A New Scientific Discovery About J.W.'s (page 3)

d0rkyd00d

ka poo fmem faj isshy? jee kaspif fmem fmeoo? Bakle!

larc

MindChild,

I am still curious: Has this been published somewhere where we can read all the details?

Have you used multiple correlation to investigate the other variables you mentioned?

Have you thought about going back ten more years to increase your sample size?

You showed the data. Could you also provide the correlation between each of the three variables. I could calculate this, but I assume that you have already done so.

Abaddon

larc; Mindchild gave the details of the publishers on the previous page; no ISBN, but it should be asy enough to find.

As I mentioned in my first posting, the information has been published in one of the standard peer related periodicals for our discipline (Chronobiology.) My objective was to find out if there was really a demand to justify the effort to republish the findings in a more popular and general scientific journals. Most of the general public doesn't realize there is a huge difference between what is really going on in the scientific world vs. what they see published in typical general interest magazines. I could send you a copy directly of the article if you email me privately but due to copyright restrictions, I cannot publish the whole article online.

The correlation information you asked for is only a crude tool that is not used as a stand-alone proof of anything. Correlation does not equal causation. Typically, anything less than a .5 level of correlation with ample data spread is considered suspect. If you run a correlation analysis using the z-scores for say the sunspot numbers and planetary magnetic activity in the examples I gave earlier, you would find that the correlation is .48. Yet there is no doubt that there is a connection between sunspots and the planetary magnetic field. The highest correlations we have are for rapid run magnetograms from geomagnetic observatories that show a .61 correlation between Pc3 geomagnetic pulsations and slightly less correlations with other frequencies, such as Pc4, Pc5 and Pi2. Essentially, the brain is frequency dependant and different periods of pulsations seem to have different results. This process is poorly understood at this point but is an area undergoing intensive investigation. However, I warn you that again correlation does not mean causation and all scientists need to be skeptical of results because we are dealing with complex phenomena.

Another paper I published in November of 2000 in the 1st International Symposium Workshop on Chronoastrobiology and Chronotherapy in Tokyo, Japan with the title,"Does religious motiation follow a circadecennian (about 10.5-year) cycle?" showed that there were several aspects of the solar terrestrial connection that were close matches to the activity of Jehovah's Witnesses in Alaska for a 41 year period and these included the following variables that came close to the JW activity cycle:

C9 planetary geomagnetics (10 year period)
Kp planetary geomagnetics (10 year period)
Ap planetary geomagnetics (9.9 year period)
Solar wind density (9.9 year period)
Dst equatorial geomagnetics (10.3 year period)
Solar wind plasma speed (9.3 year period)
Solar wind plasma variation (9.8 year period)
Am. Rel. Sunspot Nr. (R) (10.5 year period)
10.7 cm solar flux (10.5 year period)
Ionospheric IF2 (10.5 year period)
Ionsopheric IG (10.5 year period)

Now compare this with the spectral analysis of the JW variables for the same time frame in Alaska for 41 years:

Peak proselytists (9.3 year period)
Avg. Proselytists (9.5 year period)
Baptisms (14.8 year period)
Total hours (x10-3) (8.3 year period)
Avg. hrs/month (10.4 year period)

So, what does one make of all this? Essentially in the mathematical analyis the point estimates of a number of physical enciornmental and motivational human periodicities detected by nonlinear rhythmometry are close to the solar activity period of 10.5 years and their 95% confidence intervals overlap 10.5 years. In simpler terms, somehow all these things are related together with a high degree of probability. The reason for the complexity is that all of these factors work together to produce an effect. For example, how could the solar flux have an influence on you? Well, what happens is that the UV and soft x-rays from the sun (which are cyclic and follow the sunspot cycle) heat and ionize Earth's atmosphere at different levels over time. This is important because this effects the propogation of electromagnetic waves through the atmosphere. If we did not have the ionization involved, the electromagnetic waves inside the lower atmosphere would not propogate as well and therefore there would be far fewer times when the human brain was stimulated by geomagnetics, simply because the radiation does not cover the earth evenly. When the ionosphere is highly charged, it greatly effects the extent of which geomagnetic pulsations travel around. Thus, you will see some correlation and a similar in-step time cycle to this and the hours JW's spend per month in their religious activity.

So, in conclusion, it is a difficult and complex puzzle to fit all the pieces together exactly but at least we know the number of pieces that go together, their colors and general shapes...we simply haven't finished putting together the picture yet.

Kind Regards,

Skipper

Mindchild

Hi Moxy,

Thanks for your input. I don't have the graphs and data tables from my research paper with me to show you which time frames match your projections but I was wondering if you or anyone else has JW yearbook information that extends prior to 1949? I know there are some very old yearbooks sold online but the costs are high, over $30 each. I managed to get the yearbooks from 1949 to the present for the research. At a later date, we are also hoping to do another paper on the monthly relationships between JW hours for different countries over many decades, and I found it difficult to find old Kindom Ministry or Informant issues that extend backwards in time before the first Watchtower CD. If you have any of these that go way back then, please let me know.

Perhaps you might also enjoy reading some other information from other researchers in the growing field of neurotheology. Here are links ot a couple of recent articles that appeared in both Newsweek and the Washington Post that talk about the brain and religion.

"Tracing the Synapses of Our Spirituality" from the Washington Post:
http://washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/nation/science/A10767-2001Jun16.html

"Your Brain on Religion" from Newsweek:
http://www.alchemind.org/neurotheo/neuronewswk.htm

Kind Regards,

Skipper

Moxy

you probably noticed then, that the yearbooks before 1969 (iirc) do not contain hour information. before then they used to record things like total placements and RVs (back-calls) tho i would imagine it would be a little trickier to incorporate that into your research. i dont know if detailed hour information exists at all before then.

when i compiled these stats for myself a while ago, i WAS amazed by how regular the avg hours stats is, compared to other stats that peak and trough wildly. avg hours flows up and down in steady curves and seemed like an excellent general indicator. avg studies is another smooth curve tho id imagine there are additional variables affecting this one.

mox

Mindchild

Yes Mox, the format does change through time with the Year Books. However you can still get detailed monthly information through the Kingdom Ministry and it's precusor but you can also just simply do estimations using the total hours, total publishers, etc. We tried a variety of ways and found most results within a few percent of each other in variation.

There are some secular and outside influences that effect the hours besides nonionizing photic radiation and these include population demographics, the economy, weather, and more. There is also things that surprised us, like incompetency to do simple mathematics for making accurate reports (we found some totals in the Year Books and Kingdom Ministry to be a result of poor math). However, this much should have been expected because of the number of adherents to this sect that are from minimal educational backgrounds and the delegation of roles to incompetent individuals. Ah, sounds like one of the "Peter Principles" in the business world where people keep going up the corporate ladder until they reach a point of maximum incompetency and cannot get promoted above that point. Seems like a familiar story in JW Lala land.

Skipper

AlanF

Love your humor, Mindchild. Please email me so we can get acquainted. I'll be on vacation for the next week, though.

AlanF

Prisca

This is one of the most stimulating threads I have read here for ages!

Thank you Mindchild for your research. At first I was thinking "why would you want to do this kind of research?" but your later posts explain that.

Please update us on your findings.

Sunnygal41

Hi Skip! Enjoyed your information....what I could grasp of it. While I was a very high marks student in science, some of the terms you used were a little beyond me. What I did grasp of your findings was that vibrational energy in the form of magnetism and sun spot activity makes "fanaticism" fluctuate also. (sorry, a little tongue in cheek towards Borg there, couldn't resist) I have read a similar finding from more esoteric sources....those of the New Age group of spiritualists have been predicting for some time that earth would be entering certain energetic phases that would elevate vibrational levels in human beings. Personally, as I read your findings it sounded very much similar to that info. Needless to say, I personally found it fascinating and am sure others would also, especially those readers of Psychology Today and similar mags. Thanks for the info!

Terri

A New Scientific Discovery About J.W.'s

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