OK I'm just thinking out load here so to speak. But let say in the year 2000 the WT says they have 1 million publishers and at the end of the year they say they had 300,000 people get baptized so in the beginning of the year 2001 they show 1,300,000 publishers. Then in this new year they state another 300,000 get baptized but with 50,000 deaths and 50,000 disfellowshippings they stated at the end of year 2001 a total of 1,500,000 total members. But wait a minute, the in the two years they report both 2000 and 2001 a total of ones baptised as 600,000 , 300,000 per year. But here is the thing, these baptised we're formally publisher's most likely kids and we're reported as such. So from the publisher ranks already counted they get baptized and are again counted. Does the WT make the proper adjustment in their numbers? I think no would be the answer, because if 300k we're once publishers then baptized would not they amount be zeroed out the next year? Or am I missing something? I smell a rat.
The fraud that is the WT member numbers
by Crazyguy 19 Replies latest watchtower scandals
-
-
Simon
It does seem like smoke and mirrors and they are probably taking advantage of the fact that most people will assume that publishers + baptisms = new publisher count when the reality is more complex (people die, leave etc...)
The set of publishers always includes the baptized as well (barring a minimal number of exceptions) but you're right, they don't get added to them at baptism - to qualify most would already be publishers.
-
eyeuse2badub
Reasonable, logical humans use mathematics to calculate things that have to do with real numbers. The wtbts uses, and has always used, "mathmagic". With "mathmagic", all things are possible!
just saying!
eyeuse2badub
-
dropoffyourkeylee
The WT maintains that a 'publisher' is a Witness and someone who isn't a publisher is not a Witness. In this context a publisher is one who has reported time in at least one of the past six months. Some of these are baptized and some are not. One thing that happens frequently to appear as growth is when former publishers who have become inactive start to go again. I think it fair to say that many of the 19 million memorial attenders are former publishers. The WT would love to have these ones start up again, but most will not. They attend the Memorial once a year for family reasons only. -
kairos
Overlapping math based on invisible members. Trust me, it's legit... -
slimboyfat
The fact the Watchtower counts un-baptised members as publishers makes interpreting their figures a little more complicated, but hardly fraudulent. Over time un-baptised publishers who fail to get baptised fall out of the numbers anyway, and those who get baptised are added to the baptism figures a year or two down the line, so it evens out over the medium to long term. -
stillin
As the saying goes; the figures don't lie, but liars can figure. -
the girl next door
We talked about this a bit yesterday. Using Watchtower numbers the following chart could be built. Of course Watchtower would never present their numbers this way:
-
maksutov
Fraud in the numbers certain occurs at publisher and congregation level - publishers report time that they never did, and congregation secretaries insert 'estimated' reports for those who never actually turned in a report (I have seen both of these things occur, and I am quite confident it is very common). Once the numbers make it to the branch office though, does the trend continue? Possibly. But I highly doubt they count publishers twice if they get baptised. The baptism figure is not included in any of the other figures. Average pubs and peak pubs are the number of individuals who report time, regardless of whether they are baptised or not.
Assuming a trend of growth, the number baptised will lag behind the increase in number of publishers. That being the case, 2015-2016 should see a reduction in baptisms (due to the reduction in publisher growth for 2014/2015). If there is no drastic drop in baptisms in next year's figures, that could be due to people taking longer to get baptised after they start reporting time, or it could be due to an increase in the number of people leaving. There are also those who remain perpetual publishers or on/off publishers and never get baptised. So the best we can do is a very rough estimate as per the chart above (which is nevertheless, very interesting).
-
Crazyguy
I was thinking last night about the annual death rate in the world, it's 18 deaths per thousand. Then I realized that based on the orgs numbers they had 8m publisher as of 2015 roughly and according to some figures posted on this forum, from 2014 to 2015 they lost roughly 140,000 publishers. Well if my math is correct the death rate of 8 million is roughly 144,000 annually. So if this is correct then the borgs number seem to only reflect the death rate and not all the ones dfd or just quit. Again I smell a rat with their numbers.
