Posts by humbled

46

Paranormal stuff: is it a cultural thing? Rant ahead

by Whynot in

paranormal stuff is common where my family is from it's almost expected.

native american background, my great grandmother was a witch doctor a damn good one too, my non witness relatives dabble in it.

so i have seen stuff and experienced stuff.

humbled

Simon, there is a lot of US culture and entertainment fixated on ghosts and haunted houses. But this topic is, well,broader than Ghost Busters.

There is no disagreement that any thread with the word “paranormal”will set most of us on edge. It does me. The conversation has a tendency to “swarm” as they say here locally. I am not nearly as brave others to talk about personal experiences but l am trying not to be so cowardly that these few brave posters be left twist in the wind of withering ridicule without admitting l too have been unable to find a “normal” explanation for some experiences.

I agree with much of your criticisms. Really l do. But do read thatAnthropology article that has a link. The matter was also addressed by Einstein you know. I believe it is mentioned in the article above.

Certainly skepticism is in order. But just because there are scammers around doesn’t mean there isn’t something that will one day explain some of these phenomena.

I will

27

Weird, weird. Newest internet debate, Laurel or yanny?

by James Mixon in

jw
friends

i heard laurel and the wife heard yanny.

maybe someone can post the spoken word..

humbled

It is Yanny .

We also have a southern cookin cafe that a Chinese couple bought called LlCK’S lLON SKIRRET

They say” Yanny”, too.

46

Paranormal stuff: is it a cultural thing? Rant ahead

by Whynot in

paranormal stuff is common where my family is from it's almost expected.

native american background, my great grandmother was a witch doctor a damn good one too, my non witness relatives dabble in it.

so i have seen stuff and experienced stuff.

humbled

I’ve been thinking about this thread all day. Whynot, Xan, Flipper as well as DFP were brave indeed. While there shouldn’t be a thing wrong with saying “such and such happened , l did thus and so and this is what followed”—there is plenty of pushback to saying anything even when there is ready admission that we don’t know exactly what is going on.

One of the problems in discussing these experiences is avoiding these old worn out triggers, these words that have been laughed in boogie man stories.

When I got the chance this evening, I found this very useful article about ethnography that let me reconsider my own experience of usual events. Ethnographers who had to decide what to do about the “paranormal” experiences of peoples they studied and in reading this scholarly treatment of their own research l decided they provided a way for me to be more relaxed about my own strange experiences . There even is a phrase, a more helpful name they give this phenomenon: subjective anomalous experience .

Psi and the Universe
Writing at the dawn of the twentieth century, the philosopher and early pioneer of psychology, William James, summed up what I consider to be, potentially, the most important contribution of the anthropology of consciousness, and the anthropology of the paranormal, to our understanding of the universe as a whole, when he wrote that no account of the universe in its totality can be final which leaves these other forms of consciousness quite disregarded.'
The unusual phenomena investigated by parapsychologists, and the range of altered states of consciousness and supernatural beliefs encountered during ethnographic fieldwork, are aspects of the world in which we live and the cultures that have developed in it, and as such should not be ignored by the social sciences. Although we are a long way from the outright acceptance of paranormal phenomena as valid subjects for serious investigation by mainstream anthropology, it is promising to see that both contemporary anthropologists and parapsychologists are coming to realize the mutual benefits each discipline can receive from the type of interdisciplinary collaboration suggested by Andrew Lang at the end of the nineteenth century (Giesler 1984; Young & Goulet 1994; Goulet & Miller 2007; Bowie 2010; Luke 2010; Wilson 2011; Young 2011).
Over the course of the discipline's development, anthropology has shifted its focus from attempting to explain away supernatural beliefs to an approach that accepts the significance of subjective anomalous experience in the development of such beliefs without applying a reductive interpretation.
This is a positive step forward for our understanding of the ways in which consciousness and culture interact to create reality/realities, and I look forward to further research in this direction.
Notes
Sections of this article were first published in Edgescience: The Magazine for the Society for Scientific Exploration, Issue 10 (March 2012), pp. 14-18.
* It was Joseph Long's unusual experience in Jamaica that ultimately led to the publication of Extrasensory Ecology in 1977. I think of this anthology as a companion to Long's groundbreaking book on the connections between anthropology and parapsychology.

http://realitysandwich.com/162119/supernatural_natural_anthropology_paranormal/

24

I Went To My Brother’s Memorial Service at the Kingdom Hall

by minimus in

jw
friends

i have to say that the talk was very good.

instead of just repeating a jw manual , the speaker actually spoke about my brother!

there were a few scriptures with the jw hope but 80 % of the talk was actually about the life of my brother.

humbled

There are a lot of nice people in the religion but they all have been dumbed down.

...and numbed.

That is a kind of triumph to have an actual remembrance of your brother, Min. It matters for the person to be remembered.

11

North American History - Red George MacDonnell

by cofty in

greetings to the colonies .

i have come across this individual in the course of some local history research - back in the late 18th c his aunt and her husband owned the estate where i now live and his parents settled nearby.

he gets credit for a victory at ogdensberg in the war of 1812.. is 'red george macdonnell known to the average american/canadian or is he an obscure figure?

humbled

I didn’t know about the guy-

It isn’t US custom to study the heroes of other countries—especially those who hand us our own ass in a sling. MacDonnell didn’t exactly overstep his commander’s orders it seems. He indulged in creative interpretation of carrying them out.

The wiki says he was not well recognized for this action. A bias against Mcdonnell may have been afoot as one source said the credit sometimes was assumed by a Lt.Col. Thomas Pearson. Since MacDonnell was born in Newfoundland l wondered if Pearson was born in the motherland. If so , bias against Mcdonnell may have been afoot if the credit was held back in favor of Pearson.

I favor native-born MacDonnell as the initiating the action. Certainly colonial boys both sides of the border were noted for innovative tactics, more likely to buck authority and seize the moment ahead of orders (for better and worse) But politics, snobbery can play out in the military and not give credit where due.

Interesting bit of history. Somebody kicked US ass back then.

46

Paranormal stuff: is it a cultural thing? Rant ahead

by Whynot in

paranormal stuff is common where my family is from it's almost expected.

native american background, my great grandmother was a witch doctor a damn good one too, my non witness relatives dabble in it.

so i have seen stuff and experienced stuff.

humbled

But relating it on the forum just invites the typical
you're mentally imbalanced
on drugs
influenced by JW land
chemically altered or driven
hysteria has taken you away
and don't forget you're schizophrenic
In the end, if a person doesn't know you, it's difficult to believe that something really happened other than the above reasons.
schizophrenic
In the end, if a person doesn't know you, it's difficult to believe that something really happened other than the above reasons.

The “two witness rule” strikes again!

20

"Demons" Living In My Brothers Gym Equipment

by pale.emperor in

spoke to my younger brother dan yesterday (he da'd about 6 months ago).

he was telling me that he got a visit from our older brother the day before.

our older brother was raised a jw but never committed, lives a full-on "worldly" life - smokes, binge drinks, hangs out with non-jws, but he's been studying for about 6 years would you believe?.

humbled

How come the demons dont live in my older brothers cigarettes and porn collection?
Isn't it funny how demons dont live in banknotes and coins that non-JWs might put into the contribution box?

👻👺 hahaha

46

Paranormal stuff: is it a cultural thing? Rant ahead

by Whynot in

paranormal stuff is common where my family is from it's almost expected.

native american background, my great grandmother was a witch doctor a damn good one too, my non witness relatives dabble in it.

so i have seen stuff and experienced stuff.

humbled

Whynot,

I cannot respond to that particular question. I don’t live in or near the Irish/welsh legacy that formed the essence of my family. My early life was Catholic and did tend accept supernatural events and occasional prayers to saints. Obviously not connected to JWs.

Besides that —the JW literature talks about Satan all the time but, unless memory fails me the narratives of the WT follow prefer to keep the paranormal in a more theoretical place. l cannot recall once when the WT writers maintained that an active JWs dealt with demons.

It’s a tricky topic—not closely associated with scientific metering. Although these hauntings that that occur science explains: My sister moved out of s home after an incident in a closed room—but what she likely suffered from is a well known phenomenon: sleep paralysis . For her it was a ghost hound .to this day. Also..Isn’t it acknowledged by science that sponanteous healings have occurred ?

In my earlier Catholic years the mystical and fantastic interventions of God or the saints was definitely the way l was given to explain matters. Now l see that the incidence of coincidences can be powerful l have to look at how l viewed everything that happened. I might, I could have superimposed a narrative without considering other natural factors surrounding these moments.

But the power of the mind —maybe it does have some power.

That said, l wonder at the several moments of powerful sequential coincidences in my life experience .And l listen to the stories of strange events that others experience-an old German born pioneer sister had wild stories— and wonder. Is it a sense we have lost like a sense of smell? I just let it go now.

But the JW culture l believe keeps a lid on this topic no matter what cultural views you bring to it.

edit: Pale Emperor reminds us that the demons are alive and well in JW tradition . They live in used clothing and other second hand objects.

18

Even elders don’t know their beliefs

by Addison0998 in

i had a deep conversation with my elder father today about the bible.

first i talked to him about luke 16:19-31. the one where jesus makes this crazy illustration regarding the afterlife.

of course he had to look it up on the watchtower library to be spoon fed his beliefs.

humbled

Yes, it's often this way. One eventually gets the idea that the beliefs don't really even matter.

https://youtu.be/qWS2NVX6VP0

11

Borg nearly apologies child abuse victims in Finland

by Festus in

the attached picture is historical.

the man on left is ari hakkarainen, representative of jw in finland.

the woman in middle is reporter susanna päivärinta and the lady at right is josefina pakomaa who was abused by family friend - a jw - when she was 11. a vicious apostate today.

humbled

That guy, Ari, is probably on the way out...l definitely want to watch what happens to him.