But you are willing to let humans, writing a book, tell you what they think god said. Why do you trust these humans? Because they told you they were speaking for god? Kind of like how Joseph Smith wrote a book that he said was from god, and in the book he wrote, his name was given as a future prophet. Therefore, Mormons argue god meant Smith to be a prophet.
Brilliant post, Marcus.
I had never considered how Joseph Smith/Mormonism are the same thing as Biblical writers/Christianity.
Given the enormous crushing weight that you just introduced me to, I am struggling to find a path that would allow me to remain a Bible believing Christian. I need to do some serious thinking.
Thanks again for sharing your wisdom with me.
Sad attempt at avoiding a clear point: throughout history certain human beings have written or recited texts which, they assure us, tell us just what their favourite deity wants us to do. Sometimes they claim to have been directly addressed by the said deity in person. They insist that we must believe them, often on pain of lots of unpleasantness in this world and after death. Smith is just one of many examples.
Why on earth should we trust any of those people?
Maksutov:
That's the problem with this supernatural stuff, it doesn't really solve anything. It's a placeholder for ignorance.
Mayan Elephant:
Not only have I denounced the Big Lie, I have denounced the Big lie big lie.
It was recently revealed that Alzheimer’s research scientists were manipulating data for decades, potentially depriving millions of effective lifesaving treatments and wasting millions of dollars on dead ends:
Charles Piller and the team here at Science dropped a big story yesterday morning, and if you haven't read it yet, you should. It's about Eliezer Masliah, who since 2016 has been the head of the Division of Neuroscience in the National Institute on Aging (NIA), and whose scientific publication record over at least the past 25 years shows multiple, widespread, blatant instances of fraud. There it is in about as few words as possible.
As is so often the case, image manipulation is at the heart of the scandal. Readers here will be all too familiar with the techniques of cutting and pasting Western blots in order to make them tell the story the authors want told, and of re-using images and parts of images over and over even when they're supposed to be produced from different experiments at different times. That's what we're seeing here, and a 300-page dossier has been assembled with examples of it. Splicing, cloning, overlaying, copy-and-pasting, duplication of the same image with different captions about different research in different journals: a great deal of effort seems to have gone into carefully doctoring, cleaning, beautifying, and spicing up these papers digitally. After looking over examples, I find the evidence convincing and impossible to explain (at least in my mind) as anything other than sustained, deliberate acts of deception lasting for decades. Hundreds of them. Again and again. The dossier references 132 papers with apparent problems. Unfortunately, these include many highly cited papers on mechanisms of synaptic damage (Masliah specialized in Alzheimer's and Parkinson's mechanisms, particularly around the alpha-synuclein protein).
The article has a range of reactions to this news from co-workers and others in the field. Everyone seems to have been overwhelmed (as I was) by the scope of the manipulations, and there are plenty of angry and incredulous responses to the news.
I’m still going to trust science in general. The existence of examples of fraud in science does not undermine the enterprise of science as a whole. I would imagine this is the same for religious people discovering instances of fraudulent religious hucksters like Joseph Smith.
I’m still going to trust science in general. The existence of examples of fraud in science does not undermine the enterprise of science as a whole. I would imagine this is the same for religious people discovering instances of fraudulent religious hucksters like Joseph Smith.
Your analogy is not a good one. We have plenty of proof that science, honestly done (as it is the vast majority of the time) leads to real insights into nature whose validity is, in part, guaranteed by the new powers it gives us to cure diseases, fly to the moon and get energy from the sun.
Religion? Not so much.
Maksutov:
That's the problem with this supernatural stuff, it doesn't really solve anything. It's a placeholder for ignorance.
Mayan Elephant:
Not only have I denounced the Big Lie, I have denounced the Big lie big lie.
I’m still going to trust science in general. The existence of examples of fraud in science does not undermine the enterprise of science as a whole. I would imagine this is the same for religious people discovering instances of fraudulent religious hucksters like Joseph Smith.
Your analogy is not a good one. We have plenty of proof that science, honestly done (as it is the vast majority of the time) leads to real insights into nature whose validity is, in part, guaranteed by the new powers it gives us to cure diseases, fly to the moon and get energy from the sun.
Religion? Not so much.
I think a lot of religious people would disagree with you that their religious experience is devoid of insights and powers to change their lives for the better. Religion doesn’t need to provide an alternative method for space travel in order to be useful, and even if the afterlife doesn’t exist religion can be a powerful force for good in the world.
Mormonism is a really extreme example of a religious worldview that requires 10 percent tithing, teaches young earth creationism in the temple, was invented by a snake oil salesman, etc. I don’t think it’s fair to throw the entire religious enterprise away by looking at extreme examples.
But you are willing to let humans, writing a book, tell you what they think god said. Why do you trust these humans? Because they told you they were speaking for god? Kind of like how Joseph Smith wrote a book that he said was from god, and in the book he wrote, his name was given as a future prophet. Therefore, Mormons argue god meant Smith to be a prophet.
Brilliant post, Marcus.
I had never considered how Joseph Smith/Mormonism are the same thing as Biblical writers/Christianity.
Given the enormous crushing weight that you just introduced me to, I am struggling to find a path that would allow me to remain a Bible believing Christian. I need to do some serious thinking.
Thanks again for sharing your wisdom with me.
You're welcome! Thank you for taking my question seriously about why you are willing to let humans, who wrote a book, tell you what they think god said. Your response makes it clear that you agree with me that trusting these humans, simply because they told you they were speaking for god, is not a rational position.
I do have a small request. Could you stop calling people morons? We are in a forum that prohibits personal attacks.
On the off chance you weren't totally sincere in agreeing with my point, I will default to agreeing with Chap's response:
Sad attempt at avoiding a clear point: throughout history certain human beings have written or recited texts which, they assure us, tell us just what their favourite deity wants us to do. Sometimes they claim to have been directly addressed by the said deity in person. They insist that we must believe them, often on pain of lots of unpleasantness in this world and after death. Smith is just one of many examples.
I do have a small request. Could you stop calling people morons? We are in a forum that prohibits personal attacks.
You have a problem with me calling a certain board member a moron (a certain board member that happens to be on your ideological team), while suffering from complete and total lockjaw over the hundreds and hundreds of times that other people on this board call other certain people (who happen to not be on your ideological team) morons on a daily basis?
You are not only a high-level hypocrite, You're also a moron.
I do have a small request. Could you stop calling people morons? We are in a forum that prohibits personal attacks.
You have a problem with me calling a certain board member a moron (a certain board member that happens to be on your ideological team), while suffering from complete and total lockjaw over the hundreds and hundreds of times that other people on this board call other certain people (who happen to not be on your ideological team) morons on a daily basis?
Oh no! Every day, people on this board are calling other board members morons??
We need to bring that to a stop. I searched for "moron*", and looked for the board members who are calling other board members a moron in their responses. Shockingly, there were 5 incidents in the past 9 days:
Oh no! Every day, people on this board are calling other board members morons??
We need to bring that to a stop. I searched for "moron*", and looked for the board members who are calling other board members a moron in their responses. Shockingly, there were 5 incidents in the past 9 days:
