Recovery from MAD

[Tator]

The only reason whyme, or any other believer, can honestly claim that, in their view, the apologists do such a good job that it is always a "draw" between evidence for the church and against it, is because they already believe for reasons that have nothing to do with logic, reason, and evidence. Believers are not looking for evidence to help them determine whether or not it is reasonable to believe in Mormonism's claims - they are looking for reasons to feel good about what they already believe, for other reasons.

And some go even beyond this situation into True Belief, which has been described so well by Eric Hoffer, in his book The True Believer:

“So tenaciously should we cling to the world revealed by the Gospel, that were I to see all the Angels of Heaven coming down to me to tell me something different, not only would I not be tempted to doubt a single syllable, but I would shut my eyes and stop my ears, for they would not deserve to be either seen or heard.” (Luther) To rely on the evidence of the senses and of reason is heresy and treason. It is startling to realize how much unbelief is necessary to make belief possible. What we know as blind faith is sustained by innumerable unbeliefs. The fanatical Japanese in Brazil refused to believe for four years the evidence of Japan’s defeat. The fanatical communist refuses to believe any unfavorable report or evidence about Russia, nor will he be disillusioned by seeing with his own eyes that the cruel misery inside the Soviet promise land.

It is the true believers ability to “shut his eyes and stop his ears” to facts that do not deserve to be either seen or heard which is the source of his unequaled fortitude and constancy. He cannot be frightened by danger nor disheartened by obstacles nor baffled by contradictions because he denies their existence. Strength of faith, as Bergson pointed out, manifests itself not in moving mountains but in not seeing mountains to move. And it is the certitude of his infallible doctrine that renders the true believer impervious to the uncertainties, surprises and the unpleasant realities of the world around him.

Thus the effectiveness of a doctrine should not be judged by its profundity, sublimity or the validity of the truths it embodies, but by how thoroughly it insulates the individual from his self and the world as it is. What Pascal said of an effective religion is true of any effective doctrine: it must be “contrary to nature, to common sense, and to pleasure”.

The evidence against Mormonism is overwhelming, in so many important issues, that it is clearly obvious to those who do not possess some sort of emotional incentive to believe, or continue believing.

There is no draw. The draw is wishful thinking from those who are determined to continue believing, no matter what.

In fact, that weakness of the Mormon position is obvious in the fact that their arguments often devolve to these two ideas:

1) it's a draw

2) the Bible and general Christianity is just as problematic

I mean, really. Think about those two arguments. Just how weak does a position have to be before resorting to these tactics?

[_moksha]

Looks like a maple leaf to me.

Lets just hope it isn't poison oak. The hemp leaf would be inadequate for the task at hand.

Jersey, I have had very mixed results with PMing the moderators there. I have been reprimanded for not providing the crucial "substance" which they feel is necessary to a good post, so a post of Landover's own description of it itself on a thread about Landover was indeed the crucial substance. Those offending URLs were merely embedded links made by the site themselves for easy access to further readings. If I was being dinged for such a post, then it should be a concern for discussion to prevent others from repeating this error. (Although none have been in the past). If on the other hand, this was based on something totally unrelated to the specified charge, then would it behoove me to suffer an unjust reprimand in private? Perhaps. I don't always consider the total ramifications when writing in these posts.

[_beastie]

his is an interesting thread from the MAD board which I think is very interesting about evidence. I like it. It sounds good to me.

It sounds good to you only because you know very little about ancient Mesoamerican culture.

The idea that a Maya myth may have had its origins in a Judeo Christian culture is laughable. There was no distinction between religion, culture, politics and power in ancient Mesoamerica. Those with power dictated the religious vision that the entire culture embraced and repeated, over and over. It has no resemblance whatsoever to JudeoChristianity.

If any powerful city in ancient Mesoamerica, during the Book of Mormon time period, was actually practicing the culture and religion described in the Book of Mormon, we would know about it, because its echoes would be found throughout the region, for centuries - exactly like the real history of ancient Mesoamerica.

[_beastie]

Brant is back, and being sloppy. He knows better, and says sloppy things that gives believers with less background knowledge than he possesses the wrong impression.

Chonguey said this:

CFR for a 100,000+ standing Army annihilation in Mayan culture around 400 B.C. The expansion of militarism and the conquest of other smaller surrounding states didn't happen until the post-classical period. The time frame is still off.

And Brant replied:

You seem to be reading earlier literature. More recent literature on the subject clearly indicates warfare in the middle and late Preclassic, which are Book of Mormon times. The time frame is actually dead on. Particularly relevant is Mormon's claim of changes in the nature of warfare during his tenure as general - which corresponds to the changes seen in the archaeological record of the Teotihuacano expansion in that area, known to have begun by at least A.D. 378.

The Book of Mormon clearly, and I mean CLEARLY, describes a standing army. Brant knows good and well that no such critter existed in ancient Mesoamerica during the specified time period. Yet he ignores that point and pretends that the point was about warfare, in and of itself.

But notice how well his response pacified the believers. Why did it work?
Because they don't know better.

[_beastie]

While I was over there I visited the horse thread, where the believers are certain that the finding of horse bones dated a century past the arrival of the spaniards and their horses provides exciting support for the Book of Mormon, only to find this statement by Juliann:

The countermo frantic reactions to this are hilarious (as usual). I can't wait to see the abuse heaped upon the heads of that hapless expert who said anyone might have thought a horse was a deer. They have told us over and over what a stupid concept that is if an expert who happens to be Mormon says it.

Ah, the discovering has all been done. Why doesn't the rest of the world just admit it?

LOL! Some things never change, particularly Juliann's dogged distortions of the "counter-mo" argument.

[_wenglund]

The only reason whyme, or any other believer, can honestly claim that, in their view, the apologists do such a good job that it is always a "draw" between evidence for the church and against it, is because they already believe for reasons that have nothing to do with logic, reason, and evidence. Believers are not looking for evidence to help them determine whether or not it is reasonable to believe in Mormonism's claims - they are looking for reasons to feel good about what they already believe, for other reasons.

Let's see if you are projecting here in your stereotyping of Mormons, and test this hypothesis to see if the evidence confirms or negates it, or perhaps even leaves it a "draw", or whether you ironically hold to your stereotyped hypothesis in spite of logic, reasoning, and evidence to the contrary.

Because of the "only reason" qualifier, all that is needed to negate this hypothesis is to demonstrate that there is at least one believer who uses logic, reason, or evidence for honestly believing apologist do "such a good job that it is always a 'draw' between evidence for the church and against it".

To meet that negating threshold doesn't require that the logic, or reasoning, or evidence proferred by the believer is sound or valid or strong or compelling or even true. It merely needs to have the form of, or have "something to do with" logic, or reasoning, or evidence, and be at least a part of the reason for a believer believing that way about apologists.

Now, whether one agree's with Why Me's logic, or reasoning, or evidence; or whether or not one thinks any of it is sound or valid or strong; do you, Beastie, deny that he has used logic, or reasoning, or evidence?

If not, then your hypothesis is negated.

But, if you do deny it, then it is clear that you are projecting. ;-)

And, if this doesn't suffice, then we can test the hypothesis using the "any other believer" qualifier. I will happily offer myself into evidence as the ultimate authority of what I, as a believer, believe on this issue.

Once this is settled, we can move on to test some of the other assertions you emoted.

Thanks, -Wade Englund-

[_beastie]

He, like any other human being who insists on believing in something which has been satisfactorily disproven to those without an emotional incentive to believe, is using logic, reason, and evidence, only through the distorted lens of confirmation bias, or, quite possibly, a lack of adequate background knowledge.

Once this is settled, we can move on to test some of the other assertions you emoted.

Is this the same "we" that ran SAD and the anti-bigotry initiative?

[_wenglund]

He, like any other human being who insists on believing in something which has been satisfactorily disproven to those without an emotional incentive to believe, is using logic, reason, and evidence, only through the distorted lens of confirmation bias, or, quite possibly, a lack of adequate background knowledge.

This is certainly one ironic way to evade engaging the rational test of your hypothesis. ;-)

Thanks, -Wade Englund-

[_beastie]

Just stating something obvious, to those who, once again, do not have the emotional compulsion to believe - Mormon apologetics is littered with confirmation bias.

Deep down, you all know that people without any compulsion to believe view your assertions as ridiculous.

[_Trevor]

Brant is back, and being sloppy. He knows better, and says sloppy things that gives believers with less background knowledge than he possesses the wrong impression.

I'll give Brant one thing, he is a tireless Energizer Bunny of Book of Mormon scholarship and apologetics. If he enjoys what he is doing, then bully for him. Until he has any evidence for the Book of Mormon's antiquity that does not rely almost wholly on interpretation of the text itself, I am not interested.

I will beat my point to death because it represents, in my view, the first step in any investigation of the Book of Mormon's antiquity: the existence of solid evidence (archaeological or linguistic [and linguistic does not include hypothetical back translations from English to Hebrew, etc.]) that the Book of Mormon, as an artifact, is an ancient document. Since we lack the plates, lack any remnants of the language beyond the translation, a few 'untranslated' words, and a few stray characters (certainly not enough characters to verify whether it is in fact from an ancient writing system), and lack any other example of a verified ancient document that matches in any meaningful way the description of the Book of Mormon (e.g. written on plates of metal in an Egyptian-based writing system), there is no reason, aside from spiritual conviction, to accept the book as an ancient text.

I wish the best to all of those who believe it is ancient for spiritual reasons and then spend many pleasant hours drawing parallels with other ancient texts. For those who believe, surely this is enriching and fun, but it does not constitute proof that the text is ancient. Fortunately, they happily admit that this is true.