just wanted to show the activity in downtown detroit from the convention.
trafic is on jam!.
lots of people .
I'm live posting from my loft balcony as I watch them all walk by.
I don't think I've seen anyone under 40 outside of a few kids and one single mother since I've been watching them walk.
I saw someone from my old hall that had too much tunnel vision to even notice me.
My dogs can't stand all the people walking by and bark at them.
90% of the people look tired and depressed. Only around 10% have smiled or waved even with my cute dogs showing off for them.
we know that christians generally go through ridiculous mental voodoo to explain why a benevolent god allows human suffering, and none of it makes any sense, or is filled with bunk logic.
that's what happens when you try and retrofit a jewish "god is good and evil" religion into a benevolent religion.. .
one of the biggest "trips" to a jw/christian in continuing this line of thought is asking them why god would create animals simply to suffer and die, then, after they try to blame everything on adam (whose brain god supposedly created, and who put him into the exact situation that had an influence on that brain to cause him to sin).
It's specifically how God is described in the Old Testament - the older the book, the "lesser" he is described. And, while Judaism has evolved, that's still the basic viewpoint of the religion today.
Christianity "stole" Judaism's God and tried to retcon it as a more benevolent being while upping its power level to more powerful than any other God. but by doing this, it creates conflicts with a lot of God's actions and descriptions in the Old Testament that need huge apologetics to attempt to fill.
we know that christians generally go through ridiculous mental voodoo to explain why a benevolent god allows human suffering, and none of it makes any sense, or is filled with bunk logic.
that's what happens when you try and retrofit a jewish "god is good and evil" religion into a benevolent religion.. .
one of the biggest "trips" to a jw/christian in continuing this line of thought is asking them why god would create animals simply to suffer and die, then, after they try to blame everything on adam (whose brain god supposedly created, and who put him into the exact situation that had an influence on that brain to cause him to sin).
Even if that God did exist, the reason why he's worshipped (by Christians) is that he is a loving, benevolent God (supposedly). The "loving" and "benevolent" is a human description of that God's actions, according to Christianity. What loving and benevolent person would torture their pets to death for no reason at all?
If you take the Jewish viewpoint that God is good and bad, and a lot less powerful of a creature, then different arguments would apply.
we know that christians generally go through ridiculous mental voodoo to explain why a benevolent god allows human suffering, and none of it makes any sense, or is filled with bunk logic.
that's what happens when you try and retrofit a jewish "god is good and evil" religion into a benevolent religion.. .
one of the biggest "trips" to a jw/christian in continuing this line of thought is asking them why god would create animals simply to suffer and die, then, after they try to blame everything on adam (whose brain god supposedly created, and who put him into the exact situation that had an influence on that brain to cause him to sin).
Also, why would God have to create predators? He's omnipotent - he could make whatever type of system he wanted.
we know that christians generally go through ridiculous mental voodoo to explain why a benevolent god allows human suffering, and none of it makes any sense, or is filled with bunk logic.
that's what happens when you try and retrofit a jewish "god is good and evil" religion into a benevolent religion.. .
one of the biggest "trips" to a jw/christian in continuing this line of thought is asking them why god would create animals simply to suffer and die, then, after they try to blame everything on adam (whose brain god supposedly created, and who put him into the exact situation that had an influence on that brain to cause him to sin).
Raymond,
That view isn't scientifically backed up, however. Not only are "higher thinking" (we're talking, like, cats and up) animals aware of their own pain; they are also EMPATHETIC enough to recognize pain in other creatures that they're symathetic to. In fact, current science is hedging towards even things that we previously thought to not feel pain, like shellfish, possibly having a different type of pain sensory input that we just don't recognize given reactions to their harm.
It also has errors (that invalidate the whole claim). For instance, it's not true that only "higher apes" have prefrontal cortexes. Even rodents do! (and mice are VERY intelligent animals) And even if the claim was true, it's only the author's supposition that this means they "don't realllly feel pain," there's no evidence for it at all.
He's basically doing what the WTS attempted to do when covering this lesson - started from an assumption that humans and animals are uniquely different, and then layering the assumption with, "since God is good, then he must have made their pain different, so we'll just say whatever differences are there are what makes the pain different even though we can obviously see that those animals show the exact same pain indicators that we do when injured!"
The most telling part of that excerpt, though, is that, if that is the indicator of the difference in pain and why it's okay to kill other living beings, it becomes a support for even late term abortion.
just wanted to show the activity in downtown detroit from the convention.
trafic is on jam!.
lots of people .
Judging by the traffic, it SEEMS to be attendence levels for a big game at Comerica Park or something - but that COULD be because Witnesses are clueless about parking/maneuvering downtown and making it a worse cluster-cuss than it normally is.
Also, the Downtown Kingdom Hall hilariously has ben working the past two months in renovating their outside and making it look prettier for some reason (why couldn't it just be what it is?).
we know that christians generally go through ridiculous mental voodoo to explain why a benevolent god allows human suffering, and none of it makes any sense, or is filled with bunk logic.
that's what happens when you try and retrofit a jewish "god is good and evil" religion into a benevolent religion.. .
one of the biggest "trips" to a jw/christian in continuing this line of thought is asking them why god would create animals simply to suffer and die, then, after they try to blame everything on adam (whose brain god supposedly created, and who put him into the exact situation that had an influence on that brain to cause him to sin).
That's why pets are generally used as the illustrative point.
Many people have a cognitive dissonance between animals for food and animals for companionship. We/They generally just block off giving anything we eat any kind of "personhood" while granting it to animals that we let into our homes as a way to continue enjoy what we're eating.
When you know those people have Fluffy or Fido or whatever and cuddle next to them, -that's- what you generally use as the point. Instead of their minds going to "dumb cows" (they aren't really, but it's easy to get that impression) or "dumb fish" or whatever, if the point of reference is something that they care about, -then- it typically becomes an issue. It's something like:
"What would you do if I grabbed your cat, slit its throat while it screamed, put it on a rock, set it on fire, and then happily went home?"
- Angry answer.
"Why would God demand that of countless animals then?"
That same allegory can also be applied to any way an animal is killed in the wild via the natural order that God supposedly designed. "What if I disembowled your dog and let it slowly bleed out in pain for the rest of the day in torture?" "Why did a loving God create a system where similar has happened BILLIONS of times?!" Etc.
It's true that it only works with people that can actually empathize with non human suffering, however, a TON of meat eating humans have animals they empathize with. If that's the point of relation, it's a bit of inescapable logic that drives them crazy.
we know that christians generally go through ridiculous mental voodoo to explain why a benevolent god allows human suffering, and none of it makes any sense, or is filled with bunk logic.
that's what happens when you try and retrofit a jewish "god is good and evil" religion into a benevolent religion.. .
one of the biggest "trips" to a jw/christian in continuing this line of thought is asking them why god would create animals simply to suffer and die, then, after they try to blame everything on adam (whose brain god supposedly created, and who put him into the exact situation that had an influence on that brain to cause him to sin).
Yeah, I became a vegetarian as it was the best balance of not purposely causing animals pain for my pleasure (ie. animals don't -need- to be harmed or killed to support a vegetarian diet, even though they sadly are in most instances), while still being able to survive somewhat comfortably, since a vegan diet would make eating a giant pain and my health would start to suffer. I want to go vegan eventually, but weaning myself to be able to do a livable vegan diet is taking a while.
When my mom would talk to me about Christian morality and my reasons for not practicing, etc. my response became, "you torture and kill animals strictly for your pleasure." Her response was always a variation of "well it's not the Paradise yet."
just wanted to show the activity in downtown detroit from the convention.
trafic is on jam!.
lots of people .
I live in the lofts next to the Kingdom Hall right across from Ford Field, so I'm right there. I even let a JW friend of the family use one of my parking spots in return for him helping out with my mom so much in the past.
Witnesses walking in the middle of the street made me late for work this morning, so I'm already aggravated. My street isn't the "narrow road" that was being referred to, idiots.
we know that christians generally go through ridiculous mental voodoo to explain why a benevolent god allows human suffering, and none of it makes any sense, or is filled with bunk logic.
that's what happens when you try and retrofit a jewish "god is good and evil" religion into a benevolent religion.. .
one of the biggest "trips" to a jw/christian in continuing this line of thought is asking them why god would create animals simply to suffer and die, then, after they try to blame everything on adam (whose brain god supposedly created, and who put him into the exact situation that had an influence on that brain to cause him to sin).
We know that Christians generally go through ridiculous mental voodoo to explain why a benevolent God allows human suffering, and none of it makes any sense, or is filled with bunk logic. That's what happens when you try and retrofit a Jewish "God is good and evil" religion into a benevolent religion.
One of the biggest "trips" to a JW/Christian in continuing this line of thought is asking them why God would create animals simply to suffer and die, then, after they try to blame everything on Adam (whose brain God supposedly created, and who put him into the exact situation that had an influence on that brain to cause him to sin). Answers and their rebuttals include:
- Animals didn't kill each other in the Paradise - sin messed that up.
*There is TONS of evidence that dinosaurs killed, fought, and ate each other, and they still suffered and died in painful ways even without that.
- Animals don't think and work on instinct unlike us superior humans.
*Any pet owner would tell you that's idiotic. They feel, have emotions, predict pain, avoid pain, etc. on various levels. They recognize "self." Apes, dogs, dolphins, pigs, and other animals "feel" on a level close to humanity. The "animals are stupid robots" idea has long been phased out.
Then, if you want to REALLY attempt to hit home, ask them, "In fact, knowing that animals suffer, why do you EAT them and add to their suffering?"
- God told Noah he could eat animals.
*So why would God ADD to animal suffering on top of what they already experienced by creating one more predator for them? Why would a loving God cause suffering like that?
You will never, ever, not get a blank stare where you immediately see the cognitive dissonance breaking and them walking away. In fact, in JW land, this is one of the easiest ways to get someone to stop talking to you - as it's something they encounter on a day to day basis and can't really reconcile. It generally bothers them to come to this realization, so they think that this "bother" is coming from the Devil as opposed to their natural logical senses seeing an obvious contradiction.
