Posts by Jeffro

120

The right to shun - wrong?

by Simon in

many people are understandably upset and angry at the notion that jws have the right to shun people.

it seems such an obvious "no brainer" cruel and inhuman thing to do - it must be wrong ... surely?.

of course we look at things from the perspective of those hurt and harmed by shunning.

Jeffro

Simon:

What would the legislation look like? How would it be worded to only apply to religious shunning?

There is no reason why such legislation would need to apply only to "religious shunning". It would apply to organizations that direct people to shun others.

Would it be of any value if people were still shunned? What would the penalties be?

Similar to other anti-discrimination laws.

Would it mean people who should be shunned couldn't be? (e.g. child molesters)

People should be given specific warnings about individuals who may pose a threat to society (or to vulnerable groups in society) and individuals can then make their own informed decisions about who they associate with, but that doesn't mean that certain people 'should' categorically be 'shunned'.

There's a big difference between "keep children away from A because he's a convicted child molester" and "don't talk to A because we said so".

120

The right to shun - wrong?

by Simon in

many people are understandably upset and angry at the notion that jws have the right to shun people.

it seems such an obvious "no brainer" cruel and inhuman thing to do - it must be wrong ... surely?.

of course we look at things from the perspective of those hurt and harmed by shunning.

Jeffro

Simon:

Everyone has to have the right to shun people. There is simply no way on earth that the opposite can be legislated for.

Whilst it is extraordinarily unlikely that legislation would be introduced to ban shunning, it is entirely possible to introduce legislation that prevents organisations from directing its members to shun people.

JWs shun because they are told to.

45

Cedars leaked letter requested to be taken down by WTBTS

by umbertoecho in

i don't know if this is already posted so sorry people if it is.

cedars site has had a request to take down the leaked letter regarding changes to the theocratic ministry school and other issues.. the reason given by wt is that it is a "copyright" issue.

of course this validates the letters authenticity even more.. have a good day or night people.

Jeffro

Village Idiot:

Are those letters copyrighted?

Copyright implicitly applies to any original work, and does not have to be registered. Copyright can therefore be asserted for the letter.

4

Server Error when using "Governing Body" in Search box

by Tenacious in

i have tried many times to use the words governing body in the search box field but i get a "server error" message every time.. anyone else experiencing this?.

Jeffro

Most likely demonses.

72

Arctic Ice Increasing

by Perry in

arctic has gained hundreds of miles of ice the last three years.

red shows the september 2012 minimum extent.

green shows the current extent, which is likely the minimum for 2015. the arctic has gained hundreds of miles of ice over the past three years, much of which is thick, multi-year ice.. article.

Jeffro

Perry:

I thought Leonard Nimoy was Vulcan

You may be losing your grip on reality.

72

Arctic Ice Increasing

by Perry in

arctic has gained hundreds of miles of ice the last three years.

red shows the september 2012 minimum extent.

green shows the current extent, which is likely the minimum for 2015. the arctic has gained hundreds of miles of ice over the past three years, much of which is thick, multi-year ice.. article.

Jeffro

Perry:

It is really amazing to me how normal good folks like the ones on this discussion board could have suffered so much from deception by their leaders in the Watchtower, only to put full trust in seemingly every band wagon that comes down the pike.

Correlation fallacy - faulty implication that 'Watchtower deception' has any bearing on accepting climate science
Ad hominem - ignoring view of 99% of climate scientists and focusing on forum members instead
Sweeping generalisation - recognising global warming supposedly means accepting everything

72

Arctic Ice Increasing

by Perry in

arctic has gained hundreds of miles of ice the last three years.

red shows the september 2012 minimum extent.

green shows the current extent, which is likely the minimum for 2015. the arctic has gained hundreds of miles of ice over the past three years, much of which is thick, multi-year ice.. article.

Jeffro

Perry:

Global population of polar bears has increased by 2,650-5,700 since 2001

Nope. The blogger conflates reviews of estimates with assumptions about actual numbers.

72

Arctic Ice Increasing

by Perry in

arctic has gained hundreds of miles of ice the last three years.

red shows the september 2012 minimum extent.

green shows the current extent, which is likely the minimum for 2015. the arctic has gained hundreds of miles of ice over the past three years, much of which is thick, multi-year ice.. article.

Jeffro

Perry:

Time Magazine sums it up for me:

Ah yes... the peer-reviewed journal... Time magazine. Wait... what?!

16

Solomon's Temple construction, things you realize when no longer asleep.

by Crazyguy in

ok so in 1kings chapters 5-6 is where we have the story of the construction of solomon's most holy temple to god, the supreme god.

it says that to build this magnificent temple they used 30,000 men, 10,000 per month.

another 70,000 common laborers in the hills digging up stone and 80,000 stone cutting laborers.

Jeffro

hoser:

The other thing if could not figure was how long did it take to walk to the outside of the camp of Israelites to take a dump? There was supposed to be a few million that left Egypt It would be a long walk if you really had to go bad.

The simple answer is that the 'exodus'' never happened. Aside from the story being obviously fanciful, there is no evidence at all of the Jews wandering in the desert for 40 years.

The claim that there were millions of Jews is also overstated (speculatively given as 3 million in JW literature). Even by the time of the Babylonian exile, the figures recorded at 2 Kings 24:14 and Jeremiah 52:28-30 show that the population was much lower.

16

Solomon's Temple construction, things you realize when no longer asleep.

by Crazyguy in

ok so in 1kings chapters 5-6 is where we have the story of the construction of solomon's most holy temple to god, the supreme god.

it says that to build this magnificent temple they used 30,000 men, 10,000 per month.

another 70,000 common laborers in the hills digging up stone and 80,000 stone cutting laborers.

Jeffro

According to the story, initially provided for the temple were 100,000 talents of gold and 1,000,000 talents of silver, in addition to even greater amounts of bronze, iron, wood and stone (1 Chronicles 22:14). A talent = about 34kg, so that's 3,400 tons of gold and 34,000 tons of silver, plus the other materials. Gold is 19.3g per cubic cm, and silver is 10.49g per cubic cm, meaning 176 cubic metres of gold, and 3241 cubic metres of silver. (If the gold and silver were actually either alloyed or contained impurities, the density would be lower so the volume would be even more.) David then supplies an additional 102 tons of gold and 238 tons of silver (1 Chronicles 29:3, 4). The 'princes' supply another 170 tons of gold, 340 tons of silver, 610 tons of bronze and 3,400 tons of iron (1 Chronicles 29:6-7). The temple was supposedly 60 cubits long, 20 cubits wide and 30 cubits high (1 Kings 6:2, 3). A cubit is about 44cm, so the volume of the temple (excluding the 'portico') was about 3067 cubic metres. Even if the main part of the temple were a *solid block of silver*, there would still be silver left over to put 'on top' of the 'portico', which would be a *solid block of gold* over 4.5 metres high. And there's no room for the copper and iron and stone and wood, which would have to go somewhere else.