Has anyone ever heard of someone being disfellowshipped for having a disfellowshipped person on their friend list?
Because this WT specifies social media.
slimboyfat
JoinedPosts by slimboyfat
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191
Evolution is a Fact - Index of Parts 1 - 40
by cofty in#1 protein functional redundancy comparing the sequences of amino acids in ubiquitous proteins confirms the relationship between all living things..
#2 dna functional redundancy comparison of the dna that codes for the amino acids of ubiquitous proteins predicts the tree of life with an astonishing degree of accuracy..
#3 ervs endogenous retroviruses that infected our ancestors are found in the same place of the genome of our closest primate cousins..
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slimboyfat
First you said evolution is a fact.
When I said evolution was a complex combination of different facts woven into a compelling narrative, you said the central fact of evolution is that:
Every living thing descended from a common ancestor over millions of years.
Now you say:
No it's not impossible that the very deepest roots of the tree of life have more than one starting point.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but if life had multiple starting points then it wouldn't all share a common ancestor.
So what happened to your one unalterable central fact of evolution? Not so unalterably factual after all.
And Darwin said God possibly started the process of evolution in a few primitive creatures. It that's not divine intervention I don't know what is.
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191
Evolution is a Fact - Index of Parts 1 - 40
by cofty in#1 protein functional redundancy comparing the sequences of amino acids in ubiquitous proteins confirms the relationship between all living things..
#2 dna functional redundancy comparison of the dna that codes for the amino acids of ubiquitous proteins predicts the tree of life with an astonishing degree of accuracy..
#3 ervs endogenous retroviruses that infected our ancestors are found in the same place of the genome of our closest primate cousins..
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slimboyfat
Every living thing descended from a common ancestor over millions of years.
This seems like a simple, stable fact, but is it really?
Addressing it firstly in purely scientific terms.
First of all there are some obvious problems with the statement as it stands. When you say "every living thing" I assume you probably mean every living thing on Earth. You don't intend to rule out the possibility that life arose in different parts of the universe and don't share a common ancestor.
But even if we confine ourselves to this planet it is still presuming a lot. As extensive as our knowledge of life on earth is, is it really out of the question that, deep in the ocean, or in some other inhospitable habitat, life has arisen separately from the rest of life on Earth? Some may say it's unlikely, but I don't think many scientists would rule it out.
And there are philosophical problems with the statement too.
In a sense even a creationist could agree with the statement, since they believe that God is the Father of all living creatures.
The you might want to qualify "ancestor" through reproduction of one finite living thing from another.
Of course Darwin himself famously left open the possibility that God gave life to a few original creatures, or just one, and that evolution took over from there. So Darwin himself wasn't necessarily dogmatic about this supposed central "fact" about evolution.
Since Darwin's time scientists have scrutinised life on our planet an concluded that all life on Earth has a common ancestor and that evolution does not have multiple starting points. There are apparrently good reasons for drawing this conclusion. But is it out of the question that new discoveries will undermine this conclusion and that in fact life on Earth had multiple starting points. However unlikely you think it might be, it would be unwise to say it's impossible.
Plus all of this assumes a purely materialist conception of reality to begin with. How can we know that what appears as physical beings with causal and reproductive relations to one another is not the result of a mind that is external the reality as we see it? Strange and weird idea? Well yes. And there are many things about reality that are strange and weird. Frankly if the material universe is all that there is, all reality can be explained by the process of natural laws, and humans are the most intelligent beings ever to arise. Then frankly that's pretty weird and mysterious. No less miraculous that the explanations offered by many religions
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191
Evolution is a Fact - Index of Parts 1 - 40
by cofty in#1 protein functional redundancy comparing the sequences of amino acids in ubiquitous proteins confirms the relationship between all living things..
#2 dna functional redundancy comparison of the dna that codes for the amino acids of ubiquitous proteins predicts the tree of life with an astonishing degree of accuracy..
#3 ervs endogenous retroviruses that infected our ancestors are found in the same place of the genome of our closest primate cousins..
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slimboyfat
I don't think evolution is a fact.
"Men landed on the moon in 1969" is a fact.
Evolution is more complicated than a fact. It is a complex combination of many facts woven into a story to explain life and its variety in scientific terms. It's subject to change in a way comparable to other stories, whereas some singular facts are more static.
Evolution is a compelling story, but don't eliminate the possibility of surprises and revision.
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25
Aust Census Data shows decrease while Yearbook shows increase
by shepherdless inon threads about 8 or 9 months ago, i put up some detailed data from the 2011 and 2006 australian censuses.
data from the 2016 census is becoming available in stages, and i mentioned recently that i would do an update.
finally, as of about today, some data of interest is available, and i have started to look at this, but it is time consuming, and i am time-poor.. anyway, the first search i have conducted is just a simple breakdown of the number of people describing themselves as jw's.
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slimboyfat
The numbers in 2016 could have been worse actually, when you consider it was probably at the height of the Australia Royal Commision coverage, plus all the cutbacks and closures being announced from WT headquarters. I find the Canadian data more startling as it shows significant, sustained decline.
It can't be long until even WT statistics begin to show sustained declining publisher and congregation numbers. But will they continue publishing the numbers when decline sets in?
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25
Aust Census Data shows decrease while Yearbook shows increase
by shepherdless inon threads about 8 or 9 months ago, i put up some detailed data from the 2011 and 2006 australian censuses.
data from the 2016 census is becoming available in stages, and i mentioned recently that i would do an update.
finally, as of about today, some data of interest is available, and i have started to look at this, but it is time consuming, and i am time-poor.. anyway, the first search i have conducted is just a simple breakdown of the number of people describing themselves as jw's.
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slimboyfat
And me in 2001 in Britain in fact!
Although strangely enough I reverted to describing myself as JW in 2011.
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slimboyfat
"We must avoid..."
I don't recall language as demanding as that before. It's as if the WT has given up trying to convince its readers by force of argument and is simply issuing commands instead.
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25
Aust Census Data shows decrease while Yearbook shows increase
by shepherdless inon threads about 8 or 9 months ago, i put up some detailed data from the 2011 and 2006 australian censuses.
data from the 2016 census is becoming available in stages, and i mentioned recently that i would do an update.
finally, as of about today, some data of interest is available, and i have started to look at this, but it is time consuming, and i am time-poor.. anyway, the first search i have conducted is just a simple breakdown of the number of people describing themselves as jw's.
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slimboyfat
Canadian figures for comparison:
1991 - 168,000 (census)
2001 - 154,750 (census)
2011 - 137.775 (census)
I don't have the yearbook numbers handy but I think it shows a small increase in publishers over the same period.
Sources:
http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/jehovahs-witnesses/
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25
Aust Census Data shows decrease while Yearbook shows increase
by shepherdless inon threads about 8 or 9 months ago, i put up some detailed data from the 2011 and 2006 australian censuses.
data from the 2016 census is becoming available in stages, and i mentioned recently that i would do an update.
finally, as of about today, some data of interest is available, and i have started to look at this, but it is time consuming, and i am time-poor.. anyway, the first search i have conducted is just a simple breakdown of the number of people describing themselves as jw's.
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slimboyfat
To complicate matters further: it's also possible that there are a few JWs who are counted as publishers because they submit reports but who, for one reason or another, don't describe themselves as JWs on the census. This might be because they don't want to identify themselves as JWs to the authorities for paranoid reasons, or more commonly because they don't believe in JWs any more and only adhere for social reasons. This may not be a very large group but is probably growing in number, so may to a small extent explain the falling census numbers relative to publisher numbers. JWs "voting with their census statement" as it were.
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25
Aust Census Data shows decrease while Yearbook shows increase
by shepherdless inon threads about 8 or 9 months ago, i put up some detailed data from the 2011 and 2006 australian censuses.
data from the 2016 census is becoming available in stages, and i mentioned recently that i would do an update.
finally, as of about today, some data of interest is available, and i have started to look at this, but it is time consuming, and i am time-poor.. anyway, the first search i have conducted is just a simple breakdown of the number of people describing themselves as jw's.
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slimboyfat
What would be really fascinating would be an age profile of JWs from the latest data if possible. I predict that the average age of JWs is climbing rapidly.