Posts by Laika

14

Evolution is a Fact - Index for Numbers 1 - 20

by cofty in

#1 protein functional redundancycomparing the sequences of amino acids in ubiquitous proteins confirms the relationship between all living things.. #2 dna functional redundancycomparison of the dna that codes for the amino acids of ubiquitous proteins predicts the tree of life with an astonishing degree of accuracy.. #3 ervsendogenous retroviruses that infected our ancestors are found in the same place of the genome of our closest primate cousins.

#4 smelly geneshundreds of broken genes that used to code for olfactory receptors in our ancestors are still found in our genome.. #5 vitamin cwhy humans can no longer make their own vitamin c and what that tells us about our species' history.. #6 human chromosome 2our second biggest chromosome is made up of two of our ancestors' genes stuck end-to-end.. #7 human egg yolk genehumans and our primate cousins have the genes for making vitellogenin and they are all broken in the same way.

#8 jumping genesbits of parasitic code called alu elements prove our common ancestry with primates.

Laika

Does this mean you've finished? :(

70

how do most of you now feel about the military?

by sowhatnow in

was not sure where to post this, but i was curious, how do some of you now feel about the military?

would any of you let your children enlist, or would you yourselves join any military field?

how do you feel about the idea of women in the military?

Laika

I don't like our aggressive foreign policy or the way our culture glorifies violence, having said that I hope I don't feel the same moralistic disdain for soldiers as I used to.

31

Your favorite Bible version / translation

by lumberjack in

jw
friends

which one is your favorite?

Laika

New living translation

96

Is the religion of Jehovah's Witnesses really an inferior form of Christianity?

by nicolaou in

seems to be quite a few posters recently pulling down the beliefs of jw's as not biblical or truly christian.

maybe you're right, maybe you're wrong, i really don't care.. in some important ways though mainstream christians often behave better than jehovah's witnesses; most don't practice shunning or impose lethal medical prohibitions on their members.

many are far more tolerant of the lgbt community and a few even make the awkward attempt to square the fact of evolution with their faith.. please note that i'm saying some, not all.. so i suppose it's fair to say that differing forms of christianity can be better or worse for individuals, families and the wider community.

Laika

In James Fowler's book 'Stages of Faith' he describes spiritual development in a set of 6 stages.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stages_of_faith_development
JWs are required to get stuck at somewhere around stage 2 and 3, accepting 'us vs them' paradigms and avoiding paradox. Maturing beyond that is seen as 'falling away' or worse 'apostasy'. This is of course very common in many religious institutions, but there is, I believe, a more mature way to practice Christian faith, away from the dogmatism and dualism of JWism and similar churches towards contemplation and compassion.

41

Who is your favourite thinker?

by The Rebel in

jw
friends

having recently read orwells 1984, i was impressed with how he understood that both politicians and people abuse language.

this further confirmed to me how the w.t had deceived me by using words to distort reality.

the book 1984, also contains many other great thoughts of george orwell.. of course there have been many other great thinkers, buddah, darwin, freud, einstein and marx come to mind.

Laika

Rene Girard

Richard Rohr

Stanley Hauerwas

St. Paul

91

Is the Watchtower organisation facing the biggest crisis of its history?

by slimboyfat in

recent developments make me think they might be.

the problems they are facing are not just lack of funds but also draining authority, and the two could be a heady and explosive mix.

one of the best analyses ever written of the watchtower was a book called "trumpet of prophecy" by sociologist james beckford in the 1970s.

Laika

Hi Phizzy: "In my day we used to pay, via the Worldwide Work box, as JW's, for all Literature we gave away, has something changed?"
This would be done at a JWs discretion, and in my experience as accounts servant most JWs don't put in enough to cover the costs. I doubt they would have reduced the size of the magazines if they were contributing enough.

91

Is the Watchtower organisation facing the biggest crisis of its history?

by slimboyfat in

recent developments make me think they might be.

the problems they are facing are not just lack of funds but also draining authority, and the two could be a heady and explosive mix.

one of the best analyses ever written of the watchtower was a book called "trumpet of prophecy" by sociologist james beckford in the 1970s.

Laika

They have some interesting challenges for sure. The preaching work must be a major drain on their resources, since it involves giving away a huge amount of free literature, but any attempts to scale that down would cause far more doubts then 100 changes to the generation doctrine.

I've also read on here that there are concerns about them finding enough 'appointed men' to run their congregations, if this becomes a big problem they might have to scale back on activity but constant activity is an important part of keeping JWs going.

59

Ex JW's - Which Christian denomination are you with now and why?

by Truthexplorer in

this is a question for ex jw's who have joined another christian faith group.

the purpose of my question iis to find out which christian faith group you chose after leaving watchtower and what convinced you to travel this new spiritual path you are on.

i am interested to know because i personally would like to find a genuine faith group where i can feel true christian liberty as i initially thought i had with the witnesses.

Laika

Strange responses on this thread...

Anglican, because I like their theological flexibility. They've got calvinists to wesleyans, catholics to charismatics and everything in between (at least in the UK).

30

What are the economics of cart witnessing?

by slimboyfat in

on another thread shepherdless sketched out the past business model of jws and its demise.

until 1990 they were a straightforward publishing business with the tremendous advantage of free labour in production and free distribution agents.

since then they've been relying on donations for literature to keep the old model going.

Laika

The JW who I spoke to on the cart with katewild on Sunday wanted me to take a bible teach book, and the ones who called on me yesterday wanted me to take one too. They don't seem worried about the cost.

Whatever profit they make on the carts is surely lost on literature.

20

240 'Lands'

by Jeffro in

jehovah's witnesses are purportedly 'active' in 240 'lands', quite a remarkable feat for a planet with only about 200 sovereign states (206 if you count all that are recognised by at least one un member, of which jws are present in 166).

more than half of all jws worldwide are in just 10 countries.

over 90% are in 45 countries.. to achieve this mathematical miracle, various places that are not separate countries are counted as 'lands'.. tahiti is counted as a separate 'land' though it is part of the society islands, which is part of french polynesia, which is part of... france.

Laika

Did they use to count the channel islands as separate lands? When did they stop?