by nicolaou 10 Replies latest jw experiences
It's infuriating because it's so childish. You can explain how a rainbow appears because sunlight is refracted under the right conditions but you'll get asked;
"So who made those conditions that way?"
I was on a family holiday in Cyprus, the water there is crystal clear. I tried explaining why the Med' doesn't stagnate because of the powerful cycle of currents running continuously in and out of the straights of Gibraltar.
"Who made the currents run like that?" asks my JW Mum.
Aaaaaargh!
Some snakes have sharp, long, hollow or grooved teeth that are connected to a small sac in the snake's head behind its eyes.
These sacs produce a poisonous liquid called venom and are 'designed' to kill.
So who made it that way?
I remember, many years ago, I had a conversation with two sisters around 20 years of age. They were adamant that God had created the rainbow for Noah. I was trying to explain that God simply gave the rainbow as a sign even though it already existed, however, they were saying that rainbows did not exist before Noah.
So, at the end of the deluge, when Noah came out, Jehovah changed the properties of the neutron, atoms, wave lengths of the photons and effectively changed the makeup of all living things just so that he could create an optical illusion to Noah??? their answer: Yes he did.
It seems like a reasonable question to me! Although I would pose the question at a more fundamental level than, why a rainbow, or why currents in the sea. I would ask why the world is set up in such a way, and with intrinsic rules and patterns, that allow all such phenomena to even develop and exist. Or why there is anything at all, that can be subject to these sorts of patterns and formations. But ultimately maybe it is the same question. Because it’s not that awareness of the possibility of God means that every dumb thing that happens must has a superfluous “reason” attached to it. (“I must have dropped my toast for a reason”) It’s rather the fact that the world exists at all permeates all that we encounter with such intrinsic meaning that everything makes sense at fundamental level, even if all the parts only make sense, either in relation to one another, or apparently not at all.
If you're walking under a coconut tree in the new system and a coconut lands on your head and crushes your skull, is this because Jehovah created gravity? Will you feel pain because Jehovah created nerve endings?
Who made the currents run like that?" asks my JW Mum.
Witnesses have some funny notions about the sea. I think it’s mainly due to that scripture that says that freshwater stays in the river and at the river mouth stops dead doesn’t mix ( they obviously weren’t aware of mangrove swamps, brackish water and rivers that run in the sea at the poles and even sub tropical regions).
Her reasoning is inconsistent. What about places where the water does stagnate and it's dirty or at least dirty looking? Who made it that way?
And I strongly second Giles Gray's point. I had the venomous snake question about 40 years ago before I was baptized. I presented it to mature JWs who tried to offer feeble answers that I quickly shot down. I was told to just hold the question and that I would soon get an answer to it. Forty years later, and I'm still holding.
And back to the JW inconsistency...
Magnum: Wow! Isn't it amazing how the shape of that camel's red blood cells help it to go long periods of time without drinking water and then allow it to drink huge quantities when it does drink?
JW: Yes, and who made it that way?
Magnum: Wow! Isn't it amazing how that pit viper seems amazingly designed as a killing machine - with its fangs, venom, infrared sensors, jaws that allow for swallowing large prey, etc.?
JW: [silence]
Magnum: And who made it that way?
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I'm not an atheist (I agree with what slimboyfat wrote); I just believe in consistency. JWs selectively apply logic and reason, and they selectively use evidence.
It's impossible to use logic to reason with someone so illogical. Citing the poisonous snake example would just bring the defense that snakes only became like that 'after the flood' - or some other equally ridiculous nonsense.
Slim', not sure I follow you. What 'intrinsic meaning' do you attach to the worlds existence?
The problem is that creationists don't use logic at all. They base their beliefs on their feelings:
'Wow isn't wildlife wonderful - clearly God made it all'
They have no answer to logic (e.g. 'so, did God create venomous fangs of snakes, too?').
Their lack of logic is painfully evident.
Then lets all lift up our heads and praise Jehovah for his wonderful creation of the Guinea Worm.
A creature that's sole purpose is to fester inside your body for a whole year before causing fever, nausea, vomiting, blisters and diarrhea and extreme pain. If you're lucky it'll travel down to your foot causing a burning sensation where you'll try and gouge it out by winding it up around a stick.
If you're not so lucky it'll burrow into your spinal cord causing paralysis and later death - or into your brain where it'll cause delirium and then death.
Oh... and it'll lay eggs inside you for the year that it's in you.
Praise Jah indeed!
