nelim

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Posts by nelim

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  21

  Paint Nite - fun evening and a new hobby

  by Simon in

  1. social
  2. entertainment

  we (and by 'we', i mean my wife) decided that we should try something new and she, erm, i mean 'we', liked the idea of painting.

  so i enthusiastically (i.e.

  begrudgingly) went along for the night to the "pain nite" event she'd booked us for a couple of weeks ago.. the premise is pretty simple: it's held in a pub or restaurant, all the art supplies are provided, the instructor then walks you through how to reproduce a painting they have chosen for the night and you have a glass of wine or beer, do some painting, have something to eat, have some more wine, more painting, more wine, realize you are drinking the dirty paint water and so on.. here's the site: https://www.paintnite.com/.

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  nelim

  "Pain Nite" lol! I'm sure it felt like that the first time? It would for me! Very nicely done, it's inspiring :-)
  
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  2015 April 28, BOE!--Orchestral Accompaniment!

  by Atlantis in

  1. watchtower
  2. bible

  2015 april 28, boe!..

  re: orchestral accompaniment for singing at congregation meetings.. .. click the green download button.. http://wwwb.fileflyer.com/view/mh6kxar.

  .. .. petra!.

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  nelim

  Haha! Oooooh dear! At least the plinky-plonk piano indicated the rhythm clearly, and still everyone was singing 'all over the place', out of tune and out of beat. At least in my former congregation :-) With those violins etc it's probably going to be even worse!
  
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  6

  How do you feel about the Red Letters?

  by zophar in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  curious as to how you feel about the actual words ascribed to jesus in a red letter edition translation bible like niv on biblegateway.com?.

  do you feel these teachings are inspired and or beneficial to a productive life?

  it seems to me that the actual words of jesus contain real wisdom and show how to live a fulfilling life.

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  nelim

  Relating adherence to "Truth" is already deep into dangerous territory. Elaborating: truth is all things which are true. Personally, you may adhere to whatever you like, but if you preach that to others it tends to get into an organization pretty quickly with all the dogmatism associated with that. That's because sayings of Jesus are not consistent, so it depends on which parts you put more emphasis, what your religion/adherence/whatever is going to look like in practice. Calling this "Truth" means you're denying inconsistencies. Which means critical thinking has been turned off, which opens the door for mind control.
  
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  113

  Are you religious or are you spiritual? Wake up to what?

  by Deltawave in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  there is a huge difference between been religious and been spiritual.

  been religious is about been superior to others in the sight of god.

  however, been spiritual is about self awareness, inner peace and unity with the natural world.

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  nelim

  What does "being spiritual" mean? The dictionary definition says, amongst others, "
  

  of, relating to, or consisting of spirit; incorporeal." ... but if it has to do with the supernatural, where exactly is the boundary with religion? If one writes rules/guidelines how to "be spiritual", isn't one starting a new religion then, effectively?
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  16

  Do you think the 'Rama Singh misquote' situation is uncalled for?

  by neat blue dog in

  1. watchtower
  2. scandals

  let's be honest with ourselves, even if you have an ax to grind with the wts.

  i mean, the quote in question was merely a statement of what he believed to be a fact, or else he wouldn't have said it.

  there was nothing in the quote (and everyone has the right to make accurate quotes under the fair use doctrine), that even remotely suggested that he was pro-creationism or anything like that.

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  nelim

  It is a misquote. If they were just interested in repeating his opinion, why did they put his title "professor of Biology" there? And why did they not include the full sentence, at the very least? "... including biologists, non-biologists, and the lay public."? Mr. Singh is talking about educated people in all kinds of professions, not just biology. Which reduces the value for WT quoting him. And why didn't they (honestly) put something like: "Rama Singh, supporter of evolution and professor of ...., makes the following observation: ..."? That would have been honest towards Mr. Singh.
  
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  16

  I need ideas for my hubby

  by monis in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  i have been out of the org for several years.

  i faded.

  my husband became inactive but still believes that the jws have the truth.

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  nelim

  Allow me to refer you to Paul Grundy's excellent website, especially his "Helping Someone Leave" article: http://www.jwfacts.com/watchtower/helping-someone-leave.php

  Quote: "Generally, arguing doctrine is not a good tactic, particularly at first. All that happens is that you will end up in a doctrinal tennis match, lobbing different Scriptures at each other."

  And: "To get through to a Witness you need to use the Socratic method of asking questions. If you directly attack the organization or its teachings a Jehovah’s Witness will get very defensive."

  It is hard, be careful, but it's not impossible. I hope this helps you.
  
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  23

  Are the writers in the writing department purposely misquoting people?

  by paulmolark in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  after reading that great post about the june 1 article on science i got to thinking.

  although it is great to believe there is this huge group of guys in the jw writing department that are constantly looking to mislead us by twisting the words of scientist etc... i really think it is more likely they are google researchers that do not have the ability to grasp the thoughts that are being expressed in the scientific article they quote mine from.. i honestly believe the reason that this happens is because of the individuals they use to write these magazines.

  these are not college educated men.

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  nelim

  Although there is Google now indeed, Google doesn't have a search button "look for support for this statement"... you'll have to enter an exact phrase (more or less). As Island Man said, thinking about the fact this quote mining is already going on for a long time (Trinity and Creator books, anyone?).... it boggles my mind how much effort they put in to find all these! Imagine.... the number of people required reading all these books, scientific articles, encyclopedias, .... to find a "suitable" quote. Because they do reference a variety of sources. Wow!
  
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  18

  May 2015 JW Broadcast, "The Watchtower Has The Most Multilingual Speakers in the World? True or False?

  by RoyalFlushPhil in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  stephen lett about 33 minutes in to may's "liar liar" episode of the monthly worship broadcast said "jehovah's witnesses have the most multilingual speakers of any organization in the world!".

  the catholic church has the most people i thought, do you think he's telling the truth and where is he getting these facts?

  i finally broke down and decided to watch this in order to work on my reverse witnessing skills, lots of ammunition for anyone needing fuel to extinguish their dirty flames of lies!.

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  nelim

  Haha well spotted, Phil! Another common WT rhetoric. Note that he starts that sentence with "It may well be that ....". It may well be that my foot is attached to my head...! But then again, it may also not be. (It is not, for the record, lol!) Almost anything can follow after "It may well be".
  

  Perhaps all those Catholics only speak one language and are therefore not multilingual. Highly unlikely though, as many countries have a native language (English, French, etc) and a local one. Yet another stirring-up of the "we are so special"! *puke*
  
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  11

  Quote or Misquote?.. Here are the full quotes from the June 1st 2015 Watchtower- How Science Affects Your Life

  by defender of truth in

  1. watchtower
  2. bible

  quote from 1 june 2015 watchtower:.

  quote from 1 june 2015 watchtower:.

  quote from 1 june 2015 watchtower:.

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  nelim

  I think the first two aren't misquotes? WT article says that some scientists think that if God existed, he would have been found. Which is what the quotes say.

  The third and fourth are misquotes indeed.

  The fifth about dogmatism I'm not quite sure why WT has cited it? Seems to me that it speaks against them, as WT believes that Jehovah created it all, so things are as they are because Jehovah created them that way. Which is dogmatic. Which is exactly what the 'quote' opposes; the author wants to keep an open mind. It seems that WT is quoting this to say that rejecting belief in God would be dogmatic, but this is utter silliness of course. Rejecting belief in elves and trolls is not dogmatic; that would be a redefinition of dogmatism :-)

  I think the sixth quote about the Babylonians is just a fallacy on its own. Although I guess that Mr. Evans didn't mean to say that the "no-less-strange" proves there is a possibility of still finding God as it were. I think he just means it as a general statement, there are still many mysteries, but I'm not sure.
  

  All in all, quote a useless article, just raising a bunch of questions without answering anything or enlightening the reader in any way.... but what did we expect? Haha. The articles on the next pages are increasingly worse... "Science cannot prevent crime"? Really? The only reason for not polluting the Earth is because God is going to punish you? Come on now, really?!
  
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  9

  Lets run some numbers...

  by Lemonp in

  1. watchtower
  2. scandals

  after the bombshell that is the may broadcast asking for cold hard cash, i was thinking about the mathematics of the money that they want.

  details are very few, but with help from a few people we could build up a decent guess about cashflow.

  we know that 6 buildings recently were sold for 375 million dollars, tax free i assume.

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  nelim

  Taking ecan6's numbers and considering there are 113,000 witnesses in Canada; assuming those are Canadian dollars? Then I get to about 1.5 billion USD globally. I have glossed over the 2014 year report, estimating 3.5 million "well-paying" witnesses. For some countries taking a factor 1/3. Calculation then is: 61800000 * 0.82 / 113000 * 3500000 = ~1.569 billion USD.
  

  Assuming the 'significant property' was $81 million (taking the Bossert Hotel), and the 'few weeks' is 3 weeks, then I get to 1.4 billion dollars spent. ( 52 * 81 / 3 = 1404 )

  These two seem to be not far off, so I guess these are in the ballpark. Note that these calculations are way too fuzzy to conclude a deficit or surplus on WT's part.
  

  The 3.5 million witnesses sum is: 66+21+24+767/3+134+113+15+14+18+124+163+28+22+248+215+100+2+802/3+29+14+12+122+48+40+165/3+4+11+95/3+108+22+18+1186 = 3530.666 for those who want to check my work (run down countries alphabetically).