Apparently now, because of covid, the JWs are no longer standing in public displaying copies of AWAKE or knocking on random doors. They are dialing phone numbers. I just got a phone call from Bill, who wanted to share the message with me.

He got more than he bargained for.

He started by saying "the Bible says..." I interrupted him and asked him why he beieved what the Bible says. "Because of all the prophecies that have been fulfilled!"

"What about all the prophecies that haven't been fulfilled?" I asked.

"There aren't any!"

"You obviously haven't read your Bible very carefully! There are a lot of unfulfilled prophecies in the Bible: that the Egyptians would speak Hebrew; that the Nile would dry up; that Damascus would be destroyed; that Nebuchadnezzar would conquer Tyre... Would you like to look at a website that lists more?" No response.

He asked whether I believed in God. "Which god?" I said. "We are all born as atheists, without a belief in any God. The only reason people believe in any god is because their parents and teachers inculcated the idea in them when they were children."

I asked him, "Why would I want to believe in a god who would send me to eternal torment in hell if I didn't believe?"

"Oh, there is no hell," he said. "You don't believe your own Bible then, which clearly says there is a hell with everlasting torment" I said.

Of course things went nowhere. He finally said he would pray for me.

Thanks for letting us know. You were kind to be that civil. I don't think I could.

And I thought scam and telemarketing calls were annoying!

I hope those prayers work for you. ;-/

Richard, when he said he would pray for you, you should have said you would think for him. *LOL*

That's funny.

That was a Steve Benson line. You can pray for me and I will think for you. Or something like that. It always made me laugh. There's not much of a comeback to that.

RPackham: As a JW (back in the day) I would dread coming up against someone like you. Kind of hard to answer. Or prove wrong, which is the first step in trying to convert a skeptic. And I wonder how that prayer from your caller would go: "Jehovah, please enlighten that guy I've never met, whose name I don't know, who I just phoned out of the blue and who gave responses I wasn't expecting.

That line preceded Steve Benson by many years.

Oh, OK. Well, that's where I first heard it. In any case, it's a good one.

I believe Steve got it from Anne Gaylor.

I live in an apartment complex, and they are not allowed in.

But last week I got a handwritten letter from them, with a few pamphlets inside.

There was an e-mail address, and I wrote them a long message saying that sending me letters was a waste of paper, ink, time, energy and money.

I went on to say that I decline one of the 144,000 crowns in heaven, or a green pasture to eternally roll down with little lions and sheep in some "earthly paradise".

I also said that I prefer "Babylon" to a "paradise" where parents shun "apostate" children, and children shun "apostate" parents. Disgusting.

I am sure that they will not read it entirely, but I hope not to get more letters.

Ditto on day-before-yesterday getting my second letter from a J-dub. In both instances, the envelope was hand-addressed, with a pre-printed one-page message, along with a flyer.

You know, if they don't 'witness for Joe Hova' at a certain rate, they aren't good J-dubs. It'd be like telling 18 year-old mormon boys that if they don't go on a mission, they won't go to the CK.

I can't tell you what the message was because it hit the trash before I'd finished rolling my eyes.

Another reason to never pick up an unknown number. Right now my cell is set to not ring if the person is not in my contact list.

At least he didn't offer you a last chance to extend your auto warranty.

Damn it! I keep putting it off!!!

I laugh because I keep getting spam robocalls wanting me to buy an "extended warranty" for my old beater that needs to go to the crusher.

I was getting them for a 15-year old car up until the day I traded it in. I got $500 for it and was happy with that.

...or telling me that my computer has a very serious issue that only the caller can resolve.

Darn! I never read a JW letter (they never sent any in braille--I guess they figured the Lord would allow me to somehow read it). Oh well! I hang up on most calls nowadays, anyway.

Babies are no more born "atheist" than they are born vegans, voters for the whatever party or anti-vaxxers.

Wrong thread much?

'He asked whether I believed in God. "Which god?" I said. "We are all born as atheists, without a belief in any God. The only reason people believe in any god is because their parents and teachers inculcated the idea in them when they were children."'

By the same illogic, we are all born as Mormons, because we can't drink coffee or beer as babies.

Speaking of illogic, compare these two propositions:

1) All believers in God are believers in God, and

2) All who abstain from coffee and beer are Mormons.

Do you see the problem with that?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/25/2020 05:27PM by Lot's Wife.

The notion that all babies hold any theological position - including atheism - is pure nonsense.

The idea that all babies are Mormons is pure satire.

Bye Titania...

"Satire?" No, you mean "irony," which is different. And it was not irony either since you used it to show what you claimed was the "illogic" of Richard's assertion. To call your statement irony now is to acknowledge that you were wrong.

But sure, let's move forward and see if your logic is better in this new formulation. You write: "The notion that all babies hold any theological position - including atheism - is pure nonsense."

Yet the word "atheism" literally means without a belief in deity. So by definition babies are atheistic: as you put it, they "hold" no "theological position." That's exactly what Richard said. So the problem lies not in the proposition but in your insistence on an arbitrary definition of the word "atheism."

Goodbye, Polonius.

Thanks Titania. (Not a Shakespearean reference.)

Have it your way, Uranus.

Babies are suckers for the mother's milk of agnosticism!

Or if Get Fact is correct, God's name is "Boob."

Get Fact Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> The notion that all babies hold any theological
> position - including atheism - is pure nonsense.

As has been often pointed out here, "atheism" is NOT a theological position. Rather, it means merely "not having a belief in God or gods."

One could just as well (and correctly) point out that babies are not born as Democrats or Republicans. They are without any opinions or beliefs. They only have instincts, which do not include beliefs.

"Theism" is a belief in some god or gods. "A-theism" means NOT theism.

"Political" means having political opinons. "A-political" means NOT having political opinions.

You might want to write that down, Get Fact.

Atheism is a theological matter because it involves taking a conscious position on the nature of god(s), which babies are completely incapable of doing.

You might as well say we are all born anarchists, because an-archy means "no rules" and babies don't follow rules or governments. Babies also own no property. Merci, petits Proudhons. But you can also say they are capitalists, because they demand control of nipples and try to extract maximum profit from them. Or is that babies taking control of the means of milk production?

Babies are also abstentionist, because they do not believe in voting, and any baby put into a political contest will not stand or run. They may wriggle, scream or void their bowels, but it is uncertain whether these are political statements.

Or we could just say that describing babies as "atheist" or any other position is a ridiculous distraction from real arguments. It's pointless to go to babies for political or philosophical advice, unless one can achieve a mind meld. They have a limited vocabulary.

Get Fact Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------
> Babies are also abstentionist, because they do not
> believe in voting, and any baby put into a
> political contest will not stand or run. They may
> wriggle, scream or void their bowels, but it is
> uncertain whether these are political statements.

Not that different from some of our politicians now

RPackham Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> "Theism" is a belief in some god or gods.
> "A-theism" means NOT theism.
>
> "Political" means having political opinons.
> "A-political" means NOT having political
> opinions.
>
> You might want to write that down, Get Fact.

You might want to write these down too:

"Theism" is a belief in some god or gods. "A-theism" means NOT theism. Therefore, buses are atheist, because they are not theism.

"Anemia" is the lack of red blood cells. If no people or animals are on the bus, and there are no blood stains left on the seats, then the bus is technically an-emic.

Buses are also a-moral, a-banana (not a banana), a-sexual (without certain modifications), and buses can potentially be an-aerobic (not requiring oxygen) if they do not have combustion engines.

A bus in Brazil is probably not Australian. One in Australia is probably not Brazilian. One could concoct some kind of similarly illogical and irrelevant connection between these two phenomena, and learn nothing apart from the fact that Australia and Brazil appear to occupy two separate locations within space (although due to orbital factors, parts of Australia may find themselves in locations occupied by Brazil earlier in the day.) Neither bus will ever make a conscious decision about which country it occupies (at least pre-AI.)

Now you're being silly. Buses are inanimate objects and are not expected to grow and learn from parents and teachers which they don't have. A slightly more (but not really) apt comparison could be made between babies and computers because of artificial intelligence, but I'd be hesitant to use that one as well.

There is an argument in philosophical circles (I remember hearing about it in college) that says that babies are born knowing everything and that learning just brings out what they already knew. That has little, if any scientific backing and ignores the fact that the knowledge of adults varies widely between individuals.

Both Richard's and your comments bring up the question of nature versus nurture; that is, whether or not human behaviors are genetically preprogrammed within us. I remember seeing studies of identical twins separated at birth and raised in different countries and social circumstances winding up with many of the same personality traits when they become adults.

The biggest problem with that argument is that I find it difficult to apply it to religious views or the lack thereof. Richard's point still very much holds--a person's religious beliefs or lack thereof are going to primarily be determined by nurture (how he/she was raised) as opposed to nature (something inside his/her genetic code). In other words, religion is a learned phenomenon and not one that comes at birth.

Religion is a learned behaviour, but that doesn't make babies "atheist". It is a ridiculous statement.

Babies have no more cognitive abilities to be "atheist" than a bus does or a carrot or Twinkie. I suppose if there is any comparison to be made it is that the mother (or person feeding the baby) is godlike to the baby. There is a good argument for saying religion comes out of parental relations, particularly in Mormonism. But anything beyond that is a gross misrepresentation.

Yes, I agree that there is some evidence that some patterns (genetic, neural etc) are mapped out for children. Chomsky discusses this in regard to language. But that still brings up issues in regard to this question, given the central position of religion in all cultures until a couple of hundred years ago. (Except the Pirahã, if accounts are to be believed.)

But to use babies as an argument for atheism is ludicrous. They don't have a clue, or an interest in such a question, let alone a considered position. You might as well say a baby isn't a baseball fan or feminist - it's about as relevant.

You don't need cognitive abilities to be "without a belief in God," which is what atheism means. And if you want to call babies anarchists, that's fine as long as you define anarchist as "without rules" because yes, babies without significant cognitive abilities truly do not have rules.

You asserted a couple of times that atheism requires a cognitive decision. That is not true of newborns. Being "without God" or "without language" or "without rules" or "without gender politics" is a precognitive state that is perfectly compatible with the mental life of babies.

You are the only one here who insists that the native atheism of precognitive beings is "an argument for atheism" among adults. That's just a case of you projecting your adult anxieties onto a discussion of the spiritual life of infants.

"the spiritual life of infants"

Good book title!

Yeah, I semi-cribbed it.

https://www.amazon.com/Spiritual-Life-Children-Robert-Coles/dp/0395599237

THAT is a phenomenal book.

Thanks for the tip, LW. I've looked it up - intriguing. Another book to add to my already teetering pile...

Atheism is something you opt into, like religion. Or that part of a process of enculturation in some cases.

There is no more evidence that babies have a no-god position anymore than a god position. (Unless we think in terms of the great mother symbol - I mention that above.)

If I am an atheist, it is because at some point I have examined that position. No baby ever does that.

Get more facts:

Not opting is by default also an atheistic position. You have limited the definition of the word to suit your argument. It simply means without a theistic belief as multiple people have tried to explain. Many atheists need nothing further to identify as atheist. It has nothing to do with the ability to study and make a definitive decision.

+Get Fact:
If there are 2 political parties and I don’t choose to be in either one, then where am I?
We can think of the political parties as buckets.
There are 2 buckets. If I am not in bucket 1 or 2, then I guess I am in bucket 3 with all the other guys that haven’t chosen political party 1 or political party 2.

Aren’t the babies going to be in bucket 3 as well?

~~~~iceman9090

+Get fact:
"But to use babies as an argument for atheism is ludicrous. They don't have a clue, or an interest in such a question, let alone a considered position. You might as well say a baby isn't a baseball fan or feminist - it's about as relevant."

==I have seen some people calling it implied atheism.
There is also explicit atheism, in other words, the person makes a conscious decision about this gods thing.

~~~~iceman9090

Thank you for mentioning Australian buses in this thread. They are a very interesting branch of bus theology. Most Australian buses are assembled locally but with imported motors and other components, so not fully (fair dinkum) Aussie buses.

Also bus services are typically run by states, rather than by the Federal Government. So most buses would not qualify as Australian on that count either. They could be South Australian, or Victorian. (Unfortunately there is no equivalent possessive adjective for Queensland.)

As to whether these buses are theist or atheist, that is a very big question that requires its own thread.

Funny oldpobot!

Yes, that's all true. I don't know if Holden made buses - no idea - I doubt many Brazilian made buses make it to Australia or vice versa. I made a point not to make it the USA, Germany or Japan, because I'm sure American, German and Japanese made buses then up occasionally in all three countries.

Anyway, buses have about as much relevance to adult personal beliefs as new born babies do. Most mainstream churches acknowledge that very small children can't accept their religion at baptism, so they get confirmed later on. (Although in the LDS, children are made to bear their testimony as soon as they can string a small sentence together.)

"What about all the prophecies that haven't been fulfilled?" I asked.

"There aren't any!"
________

Surely, this isn't even true from the Watchtower's perspective. Not only are there prophecies in the Bible about things which haven't happened (your POV), there are others which aren't supposed to happen until the very end of the world (their POV). Even JWs must notice that while the world is in a mess, Jesus hasn't come and opened up the graves and the human race hasn't terminated itself. Yet.

So weirdly, their answer is heretical according to their own religion.

Thanks for the warning RP. Any idea how they are getting their phone numbers? I am getting nearly daily unsolicited calls originating from Utah that I do not answer and they all leave a voice message of exactly five seconds that is silent. They originate from many different cities and I have no longer any connections with anyone from Utah.

Robocallers can use a plethora of numbers from all over the place, and even spoof numbers. They employ data mining and machine learning techniques to select numbers that you may be likely to answer, like your hometown or other places you've lived.

For example, I get calls that look like they're from my hometown. I haven't set foot in the town in more than seven years (since my dad died), moved away in 1994, and sold a home I owned there in 2005. In other words, I've had minimal and decreasing contact with that town, but they determine that I have a connection there by digging through data records.

I also get occasional calls that look like they're from the Silicon Valley neighborhood I lived in for a couple years back in the 1990s.

And, naturally, many originate from numbers near to my current home, so they look "local."

That's an awesome conversation. It sounds like the kind of things I wouldn't think up at the time, but a few hours later in the shower instead.

I love that he said he would pray for you. The is such a veiled insult. Its so condescending. Either God will listen to him and not you, or he has special knowledge you are too dense to see.

I think you and I agree: a baby does not have the ability to believe in God (or gods). Belief is a learned behavior.

Our difference seems to be only in the definition of the terms "atheist" and "atheism."

You appear to define "atheist" as "one who has decided not to believe in God." That is the definition that is preferred (I think) by most theists.

I am using the broader definition: "one who does not have (for whatever reason) a belief in god or gods -- one who is not a theist."

RPackham Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> "Oh, there is no hell," he said. "You don't
> believe your own Bible then, which clearly says
> there is a hell with everlasting torment" I said.
>
> Of course things went nowhere. He finally said he
> would pray for me.


==My experience with JW have been similar. Although it is true that there is some line or 2 that says the dead feel nothing, they know nothing and it does call it sheol, other parts of the bible talk about hell and element 16.

------------------------------------HELL1
Luke 16:19-31 describes hell.
It is the story of The Rich Man and Lazarus.

The message is = give money to the poor or go to hell.
------------------------------------HELL2
Hebrews 10:27
But a certain fearful looking for of JUDGMENT AND FIERY INDIGNATION, which shall devour the adversaries.
------------------------------------HELL3
Revelation 21:8
But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death.
------------------------------------HELL4
Matthew 16:18
Also, I say to you, You are Peter, and on this rock-mass I will build my congregation, and the gates of HADES will not overpower it.
------------------------------------NO HELL1?
Ecclesiastes 9:10
Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do [it] with thy might; for [there is] no work, nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom, in the grave, whither thou goest.
------------------------------------NO HELL2?
Ezekiel 18:4
Behold, all souls are mine; as the soul of the father, so also the soul of the son is mine: the soul that sinneth, it shall die.
----------------------------------------
This has happenned because the Bible is a multigenerational piece of work. Each author has injected their own POV into it.


~~~~Too many cooks in the kitchen spoils the soup.
~~~~iceman9090

If they called me, I'd simply ask, "Does your religion have rules? Does it have commandments and standards? Do you define sin as being disobedient to those rules and commands? Then what benefit is it to me to have those restrictions and punishments in my life?"

They all wanna talk about the nature of God, the meaning of life, and fluffy crap. No, seriously. Why would I sign up to a system of shame and guilt? You cannot carrot on a stick me. I desire nothing from God nor do I need my life to mean something in order to enjoy it. So, without that mess to convince me, how does "you better do this/not do this, OR ELSE!!!!" improve my state of being?

I told him I had been a Mormon Missionary and had many long discussions with members of his Church and was not interested. He did not persist.

I'd say [you mean PRAY WITH ME: because I've been praying for you this whole time.