What is the definition of "porn"? If you had a magazine that showed the drawing of a topless woman, would that be enough? If so, the WT has had porn. As was stated, they used to draw Eve topless. Without a convenient plant in the way...
Posts by Seeker
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20Is there porn in the wt-literature?
by Carlo inhave a look on the picture in wt 1. january '97.. .
this is the entire page.
below is a zoom on the two men dealing magazines in the middle.. .
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Seeker
So sorry to hear you are going through a horrible stretch, Tina. Please know that it isn't possible to please everybody, so there will always be somebody who just hates you. Forget them. Concentrate instead on those who love you, and there are far more of them here.
Very warm regards.
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AMAZING - Exposing Elders (re: Expose Ave...
by AMNESIAN inreplying to:.
http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/forum/thread.asp?id=17880&site=3.
http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/forum/thread.asp?id=17923&site=3.
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Seeker
Say, this is some thread, huh? I didn't read past the second page, but I had to say one thing to Amnesian: That was one of the clearest, best-written, most thorough, honest, perceptive posts I've had the privilege to read on this site. Thanks for making my day.
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the ole free the lose minds website is begging
by malcomx insniff sniff donations people we have no money to hold together this site of foolishness all these socalled educated people could u please give money!sniff i though the org was broke but jehovah protects them .
we also need meteor insurance send me some companies thanks free the lose minds.........
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Seeker
Why is it that WT trolls cannot write clear sentences. You would think all that Theocratic School training would come in play as they attempt to give a witness. Evidently we only get the deranged JWs here, the ones who refuse to listen to Jehovah's instructions to stay away from sites like this.
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32
Star Wars vs Lord Of The Rings
by unclebruce ini don't wanna be a jedi, i don't wanna be a jedi, you better not try and make me a jedi, you won't like me as a freak'n jedi!!!.
last year on h20 focus drew my attention to reading tolkien's lord of the rings.
i'd long appreciated the artwork and finally got arround to reading the book a few months ago.
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Seeker
Well gambler, it's clear that we have different taste in movies.
seeker jaws and star wars are two tolaly diferent movies.Many people agree with you that jaws was the begining of big buget action adventure films but I dont veiw jaws as action adventure of sci-fi fantacy, its a horror filck.
However you want to classify Jaws, it is the movie held up as the one that began the summer blockbusters.I am not a fan of the godfather movies and I still stand by my opinion that most of the films in the 70s were not that great,there are some exceptions of course.
This is how I know that we don't agree on movies, for I view the early 70s as the last great era of American cinema. There have been great movies since then, but they are exceptions. In the 70s, there was an attempt to make serious, adult movies. Most movies now are for kids, even the ones aimed at adults are dumbed down to kid level. A movie like Taxi Driver could hardly be made now.Technology plays a huge part in better cinama and better soundtracks.Take for instance two of my favorite movies, saveing privete ryan and The Last of the Mohicans.Can you imagine how much they would suck if they were made in the 70s or earlier.Just imagine the most beautiful musical score ever made for a movie in the last of the mohicans beinging replaced with a disco track.
I will agree that special effects are much better now. The music too? I don't know about that. I don't recall any disco soundtracks, except in disco-themed movies. In any case, the best special effects and the most moving music can't save a bad script, and more often than not we get bad scripts today. Too often it's nothing but great special effects -- eye candy, satisfying to the eyes but not the soul.It's one of the reasons I enjoyed Lord of the Rings: Instead of focusing on the special effects, they just used them in the background to tell a story. It wasn't about the effects.
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Star Wars vs Lord Of The Rings
by unclebruce ini don't wanna be a jedi, i don't wanna be a jedi, you better not try and make me a jedi, you won't like me as a freak'n jedi!!!.
last year on h20 focus drew my attention to reading tolkien's lord of the rings.
i'd long appreciated the artwork and finally got arround to reading the book a few months ago.
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Seeker
Gambler,
Hmmm...we sure don't see eye-to-eye on this subject!
Star wars hands down but NOT phatom menace.Star wars was groundreaking, nothing like it had been done before.
Lucas said he wanted to return to the Saturday matinee serial. So it most certainly had been done before, though not as a big budget movie before.Star wars was the first bigtime sci-fi action blockbuster movie.It started the summer movie wars.
No, Jaws did that two year previously.Movies before starwars were dull, boring and developed at a snails pace, with the only exeption being jaws.
Or The Godfather, or Godfather II, or the French Connection, or the rest of some amazing 70s cinema that was blasted into adolescence oblivion by the bloated, dumbed-down summer flick.Although I really enjoyed LotRs it will not impact the movie world the way star wars did.
It will do for fantasy what Star Wars did for SF in the cinema. -
51
Sum everything up with just one sentence???
by Celtic inwhat you got to say, in a nutshell?.
peace.
celtic
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Seeker
Never stop learning.
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80
To those who need no purpose in life
by gumby inafter reading the comments from many on the thread "is there a purpose in life" by itsjustme , posted a couple of days ago i am confussed.. i cannot understand how anyone can be content and not believe life has a purpose.. to not be compelled to wonder how all the design around us is just here because who knows why ......totally baffles me.. at this point in my life believe in a creator but have so many unanswered questions.
things do not make sense in the bible.. if i were to come to believe that the bible were a fairytale of myths...i would feel as stupid as i did when finding out the borg was a crock.. i also would be emotionally devastated.. here are some samples of your comments about lifes purpose.
we may have been put here by someone, or we may not have.
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Seeker
RW,
I finished something early, so I will steal a few minutes to respond to you.
1) Previously in this thread you acknowledged the importance of respecting precise definitions of words where science is concerned, yet here you exempt Dawkins from just such precision when it comes to theology. In fact, you over-generalize and create a strawman (for Dawkins) by claiming that "the believer will disagree and say, 'Oh, no, faith is much more complex than that,' and then run around saying, 'They found the ark, they found the ark!'" Yes, a precise definition of faith IS more complex than you and others portray, as Barlow indicates when he says: quote:
If Dawkins were giving a theological lecture, he would be held to a high standard. If he were trying to prove religion wrong, he would be held to a high standard. But when he talks about faith in a general speech, he is obviously not talking from an expert perspective, and no one expects that of him.
Reformed Christians realize that this [Dawkins'] definition of faith is a caricature. Instead of viewing faith as belief that is not based upon evidence, we view faith as that which is a pre-condition for gaining any other knowledge; faith itself is not irrational or unscientific, but that which must be in order to gain other knowledge through science and logic.When people in this forum try to discredit science by misuing terms that scientists use in precise ways, they should be held to a high standard. If they are just talking about science in general speech, no one expects them to be scientists, or to talk about science from an expert's perspective.
Barlow had every right to point out flaws in Dawkins' definitions, if Barlow thinks they are incorrect. However, I do think Dawkins is right in this case. Faith really does amount to belief without proof. After all, if faith could be proved, it would no longer be faith, but proof. Now, that is a simple way of expressing it, but it does come down to that in the end, in my opinion.
Believers disagree and present all sorts of things they view as evidence. Inevitably, their evidence boils down to emotion, coincidence, wishes, and hope. When Aunt Tillie has her prayer answered by taking the correct turn at the U-turn, that's proof to her, but not to me. When someone says they have virtually spoken with God, that's proof to him, but not to me. And so on. Dawkins is used to evidence in the scientific sense, and it's much more vigorous than they way you or I use the word. Religious persons can provide zero evidence of that nature in support of their faith, and thus Dawkins sees what he sees.
Barlow says, 'Oh no, faith is merely a precondition for knowledge,' which begs the question of what faith itself actually is. Faith is irrational and unscientific -- from the strict perspective of the scientist. Dawkins spoke from his perspective, Barlow from his, and none of this has anything to do with evolution veracity or failure. It's merely two men talking about a word from different perspectives.
You do not address this at all, giving the impression of holding Dawkins to a lower standard than you hold those who question aspects of evolutionary theory.
Not a lower standard. Barlow has every right to object to Dawkins' use of the word. That's the same standard. I may not agree with Barlow, but that doesn't negate his right.2) Barlow's argument clearly is NOTaimed at science, but, rather, at Dawkins' philosophy of metaphysical naturalism--the view that the physical universe, the "cosmos," is all there is (and thus that there can be no God) ... his scienTISM. Barlow takes Dawkins to task not for any issue of science, but for his unquestioning "faith": "faith in logic, of whose foundations he can give no account, faith in induction, upon which he builds science, and faith in the evolving human brain and the evolving human society to more often produce Martin Luther Kings than John Wayne Gacys."
Dawkins doesn't have "faith" in logic. And yes, Barlow is aiming at science, trying to discredit a very famous evolutionist. This is the dishonest part I was referring to. If you can discredit Dawkins in other areas, you begin to feel that you can discredit anything he says. It's a favorite trick of the believers (and the WTS, come to think of it). There is a reason Barlow chose to respond to a speech by Dawkins, and it has to do with Dawkins standing as an evolutionist. He's enemy #1 (or #2 or whatever) to believers who want to fight against evolution. So I viewed this essay as an attempt to discredit the thinking of Dawkins when he happend to be talking about something other than evolution. By doing so, I'm fairly certain Barlow wanted his readers to say to themselves, "Huh, this Dawkins guy doesn't even know the first thing about something I know well, faith, so clearly he can't be trusted in anything."Why do I think this of Barlow? Seen it many times before, and against Dawkins himself. It's an old tactic.
3) Barlow's argument is also aimed at Dawkins' arguments in the area of religion. If a Christian physicist makes an argument for directed evolution, many would no doubt take issue, saying that he is not qualified to speak about biology; likewise, if a Christian biologist makes an argument for a created universe, many will say he is not qualified to speak about cosmology. So can you see why Barlow is correct in taking issue with Dawkins when he makes strident claims about ethical, metaphysical or religious issues, even using theological references imprecisely ("faith") or inaccurately ("doubting Thomas")?
Absolutely, this is Barlow's area of expertise, and he can object as much as he wants. That is his right. And yes, when Dawkins speaks on the subject of religion, he is not an expert the way he is in evolution or science. It's like asking a biologist to explain the weather. He may do a bang-up job anyway, but it's not his area. The WTS likes to do this all the time, quoting a lawyer who says something bad about evolution, as if that's relevant.Next, you said:
I misstated the point. What Barlow said was, "In Dawkins' world-view, people are just animals battling it out in history -- it is no more ethical to let our children decide for themselves about religious issues than it is to grind them up and use them to fertilize the family garden." and from that I read into it an offensive idea that he was assigning to evolutionists. I'm so used to believers slandering evolutionists about their lack of morals that I read what Barlow said as morality being no more relevent than it is to an animal.quote:
Morality is better based on Christianity? Nonsense. The author's view of how morality developed leaves out the key development. It isn't just a case of matter developing over time, but of observed and enforced behavior. It absolutely is possible to tell right from wrong without resorting to God's checklist, and humanity figured it out long before there ever was a religion. The author ignores this, and pretends that morality is irrelevant to an evolutionist. That's truly dishonest.Barlow did not say that "morality is irrelevant to an evolutionist." This is the second instance where you have obviously misrepresented him.
He argues against Dawkins' concept of "rational moral philosophy." You have not offered any counterpoints in this connection, but have merely warned us away with your opinion. "Observed and enforced behavior"? Observed and enforced by whom? Parents? Schoolteachers? Employers? Governments? Societies? Cultures? Eras? These may all have different views and standards. How do you arrive at the conclusion "it absolutely is possible to tell right from wrong" with all these possibly conflicting standards? "Humanity figured it out long before there ever was a religion"? When was this? Is this ages-old standard still followed by modern-day society? If this is true, can you respond to Barlow's argument: "At least Christianity provides the ethical tools needed to critique the behavior of its own. Christians can condemn the actions of the Spanish Inquisition. Scientists like Dawkins [note, LIKE DAWKINS, i.e., not ALL scientists], however, cannot even give a coherent reason for why the biological experiments of the Nazis were unethical."
They were unethical because they caused harm. Yes, morality can vary depending on the circumstance and era and society, but taking life is always considered wrong, even if it can be necessary in time of war. Why? Why do we view taking life as wrong? Because of observed behavior. It's easy to see the harm that comes from murder, and it must have been so the first time it happened in humanity's past, millions of years ago. Long before humans had the higher capacity to invent religious ideas, they could kill each other, and notice the pain that such killing caused to others. That's what I meant.You said:
Let me quote some other of his words, the words I had in mind when I said contradiction:quote:
Finally, he thinks he finds a contradiction in Dawkins' view of the awe of science, without thinking it through enough to realize that both statements are true: there is awe in the world and despair. No contradiction at all.Here, again, you have apparently misunderstood what Barlow said. He says nothing about any contradiction. Note his actual words (I'm highlighting to help): "I'm not so sure that Dawkins has made his case that science replaces religion's sense of wonder and awe." Barlow did not say that science doesn't afford a sense of awe. Of course it does. Barlow was taking issue with Dawkins' claim: "The merest glance through a microscope at the brain of an ant or through a telescope at a long-ago galaxy of a billion worlds is enough to render poky and parochial the very psalms of praise."
"Dawkins writes...[about awe]. Later, however, he writes...[about despair.] So is science a good source of encouragement and awe, or for despair and nihilism?"
See the contradiction he's trying to introduce? I don't think I misunderstood the linguistic trickery Barlow tried to pull here.
Barlow is trying to discredit Dawkins at every turn, when Dawkins gave a speech on an area that is not his area of expertise. Why do this? Because Dawkins is good at teaching evolution, so good that it's better to find ways to discredit him elsewhere and hope the reader gets the hint and ignores what Dawkins says on evolution as well.
I don't deny Barlow's right to take on Dawkins. Good for him! But I also don't agree with what he said, and found he wasn't being very honest underneath it all. People often try to turn discussions about evolution away from science and into emotion. 'Yes, but what if this were true, we'd have anarchy!' But this has nothing to do with evolution. Evolution explains how we developed as a species. These forays into 'social evolution' are designed to discredit the science of evolution by introducing ideas that evolution does not, and should not, comment upon. That we descended from other creatures is written clearly in the evidence of this world. That this should somehow come to bear on the issue of morality is something for the philosophers to discuss, not science.
But believers, who cannot answer Dawkins on the subject of evolution, will take comfort on this criticism of his comments on morality and feel thereby that he must not know what he is talking about in science as well. That's the dishonesty.
Seeker, I've tried to word this post so as not to be offensive or sarcastic. I dread seeing emotion creep into forum threads. I'm sure you'll agree that if we are truly "seeking" truth, then these ought not be emotional, but simply rational and respectful discussions.
I had no problem with your post. It was quite respectful, even though you clearly disagreed with me. I thank you for that. -
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To those who need no purpose in life
by gumby inafter reading the comments from many on the thread "is there a purpose in life" by itsjustme , posted a couple of days ago i am confussed.. i cannot understand how anyone can be content and not believe life has a purpose.. to not be compelled to wonder how all the design around us is just here because who knows why ......totally baffles me.. at this point in my life believe in a creator but have so many unanswered questions.
things do not make sense in the bible.. if i were to come to believe that the bible were a fairytale of myths...i would feel as stupid as i did when finding out the borg was a crock.. i also would be emotionally devastated.. here are some samples of your comments about lifes purpose.
we may have been put here by someone, or we may not have.
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Seeker
RW,
I had a detailed response to you, and the system lost it. Now I have to run and I don't have time to write it all again. I'm sorry.
You had some valid points, but on the whole I had something to say to everything you said. *sigh* this is frustrating. No doubt for you as well. Look, I'll be happy to get into a long discussion with you sometime. For now, know that I've seen what Barlow did before, and I'm tired of it. There is a basic dishonesty to his approach, though on the surface it seems correct. But we'll have to disagree for now as I am just out of time.
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Is there Religion after the Watchtower
by clash_city_rockers infor those wha have left jehovahs witnesses is there religion after you leave the watch tower?
this is just a survey i would like to hear people share pesonal experiences on the matter.. 1. do you still believe in a god.
2. have you joined another religion.
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Seeker
1. Do you still believe in a God
No.
2. Have you joined another religion
No.
3. Do you still believe in a bible or a Holy book?
No.
4. Are burned out on religion?
No.
5. Do you trust others who talk about God, Jesus and religious stuff?
Yes.
7. Do you believe in truth?
Yes.
8. Is truth absolute?
Yes, except in philosophical areas, but in the sense of truth being observable facts, yes, I believe some things are true in an absolute sense.
9. Are ethics and morals absolute or relitive and arbratrary?
Depends. Some morals are dependent on society to determine. The Talian defined a woman showing her face in public as immoral. We disagree. That's relative morality. Killing is wrong, correct? Except when it's time to go to war. Even Bible believers accept that.