If plates then God

[MG 2.0]

Every time you see “MG 2.0 wrote” in a quote box, that’s me.

Regards,
MG

And every time you see my response to your quote box, that’s me. What does that have to do with anything?

I posted a lengthy response to your post, Chap commented that you essentially ignored it, and I agreed. That’s all fine.

Now you want to pretend that you answered. That’s not as fine. The entire post went unanswered. Not that I care, but don't try to gaslight everyone.

OK. Which questions do you think I did not have an answer for?

I answered your bolded question. What did I miss that you think was so important?

Regards,
MG

[Marcus]

Unger's basic position is the bedrock of 15 years of your own apologetics. As a "philosophical skeptic", Unger's basic position is that of apologists like Terryl Givens, who you are enamored with. However, given your latest response, I think my initial assessment of your citation was wrong, and I'm now leaning toward ignorance on your part: Yes, you've read Givens and other postmodern leaning Mormon writers, you embrace wholeheartedly their ideas of skepticism and relativism, but without understanding where these ideas come from. You've never heard the word 'epistemology' before, even though it consumes your posting here and go-to apologists like Givens. And so you quickly looked up the word and tried to pull a fast one on me.

I hereby retract my insult and go with Doc Cam's insult. You're not the Freshman college student getting too carried away with a seductive idea, you're a backwoods yokel with little to no education shooting from the hip and playing games. You're the ultimate low-effort poster.

Epistemology is the study of knowledge. It does not share an identity relationship with radical skepticism. There are plenty of Christian epistemologists who reject skepticism, including the world's first epistemologist, Rene Descartes, who believed in truth and certainty. Radical skepticism may be a less popular idea within atheism and secularism than it is within Christianity, in Today's world.

Epistemology is the study of knowledge like psychology is the study of the mind. Look up "episteme" and "psyche". There are different schools of thought within the study of mind and there are different schools of thought within the study of knowledge.

The real foot-shooting here, MG, is your sudden turn to "the truth" to try and score a cheap point after 15 years of low-effort relativism.

My point was that through the processes of epistemological inquiry God cannot be discovered only through the intellect or rational thought. As I said:

One is always caught between a rock and a hard place and nothing is ever known for a fact one way or the other.

But you’re right, epistemological thought can be used to ‘rationalize’ God.

Nicolas Wolterstorff, a reformed epistemologist, is quoted as saying:

In his paper entitled “Can belief in God be rational?” he considers what obligations rationality places upon us, and in particular whether rationality requires that we only believe in God on the basis of evidence. Wolterstorff argues that:

A person is rationally justified in believing a certain proposition which he does believe unless he has adequate reason to cease from believing it. Our beliefs are rational unless we have reason for refraining; they are not nonrational unless we have reason for believing. They are innocent until proved guilty, not guilty until proved innocent. (Wolterstorff 1983: 163)

He then turns to applying this to belief in God. He observes that people come to believe that God exists in a variety of ways such as from their parents, or in response to an overwhelming sense of guilt, or by finding peace in the midst of suicidal desperation. In many cases, belief in God seems to be immediate (that is, not based upon other beliefs) and so long as the person who forms the belief has no adequate reason to give up their belief then that belief will be rational.

His argument is that by using the tools of epistemology one can rationalize belief in God. But then that view can be held up against the skeptical school of epidemiology and find itself as one of many epidemiologies.

So the outside observer is left somewhat in a quandary…essentially. That is where I would imagine you and a lot of others hang out. Not knowing. Looking at competing arguments and philosophical viewpoints and then going around in circles never coming to a knowledge of the truth (a word that you seem opposed to) as it really is (or at least hoped to be).

Earlier I said:

I think there are ways of knowing…or at least coming closer to whatever truth there might be. Does epistemology allow for that?

Do you allow for that?

I don’t think you answered this question.

A question from a local yokel.

Regards,
MG

I thought about responding to this, but this post stands alone as a monument to how you think. You are so profoundly earnest in your utterly irrational disagreement ---with yourself(!!!) while you simultaneously prove Gadianton's point over and over and over.

Bravo.

But this:

...That is where I would imagine you and a lot of others hang out. Not knowing...

This is brilliant. Such stunningly insupportable bravado requires a level of crazy crazy that only the most foolhardy can engage.

I will leave you to your inanities.

[Morley]

And every time you see my response to your quote box, that’s me. What does that have to do with anything?

I posted a lengthy response to your post, Chap commented that you essentially ignored it, and I agreed. That’s all fine.

Now you want to pretend that you answered. That’s not as fine. The entire post went unanswered. Not that I care, but don't try to gaslight everyone.

OK. Which questions do you think I did not have an answer for?

I answered your bolded question. What did I miss that you think was so important?

Regards,
MG

That wasn’t bolded by me.

Here’s the setup:

MG2.0

Supposedly, a few extended families of bilingual Jews migrated to the Americas in 600 BCE, where they prospered and grew and created an empire that was as successful and sophisticated as any on earth. It would have rivaled contemporary empires in China, India, Persia, and Rome. They built roads and temples, smelted iron and worked steel, they grew vast cities and developed a complicated society. They fought wars that involved millions of people on each side. Even though they were here for 1000 years, they disappeared without a trace. They left no literature, pottery, place names, horse bones, mythology, chariot wheels, rusted swords, theology, or DNA. There is no archeological, scientific, social, literary, artistic, or historical evidence of their existence.

Another group, a few hundred years later, sailed to North America from Norway. They settled on the tip of Newfoundland in a place now known as L'Anse aux Meadows. The settlement there only lasted for a few years. In spite of this, archeologists have found jewelry, needles, lamps, evidence of smelting, textiles, and buildings--all consistent with the Viking culture of the time.

On one hand, we have a vast and wealthy empire, a major civilization that supposedly dominated an entire hemisphere for a thousand years--which leaves no discernible trace. On the other, we have a ragged group of Norsemen who put up a few shacks and occupy a remote outpost for a few years in an inhospitable spot in Newfoundland--and there are artifacts all over the place.

Were you not a Mormon, MG, what conclusions would you draw, my friend?

To which you replied:

I hope that I would want to learn more rather than jumping to a conclusion that could impact my life in such a powerful way. If I was serious about God and learning whether or not He speaks to prophets and if Jesus is the Christ, I would read the Book of Mormon, study it, and ask God if it was true. I might find myself asking some of the questions that have been raised in this very thread having to do with Book of Mormon provenance.

Could Joseph have written this book or is it the work of God?

Of course if I wasn’t serious about gaining further knowledge and/or understanding of God and His ways I might find myself jumping to a more secular/humanistic conclusion.

As many have.

Would you place yourself into that general category? And as a result, what is the state of being in regards to your own faith in a creator God? In Jesus Christ as Son of God? As a nonbeliever in the Book of Mormon’s status as scripture (in its pure sense) are you still able to maintain a belief in God that motivates you to action?

Not to say that many folks do respond to this call to action as believers in Jesus Christ.

Are you one of them? Or has your non belief in the restoration and the Book of Mormon taken/led you away from faith? If so, are you the ‘better man’ for it?

As it is, I think I am. Although it appears that at least one person here would just as well look at believers as being “yokels”.

Regards,
MG

And here was my response to the above--and the post that you ignored--while suggesting you’d answered it.

I hope that I would want to learn more rather than jumping to a conclusion that could impact my life in such a powerful way.

I don’t think you would. You haven’t done that for the Quran or the Bhagavad Gita. Why would you do it for The Book of Mormon?

If I was serious about God and learning whether or not He speaks to prophets and if Jesus is the Christ, I would read the Book of Mormon, study it, and ask God if it was true. I might find myself asking some of the questions that have been raised in this very thread having to do with Book of Mormon provenance.

As did I. As have many, many others. I prayed daily for years for an answer that was different from the one I was getting. I wanted God to tell me the Book of Mormon was genuine. The answer that I got was that it wasn’t. Why do you think you’re the only one to have ever prayed?

Could Joseph have written this book or is it the work of God?

No. And no. Both obviously so.

Of course if I wasn’t serious about gaining further knowledge and/or understanding of God and His ways I might find myself jumping to a more secular/humanistic conclusion.

As many have.

Ha! Because you know all about secular humanism?

Would you place yourself into that general category? And as a result, what is the state of being in regards to your own faith in a creator God? In Jesus Christ as Son of God? As a nonbeliever in the Book of Mormon’s status as scripture (in its pure sense) are you still able to maintain a belief in God that motivates you to action?

Both none of your business and immaterial to the discussion. You’re trying to change the subject.

Not to say that many folks do respond to this call to action as believers in Jesus Christ.

Really? So, the millions of folks the LDS missionaries teach who read and pray and then piously reject Mormonism’s claims don’t count?

Are you one of them? Or has your non belief in the restoration and the Book of Mormon taken/led you away from faith? If so, are you the ‘better man’ for it?

Yes, yes, and yes. I’m Immeasurably better for it. Thank you for asking.

As it is, I think I am. Although it appears that at least one person here would just as well look at believers as being “yokels”.

Not a discussion I’m part of. Take it up with someone else.


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[Nevo]

Make the easiest case—not to prove beyond doubt that Smith couldn't possibly have produced the Book of Mormon himself, but just to show any reason at all why this would have been harder for him than a decent day's work.

Hmm, any reason at all why it would have been "harder for [Smith] than a decent day's work" to dictate in 65 days, in essentially a single draft, "a unified, coherent, history-like narrative of nearly 270,000 words and almost 200 named characters interacting with one another in complicated plot lines," that covers a thousand years of history and includes "a diverse array of genres (history, sermons, prophecy, scriptural exegesis, poetry, allegory, letters, etc.), multiple levels of narration (with later narrators editing and commenting on previous accounts), and literary techniques such as flashbacks, embedded documents, and parallel narratives," while also keeping track of "genealogical relationships, the sources of various plates and records, and successions of rulers," and exhibiting intertextuality and internal allusions and playing with temporality, and addressing not only the question of Indian origins and the state of contemporary Christianity, but also "God's covenants with Israel, the nature of salvation, prophecy, scripture, faith, eschatology, human agency, and divine justice and mercy," while also presenting, in sermons and stories, "a coherent spiritual vision that draws from biblical precedents, resolves ambiguities, and both explains and applies doctrines in ways that were intelligible to nineteenth-century readers," that would also resonate with millions of future readers around the world, and that future historians would hail as "one of the greatest documents in American cultural history" and "among the great achievements of American literature"?

Nothing comes to mind. Sorry.

(Grant Hardy might have some thoughts though. See, e.g., his essays in The Annotated Book of Mormon [Oxford University Press, 2023]. 745–829.)

[drumdude]

"among the great achievements of American literature"

Or “chloroform in print”, depending on your affinity for “it came to pass.”

[Marcus]

Make the easiest case—not to prove beyond doubt that Smith couldn't possibly have produced the Book of Mormon himself, but just to show any reason at all why this would have been harder for him than a decent day's work.

Hmm, any reason at all why it would have been "harder for [Smith] than a decent day's work" to dictate in 65 days, in essentially a single draft, "a unified, coherent, history-like narrative of nearly 270,000 words and almost 200 named characters interacting with one another in complicated plot lines," that covers a thousand years of history and includes "a diverse array of genres (history, sermons, prophecy, scriptural exegesis, poetry, allegory, letters, etc.), multiple levels of narration (with later narrators editing and commenting on previous accounts), and literary techniques such as flashbacks, embedded documents, and parallel narratives," while also keeping track of "genealogical relationships, the sources of various plates and records, and successions of rulers," and exhibiting intertextuality and internal allusions and playing with temporality, and addressing not only the question of Indian origins and the state of contemporary Christianity, but also "God's covenants with Israel, the nature of salvation, prophecy, scripture, faith, eschatology, human agency, and divine justice and mercy," while also presenting, in sermons and stories, "a coherent spiritual vision that draws from biblical precedents, resolves ambiguities, and both explains and applies doctrines in ways that were intelligible to nineteenth-century readers," that would also resonate with millions of future readers around the world, and that future historians would hail as "one of the greatest documents in American cultural history" and "among the great achievements of American literature"?

Nothing comes to mind. Sorry.

(Grant Hardy might have some thoughts though. See, e.g., his essays in The Annotated Book of Mormon [Oxford University Press, 2023]. 745–829.)

Rather than reference a bunch of essays, could you support your comments? Because you've made a lot of controversial assertions that are not uniformly accepted by all, but given no support for them.

To start with, I notice a lot of your post content was phrases in quotes, could you give a link for each one of those quotes, and your reasons to support them?

[Morley]

I could be wrong, but I believe they’re all Grant Hardy.

[Marcus]

I could be wrong, but I believe they’re all Grant Hardy.

A Grant Hardy Gish Gallop. (is Nevo a pen name? I apologize for being out of the loop.)

[Kishkumen]

Hmm, any reason at all why it would have been "harder for [Smith] than a decent day's work" to dictate in 65 days, in essentially a single draft, "a unified, coherent, history-like narrative of nearly 270,000 words and almost 200 named characters interacting with one another in complicated plot lines," that covers a thousand years of history and includes "a diverse array of genres (history, sermons, prophecy, scriptural exegesis, poetry, allegory, letters, etc.), multiple levels of narration (with later narrators editing and commenting on previous accounts), and literary techniques such as flashbacks, embedded documents, and parallel narratives," while also keeping track of "genealogical relationships, the sources of various plates and records, and successions of rulers," and exhibiting intertextuality and internal allusions and playing with temporality, and addressing not only the question of Indian origins and the state of contemporary Christianity, but also "God's covenants with Israel, the nature of salvation, prophecy, scripture, faith, eschatology, human agency, and divine justice and mercy," while also presenting, in sermons and stories, "a coherent spiritual vision that draws from biblical precedents, resolves ambiguities, and both explains and applies doctrines in ways that were intelligible to nineteenth-century readers," that would also resonate with millions of future readers around the world, and that future historians would hail as "one of the greatest documents in American cultural history" and "among the great achievements of American literature"?

Nothing comes to mind. Sorry.

(Grant Hardy might have some thoughts though. See, e.g., his essays in The Annotated Book of Mormon [Oxford University Press, 2023]. 745–829.)

I think it is pretty obvious that he worked on the Book of Mormon long before he dictated it. Not only was there a partial draft that was lost, but he was drafting material and orally presenting it to his family long before the first dictation draft commenced.

[Morley]

Make the easiest case—not to prove beyond doubt that Smith couldn't possibly have produced the Book of Mormon himself, but just to show any reason at all why this would have been harder for him than a decent day's work.

Hmm, any reason at all why it would have been "harder for [Smith] than a decent day's work" to dictate in 65 days, in essentially a single draft, "a unified, coherent, history-like narrative of nearly 270,000 words and almost 200 named characters interacting with one another in complicated plot lines," that covers a thousand years of history and includes "a diverse array of genres (history, sermons, prophecy, scriptural exegesis, poetry, allegory, letters, etc.), multiple levels of narration (with later narrators editing and commenting on previous accounts), and literary techniques such as flashbacks, embedded documents, and parallel narratives," while also keeping track of "genealogical relationships, the sources of various plates and records, and successions of rulers," and exhibiting intertextuality and internal allusions and playing with temporality, and addressing not only the question of Indian origins and the state of contemporary Christianity, but also "God's covenants with Israel, the nature of salvation, prophecy, scripture, faith, eschatology, human agency, and divine justice and mercy," while also presenting, in sermons and stories, "a coherent spiritual vision that draws from biblical precedents, resolves ambiguities, and both explains and applies doctrines in ways that were intelligible to nineteenth-century readers," that would also resonate with millions of future readers around the world, and that future historians would hail as "one of the greatest documents in American cultural history" and "among the great achievements of American literature"?

Nothing comes to mind. Sorry.

(Grant Hardy might have some thoughts though. See, e.g., his essays in The Annotated Book of Mormon [Oxford University Press, 2023]. 745–829.)

There were 270,000 words, with about 40,000 of them coming from the King James Bible--so, about 230,000 words. About 6,000 of those 230,000 were some variation of the phrase, "And it came to pass," so if we subtract those, we're left with 224,000. Joseph had 65 days, but as Kish notes, he'd already rehearsed the script for years with his family and had composed a beginning draft and outline with the lost 116 pages that he'd composed with Martin Harris. He also had the collaboration, during those 65 days, of a relatively educated Oliver Cowdery. Working together, he and Oliver had to churn out about 3500 words a day--which would be a challenge, but by no means impossible.

What do you think, Nevo? Which is more likely, that Smith and Cowdery wrote the book together, or that God made the words appear, one at a time, on a stone in the bottom of a hat?