Ask evolutionists how in about 50,000 years humans seemingly evolved more than the previous 50,000,000 years of normal evolution.This seems to be popping up a bit recently. Honest question here, where do you get the idea that this is unexplained WireRider? And why the 50,000 years date? Are you going on the idea proposed by Klein in the late 80s, which is really widely discredited now, that there was a sudden revolution? Can provide the pdf essays refuting his theory if you want?
Mephis
JoinedPosts by Mephis
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Evolution a Fact - Agreed but So What?
by LAWHFol inin many debates between believers and non believers (nb), the nb uses evolution as some sort of proof to support the non existence of god.. i agree that evolution is a fact, however i feel that evolution is proof of some sort of benevolent original cause.. if i were to create an a.i.
, i would program into it the ability to self-refactor and evolve.. i would also randomly inject viruses into the program (evil) where the a.i.
would be forced to stretch its current capabilities & modify it's operating functions in order to get through the random virus, and continue living.. with a steady flow of different viruses, the a.i.
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Mephis
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"If I wasn't born a JW, I would never have become one."
by OneEyedJoe ini've seen it mentioned by a few on the forum that at some point there was a realization that had they not been born a jw, they never would've converted no matter how many times the jws tried to study with them.
this was my experience too, and i'm wondering how universal it is for those that were born-in but eventually left.
i think i started having this thought (more specifically that if i were not born a jw, i would surely have become an atheist by now) in my late teens.
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Mephis
I was in my pre-teens when I realised that this was something my parents did, not something I believed in. The 'personal relationship with Jehovah' idea rings a bell - I'd no idea what it was. Still don't really understand it. Does he talk back? I asked really honestly and was listening hard for a reply. But, yeah, not something which happened for me.
Was always a bit geekish and bookish though, and I was reading stuff which was dismantling the whole Abrahamic religion belief set through the historical evidence really. Would have been an even quicker process if the internet had existed - having to chase down the sources via interlibrary loan was a slow process! Wouldn't have really resolved the problem of being a minor stuck inside. Possibly would have given a better twist to how I did end up leaving, at least in terms of dealing with things afterwards.
Know that feeling described in the OP very well. Everything had to be questioned and tested again. Even more recently, it's been the past couple of years where I've properly dealt with some lingering niggles which were still there. I found it very disorientating as a late teen, especially with the shunning thing going on and coming out of a very sheltered life. Still find the whole thing rather curious and difficult to explain at times. Is what it is.
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Conversation with a Biblical scholar - Richard Dawkins
by CookieMonster inquite interesting when you look at the bible objectively and the historical records.
it highlights the problems of using the bible as authoritative and validation of history.. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lxcutg0lvr0.
spoiler: didn't know that the immanuel prophecy attributed to jesus as being born from a virgin is actually a mistranslation.
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Mephis
doublepost.
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Conversation with a Biblical scholar - Richard Dawkins
by CookieMonster inquite interesting when you look at the bible objectively and the historical records.
it highlights the problems of using the bible as authoritative and validation of history.. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lxcutg0lvr0.
spoiler: didn't know that the immanuel prophecy attributed to jesus as being born from a virgin is actually a mistranslation.
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Mephis
Hi Kepler,
Yeah, the evidence for a temple of Solomon is limited to the tradition rather than the archaeology. There have been some recent excavations at a site outside the original walls from the city which may correspond with a description of a royal palace being in a place which fits the biblical account, and that would then help further buttress the location of the temple. Mazar was the archaeologist, was billed as 'David's Palace', but it's worth reading Finkelstein's rebuttal too - he holds a very 'minimalist' position and I always find him a useful guide on how far things can be interpreted without reference to the bible. Mazar in particular has had a couple of digs where the dating seems shoehorned to fit the bible.
General point though is that even, say, Finkelstein accept that something was happening in the hills. His suggestion remains that the 40 years of David/Solomon isn't actual time so we're very much in the stuff of legends. Even if they could dig on temple mount, I suspect the remains of any pre-exilic temple would be at best some re-used masonry. If that. Don't think there's any reason to fully doubt the existence of a cult sanctuary (of some type) there though?
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Starlight in a Young Universe
by Perry inthe scientific method begins with a faith statement called a hypothesis, and then goes on to look for evidence, for or against support of the faith statement.. secular materialists often change their ideas on exactly how things have made themselves, but never whether they did.. the manifesto for this self imposed mental ban seems to be summed up by geneticist richard lewontin:.
‘our willingness to accept scientific claims that are against common sense is the key to an understanding of the real struggle between science and the supernatural.
we take the side of science in spite of the patent absurdity of some of its constructs, in spite of its failure to fulfill many of its extravagant promises of health and life, in spite of the tolerance of the scientific community for unsubstantiated just-so stories, because we have a prior commitment, a commitment to materialism.. it is not that the methods and institutions of science somehow compel us to accept a material explanation of the phenomenal world, but, on the contrary, that we are forced by our a priori adherence to material causes to create an apparatus of investigation and a set of concepts that produce material explanations, no matter how counter-intuitive, no matter how mystifying to the uninitiated.
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Mephis
There is only a "controversy" with those that won't accept facts. The existence of young dinosaur soft tissue, blood cells, DNA etc. is well documented.
The dimwit who wrote that article somehow has managed to confuse 10,000 years and 1.5 million years. The article in Nature covering the study is here: http://www.nature.com/news/dna-has-a-521-year-half-life-1.11555
If a creationist needs to lie (and yes, that is a lie) about something as simple as a scientific paper he's quoting then it's pretty clear that the discussion is not a scientific one. The dinosaur DNA idea is widely disputed - I know, socially, people who work with remains much more recent than that and who are at the cutting edge of the field. We're only just about able to pull out Denisovan and Neanderthal DNA from a couple of hundred thousand years ago. So there's no controversy about something which hasn't passed peer review studies. Collagen and red blood cells, if not contamination, then that's still being kicked about to see if it stands up.
Science isn't a religion. You disprove a major theory, you get tenure and a Nobel prize and your name goes into history. You disprove a religion's foundational beliefs and all the believers get upset and start looking for pitchforks and torches.
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This idiot just embarrasses me.
by joe134cd inyup a mentally diseased apostate.. http://youtu.be/e7qmypu7mxo.
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Mephis
Has anyone here been 'woken up' by direct activism like that guy does? I know that sort of thing didn't have any part to play in me coming out, if anything it just cemented in a stereotype of apostates even many years after I'd left. But I wonder if there are those who it does work for? -
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Is proselytizing less condescending when evolutionists do it?
by paul from cleveland inis it just me?
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Mephis
No amount of copy and paste about our DNA or common ancestor and whatever which change the fact in a relatively short period of time or milli-second in evolutionary terms can explain who one species went from cave paintings to putting a man on the moon.
In fairness, that's a history question rather than a biology one once the fundamentals of speech and toolmaking are in place.
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What is the alternative to JW?
by Formerbrother ini mean this with all due respect, i would like to hear from genuine people who think jw have it wrong and then what is the truth?.
im not talking about silly little quibbles here and there.. is jehovah real?
the the bible is word?
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Mephis
Sounds like an excuse to me, I still say either believe all the Bible or non of it.
At least the JWs are the only ones who believe all of it.
Others say they do, but when it comes to men laying with men, or the blood issue, then that is what sorts the true religion from the false.All the bible. Ok. Here's Jehovah (Yahweh) in action. This is the true religion, right?
The morality of the divine patron can seem very foreign to modern sensibilities. For example, since ancient Near Eastern society was patriarchal, treating women as subordinate to men, it follows logically that the divine patron also treated women this way. A biblical example illustrates the point. In 2 Samuel 11–12, King David covets another man’s wife, takes her, and later kills the husband when the woman becomes pregnant. According to the story, the patron god, Yahweh, is angry, but not because David has raped and murdered. Yahweh expresses disgust that David has taken the wrong man’s wife, for he, Yahweh, is eager to give David the wives of other men if David desires them (12:7b–8). As punishment for David’s sin, the woman’s child shall die and another man shall rape several of David’s other wives (12:9–14). The moral values of Canaanite culture are clearly on display in this tale: the divine patron punishes a man by killing a child and orchestrating the rape of other women. The divine patron protects the property of males by violating or destroying the property of other males. Religious morality is a by-product of social prejudices.
Kurt Noll. http://people.brandonu.ca/nollk/canaanite-religion/
Don't give blood to save someone's life, because that makes him sad and he'll kill you. Only rape the right women (!!!), or he'll be sad and have your wives raped and kill children. That's the god JWs want to worship. Forgive me for not giving a damn what he says about consensual sex between adults.
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for those still interested in bible discussion check out this website
by nowwhat? inhttp://www.discussthetruth.com/.
it's an objective forum in association with beroean pickets.
for those like me who are fed up with the organization but still believe in gods word.. snarky comments to follow!
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Mephis
No snark here. Good luck with it and hope it helps people with the leaving process. -
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Conversation with a Biblical scholar - Richard Dawkins
by CookieMonster inquite interesting when you look at the bible objectively and the historical records.
it highlights the problems of using the bible as authoritative and validation of history.. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lxcutg0lvr0.
spoiler: didn't know that the immanuel prophecy attributed to jesus as being born from a virgin is actually a mistranslation.
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Mephis
Is there an explanation for Judah's existence that completely sidesteps Solomon and David? How about that Temple attributed supposedly to the clan?
There's a fair bit of theory to explain the archaeological evidence without needing biblical David. Lot of stuff published in 80s and early 90s comes from that angle. A King Arthur type figure for later scribes, or you could even do the links to Horsa and Hengist who similarly stand on that boundary between being plausibly based on historical figures and full on mythological founding fathers. I can't think of anything current which totally dismisses the bible stories, especially not with the House of David evidence now. Something seems to have happened in the hills which could plausibly be explained by a centralised power arising. 'If not the biblical David, another man of the same name' kind of thing.
With the temple, the evidence is for numerous smaller 'shrines' around Israel even until, say, Josiah's time. eg references to Yahweh of X (not Jerusalem) have been found which kind of hints towards a less centralised religion than the picture painted by the bible stories So I would wonder about how far a single 'temple' even in Jerusalem really was the main focus for Israelite worship and how much is actually later creative interpretation of history by writers. Against that, if there were a new centralised state arising in the hills then an attempt to centralise a religion/cult would also make sense as something which would happen around the same time. Or at least an attempt to have a major new cult site act as a focus. Herding cats one suspects.