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

[_Dan Vogel]

Roger,

The data is not mine. I do not have a searchable 1830 Book of Mormon text. Instead of making this an us against them thing, why can't we work together on this? Do you have or have access to a searchable 1830 Book of Mormon text? If so, I'm sure you can find hundreds of patterns, some of which may negate what I see in Dale's chart.

Sorry, but I’m going to make you work. Apparently, all you have is Dale’s chart. You can’t even give examples of the redundant “that”. If you don’t have Signature Book’s CD, which has an 1830 Book of Mormon searchable text that I created myself, try the following (I’m sure there are others):

http://www.2think.org/hundredsheep/bom1830/inep.shtml

I do not know what patterns will emerge at this point, other than the limited information I have seen which includes the data in Dale's chart. So it is entirely possible that you could come up with patterns that are fairly evenly distributed across the entire text.

There is no data in Dale’s chart.

My reason for wanting to focus on error patterns or colloquialisms, is based on the common sense logic that whoever is using a particular error or speech pattern is likely doing so subconsciously and is therefore not likely to vary the usage in so striking a pattern as can clearly be seen in Dale's chart where, under Nephi priority (for Glenn) it appears frequently at the beginning then drops off entirely and then comes back again at the end; or, under Mosiah priority (for the rest of us) it is non-existent and then appears frequently.

I haven’t seen any examples of the redundant “that” in the Book of Mormon. There may be more opportunities for it to appear in rhetorical situations than in historical narrative. I’m not sure until I get a better understanding of what Dale thinks is a redundant “that”.

First, I appreciate that you are at least thinking about it now. I realize that Metcalfe wasn't postulating different authors and that his interpretation of the evidence is an obvious shift in preference by the same author. The reason for the shift in preference, however, is unclear. For some reason, Joseph Smith simply decided to start using wherefore over therefore. I am suggesting that an unintended conclusion of Metcalfe's observation is simply more than one author. In that case, the shift does not represent a consistent change in usage by one author based on a hypothetical change in preference, but rather the work of more than one author.

The reason I think they follow a similar pattern is clear... just look at the chart! The frequency of "wherefore" occurs at high levels at the beginning and end of the text, but not in the middle. Same thing for the redundant that.

My suggestion is that with each new piece of data that is added to the mix and conforms to a similar pattern, the more difficult it is to explain the data as a shift in preference by one author. Your author must shift his preferences for a number of phrases and words (some of which appear to be unconscious errors) at the same general location in the text and he then goes on to consistently follow the new preferences in each instance.

Your assumption might be wrong, especially with someone in their formative years as a writer. Even seasoned writers can change preferences. In fact, it takes effort to stay out of comfortable ruts. You also need to explain why the same shift occurs in Joseph Smith’s revelations.

That's a fair observation and I think I agree with it. That would seem to support the notion that Rigdon and/or Smith/Cowdery was adding much of the religious material while Spalding's ideas (or at least something other than Smith/Cowdery) served as the historical framework--but this would not be very obvious until we come out of the 116 page replacement section since that section was totally re-written. That seems to be what we are seeing in Dale's chart. It is noteworthy that Spalding never uses the phrase "wherefore" and, beginning in the Book of Mormon section coming out of the rewrite--the first section that would represent the fewest redactions between us and Spalding, wherefore drops off and therefore becomes dominant.

Do you have a better explanation?

I’ve only given a preliminary explanation; I can’t go any further until I get more information. Your speculation goes way too far with so little data—data that you apparently don’t understand completely yourself.

If I had a searchable 1830 Book of Mormon text and some time, I could look for the distribution of errors--or patterns of speech--such as the "a going" phrase or the "them for those" substitutions. As it is, I do not.

The one online I gave above has current versification, which is extremely helpful.

[Guest]

marg:

I missed this. What evidence is there that MSCC portions were composed after 1813? You think it's possible MSCC came after MF..why?

There is a letter written on the back of one of the sequentially numbered manuscript pages. The narrative surrounding the letter appears to flow uninterrupted. The letter has an 1813 date which strongly implies that what came afterward was composed after the letter. The only alternative to that is that Spalding skipped the page (left it blank) while he was writing his narrative and then later went back and used the blank page to compose a letter. This does not seem as likely as that he simply composed the letter at the same time he was composing narrative.

It is not safe to draw the conclusion that all of MSCC came after MF, however, evidence seems to indicate that he was working on MF as early as 1809, as supported by some of the witnesses. So he was either working on both MF and MSCC during that time or he possibly began working on MSCC around 1812. Dale knows the dates better than I do, so I am interested on his take on this.

The idea that he began MF after MSCC comes from the notion that he "went back earlier in time" and adopted a scriptural style to make the work appear more ancient. This would seem to imply that MSCC came first since it comes from a post-Christian era. But Wright was responding to the discrepancy of no Nephi and Lehi in MSCC when he was confronted with it. Wright does not concede... oh yeah! by george that is the ms I was referring to. Instead he says in the other one, Spalding went back further in time and adopted a Scriptural style to make the work appear more ancient. I agree that as worded, Wright implies an earlier date for MSCC, but, in the first place I don't think Wright was in a position to know for sure which came first and in the second place he may not have intended the implication his language results in... meaning "he went back in time" may not actually have been intended to imply that MF was a rethinking of an earlier MSCC as opposed to simply distinguishing one from the other. ie: in one ms he has Christian era sailors land in America, as you can clearly see Mr. Hurlbut, but in the other, he went back in time and adopted a scriptural style in an effort to make the work appear more ancient.

So either Spalding had started MSCC earlier and then switched to MF but continued to work on MSCC as late as 1813, or it is incorrect to interpret Wright's implied logic to mean that MF was an attempt to make MSCC appear more ancient. Either explanation works.

The point Glenn wanted to make (I think) of the quagmire story is that if we parallelomaniacs are going to be consistent we are going to have to agree that Spalding used a story in his novel that occurred in 1812 but Glenn is (apparently) under the (mistaken) impression that all of MSCC had to have preceded MF (or was all there ever was) and, if so, then how do we account for the witnesses who claimed to have been familiar with the story well before 1812? At least I think that's where Glenn wants to go with this.

But that does not pose a problem since there is nothing (aside from Wright's implication) that demands MSCC preceded MF and even if it did there is nothing written in stone to say that Spalding could not have worked on both manuscripts at the same time.

For starters, Aaron Wright's statement is the only one that you have that hints at a second manuscript. Wright's "implication" is pretty straightforward. "I recognise them to be the writings hand writing of sd Spalding but not the manuscript I had refferance to in my statement before alluded to as he informed me he wrote in the first place he wrote for his own amusement and then altered his plan and commenced writing a history of the first Settlement of America the particulars you will find in my testimony Dated Sept 1833 August 1833".

That statement is pretty clear that Wright is saying that the manuscript he was viewing had to come first.

The writing for his own amusement comports very well with the statement attributed to Matilda Spalding Davison who said "His sole object in writing this historical romance was to amuse himself and his neighbors. This was about the year 1812. Hull's surrender at Detroit occurred near the same time, and I recollect the date well from that circumstance."

The problem for the S/R theorists is to provide some evidence that Solomon was engaged in writing two stories at the same time and providing some evidence that Josiah Spalding would have been oblivious to that fact as he only reported details from the Oberlin manuscript. Josiah said that "I went to see my brother and staid with him some time. I found him unwell, and somewhat low in spirits. He began to compose his novel." Josiah puts his sojourn with Solomon after the war broke out in June of 1812.

Josiah, the wife Matilda, nor the daughter Matilda report a second manuscript. Matilda Davison's statement was recorded in 1839, after Hurlbut had realized that he did not find what he expected, after Howe's book was published.

S/R theorists have some dazed and confused witnesses, but have no second manuscript.

Since neither one of us are actually scientists we are both going to have to appeal to our respective experts. However, even if I were to accept your argument that Schaalje's work negates Jocker's (which I don't) what would that prove? Would that be enough to render S/R dead? Not at all. S/R stood before Jockers came along. Jocker's data merely supports the S/R thesis, just like the data in Dale's chart supports it. You, however, want to use Schaalje to support the notion that no one in the 19th century contributed content to the Book of Mormon. Using Schaalje to promote that notion is going to run into a lot of resistance, not just from S/R proponents but from people like Dan Vogel and the Tanners, etc. who are all convinced beyond doubt (as am I) that the Book of Mormon was composed in the 19th century and there were never any Nephites.

On this very thread, Ben Maguire has stated that Jocker's method is very reliable when the real author is among the candidate set. Jocker's latest data includes Joseph Smith. There should be no more likely Book of Mormon author to include among potential candidates than Joseph Smith. So if Ben's assessment of Jocker's method being accurate when the real author is among the candidate set is correct, then it doesn't matter much what conclusions Schaalje draws. Dale has already shown that Schaalje was not forthcoming when it came to identifying dots on his chart. When Dale found a way around that, he discovered that the data clusters in ways he had predicted long before computer word studies were possible. Schaalje's own response was that large distance is meaningful while short distance is not. Call me naïve, but that just doesn't add up.

It was also pointed out that the entire basis for Schaalje's conclusions (about the 19th century candidate authors) comes down to PC1. But there is a factor in PC1 that tends to drive the Book of Mormon chapters away from the 19th century candidate authors (although even in PC1 that phenomenon is not 100% potent). What Dale and others have repeatedly pointed out is that the dots move together and intermingle in PC2 and PC3. The factor causing the separation in PC1 is likely King James English--which only makes logical sense, since the candidate samples are not composed in King James English. Eliminating that factor basically takes the steam out of Schaalje's conclusion. Couple that with Ben's assessment, and I don't place much stock in Schaalje's conclusion.

It is apparent that you do not place much stock in Schaalje's conclusion. However, if you read Matt Jocker's post very early in this thread, he says that Bruce has made some very valuable contributions to the original NSC methods. I will quote what he said: "Professor Schaalje's work in trying to deal with the closed vs. open set problem is innovative and will likely inform future work in the field. As a new approach to authorship problems, I think he and his team have likely made a valuable contribution. I do not, however, see Professor Schaalje's paper as a refutation of our work, and perhaps this is because I read the results of our work differently than he does.

The paper we wrote was designed to answer the question of who among the suspect candidates was the most likely. That's it. In my opinion, Professor Schaalje's paper takes aim at a fictionally constructed argument that we did not in fact make: hence my reference to the "straw man," "playing fast and loose with our conclusions," and "slight of hand." I understand that Professor Schaalje and other readers may believe that our paper was about "proving" who wrote (or most likely wrote) the Book of Mormon. That is most certainly not what it was about for me, and this is why I do not believe that Professor Schaalje's paper stands as a rebuttal of our work. Our work was designed to rank a closed set of candidates who had been suggested by other researchers as possible authors. From my point of view our results showed simply that one candidate in the set was more likely than another (for any given chapter)."

Bruce's conclusion about 19th century authors was not drawn from PC1, but from the methods he employed to check for the possibility that none of the authors included in a paticular candidate set were actually the author of a particular manuscript.
According to Matt himself, their NSC methodology did not pick an author, but just selected the most likely candidate in the list. Bruce's work corrected for the possibility that no one on the list was the actual author.

Glenn

[_marg]

DAVID WHITMER (in Fayette, June 1829, 1 Nephi-Words of Mormon)

David Whitmer was excommunicated in Missouri in 1838, along with Harris and Cowdery. He never returned to the church, and resided in Richmond, MO, until his death in 1888. At the insistence of his family, he organized a church in the 1870s named “The Church of Christ,” consisting of a small group of interested worshipers that was short lived.

David Whitmer is known as the most interviewed witness. He said he had free access to the translation process, and left many statements about it. The earliest statement giving a description of Joseph Smith’s method of translation was reported by Eri B. Mullin of the RLDS Church in 1880 of an interview he had with Whitmer in 1874:

... I for my part know he said that Joseph had the instrument Urim and Thummim. I asked him how they looked. He said they looked like spectacles, and he (Joseph) would put them on and look in a hat, or put his face in the hat and read. Says I, “Did he have the plates in there.” “No; the words would appear, and if he failed to spell the word right, it would stay till it was spelled right, then pass away; another come, and so on.” ...

--Eri B. Mullin to Saints’ Herald, 25 January 1880, Saints’ Herald 27 (1 March 1880): 76. (EMD 5:15)

Due to time lapse, some of the details are garbled. Even some members were confused about the spectacles and the stone in hat. This was largely due to the fact that Joseph Smith’s history mentioned only the spectacles and referred to them as “Urim and Thummim”, and some witnesses (and reporters) called the seer stone by the same term. Whitmer frequently corrected reporters.

Dan, seer stones which glow words and special magical spectacles by which one can read words are totally different scenarios.

It appears the problem was that Smith and Cowdery by using the explanation of "spectacles" instead of "seer stone" .. created a bit of a problem for all those who had previously said he stuck in head in a hat and read words off a glowing stone.

They simply are not the same term and explanation. This is an example of ad hoc fallacy. The first explanation is head in a hat + exclude light and read words off a glowing with word stone. Then Cowdery and Smith later say magical spectacles were used. Well spectacles don't glow words Dan and where's that stone when the spectacles are being used. So the ad hoc new explanation that is created to account for the difference in translation process is..."the words spectacle ala Urim & thummin means the same thing as seer stone." Ya right "rolling eyes"

[_marg]

... During all these months David had free access to their room, and was

AN EYE-WITNESS TO THE METHOD OF PROCEDURE.

The plates were not before Joseph while he translated, but seem to have been removed by the custodian angel. The method pursued was commonplace but nevertheless effective. Having placed the Urim and Thummim in his hat, Joseph placed the hat over his face, and with prophetic eyes read the invisible symbols syllable by syllable and word by word, while Cowdery or Harris acted as recorders. “So illiterate was Joseph at that time,” said Mr. Whitmer, “that he didn’t even know that Jerusalem was a walled city, and he was utterly unable to pronounce many of the names which the magic power of the Urim and Thummim revealed, and therefore spelled them out in syllables, and the more erudite scribe put them together. ...”

--“The Golden Tablets on Which Were Inscribed the Records of the Tribe of Nephi. Written in ‘Improved Egyptian’ and Translated by Joseph Smith. How He Came to Find Them and the Mighty Goggles by Which They Were Translated. And How He Was Pitched Down Hill for Daring to Think He had Struck a Bonanza. An Interview with David Whitmer, Who Helped to Make the Translation. And Who Now Holds the Original Manuscripts of the Book of Mormon. ...,” Chicago Times, 7 August 1875, 1. (EMD 5:21) [/quote]

Oi Vey....this is a different explanation than head in hat and reading words off a word glowing stone. Besides the extraordinary claim being made which itself is unbelievable ...D. Whitmer is not even consistent in the process. Now he's talking about spectacle ..instead of a word glowing rock.

Dan as I said before your use of these statements as being good evidence that Smith used a head in the hat and dictated the entire Book of Mormon that way...says more about your poor critical thinking skills than anything else.

[_Roger]

marg:

Roger thanks I remember some of it now. And I believe Glenn posted a copy of the date of the letter written and it looks as if the date was 1812 instead of 1813...so there is some discrepancy unresolved on that.

Yes, I had forgotten about the discrepancy. I think Dale dates the letter to 1813. I think the "2" could be a "3" and it's difficult to tell given the handwriting. But I could be wrong on that.

[_Dan Vogel]

Marg,

Dan it is impossible that Smith would know when Emma was misspelling if he was not looking at what she was writing. So what are the options?

The only thing I can think of is she's lying. She's attempting to make it appear that the stone actually was divinely controlled, that Smith read off of it words but not only that despite Smith not being able to spell himself, he knew without even looking at what she was writing when she was misspelling. And so what in the intended inference one is supposed to draw from her statements....that God was guiding Smith. But what she is claiming is impossible. That is it is impossible for Smith to know when she's is misspelling without looking at what she is writing, but that is her claim.

She's a liar Dan.

That’s the only option?

Remember, you are reading statements given by those whom Joseph Smith had convinced he had supernatural powers to see whatever he wanted in his stone. When I did magic, the one thing I noticed was when one of my friends was telling another friend the trick I had shown them, it was told in such a way as to make it more miraculous than it was. In fact, they way it was described would have been impossible to do. Also, Emma is drawing on memories that are twenty-eight-years-old, and they are being reported by Briggs sixty years after that. Nevertheless, David Whitmer made a similar statement to Eri B. Mullin and James H. Hart. It was Joseph Smith’s job to convince people he was translating by a gift from God—it worked! Most likely the claim is based on a few instances of Joseph Smith’s having the scribe read back and spelling a new name, changing the spelling, and explaining that that was why the sentence didn’t disappear from the stone.

Dan she's actually a very good witness for the S/R position. She establishes herself as a liar by claiming something which could not have happened, and then goes on to describe a process that is not Smith simply dictating but rather reading off of material. When she says he would spell out what he couldn't pronounce does that sound like a person simply dictating without reading off of something? Does anything she describes sound like a person simply dictating as opposed to reading off of prewritten material? No Dan, it does not. But she states this, because it supports what Smith and Co want which is propaganda that not only was he not capable of writing but that he was being guided by a God.

Strange logic! Joseph Smith is pretending to read the translation, so to interpret that pretence as evidence that he was reading something is nutty. She lied about Joseph Smith correcting her spelling, but told the truth about Joseph Smith spelling words out. So, it sounds like you think Emma was a dupe, and that her description of Joseph Smith reading with head in hat is true.

[_Uncle Dale]

marg:

Roger thanks I remember some of it now. And I believe Glenn posted a copy of the date of the letter written and it looks as if the date was 1812 instead of 1813...so there is some discrepancy unresolved on that.

Yes, I had forgotten about the discrepancy. I think Dale dates the letter to 1813. I think the "2" could be a "3" and it's difficult to tell given the handwriting. But I could be wrong on that.

I'd like to see the page photographed in infra red and ultra violet,
which might bring out the detail a bit better. I had an opportunity
to examine the actual document in 1980 -- under a magnifying
glass in strong light -- and I'm fairly certain it was an 1813. Also
I'm fairly certain that the handwriting is not Spalding's. Certainly,
I reject the absurd explanation that he was writing to his parents,
who were deceased by that time.

The most logical explanation I can come up with, is that the page
was NOT blank, when Spalding folded it and included it in a sewn
folio signature, some time before mid-1816. Why he chose to
include such a partly damaged page in his manuscript, I cannot
guess -- but at least he was able to make full use of the other
three pages of the folded sheet.

As to the use of what I call the "redundant that" in the Book of
Mormon: the occurrences do not drop down to zero in the pages
attributed to the "large plates," but the frequency there, prior to
mid-3rdNephi, is relatively low. Its frequency of use in the latter
part of the "large plates," and in the "small plates" is much higher.

It is not a "double that" -- the word is redundant because it is
unnecessary and does not match our use of the word in modern
English. I would not call its use an error -- but it is part of the
faux KJV simulation that intensifies in lockstep with the switch over
to "wherefore."

The wherefore/that occurrence patterns do not supply the sum
total of vocabulary changes found in the text, beginning towards
the end of the "large plates" and continuing/intensifying when we
get to the "small plates."

If your responders cannot recall such patterns, perhaps they
would be well advised to take a short vacation from posting here,
and spend that time re-reading the 1830 Book of Mormon.

UD

[_marg]

I, too, have seen the “manuscripts” and examined them. I, too, have heard Father Whitmer say that he was present many times while Joseph was translating; but I never heard him say that the translation was made by aid of Urim and Thummim; but in every case, and his testimony is always the same, he declared that Joseph first offered prayer, then took a dark colored, opaque stone, called a “seer-stone,” and placed it in the crown of his hat, then put his face into the hat, and read the translation as it appeared before him. This was the daily method of procedure, as I have often heard Father Whitmer declare; and, as it is generally agreed to by parties who know the facts, that a considerable portion of the work of translation was performed in a room of his father’s house, where he then resided, there can be no doubt but what Father David Whitmer is a competent witness of the manner of translating. ...

With the sanction of David Whitmer, and by his authority, I now state that he does not say that Joseph Smith ever translated in his presence by aid of Urim and Thummim; but by means of one dark colored, opaque stone, called a “Seer Stone,” which was placed in the crown of a hat, into which Joseph put his face, so as to exclude the external light. Then, a spiritual light would shine forth, and parchment would appear before Joseph, upon which was a line of characters from the plates, and under it, the translation in English; at least, so Joseph said. ...

--J. L. Traughber to Editor, 13 October 1879, Saints’ Herald 26 (15 November 1879): 341. (EMD 5:59)

Sigh ....okay so now I don't know who J. L. Traughber is but according to them D. Whitmer never said Smith used the spectacles ..he only said Smith used the seer stone.

However this is not consistent with what Oliver the main scribe claimed.

[_Dan Vogel]

Marg,

Oi Vey....this is a different explanation than head in hat and reading words off a word glowing stone. Besides the extraordinary claim being made which itself is unbelievable ...D. Whitmer is not even consistent in the process. Now he's talking about spectacle ..instead of a word glowing rock.

Dan as I said before your use of these statements as being good evidence that Smith used a head in the hat and dictated the entire Book of Mormon that way...says more about your poor critical thinking skills than anything else.

It’s your poor reasoning skills and lack of source-critical training that puts you so easily off track. Didn’t you read the introduction?

Due to time lapse, some of the details are garbled. Even some members were confused about the spectacles and the stone in hat. This was largely due to the fact that Joseph Smith’s history mentioned only the spectacles and referred to them as “Urim and Thummim”, and some witnesses (and reporters) called the seer stone by the same term. Whitmer frequently corrected reporters.

This was an easy mistake for reporters unfamiliar with the nuances of Mormon history to make. This problem is well known and discussed in the essays I mentioned at the beginning of the excerpts I provided. You have to be able to glean the important facts from imperfect sources.

[_marg]

Marg,

Dan it is impossible that Smith would know when Emma was misspelling if he was not looking at what she was writing. So what are the options?

The only thing I can think of is she's lying. She's attempting to make it appear that the stone actually was divinely controlled, that Smith read off of it words but not only that despite Smith not being able to spell himself, he knew without even looking at what she was writing when she was misspelling. And so what in the intended inference one is supposed to draw from her statements....that God was guiding Smith. But what she is claiming is impossible. That is it is impossible for Smith to know when she's is misspelling without looking at what she is writing, but that is her claim.

She's a liar Dan.

That’s the only option?

Remember, you are reading statements given by those whom Joseph Smith had convinced he had supernatural powers to see whatever he wanted in his stone. When I did magic, the one thing I noticed was when one of my friends was telling another friend the trick I had shown them, it was told in such a way as to make it more miraculous than it was. In fact, they way it was described would have been impossible to do. Also, Emma is drawing on memories that are twenty-eight-years-old, and they are being reported by Briggs sixty years after that. Nevertheless, David Whitmer made a similar statement to Eri B. Mullin and James H. Hart. It was Joseph Smith’s job to convince people he was translating by a gift from God—it worked! Most likely the claim is based on a few instances of Joseph Smith’s having the scribe read back and spelling a new name, changing the spelling, and explaining that that was why the sentence didn’t disappear from the stone.

Dan you have no idea that Smith was able to convince Emma of supernatural powers. You should not be making those sorts of assumptions especially being as you are supposed to be an objective historian.

As far as your anecdote it doesn't match the circumstances that occurred with Emma. She was relating her personal experience, not giving second hand information.

Let look at what she said:

if I made any mistake in spelling, he would stop me and correct my spelling, although it was impossible for him to see how I was writing them down at the time.

Why are you arguing with her claim?

But then you write "Nevertheless, David Whitmer made a similar statement to Eri B. Mullin and James H. Hart."

So I guess then she wasn't mistaken huh?

Then you write: " It was Joseph Smith’s job to convince people he was translating by a gift from God—it worked!"

Dan you are side-stepping what the description of her experience suggests. If Smith as she said was not looking at what she was writing, if he had his head in the hat as she claimed was the case...he could not have done what she claimed..unless he was able to defy physical laws and what we know about how the world operates.

Your ad hoc explanation that she believed he had supernatural abilities or she'd forgotten and was claiming things which didn't happened is an example of ad hoc fallacy.

There was no way he was able to do what she claimed irrespective of her belief in God or whether or not smith had supernatural abilities...hence I can think of no other explanation than she simply...was lying. I know that's hard for you to accept Dan. Book of Mormon witnesses just don't lie..huh?

Dan she's actually a very good witness for the S/R position. She establishes herself as a liar by claiming something which could not have happened, and then goes on to describe a process that is not Smith simply dictating but rather reading off of material. When she says he would spell out what he couldn't pronounce does that sound like a person simply dictating without reading off of something? Does anything she describes sound like a person simply dictating as opposed to reading off of prewritten material? No Dan, it does not. But she states this, because it supports what Smith and Co want which is propaganda that not only was he not capable of writing but that he was being guided by a God.

Strange logic! Joseph Smith is pretending to read the translation, so to interpret that pretence as evidence that he was reading something is nutty. She lied about Joseph Smith correcting her spelling, but told the truth about Joseph Smith spelling words out. So, it sounds like you think Emma was a dupe, and that her description of Joseph Smith reading with head in hat is true.

No Dan it's not strange logic. And I don't think Emma was a dupe, anyone who believes Emma is telling the truth is the naïve one. She is trying to present Smith in a particular way. Trying to present him as incapable of spelling, of even reading difficult words, but he's able to spell the words he can't pronounce, he's able to talk about things he knows nothing about ie. Jerusalem having walls so the implication is he's getting some sort of out of body help...but the clincher and her slip up which reveals what's going on is that she claims Smith was able to correct her spelling while looking into the hat and not able to see what she was writing. That Dan is impossible to do. So what is the most likely explanation Dan for all that she claims? What does occam's razor suggest? Yes occam's razor applies in this situation Dan...the simplest explanation to explain all the facts for the phenomenon she describes is that she's lying. She's trying to present a scenario of 2 things..#1...that Smith wasn't capable of writing the Book of Mormon himself, didn't have the knowledge couldn't even pronounce names and words he spelled out..so the ideas and words were coming from someone/something other than Smith's conscious mind, # 2...that Smith has such amazing supernatural like abilities..he could know without looking what she was writing, when she was misspelling and she's have to correct before they could continue on. She wants the listener to assume with that little tid bit of information...that a God MUST have been involved.

She's a liar Dan there is NO better explanation that I can see, and your counter doesn't overturn that reasonable explanation.