JW Science Quote Of The Day 8-29

by TD 15 Replies latest jw friends

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  TD

  H.G. Wells 1898 novel, War Of The Worlds depicted the earth under attack by a race that had evolved past the need of eating to obtain nourishment. These beings, in fact, had no digestive organs of any sort:

  "Entrails they had none. They did not eat, much less digest. Instead, they took the fresh, living blood of other creatures and injected it into their veins…..The physiological advantages of the practice of injection are undeniable, if one thinks of the tremendous waste of human time and energy occasioned by eating and the digestive process. Our bodies are half made up of glands and tubes and organs, occupied in turning heterogeneous food into blood."

  Although Wells completely misunderstood the function of blood even by the science of his day, his book is still published nearly 110 years later, which is no mean feat. People read the book not for its technical accuracy, but for its overall imagination and vision. Subsequent generations knew that blood is not simply the transmogrification of food from various forms into one homogenous form, that a transfusion is not a bypass of the digestive system and that injecting the blood of one creature into another will not nourish the recipient regardless of how well fed the donor may have been. Right?

  Wrong.

  Today’s JW science quote of the day is a repetition of the exact same misconception about blood held by Wells. This was one the JW’s original objections to transfusion medicine.

  "A patient in the hospital may be fed through the mouth, through the nose, or through the veins. When sugar solutions are given intravenously, it is called intravenous feeding. So the hospital's own terminology recognizes as feeding the process of putting nutrition into one's system via the veins. Hence the attendant administering the transfusion is feeding the patient blood through the veins, and the patient receiving it is eating it through his veins." (The Watchtower July 1, 1951 p.415)

  Tomorrow: "The Equal Night"
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  Leolaia

  Very nice tie-in to the sci-fi classic. :)
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  Jeffro

  Hmmm... a religion using a premise from science fiction... Sounds like they're playing on Scientologist turf there.
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  WTWizard

  When you tell an untruth in a work of fiction, that is perfectly OK because people are reading it only for entertainment. And this is one book that is going to be around for another 100 years. I do not have a problem with that, since that is the stuff science fiction is made of. Much of what happens in science fiction is scientifically unsound, but people suspend that requirement because it is meant to entertain, not educate.

  However, when the Watchtower Society puts out scientific untruths in publications meant to educate, I have a big problem with it. People are supposed to look at this material as the truth. This is not merely unproven theory. This is supposed to be the absolute truth! And, unlike entertainment, when one puts false science in a fact magazine like the Asleep magazine is billed as, this misleads. People are looking at it as education, not entertainment. And when they do it on purpose to derail integrated thinking, it is even worse because they are trying to confuse the flock into accepting doctrines that are blatantly wrong.

  And this is supposed to replace college? When the Asleep keeps putting in science flubups like these, it is going to make for some very poor education. I remember the one on nuclear power plants--the wording was wrong, and no nuclear engineer would rely solely on the Asleep for learning how to run one of those things. No wonder they want people to flunk biology and chemistry in high school and not go to college!
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  Shepherd Book

  TD-

  You are quickly becoming my favorite poster here. Keep it up!
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  Mrs. Witness

  Love it TD! Keep 'em comin!
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  Scully

  The WTS repeated that notion up until 1977:

  ***

  w77 9/15 p.570 Finding a Real Purpose in Life***
  

  Medical studies proved to be challenging to me in a number of ways. For one thing, there was the temptation to get absorbed in the world of medicine and to make a name for myself as a doctor. It took determination to maintain the desire to become a pioneer. Then there was the problem of blood transfusions, which are an intravenous feeding on blood. The Scriptures command that Christians "abstain . . . from blood."

  ***

  w61 4/15 p.252 Preservation by Obedience to God’s Law on Blood***
  

  When Hannie turned nineteen the attacks returned after a relaxation of a few years and increased in severity. Finally a specialist in blood diseases advised the father that the spleen should be removed. The operation, the father was told, might require blood transfusions, but the father explained that as a Christian he could not do otherwise than object to the use of blood in this way, since the Word of God forbids the feeding of blood into the body, whether by the mouth or by any other means that has been devised by science.

  ***

  w61 9/15 p.558 Respect for the Sanctity of Blood***
  

  It is of no consequence that the blood is taken into the body through the veins instead of the mouth. Nor does the claim by some that it is not the same as intravenous feeding carry weight. The fact is that it nourishes or sustains the life of the body. In harmony with this is a statement in the book HemorrhageandTransfusion, by George W. Crile, A.M., M.D., who quotes a letter from Denys, French physician and early researcher in the field of transfusions. It says: "In performing transfusion it is nothing else than nourishing by a shorter road than ordinary—that is to say, placing in the veins blood all made in place of taking food which only turns to blood after several changes."
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  sir82

  The WTS repeated that notion up until 1977

  Ha! And they still, to this day, use the silly illustration that goes like this: "If your doctor told you to abstain from alcohol, would you be obeying him if you injected it directly into your veins? So, a blood transfusion is no different."

  While they don't explicitly come out and say that blood transfusions are "feeding", their continued use of that illustration certainly implies it.

  What kills me is that they know how intellectually dishonest that illustration is, but they stil use it. B*st*rds.
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  badboy

  SCULLY,ARE THEY SAYING THAT FOOD TURNS INTO BLOOD?
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  stillajwexelder

  these little science quotes and threads are excellent - thank you for the work done so far