Posts by Galileo

75

Just one shred of evidence?

by nvrgnbk in

is there just one shred of evidence that proves beyond any doubt that there is a being that is responsible for the existence of the universe and that it continues to have some effect on its inhabitants?

thanks for the inspiration, honesty.

Galileo

Yes. One. But it's a pretty powerful piece of evidence that not only is there a god, he has damn good taste:

alt

That's right. All the top theologians agree. The most compelling evidence for the existence of god is Scarlett Johansson.

33

Just ONE shred of Evidence?

by Honesty in

is there just one shred of evidence that proves beyond any doubt that jesus appointed the leaders of the jw's (c.t.

russell, j.f rutrherford, nathan knorr, or the governing body) as the faithful slave?

Galileo

40

WHY I believe there is a GOD..listen up...poster named "parakeet"

by dirtyknections in

simply put...i believe there is a god..and his name is yhwh aka jehovah..and his son yeshua or yehoshua aka jesus..died for our sins as a propitiatory ransom sacrifice to antone for mankinds sins..i therefore am also a creationist...i do not believe science contradicts the bible...rather i think it agrees and compliments it rather well.. .

i am creating this post in response to comments made in my last post by the poster named "parakeet"... i just thought i should explain myself before he/she starts deducting praise from me (see my last post)..lol...alright here goes.

i grew in a small town in florida called macclenny..population- 20,000.. my mother and her family were raised in this quaint little city...my family on my mothers side has been in this city since the early 1920's...ok...lemme me get to the meat of the story.. .

Galileo

I wonder what Marconi or Edison or Davinci or Einstein or Archimedes or Copernicus or Newton or Sagan would say about the importance of PERSONAL RESEARCH..I think its obvious by the way they lived their lives..

Einstein said: "If I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants." He was quoting Isaac Newton. Both men recognized the importance of the research that others had done. No scientist could possibly do there own personal research in every subject. I agree, it would be ludicrous just to accept someone's word for whether or not ghost's exist. We know how fallable the human mind is. It misinterprets data. It sees a jacket on a chair and sees a body, or hears a tree rattling on a roof and imagines footsteps. That is why we have the scientific method. It is quite a different thing to look at the data of people studying these paranormal activities in a genuinely scientific way. The reason I brought up Michael Shermer is that he doesn't simply announce: "This house isn't haunted!" In most cases he actually figures out the real cause of the "paranormal" incidents.

Similarly, in investigating haunted houses, we must have a baseline measurement of noises, creaks, and other events before we can say that an occurrence is unusual (and therefore mysterious). I used to hear rapping sounds in the walls of my house. Ghosts? Nope. Bad plumbing. I occasionally hear scratching sounds in my basement. Poltergeists? Nope. Rats. One would be well-advised to first thoroughly understand the probable worldly explanation before turning to other-worldly ones. - Michael Shermer

You are right, science cannot say that there is no such thing as a haunted house. It also can't say that there is no such thing as a unicorn or a leprechaun. In all these instances, it can only say that in every case that has been investigated it has produced no evidence to support their existence.

40

WHY I believe there is a GOD..listen up...poster named "parakeet"

by dirtyknections in

simply put...i believe there is a god..and his name is yhwh aka jehovah..and his son yeshua or yehoshua aka jesus..died for our sins as a propitiatory ransom sacrifice to antone for mankinds sins..i therefore am also a creationist...i do not believe science contradicts the bible...rather i think it agrees and compliments it rather well.. .

i am creating this post in response to comments made in my last post by the poster named "parakeet"... i just thought i should explain myself before he/she starts deducting praise from me (see my last post)..lol...alright here goes.

i grew in a small town in florida called macclenny..population- 20,000.. my mother and her family were raised in this quaint little city...my family on my mothers side has been in this city since the early 1920's...ok...lemme me get to the meat of the story.. .

Galileo

Also, come to think of it, if anyone that lived in that house genuinely believed it was haunted, or demon possessed, then they wouldn't be living there any more. Period. Can you imagine? "Oh, there's this powerful evil spirit that shares the house with us. It likes to shred all my clothes, turn into a vicious hell dog sometimes, and, who knows, maybe tonight it will feel amorous and rape my wife. Well, goodnight everyone!" My guess is that a couple of odd experiences turned into a fun little family legend that gives them something to talk about, to the point that now anything even slightly odd is turned into a new "demon tale".

40

WHY I believe there is a GOD..listen up...poster named "parakeet"

by dirtyknections in

simply put...i believe there is a god..and his name is yhwh aka jehovah..and his son yeshua or yehoshua aka jesus..died for our sins as a propitiatory ransom sacrifice to antone for mankinds sins..i therefore am also a creationist...i do not believe science contradicts the bible...rather i think it agrees and compliments it rather well.. .

i am creating this post in response to comments made in my last post by the poster named "parakeet"... i just thought i should explain myself before he/she starts deducting praise from me (see my last post)..lol...alright here goes.

i grew in a small town in florida called macclenny..population- 20,000.. my mother and her family were raised in this quaint little city...my family on my mothers side has been in this city since the early 1920's...ok...lemme me get to the meat of the story.. .

Galileo

Put up some freaking video cameras already. There has never been a single verified haunted house in history, so you have a fantastic opportunity to be the first, turn science on it's head, and shut the mouths of all of us godless skeptics. It should be easy, what with it happening all the time as you claim. I look forward to your video evidence eagerly.

Google Michael Shermer. Over the last thirty plus years, he has scientifically investigated virtually every prominent haunted house in existence, including the notorious Amityville house. He has never found anything to make him believe in anything supernatural.

What I find so puzzling, and did even when I used to put stock in such stories, is: Why would a demon solidify a believers faith, in effect making them much stronger spiritually, by giving them concrete evidence of the spirit world? When I was a kid, I used to constantly hope I inadvertently did something to cause the demons to appear to me. I reasoned that it would be frightening for a moment, but then it would be over and I would never again be plagued with doubts. Don't you find it sick that Satan and the demons would give you the evidence to believe in God, while God himself refuses to provide similar evidence?

29

Hmmmn..Intresting Convo with my DAD last NIGHT

by dirtyknections in

so me and my father who is an elder get into yet another rather tense discussions about the bible .

and my new found "beliefs".

one of the things we discussed was my belief that the way we conduct studies... .

Galileo

Jadon:

You must be an awful researcher. Let me give you a couple points to research.
(1) Babylon sacked Jerusalem in 586 -587 B.C.E., Not 607 B.C.E. as the Witnesses, and ONLY the Witnesses, claim. There is a mountain of historical evidence supporting this, so don't take my word for it. Research it yourself. Without the 607 date, their chronology about 1914 falls apart.
(2) The Tetragrammaton is nowhere in the Greek Scriptures. Not even once. The NWT simply adds it wherever it struck the translators fancy.

37

My Story - Part 1

by Jeremy C in

i have never posted my personal story about my years as a jw, and my departure from the organization.

i thought that my personal story might be of interest.

it is my hope that some of my experiences and observations might be of help to some of you who have recently left the organization.

Galileo

I think that the Aid book's replacement was mostly due to a desire to streamline the volume with more comprehensive material and artwork.

Actually, one of the major changes between the Aid & Insight books was to take out almost the entire section on 607 B.C.E. and the evidence (or more precisely the lack thereof) that supported it. Here is a quote from Crisis of Conscience:

Months of research were spent on this one subject of "Chronology" and it resulted in the longest article in the Aid publication. Much of the time was spent endeavoring to find some proof, some backing in history, for the 607 B.C.E. date so crucial to our calculations for 1914. Charles Ploeger, a member of the headquarters staff, was at the time serving as a secretary for me and he searched through the libraries of the New York city area for anything that might substantiate that date historically.
WE FOUND ABSOLUTELY NOTHING IN SUPPORT OF 607 B.C.E."
In order to be as honest as possible, and still argue for the Society's position, instead of outright lying Ray Franz tried to discredit the mountain of evidence for 586-587 B.C.E:
Without 607 B.C.E. the crucial date of 1914 would be placed in question. I took the view that the historical evidence was likely defective and argued that was in the Aid book.
In the Insight book, they basically just cut out virtually any reference that the date is in question at all. This must have been a major motivation for creating the Insight books, as the original section on 607 B.C.E. in the Aid book was the longest single entry.

37

My Story - Part 1

by Jeremy C in

i have never posted my personal story about my years as a jw, and my departure from the organization.

i thought that my personal story might be of interest.

it is my hope that some of my experiences and observations might be of help to some of you who have recently left the organization.

Galileo

Great post, Jeremy. I'm looking forward to the next installment. I also vividly remember the demon obsession the Witnesses had in the eighties - everyone had a demon story. Now, it seems like no one does. It was an odd fad. Anyway, welcome!

45

Top 10 strange reasons WT is right

by knock knock in

jw
friends

had a long conversation with my mom tonight and we went back and forth for over an hour regarding the wt.

she said something tonight that kind of left me speechless as i've never heard anything like this one before.

the wt is right because... .

Galileo

The WT is right because...
It has been continuously in print since 1879 ... AND ... Every magazine is exactly 32 pages.

This is so surreal, it reminds me of something they would've said at the tea party in Alice in Wonderland. Next time you hear this kind on nonsensical argument, you could reply with the equally nonsensical "Why is a raven like a writing desk?" (the riddle from Alice in Wonderland which has no answer).

As a former worker in the press room at the Farm, this type of publication has to have a multiple of eight because the size of presses that are available and the size of the magazine. In other words, if they wanted to make the magazine longer they would have to make it 40 pages long (two sides of four panels.) If they wanted to make it shorter it would have to be 24 pages. They just happened to choose 32 over other options.

This is exactly correct. It's the same reason almost all of their books have 192 pages.

I think the strangest rationale I ever heard wasn't specifically about the JW's but about the bible itself, although it was spoken by a CO that was trying to answer my doubts: The bible is true because we can actually go to the places it mentions, Jerusalem, Egypt, etc., and they are really there. I answered that I can go to Tokyo too, that doesn't mean I believe Godzilla is a documentary.

12

The problem of evil - SOLVED! Straight from God's mouth

by Galileo in

god explains why he allows evil.

brilliant.

http://crackle.com/c/moving_targets/mr._deity_and_the_evil_-_season_1%2c_ep_1/1805164/#ml=fu%3d2119977%26fx%3d.

Galileo

Lore: Yeah, the one about prayer is my second favorite. I love how he calls prayer before meals "spam"! Genius.