There are many books on the the origins of belief from an evolutionary standpoint.
The ideas in these books go some, if not all, of the way to explaining the preponderance of different religions and belief systems throughout the world and throughout time.
uk humanist
JoinedPosts by uk humanist
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39
The Bible. Despite many reasons to dismiss it why do so many believe?
by nicolaou ina man cannot walk on water, truly dead people do not come back to life and 1 + 1 will never equal 3. these are just a few of the absurd impossibilities that one must swallow and accept in order to 'believe' the bible.. why does the belief that the bible is 'truth' persist?.
men cannot survive a fiery furnace unscathed, the sun cannot stand still in the sky and donkeys cannot speak hebrew.
unless you believe the bible.
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uk humanist
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I'm going back to the JW's
by Honesty inif you can acccurately disprove the mathematics in the following i will be at the local kingdom hall first thing in the morning and ask the elders if i may rejoin them in worship.. here is some information i have compiled regarding what the watchtower has printed in regards to the babylonian kings and how the lengths of their reigns can be calculated to arrive at the date of the destruction of jerusalem by nebuchadnezzar.
if you're like me you've probably remained totally clueless whenever the subject of the chronology leading to back 607 b.c.
as the date for the destruction of jerusalem by nebuchadnezzar comes up.
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uk humanist
Sorry, I'm new to this forum, and I've never been a Jehovah's Witness.
I have to ask:
Is this scholar guy for real?
If so, his comments seem a testament to the statement "never underestimate the power of denial".
Even forgetting the starting point of the 1914 calculation, the rest seems to be pure conjecture too, it's a house of cards.
It interests me how every end-of-world sect believes the end of the world will be 'in their lifetime', and massages the numbers (in an obvious and ridiculous manner in this case) to provide evidence for it. It doesn't ever seems to be anything like 'in the year 5010...'. -
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WHAT IS A MEME? (mind virus controls behavior?)
by DannyHaszard inwhat is a meme?
(mind virus controls behavior)
christianity meme
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uk humanist
A meme can be as simple as making neat folds in the end of the toilet roll in hotels.
As you have identified regarding the watchtower, religious ideas are also a meme.
Dr. Susan Blackmore , a self-declared memeticist, describes memes thus:
"Memes are habits, skills, songs, stories, or any other kind of information that is copied from person to person. Memes, like genes, are replicators. That is, they are information that is copied with variation and selection. Because only some of the variants survive, memes (and hence human cultures) evolve. Memes are copied by imitation, teaching and other methods, and they compete for space in our memories and for the chance to be copied again. Large groups of memes that are copied and passed on together are called co-adapted meme complexes, or memeplexes."
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ARMAGEDDON IMMINENT WTS PR media push !
by DannyHaszard insplashy watchtower pr puff piece extravaganza
photo and video
walking for jehovah
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uk humanist
The reason we're so concerned is the times we're living in. No one can deny the times are critical.
I absolutely deny that the times are critical. That's that argument blown!
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An Inconvenient Truth.
by Blueblades inthe planetary emergency of global warming and what we can do about it.
al gore.
has any read this book or seen the movie?
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uk humanist
You still seem to be saying, correct me if I'm wrong, "don't try to improve the situation, because there is a possibility that the wrong action could be taken"?
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An Inconvenient Truth.
by Blueblades inthe planetary emergency of global warming and what we can do about it.
al gore.
has any read this book or seen the movie?
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uk humanist
I will offer an analogy - that of Margaret Meade (the so-called anthropologist of the south sea islands of the 1920's). She taught a sort of pre-hippy "free love" amoral culture of the South Pacific islands as mankinds natural behavioral order. Modern society with its mores and rules were said to be artificial results of prissy religions. This was soundly debunked in the 1980's because it was discovered that she was just apeing her mentors and giving positive vent to her own personal lifestyle. She had barely visited the cultures in question - having spent most of her time in various "social" activities. Those who opposed her view, however, were taken to be krackpot nuts by the mainstream university professors, and were immediately supressed. She is still taught in most courses on this subject because she was famous and it has become the norm. The only two girls she is supposed to have interviewed on the island have long since renounced her accounts.
Thats a false analogy - one person getting it wrong in a niche area of science does not equate with a global conspiracy between countless individuals in one of the most highly visible areas of science. I'm not yet convinced of any reason to distrust these people? Given that they have the best access to evidence, and experts in the field, it will take a lot to persuade me that they are lying, or misguided. Let's start with motive - what's there motive?
Can you imagine the "risk" we would take by instantly dismantling our electric power grid and current transportation systems worldwide (including rail, sea, air, as well as the highway vehicles)? Or by doubling our fossil fuel power production to run minimal electric cars? Or to try and replace it all with nuclear fission? How do you know that the third world developing countries would not just burn oil and coal to more than make up for those who made the sacrifice. Brazil is in fact, still a petroleum importer - they only make about twice as much fuel ethanol as we do - and have done great ecological harm to their native forests to grow that much sugar cane. I submit that if poorly researched panic mode plans are taken, then we might prove to be more "sorry" than "safe".
I agree, we shouldn't implement 'poorly researched panic mode plans'. I guess your saying "don't try to improve the situation, because there is a possibility that the wrong action could be taken". If everyone followed that logic, we'd still be in the pre-stone age.
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Do we have non-Biblical evidence that Jesus Christ existed?
by Inquisitor inwhat non-biblical, historical evidence proves or supports the notion that jesus once existed as a living, breathing jewish man?
i'll start with the one that i used to swear by back when i was a good jw.
the roman historian suetonius (c. 69-140 c.e.
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uk humanist
Don't you think it's odd that the evidence is so weak, given the absolutely amazing events that occurred during this man's apparent existence?
Accepting that this situation does not make sense (ignoring the fact that sky gods and god men from the mists of time do not make sense either), this leaves two possiblities:
Jesus was real but didn't perform miracles, in which case what does this person matter?
Jesus wasn't real.
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An Inconvenient Truth.
by Blueblades inthe planetary emergency of global warming and what we can do about it.
al gore.
has any read this book or seen the movie?
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uk humanist
I haven't read the book, but according to Wikipedia:
Crichton included a statement of his own views on global climate change at the end of the book, affirming that the world is heating up, but arguing that the causes, consequences and benefits or harms of this change are unknown. He warns both sides of the global warming debate against the politicization of science, and endorses the preservation of wilderness and the continuation of research into all aspects of the Earth's environment.
Is this not correct? It seems to disagree with "Is it caused by man? NO" as a fact presented by the book?
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An Inconvenient Truth.
by Blueblades inthe planetary emergency of global warming and what we can do about it.
al gore.
has any read this book or seen the movie?
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uk humanist
This is an interesting blog post from a climate scientist about the 'arguments' in Crichton's book:
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php?p=74
Global warming may well be due to the natural swing between temperatures that the planet has experienced throughout history. But it would seem a majority of climatologists consider it probable that human causes are adding to or speeding up this warming effect:
In its 2001 report, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change stated, "There is new and stronger evidence that most of the warming observed over the last 50 years is attributable to human activities."
I find it hard to believe that there is a global conspiracy between scientists from around the world, what purpose would this serve?
Ultimately, if it could possibly relate to our activities (which seems likely), and we won't enjoy the consequences, why take the risk that the people with the most information are wrong? ...better safe than sorry would seem to be a sensible approach, given that we don't have any spare planets to live on. -
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uk humanist
Kero... You're saying that buying a military card in Mexico wasn't a problem for the GB because it wasn't illegal. But buying a party card in Malawi wasn't illegal either, so in your view, what justifies the difference in orders, the hypocrisy, from the GB in this case? Also, I don't believe you've read Raymond Franz' books. It appears to me from reading them that he has made a conscience decision to absolutely avoid saying anything that might sound bitter, because it would devalue his work. Can you give us a quote which you think exposes this bitterness you describe?