WordWolf

I think that those who say that God Almighty was the "first cause" that started a process of evolution that began the process that resulted in us being here today could sensibly referred to as "Evolutionary Creationists." They'd believe there's have been no creation without God, nor anything TO evolve, and without God, there'd be no evolutionary process at all.

Ok, let's move this along. This was "Disaster", a ST:TNG episode where the ship was seriously damaged without warning, maybe from a "cosmic string fragment" or something. (Those cosmic string fragments sure came in handy writing some of those scripts...) Poor Keiko O'Brien went into labour in 10-Forward, and the only person certified with current medical training there was WORF. Best quote there was Worf reciting to himself that he had to encourage her to push. So he "encourages", Klingon-style. "Push. Push, Keiko. Push. Push! PUSH!" "I AM PUSHING!!!!" Captain Picard, you may remember, doesn't like kids. (Unless he's related to them.) He was talked into giving a personal tour of a handful of the grammar-school children who won prizes on "Captain Picard Day." He ended up trapped in an elevator with them, then forced to get them out safely. He partly gained control over the situation by giving officer positions to each of the kids, who seemed to respond to being given authority. Riker and Data were trapped where they could access Engineering, but the command consoles were offline, so Data suggested using his own command-circuitry- in his head-to control the console, or something. Deanna Troi was the highest-ranked officer on the bridge (that reminds me, isn't the officer-on-duty supposed to be on the bridge at all times? Whatever), and had some tough decisions to face-like if they should abandon the stardrive section of the ship. Later, she bantered with Riker.

It seems that, as usual, vpw's story of who he was and what he told people changed over the years and with who he was telling it to. As of 1970/1971 (the way:living in love), vpw grew up on a farm and was assigned chores (which he avoided doing). According to Uncle Harry, they all walked a mile to the same schoolhouse. (No "family drove them there in 5 minutes", which is one sign of conspicuous wealth.) pg-77. Uncle Harry, pg-79, on growing up on the farm. "But that's the way we were brought up years ago. Our German people were not afraid of work. I guess that stays with you." vpw himself, pg-174, on his plans as a youngster. "First, I thought I wanted to be a doctor, then a lawyer; but by my junior year in college, I had my heart set on the ministry." Interesting how he later told some of the corps here that he had originally considered the business field, and the entertainment field, then later decided on the ministry. From "Born Again to Serve", pg-36. ""I'd had the best education money could buy; but with all that I knew, I just could not help people. I was discouraged the first year in the ministry, 1941-42. I thought, 'Had my dad spent all that money to educate a fool?' " I'm having trouble laying my hands on the exact quote this minute of what his dad said about school, and which one they supported. Maybe someone can beat me to it. We know that vpw commonly referred to anything HE did as either the FIRST or the BEST. Thus, his education was the BEST, and so on. Seems vpw grew up on a family farm, the entire family had chores, and he decided that he preferred to go to school rather than inherit the farm. How rich COULD this farm have been? In the early 70s, they supposedly grew up working hard on a farm, and that's how they knew these students with their reluctance to perform manual labor, were off. In the 80s, he grew up affluent, almost-rich. vpw's life just got bigger and bigger with each retelling. If he was still alive today, he probably would now be saying he was born in a log cabin, and angels periodically brought portents he was going to be special....

vpw didn't UNDERSTAND teaching. vpw was not TRAINED to teach. vpw was trained inHOMILETICS. In homiletics, yo get up on the pulpit, tell stories and convey morals, and everyone's supposed to sit and agree with them. There's no blackboard, there's no bullet-points, there's no note-taking. Just "this one talks, and those ones nod and agree." In teaching, there's a dialogue. Sometimes the TEACHER learns as well. It's been said that one of the best ways to learn something is to attempt to teach it. There can be surprises, there can be disagreements, but there's a 2-way process. Otherwise, how do you know they're actually thinking and learning rather than memorizing and regurgitating? I had a pair of exchanges with a professor back in college. Once, he was covering something on weather, and said that hurricanes north of the equator spin in one direction (counter-clockwise?) and south of the equator they spin in the other direction (clockwise?), and that the toilets drain in the same direction- spinning one way north of the equator, and south they spun the other way. I immediately raised my hand, and asked about toilets placed ON the equator. He replied that the just break down and don't spin. He then admitted the toilet comments were not true-I beat him to the punchline. Hurricanes DO spin that way, but toilets, being smaller, all spin in the same direction due to the mechanics of plumbing overriding weather patterns when on that small a scale. However, apparently, I was the only student who raised his hand at that point, which said something about the rest of the class was at that moment. Another time, he made a dry joke, and there was the requisite groaning among the students. He mumbled a note to himself not to make bad jokes. I ran up to him afterwards, and pointed out the groaning meant the students were WITH him and understood what he was saying- and that's a good sign. Whether the joke was laughed at or groaned was secondary to them following the lecture. Sometimes, a good teacher has to note when he or she is pushing too HARD, since humans can only learn so much, so fast before it's just sounds and syllables to them. (Their brain is full.) vpw, however, expected the students to always be ready to learn everything, even if he worked them short of sleep and exhausted from manual labour. Sometimes, something has been phrased to form a specific problem for a student, even one paying close attention. A long time ago, I overheard a teacher attempt to explain something involving decimals while teaching fraction conversions. The effect was to cause me to think the comment was germane to fraction conversions, which meant I followed incorrect instructions to perform the operations. But I was following what that same teacher said. Poor communication for a moment led to a misunderstanding. I had a similar problem when beginning the "Listening with a Purpose" questions in pfal. I understood session 1 completely, and had even taken notes all across the session. However, I found the first question awkwardly phrased, and I was unclear what was meant. We had 3 types of believing, so when asked about the "2 types", I wasn't sure. However, when the person running it rephrased the question and asked about the "2 SIDES" of believing, I understood what was being asked. Again, was that me being a poor student? I think miscommunication can be honest, and still be an impediment to any lesson of any kind. ======== On the other hand, "no questions" may be an acceptable goal with a homily, but with any lesson of consequence, there can be many questions-often perfectly legitimate ones. In the case of my lecture as a student, I posed a perfectly-legitimate question about exactly what the professor was teaching about. Another time, I was in a Psychology class discussing "the 3 Jesuses of Ypsilanti", where 1 Psychologist found 3 men who had the delusion that they were Jesus Christ himself, and brought them together in the same room. The professor picked that moment to change subjects. At the next chance to ask a question, I asked what the result was when the 3 men were brought together. (Nothing-each one remained convinced HE was the REAL Jesus.) It was a fair question, and how GOOD the professor was (and he was pretty good) had nothing to do with me having a question. Personally, I'm disappointed nobody else had wanted to know. vpw lacked understanding of that- how questions can illuminate aspects not discussed, and bring in new insights, new observations, new questions for further study not previously raised. As such, some of the most apt STUDENTS may have the MOST questions-because they DID understand the teacher. Why was vpw loathe to entertain questions? Was it laziness, or isinterest in the individual students? Did it cover up a lack of sufficient understanding to discuss outside of the homiletic format? Sadly, we'll never know for sure. We know there are no POSITIVE reasons to stifle and suppress questions categorically... Nice "False Dilemma". If you have any questions, then it's because you didn't understand. (Sometimes false.) P -> Q. If you "didn't understand" what he's teaching,then you're stupid. Q-> R. Therefore, if you have any questions when he teaches, then you're stupid. P -> R. Since the initial conclusion is false, the entire logic equation is faulty, however. Then again, whether or not he was actually RIGHT was of less concern to vpw than if he was AGREED WITH.

Yes, but I don't log in every 20 minutes, and thus can often need to wait up to 24 hours to find something, let alone reply to it. This was also the same man who said THE WORST THING you can do after he's taught is to go up and ask him a question. That's because he's not "apt to teach." When I teach, I can go for hours. I can use up all my allotted time, and announce we're stopping only because we ran out of time to go any further- and have some of the people stay for further discussion with me until I announce we have to leave. After I teach, I have no problem being asked a question. (Providing, of course, it's an honest question, and not someone just throwing something in to be difficult, to amuse themself.) I may not be the best teacher in the world, but, apparently, I'm more "apt to teach" than vpw was. And he was getting paid to do it- generally I teach for the joy of it, and to educate others eager to learn.

Groucho, maybe you should have used something like "peat bog" or "marsh bog"or "tar pit."

Incorrect. He stated that those who were called Jews nowadays were not the descendants of the Jews mentioned in the Old Testament, selected out by God. That's why the term "Judean" was used in twi-to avoid saying either "Jew" or "so-called Jew", either of which was an unacceptable situation, albeit for different reasons. As has already been pointed out here before-and you seem determined to remain in abject denial of- Koestler's claims were DISPROVEN. As quoted on the wikipedia entry on his book, "the Thirteenth Tribe", http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Thirteenth_Tribe "Recent genetic research studies have contradicted the main thesis of The Thirteenth Tribe. For example, a 2000 study of haplotypes by Hammer et al indicates that the Y chromosomes of most Ashkenazi and Sephardic Jews are of Middle Eastern origin, containing mutations that are also common among Palestinians and other Middle Eastern peoples, yet are uncommon in the general European population. These results strongly suggest that most male ancestors of the Ashkenazi Jews can be traced primarily to the Middle East. A second study (2006) by Behar et al, based on haplotype analysis of mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA), also indicates that about 40% of the current Ashkenazi population is descended matrilineally from just four women. These four "founder lineages" were "likely from a Hebrew/Levantine mtDNA pool" originating in the Near East in the first and second centuries CE." In plain English, modern Jews not claiming mixed heritage are descended PRIMARILY from the Jews of the Old Testament, the 12 tribes of Israel. Modern Jews are NOT descended PRIMARILY from the Khazars. There's genetic evidence of their 12 tribes heritage, but no genetic evidence of a Khazar heritage. That was wild speculation on the part of Koestler, and has been disproven. Your insistence on ignoring this is sad, but correctible. However, since you remain determined to miss this, we'll eventually have to have this same discussion again a year or so from now again, where you paste someone else's quotation of Koestler and someone will, again, have to link to and post the refutations that everyone ELSE can easily see disproved Koestler YEARS AGO. Well, that's better than no mention at all, but you didn't say what was YOU speaking, and what was JCOP. You didn't use quotes or otherwise indicate what was their words and what was your own. That's ok, it's almost traditional for vpw to take credit for the work of others, you're just proudly carrying on that tradition, I expect....morality and legality don't really figure in...

*counts* I counted 13 museums across the entire US. (My count may have been off by 1.) That's your idea of "every major American city"? And if you didn't have any better documentation than 13, why say "every major American city?" Posting rhetoric you cribbed from someone else- or rearranged the words on- isn't actually STUDY. It's regurgitation, and is only as reliable as the sources you use. In this case, you're relying on those who make other wild claims all the time.

Now, those of you arriving late may have missed some details. I shall recap, and you can see the documentation all over the longer Holocaust thread. For those of you wondering-because you never were there when vpw said anything denying the Holocaust- there's an amazing correlation on the GSC between the tiny handful of posters who've argued against the Holocaust- "it didn't happen" "the numbers were inflated" "there were no crematoriums used to incinerate Jews" "it's all a Zionist plot" and the tiny handful of posters who keep putting forth that vpw was some sort of spectacular guy. Every single Holocaust denier on this board is a vpw-promoter. Every single one. (I haven't checked if every single vpw-promoter is also a Holocaust denier.) I ask you, if Holocaust denial wasn't part and parcel of what vpw taught them, why the connection? vpw-apologists are often quick to claim that anything they don't like wasn't vpw's fault at all- but the fault of those who came along later. Why, then, embrace this faulty, demagogue-based ideology of Holocaust denial? I think this is at LEAST as strong a testimony as the poster who posted what they heard vpw say directly. In other words, "This is your brain on vpw. Any questions?"

Actually, it's a historical event where millions of people, many of them Jews, were imprisoned by the Nazis and most of them (the prisoners) were killed by the Nazis while imprisoned. That's so well-documented by now that only the most severe Kool-Aid drinkers can bring themselves to say "it didn't happen" "millions of Jews weren't slaughtered" and so on. But for some people, there was no mass-murder, just a media event decades later about some made-up problems. "Hardly a month." So, from the last 12 months, you can name 10 different NEW TV productions, films, or books, at least? Drawing from all 3 media? Shouldn't be hard if that's really happening, and not just rhetoric from a poster.... Got documentation for this claim? EVERY major American city? Is this hundreds of memorials, or are you creatively redefining "major" so that there's only a few "major" cities? I'd expect the bulk of them in Europe, CLOSE TO WHERE IT HAPPENED.I'm doubtful there's fully 250, but there's probably many that represent specific people, memorializing THEM, and those are being added together to make a false impression.... Wasn't in my education. How many American schools in this "many"? And ONE Holocaust museum for the entire country hardly suffices as emphasis. There's more than one museum in this country just for aeronautics, one in the same town as that Holocaust museum. And so on, for many other subjects (the American Indian, Natural History, Criminology...)

Sometimes it costs very little- just overcoming reluctance to step outside your comfort zone- to make a small gesture which makes a large difference to the person you made it to.

Ok, here's what we agree on, and what we don't agree on. "vpw got believing in reverse wrong"- check. "We should believe the promises of God"- check. "God made an immutable law for sinner and nonsinner of believing"- no check. Believing God? Good thing. Claiming that's some sort of "law"? Not so much. We agree on quite a bit, though.

As written, I agree with this post. As a whole, the 12 sessions of pfal are not atheistic- not in the usual sense of "antagonistic to religion" nor in the specific sense Juedes meant- which was technically correct- of a 12 session class where God was irrelevant. However, Juedes didn't say the entirety of pfal, all 12 sessions, were atheistic. He said the so-called "LAW" of believing was "atheistic", that is, God was irrelevant to the system. It required "laws of the universe", and occasionally mentioned God, but He was incidental at best to any practical application of these supposed "laws". Believing could get you RED DRAPES, or kill your child, or give a hypochondriac illnesses he never had-just claimed he did.

15-minute increments. I was long gone when they did it, too. It's almost like they deliberately were saying "Let's see how moronic and controlling we can make this VERY SLOWLY before they feel the boiling water and jump out."

CORRECT! Here's how they came in... "Offer me money." "Yes." "Power too-promise that!" "All that I have and more. Please." "Offer me everything I ask for." "Anything you want!" "I want my father back, you son of a b*!" Inigo Montoya caught up to the six-fingered man. "He didn't fall? Inconceivable!" "You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means." Vizzini kept saying the man in black keeping up with them was "inconceivable", but obviously it wasn't....as Inigo pointed out. Actually, if it hadn't been part of your signature, that WOULD have been my first quote, either "Never get involved in a land war in Asia" or "Never go up against a Sicilian when death is on the line."

All I know is, anyone wants to take off my head, that would be a terrible thing, a tragedy or a crisis.

No, it's a righteous mission to salvage an idyllic memory of twi, pfal and your own past there, getting your own memories out of bondage. Part and parcel of that is to attempt to crucify people like Juedes- whether that means ignoring almost everything he says, distorting what he says, or even distorting what vpw said. Who said we HATED vpw and twi? We all follow the dictates of our respective consciences- which respond as we have instructed them. This "people who criticize vpw are deeply emotional" thing isn't based on us, but, again, part and parcel of trying to discredit any criticism of vpw. Cold logic demonstrating his doctrinal error can't be countenanced, so it must be relabelled as emotional outbursts one way or another.

If you want. So far, we're at 1 promise not to respond if we post about Juedes, and 2 posts responding to not responding if we post about Juedes.

"Offer me money." "Yes." "Power too-promise that!" "All that I have and more. Please." "Offer me everything I ask for." "Anything you want!" "I want my father back, you son of a b*!" "He didn't fall? Inconceivable!" "You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means."

You added that to vpw's explanation. vpw said that believing brings down death, illnesses and other things. I disagree that vpw's explanation-without extensive rewriting- works. Acting- or failing to act- bring results. vpw claimed that CONFESSING illness (being a hypochondriac) will mean you will HAVE illness (you will acquire the specific sicknesses you claimed). However, hypochondriacs exist all the time, and most of the time, they are physically well but PRETENDING or CLAIMING/LYING that they are physically ill but they're actually not.) How do you interpret that their confession of specific illness gives them that illness? Adding that completely to the Orange Book and Blue Book. vpw HIMSELF didn't bring up PRACTICAL CONSIDERATIONS as to HOW his supposed "LAWS" would work. He said that it happened, and for it NOT to happen would be a violation of "THE LAWS OF THE UNIVERSE". For those who saw they failed to happen, he left it to people like you to introduce all sorts of outside considerations to attempt to legitimize his statements. He'd be impressed to what degree he succeeded, in my opinion.

I read you fine. You said if anyone besides Juedes responded, there's little point because you won't read it. "let him speak for himself. Even though I know I can't stop you from doing so I'll tell you now -- it will be wasted on me 'cause I won't bother responding to it." My response of "If we let whether or not you're willing to listen limit our posting, it would get pretty quiet on threads you post on around here." reflected an understanding of what you wrote, thus, no re-reading is necessary. Neither was rephrasing necessary, I understood you the first time.

While I agree that more love and compassion is needed, I disagree as to how it arrived. You're saying it "crept in." I say a lot of it was part and parcel of the framework. For example: vpw HIMSELF takes shots at this minister and mother who may not have even existed. Compassion? At a FUNERAL? Who would have that?

The system being in place, whether or not you receive something has nothing to do with any involvement from God. The laws of the universe are in place, and your receiving will be based entirely on what and how you believe. vpw: "If a person makes up his mind that this time next year he is going to be dead, God would have to change the laws of the universe for the person not to be accomodated." You're misrepresenting Juedes and ignoring when he explained your misrepresentation. Juedes clarified, attempting to shore up your understanding. Amazingly, you completely skipped this, although you quoted and criticized a few of his sentences following. Juedes: "It is striking to me how strongly people have responded to this article on the "law" of beleiving. Perhaps this response hints at how entrenched the idea was in TWI, and perhaps also at how much damage it has done to people (to themsevles or to people they know). My article does not say that VPW promoted atheism. It does say that "the law of believing" is an atheistic system. In VP's view, Christians and non Christians "operate" it to do good or to do evil. While VP mentioned God's promises, they really don't make any difference to the "law." He told the story of the mother who caused her child to be killed by her negative believing. Does that mean that she knew the promises of God were "available" and used her believing in God's promises to kill her child? Certainly not!" This IS what vpw said. "If a person makes up his mind that this time next year he is going to be dead, God would have to change the laws of the universe for the person not to be accomodated." God's involvement in this transaction is NONEXISTENT. The person believed and was killed by the interaction of his believing and "the laws of the universe." God set up these supposed laws millenia ago, and can merely watch in impotent fury if one of his precious children has determined they could die. The only thing he CAN do is send a prophet to try to convince them to change their believing, but if the person remains resolute, God MUST stand aside and watch them die. No fair making sense here, another spot. We're discussing how vpw's rules don't work- or attempting to rewrite them so that they DO work, depending on who's posting. Not that I don't agree wholeheartedly, but we're busy circling some nonsense.

Whether or not the mother taught the child how properly to cross the street is incidental to what vpw taught. Kindly quote-citing the page- where vpw said that in the Orange or the Blue Book. That issue didn't come up until raised BY US on the messageboards. vpw said his mother's fear killed him. Period. Orange Book, pg 44. "What one fears will surely come to pass. It is a law. Have you ever heard about people who set the time of their death? When somebody says 'Well, this time next year I will not be here," if you are a betting man, bet your money; you are going to win. If a person makes up his mind that this time next year he is going to be dead, God would have to change the laws of the universe for the person not to be accomodated." Orange Book, pg-43-44. "Do you know what killed that little boy? The fear in the heart and life of that mother. She was so desperately afraid something was going to happen to her little boy that she finally reaped the results of her believing." I would also like to point out that we have no documentation that this woman and her child EVER EXISTED. We know the attitudes vpw claims towards such people, but we have no guarantee they were REAL and not just made up to supposedly illustrate the so-called "LAW" of believing that fails to work as written, so people desperate to prop it up have to add all sorts of codicils to handwave away all the times it DOESN'T work or explain what happened.

If we let whether or not you're willing to listen limit our posting, it would get pretty quiet on threads you post on around here.