I left in '99. Part of the reason I am out is because I could never, from the age of 14, completely swallow the expected daily regimen of bull. While in the JW, this problem directly impacted the ability to create and maintain permanent friendships, which meant a reduced experience in creating and maintaining (any) friendships at all. Now that I am out, I have infinite opportunity to craft any such friendship that I desire, but I am past a certain social-brain-formative point of really being compelled to. There is no real substitute for an adequate circle of friends in which you can offload and confide, and I have just enough to keep me part of society. But of more importance to me personally: by being as far away from the JW experience as possible, I have infinite opportunity to think, conceive, apprehend, comprehend any idea, thought form or emotion that I please. Anyone leaving would do well to count the cost by assessing how much time they (already) spend in their head versus how much time they (already) spend in human company. (Being out in service, for me, did not count as being in human company.)
Posts by rmt1
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26Recent qutters, do you even have a social structure now?
by oompa inat least when i was in high school, i had lots of somewhat secret worldly friends.
i fit in well for guy with short hair.
my liberal elder/dad let me play on the tennis and soccer team....and go to the prom with my catholic girlfriend...talk about scandal.
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6
Whats unusual about an undergrad attending a prof/grad student party?
by tsunami_rid3r inso i've been hanging around the professional crowd for a while, its much more funner than hanging out with people my own age.
like tonight, i was the only undergrad at my prof's party.
it was cool too because i got to hang with my profs at a more chill setting.
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rmt1
There's a difference between doing what it takes and having what it takes. Doing is ephemeral, having is long-term. Concentrate on having what it takes (to be in the circle), and the doing will follow. Concentrate on the doing without the having, and you will burn out your ambition. Ambition has a certain market value, and tested skills have higher value.
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6
Whats unusual about an undergrad attending a prof/grad student party?
by tsunami_rid3r inso i've been hanging around the professional crowd for a while, its much more funner than hanging out with people my own age.
like tonight, i was the only undergrad at my prof's party.
it was cool too because i got to hang with my profs at a more chill setting.
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rmt1
If you have the goods, then nothing is unusual. Try to detect if they are 1) merely allowing an interested person into the circle, 2) allowing potential future replacements or heirs into the circle, 3) encouraging a rising star to think seriously about grad school in the field, 4) determining your suitability for something, or 5) actually grooming for something.
If none of that, you probably need to compare your networking ability between the two groups. Fellow undergrads as they percolate up into business and career _will be_ useful, and so is the connections of already knowing faculty who have inside knowledge of _current or near-term_ opportunities. Keep a mix. -
119
Could U Please Cite Some Personal Interesting Observations About The Truth?
by minimus infor anyone that looks at this thread, could you write something either profound or simply interesting so as to make the reader see the truth about "the truth"?
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rmt1
Anyone who has time for a JW might consider using an equal amount of time performing a Google search on the following terms: "evolutionary psychology" and "costly signaling". Religion has always and will always have an evolutionary purpose of increasing cooperation and community between suitably vetted participants, while constructing a binary dichotomy against non-participants and abjecting onto non-participants the most vilified components of the participants' actual, whole selves. This constructed dichotomy facilitates, rationalizes and exonerates the securing of resources from non-participants by deceit and by violence, two methods held in the most extreme reserve by rank-and-file when dealing with fellow rank-and-file, or explained as necessary prerogative if used by elite participants on rank-and-file. So, everybody wins except the non-participants. Religion's advantages are only superceded if the individual investor can find them elsewhere for cheaper. The First World happens to live, for the last few decades at least, with free energy, and this has dramatically extended First World life expectancy beyond those where the evolutionary advantages of religion were most required. (Of course, no one who was religious in the era of living-till-60 really deeply appreciated that they were making cold survival calculations when they stuck with the church of their forebears, which is the often seamless beauty of religion.)
But, however attractive religion can be when used by evolution to get humanity up out of one rocket stage and into another, JWs are completely, utterly, off the rocking chair. -
24
Regarding "The End Is So Close" Thread
by senora ini just had another take on that thread, so i decided to start a new one.. i've been going to the meetings off and on lately, so for the ones of you who haven't been in a while, you would not believe how much the the borg is constantly repeating that phrase over and over again.
its like they are trying to spook everyone out.
so everyone is constantly saying that phrase over and over, and i mean everyone.
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rmt1
There should be some kind of elaborate nomenclature for the phenomenon of generational memory, expressed in terms of Sine, Cosine, amplitude, resonant frequency, damped and driven oscillations.
The generation that was young and impressionable to take such actions in '75 essentially hooked themselves into the organization. The lucky ones were able to unhook themselves and get out after the storm passed. The point here is that the WTS at that time needed to perform quick-wristed jerk on the pole to get the hook up through the fish's mouth. You can't just let the fish snif, lick, eat and get away- they needed decisive action to impale or imbarb as many rank-and-file as they could, so there'd be some for the lean times.
Shift one generation ahead (generation of those young and impressionable enough to take such actions now as done in 75), and amplify it with driven ocsillation/ jerk the pole, and they'll have a good catch of hooked, barbed, caught, stuck and YOUNG (precious, Gollum) rank-and-file for the lean times.
It's not about what's going to happen, it's about what resources will be left when it doesn't happen. Good fishers of men in Brooklyn. -
119
Could U Please Cite Some Personal Interesting Observations About The Truth?
by minimus infor anyone that looks at this thread, could you write something either profound or simply interesting so as to make the reader see the truth about "the truth"?
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rmt1
They use projection and transference. They prey on the weak, largely otherwise normal people who have become temporarily adrift financially or socially, people with emotional handicaps, histories of neglect, abuse. The children of JWs, perfectly poised to otherwise have a normal human experience, fall as much into this category of the sick, the weak, the old, the cullable, as do the JW's primary target market of the low-income. The main currency in their belief system is not cash, which would be a cynical observation from an external reference, but insight. Insight is, in their world, better than cash. It exceeds all worldly goods in value. Nevermind that this insight is a completely manufactured product from start to finish. If anyone has played Second Life, there is a virtual currency called "Linden". It is bought with real cash and has value primarily within that particular virtual world in which people have invested their limited resources of time. JW insights are the currency within their virtual world and have no value outside of that world. (By insights I am talking about things they uniquely claim to be theirs (blood, flag, holidays), and not common religious sentiment.) The main thing these lions look for is signs of helplessness, a broken wing, flailing, signs of struggle. When they spot this behavior they set up an encirclement by bringing additional "new faces" to the bible study so that the prey feels they have additional escape routes from their struggle. I'll stop blending this metaphor here by admitting that there is no one point where the lion "pounces" for the kill, except that they will compel you to "take a stand" against some stupid thing or other as a test of your investment in their currency of insights. Reduce the factors and deduce their motivation: They do not *care* about your money. The production values of their products are bargain. If they wanted money they'd go work harder or educate themselves. No. They want your emotional investment in their currency of insights to bolster the worth of their own investment in that currency. It's a pyramid. They vampirize others because their self-doubt about being in the organization motivates a flight response but doesn't know how to flee. The flight response is turned inward by having the drones/rank-and-file chase people who are "fleeing to God's kingdom".
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75
Relative to the Population at large on a 1-10 how do you rate.....
by new boy in1.your physical attractiveness.. 2.your intelligence.. 3.your personality.. with 5 being average.. i don't think many will answer these tough questions.
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rmt1
Pi^2
c
Planck's Constant
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Does 100% Pollution Free electricity cost less than fossil fuel now???
by Elsewhere ini'm a bit skeptical, but i thought i would give it a shot.. i've been watching my electric bill with reliant electricity and over the last year it has gone from $0.09 per kwh to about $0.15 per kw.
i looked around and discovered that green mountain, which provides 100% wind and water electricity, is charging about $0.13 per kwh.. could it be true???
could 100% renewable and pollution free energy actually cost less than fossil fuels and nuclear energy now???
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rmt1
You also need to compare the pollution required during manufacture with the time required to pay for itself (before it is free and clear "non-poluting"). As far as I've read, they pay for their dirty manufacture rather quickly, at least on the massive scale in Netherlands etc.
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ANOTHER 200 Scientists Document Global Climate Change - Yo Deniers!
by Seeker4 inhttp://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/07/science/earth/07climate.html?_r=1&th&emc=th&oref=slogin.
another international slate of scientists have released their findings regarding global climate change and human's effect on that (see the above link).. after the last major study released by several hundred scientists a few months ago, it does seem there is a serious concensus here among the leading thinkers and scientists on this issue.
i know i've banged heads with a few who disagree with this, but it does seem as though that handful of folks who disagree with the science are looking more and more like deniers, as in holocaust deniers, moon landing deniers, etc.. in other words, out there on the lunatic fringe.. so, do you folks think it might be time to reconsider?.
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rmt1
Egypt was a sand lot before 8500BP, at which point there was a sudden onset of humid conditions which lasted for 3000 years until 5500BP, at which point residents of the gamey Sahara had to withdraw to the Nile valley, an ecological exodus to a land of milk and honey which the Bible writer Moses sublimates. The Sahara is right under the latitude of the high pressure component of the Hadley cell, just like the Gobi, Sonoran and Arabian deserts. Wet conditions were an exception. Ah, the Argumentum ad Crichtum. Michael Crichton was a physician and has been an entertainer. To the best of my knowledge, he has never been a meteorologist or a climatologist. While chaos theory was a useful plot driver in Jurassic Park; he redeploys it in State of Fear to obfuscate and exonerate. If he applied it in the same manner as he did in Jurassic Park, chaos theory would address unforeseen or chance runaway effects in climate change. (I also don't throw Al Gore any farther, as he carries the aroma of sensationalism.)
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If every one was an atheist they would not go to war knowing when they die
by jaguarbass inhave you ever thought one of the main reasons we have religion is so people like george bush and osama bin ladin (kings) can get young men to die in battle for them.
to furhter their economic and hedonistic pursuits.. this goes all the way back to bible times, the israelites conquering the promised land for the ruling levitical priesthood.. if every one was an atheist they would not go to war knowing when they die, that is it.
at least not in a former wealthy society like the united states.. the bible& the koran are to serve the kings, rulers to further their agendas of world domination.
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rmt1
I believe you are getting at one of the fundamental truths of existence: conservative Biblically-literalist sexually-abstentionist fundamentalists perform the work of evolution better than do their liberal opposites, who outthink evolution so much that their birth rate drops. IOW, conservative Biblically-literalist sexually-abstentionist fundamentalists harness and channel the power of matrimonial sex more directly into the breeding of future soldiers and patrician wives so as to fill the earth, subdue it, abuse it, exploit it, and exhaust it, all unbeknownst and according to the god named GENE, whom they mistake for some Mesopotamian cumulonimbus herm. Such soldiers with a clearly internalized vision of their afterlife have less problem selling their current existence than would an atheist soldier (look up Hamilton's Rule); atheists who trust to no future sentient existence have only the shaky faith that they might be carried on in public memory for having lived good and meaningful lives. Nihilist anarchist atheists, I firmly suppose, are much much rarer than conservative Biblically-literalist sexually-abstentionist fundamentalists would have anyone believe. The average for atheists, I firmly suppose, would be people who seek solutions in the here and now, because they are quite certain, in an adult fashion, that help in not coming from anywhere or anywhen else. OOPs I must clarify that conservative Biblically-literalist sexually-abstentionist fundamentalists does nto exclusively refer to JWs but might conceivably include a certain cabal in Washington.