Simon, I suspect we'll have an interesting influx of IDZap-ped accounts that will be used only once... to vote that is.
cynicus
JoinedPosts by cynicus
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67
Please help me with the forum
by Simon inkeeping a balance in what is allowed and what is not is very difficult and is more difficult if i have to take action against one person when i have let other things go by others.. it would help a lot if we could stop the personal attacks and some of the name calling & insults that are thrown about.
i know personalities do and will clash but please disagree about the subjects being discussed and not get personal!.
if you think someone is deliberately trying to cause arguments please do not respond to them as this is giving in to what they want.
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order in chaos
by ballistic insome people here seem pretty clued up on science, so can anyone explain:.
does the fact that disorder increases with time (the entropy thermodynamic law), contradict the fact that there is order in chaos (the fact that an underlying order can be found in seemingly chaotic systems).. what goes up must come down
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cynicus
Does the fact that disorder increases with time (the entropy thermodynamic law), contradict the fact that there is order in chaos (the fact that an underlying order can be found in seemingly chaotic systems).
The 2nd Law of Thermodynamics is often misinterpreted, especially by creationists. It is important to remember that the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics applies to closed systems only. As far as I know we have no means of establishing whether the universe is a closed system.
Although I know some astronomically knowledgable JWs who might agree with parts of Big-Bang theory --- arguing that it could be (part of) the instruments god chose to create the universe --- they generally contend also that the universe is by no means a closed system.
God, as a source of dynamic energy injects energy into the universe; I've often heard this argument used in discussions about the moment when our Sun would have burnt all its fuel and might turn into a supernova that would likely destroy our solar system, and how this conflicts with the scenario of everlasting life on Earth.
Where this viewpoint originates is not clear to me. It might me buried somewhere in the literature. I never made the effort to dig it out. Maybe AlanF has a pointer?
Anyway, please find below a reference to some more explanations:
As will be shown later on, it is only the over-all entropy of a complete, or closed system that must increase when spontaneous change occurs. In the case of spontaneously interacting sub-systems of a closed system, some may gain entropy, while others may lose entropy. For example, it is a fundamental axiom of thermodynamics that when heat flows from subsystem A to subsystem B, the entropy of A decreases and the entropy of B increases. The statement that an increase in order can only occur as the result of a directional mechanism, program, or code is misleading. Any process that can be demonstrated to take place with an increase in order/decrease in entropy is arbitrarily deemed to be the consequence of an undefined "directional mechanism."
You can find this and more at:
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"Mists of Avalon"
by Mulan indid anyone watch this show on tnt this week?
it's another version of the arthur legend.
i finished watching it tonight.
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cynicus
Englishman:
I like the vibes of Monty Python's version a lot.
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Can anyone answer?
by Kent ini just got this e-mail, and i'd like to give the guy an answer.
can anyone tell me the recent policy?.
my name is xxxxxx and i am a totally blind braille user and have been blind sense birth.
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cynicus
Can anyone tell me the recent policy?
Only mental disabilities -- absence of critical minds, sommon cense dyslexia, skepto-castratia -- are allowed. Full lobotomies no problem, "evil slave"-phobia a plus.
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Perfection and the Penis
by crossroads indid jesus get circumcised or not?
quote from mark(thats me) "i believe woman was the .
last and greatest creation" of course i have my own.
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cynicus
Just adding some gasoline to the fire I guess...
http://www.quackwatch.com/01QuackeryRelatedTopics/Naturopathy/naturopathy.html
In the first place God made idiots. This was for practice. Then he made school boards. --- Mark Twain
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Submit your favorite quote!
by Spartacus inwhen a difficulty is deep and painful, the triumph is glorious and jubilant.. -spartacus 2001
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cynicus
Seen here recently:
Give a man a fish and you'll feed him for a day; give a man a religion and he'll starve himself to death praying for fish.
:)
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WTS says 215 years - Bible says 430 - Which?
by Amazing in215 years or 430 years?
the july 15th wt study some have been talking about (not sure of which issue of the wt is involved) was quoted as saying this, "when the israelites headed for freedom after spending 215 years in egypt, much of that time in slavery, a vast mixed company also went up with them.
(exodus 12:38) ".
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cynicus
Hi Cynicus: Thanks for the research. So, then, I guess that I am to now presume that the Watch Tower Society is not out of its collective mind? Or could there be more? Thanks - Amazing
As far as chronology is involved the bOrg is pretty bonkers AFAIK. Occasionally someone posts here under the name COJ. He has written some excellent material on the subject and I'm sure you've enjoyed it as much as I did.
I'd say that 215 + 215 = 430 is mathematically pretty solid, but biblo-historically considered to be questionable.
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WTS says 215 years - Bible says 430 - Which?
by Amazing in215 years or 430 years?
the july 15th wt study some have been talking about (not sure of which issue of the wt is involved) was quoted as saying this, "when the israelites headed for freedom after spending 215 years in egypt, much of that time in slavery, a vast mixed company also went up with them.
(exodus 12:38) ".
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cynicus
215 Years or 430 Years?
"The statement in Exod 12:40 that the people of Israel dwelt in Egypt for 430 years is also not without question. [footnote: The figure of 400 years for the same period found in Gen 15:13 (MT and LXX), in Acts 7:6 and in Josephus (Ant. 2,204; War 5.382), is most simply explained as a round number for the 430 figure. For a more complex assessment see Harold Hoehmer, "The Duration of the Egyptian Bondage", BSac 126 (1969): 308-316.)"
"If, however, a shorter and presumably more realistic estimate is made of the probable length of these generations [Bezalel; Elishama; and Joshua] a shorter sojourn can be supposed. A shorter genealogical sequence which also can point to a shorter sojourn is found in Exod 6:16-20 ... we are not told the age of Kohath when he went down into Egypt, if we suppose that his grandson, Moses, was born 80 years later, and if Moses was 80 years old al the exodus (Exod 7:7), we have a total of only 160 years for the sojourn in Egypt."
"In Exod 12:40 an actual textual variant in the Septuagint adds several words, so that the statement reads 'The time that the people of Israel dwelt in Egypt and the land of Canaan was four hundred and thirty years.' ... the Alexandrian-Jewish chronographer Demetrius (before 200 B.C.) ... understood that there was an exact division of the 430 years into 215 years in Canaan and 215 years in Egypt. The LXX text is apparently reflected also in Gal 3:17 which makes the 430 years cover the time from the promises from Abraham to the exodus and the giving of the law. Similarly, and perhaps in dependence upon Demetrius, Josephus states in one passage (Ant. 2:318) that the Israelites left Egypt '430 years after the coming of our forefather Abraham to Canaan, Jacob's migration to Egypt having taken place 215 years later.'"
"Gerhard Larsson (whose comparison of chronology in the MT and LXX indicates that alterations in the LXX are at points where the MT is difficult to understand or self-contradictory) finds a 430-year sojourn-period 'impossible', in the light of the Kohath/Amram/Moses sequence, and concludes that 'at most the period [of the sojourn] could be little more than 300 years' (footnote: Larsson, JBL 102 (1983) : 406). ... for the sake of an interesting possibility in connection with Joseph in Egypt we will add 14 years ... and set down the figure of 314 years."
The "connection with Joseph" mentioned above lines the biblical chronology up with an Egyptian manuscript, the Book of Sothis.
The above is taken from paragraphs 358-363 in Handbook of Biblical Chronology, by Jack Finegan (revised edition, 1999.
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WTS VENDOR LIST - fascinating
by Amazing inthe following is taken from a list i have, but it shows some of the vendors that the society has dealt with on and off.
it is fascinating.
why am i publishing this?
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cynicus
Hell Graphics Systems, Inc. Washington, NY
One of my favourite posters here consistently refers to the bOrg as the Watchtower Printing Corporation, you shouldn't be amazed :) that they have quite some business to do there. And hell, some people are called Hell.
http://www.hell-gravure-systems.com/yourpartner/drhell/drhell.html
For more stuff on font technology, some serious Heidelberg printing machinery, highend Linotype colour scanners etc. do a search on "linotype-hell" on your favourite search engine.
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cynicus
Amsterdam, the Netherlands.