Posts by rem

22

Are the Gospel Stories Fictional?

by JosephAlward in

there is abundant evidence that marks stories are fictional.

in this post, i will explain how marks story of jesus miraculous feeding of the five thousand (mark 6:32-42) was copied from scripture.. at the beginning of his story, mark wants his readers to believe that his jesus is just as compassionate as the lord, so he introduces him as a person who was just as concerned as the lord is for people who are like sheep without a shepherd.

the lord is my shepherd, i shall not be in want.

rem

Elijah,

Oh, yeah, that's why I've never heard of the Archko Volume. Because it's just a hoax! No scholars take this fabrication seriously. Here is a link debunking this obvious hoax:

http://answers.org/Bible/archko.html

Here are some excerpts from this ridiculous volume:

http://www.losttribes.org/white.htm

There's plenty of informationo available through google.com if you care to search. This is what I mean about supposed 'evidence' for the existence of Jesus. Whenever you look into it in greater detail, it's initial persuasiveness is destroyed. I have not yet seen any contemporary first-hand accounts of Jesus, nor any compelling non-contemporaneous evidence. The most interesting evidence almost always turn out to be clear interpolations or downright hoaxes. You would think there would be clear, unambiguous evidence (or at least some evidence at all) of God's son existing on this earth 2,000 years ago.

rem

21

Religious Authority an Enemy of Truth?

by D wiltshire in

jw
friends

any person who has a decent knowledge of world history especially as reguards new scientific understanding know that religious authorities both christian and pagan have done much to suppress truth.. the reason for the supression is,.. it contradicts there religious teahings.. a question that begs for the asking:.

how much farther would have science advancements if religion did not fight against new understandings?.

too be fair many religious people have been good scientist, and have not let common held religious beleifs, hold them back.. .

rem

Carmel,

I wasn't trying to imply that you said Islam originated scientific thought. The point I was making is that scientific thought is areligious in nature. You were making the point that religion has brought benefits, such as the enlightenment by the Islamic followers during the Christian dark ages. I don't believe that Islam or any religion was necessary for scientific knowledge to progress, but has in fact stunted it many times in history. Just because a particular religion did not stunt rational inquiry does not mean that religion in general brings the benefit of scientific thought. I believe they are completely separate fields and you have blurred the lines. You may have a point that religion has brought benefits in other areas, such as charity and so forth, but to say that any religion was responsible for the benefit of scientific thought or the preserving of scientific thought, I believe, is going too far.

I'm not sure how you could contend this. What Helenistic thought was inspired by early Jewish thinkers?

rem

21

Religious Authority an Enemy of Truth?

by D wiltshire in

jw
friends

any person who has a decent knowledge of world history especially as reguards new scientific understanding know that religious authorities both christian and pagan have done much to suppress truth.. the reason for the supression is,.. it contradicts there religious teahings.. a question that begs for the asking:.

how much farther would have science advancements if religion did not fight against new understandings?.

too be fair many religious people have been good scientist, and have not let common held religious beleifs, hold them back.. .

rem

Carmel,

I'm not sure it was so much the Islamic religion that made the positive contribution towards science that provided the benefit. I believe Islam was more tolerant of pagan teachings and writings than the Christians which allowed them to continue in scientific knowledge. Scientific knowledge was present well before Islam, and it is fortunate that this was expanded upon by practicers of Islam. But Islam didn't start the movement for knowledge.

I don't see gaining scientific knowledge as a positive contribution of any religion. If anything, the early Greek philosophers (before Christianity and Islam) did more to contribute in this area, and some of them were even atheists. Perhaps the pagan religions, if any, were the most positive because of their tolerance of outside ideas, but even then, I don't see progress in rational thinking as a product of paganism. I see it as a secular school, rather than a religious one.

rem

23

Why the Bible anyway?

by willy_think in

why do i believe the bible is the inspired word of god anyway?

here are some answers i consider wrong .

1. it just fell out of the sky.

rem

Elijah,

So if you wouldn't trust these ancient, tribal men in their scientific knowledge then why would you trust these primitive men in their spiritual knowledge?

rem

22

Are the Gospel Stories Fictional?

by JosephAlward in

there is abundant evidence that marks stories are fictional.

in this post, i will explain how marks story of jesus miraculous feeding of the five thousand (mark 6:32-42) was copied from scripture.. at the beginning of his story, mark wants his readers to believe that his jesus is just as compassionate as the lord, so he introduces him as a person who was just as concerned as the lord is for people who are like sheep without a shepherd.

the lord is my shepherd, i shall not be in want.

rem

Elijah,

Please post a cite. I'm interested in learning about this.

rem

14

Genetic evidence for "macroevolution"?

by fodeja in

jw
friends

first genetic evidence uncovered of how major changes.

in body shapes occurred during early animal evolution.

biologists at the university of california, san diego have uncovered the first genetic evidence that explains how large-scale alterations to body plans were accomplished during the early evolution of animals.. in an advance online publication february 6 by nature of a paper scheduled to appear in nature, the scientists show how mutations in regulatory genes that guide the embryonic development of crustaceans and fruit flies allowed aquatic crustacean-like arthropods, with limbs on every segment of their bodies, to evolve 400 million years ago into a radically different body plan: the terrestrial six-legged insects.. the achievement is a landmark in evolutionary biology, not only because it shows how new animal body plans could arise from a simple genetic mutation, but because it effectively answers a major criticism creationists had long leveled against evolutionthe absence of a genetic mechanism that could permit animals to introduce radical new body designs.

rem

ThiChi,

I guess you've never run the computer program "Tierra" on your machine. It does exactly that. This technique has also been used to create analog circuit boards so complex that humans can't even understand how they work!

rem

37

Most hated Bible stories....

by PopeOfEruke in

years ago, i had a pet-hate bible story, and it was this one story that actually started me on the path to freedom from the borg-org.. it was the story of lot when he was living in sodom and the 2 angels visited (dressed like men of course).

and the crowd of sodomites were yelling "send out the visitors so we can bonk them senseless".

remember?.

rem

Dedalus,

That's funny because that's the same story that bugs my Witness buddy (workmate). When I told him of some of the Bible stories that didn't make sense to me, he said almost the exact same thing as you! "It's Dumb" LOL

rem

67

WARNING - THE WTBS CAN LOCATE YOU

by Jim Dee in

jw
friends

guys and girls.

the society have now instituted carnivore - their data tracking system installed into the uk bethel to track all apostate email and activity.

the reason is the amount of "leaks" of confidential mail and facts.. they have tried and failed with legal blocking, so now they are plugging the leaks, these guys were brought into mill hill late last year after the leak of the june 1 letter.. their method is to use message boards and chat rooms for the "disaffected" and get them to go to other "society monitored" web sites.

rem

Jourles,

You are correct that if you are running a personal web server with all of your information available, then you are not exactly anonymous on the Internet. Though, if your IP address is dynamic (almost everyone's is nowdays) then a person might be able to figure out who you are if they try to browse the IP address right away, but after the IP address changes then that IP address will no longer point to your personal web server. So the chances of being found out are greatly reduced with dynamic IP addresses which are extremely common for normal consumer Internet access. If your IP address is static, then it can be easier to identify you.

rem

67

WARNING - THE WTBS CAN LOCATE YOU

by Jim Dee in

jw
friends

guys and girls.

the society have now instituted carnivore - their data tracking system installed into the uk bethel to track all apostate email and activity.

the reason is the amount of "leaks" of confidential mail and facts.. they have tried and failed with legal blocking, so now they are plugging the leaks, these guys were brought into mill hill late last year after the leak of the june 1 letter.. their method is to use message boards and chat rooms for the "disaffected" and get them to go to other "society monitored" web sites.

rem

UR,

The 63.92.157.81 address is just from Rhett's ISP. SYN explained the trick well.

It looks like the Watchtower's web site is hosted on Verio:

Just some useless info,

rem

67

WARNING - THE WTBS CAN LOCATE YOU

by Jim Dee in

jw
friends

guys and girls.

the society have now instituted carnivore - their data tracking system installed into the uk bethel to track all apostate email and activity.

the reason is the amount of "leaks" of confidential mail and facts.. they have tried and failed with legal blocking, so now they are plugging the leaks, these guys were brought into mill hill late last year after the leak of the june 1 letter.. their method is to use message boards and chat rooms for the "disaffected" and get them to go to other "society monitored" web sites.

rem

Rhett,

That's pretty funny! (though I wasn't fooled - I've seen that trick before) :)

This paranoia about the WTBS tracking you over the Internet is ridiculous. The worst they could do is track emails and packets from within Bethel to see if information is leaking out, and even then it would be a daunting task.

Some people are so paranoid about people knowing their IP address. So what? Your IP address cannot be used to identify you, except in rare cases where law enforcement subpeona ISP records. Your IP address most probably changes quite often, so it can't reliably be used to track you down, unless you are doing something illegal and law enforcement get's involved.

There is no way the WT can find your identity (legally) through IP addresses if you are a normal dialup/cable/satelite/dsl user. And it would take way too many resources to try and get the information illegally - it's not like they can just look you up in a database or something, they would have to hack you and that takes time and resources. The WTBS is not a black hat hacking community, they are just a cult.

When I toured Bethel a few years ago, hoping to be recuited into their networking department (LOL), I got to see their systems and I was not impressed at all. It was sad! They didn't have much of a network to speak of and they certainly weren't doing anything advanced. I'm not sure how things have changed since then, but I don't suspect that they have recruited much talent in that field with all of the money available in the job market. Plus, their charter is not to hunt for apostates by hacking on the net, it's to manufacture books.

rem