Glass & Steel in the Book of Mormon, why a problem?

[_SteelHead]

Buffalo beat me to it....

[_moksha]

Time to introduce the possibility that the Angel Moroni dismantled and hid the Nephite Bessemer Convertors in the original Mesoamerican Hill Cumorah.

[_Quasimodo]

Time to introduce the possibility that the Angel Moroni dismantled and hid the Nephite Bessemer Convertors in the original Mesoamerican Hill Cumorah.

Sorry to embarrass you again, moksha. You say more in a paragraph (in this case a sentence) than most do in a page and you also manage to make it very funny.

I hope everyone else appreciates your wit and wisdom.

[_bcspace]

I'm trying to think of a hard metal that would look and feel like steel and be extracted from ore through high-temperature smelting.

How many metals or alloys look like silver (the color of steel)?

[_Runtu]

How many metals or alloys look like silver (the color of steel)?

A much better question would be, How many metals or alloys look like silver but are hard enough to make good weapons and swords?

[_ludwigm]

I am enlightened!!!

Zamak. ZAMAK!!!

The Book of Mormon people used to use Zamak 2, 3, 4, 5 and 7.
Or Mazak, if they speak the reformed egyptian in UK dialect.

by the way to me it was long to enlighten.
That cheap material is spiáter in Hungarian.

[_ludwigm]

How many metals or alloys look like silver but are hard enough to make good weapons ?

Common uses for zamak alloys include:
- Hi-Point Firearms

Hi-Point Firearms, also known as Beemiller (Distributed by MKS Supply), is a firearms manufacturer based in Mansfield, Ohio. However only the CF.380, C9 9 mm, & the carbines are made in Mansfield. They manufacture low-cost pistols and carbines, in the following calibers:
.380 ACP - Model CF-380 and 380COMP
9 mm Luger - C-9 and C-9 COMP pistols,
9mm-Model 995, .40S&W-model 4095, and the .45 ACP-model 4595 carbine
The following are manufactured by Iberia Firearms[1]
.40 S&W - Model 40SW pistol
The following are manufactured by Haskell Manufacturing[1]
.45 ACP - Model 45ACP pistol

[_Drifting]

Okay, as the OP it's only fair that I contribute to the discussion (which has had decent all round contributions, thanks for that).

I think it is generally accepted that a form(s) of 'steel' production has been around for a long time, including the era of the Book of Mormon timeline. See this Wiki entry:

Ancient steel

Steel was known in antiquity, and may have been produced by managing bloomeries, iron-smelting facilities, where the bloom contained carbon.[17]

The earliest known production of steel is a piece of ironware excavated from an archaeological site in Anatolia (Kaman-Kalehoyuk) and is about 4,000 years old. Other ancient steel comes from East Africa, dating back to 1400 BC. In the 4th century BC steel weapons like the Falcata were produced in the Iberian Peninsula, while Noric steel was used by the Roman military.The Chinese of the Warring States (403–221 BC) had quench-hardened steel, while Chinese of the Han Dynasty (202 BC – 220 AD) created steel by melting together wrought iron with cast iron, gaining an ultimate product of a carbon-intermediate steel by the 1st century AD.The Haya people of East Africa invented a type of high-heat blast furnace which allowed them to forge carbon steel at 1,802 °C (3,276 °F) nearly 2,000 years ago.

(There are footnotes and references to these comments - see 'Steel' on Wikipedia)

So, for the sake of moving discussion on a little bit, it is not unreasonable to accept 'steel' (in some form or other) to be around and utilised in Book of Mormon times. We can make this deduction because there are specific evidences that are dateable that have been found around the world.

The problem with 'steel' as I see it (and I think this is Runtu's point) is that yet again, The Book of Mormon setting(s) fails to deliver such evidences that are reasonable to expect to be there.
The rust argument is a nonsense - if we have found evidences of steel and steel production then evidence should and does remain. It is not unreasonable to expect to find such evidences in the American settings for the Book of Mormon. As I understand it, no such evidences have been located.

Once again the room containing Book of Mormon atrifacts resembles the Marie Celeste...

[_Tobin]

The problem with 'steel' as I see it (and I think this is Runtu's point) is that yet again, The Book of Mormon setting(s) fails to deliver such evidences that are reasonable to expect to be there...

And you make the same fatal assumption that Runtu does. That assumption is the following: there was generalized knowledge of steel production throughout Meso-America and so we should lots of examples of the things needed to produce it and applications of the technology in other areas. However, the evidence is there WAS NOT a generalized knowledge of steel production in Meso-America OR - AND THIS IS IMPORTANT - in the world at large till the Iron Age. Applications of technologies involved in the use of steel were generally not broadened into other areas because of this limited specialization of the craft. Supplies of ore in sufficient quantites and other resources needed for large production of steel were not in place and so finding examples (given the thousands of years since its use) would be extremely unlikely.

[_bcspace]

And you make the same fatal assumption that Runtu does. That assumption is the following: there was generalized knowledge of steel production throughout Meso-America and so we should lots of examples of the things needed to produce it and applications of the technology in other areas. However, the evidence is there WAS NOT a generalized knowledge of steel production in Meso-America OR - AND THIS IS IMPORTANT - in the world at large till the Iron Age. Applications of technologies involved in the use of steel were generally not broadened into other areas because of this limited specialization of the craft. Supplies of ore in sufficient quantites and other resources needed for large production of steel were not in place and so finding examples (given the thousands of years since its use) would be extremely unlikely.

The requisites for steel or something like it are present or very close in both time and space in the Mesoamerican LGT context to make it very plausible for the word to legitimately appear as a result of the Book of Mormon translation process.