<SYSTEM_TASK:>
Solve the following problem using Python, implementing the functions described below, one line at a time
<END_TASK>
<USER_TASK:>
Description:
 def merge_split(*paths):
 """Merge paths into a single path delimited by colons and split on colons to return a list of paths. :param paths: a variable length list of path strings :return: a list of paths from the merged path list split by colons """

  filtered_paths = filter(None, paths)
  return [p for p in ':'.join(filtered_paths).split(':') if p]