Posts by IsaacJ22

251

Evidence for God...

by tec in

jw
friends

life come from the living, and this is a universe of life.

his teachings are truth.

which is why i weight it against the truth of the teachings (and one other thing that i will get to).

One of the most important differences between skeptical atheists and believers I have seen is that have very different intellecual values. If you watch many debates between the two camps (there are loads of them online) this becomes pretty obvious if you're really paying close attention. It's one of the reasons that it's so hard for both sides to have a real conversation about gods, beliefs, and all that.

A believer will site all their reasons for believing and then look at the atheist camp, confident that they've made a powerful argument for believing. But the atheists will just shrug because none of it is convincing or powerful to us. Then the atheists respond feeling the same way about their arguments against believing, but the believers are just as unimpressed. It's often the same way with evolution versus creationism, too.

I don't think this post will convince anyone who doesn't already believe that they should. Not that this was necessarily your goal.

Still, the differences between the camps are interesting on their own.

1

The evolution of christianity

by corpusdei in

i came across the michael moorcock story "behold the man" the other day.

great story by the way, i urge you to check it out, but this quote really stood out:.

"you make the mistake of considering christianity as something that developed over the course of a few years, from the death of jesus to the time the gospels were written.

IsaacJ22

I tend to lean toward this idea myself. There seems to be plenty of good reasons for it. Then again, I'm an atheist. So that makes it easy for me to go there. :-)

Still, when you try to research ideas like this--the questionable historicity of Jesus is, in many ways, an even bigger one--you seem to get various opinions from real historians. I would be interested in seeing a strong case for the existence of a real, historical Jesus, instead of the usual apologist stuff. If only to give them a chance to change my mind. But I haven't seen much from them. I heard that Bart Ehrman wrote a book that tried to disprove the arguments of Jesus skeptics, but others said it was a badly written book full of errors.

So what else is atheist meant to think about both topics?

26

need your opinion on "who else preaches like the JWs?"

by outsmartthesystem in

i have a friend that has recently confided in me his doubts about the society being god's one and only organization.

his doubts run pretty deep.....but he is very much held in check by "but who else is preaching about the kingdom of god world-wide like jesus said"?

how would you combat that thinking?

IsaacJ22

A few things that might be worth considering:

Where I live, many church leaders preach door to door. Especially Pentecostals, who are constantly inviting people to go to their church. Note that with Pentecostals, it isn't just the leaders who do this. All of them seem determined to preach to everyone they meet.

The Mormoms and 7th Day Adventists preach door to door, though their methodology seems different. They don't preach in their own neighborhoods. They treat it as missionary work.

Christadelphians go door to door.

Over a very long period of time, the Catholic Church has converted more people to Christianity than there are Jehovah's Witnesses in the entire world.

As others have said, other orgs are using other methods, like TV ads, to reach as many people as possible. They did not have TVs in Jesus' day, so that was not an option. Some have 800 numbers and post billboards asking people to call. Some put out ads in local papers, or send out flyers by mail. Note that this is less annoying than dealing with a pushy evangelist on your door step. Also, preaching is preaching--people who do it by other means, besides just door to door, deserve credit too. :-) Naturally, the Society puts emphasis on the door to door work because that's how THEY do it. Who says their opinion is the final opinion?

As far as proving someone's faith if literally "the truth," others will emphasize points that their faith does best in building a case. Look up any religion on Google and add the phrase "true religion" and you will find many articles that make the argument that the faith in question is somehow the one that is true. They can all claim it. But it doesn't make sense to use their own standards in deciding which (if any) is right, now does it? That's just too easy.

21

Atheists! Would like your suggestion..

by umadevi in

jw
friends

hi friends, i have been reading threads on atheism and how they see life from their point of view.

i must admit some of the points that you (atheists) put forth have given me something to think about.

i still have faith in god but let's say if i would like to do a research on atheism, where should i start?

IsaacJ22

If you want to go the free route, you can check out Austin Cline's web site at About. http://atheism.about.com/ This is probably the most thorough web site I know, but Austin can be a tad dry and sarcastic at times. You might want to start here http://atheism.about.com/od/aboutatheism/u/AtheismBasics.htm.

Full disclosure, I've written some XJW articles for him too. http://atheism.about.com/od/jehovahswitnesses/Jehovahs_Witnesses_Watchtower_Bible_Tract_Society.htm

2

How much Watchtower baggage still has to leave our thinking and behaviour?

by Fernando in

this profound piece from www.thewordfortoday.com.au/blog-calendar-6683 made me wonder:.

prejudice is the product of a lazy mind.it's contempt, prior to investigation.

your first impression of someone is incomplete and often inaccurate.

IsaacJ22

Another way I have of putting it is that people are complicated. We often have a dozen different motivations in mind for our own behavior, and even then, half of them are things we made up about ourselves. To simplify creatures like that to something you can dismiss with a wave of your hand and a single comment, like "ex-Witnesses just hate authority" or "atheists just have daddy issues" reveals just how much you aren't trying. And how much you want--or need--to hate and misunderstand the other group.

It takes work to be better than that.

61

Will you ever go back to the Jehovah's Witnesses?

by XPeterX in

jw
friends

discuss..

IsaacJ22

Frankly, the whole thing is creepy to me now. I can't imagine going back. I don't think I could stomach it even if I had family in there that I wanted to reconnect with. No, I can't see myself going back for any reason.

78

Atheism or Agnosticism, which one is correct?

by Joey Jo-Jo in

this has been bugging me for a while, and while i dont want to turn this into something about semantics i think that we should quickly define what an agnostic and atheists are.. richard dawkins defines 7 different types of atheist ranging from weak to militant atheists, but along these definitions there appears one definition with a strong resemblance to agnosticism.. to me an agnostic is a person who neither believes nor disbelieves in deity/deities, but there are those who define agnostics as a ignorant who simply just don't care or don't have the intelligence to come to sound conclusion.. an atheist can be a person who disbelieves in a deity/deities based on the current mathematical and scientific understandings of the universe, as well as understandings that can refute certain religions such as the strong influence of protestantism christianity in america.. .

from here i will refer deity as anything ranging jehovah to a real spaghetti monster, it's not important because a) we dont know b)for the purpose of this discussion it is not important to define what we believe god to be.. an argument that can be used about a deity is -we cannot prove nor disprove that god exists- this is referred to as a null hypothesis, an assumption that we cannot create a hypothesis to prove or disprove this deity.

this to me is agnosticism and is more correct than the idea of atheism.

IsaacJ22

Since I don't agree with your definitions, it's hard to know how to respond on your terms. You would put me in a different category than I would put myself.

23

Is The End of the "Preaching Work" Now In Sight?

by metatron in

jw
friends

there may not be any specific plan to end the "preaching work" but that doesn't mean that things can't evolve into such an outcome.

indeed, i now wonder if such a thing is probable!.

first, if (and it's a very big if) various nations develop case law that includes liability for volunteers, this will put the watchtower in a bind.

IsaacJ22

The only way I'd see it end is if -- as you stated, Metatron -- some laws came into play about volunteers and liability. Even then, the WTS would just change their methodology to adapt and get out of responsibility. Funny,whenever laws are passed that outlaw door to door preaching directly, the WTS never stops it and willingly allows its Witnesses to go to jail for it. But if the govts started fining the Tower directly over it...oh, I think that's very different.

As others have said, the preaching work is busy work. It also forces average Witnesses to constantly reinforce their devotion by investing their time and effort, especially when they do so in the face of opposition. People get a slight high from doing something that's hard when they think it's the right thing to do. That's one of the reasons they can be so rude and disrespectful to people in the process. It isn't about converts so much as it is about patting themselves on the back. Yet they feel guilty when they fail to do what they're told is right.

57

Do demons really exist?

by Inisc in

jw
friends

i mean, is there really any scientific evidence to support their existence?.

is it used as a scare tactic of thewts?.

and i suppose if one doesn't believe in god, a belief in satan and demons and angels for that matter would be contradictory... im not sure what i believe now but would love to hear everyone's thoughts..

IsaacJ22

There are many in my family who believe in ghosts/demons and who believe they've had direct personal experiences. Many of their experiences happened in conditions where they were asleep or could have fallen asleep. Those experiences were very consistent with hypnogogic delusions. This doesn't explain all of their experiences, but -- once I realized this -- it was enough to make me look at those experiences more skeptically and to realize that I had not had any direct experiences of my own. Though I did manage to scare myself into thinking I had several times.

Now, as a skeptic/atheist, I won't say it's impossible. I certainly won't say that people who claim to have experiences are lying or crazy. But I suspect that it's a combination of many things. None of which includes real ghosts or demons. Still, if proof existed, I would love to know about it. The proof always vanishes in the presence of a skeptic, somehow...

One thing to consider: if there are objects flying around your house or weird things happening, why does it have to be a demon? Maybe it's an alien wearing an invisibility suit. Maybe it's a new species of animal that no one knows about that's also invisible and likes messing around with your things. There are pleny of outlandish explanations we can imagine. In fact, when I think about it, the two I just suggested seem more likely than a ghose or demon. At least we have reason to think aliens might exist and unknown species of animals we can't see might exist. But a ghost? A demon? We have no clue what they even are.

If the explanations I created seem too ridiculous, then how ridiculous is the idea of a ghost or demon compared to them?

27

Awake! June 2012 21 confirms that Andre has moved to East Timor

by therevealer in

i am happy to say that andre, my relative,.

serves at the east timor office of jehovah's.

witnesses..

IsaacJ22

Hey! Don't forget that there are Witnesses swimming through crocodile infested waters just to get to the meetings every other day in distant lands! Oh, and they pray for us out of fear that our wealth might corrupt us and cause us to become complacent.

Gag. I don't know why I thought of this, but it's a similar sort of weirdness for me.

Seriously, ever wonder why they keep designating places for meetings on the other side of crocodile infested waters? I think someone gets off on it. That's all I'm saying. "Watch'em run! Oh, we need someone else to work the mikes tonight. Dang."

And I'm sure starving people in other countries don't envy us the fact that we can afford to eat a sandwich whenever we want. Right.

Boy, the WT's logic is fun.