waysider

You have stated you measured changes in resistance. That involves using electronics. I'm just sayin'. OK, back to topic now.

How does plant consciousness and polygraph construction have any relevance to the plagiarism VPW committed?

This may well be the hardest part of the process, admitting to yourself you've wasted a valuable portion of your life. At least, it was for me. I had to take a cold, hard look at my time in The Way and admit to myself I had squandered my time on something of no consequence. It's the first step to moving forward.

I took "the class" in the summer of 1972 and instantly became as thoroughly involved as possible.. I had my first real epiphany about the dark side after graduating from Fellow Laborers. My exit is a little bit difficult to pin down. I was pretty much on cruise control for my last 10 years or so. GSC iced the cake for me.

I don't know what it's like now, but, when I was in The Way, you weren't supposed to say you created something. According to Way theology, to create is to make something out of nothing. Therefore, "Only God can create." It's a crazy world, where up is down and nonsense passes for wisdom.

Let's see. In 1972, Mike would have been in his early 20's. Unless he was pursuing a formal education of some sort, I highly doubt he gave much thought at all to the subject of plagiarism. There's no way to prove it, of course...but I'm still skeptical.

Nothing you have said here excuses the unethical, illegal plagiarism that Wierwille exercised

The United States is not a theocracy. "Art. 11. As the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion; as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion, or tranquility, of Mussulmen (Muslims); and as the said States never entered into any war or act of hostility against any Mahometan (Mohammedan) nation, it is declared by the parties that no pretext arising from religious opinions shall ever produce an interruption of the harmony existing between the two countries."...Treaty of Tripoli (1796) Plagiarism laws are part of a legal system that has been carefully crafted over hundreds of years. It's not our place to now decide which of those laws to choose and reject, based solely on religious beliefs.

Looking at the subtle differences between Wierwille's version and Stile's version, it quickly becomes obvious that Wierwille's intent was to obscure the trickery. This is the level of incompetence you might expect to see on a middle school term paper, not from someone who held himself out to be an authority on a subject..

Not always the case. In fact look at THIS comparison John Juedes did, involving Wierwille and Stiles.

Yeah. I'm not saying original, initial revelation in a Biblical context, I'm saying primary revelation, as it related to this particular discussion and the works of Wierwille and the people he copied..

Here's where the logic falls apart, at least for me. According to Mike, Wierwille got revelation to assemble things that had already been given by revelation. I'll call this revelation that had already been given the primary revelation and Wierwille's the secondary revelation. We've already demonstrated that the primary revelation contained errors. Why would secondary revelation be given to use something (the primary revelation) that is known to contain errors? That seems awfully counterproductive, in my opinion.

That's exactly what Mike is arguing.

The snowstorm never happened. That's a fact. Despite what you might think, Mike, Ohio has weather records that are quite comprehensive, dating all the way back to the late 1800's. We've been through this all before and looked at specific dates for Ohio weather records.

Yes, this appears to be a crucial difficulty with drawing a parallel here.

Totally irrelevant and distracting from the discussion.

Ahhhh. The Pure Evil Model. Yes, indeed. The straw man to rival all other straw men. You see, Mike, it's not the purpose of this site to create a "pure evil model" of Wierwille. The purpose of this site is to expose what was and is the reality of the inner workings of The Way ministry. That reality is not always pretty. So, continue on to argue on VPW's behalf if you must, but be aware that this site is about much more than you or me or V.P. Wierwille.

You said it, not me...

....and yet you said this just 10 minutes earlier.

You don't think VP was completely at the reins in 1967?

I'll give this a bit of a twist... Dating someone to get them to take PFAL.

We had a discussion a while ago, about how ex-TWI people seem to be inordinately attracted to unusual theories. I can't seem to find it at the moment.

I dunno, I thought it was rather applicable to the topic at hand.

Consider for a moment the incredibly massive number of individuals that would need to be sworn to secrecy to pull off a conspiracy of this magnitude.

I agree. This is especially true in our current geopolitical climate, where several generations have been conditioned to believe that this or that ethnicity is evil or inferior. These beliefs, if given enough time, do seem to become diluted in the general populace. I think the same will hold true of this trinity issue. Perhaps in another 100 years people will scratch their heads and wonder why people were so consumed with something that doesn't seem to matter to them anymore. edit: As I was typing this, I was thinking specifically about the issue of Korea's "comfort women" and how subsequent generations following WWII have adjusted their beliefs and attitudes as time itself dilutes the first hand and second hand memories.