- 146
Isaiah
- 51:11-13
- 56:1-2
Ezekiel
- 2:1 - 47:6, used 97 times
Daniel
- 7:13-14
- 8:16-18

In Numbers, "son of man" is used to contrast God with Humanity showing how he is different using the example that he is above lying or repentance.

Numbers 23:19
God is not a man, that he should lie, Nor a son of man, that he should repent: Has he said, and will he not do it? Or has he spoken, and will he not make it good?

In Ezekiel, the author is addressed as "son of man" in the context of addressing him by his type of being, emphasizing the difference between the author and God.

Ezekiel 2:1-10
1 He said to me, son of man, stand on your feet, and I will speak with you.
2 The Spirit entered into me when he spoke to me, and set me on my feet; and I heard him who spoke to me.
3 He said to me, son of man, I send you to the children of Israel, to nations that are rebellious, which have rebelled against me: they and their fathers have transgressed against me even to this very day.
.....

When the Book of Daniel was written the term turned up in chapter 7 verse 13. This instance of usage is believed by some to be a reference to the Messiah, and still it is consistent with the historical and cultural usage of the term. It is a reference to a being "like a son of man" which is believed, in Judaism and depending on the interpretation, to be either an Angel or a representation of the Messiah as a Human being. In either case though, it clearly is metaphorical and is not necessarily a reference to one single person that will get dominion forever because further on in verses 18 and 27, the text clearly states that "the Saints" and "the people of the Saints" (Plural) will have dominion. This is interpreted by some to mean the people of Israel will have everlasting dominion and that the human figure was representing a group.

Below are the relevant verses from Daniel discussing the "being like a son of man" and the plurality of who are going to get Dominion. I highly recommend that the reader look up the whole passage and read it in its entirety, in context. "Ancient of Days" is accepted as a reference to God in one of his constantly changing mystical anthropomorphic states.

Daniel 7:13-8:17
13 I saw in the night visions, and, behold, there came with the clouds of heaven one like unto a son of man, and he came even to the Ancient of days, and he was brought near before Him.
14 And there was given him dominion, and glory, and a kingdom, that all the peoples, nations, and languages should serve him; his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom that which shall not be destroyed.
...
18 But the saints of the Most High shall receive the kingdom, and possess the kingdom for ever, even for ever and ever.'
...
22 until the Ancient of days came, and judgment was given for the saints of the Most High; and the time came, and the saints possessed the kingdom.
...
27 And the kingdom and the dominion, and the greatness of the kingdoms under the whole heaven, shall be given to the people of the saints of the Most High; their kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and all dominions shall serve and obey them.'


Daniel 8:17
17 So he came near to where I was standing, and when he came I was frightened and fell on my face; but he said to me, "son of man, understand that the vision pertains to the time of the end."

There is consistent usage of the term "son of man" within Daniel 7 and 8, and its usage denotes a type of Human being. In verse 8, the author is referred to as "son of man". While most Jews don't seem to generally consider 7:13 a Messianic prophesy, some do, however they do not consider "son of man" a specific title for the Messiah as Christians do or as the authors of the Gospels had Jesus use it. Most Jewish Scholars don't think it likely that Jesus would have used the Aramaic term in that way because in Aramaic it never had that meaning(3). In other words, it never mapped to the Messiah as a Real World state, it only ever mapped to the category of Human.

And though it is written that Jesus used the term to describe himself, it is not clear that he considered himself God or the Messiah. For example, in Mark 8:27-31, and John 7:26-31, Jesus has the opportunity to say clearly and unequivocally that he is the Messiah, the Christ and God on Earth, but he doesn't. Numbers 23:19 says that God is not a man that he should lie, nor like a son of man that he should repent. There is a distinction between humans and God, one characteristic of that distinction is that he would not lie. A lie is hard to define so its hard to defend a claim that Jesus was lying, however, a lie does fall into the category of deception so if nothing else, Jesus was deceptive, which is considered to be a characteristic of Satan and Humans but not of God.

Numbers 23:19
God is not a man, that he should lie, Nor a son of man, that he should repent: Has he said, and will he not do it? Or has he spoken, and will he not make it good?

Here the gospels have Jesus using the term "son of man" incorrectly and using a deceptive rhetorical persuasion technique just as numbers said God wouldn't. Here he uses the bandwagon fallacy because who the people say he is is not relevant to who he really is, and he uses an improper appeal to authority because since the disciples have never seen a God on earth, and since they have not attempted to distinguish between Jesus and a Con Man, they are not qualified to assess. Jesus uses a rhetorical persuasion technique where he gets the "mark" to verbalize a commitment which increases the likelihood that they will defend the commitment even against disconfirming evidence and then he told them not to tell anyone which insulates them from having to defend their commitment because it decreases the amount of instances where a defense will be needed.

Mark 8:27 - 31
27 Jesus went out, along with His disciples, to the villages of Caesarea Philippi; and on the way He questioned His disciples, saying to them, "Who do people say that I am?"
28 They told Him, saying, "John the Baptist; and others say Elijah; but others, one of the prophets."
29 And He continued by questioning them, "But who do you say that I am?" Peter answered and said to Him, "You are the Christ."
30 And He warned them to tell no one about Him.
31 And He began to teach them that the son of man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders and the chief priests and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again.

According to the Authors of the Gospels, when Jesus starting using the phrase "son of man", he was using it as personal pronoun to describe himself. If anyone who heard Jesus use this term in this way challenged it or asked for clarification, it is not recorded. There is no explanation of why Jesus changed the meaning of this phrase, presuming he had the authority to do so. But presuming he had the authority to do it, a sound general principle is that "if something can be done, doesn't mean it should be done". To maintain coherence over time and to explain to knowledgeable Jews who would not be able to have contact with Jesus, an explanation of the new use of the word was warranted. As it stands now it looks like Jesus didn't understand what the term meant or he was intentionally using it in an ambiguous way or that the authors and or translators of the Gospels didn't understand how the term should be used which is one reason why there is no consensus on Jesus' usage of it to this day.

Since Jesus was supposed to be God, then the Old Testament was Jesus' Word, and he used the phrase "son of man" in the Old Testament in the traditional way and he validated the authority of the Old Testament as the Word of God by using it as a reference for his teaching (5), he is not likely to have used the phrase "son of man" in that way because it is a new mapping to a real world state creating ambiguity.

It looks like the the phrase "son of man" was misunderstood by Jesus or the original authors (or translators) of Gospel resulting in a mapping to a wrong state, or a meaningless state depending on the perspective of the critic. In any case, if Jesus was god, then referring to himself using a term which he re-defined but did not explain is deliberately ambiguous and confusing. Since it is irrational for a teacher to teach and communicate to her students using ambiguous terms and deception, it follows that it would be irrational for God to do so as well, therefore the ambiguous use of the term "son of man" was an IDQ design deficiency of Ambiguous Representation in the origin of the text.

References and Further Reading
1. Anchoring Data Quality Dimensions in Ontological Foundations
2. Wikipedia, son of man
3. JewishEncyclopedia, son of man
4. Mechon Mamre
5. How Accurate is the Bible?

Applying IDQ Principles of Research To The Bible

By applying principles of Information and Data Quality (IDQ) in research to the Bible, it can be shown that a high level of confidence in the accuracy and reliability of the information in the Bible is irrational, therefore arguments or claims using the bible as a premise are inherently weak.

Cross-check, Cross-check, Cross-check!
Accuracy and verifiability are part of the foundation of IDQ.
Researchers of Information and Data Quality (IDQ) have created classifications for Data Collectors, Data Custodians and Data Consumers. Those that collect the data provide it to those that store it and maintain it, and to those that use it. There are different values associated with IDQ dimensions depending on which categorical context it falls into(16). For example, the data custodian considers accuracy as the number one value while the consumer (depending on the context) may not consider accuracy the most important dimension. In all cases the most important criteria for the user is whether or not it is useful.

The fact that the consumer does not necessarily regard accuracy as the highest value creates a market for less accurate information which enterprising data producers are willing to satisfy. One example is the "tabloid" and "gossip magazine" industry. However, the desire for useful though inaccurate information extends across categories into business, marketing, politics and religion. Unfortunately, to ensure accurate data when needed, some extra work is necessary in the form of cross-checking.

Who is the author?
Like everything in life, cross-checking should be able to be used to verify a piece of information to see if it makes sense from another perspective. One way to do that is by being able to identify the author. When the author can be identified their credentials can be reviewed. Whether or not the author is an expert can be assessed, what their peers thought of them and what environment they lived in. These properties can be used to cross-check to see if the information has external consistency and makes sense from other perspectives. These properties allow the use of inference to assess the credibility, plausibility, believability and most importantly the accuracy of the information. There is no precise definition of accuracy, and in fact many of the dimensions of IDQ are self-referential, but it is the case that what accuracy is NOT is apparent and using that as a criteria, a working definition can be derived.

Accuracy implies that the datum represents a real world state.
It implies that when the data are reviewed, and compared to the real world event or object it describes the real world event sufficiently for more than one person to have as close to the same understanding of it as possible. An accurate representation of a real world event will not be ambiguous, will not lack precision and will not be incomplete because this will lead to inferences about the real world that do not or never existed or that represent an incorrect element in the real world(3).

Accurate and verifiable data are crucial to having enough understanding about the subject to be able to make reliable decisions, inferences and predictions in order to increase the likelihood of successful outcomes. Verifiability increases the credibility of information.

Your spouse, parents and reputable organizations endorse accurate reporting.
Almost everyone that has an interest in making some kind of an investment whether its monetary from a giant corporation or emotional from a trusting spouse desires, requires and demands IDQ. Human understanding and knowledge depend on it. Technology is successful because it builds on the accurate reporting and successful reproduction of work that came before it. Relationships are successful because Information Quality (also known as truth) fosters trust. Since Information Quality is so fundamental, it is easy to find reputable organizations that endorse it and not just your mother, father, spouse or friend.

Reputable organizations such as Cornell University(17), East Tennesee State University(19) and George Mason University(20) and McGraw Hill(21) and the U.S. Government(18) have websites set up which are devoted to promoting criteria for assesing the quality of information from sources. They place a high value on it and stress the importance of it. Two other websites related to education are "The Virtual Chase"(22) which is devoted to "teaching legal professionals how to do research", and Robert Harris's VirtualSalt(15) which is heavily referenced throughout the Internet. VirtalSalt has a checklist called "CARS" which was derived from the first letter of its major criteria, Credibility, Accuracy, Reasonableness and Support. The CARS Checklist encapsulates the research criteria that are endorsed by reputable organizations in an easy to remember mnemonic and can be found here

Criteria for Data and Information Quality in research
Listed below are the components of the CARS checklist. The initials of some of the other organizations listed above are used to show where their criteria fit into it. Their initials are beside the data quality dimension they endorse - vs is VirtualSalt, c is Cornell, vc is VirtualChase,

* Credibility (Credentials)
vs Author, c Author, vc Authority, c Publisher, c Title of Journal
Two relevant indicators of a lack of credibility are Anonymity and lack of quality control.

Critical Questions to ask are:
- Why should I trust this source?
- What is it that makes this source believable?
- How does this author know this information?
- Why is this source believable over any other?
- What are the authors credentials?
- What type of quality control did it undergo?
- Was it peer reviewed?

* Accuracy
vc Accuracy, vs Timeliness, vc Timliness, vs Comprehensiveness, c Coverage, vc Scope of Coverage, vs Audience and Purpose, c Intended Audience, c Edition or Revision, c Date of Publication,
Three relevant indicators of a lack of accuracy are no date for the document, vague or sweeping generalizations and biased to one point of view.

Critical Questions to ask are:
- Is it accurate? Is it correct?
- Is it up to date? Is it relevant?
- Is it Comprehensive? Does it leave anything out?
- What was the intended audience and purpose?

* Reasonableness
vs Fairness, vs Objectivity, vc Objectivity, c Objective Reasoning, vs Moderateness, vs Consistency, World View, - c Writing Style, vs consistency, vs world view
Some relevant indicators of a lack of reasonableness are intemperate tone or language, incredible claims, sweeping statements of excessive significance and inconsistency (written on the VirtualSalt as "conflict of interest")

Critical Questions to ask are:
- Does it offer a balanced, reasoned argument that is not selective or slanted?
- Is it biased?
- Is a reality check in order? Are the claims hard to believe? Are they likely, possible or probable?
- Does this conflict with what I know from my experience?
- Does it contradict itself?

* Support
vs [source documentation or bibliography], vs corroboration, vs External Consistency, c Evaluative Reviews
Some relevant indicators of a lack of support are numbers and statistics without a source, absence of source documentation and/or there are no other corroborative sources to be found.

Critical Questions to ask are:
- Where did this information come from? What sources did the author use?
- What support is given?
- Can this be cross-checked with at least two other independent sources?
- Is the information in the other independent sources consistent with this information?


What are some real world examples of poor Data and Information Quality research?
Conclusions about History are necessarily defeasible. One of the problems is that methodology and techniques improve a little every century. Conclusions made about a certain topic are revised as new information turns up. New information is used to compare to the old information for coherency and consitency. Some of these problems stem from poor data creation by the originator. Data are not accurate or complete. Users still struggle with these problems today. "A Website Dedicated to Information/Data Quality Disasters from Around the World" has been set up by the International Association for Information and Data Quality (IAIDQ) and its called IQ Trainwrecks(14 ). "Poor data quality can have a severe impact on the overall effectiveness of an organization"(3) and "Poor data quality can have substantial social and economic impacts"(11) that span the spectrum from news to marketing to text books to health care. Fortunately we can examine the methods of the ancient historians and scientists to see what led to poor results so that we can avoid those methods, improve what can be improved and derive new ones to replace the old.

Applying Data and Information Quality for research to the Bible.
As accurate as they tried to be, the authors of scripture still suffered from the same sorts of problems common with ancient historians and scientists. They were biased, inaccurate, had no way to verify information, depended on second or third hand information from relatively uneducated people, were influenced by political affiliations and commissions from aristocrats and state leaders and had poor tools to work with.

The Authors of the bible do not do any better job than their historian and scientific peers in documenting the world. In fact, of the three categories, scientists fared somewhat better because of their quality of documentation. The Library in Alexandria was destroyed by fire over time so much of ancient scholarship and science was lost but some of the works that do remain leave little doubt about how to reproduce their experiments or their authorship.

It used to be believed that every author of every book in the bible could be identified but over time, it has come to be recognized that tradition is a poor way to record who authored what. External verification of the data revealed how unlikely it was that the person traditionally believed to be the author actually was or even existed.

According to several sources "The Bible comprises 24 books for Jews, 66 for Protestants, 73 for Catholics, and 78 for most Orthodox Christians." (wikipedia) From others: "The Protetant Bible contains 66 books (39 OT, 27 NT); the Catholic Bible contains 73 books (46 OT, 27 NT); the Eastern Orthodox Bible contains 78 books (51 OT, 27 NT). The Hebrew Bible (the name of the OT by Jews) contains only 24 books.(23)

Most of the authors of the original information about the Abrahamic God are unknown
There are different books in the bible depending on if you use the Hebrew, the protestant, the catholic or the orthodox (for example) If we use the greatest number of books in any bible as our total, then there are only about 21% of them where the author can be identified. 79% percent of them are unknown(24). 79% percent of the original information that exists about the abrahamic god comes from unknown sources. One of the indicators for lack of credibility in a work is anonymity(15). A small percentage of scripture are not considered worthy of inclusion between denominations. What makes one worthy to one group and not worthy to another? Lack of credibility is one criteria that comes to mind.

The bible is an amalgum of scriptures that span years. Some of the scriptures seem to be derived from other scriptures most of which were also included in the Bible. Trying to use the criteria for varied sources for cross-checking with the Bible is difficult because they were derived from each other, a large portion of the authors are unknown and the quality of production was poor. The criteria used to put them together is not clear but a presumption at a minimum of a need for coherency and consistency is warranted.

The word "trust" is used liberally to describe IDQ criteria. While the bible is generally considered to be trustworthy, is it really? What is it about something that make it "trustworthy"? Accuracy? Coherency and consistency with what we know from our experience?

What follows is a summary of principled research criteria standards which the Bible does not meet with some generic examples.
For the sake of brevity I did not include many solid examples but I do welcome audience participation by documenting them in the comments.

* Authorship - Traditional authorship have been overturned by later scholarship
* Not up to date - Leviticus and Deuteronomy in the OT, Pauls bias against women in the NT
* Inaccurate, incorrect - The rivers of Eden in the OT, Inconsistencies between the gospels
* Irrelevant - Leviticus and Deuteronomy in the OT, ambiguous NT fallacy apparently contradictory anyway "Whoever is not against us is for us — Mark 9:40" vs "He who is not with me is against me — Matthew 12:30a"
* Bias - Old testament treatment of worshipers of other gods, NT treatment of Jewish leadership and scholars.
* Unlikely - Most of the OT and in NT Jesus sternly rebuked his disciples for sleeping in the garden of gesthemane so who witnessed it?
* Conflicts with knowledge obtained from our experiences - Magicians do water to wine tricks.
* Contradicts itself - Who discovered the empty tomb?
* Cross-checking with external sources is extremely difficult and does not support to a large degree. There is no verifiable eyewitness account of the existence of Jesus, however that does not mean he did not exist.

Robert Harris's VirtualSalt has a checklist with a mnemonic for how to deal with information.

Living with Information: The CAFÉ Advice from VirtualSalt(15)
Challenge
Challenge information the information with critical questions and expect accountability.

Adapt
Adapt your requirements for information quality to match the importance of the information and what is being claimed. Extraordinary claims warrant extraordinary evidence.

File
File new information in your mind rather than immediately reaching a conclusion. Turn your conclusion into a question. Gather more information until there is little room for doubt.

Evaluate
Evaluate and re-evaluate regularly. New information or changing circumstances will affect the accuracy and the evaluation of previous information.

I will sum it up in a word.
Cross-check, Cross-check, Cross-check.

REFERENCES AND FURTHER READING
1. Wikipedia, "Data Management"
2. Information Quality at MIT
3. Anchoring Data Quality Dimensions in Ontological Foundations
4. DMReview, Data Management Review
5. IQ-1 Certificate Program
6. Wikipedia, 2003 Invasion of Iraq
7. How Accurate Is The Bible?
8. Datalever.com
9. Wikipedia, Tanakh
10. Null Hypothesis
11. Beyond Accuracy: What Data Quality Means To Consumers
12. IQ Benchmarks
13. Reasonable Doubt About Adaption Theory
14. IQ Trainwrecks
15. Robert Harris' VirtualSalt
16. Data Quality Assessment
17. Cornell University Library
18. Guidelines for Ensuring and Maximizing the Quality, Objectivity, Utility and Integrity of Information Disseminated by Federal Agnecies
19. East Tennesee State University Researchers Toolbox
20. George Mason Univeristy
21. McGraw-Hill Higher Education, Evaluating Internet Resources
22. The Virtual Chase, Criteria for Quality in Information--Checklist
23. Know Your Bible
24. Wikipedia, Authors of The Bible
25. Ancient HistoriansPart 1, Part 2

Jesus As God From IDQ Design Deficiencies

This article will show how the concept of the Trinity was derived from the Design Deficiency of incomplete representation in scripture leading to "Garbling" causing Scripture to map to a meaningless state. The Bible has many instances of incomplete representation but for the sake of brevity, this article will focus on "Jesus as God". It highlights some disconfirming evidence which refutes the proposition that "Jesus was God" can be rationally determined from the text.

This Article is part five of the series of articles applying Information and Data Quality Principles to the Bible. Links to the previous articles are listed below.
1. How Accurate is the Bible?
2. Applying Data and Information Quality Principles To The Bible
3. Applying IDQ Principles of Research To The Bible
4. Overview of IDQ Deficiencies Which Are Evident In Scripture

Presuming that Jesus was Jewish, and that Jesus was a rabbi, and that Jewish rabbis were experts in Jewish theology, and Jesus was an expert in Jewish theology, in John 14:6-11 Jesus was not referring to himself as god but more likely referring to a Jewish teaching regarding their view of the relationship between God and Man with respect to the soul. It can also be seen that Jesus did not clearly and unequivocally state that he was the incarnation or personification of God.

The example used in this article could be used for two types of IDQ deficiencies depending on the context. If we presume for the sake of argument that it is true that Jesus was God, then the example falls in the category of the IDQ deficiency of Incomplete representation. If we presume that Jesus was not God then the example would fall under the category of Ambiguous Representation. However, I would prefer to use the presumption that Jesus was God and handle it as a an Incomplete Representation and save the Ambiguous Representation for another example.

As described in my article "Overview of IDQ Deficiencies Which Are Evident In Scripture"(1), in order for an information system to accurately represent real world events, each of the Information System data must "map" to a real world event.
A brief review of Incomplete Representation and Mapping to a Meaningless State(2) follows.

Incomplete representation
If the Information System is missing some information about the real world, then the information system cannot accurately represent the state of the real world for which it was intended. This is termed as "incompleteness". Figure 1 illustrates this point by showing three instances of data represented by spheres in the column labeled RW (Real World) and two instances of Data in the D column. One instance of a Real World state is not represented by the Data in column D.

Figure 1


Operation Deficiencies - Garbling:
Meaningless State
In human terms, garbling occurs at the point of "consumption" or reading and interpretation. In Information Systems, it occurs at operation time or when the database is being accessed. Garbling occurs when a Real World state is incorrectly mapped to a wrong state in the Information System. There are two cases in which this occurs. If a meaningless state exists, then Real World mapping will be to a meaningless state, or the mapping might be to a meaningful but incorrect information state. This can occur as a result of inaccurate data entry or omissions of real world states at the creation or origin of the data. Analogous examples of this type of garbling are legends, folktales and the "Artistic License" of the author or originator.

Figure 2 illustrates this point by showing two instances of data represented by spheres in the column labeled RW (Real World) and three instances of Data in the D column. One instance of an information state is not represented by or does not map back to a real world state and a Real World state in incorrectly interpreted as being represented by the superfluous datum.

Figure 2


The Trinity
The concept of the Trinity was a hotly debated topic for generations that came to a head in 325ce when it was formally adopted as a tenet by the Council of Nicaea(3). It lead to accusations of Heresy, religious persecution and according to sources lead to the poisoning of Arius(4).

Jesus was Jewish and a Jewish principle is that the "soul" is part of God that God has hidden in us, and we are to show it to other people through our lifestyle, and by doing so Gods influence on the earth will be released.
On the website Askmoses.com, Rabbi Shlomo Chein(5) responds to a request to define the Jewish soul. He says

" A person is known as a "miniature world". The soul can perhaps be explained as a "microcosm of G-d". By allowing his G-dly soul to be expressed within his own existence the Jew can bring G-d into all of existence."
…
"So the next time you face adversary, feel ostracized, or question your ability to carry out your Divine mission of Judaism, remember, G-d is not only with you, He is in you."

But Scripture tells that Jesus said the following about himself which has been used to justify the concept of the Trinity. If Jesus really said this and he was a Jewish Rabbi it is not likely that he meant that he was God on Earth.

John 14:6-11
6 Jesus said to him, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but through Me.
7 "If you had known Me, you would have known My Father also; from now on you know Him, and have seen Him."
8 Philip said to Him, "Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us."
9 Jesus said to him, "Have I been so long with you, and yet you have not come to know Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father; how can you say, 'Show us the Father'?
10 "Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father is in Me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on My own initiative, but the Father abiding in Me does His works.
11 "Believe Me that I am in the Father and the Father is in Me; otherwise believe because of the works themselves.

So if John 14:6-11 represents the type of thing Jesus said about himself, and Jesus was a Rabbi, Jesus probably had the same concept as Rabbi Chein and was not saying that he was God incarnate. It seems to be a misinterpretation of a Jewish teaching that was not part of Gentile culture. Understood as the Jewish viewpoint of the soul, it makes more sense, but understanding it as Jesus saying that he was God on Earth, can only be described as DOUBLETALK.

Jesus never clearly said that he was God on earth, and he never said that he, God and the holy spirit were one substance. Therefore, if it is true, and it was not included in the scriptures, it is the design flaw of incomplete representation. It has been shown through IDQ research that "Poor data quality can have a severe impact on the overall effectiveness of an organization"(2) and "Poor data quality can have substantial social and economic impacts"(6). Christianity has had a relatively poor adoption rate compared to Mathematics which was developing about the same time(13). Mathematics adoption is practically ubiqutious where Christianity is not. These results can be explained, when compared to Christianity by the relatively high quality of information about Mathematics, its relevance, utility, reproducability, and resultant plausibility.

The scriptures recognized the problem with Information and Data Quality, but the insight they demonstrated was typically human and poor when compared to their peers. They had no divine guidance about how to handle this "divine revelation". Instead, they handled it inadequately by warning against false prophets and worrying about the "correct" interpretation of scripture which has resulted in a very splintered church(7). Not even the "Holy Spirit" has been effective in preserving the true meaning of the text across Christian Churches and denominations. Due to lack of clarity, many interpretations have been derived from poorly designed scripture and have resulted in the three major divisions which are The Roman Catholic, the Eastern Orthodox and the Protestant Churches. Further competing interpretations have lead to each of those divisions having various subdivisions resulting in tens of thousands of denominations. Furthermore this has historically led to Christian on Christian violence which leads to a doubt about the Holy Spirit(8) and is not likely to be something intended by Yahweh or foreseen by him, or those that put words in his mouth. Christians will equivocate this point calling it "the body of Christ" pointing to the parable of the grape vine, but we know through real world experience, trial and error, applications in business, war strategy and a field of research that it is a weakness and a sign of poor performance, so much so that there is a saying addressing it, "United we stand, divided we fall".

God showed remarkable lack of insight by not providing instructions for ensuring the Quality of Data and Information, or in picking the right people that would have done it naturally or that would have figured it out without compromising their free will. The Fact that Jesus verifies scripture as Gods word and it can be shown to be of such poor quality is further disconfirming evidence that the scripture is the word of god and that Jesus was god on earth. From the text, it cannot rationally be determined whether Jesus was God or not and interpreting John from the view point of a Jewish Expert, Jesus was just repeating a Jewish teaching about the soul.

Below are some lists showing how poor quality data has lead to the splintering of Christianity and its poor 33% performance world wide over 2000 years(9).

A Short List of Christian Denominations
1 Catholicism
1.1 The Catholic Church: Churches in communion with the Bishop of Rome
1.2 Other Churches that are Catholic, But Who Are Not In Communion With Rome

2 Eastern Churches
2.1 The (Eastern) Orthodox Church
2.2 Western-Rite Orthodox Churches
2.3 Other Eastern Orthodox Churches
2.3.1 Assyrian Church of the East
2.4 Oriental Orthodoxy
2.4.1 Oriental Orthodox Communion

3 Anglicanism
3.1 Anglican Communion (in communion with the Church of England)
3.2 Independent Anglican and Continuing Anglican Movement Churches

4 Protestant
4.1 Pre-Lutheran Protestants
4.2 Lutheranism
4.3.1 Presbyterianism
4.3.2 Congregationalist Churches
4.4 Anabaptists
4.5 Methodists
4.6 Pietists and Holiness Churches
4.7 Baptists
4.7.1 Spiritual Baptists
4.9 Apostolic Churches - Irvingites
4.10 Pentecostalism
4.11 Oneness Pentecostalism
4.12 Charismatics
4.12.1 Neo-Charismatic Churches
4.13 African Initiated Churches
4.14 United and uniting churches
4.15 Other Protestant Denominations
4.16 Religious Society of Friends (Quakers)

5 Messianic Judaism

6 Restorationism
6.1 Stone-Campbell Restoration Movement
6.2 Southcottites
6.3 Millerites and Comparable groups
6.3.1 Sabbath Keeping Churches, Adventist
6.3.2 Sabbath-Keeping Churches, Non-Adventist in north Pennsylvania
6.3.3 Sunday Adventists
6.3.4 Sacred Name Groups
6.3.5 Other Adventists
6.3.6 Bible Student Groups
6.4 Anglo-Israelism

7 Nontrinitarian Groups
7.1 Unitarianism and Universalism

8 Religious movements related to Christianity
8.1 Manichaeism
8.2 The New Church also called Swedenborgianism
8.2.1 Episcopal
8.2.2 Congregational
8.3 New Thought
8.4 Christian mystery movements

9 Ethnic or syncretic religions incorporating elements of Christianity

10 Christianism

A List of Inter-Christian controversies
- Trinity or no?
- Arianism
- The disputes that drove the creation of Protestants.
- Denominations of Protestants
- Denominations of Catholics
- War between Catholics and protestants
- Holy Spirit male or female?
- Holy Spirit is a person or not?
- Salvation, faith or works
- Baptism
- Infant Baptism
- Hell is real and fiery or not?
- Purgatory
- Snake handling
- Once saved always saved?
- Where do Suicides go?
- Speaking in tongues
- Blasphemy of the Holy Spirit
- New covenant theology
- The 'two natures' in Christ.
- The Ordination of Women
- The attitude towards gays
- The various parts of the Bible that seem to be later additions, such as the 'story of the woman taken in adultery' and the 'Great Commission' that ends Matthew, etc.
- The Rapture
- Slavery
- Biblical inerrancy
- Christendom
- Papal Infallibility
- Double Predestination
- Just War Theory
- Penal Substitution
- God as a Male
- Sin
- Unforgivable Sin
- Second coming has already happened
- The point in time that the holy spirit indwells and fills you
- Gifts of the spirit given to everyone or different people at different times
- 'pre-Nicean' controversies


References and Further Reading
1. Overview Of IDQ Design Deficiencies Which Are Evident In Scripture
2. Anchoring Data Quality Dimensions in Ontological Foundations
3. Wikipedia - Formulation of the doctrine of the trinity
4. Wikipedia - Arius
5. Askmoses.com, Rabbi Shlomo Chein describes the Jewish Soul
6. Beyond Accuracy: What Data Quality Means To Consumers
7. Wikipedia - Christian Denominations
8. Reasonable Doubt About The Holy Spirit
9. Major Religions of the World Ranked by Number of Adherents
10. Wikipedia - Arianism
11. Wikipeda - Trinity
12. Wikipedia - Christology
13. Wikipedia, History of Mathematics

Overview of IDQ Deficiencies Which Are Evident In Scripture

The originators of scripture had a remarkable lack of insight when creating scripture considering it was revealed to them by God. Apparently God didn't reveal to them some fundamental principles in ensuring they were creating quality information and data that would stand the test of time and generations.

This article introduces Information and Data Quality design deficiencies which will be elaborated on with scriptural examples in follow on articles and will serve as quick reference for them. It is part four of a series on applying IDQ priniciples to cross-checking the authority and trustworthiness of the Bible. Links to the preceding articles follow.
1. How Accurate is the Bible?
2. Applying Data and Information Quality Principles To The Bible
3. Applying IDQ Principles of Research To The Bible

What are Design Deficiencies?
As the saying goes "Do it right the first time" many industries recognize and practice the principle of ensuring quality early in the production cycle to avoid problems later in the cycle or in the market(27). As a marksman knows when taking aim, a tiny deviation from the target at the source can lead to large deviation at the target. By not ensuring data integrity and quality at the creation of scripture, many problems have manifested themselves and continue to appear as the scripture gets older. Metaphors do not retain their integrity in meaning over thousands of years. Some of the problems have led to persecution for heresy, divisions in the church and division of the Churches into denomintations until there are tens of thousands of variations of Christianity in existence. For example, they may all agree that Jesus died on the Cross, but they don’t all agree on his nature.

With these kinds of problems it is no wonder why after close to 2000 years, Christianity has only a 33% mind share while all other religions together total 66%(28). Its not that people are evil so they don't believe, it is that there are no compelling reasons to believe in Jesus. Comparing all these religions to some other philosophical ideas that were developing in parallel about the same time, Mathematics has become ubiquitous while the various religions are still languishing under the weight of implausibility(26).

The originators of scripture had a remarkable lack of insight when creating scripture considering it was revealed to them by God. Apparently God didn't reveal to them some fundamental principles in ensuring they were creating quality information and data that would stand the test of time and generations. And furthermore God had a choice in who he revealed scripture to. Using the law of large numbers, he would have been able to analyze and consider any number of millions of starting points for his desired outcome to include the one person that would start a path of reliable transmission of the data from person to person(29). He, like no one else, had the ability to choose the one in ten million starting point that would have gotten the scripture to this point uncorrupted.

Overview of Proper Representation and Design Deficiencies
Some fundamental deficiencies in data design and creation have been identified in the field of Information and Data Quality through research and trial and error(3). Each of them will be defined in this overview and then how they relate to scripture will be elaborated on separately in follow on articles.
They are as follows.
- Incomplete representation
- Ambiguous representation
- Meaningless representation
- Garbling by mapping to a meaningless state
- Garbling by mapping to a wrong state

Proper representation
In order for an Information System (IS) to accurately represent real world events, each of the datum in the Information System must "map" to real world states. Each real word state must be accounted for in the information system. Having more than one instance of a state (a record) is appropriate if it represents an aspect of the state that hasn't been previously accounted for. To have more than one instance of a record of the same state doesn't add any significant value, but a record of the same state that has related data, in another context for example, adds value if it doesn't lead to a meaningless state. For example, having two instances of the same story do not add any value unless one of the stories has information in it which does not contradict the other. Figure 1 illustrates this point by showing three instances of data represented by spheres in the column labeled RW (Real World) and four instances of Data in the D column. Each Real World state is represented by a datum in the information system with one instance of a Real World state being represented by two instances of data in the Information System.

Figure 1.



Incomplete representation
If the Information System is missing some information about the real world, then the information system cannot accurately represent the state of the real world for which it was intended. This is termed as "incompleteness". Figure 2 illustrates this point by showing three instances of data represented by spheres in the column labeled RW (Real World) and two instances of Data in the D column. One instance of a Real World state is not represented by the Data in column D.

Figure 2




Ambiguous representation
While it is permissible to use to a multiple datum to represent one real world state, it is not permissible to use one datum to represent two real world states. If multiple Real World states are represented by one datum there is not enough information with which to accurately represent either Real World state. This situation is called "Ambiguity". It is similar to incomplete representation because it can be considered an instance of missing information, even though one datum could incompletely represent two instances of a Real World state because it is not specific enough. It is analogous to using the term "she" in a conversation when discussing an event concerning multiple women. By not specifying which "she" is being referenced, the details of the event become unclear because the "she" being referred to is ambiguous.

Figure 3 illustrates this point by showing three instances of data represented by spheres in the column labeled RW (Real World) and two instances of Data in the D column. One instance of a Real World state is not represented by the Data in column D but instead, two instances of Real World states are represented by one instance of an information state.

Figure 3




Meaningless representation
When the information system contains superfluous information then it can lead to a situation where the Information System does not accurately represent (map back to) a real world state. For example this can occur by the use of too many descriptive terms, undefined terms or some minor addition to the story intended as an elaboration. To say that in a battle some person or group chose a brilliant strategy and exhibited exceptional strength or bravery may mean that an unintended desperate situation has been incorrectly represented and will be incorrectly interpreted. This situation happens often in television, movies and songs about historical events such as the Spartan battle with the Persians at Thermopylae depicted in the movie "300" or Egyptian Hieroglyphs documenting events in the lives of pharoahs.

Figure 4 illustrates this point by showing two instances of data represented by spheres in the column labeled RW (Real World) and three instances of Data in the D column. One instance of an information state is not represented by or does not map back to a real world state .

Figure 4




Operation Deficiencies - Garbling:
Meaningless State
In human terms, garbling occurs at the point of "consumption" or reading and interpretation. In Information Systems, it occurs at operation time or when the database is being accessed. Garbling occurs when a Real World state is incorrectly mapped to a wrong state in the Information System. There are two cases in which this occurs. If a meaningless state exists, then Real World mapping will be to a meaningless state, or the mapping might be to a meaningful but incorrect information state. This can occur as a result of inaccurate data entry or omissions of real world states at the creation or origin of the data. Analogous examples of this type of garbling are legends, folktales and the "Artistic License" of the author or originator.

Figure 5 illustrates this point by showing two instances of data represented by spheres in the column labeled RW (Real World) and three instances of Data in the D column. One instance of an information state is not represented by or does not map back to a real world state and a Real World state in incorrectly interpreted as being represented by the superfluous datum.

Figure 5




Map to a wrong state
Figure 5 illustrates this phenomena by showing two instances of data represented by spheres in the column labeled RW (Real World) and three instances of Data in the D column. One instance of an information state is not represented by or does not map back to a real world state and a Real World state in incorrectly interpreted as being represented by a valid however incorrect or unintended information state.

Figure 6



In successive articles I will explore each IDQ design deficiency and give a biblical example.

REFERENCES AND FURTHER READING
1. Wikipedia, "Data Management"
2. Information Quality at MIT
3. Anchoring Data Quality Dimensions in Ontological Foundations
4. DMReview, Data Management Review
5. IQ-1 Certificate Program
6. Wikipedia, 2003 Invasion of Iraq
7. How Accurate Is The Bible?
8. Datalever.com
9. Wikipedia, Tanakh
10. Null Hypothesis
11. Beyond Accuracy: What Data Quality Means To Consumers
12. IQ Benchmarks
13. Reasonable Doubt About Adaption Theory
14. IQ Trainwrecks
15. Robert Harris' VirtualSalt
16. Data Quality Assessment
17. Cornell University Library
18. Guidelines for Ensuring and Maximizing the Quality, Objectivity, Utility and Integrity of Information Disseminated by Federal Agnecies
19. East Tennesee State University Researchers Toolbox
20. George Mason Univeristy
21. McGraw-Hill Higher Education, Evaluating Internet Resources
22. The Virtual Chase, Criteria for Quality in Information--Checklist
23. Know Your Bible
24. Wikipedia, Authors of The Bible
25. Ancient HistoriansPart 1, Part 2
26. Wikipedia, History of Mathematics
27. Data Quality Requirements Analysis and Modeling
28. Major Religions of the World Ranked by Number of Adherents
29. Making Sense of Probability

"The Son of Man" As Jesus From IDQ Deficiencies

While acknowledging that Jesus' usage of the term "son of man" has no consensus, this article shows how the term "son of man" was historically used to refer to mankind or Humans as a category, was never generally considered by the Jewish community to be a descriptive phrase for the Messiah, and therefore seems to be used incorrectly either by Jesus, by the authors and/or translators of the gospels as something like a personal pronoun for Jesus. In any case, presuming the Bible is the Word of God, the term still maps to two real world states fulfilling the criteria for Ambiguous Representation which is an Information and Data Quality (IDQ) design flaw.

This Article is part six of the series of articles applying Information and Data Quality (IDQ) Principles to the Bible. The purpose of the series is to show that the Bible is not a reliable or trustworthy source of information about God because it has problems identified in Information and Data Quality research as causing inaccuracy and unreliability. Links to the previous articles are listed below.

1. How Accurate is the Bible?
2. Applying Data and Information Quality Principles To The Bible
3. Applying IDQ Principles of Research To The Bible
4. Overview of IDQ Deficiencies Which Are Evident In Scripture
5. Jesus As God From IDQ Design Deficincies

A brief review of Ambiguous Representation and Mapping to a Meaningless State(1) follows.

Ambiguous representation
While it is permissible to use to a multiple datum to represent one real world state, it is not permissible to use one datum to represent two real world states. If multiple Real World states are represented by one datum there is not enough information with which to accurately represent either Real World state. This situation is called "Ambiguity". It is similar to incomplete representation because it can be considered an instance of missing information, even though one datum could incompletely represent two instances of a Real World state because it is not specific enough. It is analogous to using the term "she" in a conversation when discussing an event concerning multiple women. By not specifying which "she" is being referenced, the details of the event become unclear because the "she" being referred to is ambiguous.

Figure 1 illustrates this point by showing three instances of data represented by spheres in the column labeled RW (Real World) and two instances of Data in the D column. One instance of a Real World state is not represented by the Data in column D but instead, two instances of Real World states are represented by one instance of an information state.

Figure 1



Operation Deficiencies - Garbling: Map to a wrong state
In human terms, garbling occurs at the point of "consumption" or reading and interpretation. In Information Systems, it occurs at operation time or when the database is being accessed. Garbling occurs when a Real World state is incorrectly mapped to a wrong state in the Information System. Figure 6 illustrates this phenomena by showing two instances of data represented by spheres in the column labeled RW (Real World) and three instances of Data in the D column. One instance of an information state is not represented by or does not map back to a real world state and a Real World state in incorrectly interpreted as being represented by a valid however incorrect or unintended information state.

Figure 6



The son of man
In Hebrew, son of man can be used, generally speaking, as the word "Human". It originated in ancient Mesopotamia and was used to denote humanity or mankind in general especially when distinguishing between mankind and God (2, 3). In the Old Testament, "son of man" was used as the word "Human" would be used today. When the word "Human" is used to replace the phrase "son of man" in the Old Testament, the context retains its meaning. A list of instances where "son of man" appears in the Old Testament follows.

Old Testament instances
Numbers
-23:19
Job
- 16:18-21
- 25
- 35:6-8
Psalms
- 8
- 80
- 144
- 146
Isaiah
- 51:11-13
- 56:1-2
Ezekiel
- 2:1 - 47:6, used 97 times
Daniel
- 7:13-14
- 8:16-18

In Numbers, "son of man" is used to contrast God with Humanity showing how he is different using the example that he is above lying or repentance.

Numbers 23:19
God is not a man, that he should lie, Nor a son of man, that he should repent: Has he said, and will he not do it? Or has he spoken, and will he not make it good?

In Ezekiel, the author is addressed as "son of man" in the context of addressing him by his type of being, emphasizing the difference between the author and God.

Ezekiel 2:1-10
1 He said to me, son of man, stand on your feet, and I will speak with you.
2 The Spirit entered into me when he spoke to me, and set me on my feet; and I heard him who spoke to me.
3 He said to me, son of man, I send you to the children of Israel, to nations that are rebellious, which have rebelled against me: they and their fathers have transgressed against me even to this very day.
.....

When the Book of Daniel was written the term turned up in chapter 7 verse 13. This instance of usage is believed by some to be a reference to the Messiah, and still it is consistent with the historical and cultural usage of the term. It is a reference to a being "like a son of man" which is believed, in Judaism and depending on the interpretation, to be either an Angel or a representation of the Messiah as a Human being. In either case though, it clearly is metaphorical and is not necessarily a reference to one single person that will get dominion forever because further on in verses 18 and 27, the text clearly states that "the Saints" and "the people of the Saints" (Plural) will have dominion. This is interpreted by some to mean the people of Israel will have everlasting dominion and that the human figure was representing a group.

Below are the relevant verses from Daniel discussing the "being like a son of man" and the plurality of who are going to get Dominion. I highly recommend that the reader look up the whole passage and read it in its entirety, in context. "Ancient of Days" is accepted as a reference to God in one of his constantly changing mystical anthropomorphic states.

Daniel 7:13-8:17
13 I saw in the night visions, and, behold, there came with the clouds of heaven one like unto a son of man, and he came even to the Ancient of days, and he was brought near before Him.
14 And there was given him dominion, and glory, and a kingdom, that all the peoples, nations, and languages should serve him; his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom that which shall not be destroyed.
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18 But the saints of the Most High shall receive the kingdom, and possess the kingdom for ever, even for ever and ever.'
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22 until the Ancient of days came, and judgment was given for the saints of the Most High; and the time came, and the saints possessed the kingdom.
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27 And the kingdom and the dominion, and the greatness of the kingdoms under the whole heaven, shall be given to the people of the saints of the Most High; their kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and all dominions shall serve and obey them.'


Daniel 8:17
17 So he came near to where I was standing, and when he came I was frightened and fell on my face; but he said to me, "son of man, understand that the vision pertains to the time of the end."

There is consistent usage of the term "son of man" within Daniel 7 and 8, and its usage denotes a type of Human being. In verse 8, the author is referred to as "son of man". While most Jews don't seem to generally consider 7:13 a Messianic prophesy, some do, however they do not consider "son of man" a specific title for the Messiah as Christians do or as the authors of the Gospels had Jesus use it. Most Jewish Scholars don't think it likely that Jesus would have used the Aramaic term in that way because in Aramaic it never had that meaning(3). In other words, it never mapped to the Messiah as a Real World state, it only ever mapped to the category of Human.

And though it is written that Jesus used the term to describe himself, it is not clear that he considered himself God or the Messiah. For example, in Mark 8:27-31, and John 7:26-31, Jesus has the opportunity to say clearly and unequivocally that he is the Messiah, the Christ and God on Earth, but he doesn't. Numbers 23:19 says that God is not a man that he should lie, nor like a son of man that he should repent. There is a distinction between humans and God, one characteristic of that distinction is that he would not lie. A lie is hard to define so its hard to defend a claim that Jesus was lying, however, a lie does fall into the category of deception so if nothing else, Jesus was deceptive, which is considered to be a characteristic of Satan and Humans but not of God.

Numbers 23:19
God is not a man, that he should lie, Nor a son of man, that he should repent: Has he said, and will he not do it? Or has he spoken, and will he not make it good?

Here the gospels have Jesus using the term "son of man" incorrectly and using a deceptive rhetorical persuasion technique just as numbers said God wouldn't. Here he uses the bandwagon fallacy because who the people say he is is not relevant to who he really is, and he uses an improper appeal to authority because since the disciples have never seen a God on earth, and since they have not attempted to distinguish between Jesus and a Con Man, they are not qualified to assess. Jesus uses a rhetorical persuasion technique where he gets the "mark" to verbalize a commitment which increases the likelihood that they will defend the commitment even against disconfirming evidence and then he told them not to tell anyone which insulates them from having to defend their commitment because it decreases the amount of instances where a defense will be needed.

Mark 8:27 - 31
27 Jesus went out, along with His disciples, to the villages of Caesarea Philippi; and on the way He questioned His disciples, saying to them, "Who do people say that I am?"
28 They told Him, saying, "John the Baptist; and others say Elijah; but others, one of the prophets."
29 And He continued by questioning them, "But who do you say that I am?" Peter answered and said to Him, "You are the Christ."
30 And He warned them to tell no one about Him.
31 And He began to teach them that the son of man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders and the chief priests and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again.

According to the Authors of the Gospels, when Jesus starting using the phrase "son of man", he was using it as personal pronoun to describe himself. If anyone who heard Jesus use this term in this way challenged it or asked for clarification, it is not recorded. There is no explanation of why Jesus changed the meaning of this phrase, presuming he had the authority to do so. But presuming he had the authority to do it, a sound general principle is that "if something can be done, doesn't mean it should be done". To maintain coherence over time and to explain to knowledgeable Jews who would not be able to have contact with Jesus, an explanation of the new use of the word was warranted. As it stands now it looks like Jesus didn't understand what the term meant or he was intentionally using it in an ambiguous way or that the authors and or translators of the Gospels didn't understand how the term should be used which is one reason why there is no consensus on Jesus' usage of it to this day.

Since Jesus was supposed to be God, then the Old Testament was Jesus' Word, and he used the phrase "son of man" in the Old Testament in the traditional way and he validated the authority of the Old Testament as the Word of God by using it as a reference for his teaching (5), he is not likely to have used the phrase "son of man" in that way because it is a new mapping to a real world state creating ambiguity.

It looks like the the phrase "son of man" was misunderstood by Jesus or the original authors (or translators) of Gospel resulting in a mapping to a wrong state, or a meaningless state depending on the perspective of the critic. In any case, if Jesus was god, then referring to himself using a term which he re-defined but did not explain is deliberately ambiguous and confusing. Since it is irrational for a teacher to teach and communicate to her students using ambiguous terms and deception, it follows that it would be irrational for God to do so as well, therefore the ambiguous use of the term "son of man" was an IDQ design deficiency of Ambiguous Representation in the origin of the text.

References and Further Reading
1. Anchoring Data Quality Dimensions in Ontological Foundations
2. Wikipedia, son of man
3. JewishEncyclopedia, son of man
4. Mechon Mamre
5. How Accurate is the Bible?