Posts by AlanF

77

did snakes have legs

by tijkmo in

questions from readers.

did the serpent lose legs or feet as means of movement as a result of the divine curse recorded at genesis 3:14?.

at genesis 3:14 we are told: "and jehovah god proceeded to say to the serpent: ?because you have done this thing, you are the cursed one out of all the domestic animals and out of all the wild beasts of the field.

AlanF

cyborgVision said:

: I think you should not read into my post beyond of what I have written,

Then your comments were pointless, because you completely misunderstood the point of the post. Even after I've spelled it out for you, you still don't get the point. Let me spell it out for you in as simple English as I can manage:

The original poster's point was not about whether snakes ever had legs. The point was about whether "the curse" of God removed snakes' legs.

I don't see why this is so difficult for you to understand. I even bolded this information in my last post.

: I think I'm pretty consistent with all my posting and respect other people opinion without labeling them as stupid. (No self-respecting academic would ever do that.)

So far as I can see, no one labeled you stupid. Do point out where someone did, if you disagree. Various posters have stated that the idea that God removed snakes legs 6000 years ago is stupid. There's a big difference between labeling a person stupid and saying (an even demonstrating) that an idea is stupid.

The idea that the earth is flat is stupid, given what we know today. The idea that God removed snakes' legs 6000 years ago is stupid, given what we know today.

I'll leave you to judge whether a person who believes the earth is flat is stupid.

: Something that many people here can learn from I'd imagine. I don't care about Genesis account, all I pointed out was that it is not entirely "stupid" idea that snake may have had legs. (that's all, so let's leave it at that)

Which again shows that you entirely misunderstood the point of the original post, and failed to understand my attempt to clue you in.

: I'm open minded enough to at least consider all possibilities without labeling them as outlandish.

So you'd be willing to consider the possibility that the earth is flat without labeling it as outlandish?

I think not.

: I do not know enough about Hebrew theology to be able to make judgment what was meant as figurative and what as literal.

Once again, that's irrelevant to the point of the thread. The point is about what Fundamentalists like the Jehovah's Witnesses believe to be literal -- that real, live snakes had literal legs until God literally removed them.

: What I do know is that there's still a lot to be learned and discovered before we know full story. Labeling something as stupid basically closed the door to reach any level of rationality about the issue at hand.

I see. I guess I'll have to change my mind about your willingness to consider that the earth might be flat.

: By the way by insisting that it is "stupid idea"

Ah! A bit of light! But above, you claimed that you were being labeled stupid. Which is it?

: you are using same tactic as many religionists. Which only lead to quorrel and opposing side will never listen. So what are you gaining?

The same thing as people do who label Flat-Earthism stupid. What do you think that might be?

: At least I do try to use science in all my arguments without resorting to labeling.

The fact that you don't seem able to understand simple English pretty much disqualifies you from attempting to use science for anything at all.

The fact that you posted a picture of a snake gobbling down a frog and labeled it "a snake with legs" proves that your ability to use the scientific method needs much honing before it becomes useful.

: I think people here are way too much focused on "proving" that WTS is wrong, to me its like trying to prove that moron really needs psychiatric attention. What's to prove??? Move on.

A lot of people are still saddled with a mass of stupid Watchtower ideas. They often need help to "move on" because there's so much nonsense they learned as JWs. The point of threads like this is to help them move on.

: p.s. and that about whether it was possible that snake had legs 6000 years ago I don't know

Well you should know. Evolution doesn't work that fast. Alternatively, are you waffling on the reliability of a literal interpretation of Genesis?

: but I know that above photo was taken 2 years ago, go figure.

Geez! A recent photo of a snake gobbling down a frog! Who woulda thunk it!

I think that your statement here demonstrates that you have difficulty comprehending simple English.

: I'd imagine that that part of original DNA sequence may still be hiding somewhere.

Ditto.

AlanF

26

kitty killers

by doogie in

jw
friends

i just read this on cnn.com and thought it was interesting:.

madison, wisconsin (ap) -- although wisconsin residents have voiced their support for a plan to legalize wild cat hunting, some legislators and cat lovers say they will continue their fight.. the proposal would allow licensed hunters to kill free-roaming cats, including any domestic cat that isn't under the owner's direct control or any cat without a collar, just like skunks or gophers -- something the humane society of the united states has described as cruel and archaic.. .... every year in wisconsin alone, an estimated 2 million wild cats kill 47 million to 139 million songbirds, according to state officials.

despite the astounding numbers, the proposal has been met with fierce opposition from cat lovers such as ted o'donnell.. o'donnell, who gathered more than 17,000 signatures in an online petition to oppose the plan, was joined at monday's meetings by scores of other animal lovers who held pictures of cats, clutched stuffed animals and wore whiskers.. .

AlanF

You mean someone put the IE teacher in a microwave and he exploded?

AlanF

26

kitty killers

by doogie in

jw
friends

i just read this on cnn.com and thought it was interesting:.

madison, wisconsin (ap) -- although wisconsin residents have voiced their support for a plan to legalize wild cat hunting, some legislators and cat lovers say they will continue their fight.. the proposal would allow licensed hunters to kill free-roaming cats, including any domestic cat that isn't under the owner's direct control or any cat without a collar, just like skunks or gophers -- something the humane society of the united states has described as cruel and archaic.. .... every year in wisconsin alone, an estimated 2 million wild cats kill 47 million to 139 million songbirds, according to state officials.

despite the astounding numbers, the proposal has been met with fierce opposition from cat lovers such as ted o'donnell.. o'donnell, who gathered more than 17,000 signatures in an online petition to oppose the plan, was joined at monday's meetings by scores of other animal lovers who held pictures of cats, clutched stuffed animals and wore whiskers.. .

AlanF

I don't think that feral cats or dogs should be used as a human food source. They're too prone to being diseased. If people want to eat cat or dog meat, it would be easy enough to start an industry raising them, like pigs or cows. They taste quite good, and grow to marketable size quite rapidly. They can be used in most recipes that call for chicken or pork. Kitty A La King sounds yummy! Or Puppy Chops in mint sauce!

AlanF

763

Daniel's Prophecy, 605 BCE or 624 BCE?

by Little Bo Peep in

hello all, i've been reading your site for a couple of years now, and have found, for the most part, it to be very helpful.

i must say, at first i was very "scared" at what i might find, but contrary to what i grew up learning, there is a "wealth" of information outside of the watchtower organization.

i haven't attended meetings for about two years now, and like many i've read about, have spent many hours researching, telling myself "i'm not wrong for searching", and doing more research.

AlanF

scholar pretendus said:

: I am rather flattered that the prominent posters on this board consider me very dangerous because I vigorouslty defend Watchtower chronology.

Well don't flatter yourself too much. The eminent astronomer Carl Sagan wrote an entire book debunking the crazy but extremely popular notions of Immanuel Velikovsky (first book, Worlds In Collision, ca. 1950), who skeptic author Martin Gardener called "the very model of a crank".

You're a crank, and even cranks can sell millions of books and get a huge following from the ignorant. That's how Russell and his followers got so far.

I can't believe you dared to show up on this board again, after being shown by several posters to be a bald-faced liar. You have no shame, and are no Christian. You're not even a scholar, having flunked out of your religious studies courses.

AlanF

77

did snakes have legs

by tijkmo in

questions from readers.

did the serpent lose legs or feet as means of movement as a result of the divine curse recorded at genesis 3:14?.

at genesis 3:14 we are told: "and jehovah god proceeded to say to the serpent: ?because you have done this thing, you are the cursed one out of all the domestic animals and out of all the wild beasts of the field.

AlanF

cyborgVision said:

: I agree that it may sound incredible but not entirely improbable, whether you believe in god or evolution. In fact, taking evolution in this matter seems easier as it would explain bizarre randomness. Read this: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2000/03/000317051940.htm

I'm not entirely sure where you were trying to go with this post, but your subsequent posts suggest to me that you're trying to suggest that the Genesis account of snakes losing their legs (as claimed by the Watchtower Society) has credibility. With that assumption in mind, I'll comment further:

First, I think that tijkmo's title for the thread, "did snakes have legs", is somewhat misleading in terms of the question addressed by the Watchtower in the "Questions from Readers" article. Note that question again:

Did the serpent lose legs or feet as means of movement as a result of the divine curse recorded at Genesis 3:14?

The point is not about whether snakes ever had legs, but whether they had legs and then lost them as a result of a divine curse. As Genesis 3:14 mentions (quoted from tijkmo's post):

Upon your belly you will go and dust is what you will eat all the days of your life.

The Watchtower then comments:

This is the only place in the Bible where any indication is given that the serpent did not at one time travel on its belly. . . for the symbolic application of this judgment upon the wicked spirit creature who became Satan to have any force there must be a fulfillment of it in the literal serpent, which has come to symbolize Satan. It, therefore, is reasonable to conclude that before God cursed it the serpent possessed legs that elevated it above the ground. As he had the power to create the serpent in the first place, God had the power to transform its body so that it ceased to have legs and was able to move about on its belly.

Understanding this, I commented:

It's a pretty stupid concept, snakes having legs very recently. Imagine putting four legs on a modern snake. The body is so long that it wouldn't be able to support its own weight. That alone clobbers the Watchtower's idea.

Apparently not understanding most of this, you gave a link to an article that discussed the discovery of a fossil snake that had legs: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2000/03/000317051940.htm . However, the fossil snake only possessed hind legs -- which doesn't do much for the Genesis story. Furthermore, the article clearly stated:

Rieppel said that it is difficult to tell how the legs themselves might have been used, since they are too small in relation to the animal's whole body to have any locomotor function. Modern pythons have a rudimentary hindlimb, usually little more than a "claw" of cartilage tipped with bone that they use during mating and occasional fighting, and it is possible that Haasiophis' leg served a similar purpose.

Clearly, this provides no support at all for the Watchtower Society's comments about a snake's legs, but is completely in line with the evolutionary notion that snakes evolved from legged lizards.

Later, you posted a picture of what is apparently a snake with legs, from this URL: http://dakotabirding.com/Snake_wlegs.jpg . You commented:

: Its great to have opinionated discussion but perhaps sometimes you've gotta check your fact too

I have no idea how you found that URL, but a little checking found a similar picture at that website: http://dakotabirding.com/garter.htm . The accompanying caption said:

The garter snake was first observed and thought to have legs. On closer view, we could see it was swallowing a frog and was almost completely done. It ended up spitting the whole thing out later since it couldn't get it further down. (May 25, 2002 Photo: Jean Legge)

So the picture is actually nothing more than a snake swallowing a frog! You've gotta check your facts!

In your last post you said:

: Or haw about this: http://www.smu.edu/newsinfo/releases/99256.html

: Your eagerness to discount anything and everything you've read from the bible might prevent you to examine clear scientific evidence.

I think it's clear by now that you haven't checked the facts or the evidence, or even understood the question. This URL even makes clear that the discovery of a fossil snake with legs supports evolution, not creation.

AlanF

763

Daniel's Prophecy, 605 BCE or 624 BCE?

by Little Bo Peep in

hello all, i've been reading your site for a couple of years now, and have found, for the most part, it to be very helpful.

i must say, at first i was very "scared" at what i might find, but contrary to what i grew up learning, there is a "wealth" of information outside of the watchtower organization.

i haven't attended meetings for about two years now, and like many i've read about, have spent many hours researching, telling myself "i'm not wrong for searching", and doing more research.

AlanF

Alleymom, scholar pretendus has been at this for years. He's been told over and over and over again the same things. He continues to set forth arguments that were long ago blasted to dust. He's a bald-faced liar. He uses despicable ad hominems, and whines like a baby when the tables are turned on him. His admitted purpose on this board is to try to defend the Watchtower Society's lunacy so that other JWs who read material on chronology might be persuaded to continue believing the nonsense. He's been between a rock and hard place many, many times, but he's so pathologically dishonest that he refuses to admit it. No one is that stupid, but plenty of JWs are that stubborn, and that dishonest -- and that kind of dishonesty is something I will not tolerate. I will give no quarter to such people.

I refuse to give in to such disgusting dishonesty for many reasons. I call a spade a spade with people after they've been shown time after time to be deliberately and blatantly dishonest. I will call claimed Christians like scholar pretendus hypocrites when they repeatedly display gross dishonesty. This is not so much for their own good, but for that of onlookers who can see what's true and what's not. If this idiot changes his mind and begins showing honesty, then of course people on this board will welcome him. Sometimes it takes a mighty slap or series of slaps upside the head to wake up a cult member. A number of JWs I've dealt with over the years were much like scholar pretendus, defending the indefensible and refusing to admit even the tiniest problem with Watchtower teaching. They eventually saw the truth, and told me that my sometimes harsh words contributed much to waking them up. Some of them are now my friends.

I consider this sort of dishonesty to be in the same league with the dishonesty that allows the Watchtower organization to put its own interests above that of victims in pedophile cases. Deny, deny, deny facts and responsibility is how JW leaders and minions handle that. Scholar pretendus' conduct is the same. It is that sort of attitude that has led the JW organization to become the disgusting, destructive cult it is today. If you'd seen the horrible things that this cult has done to people -- including many in my own family -- you'd understand why I take the stand I do.

AlanF

23

GB member Dan Sydlik's Exile

by Black Man in

jw
friends

i was talking to an ex-bethelite who was at the 'big house' in the late 60s and early 70s and he mentioned that daniel sydlik was exiled (asked to leave bethel) for a couple years when he married his wife (who at the time was very young and very much his junior).

according to this ex-bethelite, his marriage was somewhat controversial and they didn't want it to stumble anyone at the time, so he still stayed in the nyc area, but just not in bethel?

of course, this was when they had the corporation director format and before they officially adopted the governing body structure.

AlanF

Don't know about Sydlik, but I heard that for awhile, Judah Ben Schroeder was relegated to the Bethel kitchen to teach him humility. I have no actual idea of the time scale, though, but I thought it was when he reached adulthood. He was married many years later, I thought. I also heard that many Bethelites considered him a kind of usurper, not due to his own inner strengths, failings or personality, but simply because he was GB member Albert Schroeder's son. So no matter what the poor guy did, he was doomed by the jealousy of other Bethelites. So it wouldn't surprise me if Sydlik and his wife were subjected to the same kind of pettiness.

AlanF

15

Theory of Gravity wrong???

by cyborgVision in

jw
friends

http://quotes.watchtower.ca/gravitation_and_electric_energy.htm

thank you quotes for bringing this up, i've never read such a bullsh** in my life.

those people up in writing dept.

AlanF

Jesus Christ! That is about the most ignorant article I've ever read! It outdoes anything written by Flat-Earthists and Young-Earth Creationists by an order of magnitude!

It's no wonder that the Watchtower Society's leaders have gotten much more complicated things, like interpretation of current events and "Bible prophecy", so ineluctably and spectacularly wrong during their entire history.

AlanF

763

Daniel's Prophecy, 605 BCE or 624 BCE?

by Little Bo Peep in

hello all, i've been reading your site for a couple of years now, and have found, for the most part, it to be very helpful.

i must say, at first i was very "scared" at what i might find, but contrary to what i grew up learning, there is a "wealth" of information outside of the watchtower organization.

i haven't attended meetings for about two years now, and like many i've read about, have spent many hours researching, telling myself "i'm not wrong for searching", and doing more research.

AlanF

Here, let me give scholar pretendus' stock answers to various posts above:

Alwayshere

Neriglissar is fully docmentted in th Insight vlumes.

Alan F

I have posted information whereupon the Society's complete chronology for the OT and the Divide Monarchy.. Readers on this board can access the Society's publications that I referred to and see the charts for themselves. You, on the other have had a long time to provide an alternative to WT chronology as all you can do is criticize something that you do not have.

Where is your alternative to the WT chronology that is presented in the publications which includes charts of dates for the OT and charts of dates for the Divided Monarchy?The Jonsson hypothesis does not give much credit to Thiele's scheme bevcause Thiele believes in 586 and Jonsson believes 587. So you are in big disagreement with Thiele bigtime. Come on, put up or shut up/

Narkissos

Frankly, WT scholars not interested in to harmonize Neo-Babylonian chronology.

Alleymom

I believed I have gived you a direct answwwer. If some doubt then what date on reigns is published in Insight volumes then I would be agreement with as this contains the information on chronology. If Babylonian gap cannot filled by WT research then that too bad. Too bad.

Leolaia

You have not yet provide a chronology for the OT and for the Divided Monarchy. You have not supplied any substive criticism of WT chronology as you have claimed to have provided. Ihave fully addressed your previous criticisms and showed these to be false.

AlanF

763

Daniel's Prophecy, 605 BCE or 624 BCE?

by Little Bo Peep in

hello all, i've been reading your site for a couple of years now, and have found, for the most part, it to be very helpful.

i must say, at first i was very "scared" at what i might find, but contrary to what i grew up learning, there is a "wealth" of information outside of the watchtower organization.

i haven't attended meetings for about two years now, and like many i've read about, have spent many hours researching, telling myself "i'm not wrong for searching", and doing more research.

AlanF

An absolutely outstanding post, Leolaia!

Let's see if our resident JW idiot, scholar pretendus cum mentula flaccidus -- loosely translated "an idiot who pretends to be a scholar but is really a limp dickhead" -- dares to show up again.

I dare say he will, he truly being the most stupid JW I've ever encountered in 13 years on the Net. This moron is so stupid that he can't even see when his own words are turned around against him. Truly a sad commentary on what JWs can do to a once-functional human being.

AlanF