JW Insider

9 hours ago, 4Jah2me said:

Oh what wonderful information must be in that 20 + year Database. 

wonderful???

And he finally explained why he sometimes looks orange. Turns out deregulation will solve his orangeness, too. (Not kidding!)

This sounded like something coming out of The Onion, but it was for real!

35 minutes ago, 4Jah2me said:

Well if half the GB in the past were Homosexuals it's no wonder the Org wants to keep it quiet  

I'm pretty sure there was never any accusation concerning more than 3 of them out of 17 or 18 contemporary GB members at the time. (Jaracz, Greenlees, Chitty) I do not believe there was the slightest suspicion upon any of the others at the time, nor any of the current members either. Also, even if a child molestor tends to molest boys rather than girls, it is not the same as homosexuality, and this was the accusation against one of the three. Another was long rumored to be homosexual, and was ALSO accused of having been a child molestor. And the third was a man who had evidently been homosexual, but I never knew of any rumor or accusation of an underage partner.

4 hours ago, Matthew9969 said:

Maybe you jw's will get lucky and your hero Hitler will start ruling again.

What does that even mean?

I don't know if anyone provided an update to this story, but the "brother" finally pled guilty, and was sentenced to five years, for three felony counts of child rape with two different victims.

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/man-who-raped-jehovah-s-witness-girls-sentenced-5-years-n1082136

Elihu Rodriguez, 32, of Yakima, Washington, was given five years, the maximum sentence prosecutors had asked for, after Rodriguez pleaded guilty to three felony counts of child rape in the third degree in September. He was also ordered to register as a sex offender. Both of his victims attended the sentencing, which took place Friday at the King County Maleng Regional Justice Center in Kent, Washington.

I believe this was the case I was told something about in 2018, which is why I mentioned then that I couldn't say much because it was an upcoming court case. If it's the same one, then someone (parent?) convinced her not to report it because it was just a matter that this 25-year-old was in love with her, and so they told her it was actually multiple acts of fornication, not child abuse or child rape.

She agreed not to report on the basis that she would be considered guilty of fornication, too. So the family moved to another congregation, and within months, she got to a point where she decided she needed to report it to the elders. (I don't think it was because she learned about another girl being raped/abused by the man, even though this would make sense.) When she did report it to her new congregation's elders in 2013, they actually called the legal department just as they were supposed to, but evidently someone thought it was going to be possible to treat this as "consensual" and the elders tried to get her to say it was consensual. She refused to agree with the elders that it was consensual, and took it to the authorities.

When I heard about this case (or perhaps another one just like it) I was only told the general area of the US, and some circumstances, but no names. I was only told that this was disturbing that someone would try to turn a child molestation case of a "16 year old girl" into a consensual case in spite of the young age. (I was not told that she was actually 14/15.) Years earlier, J R Brown, as a spokesmen for the Society, had tried to minimize a lot of these cases by saying that a lot of them are like cases of an 18 year old boy with a 16 year old girl, which sounded a bit like the old "boys will be boys" excuse. 

On 12/4/2019 at 1:02 AM, Arauna said:

The mountains where I live now in Tbilisi look like they were formed by water swaying to and fro creating wave-like patterns.

Some do. Like the Rainbow Mountains, and some of the Caucasus (Svaneti) look more like rocky Alps. I'd love to see those mountains, and I planned to visit Georgia within two or three years if possible. I've never been to Georgia, the closest so far has been to northern Turkey (Ankara, Zonguldak, Samsun).

On 12/4/2019 at 1:02 AM, Arauna said:

The calm after the flood must have been wonderful.

If Jehovah did not intervene, and nature was left to itself, moving the tectonic plates would have caused thousands of violent aftershocks and tsunamis for quite some time after the floodwaters settled. Even on water, during the Flood, the Ark would have to be given divine protection. Settling on a high mountain might protect from tsunamis but not the quakes.

On 12/4/2019 at 1:02 AM, Arauna said:

The massive deposits if animals in gully graves that are hundreds of miles give proof of world-wide flood that was powerful (not local floods)

I'd like to look up some info on these. Where should I start?

The story has also been told that it was a "black boy" who offered him the newspaper for free:

https://mylife-chapter.blogspot.com/2017/08/who-is-richer-than-bill-gates.html

When my wife was a school principal, teachers were always putting up posters about, for example, the "Ten Things Bill Gates Says about School" or "What Bill Gates Said Were the Most Important Things in Life" etc.

He may have told a story like this, but usually people create such stories so that their own moral lesson comes across with more authority.

42 minutes ago, Arauna said:

can you write some?

This guy over here did at https://www.pgmusic.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=197629

To me, they sound a bit corny in English, but that's always fixable by translating to another language.

6 minutes ago, César Chávez said:

Genesis 7:10 water arose from the ground as well as the heavens. What power did God use to force inward water out? Any material within that power could be deposited elsewhere. 2 Peter 3:5

OK. I have long believed this explains a goo part of the issues. The Flood has been pointed to for a lot of things. I just have never made the time to study the evidence. I'm sure a worldwide flood would be expected to create a lot of shifting and catastrophic changes. We've even made claims (like Young Earth Creationists) that the pre-Flood atmosphere would have allowed less of certain types of dangerous radiation in, and that the post-Flood radiation would somehow have changed Carbon 14 dating accuracy. I don't think we ever figured out a scientific way this was possible though.

1 minute ago, César Chávez said:

Who do you think started the evolution scheme if not from a self-made God?

Do you think that's a solution, though? Positing that Satan deposited these fossils to trick us would certainly explain some things, but it also seems like a stretch to me.

14 minutes ago, César Chávez said:

However, not knowing the strength of the oceans current in the flood that science can't prove or disprove, deposit of materials can be logically inferred throughout the world.

It's a bit like me claiming that I can lift 100 tons, and then sticking by that claim just because you can't prove that I can't. I already believe that evolutionists can't prove all their claims, but it would be nice if there were some evidence of this depositing that could not be explained better in other ways. For that matter, the fact that so many areas of the world still have UNdisturbed layers of sediment bothers me.

4 hours ago, Arauna said:

But your earth's crust  is ancient - so the uranium should all be lead by now-  but is not.

Maybe this will help? Note the last line especially. But also note that HALF-LIFE doesn't mean that all of a substance is gone, does it? It means that HALF of it will be gone in that time.

https://teachnuclear.ca/all-things-nuclear/radiation/radioactive-decay/half-life/

The Earth itself is about 4.5 billion years old. The half-life of uranium-238, the dominant isotope in natural uranium, is also 4.5 billion years. When the earth was young, there was twice as much uranium-238 as exists today. Moreover, there was more than 64 times as much uranium-235 at that time than exists today (the half-life of uranium-235 is 704 million years).

https://teachnuclear.ca/all-things-nuclear/radiation/radioactive-decay/

As uranium-238 decays into lead-206, it will sometimes decay into a different isotope of its parent uranium isotope and sometimes it will decay into an isotope of a totally different element than its parent. This series of alpha and beta decays is known as the uranium-238 decay series..

[skipped a few]

Each radioactive isotope is the parent of the progeny isotope listed below it. Each progeny isotope has a much shorter half-life than uranium-238. This radioactive series will require a little over 6.5 billion years to complete.

27 minutes ago, Arauna said:

They have found dinosaur bones together with other animals in the large grave yards...... so I will not say it is impossible. 

I tried to find some of that info and Google led me to

https://www.genesispark.com/exhibits/evidence/paleontological/modern-fossils-with-dinos/

One problem is that this showed up:

In 2005 researchers in China identified a small dinosaur known as Psittacosaurus amongst the stomach region of a fossilized furry mammal that resembled a Tasmanian devil. (Hu, Y. et al., “Large Mesozoic Mammals Fed on Young Dinosaurs,” Nature: 433, 2005, pp. 149-152.) To find such an advanced predatory mammal came as a surprise to these researchers. The evolutionists had long maintained that the only mammals alive at the time of the dinosaurs were very small, like the supposed human ancestor that resembled a squirrel!

Nothing in this article could show that some of these other animals ONLY lived in "modern" times, which takes us right back to the problem of animals eating other animals.

3 hours ago, Arauna said:

I am looking for lyrics for this waltz.

It had words? In what language? Who wrote them? Shostakovich?

I saw that someone had recently added their own words, when I googled lyrics for it. (Sometime after Stanley Kubrick used it, I assumed from a very quick scan.) But I never saw words in the original context of the work.

36 minutes ago, Arauna said:

Animals today do this because they are best suited to fill this gap in this system of things. It does not mean they were originally created to be predators.

I'm a bit confused then. The eyes of both predators and prey didn't being moving (evolving?) until after Adam's fall, 6,050 or so years ago??  [or post-Flood, 4,400 years ago?]

6 minutes ago, Arauna said:

Animals that move in herds do not eat meat.

Googling it, I see that animals that move in groups "include elephants, lions, wolves, bees, and ants." So I don't see how anyone can claim that animals that move in "herds" do not eat meat. 

50 minutes ago, AlanF said:

Harry Peloyan, editor-in-chief of Awake!, once told me why they do it: they enjoy making secularists look bad. Apparently it didn't dawn on him that such tactics make the Watchtower Society a laughingstock

I've interacted with Harry Peloyan, and thought him to be honest. But I do believe the Evolution book (1967) was almost entirely his own work. He never told me, but he dropped enough hints. Do you think he was behind the 1985 book?

I can believe that Peloyan enjoyed making secularists look bad. I find it hard to believe, however, that Peloyan admitted that he used "dishonesty" to make secularists look bad. But he did make it through Harvard, and I therefore can't believe he didn't realize what he was doing was wrong. Today, one could be kicked out of Harvard for some of the same quoting tactics.

25 minutes ago, AlanF said:

Without those things, the earth's surface would long ago have eroded below sea level.

OK. So maybe these radioactive materials were and are good after all.

Perhaps they are artifacts of creation to let us know that God is on a higher plane and his thoughts are greater than ours. One could surmise that the area of the original garden paradise was under God's control, and that as man would have needed to expand, the instructions for how to handle dangerous materials would have been forthcoming. Or perhaps all such dangers were safely buried until the Flood?

At any rate, I think we have to admit that animals behaved violently long before Adam sinned. Creating an environment good for man might have required a lot of death and destruction of very minute things as small as bacteria and some of the larger animals too, like a T-Rex, Saber-tooth Tiger, or a hippo, great white shark, lion, or crocodile. Perhaps this creates a reminder of the strength and power of the God who created them. (See Job on Leviathan, Behemoth, etc.) Whether or not man would ever sin, he should still have reminders of the awesome creation and Creator. His having the animals in subjection would not be very impressive if all animals were like pet sheep, even in their natural states.

1 hour ago, Arauna said:

I feel for the young people who are raising children in schools where they are teaching these corrupt sexual practices and other teachings as if it is the truth

You are right that there has been a movement to "normalize" all this supposed sexual fluidity and new definitions. These supposedly progressive "culture warriors" are out there trying to get anything and everything made acceptable. It's a real mess. And it is also working as a trap for stupid Americans (apologies to stupid Americans) who think that this is some wonderful bandwagon to jump on.

Even in many colleges and universities, so-called places for progress and freedom, many of these "culture warriors" have tried to suppress speech, etc.

2 hours ago, Arauna said:

that the change in the atmosphere and earth after the flood was so great that Jehovah allowed those creatures, who would not survive afterward, to die out.

This would mean that you think the dinosaurs died out about 4,400 years ago?

1 hour ago, Arauna said:

Also,  there has been an explosion of new discoveries which now are being suppressed.

I heard you mention a couple of these. The ones I looked up didn't pan out. The claims about them were not very scientific. And obviously this is where I would hope that new answers will show up, and hopefully this is where WTS writers will be especially helpful. While I was at Bethel there was no one who knew much of anything about this type of science. If there was, he or she didn't speak up when the Evolution book was ready for an update.

59 minutes ago, Arauna said:

Thanks Tom, we are obviously dealing with secularized JWs who are sitting on the fence and maybe do not even really believe the bible when it says jehovah created everything with his dynamic energy.

If you are referring to me here, then you should know that I am not disappointed in Jehovah, nor in Creation. I am only disappointed that our explanations are not able to keep up with the evidence. I can't think of another way to put it, but this is an area where we must currently reject evidence, some of which I have gone to see for myself, hoping the evidence was more ambiguous. There are many ways to resolve the existence of God and even MOST of the evidence. But we are clearly oversimplifying the process of creation if those unresolved pieces of evidence are real. 

And I have no problem with imagining that Jehovah created many thousands of species that we have not yet seen, and that creation was a much a grander and more wonderful process than we could imagine. I still think there is a good explanation out there somewhere. I am disappointed, not in the Bible, but in the fact that some WTS writers, especially in the past, had misused the writings of evolutionists instead of dealing with the evidence itself. I wasn't referring to the case that TTH mentioned. But I didn't think this point was generally in question.

2 hours ago, Arauna said:

It is propaganda...... from scholars who have a vested interest to keep things going....... just like the high priests in Jesus' time...... they like the power and the influence this system gives them.

On the overall subject of evolution, I don't pretend to know the answers. I think that a lot of the evidence on both sides has been misunderstood, but every time I try to look into it myself, it seems that the "wrong" evidence is winning. My mother believes that Satan, who keeps transforming himself into an angel of light, was given powers/permission to hide fossils in whatever places he wished to cause confusion and division. (Perhaps a hint of this in Satan's argument over Moses' body in Jude 9.) I don't like this theory at all. I've mostly heard it from young earth creationists, and was actually surprised to hear it from my mother. It brings up so many questions about the timing of such "miracles" that Satan was allowed to perform. Were these fossils moved at the time of the Garden of Eden? Is Satan still allowed to perform these miracles today?

I've heard my father (in fact I've been with him at museums) back in the years when he tried to explain the feathers on certain non-flying dinosaurs as feathery-looking ferns and/or other leaves and plants. I've now seen enough of these fossils up close so that I realize he is just grasping at straws.

I have always assumed that there is a bigger puzzle here and that none of us are ready to deal with all the facts and evidence yet. Although my own son (the math/physicist) tells me that the sum total of the evidence does currently fit the evolution theory, with some minor exceptions not yet understood, but which will probably still fit among the current theories, with minor adjustments.

To my son's credit, he does not believe the current theories are necessarily final, and they don't prove there is no God.

But here is the most surprising thing about my son's belief: The current theories are the ones that HONEST scientists are forced to accept based on rules of handling scientific evidence. It's not the same as scholars having a vested interest in keeping things going because of power and influence. In fact, if a scientist could come up with a new theory that fits the facts and evidence, he would become the new Darwin. It's probably the "holy grail" of scientists to be able to topple a current theory with a better explanation for all the evidence The problem is not the scholars, or the theory, it's that this theory is the RIGHT one from the perspective of science. It fits the old evidence and the new evidence, so far.

The best the Society can do is to look for inconsistencies and disagreements among certain scientists, and make the most of these issues to show us that there is still some room for disagreement over certain bits of evidence. I'm very disappointed when the WTS writers stoop to misquoting the evolutionary scientists, however, or quote a religious view from a different kind of scientist who clearly never dealt with evolutionary theory. I'd like to think that the WTS writers were only being careless when looking for ways to discredit evolutionary scientists, but the clever way in which words have been selected for quotes, with other words left out, tells me that the writers have sometimes understood the original intent and stooped to dishonesty. I'm not sure why a WTS writer would ever think this was a reasonable solution for us. But it tells me that the WTS is not ready to explain the overall evidence yet.

On 12/1/2019 at 2:26 PM, Arauna said:

Uranium breaks down into  lead  reasonably fast.... and there is still uranium left on the earth..... so if the earth is as old as they say, there would be no uranium left.

This reminds me of a problem I've had with uranium. What GOOD is it?

Radioactive substances were clearly on the earth when Jehovah declared each successive day "good." And after the sixth day he could look back and see that everything he had made was good.

Was it good because humans might find that some radioactive elements could be made to produce heat like coals? Obviously not! Were all radioactive elements and substances kept out of man's reach so that he would never come across them?

Perhaps it was so that man would someday harness these powers and create a safe source of energy? This implies that Jehovah wanted mankind to develop technologically, and as indicated by the Tower of Babel, perhaps controlled the pace of that progress until today or some time in the near future. But if we don't really need it until the new system, why not make it in the new system, in much the same way that he provided quail or manna. And why would we need it in the new system, anyway?

I can understand how Jehovah could have made all animals subject to man such as in a Garden of Eden. Even animals that are violent with one another can still be trained to be peaceful in their interaction with humans.

But perhaps this is the same argument that AlanF is making about thousands of years of animals being violent and unloving with one another. I have less problem with that, than with all the things that would seem to be poison to us, and which we would only learn about through dangerous, even lethal, experimentation. Does EVERY poison and danger have a good side? When did certain plants and elements become poisonous to us? Only after Adam's sin?

So, I've been mostly away from my computer for a few days, and it looks like this entire forum has been mashed up into a single thread/topic. I know that I was given the ability to move posts around to new threads, and I probably should have started to do that many days ago. (When I began I realized it was too late.)

But I also understand the simplicity (and short-term efficiency) of putting everything in the thread that people are actively participating in. In the longer-term, it's less efficient for those who need to go back and try to respond to things.

Since I think I'm getting in here at the tail end, I hoped to summarize a bit, and had hoped that Anna, Tom, Arauna, any "Allen Smith" alternative would have tired out AlanF so I could pretend to have delivered a final knock-out punch. But it keeps going and going with no end in sight. And there is no single topic on which one could hope to offer a "summary defense."

TTH, in spite of letting his tomfoolery characters get out of hand, has used them to point out so many of the areas where AlanF shows unnecessary antagonism, lack of empathy, and a lack of humor. He has also pointed out that AlanF's super-hypercritical view of JW leadership is also hypocritical in that an atheist should have no reason to pick on the spiritual and doctrinal beliefs of just one particular religion among hundreds. 

I like that Anna has picked up on some flaws in AlanF's reasoning. I think AlanF still argues against JW leadership from the FWF-era, especially the 1950's through the 1980's, when Anna and others have picked up on positive signs of transition, away from much of the dogmatism of that era. Slowly, I see some of the old arguments disintegrating, especially in moving a few of the events, once applied to 1918, 1919 and 1914, now being more correctly applied to the 1st century or the future judgment.

I like that Arauna has included some excellent points on intelligent design, some of which AlanF doesn't care to counter, but resorts to the trusty old ad hominem instead, either against Arauna or her sources.

Personally, I wish I could say more on the evolution/creation debate, but I've never tackled the relevant literature, and I can tell that even our own Writing Department has made enough mistakes in misquoting the relevant scientists that they aren't ready to fully tackle this topic either. However, I have a deep love for the Bible as God's Word, and the amazing consistency of the Bible books from first to last, and I have to wonder at the amazingly wide distribution of this particular book to every corner of the world. It's awe-inspiring. Because of this, I'll take "Pascal's wager," that even if we are of all men most to be pitied (if our faith is misplaced) we really have nothing to lose and much to gain if our faith puts us on God's side.

Besides, in the meantime, the true measure of Christianity is the activity that makes the world a better place and also makes us better individuals. We might even be better "neighbors" on random Internet forums, than those who reject Christian principles altogether.

13 minutes ago, TrueTomHarley said:

I am told that the brother who wrote the Truth book was a fellow named Peleyn. Yes? 

I don't believe I was ever told. Or if I was told, it wasn't his name I remembered. You are referring to Harry Peloyan, a Harvard Graduate. He was given a lot of the scientific and creation items to work on and became the Awake! editor, also handling most "science" related articles himself. Since the original Evolution book was last revised in 1967 and the original Truth book in 1968, I would have serious doubts that he did them both. 

2 hours ago, The Librarian said:

 do we know the writer of this paragraph in the writing committee? Just curious.

I don't have any way of telling. As of about the last four or five years, the last of the writers I might have generally recognized are failing in health and getting very few, if any, new assignments. (Aulicino, Smalley, Wischuk).

I noticed that in the preceding paragraph there is a point about "greenhouses" that appears incomplete. This is sometimes a hint that it was edited down from a talk that had once expanded on the greenhouse illustration. Perhaps someone remembers who gave such a talk?

*** w19 September p. 23 pars. 10-11 “Come to Me, . . . and I Will Refresh You” ***
10 Jesus created a peaceful, inviting environment for his fellow workers, and he enjoyed training them. (Luke 10:1, 19-21) He encouraged his disciples to ask questions, and he wanted to hear their opinions. (Matt. 16:13-16) Much like plants in a greenhouse, the disciples flourished. They absorbed the lessons that Jesus taught and produced fruit in the form of good works.
11 Do you have a position of authority? If so, ask yourself: ‘What kind of environment do I create at work or at home? Do I promote peace? Do I encourage others to ask questions? And am I willing to hear their opinions?’ Never would we want to be like the Pharisees, who resented those who questioned them and persecuted those who expressed an opinion contrary to their own.—Mark 3:1-6; John 9:29-34.

There is no specific reason to reference greenhouses as they are not mentioned in the Bible. There is just as much reason to say above "Much like plants in a fertile, well-watered field, the disciples flourished." The reason to mention a greenhouse is to speak about a closed environment "independent of external circumstances" and independent of "world" conditions. That is not done above, but was the previous use in a 1997 Watchtower:

*** w97 1/1 p. 4 Why Should We All Praise God? ***
It can be cultivated independent of external circumstances, just as plants can grow in a greenhouse whatever the weather is like outside.”

2 hours ago, The Librarian said:

How did this get by the proofreaders?

In general, the proofreaders would never question something like this. It's the type of thing that an editorial committee (and/or GB) might question. But only if they were thinking in the mindset of how it might be used against them. When editors are reading it as counsel only for others and not for themselves, it's easy to say things that might sound hypocritical or self-incriminating.

Of course, I prefer the idea that Brother Splane, for example, is using an opportunity to create a more open Society. Perhaps opening up a question or suggestion box on JW.ORG. Perhaps allowing suggestions to be upvoted and downvoted by millions of JWs. 😀  Splane, of course, was the one to make the biggest use of Luke 10 to highlight Jesus' methods of teaching in his Annual Meeting talk in 2014, and this is echoed in paragraph 10.

1 hour ago, James Thomas Rook Jr. said:

There is often a difference between what is believed, and what is taught.

The focus on only supporting future wars to be led by Christ Jesus directly, has promoted the idea that we really are expected to be pacifists. Also the idea that we focus ONLY on spiritual warfare leads to the same conclusion. As late as 2003, a convention talk mentioned this:

*** w03 1/15 p. 26 “Zealous Kingdom Proclaimers” Joyfully Assemble ***
The second speaker in this symposium addressed questions relating to neutrality. Early Christians were not pacifists, but they recognized that their prime allegiance was to God. Likewise today, Jehovah’s Witnesses hold firmly to the principle: “You are no part of the world.” (John 15:19) Since tests of our neutrality can arise quickly, families ought to make time to review the Bible’s guidelines on this subject.

Generally, however, the impression is given that we are very much like pacifists but don't want the label because it's often associated with protestors and radicals. However, the farther back one searches in the publications, the more we see that the discussion could include acceptable self-defense.

*** w64 8/15 p. 484 Those Who Pursue Peace ***
Actually, Jehovah’s witnesses are not in “rebellion” against the activities of any government, but they do maintain uncompromising neutrality as to the world’s political and military affairs, as they follow the Scriptural injunction to ‘seek peace and pursue it.’ They are not pacifists. They do not oppose any government’s program of military conscription or demonstrate against it, but they submit themselves to God’s arrangement of things.

*** w55 8/1 p. 478 Questions From Readers ***
However, this refusal to pay back insult for insult does not mean Christians are to be pacifists or that they must never resort to self-defense.