Response to Jockers, Criddle, et al., Now Available

[_why me]

Whyme you can go back to dreaming what it must have been like seeing a man sticking his head in a hat, looking at a stone and allegedly translating from some goldplates that were hidden under a cloth so wife Emma could not see them. If you belive that nonsense more power to you.

So, joseph didn't stick his head in a hat to translate the Book of Mormon...emma lied and so did david whitmer? I always liked the hat trick. Also, what happened to the original Book of Mormon manuscript as supposively written by Rigdon? Now if we had that...we can all go to sleep and have nice dreams.

And how did rigdon, smith and others keep that manucript intact as they moved it around so others can add to it? And why would sidney want it to be a communal affair?

[_Benjamin McGuire]

Dale writes:

I wonder who implanted that particular memory in people's minds? It is partly found in Howe's book, and again in some testimony from other people in the Conneaut area.

Why does it have to be an implanted memory Dale? I think that there is this curious phenomenon here with the Spalding theory (and its variants) advocates. They want or even need to assume that an entire group of people are lying. But, that another group is absolutely telling the truth.

My position is much simpler. The evidence of their texts is telling in this regard. I don't need to see false memories - because I am not a mind reader. I really don't care about whether a memory was false or not, because there isn't really any way for us to determine such a thing. What we can do is show how texts relate to one another.

Some years ago, I had a conversation with Brent Metcalfe over some of his earliest readers of the Book of Mormon. And do you know what I discovered? In at least one instance, his early reader had never read the Book of Mormon - and due to a series of errors that he made in his writings, it was possible to determine the source of his comments that he reworked and reused in his own text. Definitely not an earliest reader of the Book of Mormon. The same can be said here. None of these accounts need to be original - they can draw from a common tradition in the environment. They don't have to represent real personal experiences. They can be lying. The problem for the Spalding theorists is quite simple though - and it has nothing to do with classifying this as false memories or contesting that notion. It has to do with the fact that we have texts, and those texts say something to us that is quite different from what the witnesses themselves assert.

Ben McGuire

[_Benjamin McGuire]

Roger writes:

Dale wrote:

It doesn't quite match the Book of Mormon narrative -- so
the false memory (if that is what it is) doesn't seem very
useful to those trying to destroy the Church.

This is a key point I would like to see explained from Ben's perspective, and Glenn's perspective and Dan's perspective.

Alright then, here goes. I don't think any of these individuals had read the Book of Mormon. At best, their interactions with the Book of Mormon were from contact with Mormon missionaries, and published accounts about the Book of Mormon. From this perspective, there isn't a need for the Book of Mormon to be about the lost tribes, or this or that other issue - there just needs to be a first published account of such a thing that then gets incorporated into the public perception of the Book of Mormon - and this public perception gets used.

One of the most interesting comments (at least for me) came from the discussion of the straits of Darien. The reason why this is interesting to me is that not long before we see a witness mention this, we have Pratt publicly teaching about the Book of Mormon geography in connection to the straits of Darien (at least by early 1832). So we have the recollection of a decades earlier private conversation with Spalding that matches a very recent public (and published) explanation by Pratt. The only evidence for the private conversation with Spalding is this one recollection. Pratt seems a much more likely source.

Ben McGuire

[_Benjamin McGuire]

Dr. Shades writes:

That's because they were talking about the same book.

But they aren't just talking about the same book, Dr. Shades - that's the problem.

We have two related issues here. The first is that the similarities in phrasing cover the entire set of witnesses statements, not just the portions describing the contents of the book. They are all quite similar in their explanation of their own memories, of the details about Spalding himself, and so on. So, this is not just about the book.

The second issue is the underlying problem that has been present in this and other related threads here on these forums. Dale wants to talk about a personal style of language. This language he will tell us is Spaldingish, that language is Rigdonish, and so on. And here we have very short texts with such startling overlap in language, that it calls into question the ability to identify personal language in such a fashion. If we accept the notion that you can take words and phrases and vocabulary as Dale does, and label it as Spaldingish, then these witnesses accounts represent a single personal style - they are not independently written.

Lots of people can describe a book - they can all talk about similar themes - but to use identical language (language which, I might add, doesn't come from the book itself) creates a series of texts which clearly do not seem to be independently produced.

That is a false notion.

I would be happy to see you actually try to demonstrate this. I am fairly certain that at this very moment, you probably haven't taken the time to actually read the various statements.

Ben McGuire

[_Benjamin McGuire]

Roger writes:

I am even willing to grant that Hurlbut probably did take the statements of John and Martha and then showed them to the others to see if they remembered the same things. I think we all agree that Hurlbut could have handled this better. But Hurlbut's bungling does not mean there never was a Manuscript Found and Hurlbut's bungling does not mean the agreed upon elements as expressed in highly similar vocabularies, proves there was never a Manuscript Found. If Manuscript Found was actually what they were exposed to (like they claim), then we would expect the statements to appear pretty much like what we now have, vocabulary overlap and all, given Hurlbut's method.

It's a nice try by Ben, but it simply doesn't demonstrate what he wants it to.

And here is the apologetic.

What are we left with? We still do not know a single thing that can be attributed to the alleged Manuscript Found. We have no real evidence that a second manuscript existed - we don't have a single quote from it, or a single phrase. The name Manuscript Found fits quite well with the so-called Roman Story. So, I think that my logic works fairly well - what I am doing, is showing that it is quite possible - even probably - that the details in these witnesses accounts are not attributable to access to some mythical text.

Ben McGuire

[_GlennThigpen]

Well if you look at the context of the examples used, they are all cases in which subjects are not likely to be certain of what they saw. That's not to say that some people might have focused in on the particular detail in question but generally they are examples in which the details are relatively small and easily confusable if an alternate detail is suggested. Having listened to some of her youtube talks she discusses this in terms of why some people are more susceptible than others to memory manipulation..such as people who are unsure of their memories tend to be susceptible to memory manipulation.

The examples used were of events of a very recent event. And even with a recent event, false information has been shown to affect memory. The longer ago in time, the more easily that the effects incorrect information can have.

With the case of the Conneaut witnesses, we do not know what Hurlbut asked them. That is the kicker. We do not know if he poisoned the well. We do not know if they were initially clear about what they remembered. We only have the final statements and nothing in between.
We do have statements by other witnesses that did not give those clear details, such as the widow and daughter in their interviews, Josiah Spalding, and the Amity witnesses. Their statements described the Oberlin manuscript much better than that of a possible Book of Mormon precursor and did not contain any of the "by land and sea" phrases or the proper names. One would expect a closer agreement.

Well Glenn the witnesses are more likely to be influenced by the Book of Mormon which they had available to them and had in most cases read or perused it, than they would be manipulated by some 24 year old who was not in any way an authority figure to them and for whom they really offered the minimal amount of cooperation and effort into their statements.

We don't have to get into age and authority figures here. Those are red herrings. The statements of the witnesses belie an eagerness to cooperate. But yes, those witnesses were very likely to have been influenced by the Book of Mormon which had been read much more recently than any contact with Spalding's romance. So when Hurlbut came through and presented his theory to them, they were able to connect those dots so very well and remember "clearly" from twenty years ago. However, people with memory substitution do think they are remembering clearly. They are convinced of it.

And as mentioned previously to you, in the cases with Loftus which you cite, the sorts of things where the memory was manipulated were details easily confusable..such as color of car..red or blue, what sort of sign was on street - stop or yield sign, a building present or not in a scene viewed very briefly. And sure some people may have a clear memory but the study was set up that most people would likely not have a clear memory and hence the study would show under similar circumstances of the study memories of individuals are likely unreliable and more than that under similar circumstances memories are easily manipulated.

The situation with the Conneaut witnesses is not similar to those particular studies.

Names and actual events are easily confused also, especially over a period of time. It happened to me just recently. I remembered a statement by Eliza R. Snow coupled with a mention of the Saints going to the Rocky Mountains by Joseph Smith. I had no doubt in my mind that it was Eliza. But when I looked it up, the statement was from Lucy Walker.

As far as Josiah goes..yes he was likely exposed to MSCC and not MF.

Which is what the other witnesses would have been exposed to if you study the timelines in their statements carefully.

As far as Spalding's wife and daughter's statement's not sharing the same similarities to the 8 Conneaut witness statements ..I do have to review the daughter and wife's. However I think your main point or concern is that this indicated prompting by Hurlbut. I agree there was prompting by Hurlbut. But that is not evidence that the Conneaut witnesses' memories were false or manipulated of what they did state. And they didn't later claim they were pressured in any way or encouraged to lie, nor did they recount their statements, nor did anyone ever state later the Conneaut witnesses were untruthful.

That is the point that I am making. The widow said that she had read some of the Book of Mormon and did not think the name agreed. She, of all of the witnesses, should have been the most intimate with her husband's writings. The daughter had not read the Book of Mormon at the time, so her testimony is not pertinent.
But the point about Hurlbut's prompting is germane. None of the witnesses for which we have no affidavits remeber all of those details so clearly, no names, etc.

Hurlbut interviewd the widow and many other of the neighbors. You said that his success rate was one hundred percent. But it is one hundred percent of of the ones that he reported. What of the many others?

What the similarities in Conneaut witness statements indicate to me is a 24 year old Hurlbut, inexperienced in this sort of thing, doing the best he could with witnesses who weren't going out of their way to help him and who put in minimal effort. There was no benefit to them to give their statements to this unknown individual.

There were many people in the area who did not hold with this new religion and were more than happy to malign it or help to discredit it. Just visit Dale's site and read them. I expect that maybe you have done so already. But just look at what they were willing to do.

Glenn

[_Dan Vogel]

all right then, here goes. I don't think any of these individuals had read the Book of Mormon. At best, their interactions with the Book of Mormon were from contact with Mormon missionaries, and published accounts about the Book of Mormon. From this perspective, there isn't a need for the Book of Mormon to be about the lost tribes, or this or that other issue - there just needs to be a first published account of such a thing that then gets incorporated into the public perception of the Book of Mormon - and this public perception gets used.

One of the most interesting comments (at least for me) came from the discussion of the straits of Darien. The reason why this is interesting to me is that not long before we see a witness mention this, we have Pratt publicly teaching about the Book of Mormon geography in connection to the straits of Darien (at least by early 1832). So we have the recollection of a decades earlier private conversation with Spalding that matches a very recent public (and published) explanation by Pratt. The only evidence for the private conversation with Spalding is this one recollection. Pratt seems a much more likely source.

Dale has suggested that Spalding may have had a MS about the lost tribes that wasn’t the source for the Book of Mormon, but your argument here seems to also have merit.

[_Dan Vogel]

Roger,

Wrong on both counts. Marg is not insisting on a perfect fit. You (as in you, Glenn, Brodie and other S/R critics) are the ones attempting to force Loftus into something that fits the application you want it to. Marg is simply pointing out the fallacy in that by showing the differences.

Brodie suggested Loftus’s false memory theory? Your anecdotal evidence didn’t fit the Conneaut witnesses perfectly either, but that didn’t stop you from apply it to them. The principle is that false memories can be implanted by suggestion.

My personal experience, on the other hand, was not cited as a case study for false memories, but rather anecdotal evidence that an average human being is more than capable of accurately remembering the names of the lead characters from a book he or she was exposed to more than 20 years in the past--and if that person was indeed repeatedly exposed to those names, then he or she is likely to be adamant about those particular memories while at the same time forgetting some of the additional elements to the story--but will likely retain a general outline. It also shows that on the less remembered names (secondary characters), something phonetically similar CAN make a reasonable substitute for the actual name, as in my remembrance of "Brian" in place of the actual "Byron" or "Rhonda" in place of the actual "Rhoda." This harmonizes quite well with the points marg is making from the Loftus study.

Both generally accurate and false memories are possible, but which occurred in this instance? Unfortunately, we can’t test the Conneaut witnesses, and no one in their day bothered to test them. They only said what their heard or read they heard or read before. No one offered information directly from their memories, which could be checked against the Book of Mormon. To me their memories seem too convenient. Aron Wright is certain that Spalding wrote a romance that dealt with the lost tribes leaving Jerusalem, but that is highly suspect. This would place his certainty about the names remembered into question as well.

If Loftus were to test you, she might tell you that your parents used to read a certain book to you when you were a child, and then she would read portions to you and ask if you can remember things about it. Convinced of the authority of her information, you would bend your mind to find memories. You might think some thing sounded vaguely familiar. Six months later, Loftus would interview you again, and she might find that these vague memories are clearer. Six months later, they might have become certain memories. And if she told you that it was a false memory, you might not believe her.

As I have repeatedly stated, the false memory theory is only a way of explaining the Spalding witnesses if the Mormon testimony is deemed true.

But NOT ridiculous suggestions and not with a 100% success ratio and only in cases where the particants were generally not clear to begin with, which does not apply to the assertions about Nephi and Lehi or "and it came to pass."

Actually, Loftus was doing something a lot harder than suggesting the contents of a book once read; she was planting memories of events in a life, such as getting lost in a mall and being afraid or visiting Disneyland and taking pictures with Donald Duck (really a Warner’s Brother’s character). Of course her studies weren’t 100% successful, but neither was Hurlbut’s. Just because someone expresses certainty about their memories doesn’t mean they are accurate. Loftus found that vague memories became certain memories with time and repetition.

Sure, but misapplication doesn't work.

It only works for you, right?

Fear of collusion is most certainly a reason for interviewing witnesses separately.

Intentional collusion might be one of the reasons, but studies have shown that the major reason witnesses shouldn’t discuss their observations with each other is that their memories will probably be tainted by the more certain or authoritarian personality among them. In other words, an unconscious or unintentional collusion will take place.

And these witnesses are no different, nor does their testimony contradict that. They are adamant about what they should remember: the names of the lead characters and repeated exposure to "and it came to pass." These are the things they claim to "well remember." And some of them mentioned interesting elements of the story that stuck out to them, but beyond that, they admit to having fuzzy memories after 20+ years.

It may well be that Spalding used “and it came to pass”, which is Old Testament language, but that doesn’t mean he used it in a MS that became the Book of Mormon.

Reports from eyewitnesses play an important role in the development and propagation of both religious and paranormal beliefs. People are often ready to believe the personal reports of what others say that they have seen and experienced. Thus, it is important to consider just how reliable people’s memory and their testimony can be.
Perhaps the most important thing to note is that, even though there is a popular perception of eyewitness testimony being among the most reliable forms of evidence available, the criminal justice system treats such testimony as being among the most fragile and even unreliable available. Consider the following quote from Levin and Cramer’s Problems and Materials on Trial Advocacy:
“Eyewitness testimony is, at best, evidence of what the witness believes to have occurred. It may or may not tell what actually happened. The familiar problems of perception, of gauging time, speed, height, weight, of accurate identification of persons accused of crime all contribute to making honest testimony something less than completely credible.” (emphasis added)
Prosecutors recognize that eyewitness testimony, even when given in all honesty and sincerity, isn’t necessarily credible. Merely because a person claims to have seen something does not mean that what they remember seeing really happened — one reason why is that not all eyewitnesses are the same. To simply be a competent witness (competent, which is not the same as credible), a person must have adequate powers of perception, must be able to remember and report well, and must be able and willing to tell the truth.
Thus, such testimony can be critiqued on several grounds: having impaired perception, having impaired memory, having inconsistent testimony, having bias or prejudice, and not having a reputation for telling the truth. If any of those characteristics can be demonstrated, then the competency of the witness is questionable. However, even if none of them apply, that does not automatically mean that the testimony is credible. The fact of the matter is, eyewitness testimony from competent and sincere people has put innocent people in jail.
How can eyewitness testimony become inaccurate? Many factors can come into play: age, health, personal bias and expectations, viewing conditions, perception problems, later discussions with other witnesses, stress, etc. Even a poor sense of self can play a role — studies indicate that people with a poor sense of self have greater trouble remembering events in the past.
All of these things can undermine the accuracy of testimony, including that given by expert witnesses who were trying to pay attention and remember what happened. The more common situation is of an average person who wasn’t making any effort to remember important details, and that sort of testimony is even more susceptible to error.
Eyewitness testimony is naturally dependent upon a person’s memory — after all, whatever testimony is being reported is coming from what a person remembers. To evaluate the reliability of memory, it is once again instructive to look to the criminal justice system. Police and prosecutors go to great lengths to keep a person’s testimony “pure” by not allowing it to be tainted by outside information or the reports of others.
If prosecutors don’t make every effort to retain the integrity of such testimony, it will become an easy target for a clever defense attorney. How can the integrity of memory and testimony be undermined? Very easily, in fact — there is a popular perception of memory being something like a tape-recording of events when the truth is anything but. Memory is not so much a static state, but rather an ongoing process — and one which never happens in quite the same way twice.
As Elizabeth Loftus describes in her book Memory: Surprising New Insights into How We Remember and Why We Forget:
“Memory is imperfect. This is because we often do not see things accurately in the first place. But even if we take in a reasonably accurate picture of some experience, it does not necessarily stay perfectly intact in memory. Another force is at work. The memory traces can actually undergo distortion. With the passage of time, with proper motivation, with the introduction of special kinds of interfering facts, the memory traces seem sometimes to change or become transformed. These distortions can be quite frightening, for they can cause us to have memories of things that never happened. Even in the most intelligent among us is memory thus malleable.”
http://atheism.about.com/od/parapsychology/a/eyewitness.htm

[_GlennThigpen]

all right then, here goes. I don't think any of these individuals had read the Book of Mormon. At best, their interactions with the Book of Mormon were from contact with Mormon missionaries, and published accounts about the Book of Mormon. From this perspective, there isn't a need for the Book of Mormon to be about the lost tribes, or this or that other issue - there just needs to be a first published account of such a thing that then gets incorporated into the public perception of the Book of Mormon - and this public perception gets used.

One of the most interesting comments (at least for me) came from the discussion of the straits of Darien. The reason why this is interesting to me is that not long before we see a witness mention this, we have Pratt publicly teaching about the Book of Mormon geography in connection to the straits of Darien (at least by early 1832). So we have the recollection of a decades earlier private conversation with Spalding that matches a very recent public (and published) explanation by Pratt. The only evidence for the private conversation with Spalding is this one recollection. Pratt seems a much more likely source.

Dale has suggested that Spalding may have had a MS about the lost tribes that wasn’t the source for the Book of Mormon, but your argument here seems to also have merit.

There also the additional fact that the theory that the American Indians were descendants of the Ten Lost tribes of Israel had been discussed since the 1600's and had recently been reintroduced and discussed in Ethan Smith's "View of the Hebrews". The presence of the mounds in the area had reinvigorated that discussion locally and those ideas and discussions are a likely source for the "memories" of Spalding writing his romance based upon that idea.

Glenn

[_Uncle Dale]

...Spalding may have had a MS about the lost tribes
...

Such a manuscript was reported in existence in Middleton,
Vermont in the 1870s -- and Ethan Smith's grandson said
that Ethan Smith and Solomon Spalding exchanged some
sort of early communications regarding such a story. It
need not be pointed out that Middleton is within walking
distance of Poultney -- nor that Ethan and Spalding knew
each other from overlapping periods at Dartmouth.

But, suppose that an 1811 letter from Solomon Spalding to
Ethan Smith were uncovered next week in Ethan's preserved
papers -- and that Spalding expressed some interest in the
northern Israelite tribes, the origin of the Indians, etc.

I do not suppose that such a discovery (which I view as plausible)
would cause a Book of Mormon advocate like Glenn to leave the
Church. In fact, that very possibility was discussed, in depth, in
the old Millennial Star, as merely one more reason to reject
any sort of Spalding authorship claims.

As has been pointed out -- the Book of Mormon contains no
narrative of the northern tribes departing as a group from the
Ancient Near East; nor their presumed final destination; nor
their migrating to eastern Siberia; nor St. Thomas traveling to
that same region as a missionary; nor of any of these folks
crossing over the Behring Straits to become American Indians.

If a Spalding manuscript were ever brought forth, about such
a migration under a LEVI who had a son named NEMI, or some
such thing, it might cause a few LDS eyebrows to rise -- but
it certainly would not destroy peoples' faith in Nephites.

I suppose that Spalding proponents must at least hold open the
possibility that the discovery of such a "Came to Pass" story would
not necessarily advance their cause -- and might even harm it.

UD