Posts by bohm

19

Give me 5 minutes to explain...

by pixel in

jw
friends

i keep thinking about the time i will "come out" and tell my wife about this sick cult.

i don't know when that day will come, but knowing me i will seat down with her and ask her for 5 minutes to explain to her why we as a family has to get out.

my question is: what will you tell somebody in 5 minutes, that will convince that perdon that this is not a good religion to follow and that we have been deceived?.

bohm

pixel: It depends who the person is, if it is an outsider or someone who is in (like your wife). In your situation, i would *not* prepare a five minute talk and most *definetely* not with anything critical of the org. I think I would tell her about my doubts and ask her if this was something she felt you two could talk about and if so how. I would not tell her my full state of mind immediately.

Have you read books about cults and mind control? (for instance Steven Hassan?).

If you want to prepare to talk to her, a book i might recommend is actually "A manual for creating atheists". I don't know if you are christian or not and (despite the title of the book) I don't think it matters for this purpose. If you look beyond the "atheist street preacher" aspect (and idea which I think is pretty silly btw) I think it contains some good practical advice for talking with people about faith using the socratic method (which Steven Hassan also recommends) which is useful for undermining totalitarian faith-based views like the JWs.

33

The thousand mile bullshit stare

by bohm in

jw
friends

anyone else tired of this wt cliche?.

"a certain young man named eutychus sat in the window, weighed down with deep sleep.

as paul spoke still longer, being weighed down by his sleep, he fell down from the third story and was taken up dead".

bohm

Anyone else tired of this WT cliche?

"A certain young man named Eutychus sat in the window, weighed down with deep sleep. As Paul spoke still longer, being weighed down by his sleep, he fell down from the third story and was taken up dead"

How profound, this story is changing my life!

If the offering is a burned offering of the herd, let him give a male without a mark. He is to give it at the door of the Tent of Meeting so that he may be pleasing to the Lord. And he is to put his hand on the head of the burned offering and it will be taken for him, to take away his sin. And the ox is to be put to death before the Lord.

This story is so profound I just crapped!

105

New Watchtower Propaganda and hate speech destroying families (Feb 2016 WT)

by Daniel1555 in

the following is a paragraph from the new february study watchtower article "learn from jehovah's loyal servants.".

7 a conflict of loyalties may arise when a close relative is disfellowshipped.

for example, a sister named anne [1] received a telephone call from her disfellowshipped mother.

bohm

Yah... this has to be among the worst statements and I too believed they were toning down the rhetoric . Isn't this contradicting other recent (last two years or so) statements at least indirectly? I could easily be wrong, but it does not seem like everyone is on the same page in the writing department.

17

I have 5 Audible credits I need to use up. Recommendations?

by nicolaou in

jw
friends

something to make me think or laugh.

i've done the hitchens, dawkins, harris thing and as much as i rate them i'd like to move off at a tangent .

always enjoy philosophy or even something with a theological bent.. i'm coming to the end of heretic by ayaan hirsi ali and can thoroughly recommend it.. c'mon guys, don't let me down .

bohm

Something by Steven Pinker you have not read already. "The history of western philosophy" by Bertrand Russell (surprisingly funny).

I would not recommend the two recent books by Richard Carrier. I am struggling to get through "on the historicity of jesus" and IMO they are both poorly written and the first book, "Proving history", asserts many things which are false.

212

Why Do You No Longer Believe in God?

by Tenacious in

i know this question has popped up from time to time but i really would like to know how you guys, those that no longer believe, came to that conclusion?

was it the wts and all its crap?

was it something you read?

bohm

Viv, you asked for an example of a computer program that evolved and i provided a list.

I really dont get why you interact the way you do with people on this forum. It appears you are only interesting in starting and winning arguments, not with superior arguments or facts, but with anger and rethoric. Are you a happy person?

212

Why Do You No Longer Believe in God?

by Tenacious in

i know this question has popped up from time to time but i really would like to know how you guys, those that no longer believe, came to that conclusion?

was it the wts and all its crap?

was it something you read?

bohm

Eric: Machines can fly!
Vinnie: Awesome, name a machine that can fly on it's own
Bob: This is fairly easy, there are planes and rockets and..
Vinnie: That's not at all what the question was.

I know, I know, this is totally unrelated because reasons...

212

Why Do You No Longer Believe in God?

by Tenacious in

i know this question has popped up from time to time but i really would like to know how you guys, those that no longer believe, came to that conclusion?

was it the wts and all its crap?

was it something you read?

bohm

EOM: Computer programs absolutely can evolve!
VIV: Awesome, name a computer program that evolved on it's own
BOHM: This is fairly easy. You can find many examples of evolving computer program within the field of evolutionary computing (...)
VIV: That's not at all what the question was.

...evidently...the question is not to name a computer program that can evolve...evidently...

155

Headline: "Islamic Invasion: Europe now scrambles for guns." How true is this?

by cappytan in

jw
friends

a year to a year and a half ago, i would have taken this article at face value and believed it.. now, i realize this article comes from a dubious source.

world news daily has a die-hard right-wing bias.

so, in an effort to get real information, i'm asking my european exjw's, is this article all true?

bohm

The OP is if a certain article is also the experience by local XJWs, that europeans are gathering guns or want to at least. I actually live in one of the affected countries and I can say with 100% certainty I have not heard anyone IRL or on a website in my language talk about getting guns because of the refugees (or as the article prefers: "refugees". One wonders what would qualify a person as an actual refugee asides white skin); the idea sounds silly and absurd and play no part in the current public discourse (which *is* critical regarding what we are going to do about all those people).

Turning to the current narrative on the more right-leaning segments of the internet I think people need to consider that there *are* racists and these racists *will*, damn the facts, portray refugees as terrorists, as an islamic invasion, etc. etc. This spreading of fear and uncertainty is right out of the brownshirt playbook and will be spread regardless the facts. For this reason I would encourage anyone to carefully document the supposed facts about the refugee crisis by actual numbers which can be independently verified, for instance it has become part of the official narrative in some segments of the internet it is nearly all men who are fleeing which just does not stack up with reality:

http://www.factcheck.org/2015/09/stretching-facts-on-syrian-refugees/

"UNHCR’s data show that 50.5 percent of refugees are women. Females age 18 to 59 make up 23.9 percent of the refugees, while males in that age group make up 21.8 percent."

15

Watchtower HATES being compared to Catholic Church - but if the shoe fits...

by Zoos in

remember this?.

.

well how about this?.

bohm

Where is the last picture from? is that before or after a convention?!

212

Why Do You No Longer Believe in God?

by Tenacious in

i know this question has popped up from time to time but i really would like to know how you guys, those that no longer believe, came to that conclusion?

was it the wts and all its crap?

was it something you read?

bohm

Here is another way to look at it. Suppose a person accept evolution. In that case she accepts that evolution is a very powerful way to optimize organisms, that is, change the information in their DNA in order to make them more fit, and that person would predict that if we implemented evolution on a computer it should be able to optimize computer programs efficiently. As it turns out, this is true. Evolution works and works damn well.