Posts by OnTheWayOut

41

Does Believing in God Make You Dumb?

by Brokeback Watchtower in

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rzqaeusdmtk.

http://jdc.jefferson.edu/jmbcimfp/5/.

abstract.

OnTheWayOut

If the entire world around you insists that Santa Claus is real, you are not dumb for believing it. If you grow to be a teen and then a young adult and the whole world keeps proclaiming Santa Claus is real and you never saw your parents putting gifts under the tree, you are still not dumb for believing it.

I don't think belief is mostly intelligence-driven. It is highly emotional and includes much from our evolution, especially the desire to explain things that we haven't understood, so we say "God did it." Our evolution also gives us the desire to belong to the group and the fear to stand out against what the group says and does.

Once a person breaks from the emotional part, intelligence can come in. A person who stops believing in Santa Claus because he gets old enough to figure out that poor children get worse presents than rich children can also figure out that the miracles of his belief system stories are just as ridiculous as the miracles from the belief system stories that he scoffs at.

38

Honestly, Did Jehovah's Witnesses Do Anything POSITIVE For You?

by minimus in

jw
friends

i was raised as a witness and am very thankful that i am out.

having said that, i think my upbringing produced positive qualities in me.

do you believe that anything positive came from your being a witness?

OnTheWayOut

I am not a fan of this type of question.

If my father divorced many times, and I determined not to be like my father, does my one successful marriage give all the "credit" to my father? Or can't I say I did that despite my father?

I could state other examples, but my point is that the credit goes to the one who accomplishes something despite the JW upbringing. Minimus gets the credit for his good qualities, not the Watchtower.

26

Charles Darwin was not an Atheist

by LAWHFol in

personally i have the same viewpoint of darwin, when he said : " the safest conclusion seems to me to be that the whole subject is beyond the scope of man's intellect".

i'm not trying to convince anyone about the existence or non existence of god.. rather, i encourage everyone to keep seeking.

keep searching for the truth that makes the most sense to them.. darwin is the grand father of evolution, and his findings and life work, did not make of him an atheist.

OnTheWayOut

We could also say that facts don't care what you believe. And "you" can include people like Darwin, who had less facts and data available to him at the time.

133

What are the biggest holes in evolution?

by shadow in

how honest are the proponents of evolution?

idk but curious to see what type of response there is on a topic like this or does their study only seek to confirm their preconceptions and ignore uncomfortable facts?

OnTheWayOut

Oh, it's every living thing ON THIS PLANET. It could have happened independently elsewhere in the big wide universe.

133

What are the biggest holes in evolution?

by shadow in

how honest are the proponents of evolution?

idk but curious to see what type of response there is on a topic like this or does their study only seek to confirm their preconceptions and ignore uncomfortable facts?

OnTheWayOut

Every living thing evolved from a common ancestor over millions of years.

That's plenty enough to fill holes. When evolution was theorized, they didn't even know about DNA. The "hole" may be where people who want evolution to be wrong cling to old details of the theory. They break out ON THE ORIGIN OF SPECIES or refer to books/videos/articles that are old.

We are in the infancy of understanding many aspects of our world and our universe. If we keep questioning and accept the facts such as Cofty's assertion above, regardless of what preconceptions we have to discard, we will fill the holes.

32

44 years old and having I.V.F help to have a baby thanks too bastard "this Generation" lies!! Wife wants kids in 2016! My story.

by Witness 007 in

as a young witness married couple in the 1990's we knew "this generation" of 1914 did not have long to go!

oh how cute a young pioneer couple we were.

we wont have kids till "afew more years pass" and we are in the new system.

OnTheWayOut

Hey, my wife and I decided to "obey" and not have kids so close to the end.

She wavered a little bit closing in on her biological clock, but I was awake to TTATT by then.

Now I am glad, as she is still in the cult. I would have done everything necessary to bust them outta that and that would have made all parties feel bad.

32

44 years old and having I.V.F help to have a baby thanks too bastard "this Generation" lies!! Wife wants kids in 2016! My story.

by Witness 007 in

as a young witness married couple in the 1990's we knew "this generation" of 1914 did not have long to go!

oh how cute a young pioneer couple we were.

we wont have kids till "afew more years pass" and we are in the new system.

OnTheWayOut

Vent it here, but try to have, as The Searcher said, the greatest joy and happiness. Good luck to you.

29

What's next?

by Grey Goose in

jw
friends

hi everyone.. thanks for the welcome a few days ago, it was nice to hear your support.. this is a pure speculation thread, but what do you think the next changes are going to be?.

will we see tything come into play?.

more evangelical style meetings?.

OnTheWayOut

Watchtower has never managed as well as Latter Day Saints (Mormons) to appear mainstream. And you gotta hand it to them with their bicycle preachers and magic underwear.

I see Watchtower going more the way of Scientology- pretending to have a huge membership, but really being a real estate holding company with enough assets for the current leadership to stay in ivory towers.

Kingdom Halls will slowly be sold off as membership dwindles. There will be more streaming videos to reach members who don't drive across the county to the nearest K.H. and Watchtower will offer for them to make monetary donations to make up for their lack of physical presence. Print will be a thing of the past.

13

Another Galling Meeting!

by Nicholaus Kopernicus in

yesterday's meeting was again, quite soporific.

however, i felt indignation when it came to paragraph 16 of the watchtower catechism.

it reads..."the remarkable growth that we see today is the result of our faith in god and full acceptance of the bible..."i won't deal with the first part of that sentence here, but the claim at the end - this is just an outright and most egregious lie!

OnTheWayOut

"One Hundred Years Under Kingdom Rulership!"

Ha, only in dangerous mind control cults.

"The end didn't come yet." SO MORE OF YOU CAN BE SAVED. YOUR PRAYERS FOR MORE TIME HAVE BEEN HEARD.

"Adjustments in understanding." SPIRIT-DIRECTED INSTEAD OF INSPIRED. WE WERE NOT ALWAYS RIGHT, BUT WE ARE RIGHT RIGHT NOW.

"What is asked of us is foolish." OBEY NO MATTER WHAT WE SAY AND YOU WILL BE BLESSED. PRETEND WE WERE NEVER WRONG BECAUSE WE ARE PROBABLY RIGHT ON THIS.

"One hundred years under kingdom rulership." SO IT MUST BE IMMINENT THAT WE GET IT RIGHT THIS TIME.

31

The GB know it's all lies and wants to dismantle the WTS ... then what?

by Simon in

so imagine the gb have a sudden attack of honesty and realize "crap, this whole thing is lies - we're not god's spokespeople at all !".

how do you dismantle a religion that has +8 million members in a responsible way?

you can't just publish a watchtower saying "we were wrong" because that would be irresponsible - you need to let people down gently, put people off gradually.

OnTheWayOut

The idea is a bit broad. I mean, we would have to know if the entire G.B. was ready to admit it's all crap, and how far they go in this realization- just the cult itself, or maybe they realize that the Bible and Christianity are crap, or that Flying Spaghetti Monster is just as real as the God of men's creation.

But anyway, assuming there wouldn't be a coup (and there would be), I would say that the G.B. would have to lighten up on things quickly. Get that majority vote to stop shunning- have articles about no longer shunning. Immediately lift the blood ban and encourage closeness with non-JW family. Tell members that birthdays are okay, college is good. They could say that Watchtower is no longer going to insist on blind obedience to standards, but that every "Christian" must decide for themselves whether they will celebrate holidays, vote, get a tattoo, join the military, carry a gun, YADDA YADDA YADDA.

If they are sincere and trying to dismantle things but avoid humongous lawsuits, they can say how there is already enough money at HQ and because of the economy, will ask that no more funds be sent to the Worldwide fund. They can say they are going to have one more round of conventions this summer to announce major discoveries and simply tell people on the first day, "GO OUTSIDE, ENJOY THE DAY, STOP BOTHERING PEOPLE WITH WATCHTOWERS, GET OUTTA HERE."

The coups will be big. Maybe they can address that.