@sea breeze the articles you pointed at are very weak “evidence”. There is no archeological or historical evidence of Jesus even existing, everything about it has been proven forgeries or interpolations. The scriptures were written a lot later and based on earlier Greek and local stories. If you read the Illiad, nobody says that the writer must have seen something therefore stories about giants and mermaids are true. George Lucas didn’t travel to space, JRR Tolkien didn’t go to middle earth, yet their stories have the same motief, the same Jesus characters, the same Satan characters, good vs evil and explanations for it, promises of paradise and redemption. Yet we don’t believe those stories to be factual.
Anony Mous
JoinedPosts by Anony Mous
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58
Did the ransom sacrifice even work?
by Sharpie inshower thought entered my mind the other day... jesus christ.
as per doctrine.
is still alive in heaven right now correct?
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JW Data Protection Policy
by dropoffyourkeylee injust discovered something that is worth a comment or two:.
go to jw.org and type in the search box 'data protection'.
i had a conversation with an elder who told me that they are directed to purge some files pertaining to people who are ex-jws and have been disfellowshipped over a prescribed number of years.
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Anony Mous
It depends on jurisdiction and their website policy has nothing to do with it. Some countries/states/areas will require the purging of old ‘customer’ records. In some cases they will need affirmative consent, in other places there is a time period, in some it is ‘on demand’.
As privacy laws become more engrained, they already had to adjust the policies around return visits, not-at-home and do-not-call registries they used in public service.
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Garbage in equals Garbage Out: A study in computer science as applied to JW doctrine
by Terry inhttps://docs.google.com/document/d/1h4dynwkbyakgdibbwlibwtf2ruzpewcd5ipupvo-edm/edit?usp=sharing.
garbage in / garbage outthere is a saying about errors in computer science: garbage in / garbage outin computer science, garbage in, garbage out is the concept that flawed, or nonsense input data produces nonsense output.
rubbish in, rubbish out is an alternate wording.
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Anony Mous
I think you see it too complicated. Compilation of programs will always result in the same output, regardless of whether it works, the output is the same. However give the Bible or any holy scripture to anyone and it generates a different output every time.
Religion is more like AI (or as we should call it, generalized semantic filters). Basically you filter out concepts and other information from raw inputs like nature and then you transfer/copy those and improve upon them over time. At some point the programmer is done with it and produces a ‘model’, can be a text, a book, or in Christianity’s case, the “Bible”, other people copy the model and modify or improve it, but at its core it’s still the same model. Some people reject old models and come up with a new model (eg. Islam or Mormons), although they, like all programmers, are lazy and copy concepts (code) from other models.
However, religions are the people that have no concept of what the model can do and then start asking it random questions (alike what you have today in ChatGPT). And most of the cases you get totally non-sensical answers, but some people believe what it says and start modeling their lives around it, as times go on, people start using these things (eg. Google Home or Alexa) without even asking questions about the underlying model, or the data it was given to produce the output, or the questions it was asked. They believe what it spits out regardless of accuracy. Some people will even use it to model their behavior, their decisions etc and cunning people can use that for profit.
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Are the statistics out yet?
by slimboyfat inisn’t it about time they released the report for the service year?
or have they stopped publishing it?
did they released selected figures at the annual meeting as they usually do, such as the memorial attendance or record number of pioneers?
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Anony Mous
According to the Vatican The number of Catholics in the world grew by more than 15 million from 2018 to 2019. Other churches across the US, including Presbyterians are claiming a growth in absolute members too, where membership is actually defined by those that tithe, not just attendants. Many religions don’t take an accurate census though.
I think proportionally to the population all religion is declining but in absolute numbers they are increasing. I think there are less people claiming to be of one or the other religion, so polls like Pew research may see actual absolute number decreases, but if you use those kind of statistics there would probably be an estimated 15M witnesses (many that left but still claim it as their primary religious affiliation)
Back in the day I was slacking and told by the elders that if I didn’t at least put in the average publisher hours (9-10h) I would be marked inactive. I even got handed back my report when I didn’t do anything but marked 4 hours just to pretend, told I shouldn’t bother to turn in that low. Only the elderly could apply for an exception and then they still had to do at least 1-2 hours, talking to nurses and doctors and everyone else they could.
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Are the statistics out yet?
by slimboyfat inisn’t it about time they released the report for the service year?
or have they stopped publishing it?
did they released selected figures at the annual meeting as they usually do, such as the memorial attendance or record number of pioneers?
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Anony Mous
@slimboy: a lot of churches are growing, so is the population. The question is whether they are growing smaller or growing bigger. They aren’t growing larger even in comparison to the US population, they’re growing about half the speed of the world population. This means that the only growth is their children if half of them are staying in.
The other problem is that the method of counting has changed wildly since 2000. In 2000, you needed to make 10 hours a month in service to even be counted as an active publisher. Now you just need to show up at a Zoom meeting.
I don’t think the WTBTS will be dying anytime soon. The entire organization can literally be ran on a few million, maybe less, budget annually for running a website, video and speech productions.
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The Last of Us
by Simon inlooking forward to the first episode of this new computer-game to tv-show adaptation that airs this sunday.. it has pedro pascal from got and the madalorian plus bella ramsey, also from got, who played the bad-ass lady mormont.. lots of it was filmed near us, some right round the corner (there's quite a few productions film around here, we get ice-cream near where they filmed scenes from interstellar).. this show is a post-apocalyptic zombie series and early reviews are that it's awesome, so i'm hoping for good things, especially since walking dead jumped the shark a few seasons ago and we gave up on it.. anyone else planning to watch?.
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Anony Mous
Looks interesting, it's in my queue, whether I'll get to watch it with children and a backlog of other shows.
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Are JWs breaking the law?
by Indoubtbigtime ineverytime a publisher moves congregations they have a confidential letter of introduction sent from one body of elders to the other .
this letter contains some very very sensitive information like if they had sexual problems or mental health problems or if they self harmed etc.
most people don’t know but they can request or insist on seeing this information through a freedom of information request .
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Anony Mous
Depends on jurisdiction, the GDPR only applies in the EU and even there it is very poorly defined and enforced.
You do sign away those rights when you join, people that haven’t signed would probably be considered “bad association” and don’t get privileges. I’m pretty sure only PIMOs would refuse.
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It’s started COBE asking all appointed men if they are fully vaccinated
by Indoubtbigtime inthere is a huge problem now in all congregations as the gb stubbornly will not do the u turn on staying fully vaccinated that many hoped they would do.. all congregations around the world the cobe has to ask all ministerial servants and elders if they are fully vaccinated (meaning no more than six months since last shot).
there is a massive problem now with many many jdubs not getting their latest boosters and not wanting to stay fully vaccinated .
but more serious than that is how the gb painted themselves into a corner with these vaccine mandates.. most governments did a u turn on the vax mandates but the gb can’t get out of this one so easily .
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Anony Mous
The shots have been banned in some countries and even US states like Florida now put out warnings for people under 40 due to the danger.
Do they have different directions for different countries and states? Or will they ignore Caesar on that?
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Was Satan in Heaven while Christ was crucified?
by Sharpie injust a shower thought came to mind.. while jesus was nailed to the stake/cross (take your pick) because of the witnesses lack of belief in hell.
does that mean according to witness doctrine that satan and his demons were in heaven while jesus was being executed?.
what about after jesus went to heaven?
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Anony Mous
It’s a great question. I think the doctrinal explanation is that until 1914 Satan was allowed into heaven but he also roamed the earth (since that is what he told Jesus during the 40 day wilderness test).
He was cast out of heaven in 1914. Witnesses like to explain that he was basically treated as if he were disfellowshipped (although he talks to Jesus/Jehovah/angels at various points in the Bible) but still lived in the same house, there are older publications that make the same analogy, because they need to make clear Yahweh approves of their doctrine.
So, where was Satan at that point? Could be anywhere. Does it have to make sense? Probably not, the whole biblical doctrine hangs together with metal wire and duct tape.
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So where oh where did Judge Rutherford come up with JW theology?
by Terry inbits of unreported history that may be of casual interest… as to doctrinal origins.
sykes was one-of-a-kind in the pentecostal movement, but he was considered quite a maverick who went his own way with heretical teachings repugnant to the pentecostal faith.. joshua sykes’ congregation was integrated, unlike pastor russell’s public speeches/sermons where blacks and whites both could attend, but only in separate sections--sykes's members were sitting side by side in the pentecostal church.
this was considered dangerous and inflammatory at the time.. pentecostal preacher joshua sykes practiced racial and gender "integration" as early as 1908 -- having both african-american and female assistant preachers, staffers, and members.
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Anony Mous
A lot of the teachings come from the Adventist and Millerite movements, since that what was where CT Russel comes from.
The belief system was by no means unique in its day, but most branches died off for being too extremely anti-American in the day.
The entire movement that sprang from late 1800s Baptist’s (which includes the Amish, Mennonites and others as well) seems to have been in response to the fast industrialization and seemingly loss of morals in a world where things become easier and cheaper.