The Egyptian Test

[_Dr. Shades]

Oh man, what a fiasco!

In Gee's opening post, he writes:

They are like dentists who insist on performing delicate brain surgery, because that is more interesting than filling
teeth.

Did anyone catch the extreme irony in that statement?

[_dartagnan]

Can there be any more doubt that the MAD mods are stupid?

I mean it has been elaborated as eloquently as possible why the reason Gee's "test" is irrelevant, yet they still maintain expertise in Egyptology is necessary in order to "discuss the issue." They said critics who criticize LDS scholars should at least be experts themselves in the same field.

This is STUPID.

First of all, it is hypocritical because Brian Hauglid doesn't know Egyptian. For years the most vocal and celebrated apologist on the subject was the backyard professor! When a world renown Egyptologist, who happened to be Gee's teacher at Yale, mopped the floors with Gee's apologetics, Gee fled the scene while DCP assigned a FROB rebuttal to someone else, who, again, is completely unable to "translate Egyptian." So what the hell is Gee thinking now? Suddenly he gets to rig the game to his liking and we're supposed to just sit back and watch him stroke his ego? This guy is INCOMPETENT or dishonest. Yes, I'll say it, and I dare Gee to take legal action against me. He knows I can criticize him and he knows the criticism are valid. There is simply no other way to look at it, and I have given LDS apologists the opportunity to explain to me how Gee could be anything else.

Second of all, the problem I have pointed out for years is making itself perfectly clear again: Mormons typically don't know anything about the Book of Abraham and so they think it is a safe assumption that a background in Egyptology makes all the difference. This includes the leaders at FAIR apparently! They are absolutely clueless about the intricacies of the KEP controversy, which is really the crux of the whole matter. Egyptology has NOTHING to do with this. Just look at the amateurs pipe in every once in a while. They'll even admit they know nothing. And the reason they know nothing is because people like Gee and Nibley have for years made a very simple issue so complicated that it scares people away.

[_Trinity]

I don't know what to say about this situation except that has got to be one of the dorkiest threads known to mankind. It appears obvious that Gee is not interested in chatting and feels himself to be above reproach on the topic. It appears the mods have a collective bee under their bonnets to be engaging in such confrontive dialogue with posters. It almost feels like they are trying to bait the more reasonable critics so that they can either discover their sockpuppet, ban them, or set a precedent warning. Seems like a pretty harsh situation if they feel so threatened on the Book of Abraham issue that they must stage such ridiculous antics. Particularly the cross-posting from this board.

[QuestionEverything]

I don't know what to say about this situation except that has got to be one of the dorkiest threads known to mankind. It appears obvious that Gee is not interested in chatting and feels himself to be above reproach on the topic. It appears the mods have a collective bee under their bonnets to be engaging in such confrontive dialogue with posters. It almost feels like they are trying to bait the more reasonable critics so that they can either discover their sockpuppet, ban them, or set a precedent warning. Seems like a pretty harsh situation if they feel so threatened on the Book of Abraham issue that they must stage such ridiculous antics. Particularly the cross-posting from this board.

And this time....we didn't even start this (mini) board war/interaction thingamabob!

Although I did like the part where Orpheus(?) said "this is Gee's thread"...and yet Gee hasn't posted once on it. Good times.


PS: Did anyone notice the banning of jimmyspa on that thread....and does anyone want to wager on "Whoever"'s chances?

[_The Dude]

Nighthawke sure has a lot of posts in the Gee-wiz thread. Did anyone notice her tag line?

"I would lean towards genius, but not the kind of genius people usually think of, like Einstein or Newton. I would say more of a "Rain-man, calendar-idiot" sort of genius where there are extreme talents in one area, and major deficiencies in another." - The Dude on Joseph Smith.

Did anyone notice my tag line here?

LOL

"Rain-man, calendar-idiot" ... man, that has a nice ring to it. Who is the MADboard poster called "Drone" anyways? I'd like to thank him for coining the phrase.

[_moksha]

Hi Moksha,

Both Baer and Rhodes have done precisely that: taken a BoB from the Louvre and used it to fill in the missing columns. However, Gee's argument is not that the missing part of the BoB was the Book of Abraham. His argument is that the Book of Abraham followed the BoB on the roll. In other words, there were two texts written on the roll, and the Book of Abraham was the second one. Hopefully that helps.

-CK

Thanks for the explanation. Two quick questions:
1. What would one have to do with the other?
2. Why would these scrolls separated by millenia in time and not related in purpose follow one another or even be included together?

[_CaliforniaKid]

Thanks for the explanation. Two quick questions:
1. What would one have to do with the other?
2. Why would these scrolls separated by millenia in time and not related in purpose follow one another or even be included together?

1. Nothing.
2. Gee does not give a reason, but he does try to provide precedents for unrelated texts appearing on the same roll as a funerary text. I have argued elsewhere that the examples he provides are invalid, insufficient, and/or irrelevant.

[_beastie]

Don't LDS apologists ever wonder why their job is consistently so difficult, consistently requires them to use the fallacy of future evidence and personal attacks?

I would call this a "little clue".

But at any rate, here's the latest entertainment from the thread in question: after it was made clear by the critics (particularly effectively by Tarski) that the ability to translate Egypt is irrelevant in terms of the questions posed about the Book of Abraham, believers have explained that this thread isn't about those particular questions, but about the fact that Gee's competence has been questioned. This, according to them, is why the ability to translate Egyptian is relevant.

So, in response to that, Cksalmon says we ought to look at those accusations of incompetence, (none of the critics remember Gee's ability to translate Egyptian being questioned). Cal responded:

QUOTE(cksalmon @ Jun 7 2007, 08:28 PM) *

If that truly is the point of this thread, then perhaps it would be instructive to detail with quotations from this board those posts that have questioned his competence. CKS

Why?

I'm willing to do it to the best of my ability, but having already done a search that came up with 27 pages of posts with his name and finding that some of these posts have sections deleted by the mods (surprise on that one) thus likely losing us the most egregious examples, what is it you think will be accomplished by collecting these posts?

and Juliann chimes in:

QUOTE(calmoriah @ Jun 7 2007, 10:38 PM) *

what is it you think will be accomplished by collecting these posts?


More diversion?

Oh my. So we have, on the same thread, believers insisting that Gee's challenge is relevant due to the fact that his competence has been challenged, and when critics say it would be helpful to see those challenges because none of them remember Gee's ability to translate Egyptian ever being questioned, believers respond that the only point to collecting these accusations would be "diversionary".

Are they serious? What the heck?

Here's the obvious: Gee's competence has been questioned, but not due to his ability to translate Egyptian. His competence in historical evidence and logic is being questioned, and clearly the ability to translate Egyptian has no relevance on that question.

But that is the very question that is being doggedly avoided by both Gee and his defenders. Instead, let's talk about who can translate Egyptian.

And they claim diversionary tactics?

So let's get this straight. Gee's challenge is due to his competence being questioned. His challenge would only make sense if his ability to translate Egyptian had been questioned. So it's reasonable to ask to see these attacks on his competence to see if, indeed, the competence question was about the ability to translate Egyptian. No one can find these attacks to share, and believers say this is a diversionary tactic.

I say again: What The Heck????!!!!??????

This thread is a classic. I hope it is pinned PERMANENTLY.

[_Dr. Shades]

Oh my. So we have, on the same thread, believers insisting that Gee's challenge is relevant due to the fact that his competence has been challenged, and when critics say it would be helpful to see those challenges because none of them remember Gee's ability to translate Egyptian ever being questioned, believers respond that the only point to collecting these accusations would be "diversionary".

Not to mention the fact that Gee's little "test" is the epitome of diversion to begin with.

This thread is a classic. I hope it is pinned PERMANENTLY.

I wholeheartedly agree. Thanks for boiling it down for us, beastie!

In another thread, Mercury asked us why we bother with MA&D. That thread is one of the reasons--it's just too full of entertainment, at the apologists' expense, to pass up!

[_Runtu]

I love Dan Vogel.