Posts by allelsefails

18

Confirmation Bias

by allelsefails in

i've read a lot of crap in my life (not just wts) and i have finally found the phrase to describe almost every religious wrting i've read.

"confirmation bias" affects how jws look at historical facts, how dems and repubs look at economic facts, or how all people look at information presented to them.

i still go to meetings every once in a while to make my wife and my boss feel better about me, but sometimes i can't believe how idiotic some things are.

Thanks Breakfast. It is like reading your Horoscope (which applies to 500,000,000 people) and seeing how true it was today. When I have studied the old "Studies in the Scriptures" It is really amazing that someone like Russell could put such faith in Pyramidology. Funny that the Pyramid proves "1914" according to Russel but JWs today will tell you it is Spiritism. Silly peoples......

I think it is good study to look at logical falacies and then honestly look at what you think and believe to judge your own insights. I think (with all my fallacies) it has helped me be balanced in my life.

18

Confirmation Bias

by allelsefails in

i've read a lot of crap in my life (not just wts) and i have finally found the phrase to describe almost every religious wrting i've read.

"confirmation bias" affects how jws look at historical facts, how dems and repubs look at economic facts, or how all people look at information presented to them.

i still go to meetings every once in a while to make my wife and my boss feel better about me, but sometimes i can't believe how idiotic some things are.

allelsefails

I've read a lot of crap in my life (not just WTS) and I have finally found the phrase to describe almost EVERY religious wrting I've read. "Confirmation Bias" affects how JWs look at historical facts, how Dems and Repubs look at economic facts, or how all people look at information presented to them. I still go to meetings every once in a while to make my wife and my boss feel better about me, but sometimes I can't believe how idiotic some things are. I look around at people I know and care about - people I know are not stupid - and I wonder how they can swallow such large loads of crap.

I hope anyone who is interested in this would post other logical fallacies that they see - esp JWs, but I love them all.

109

New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures...

by Joliette in

if i'm not mistaken, werent the committee of brothers who translated this bible: nathan knorr, albert scheoder, george gangas, fredrick franz.

wasnt fredrick franz the only scholarly person (or somewhat scholarly) person who was 'somewhat qualified' to translate any type of biblical greek, hebrew, etc?.

allelsefails

I know I'm a few days late on this, but if you're still around......

I understand the arguement of adding "Jehovah" in the NT where it quotes from the OT and the OT uses Jehovah. (I personally would put that in the footnote instead of changing the text.)

However the problem is that the explanation only applies to half or two-thirds of the places where Jehovah is substituted for the greek "kyrios" EVERY one of those places (NOT quotes from the OT) is guesswork and bad translating. Again if you "THINK" they meant Jehovah, but every manuscript says "Kyrios" you should put that in your reference footnote, but do not presume to change the word of God to fit your Dogma. (Which I agree with - by the way - I'm a Unitarian, But I don't believe I need to CHANGE the bible to prove it.)

Thanks - Allelsefails

109

New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures...

by Joliette in

if i'm not mistaken, werent the committee of brothers who translated this bible: nathan knorr, albert scheoder, george gangas, fredrick franz.

wasnt fredrick franz the only scholarly person (or somewhat scholarly) person who was 'somewhat qualified' to translate any type of biblical greek, hebrew, etc?.

allelsefails

Mad - If I may interject. I read a response yiou gave earlier this thread and wanted to comment.

The Greek septuigint (which included books you consider Aprocrypha) did include the YHWH in Hebrew interjected in the Greek text. The point being made is that there are no Greek manuscripts of the New Tesatament - Greek Scriptures that use any form of the divine name. For some reason the NWT has added the name Jehovah where it does not appear in any of the oldest manuscripts.

Please don't misunderstand me - the name Jehovah or Yaweh belongs 6,000 times in the Old Testament/Hebrew Scriptures. But appears exactly 0 times int he New Testament/ Greek Scriptures. I am not a trinitarian, but I cant understand the thinking of changing the bible to fit what you want it to say. Rather than translating accurately and letting the bible teach you what it means.

Allelsefails

28

"You are only looking at things 'critical' of the Watchtower"

by sabastious in

something jws say that to a lot to people who have left or are leaving the org.. i find it very a very ironic statement since the wt and awake, or any wt literature for that matter, is never critical of itself and never directly addresses refutation of their doctrine and predictions.... i was raised a witness, as many of you were.

i have been subjected to "one-side-of-the-coin" for almost 2 decades!

the only true way to bring balance to my information is to look at the other side of the coin and give it great consideration.... -sab.

allelsefails

It has worked good for me to slip in a crticism in a group of praise (I've had SOME good exp in JW cong.) The cong is great, the brothers loving, but I'm surprised that they still teach 144,000 is a literal number. It is good to follow Bible's morality and reject worldly ideas and materialism, but I'm surprised they still teach that 607 was Jerusalem's destruction. etc...etc... They still don't like it, but they can't do the "you're only negative" card on me.

43

Some things that we APOSTATES keep getting wrong. We need some FRESH IDEAS!

by nicolaou in

just my opinions of course;.

money:.

a common attitude among ex-jw's is that the watchtower will face collapse only when the money dries up - i disagree.

allelsefails

exwhyzee - It is important for some to see the WTS topple. For me - all my family is still in. If there was a way to undermine their authority I could have a real open relationship with them again. It doesn't stop me enjoying my life and I am not obsessed with it, but I would love to contribute to its collapse.

I really like the idea of sending e-mails from anonymous addresses with "subtle" apostate thinking. Perhaps presented as a question or a really positive experience that reveals a huge hole in the WTS reasoning.

The hardest part of challenging the "authority" of the governing body is to get someone to listen. Once they listen you'll have them with in a a few years. Get the questions into their mind and it will do the rest.

269

Have your JW Relatives Explained about Generation/Overlap Change to You ?

by flipper in

jw
friends

after reading on the way out's thread about his mom explaining the generation overlap to him it kicked this idea into my head to make this thread .

i thought it would be helpful to see if anybody here has had jw relatives or friends try to explain this " generation overlap " theory to you as a faded or inactive witness and what happened in the conversations.

so please feel free to post your experiences.

allelsefails

DJ - Dont mean to but in, however dont you see that Jesus prophecy in the first century was amazing. He said that the end would come within a generation of those who saw him. And it DID! 37 years later! A biblical generation has ALWAYS been 40 years.

(IE ... Moses proclaimed God's judgement on Israel as this generation shall pass away .... 40 years of wandering in the wilderness.)

(FYI - Annaias and Saphira LIED and were put to death by God even tho there sin was not a great one. It was dishonesty that caused God's disfavor. Most people I've read have the same problem with JW's Org. They hide their mistakes and blame Jehovah for their changes in "understanding". The real problem is a group of men who are guessing at truth and unwilling to admit they have no divine direction,)

Never has the word Generation been defined the way the JW's define it now. Not in scripture or the English language could a generation be more than 80 years.

Stuff to think about.

Allelsefails

32

Do you think your baptism is still valid?

by karter in

jw
friends

i got baptised about 25 years ago and was told the new system would be here by now.. along with a lot of other false promises.. so the answer for me would be no!!

!.

allelsefails

I have a niece who got married at the age of 16. My sister had to sign off on it because everyone realizes that a 16 year old can't make a decision like that on there own. I heard no end of how awful it was that she got married so young and didn't know what she was doing and it would turn out badly.

I have since told everyone who I trust that baptism as a teenager (or earlier) is EXACTLY the same as marriage. Making a lifelong committment at the age of 15 (like me) or earlier is ridiculous. Any who would criticize the idea of a 16 year old getting married, but accept a 16 year old getting baptized is a hypocrite in my book.

That being said, I feel my baptism @ 15 is a contract with a minor. No legal entity in our country would uphold suchn a contract. Therefore I don't feel it has any validity.

Allelesefails

16

Blondie's Comments You Will Not Hear at the 08-15-10 WT Study (ANGER)

by blondie in

jw
friends

comments you will not hear at the 08-15-10 wt study (june 15, 2010, pages 15-19)(anger).

review comments will be in red or headed by comments.

wt material from today's wt will be in black.

allelsefails

Paragraph 12 was interesting - let's say the elder who propositioned my wife (not his first) - that was just imperfection - he didn't need to be removed. He had earlier written porn and sent to someone else's wife, but every other religion is bad bad bad. We have the truth it is obvious by our fruitage.

Thanks Blondie for your comments.

54

Introducing myself

by Jeremy430 in

jw
friends

i'm mostly here to meet new like minded friends.

growing up in the religion has jaded my perspective.

most of my believes the wts is bs, but there is that part in the back of my mind that fears they have the truth.

allelsefails

Welcome! Hopefully you will see that truth does live along with the lie.

I am still "in" for family and I don't think living the life is a bad way (no adultery, no stealing, no lynig, etc....) I don't believe they have anything special.

It is what it is.

Allelsefails (when allelse fails try something that makes sense)