i saw jim cameron's avatar sequel last week.. right off the bat re the avatar franchise, i believe that there are two types of viewers.. firstly, there are the fans.
the people who see the pretty visuals and immediately conclude that avatar is the greatest film franchise of all time.. then there are the rest of us - people who can appreciate the world-building and stunning visuals but do not use them to cover over the flaws, more of which later.. the plot - jake sully, neytiri and their children have to leave their idyllic arboreal existence and seek refuge among a green-skinned tribe which lives a semi-aquatic lifestyle.. bad guy quaritch is back ... in avatar form.
that's some great imagination - nice one, jim.. so the humans are back because the earth is dead.
Bad guy Quaritch is back ... in Avatar form.
Seriously??? Oh, gawd....
I could have sworn he was pierced through the heart and lungs with not one, but two spear-sized arrows that in his words were, "dipped in a neurotoxin" and then left for dead in an atmosphere incompatible with human life on a world teaming with creatures that apparently find human flesh delicious.
Killing a villain that decisively and then resurrecting him for a sequel screams lazy writing
so last night me and hubby got round to watching love actually for the first time .
seemingly everyone says that it's a must see christmas film , people watch it numerous times .
sorry to say l was underwhelmed and won't bother watching it again.
So please don't be put off by me
I'll probably end up seeing it whether I want to or not. (Wife and I take turns picking the movie)
I do enjoy Rom-Coms when they're actually funny.
so last night me and hubby got round to watching love actually for the first time .
seemingly everyone says that it's a must see christmas film , people watch it numerous times .
sorry to say l was underwhelmed and won't bother watching it again.
Haven't seen Love Actually, but thanks for the heads up
In the same vein: A female coworker recommended The Notebook (2004) as a good movie to watch with my wife. We both thought it was insipid.
On the flip side of the coin, we recently watched the movie Delicious. (2021) I was prepared to hate it, but ended up thoroughly enjoying it.
sorry if this has been discussed before but on quora someone asked if rutherford had said that dinosaurs had been taken to venus .
i assume that the questioner had heard it somewhere and wanted to check it out.
i've never come across this before is it true ?
Yes
1940's and 50's era science fiction was full of the idea that Venus was a hospitable, albeit humid place.
Heinlein's Between Planets is a very good example. It's not that the late Robert Heinlein was stupid. He was an aeronautical engineer and like Asimov and Clarke, emphasized scientific accuracy, distinguishing hard science fiction from fantasy.
over the years, i have found it helpful to see the similarites between jw's and mormons to help me understand what happened to me and my family as jw's.
robert bryan discusses this in one of the best presentations i have heard on the topic.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wok7e3utzy8&ab_channel=bibleready .
Both groups have a love affair with ancient Judaism for some strange reason. The Mormons believe the Aaronic Priesthood was conferred upon Joseph and Hyrum Smith by the angel Moroni. The JW's regularly attempt to interpret the Law, sometimes in ways that would make a Pharisee cringe. (A good example is their stance on autologous transfusion)
Both groups have a fascination with ancient texts, but paradoxically, are not terribly knowledgeable about them. A Greek expression used by one and only one Bible writer is sprinkled throughout the Book of Mormon, which should set off alarm bells, but doesn't (The only way it could have gotten there is via the AV) There's nothing unusual about meeting an Evangelical Christian who can at least muddle his way through 1 John. It's very, very unusual to meet a JW who can.
Both groups believe they are chosen by God in a special way that sets them apart from other people. Both groups believe they are better people (morally and intellectually) than those in other religions, which (not surprisingly) results in a stunning level of arrogance.
i haven’t seen anything in the news lately and wt position remains the same, so no change.
except, that when there is massive blood loss, my family mds have told me that without a bt there is practically zero chance of pulling through—short of an act of god.
jw know this and have decided beforehand.
AFAIK nothing has changed. The JW position is still based on false analogies, medical misinformation, speculation and grammatical misconstruction.
Therefore AFAIK, the moral dilemma remains unchanged. On one side of the scales, you have very clear commands about the sanctity of the gift of life and the severe penalty for unjustly depriving another human of that gift and on the other side of the scales, you have questionable (human) reasoning on what commands against eating blood might have meant in the context of modern medicine.
(And as a side note, the Jewish side of me got a chuckle at a principle very clearly embraced by Jesus of the Bible being written off as "Jewish")
occult un forces seek to hijack religion for globalism.
https://thenewamerican.com/occult-un-forces-seek-to-hijack-religion-for-globalism/it does not look like religions dominate un but the other way around.
journalist alex newman gives a totally different picture about the real state of affairs.
"I'm a faithful follower of Brother John Birch
And I belong to the Antioch Baptist Church
And I ain't even got a garage, you can call home and ask my wife!"
--With apologies to the late Charlie Daniels
the wt engages in history revisionism when insisting the world changed overnight in 1914. in fact the european power struggles that came to a head were centuries old.
millions of lives had been lost in the wars of the 19th century, with the world a powder keg the years prior to the assassination of franz ferdinand in june 1914 which is often said, albeit rather arbitrarily, as the start of the war that escalated over the next 4 years into the great war.
take a look at these two pages and ask if the wt's interpretation of history seems accurate to you.
Veering back to peacefulpete's original point:
Americans in general and JW's in particular have a vague idea who Franz Ferdinand was, but if you mention the assassination of Sisi 16 years prior to the Great War, they will have no idea what you're talking about.
Political tensions had been strained for decades. The Franco-Prussian War, The Russo-Japanese War, The Austro-Hungarian campaign in Bosnia and Herzegovina, The Moroccan Crisis, The Balkan Wars, The Italo-Turkish War all set the stage for the Great War.
The idea of a, "Shot heard 'round the world" which shattered the "peace and calm" and plunged the world into chaos is utter nonsense.
i would belief so but if you can point something out, it can be discussed.. i don’t mean what jw taught in the past that they later realized was not correct and amended.
—unless you think and can show something like that is relevant.. i’ve spoken to a lot of believers from different religions.
i don’t want to bash any religion here under this topic but their beliefs are inconsistent and their reasons are sophistry and made up and grounded on circular reasoning.
Fisherman,
Does the Bible teach predation before the fall of man as you interpret the Bible ?
Your question (Unless I've misunderstood) was whether JW teaching is consistent. Admittedly, I've picked a low hanging piece of fruit here, but it does provide a glaring example of inconsistency.
For example:
What was the food of the animals? The inspired record states: “To every wild beast of the earth and to every flying creature of the heavens and to everything moving upon the earth in which there is life as a soul I have given all green vegetation for food.” Or, as Today’s English Version of the Bible puts it: “For all the wild animals and for all the birds I have provided grass and leafy plants for food.”—Genesis 1:30. (Awake! October 8, 1982 p. 10)
"The natural “sanitation squad,” made up of insects, microorganisms and larger animals, has done other things that man would never have been able to accomplish. These scavengers work to clear the forest floor of the debris of dead branches and trees. They dispose of the carcasses of dead animals. They thus prevent many devastating forest fires and much pollution and disease." (Life Does Have A Purpose p. 94)
Obviously it's inconsistent to praise the functioning of earth's ecosystems as evidence of a wise creator in one publication and condemn it as the unplanned consequences of an original purpose gone awry in another.
i would belief so but if you can point something out, it can be discussed.. i don’t mean what jw taught in the past that they later realized was not correct and amended.
—unless you think and can show something like that is relevant.. i’ve spoken to a lot of believers from different religions.
i don’t want to bash any religion here under this topic but their beliefs are inconsistent and their reasons are sophistry and made up and grounded on circular reasoning.
I've pointed out a number of quirky things over the years. Here's a relatively minor one:
The JW belief that the antediluvian world was entirely vegetarian is a repudiation of the design requires a designer argument.
Symbiotic relationships that the JW's point to as examples of the Creator's wisdom, like the cleaner fish and the shark, the oxpecker bird and the rhino, the anemone shrimp and the sea anemone, etc. are all actually forms of predation.
The JW's don't seem to realize they're contradicting themselves here. --Worse, the decomposition chain is an integral part of every ecosystem and the mechanical breakdown performed by larger scavengers is an integral part of the decomposition chain. So the "all vegetarian ecology" teaching requires us to believe that the earth's ecosystems weren't actually designed by God after all.
