Half banana

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Posts by Half banana

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  38

  If we are further away from perfection, why are we more moral?

  by stuckinarut2 in

  1. watchtower
  2. bible

  as we know, witnesses teach that adam and eve were perfect and then committed the first act of sin and rebellion.. they in turn were cursed,and we all declined as their offspring.

  humans supposedly lived shorter and shorter lives, and became more imperfect and sinful.. the further away in time humans go then, they should be getting worse.

  so why is it then that as a society, humans have actually improved in so many ways?.

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  Half banana

  Agreed Steve2.

  (Erratum: the Enlightenment was essentially an 18th century affair) What it demonstrated was that the fixtures of monarchy and religious power were working against the interests of the French population in particular, and were outmoded generally. In principle these two evils were highly undemocratic since they favoured the rich and perpetuated their entitlement to undue privilege. The philosophes offered reason as a substitute for religious superstition.

  It might be said that early Christianity attempted to create a God centered society and by the fifth century it was being enforced as a political instrument in the ailing Late Roman Empire. In reality Christianity's weaknesses were apparent right from the start. There are very few contemporary secular texts on the subject but one from the early second century by the Stoic and rationalist Epictetus (pron; epic teetus) called the Jesus Christians "Galileans" to distinguish them from other christian sects. He felt a philosophical sympathy with their calmness in facing death but noted their passivity and gullibility in believing holy things.

  Christianity like all irrational belief has a lot to answer for. The response has got to be the the Enlightenment ideal of reason before faith.
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  38

  If we are further away from perfection, why are we more moral?

  by stuckinarut2 in

  1. watchtower
  2. bible

  as we know, witnesses teach that adam and eve were perfect and then committed the first act of sin and rebellion.. they in turn were cursed,and we all declined as their offspring.

  humans supposedly lived shorter and shorter lives, and became more imperfect and sinful.. the further away in time humans go then, they should be getting worse.

  so why is it then that as a society, humans have actually improved in so many ways?.

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  Half banana

  RT, I can't reconcile an increase in disease today with my perception of the past?

  Homo sapiens is a young species and while having begun to turn towards organising ourselves for the betterment of all, we remain for the time being at the level of raw recruits working out how to do it. This difficulty is not surprising since no other species has attempted a conscious democratic governance. Brute force was the only rule available.

  Religion worked as a political unifier in the past especially when all societies were rigidly class layered but the time for blind faith in the numinous world is rapidly declining. Our species is only just setting out on a real star treck although we've hardly got off our own planet, yet surely, the technology does seem to be pointing in Roddenberry's direction?

  If we take the typical life of a human in his or her development as a pattern; It seems to me that humans in the 21st century are collectively at the stage of teenagers still trying out the world, with some more grown up than others. Human society/societies have made progress and religion with faith in holy magic is no longer a beacon for the future.

  The next stage toward maturity: will it be built on the foundations set up by the "philosophes" of the 19th century Enlightenment?
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  38

  If we are further away from perfection, why are we more moral?

  by stuckinarut2 in

  1. watchtower
  2. bible

  as we know, witnesses teach that adam and eve were perfect and then committed the first act of sin and rebellion.. they in turn were cursed,and we all declined as their offspring.

  humans supposedly lived shorter and shorter lives, and became more imperfect and sinful.. the further away in time humans go then, they should be getting worse.

  so why is it then that as a society, humans have actually improved in so many ways?.

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  Half banana

  We are more educated, more likely to base actions on reason rather than cultural obligations and much less religious.

  Morality is not something which can be quantified.

  From the utilitarian viewpoint of nineteenth century philosopher Jeremy Bentham, we are doing better. Today in the Western World more people have more pleasure and less pain and live longer with a greater sense of wellbeing than ever before.
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  8

  Long article, but it explains a lot of things

  by JeffT in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  i found this the other day, and read it last night.

  i think it explains a lot of what is going on in both american politics and many religions around the world.

  https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2017/03/this-article-wont-change-your-mind/519093/?utm_source=feed.

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  Half banana

  “Having social support, from an evolutionary standpoint, is far more important than knowing the truth.”

  Then there is the mention of the "mental gymnastics" needed by believers to maintain the irrational premise for their being. . . and that is the whole thrust of WT literature, relentlessly showering the flock with propaganda to keep them within the social club.
  
  
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  16

  God never knew Jesus would be killed?

  by venus in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  jesus gave an illustration with a landowner being the central character:.

  “there was a landowner who planted a vineyard.

  he put a wall around it, dug a winepress in it and built a watchtower.

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  Half banana

  To get the Jesus cult going with the largest number of (paying) members, it had to be rationalized for acceptability to the Jews and then the Romans, Greeks and others in western Asia and the Levant. That is why Paul and other writers used different premises for belief for each of the believing groups and skillfully harmonised their often incompatible dogma. Christianity was not a new religion so much as a fusion of all contemporary temple and Mithraic beliefs in the second, third and fourth centuries.
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  40

  Another recorded Judicial Meeting...

  by NikL in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  i've listened to quite a few but for some reason, this one has me really angry.. my heart goes out to the young family dealing with this bull shite.. give a listen.... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ifkpiqigq9c.

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  Half banana

  It seems that the org is moving toward the idea that it does not need facts at any stage of being a believing JW.

  What now counts for membership (as the clip shows) is just total conformity with the culture of JWs as espoused by its governing body. You can be df'd for holding opinions which differ from the prevailing orthodoxy of the organisation.

  Thou shalt not think for thyself!

  The next stage in this increasingly despotic cultic regime is to demand that the GB are "God's Anointed" and that to disagree with them is to touch God's anointed (Psa.105:15). Watch this space. . .

  This brainless bunch of desperadoes is using every method of cultic reinforcement possible to fend off reality.

  Every means of aggrandising their own unjustified power over their flock is used: through dishonesty, alarmist distortion of evidence, through daily enforced exposing them to false propaganda and through powerful threats of social severance from family and friends if you do not conform to their will.

  And to what end: that more and dumber, subservient JWs are in thrall to stratospherically elevated GB members.

  Spare us!
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  16

  When did the Iron Age start according to the Bible? You'll be surprised!

  by Crazyguy in

  1. watchtower
  2. bible

  read this over at reddit so the credit goes to the person over there but in genesis 4:22 it's say one of the offspring of adam knew how to work with iron roughly 130 years after the creation of man.

  now historians and scientists say man didn't figure out how to use iron until about 1100 bc, man we're we wrong!

  it's also interesting that cain is building a city when there like 10 people on the planet and nimrod goes on to build the tower of babel only about 100 year after the flood.

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  Half banana

  The Bible is (after the Watchtower Society) the last place to go for facts.
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  31

  UK Memorial attendances up this year?!

  by Isambard Crater in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  my congregation had around 25 more people at the memorial last night than last year, and the two other congregations i have family in all experienced a similar increase in about 25 more people present.

  umm, i'm surprised, having thought this year would see a memorial decline again.

  and i'm kind of disappointed..

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  Half banana

  I do fear that we apostates are not doing our job well.

  We have not got over the message that human sacrifice is a somewhat outdated method of restoring equilibrium in society. Then to symbolically drink blood and eat the flesh, well quite honestly, it's not in very good taste!
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  20

  Does God really care about mankind?

  by Sour Grapes in

  1. jw
  2. experiences

  i am dying of cancer.

  yesterday i asked my full blown jw wife if she could snap her fingers and make me well would she do so?.

  she replied, "yes.

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  Half banana

  The fact that mankind is never cared for by an invisible paternalistic agency, demonstrates that there is no loving Heavenly Father.

  The Bible God is a frightening parent who demands abject love and fearful obedience at the same time.

  He never changes (Mal 3:6, Jas1:17) or so it was written after his devotees decided to update their grubby idol to conform to the prevailing views of their political masters the Egyptians, namely that God was to be worshipped as an invisible deity. He dashes the children of unbelievers on the rocks (Isa13:16) and has planned to murder 99% of his earthly 'grandchildren'. This loving father is not content with a clinical death but will let the mountains of dead putrefy, feeding the maggots and allowing the birds to peck out the eyes of his victims. Seven billion corpses: a sweet smell to Jehovah's nostrils.

  Sounds to me but I could be wrong, that this is wish fulfillment in an Iron Age morality, where the sweetest thing ever was to revenge your enemies.

  Grow up religious people! the world outside of religious bigotry, otherwise called humanity or the secular world, has largely moved forward towards a much more compassionate view of mankind.
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  16

  Potential New Article for JWFacts: Iglesia Ni Cristo

  by ILoveTTATT2 in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  paul has allowed me to write up two articles for jwfacts: iglesia ni cristo, and why russell was not a mason.here is my iglesia ni cristo article.

  “we believe that there is only one true god, the father, and no one else besides him”.

  thus, faith alone is not enough.. about baptism.

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  Half banana

  Very interesting ILT2, just goes to show how the evolution of religious ideas happens faster than in biology. The reason being that we are dealing with fictions which have no provable basis.

  I guess that the formula used by INC has a similar success rate for attracting punters?

  It must be intriguing for JWs to meet them in the d2d work, like preaching to the converted!.

  All in all both cults are delusional and aided and abetted by the falsehood of belief in holy things such as the Bible.