Is this HARD evidence that the INTERNET is hurting the Watch Tower Society? (page 3)

sir82

Correlation does not equal causation.

Is "internet penetration" the only, or even the principal, difference between those groups of countries?

What other potentail causes are there for the disparity in growth rates?

All that negativity aside, it is a pretty striking correlation.

cedars

sir82

Correlation does not equal causation.

I would definitely agree with that. It could always be just a coincidence - but it would be a pretty striking coincidence!!

Cedars

BluesBrother

When I first saw it , I was thinking of all the other factors that could have a bearing on it, education, cultural background etc...

There are nations listed though where the those factors are similar but net penetration differs, with a co relating effect on dub numbers....

So yes.. "Verry Interesting" as somebody once said........

The Borg are running scared over The Net (and education) anyway.....

james_woods

The Borg are running scared over The Net (and education) anyway.....

That may be one of the best proofs of Cedars theory: The Borg seem to believe it themselves.

cedars

Just in case I'm asleep by the time the more eagle-eyed among you spot the anomalies in the figures - I'll tell you what they are.

I've had to group United States with Hawaii. This sounds obvious, but until very recently the Society foolishly listed these as separate countries right up to (and including) the 2011 Yearbook, and then saw sense and have begun listing them under the "United States" (or so it appears) in the 2012 Yearbook. Obviously, when Internet penetration figures are published for the USA, this includes Hawaii anyway, so I needed to group them together for the 2009 and 2010 figures. This has resulted in a slight change in the % increase for 2011, which has shrunk from 3 to 2. I'm not sure what the Society did to the figures to account for this change. You can blame it all on them for recognizing Hawaii as a sovereign state.

I've also noticed that the Society has magically produced an extra country out of thin air - namely "Palestinian Territory". This territory was not in any of the previous Yearbooks, and thus the 59 average publishers in the "West Bank" congregation can boast a 100% increase over last year. Thankfully, this didn't really mess with my figures too much, because the website I was using was able to offer penetration figures for the palestinian territory.

I hope all that makes sense. If I've made a mistake, let me know and I'll try and fix it when I wake up tomorrow.

Cedars

jgnat

I love data mining. Thanks for your hard work.

Others have responded quite literally to your original question. In the strictest sense, this is not hard evidence. The WTS has used less for their dogma, but that's another discussion.

I'll betcha that internet use is a factor, though.

When I was digging around with the numbers, I concluded that the most obvious factor affecting Witness growth is whether there was a state religion or not. There is virtually zero penetration in Muslim countries.

If religions were families, you could call the Jehovah's Witnesses the snot-nosed bratty sister who insists on tagging along with miss goody two shoes on her missions trips. Since miss goody two shoes can't visit officially Muslim countries, Jehovah's Witnesses can't go either. The Witness "good news" is pretty dependent on an existing Christian population to take pot-shots at.

james_woods

You can blame it all on them for recognizing Hawaii as a sovereign state.

You realize that this will probably be used in some way by the Obama "birthers", right?

cedars

james_woods - Well, I guess the birthers will have to do with this as they see fit!

jgnat:

Others have responded quite literally to your original question. In the strictest sense, this is not hard evidence. The WTS has used less for their dogma, but that's another discussion.

I'll betcha that internet use is a factor, though.

I'll accept that. You can't have 'hard evidence' without monitoring the internet activity of each and every person around the world who gets called on by a Witness, as well as that of each and every Witness who fades or is DF'd/DA'd. As you suggest though, the trend MUST be more than coincidental.

I'm glad you find value in the information!

Cedars

nugget

It is interesting to see the slowing down of people joining the religion in developed countries. I am sure that the internet does play a part in many peoples decision to leave the faith. Some of the increase will be children and born ins, some will be inactives reactivated and encouraged to report in 15min intervals, some will be df'd people who have been reinstated. The number of fresh converts who have never been involved in the faith will be even smaller by comparison. This is a record of publishers and averages based on self reporting. Some of the base rate is made up of faders and people who never go out but report something to keep the elders away. If you take into account false data some of the small increases will revert to decreases.

Witnesses will be happy to see any increase however small being convinced that the work has been completed and what they are seeing is the witnesses working out their own salvation.

What would be interesting is the number of countries showing a decrease in publishers.

Is this HARD evidence that the INTERNET is hurting the Watch Tower Society?

Share this