cofty

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Posts by cofty

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  105

  Subliminal images - why and who are the individuals behind it?

  by UnshackleTheChains in

  1. watchtower
  2. scandals

  i remember about 5 years ago reading on another site about subliminal images in wt literature.

  i honestly thought it a load of bs until i checked out one glaringly obvious image of a creepy skull in clouds within the knowledge book.

  i was shocked and even showed my wife at the time who thought it was creepy.. so my question is why?

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  cofty

  The Watchtower Bible and Tract Society is today still a sect of Roman Christendom - Old Navy

  That is a very strange statement. Surely the WT traces its roots to the 19th century Protestant Adventist movement.
  
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  191

  Evolution is a Fact - Index of Parts 1 - 40

  by cofty in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  #1 protein functional redundancy comparing the sequences of amino acids in ubiquitous proteins confirms the relationship between all living things..

  #2 dna functional redundancy comparison of the dna that codes for the amino acids of ubiquitous proteins predicts the tree of life with an astonishing degree of accuracy..

  #3 ervs endogenous retroviruses that infected our ancestors are found in the same place of the genome of our closest primate cousins..

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  cofty

  #1 Protein Functional Redundancy
  Comparing the sequences of amino acids in ubiquitous proteins confirms the relationship between all living things.

  #2 DNA Functional Redundancy
  Comparison of the DNA that codes for the amino acids of ubiquitous proteins predicts the tree of life with an astonishing degree of accuracy.

  #3 ERVs
  Endogenous retroviruses that infected our ancestors are found in the same place of the genome of our closest primate cousins.

  #4 Smelly Genes
  Hundreds of broken genes that used to code for olfactory receptors in our ancestors are still found in our genome.

  #5 Vitamin C
  Why humans can no longer make their own vitamin C and what that tells us about our species' history.

  #6 Human Chromosome 2
  Our second biggest chromosome is made up of two of our ancestors' chromosomes stuck end-to-end.

  #7 Human Egg Yolk Gene
  Humans and our primate cousins have the genes for making vitellogenin and they are all broken in the same way.

  #8 Jumping Genes
  Bits of parasitic code called ALU elements prove our common ancestry with primates.

  #9 Less Chewing More Thinking
  A broken gene for a type of muscle fibre we no longer have tells a story about our evolutionary past.

  #10 Non-Coding DNA
  In common with many other species huge amounts of our genome originated as copying errors.

  #11 Tiktaalik
  An amazing fossil discovery illustrates the transition of life from sea to land.

  #12 Lenski's E.coli Experiment
  An experiment with E.Coli, now in it's third decade, demonstrates the power of natural selection.

  #13 Morris Minor Bonnets
  Evolution has to make do with building on existing designs as illustrated by the recurrent laryngeal nerve.

  #14 Joey Goes to Oz
  Fossil evidence for the origins of marsupials found in Antarctica exactly as predicted.

  #15 Robinson Crusoe
  The biogeography of oceanic islands presents an impossible dilemma for creationism.

  #16 Aquatic Mammals
  An excellent sequence of fossils illustrates the evolutionary journey of whales from land to sea.

  #17 Belyaev's Silver Foxes
  A 50 year breeding programme demonstrates the amazing power of selection and the interconnected nature of genes.

  #18 Fish Fingers
  The evolution of limbs is mapped out in an amazing sequence of ancient fish fossils.

  #19 Goosebumps
  A vestigial reflex bequeathed by our hairier ancestors.

  #20 Lucy in the Sky...
  An exceptional fossil of a 3 million year old hominid.

  #21 Footprints in the Sand...
  Footprints at Laetoli show our Australopithecus afarensis ancestors were bipedal 3.6 million years ago.

  #22 The Hillocks of Hiss...
  A vestigial feature if the human ear shared by 10% of the population demonstrates our evolutionary history.

  #23 Faunal Succession...
  The consistent sequence of fossils found in the rocks can only be explained by evolution.

  #24 The Origin of Your Inner Ear...
  How the bones that reptiles eat with became the bones that we hear with.

  #25 Deep Time...
  Scottish geologist Andrew Hutton discovered the proof of earth's great antiquity.

  #26 Colour Vision...
  How gene duplication - new "information" -and mutation equipped us with trichromatic vision.

  #27 Monkeys, Typewriters, Shakespeare, 747s etc...
  Evolution is a combination of random mutations and non-random selection.

  #28 Something Darwin Didn't Say...
  A long term study of pigeons demonstrates how natural selection acts on a local population.

  #29 Use it or Lose it...
  Fossil genes reveal the history of modern species.

  #30 Your Third Eyelid...
  The remnants of a nictitating membrane reveals our evolutionary history.

  #31 Ten Questions For Creationists ...
  The basic facts about reality covered so far pose an impossible challenge to creationism.

  #32 Sexual Selection
  How female mating preferences led to some of the most remarkable features of living things.

  #33 A Tale About Tails
  Human embryology reveals our primate history.

  #34 Hiccups and Tadpoles
  How hiccups are a relic of our amphibian ancestors.

  #35 Nature Red in Tooth and Claw
  Nature's ability to inflict pain and suffering in the battle for survival.

  #36 Mass Extinctions
  96% of life was wiped out in The Great Dying 250 million years ago.

  #37 Testicles
  The plumbing of the vas deferens gives evidence of our fish ancestry

  #38 The Origin of Complex Cells
  How a merger of simple cells made complexity possible

  #39 Homologous Structures
  Evidence for common ancestry in our shared anatomy.

  #40 What Use is Half an Eye?
  First steps in the evolution of complex eyes.
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  12

  Looking for Scottish Ex-JW's to share their experiences (If out obviously)

  by jambon1 in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  raised in edinburgh and glasgow congregations.

  lots of funny and interesting jw characters from the 90's & 2000's.

  ian shanks.

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  cofty

  No more cockles.
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  12

  Looking for Scottish Ex-JW's to share their experiences (If out obviously)

  by jambon1 in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  raised in edinburgh and glasgow congregations.

  lots of funny and interesting jw characters from the 90's & 2000's.

  ian shanks.

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  cofty

  Maybe referring to Berwick about 20 years ago. Don't know of any others in the Borders.
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  12

  Looking for Scottish Ex-JW's to share their experiences (If out obviously)

  by jambon1 in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  raised in edinburgh and glasgow congregations.

  lots of funny and interesting jw characters from the 90's & 2000's.

  ian shanks.

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  cofty

  The Edinburgh cong that had a white shirt hung up for visiting elders that wore coloured shirts.

  Was that Corstorphine?

  I was Coatbridge and then Dalkeith
  
  
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  11

  Evolution is a Fact #40 - What Use is Half an Eye?

  by cofty in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  creationists often refer to the words of darwin when he pondered the evolution of the complex eye.

  he said that to suppose that the complex eye evolve by natural selection seems "absurd in the highest possible degree".

  what they always ignore is that darwin went right on in the very next sentence to propose how the eye could have evolved and that numerous gradations must exist between the simplest light detecting organs and the complex vertebrate eye.. in the 150 years since darwin published his book not only have those gradations been discovered in the natural world but the very genes that build the eye have been discovered by science.

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  cofty

  See numbers 19, 22, 30, 33 & 34
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  11

  Evolution is a Fact #40 - What Use is Half an Eye?

  by cofty in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  creationists often refer to the words of darwin when he pondered the evolution of the complex eye.

  he said that to suppose that the complex eye evolve by natural selection seems "absurd in the highest possible degree".

  what they always ignore is that darwin went right on in the very next sentence to propose how the eye could have evolved and that numerous gradations must exist between the simplest light detecting organs and the complex vertebrate eye.. in the 150 years since darwin published his book not only have those gradations been discovered in the natural world but the very genes that build the eye have been discovered by science.

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  cofty

  Do you have an article on leftovers of body parts from when the human animal was something else?

  Yes if you go through the index at the bottom of the OP there are a few threads on vestigial and atavistic features.

  An important point to bear in mind is that these features rarely if ever have no purpose. Their history is shown in the fact that they no longer serve the same function as they did in our evolutionary ancestors. Creationists almost always miss this point.

  If your rebuttals simply explain the reduced function of vestigial features then you have misunderstood the argument.
  
  
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  11

  Evolution is a Fact #40 - What Use is Half an Eye?

  by cofty in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  creationists often refer to the words of darwin when he pondered the evolution of the complex eye.

  he said that to suppose that the complex eye evolve by natural selection seems "absurd in the highest possible degree".

  what they always ignore is that darwin went right on in the very next sentence to propose how the eye could have evolved and that numerous gradations must exist between the simplest light detecting organs and the complex vertebrate eye.. in the 150 years since darwin published his book not only have those gradations been discovered in the natural world but the very genes that build the eye have been discovered by science.

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  cofty

  Creationists often refer to the words of Darwin when he pondered the evolution of the complex eye. He said that to suppose that the complex eye evolve by natural selection seems "absurd in the highest possible degree". What they always ignore is that Darwin went right on in the very next sentence to propose how the eye could have evolved and that numerous gradations must exist between the simplest light detecting organs and the complex vertebrate eye.

  In the 150 years since Darwin published his book not only have those gradations been discovered in the natural world but the very genes that build the eye have been discovered by science. They next few threads in this series will describe scientific discoveries that reveal how vision evolved.

  "What use is half an eye?" is a challenge often heard in creationist debates. The answer is that half an eye is extremely useful. Ophthalmologists divide into two tribes - one that deals with the front of the eye and the other that is concerned with ailments of the retina. The earliest eyes that evolved at the beginning of the Cambrian period would only have been of interest to the latter.

  Stripped of all the optical apparatus such as the lens and iris, the eye is fundamentally a patch of light-sensitive cells. This sort of simple eye is still to be found in many modern species. The shrimp Rimicarus exoculata that makes its living around hydrothermal vents beneath the Atlantic Ocean is one such example. Absolutely no light penetrates to the depths inhabited by these creatures and not surprisingly they appeared to be eyeless their name suggests. Thanks to the work of Cindy Van Dover of the Marine Laboratory at Duke University the species' moniker turned out to be a misnomer.

  
  

  Van Dover became curious about two flaps of tissue on the shrimp's back and sent off a sample for examination to a specialist in invertebrate eyes. Results showed that the sample possessed the pigment rhodopsin - the same pigment that is responsible for light detection in our own eyes. But what would the point be of light detection in an environment where no light from the surface can penetrate? Van Dover persuaded geologist John Delaney to try an experiment by switching off the lights on the deep sea submersible vehicle Alvin and observing the vents with a digital camera. Sure enough they detected a sharply defined halo around the vent.

  There was a problem however. The shrimp's rhodopsin was tuned to detect green light but the light vents glowed red. Were the naked retinas of Rimicarus exoculata a degenerate organ like the blind eyes of cave fish? The answer came in two stages. Firstly the larva of the shrimps were discovered living at much shallower depths of the ocean and they were found to have perfectly normal eyes on their heads. As they mature their eyes are completely reabsorbed and the naked retinas of the adult shrimp develop from scratch on their backs. This proves that the adult eyes are not the end result of generations of loss of function but something more deliberate.
  

  The optics of regular eyes are a balance between the ability to resolve images and sensitivity. At lower light levels our pupils dilate letting in more light. The ultimate way to maximise sensitivity is to sacrifice resolution by completely removing the front of the eye so that every available photon is captured by the retina. The naked retina of Rimicarus exoculata turn out to be 7 million times more sensitive than the fully formed eyes of their own larvae.

  But what about the mismatch between the red light emitted by the hydrothermal vents and the green sensitive rhodopsin of Rimicarus exoculata? Van Dover concluded that if the shrimp had evolved an ability to detect green light then green light must exist in that environment. She turned to NASA who were experts at light detection in the inky darkness of space. They had developed a device named ALISS (Ambient Light Imaging and Spectral System) which they agreed to fit to Alvin. Sure enough ALISS detected green light being emitted from the vents at a frequency corresponding to the rhodopsin found in the retina of Rimicarus exoculata.

  In the strange world of hydrothermal vents creatures are poised between lethal extremes of temperature. The ability to detect the faintest glow of light and know if it is coming from above or below, ahead or behind is a matter of life and death.

  There is a lot more to be said about the evolutionary journey from the naked retina to our own complex eyes, the origin of light-detecting proteins as well as the genes that trigger the development of eyes in the embryo. Future threads in this series will describe some of these details.

  Information about the evolution of colour vision can be found in number 26 of this series here...

  ---

  Index for parts 1-30

  #31 Ten Questions For Creationists ...
  The basic facts about reality covered so far pose an impossible challenge to creationism.

  #32 Sexual Selection
  How female mating preferences led to some of the most remarkable features of living things.

  #33 A Tale About Tails
  Human embryology reveals our primate history.

  #34 Hiccups and Tadpoles
  How hiccups are a relic of our amphibian ancestors.

  #35 Nature Red in Tooth and Claw
  Nature's ability to inflict pain and suffering in the battle for survival.

  #36 Mass Extinctions
  96% of life was wiped out in The Great Dying 250 million years ago.

  #37 Testicles
  The plumbing of the vas deferens gives evidence of our fish ancestry

  #38 The Origin of Complex Cells
  How a merger of simple cells made complexity possible

  #39 Homologous Structures
  Evidence for common ancestry in our shared anatomy.
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  12

  Mohammad Will Style Your Hair — And Slit Your Throat

  by Hecce in

  1. social
  2. current

  mohammad will style your hair — and slit your throat.

  posted on june 29, 2017 by baron bodissey.

  mohammad hussain rashwani is a syrian “refugee” who came to germany for a better life.

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  cofty

  Merkel is driven by self-loathing Nazi guilt. Germany has long been remembered as the place people fled from in fear of their lives. Now it is where the poor of the world flee to. Germany has chosen to commit cultural suicide. It it trying to bully the rest of Europe to join it.

  I highly recommend Douglas Murray's new book, The Strange Death of Europe.
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  9

  Dawkins v Haidt on Evolutionary Advantage of Religion

  by cofty in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  dawkins uses an interesting analogy comparing religious instincts to a moth's attraction to a candle flame.. dawkins describes religion as an accidental byproduct of a whole range of psychological predispositions such as a child's instinct to believe and obey its parents - he might have mentioned hyperactive agency detection as well.

  this is almost certainly true but is religion more than that?

  dawkins declines to speculate on whether the byproduct - religion - is an evolutionary advantage, only that the instincts which resulted in religion were advantageous.

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  cofty

  Fink & Vidiot - I agree but the failure of religion to determine what is objectively true about the world is nothing at all to do with this topic.