INVESTIGATOR 136 (2011 January)BRIEF REPORTS from INVESTIGATOR MAGAZINE 136 to 139
RADIO STATION NAME CHANGE
Investigator #51 reported on the Christian radio station Alta Mira 107.9 which promotes Christianity and in particular the Assemblies of God. The station is still going but is now called Life FM 107.9.
A recent fund-raising leaflet by Life FM says that one of every 3 songs are Christian and 105,000 listen to Life FM every week.
BOXING KANGAROO
The Kraft-sponsored BorderFest Carnival in Texas celebrated all things Aussie. However, a circus act in which a clown engaged in a boxing brawl with a tethered kangaroo was cancelled after the first day due to an outcry from Australians. (Sunday Mail 2010, March 7)
HAVE ANY 2000-YEAR-OLD MEN PREACHED TO YOU?
Investigator (#61, 65, 66 & 70) reported Mr Doug Davies' search for four 2000-year-old Mormon men.
Davies had told Mormon missionaries that their prophet Joseph Smith (1805-1844) was a false prophet because he predicted the erection of a Temple on a designated plot of land in Missouri within one generation and it didn't happen.
The missionaries responded with the Mormon doctrine that four first-century men are still alive — the apostle John and three others; therefore Joseph Smith's generation had not died out and the prediction is unrefuted.
That's what set Mr Davies on his search.
Government pension departments do not give out information on individual pensioners, not even their ages. Davies, therefore, interviewed Mormons on whether they'd met the four oldies and asked how to find their names in Mormonism's International Genealogical Index. Mormons promote genealogy to identify deceased people of previous generations and baptize them by proxy. Mormon doctrine also encourages marriage and having children. That's why Mormons have the IGI and why Davies sought evidence for the four oldies therein.
The 2000-year-old-men doctrine is also used to explain how Jesus' prediction of the Gospel being preached in all nations can be fulfilled when 29 countries including China have no Mormons. The book Latter Days (2000) by Coke Newell (a convert to Mormonism) considers this problem and explains that the four oldies are active in ministry! :
It would appear that the Latter-day Saints trust in several more decades passing before the gospel has been preached in all the world. Wouldn't it? Not necessarily. We do not claim to know all that the Lord may be doing in the hands of other minsters. Firstly, there is the apostle John, he who was translated without tasting death, whose desire (granted) was to remain on earth and preach the gospel in many nations. Additionally, three Books of Mormon disciples made the same request and received the same promise. Where are they, and how effective, after two thousand years of practice, have they been? (pp 226-227)Newell doesn't answer his question "Where are they…?" and Davies' search for them ultimately failed.
If any 2000-year-old men have preached to you you're invited to report it in Investigator.
INVESTIGATOR 137 (2011 March)
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A LOST CIVILIZATION YET TO BE FOUND
There is speculation of a lost civilization beneath the Persian Gulf at:
www.cbsnews.com/8301-501465_162-20025191-501465.html
Go to the above website or, more easily, type Jeanna+Bryner+Gulf into Google Search.
INVESTIGATOR 138 (2011 May)
GOD'S PROPHET
In his book 2008 God's Final Witness (published 2006) Ronald Weinland claims that all religions teach lies. But he's different because:
Weinland says human governments and religions will end 6000 years after Adam's creation. (Chapter 3) During the final 3½ years over six billion people will die. (p139) The final 3½ years start in 2008:In 1997, God made him a prophet for this end-time.
When this book was published...in 2006…there will be a maximum of two years remaining… (p244)Weinland's website in 2009 foretold: the demise of the United States over the coming year, which will be followed by man's final world war.
A transcript of his appearance on Australia's Compass TV program is at:
www.abc.net.au/compass/s2768890.htm
Weinland stems from Herbert Armstrong's cult which predicted the world's end for the 1970s.
ANOTHER LEAK
You've probably seen Wikileaks founder Julian Assange in the news and wondered how his hair became white.
In an unofficial biography his former 2nd-in-charge, German computer scientist Daniel Domscheit-Berg, writes:
He told me that when he was 14, he built a reactor at home in his basement and got the poles reversed… his hair had grown white as a result of the gamma radiation. (The Weekend Australian Inquirer, 2011, February 12-13, p. 3)The book Inside Wikileaks (2011) describes Assange's disciplined work habits but is otherwise not always flattering. Assange has commenced legal action.
INVESTIGATOR 139 (2011 July)
SPONTANEOUS HUMAN COMBUSTION
Books with titles such as Strange World, Amazing Facts and Stranger Than Science present spontaneous human combustion as an unsolvable mystery.
Harry Edwards in Investigator #75 noted:
Spontaneous human combustion ceases to be a mysterious phenomenon when case histories are examined objectively… In nearly all reported cases, vital details which may have contributed to the event are omitted. In the case of Henry Thomas, there was a lit coal fire in the room and there was some form of material burning in the room at the time of Thomas' death.New Scientist reports: "In one recent case, a woman's charred body was found by her front door, while the rest of the room was untouched [by fire]. But closer inspection revealed a tiny trail of burned plastic and clothing leading to the kitchen, where the stove was still on." (2009, May 23, p35)
The article suggests that what happened is that the woman's food caught fire. She grabbed it and rushed to the front door, but her blouse caught fire, and she then collapsed from inhaling the fumes.
The evidence here was plain but also illustrates why some occurrences were mysterious — the ignition was in one location but most of the burning occurred elsewhere.