'Like you're touching someone covered in a lubricant': next generation condoms
The Melbourne Age - December 09, 2015
Better than nature - I cant wait .... !!!!!
'like you're touching someone covered in a lubricant': next generation condoms.
the melbourne age - december 09, 2015. better than nature - i cant wait ....
read more: http://www.theage.com.au/technology/sci-tech/brain-scans-test-pleasure-attributes-of-nextgen-condom-20151209-glj7aw.html#ixzz3trlg56vl.
'Like you're touching someone covered in a lubricant': next generation condoms
The Melbourne Age - December 09, 2015
Better than nature - I cant wait .... !!!!!
from a story in the jewish press:.
quote: "the city of david excavations of the jerusalem hebrew university on mount ophel, at the foot of the southern wall of the temple mount compound, have yielded a sensational discovery: a seal (bulla) with the name of king hezekiah (727-698 bce).".
"king hezekiahs bulla was discovered in a garbage heap that was dumped during or shortly after hezekiahs time, from a royal building that was used to store food.
From a story in The Jewish Press:
Quote: "The City of David excavations of the Jerusalem Hebrew University on Mount Ophel, at the foot of the southern wall of the Temple Mount compound, have yielded a sensational discovery: a seal (bulla) with the name of King Hezekiah (727-698 BCE)."
"King Hezekiah’s bulla was discovered in a garbage heap that was dumped during or shortly after Hezekiah’s time, from a royal building that was used to store food. This building is part of a series of buildings, including a gate and towers, which were built in the second half of the tenth century BCE (the time of King Solomon), as part of the Ophel fortifications of the new government complex that connected the city of David with the Temple Mount."
"The Hezekiah seal bears the inscription: “Hezekiah (son) Ahaz King of Judea,” with an emblem of the sun emblem with tilted down wings and two icons of the Ankh (symbol of life)."
now, 80-85 years later, we are still here.
if i was to do the counsel with a brother who had this much experience, i would have just thanked him for doing the talk, and marked him good on the point.
this is a good way to get money though.
Esse quam videri: Sorry but it doesn't look like much of a paradise to me.
so my best friend, who also happens to be my brother-in-law, was reinstated last night.
i had an idea he was trying to make his way back to the cult since i had been texting and calling him for about 2, 3 months now and no response.
i wasn't shocked when he text me this morning to tell me the news.
the only reason it matters, is that, being imbued with blind mindless faith, he now feels impelled to shun you, because he probably believes that his love for you is so great, that he must save you through his emotional blackmail.
There is nothing else to do, but to go out and make new friends. I was 60 when I was cut off, after a few months reconciling falsehood to reality, I went out and found new friends. Sadly (grin) I'm now at the age when friends of a similar age start to pop off, so I have to keep up this process of making new friends.
this has been something that is bugging me lately-.
jehovah is all knowing.
he knows that to do away with evil, he has to do away with satan.
DesirousOfChange: How did I really believe all this bullshit?
i've been invited to attend this conference (limited attendance) and consider it an exciting privilege.
maybe for many it would be too boring, as a poster said on one of my threads, (my paraphrase) " who cares about the past?".
but, if i started my adult life as a brainwashed slave to yhwh/jesus (and, don't give me any shit about jw's ignoring jesus), i am finishing it as a (somewhat-grin) enlightened man who just may have some understanding of the development of world thought.
styng: Do you think you could provide me with more info about what happened, including the program of the second day as I would be really interested to hear more.
i've been invited to attend this conference (limited attendance) and consider it an exciting privilege.
maybe for many it would be too boring, as a poster said on one of my threads, (my paraphrase) " who cares about the past?".
but, if i started my adult life as a brainwashed slave to yhwh/jesus (and, don't give me any shit about jw's ignoring jesus), i am finishing it as a (somewhat-grin) enlightened man who just may have some understanding of the development of world thought.
Half banana: FTS, enjoy your conference. Hearing the serious thinkers in the field of late classical knowledge is a joy. I heard a lecture last week from the academic Karen Armstrong, (she is extremely well informed and assiduous in presenting an accurate picture but still, I believe, leans towards a deist interpretation).
HB: I agree heartily on the matter of JW mistrust of proper disinterested scholars, they are the ones at the coal-face of reality not "Bible scholars" who have only one object in mind.
I wasn't thinking only of Jws. Perhaps most 'true believers' distrust scholarship, and will accept biblical statements as 'truth' as evidence of their 'faith.'
HB: To understand the true birth of christianity demands a knowledge of contemporary life and thought which involves knowledge of the many sects and pagan beliefs. Manicheanism was an important ingredient as was the big cover-up you mentioned once Roman Christianity had gained ascendancy.
I agree.
HB: Have you early textual references for this ?
I suggest to you that its a matter of the starting point and the evidence for that starting point.
If you see Judaism, the context for early Christianity as a unified, structured, coherent organisation (like a modern church organisation) - then you will likely also believe that early Christianity was a similar highly structured and organised social group.
But were they? More, were the predecessors of the Judaism of early Christianity, also coherent organisations? Did everybody that lived in first temple Israel believe the same things?
Did the peasant farmers have the same beliefs as the elites? Did the political elite (Military and its organisation and the King and his court administration) have the same beliefs as the religious elite (the priests who may have been factionalised) at lest on occasion?
During the so-called Babylonian captivity, did the peasants etc, that stayed behind have the same beliefs as the elites who were taken to Babylon?
We find some evidence that during the exile, the Jews absorbed some Zoroastrian beliefs like 'dualism' and that likely the Jews who remained behind in Babylon and never returned to second temple Judaism (in Jerusalem) moved on a somewhat different doctrinal trajectory to those who did return.
If you start to question some of the 'accepted' views of the development of second temple Judaism, you may easily understand why Josephus could argue for three somewhat different (but related) religious groups (doctrinally) in saying that they were the Sadducees, Pharisees and Essenes. A close reading of the translated Dead Sea Scrolls indicates quite distinct differences when compared to the Pharisees, who were distinct again from the Sadducees. Were there still other groups? We dont know for sure, but can suspect that there were. It's often that Jews in Jesus time were expecting the Messiah. Who were these people? Were they organised? Were did they live? Did they talk to each other? If so, how? Did they meet in little groups? Were they connected in some way, outside of a shared belief?
And in regard to these Messiah expectant Jews, did they all accept Jesus as the Messiah? What about those who had heard about the Messiah figure described in the Books of Enoch? And how did all these interact with the Essenes and any other group?
Similarly, what about the early Christians? The WTS pictures them as a united organisation, but they may not have been so united, but rather existed as distinct groups but sharing a common (but not neccesarily identical) belief in Jesus. We can trace differences between Paul's group and James' group. How distinctly were they organised? Some scholars suggest that the people addressed in the John letters were another distinct group. Since the various books of the NT were not united into one canon for a few hundred years, there is really little evidence that all these groups of believers in Jesus shared more than a common belief in Jesus.
Why not start somewhere there and using google scholar ( a search engine that focuses on scholarly research, see what you can find. If you live near a university you may be able to access the library for a fee. (Sydney uni charges $40 for 6 months). You are likely able to download for free many scholarly essays on topics of interest.
Hoping that helps you on your way.
i've been invited to attend this conference (limited attendance) and consider it an exciting privilege.
maybe for many it would be too boring, as a poster said on one of my threads, (my paraphrase) " who cares about the past?".
but, if i started my adult life as a brainwashed slave to yhwh/jesus (and, don't give me any shit about jw's ignoring jesus), i am finishing it as a (somewhat-grin) enlightened man who just may have some understanding of the development of world thought.
Hi styng, nice to meet a fellow xjw that studied at macquarie.
I think this function started as a staff thingie (I'm not staff - but got an invite because I'm sort of a barnacle on the place). I wanted to advertise it on my Asian history FB page, but was asked not to, because they could not accommodate more than 50.
As for the friday program, I shall post tomorrow, as I feel mentally buggered today - after spending the day helping a friend write a sort of academic resume.
Thnx for making yourself known.
i've been invited to attend this conference (limited attendance) and consider it an exciting privilege.
maybe for many it would be too boring, as a poster said on one of my threads, (my paraphrase) " who cares about the past?".
but, if i started my adult life as a brainwashed slave to yhwh/jesus (and, don't give me any shit about jw's ignoring jesus), i am finishing it as a (somewhat-grin) enlightened man who just may have some understanding of the development of world thought.
First day over. An interesting day, scholars from all over the world. Among the more interesting to me, were Nicholas Sims-Williams from SOAS and Cambridge Universities and his wife ,who is from the British Library, and Enrico Morano, you'll some idea of his academic interests from this page:
https://independent.academia.edu/EnricoMorano
--------------------
Actually Sam Lieu is not fully retiring, he's retiring (?) from his position at Macquarie and moving onto Cambridge to be involved in pure research, mainly because his wife, Judith, is already at Cambridge.
Some people in academia think Judith Lieu is the greatest contemporary New Testament scholar in the world. (Sorry about that Fred).
And that's what fascinates me - the Jws and other (lower case) Christians, tend to denigrate scholarship. Why? mainly because it often shatters their dreamworld. I don't really object if someone wants to live in a dream world (of any sort), that's why I really don't join much in the hate jws sort of posts, but after my taste of a dreamworld that I thought represented spiritual REALITY, I prefer to be more questioning about what is reality.
Historians spend their lives attempting to discover what really happened in past (and contemporary) events.
Many discussions yesterday centred around the reconstruction of document fragments that have been treated badly by time and human agency.
Without the life efforts of guys like Sam Lieu, we would know little about the branch of Christianity that's called Manicheanism. That's because the victorious branch in the early struggles set out to destroy the documents of the groups that they defeated.
The people at the conference attempt to bring that censored knowledge back to life.
it seems unbelievable but turkey (a nato member state) shooting down a russian jet fighter on their syrian border seems to be "meh" news and no one is too bothered about it too much.. the world seems a bit upside down right now.
i don't think a lot of countries really know who the hell they are fighting and who is and isn't on their side in it all and really what is going on.. smaller incidents than this have led to major conflicts in the past but hopefully calm heads will prevail.
china shot down a us spy plane years ago and the world survived and forgot about it so things will move on i'm sure.. i'm guessing the price turkey pays for their gas supply from russia will be going up soon though.. man, that republican primary is sucking all the news attention from the room.
1.Likely, behind this act of war (?), is Turkish opposition to Kurdish Independence and Russian support for at least some Kurds. The possible winners from this mess will be the Kurds with an independent nation, putting pressure on Turkey to cede its ethnic Kurdish areas to the new Kurdish nation.
2. Its doubtful that there will be any serious consequences (yet!) but note the next Russian move. From today's Asian Times:
"Russia will deploy the powerful S-400 Triumf surface-to-air missile defense system to its base in Latakia, Syria, as part of its response to Turkey shooting down one its Sukhoi Su-24 Fencer bombers.
Russia S-400 surface-to-air-missiles
Meanwhile, Russia is also moving the missile cruiser Moskva, which is armed with a naval version of the much-feared S-300 missile system called the Fort(Rif-M)—to the Syrian coast near the Turkish border.Additionally, the Russian defense ministry has stated that, henceforth, all Russian strike aircraft will be escorted by fighters—which likely means additional Sukhoi Su-30SM Flankers could be deployed to the region."
Next time a Russian plane is hit, the hitman will take a serious hit in return.
(Sorry, cant straighten out the formatting in the quotation.)