Posts by FrightMare

i remember in one of my bethel entrants school classes, the instructor commenting on the events that went down in genesis chapter 3 and commenting that one of the reasons why the serpent was so persuasive was because he "evidently" partook of the tree of the knowledge of good and bad.

because he had taken such a course, he could persuasively convince eve to do the same.

i can't remember what source material he used to support this assertion.

FrightMare

Black dude,

That's the most logical explanation I could think of, that's why I agree with it.

80

Nov. 8 Awake - Wife Beaters-Sick

by MrMoe in

jw
friends

i will let you all hang who ever the heck wrote this crap.

november 8, 2001 awake page 9: some battered women may need to seek assistance from the authorities.

at times, a point of crisis-such as intervention of the police-can cause an abusive man to see the seriousness of the action.. page 12: should the battered wife leave her husband?

FrightMare

Women are so ridiculously stupid, especially the ones who need someone to tell them to leave an abusive relationship, and can't do it on their own. I mean, even cats are smarter than that.

8

Donations my Ass

by FrightMare in

jw
friends

i think we should all objurgate those who boast about donating to the sep 11th fund, red cross, or any other loser fund.. that dumb ass mayor giuliani is the worst thing that could happen to ny, he absolutely fettered the rescue work to a grinding halt.

the hard working, almost indefatigable rescue workers could have accomplished something with the billions of pounds of rubble, if only that asshole epicene giuliani knew what he was doing, and was capable of coordinating and directing a massive rescue mission.. all the dollars you are pulling out of your pockets are now wasted because of that ass.

there are no survivors left (because of that ass).

FrightMare

Hillary,

it's board, not bored.

8

Donations my Ass

by FrightMare in

jw
friends

i think we should all objurgate those who boast about donating to the sep 11th fund, red cross, or any other loser fund.. that dumb ass mayor giuliani is the worst thing that could happen to ny, he absolutely fettered the rescue work to a grinding halt.

the hard working, almost indefatigable rescue workers could have accomplished something with the billions of pounds of rubble, if only that asshole epicene giuliani knew what he was doing, and was capable of coordinating and directing a massive rescue mission.. all the dollars you are pulling out of your pockets are now wasted because of that ass.

there are no survivors left (because of that ass).

FrightMare

I just think you should be sending money my way, I make a better mayor than Giuliani.

11

The Serpent Ate the Fruit

by Black Man in

jw
friends

i remember in one of my bethel entrants school classes, the instructor commenting on the events that went down in genesis chapter 3 and commenting that one of the reasons why the serpent was so persuasive was because he "evidently" partook of the tree of the knowledge of good and bad.

because he had taken such a course, he could persuasively convince eve to do the same.

i can't remember what source material he used to support this assertion.

FrightMare

The insight book further expounds on this point.

The WT will always depicts the serpent on the tree of knowledge of good and bad in its illustrations, never near it, or slithering on the ground. Their rendition seems very likely to me. The woman could not have been easily convinced by an animal talking to her. I mean, think about it, even a 5 year old child knows that serpents don't talk.

But the serpent was showing Eve by example that the tree was not harmful as God said it was, but rather, it was beneficial. Just look at the results, look what it did to a mere serpent, imagine what it could do for a human!

8

Donations my Ass

by FrightMare in

jw
friends

i think we should all objurgate those who boast about donating to the sep 11th fund, red cross, or any other loser fund.. that dumb ass mayor giuliani is the worst thing that could happen to ny, he absolutely fettered the rescue work to a grinding halt.

the hard working, almost indefatigable rescue workers could have accomplished something with the billions of pounds of rubble, if only that asshole epicene giuliani knew what he was doing, and was capable of coordinating and directing a massive rescue mission.. all the dollars you are pulling out of your pockets are now wasted because of that ass.

there are no survivors left (because of that ass).

FrightMare

I think we should all objurgate those who boast about donating to the sep 11th fund, red cross, or any other loser fund.

That dumb ass mayor Giuliani is the worst thing that could happen to NY, he absolutely fettered the rescue work to a grinding halt. The hard working, almost indefatigable rescue workers could have accomplished something with the billions of pounds of rubble, if only that asshole epicene giuliani knew what he was doing, and was capable of coordinating and directing a massive rescue mission.

All the dollars you are pulling out of your pockets are now wasted because of that ass. There are no survivors left (because of that ass). Your dollars will not bring the victims back to life. All you're doing is paying for rich bitches to have and rent buildings for mega bucks once again. Don't put your money to waste on these bastards.

41

Is evolution a fact or theory?

by sleepy in

jw
friends

is evolution a fact or a theory?.

i suppose it depends on what you mean.. evolution in the sense of change from one generation to the next seams to be fact.. is well observed that offspring from a given creature will differ from the parent in different ways and thus after many generation can come to be quite different.. also that the genes of a creature can be affected by radiation from the sun and be alter in a novel way producing new and unique features in its offspring ( as long as the mutation is in the sperm or the egg).. that we came about via changes in the genes that eventually created a very different creature than that existed many generations ago , is that a fact?.

this requires that not only that there are changes between generation but also that these changes could be directed by different environments to such a degree that only certain specialised features could survive and reproduce offspring whilst other creatures have died out and only remain in fossilised form.. what evidence is there that such environments can and have existed?

FrightMare

I take my philosophical starting point as roughly in accordance with Searle, but a bit more "hard AI" in some ways. In other words: Conciousness is not a thing, but a function of the brain, in the same way that the circulation of blood is not a thing, but a property of the vasculature and heart. It is thus neither an object, nor a non-material entity, but a property which an object posesses. In this view point, the "problem" of qualia is not an insurmountable puzzle for conciousness, but simply a description of part of the concious state. The major difference between conciousness and all other visceral functions is that we view (erroneously) a combination of language and entirely subjective states to discuss the visceral function, forgetting that language and subjective states are the visceral function. It is a cognitive trap that is subtle and elusive.
Penrose, and all the other "spooky" theorists of conciousness avoid several facts:

1. Conciousness is made of parts, and lesion studies show that in humans. Concious experience is not bound into a seamless whole: things are at the edge and the center of experiance depending on circumstances, and circumstances will also cause things to intrude that are not objectively real (hallucinations) and cause objectively real phenomena to drop out of sight (Chronic pain is no longer noticed except as irritability).

2. The brain has a specific architecture, and lesions in the brain cause specific syndromes. These syndromes are best explained by the activity of neurons in those areas, and their anatomical connections. These lesions can also alter the capacity of objects to enter the concious arena, and the capacity of the brain to perform tasks employed by the concious mind (ie they limit the sphere of conscious experiance). Hence, any theory of consciousness must explain these two facts in detail.

The microtubular theory proposes that somehow the thalamic 40hz scanning frequency is necessary for the coherence function of the microtubular arrays. This does not address in any way adequately the fact that much of our concious experience appears to be mediated by overlapping circuits between cortical areas: the function of many thalamic nuclei are more plausibly scanning, switching and weighting of functional importance of cortical and subcortical circuits, rather than a spooky source of quantum coherence. If the theory is so modified as to say that the actions of the thalamic mechanism is reflected by neuronal activity, then all you have to do is remove the quantum coherence bit, and you have the same explanation as the usual neurobiological one, but simply lacking the quantum stuff, and since the necessity of invoking quantum coherence on neurobiological grounds is not clear at all, the whole thing becomes somewhat pointless.

In brief, the only sensible neurobiological approach to conciousness is NOT that it is a manifestation of an event or a thing: it is first and foremost a subjective state. But that is a surprisingly subtle and tricky point: it is a subjective state in an organ that appears to have as its function the generation of particular subjective states, in the same way that blood circulation is a phenomenon in an organ whose function seems to be the maintenance of a particular pattern of circulation. If it were otherwise, then the heart (with its pacing, and its intrinsic microtubules) would be "conscious", and so would the bowels (with their truly substantial innervation and intrinsic pacers). But they don't manifest signs of experiancing subjective states in the same way that brains do, even though they surely have both microtubules and a complex architecture and intrinsic pacing. So........

What does this have to do with evolution? Once you work out what conciousness actually is, then that defines the scope of both its consequences and origins. So all of this it has to do with the idea of specified complexity but it also bears directly and simply on the notion of Intelligent design. Let us now consider the simple idea that conciousness is a prerequisite for the activity of intelligence. Hence conciousness is a prerequisite for design. Now, conciousness is a subjective state of a material brain of some sort (that's our definition). That is the only way we know of it, or can define in it any scientific terms (that's a scientific fact). It is thus impossible in the strongest terms to speak of ID without implicitly assuming a material brain of one form or another. I think we all know what that implies for theists of any type: that if G-d is the designer, G-d has a material brain. If G-d had a material brain, then He would be a natural phenomenon (by definition). Seems to me only a very naive person would accept the notion of ID as scientific evidence of Divine intervention.

12

What's that Smell?

by FrightMare in

jw
friends

"could a being create the fifty billion galaxies, each with two hundred billion stars, then rejoice in the smell of burning goat flesh?

" - ron patterson

FrightMare

You theists say that without God there is no way to explain our existence. So you are postulating the existence of an infinitely good being. This being is capable of creating the universe.

You still haven't explained why it did so.

A rational being creates something as a response to a stimulus in an attempt to better its situation. God is infinitely good. I can postulate the existence of God without the universe. God plus the universe is no better than God alone. Therefore I have trouble producing a reason for God to create the universe.

Hence the problem. A being capable of creating the universe has no reason to do so.