LDS II: The Mormons

[skyrider44]

If your beliefs are not superstitions, then there has to be a pre Colombian horse culture and forged steel in the Americas. There are no options for you. Absent the evidence of the two things, why exactly should anyone's mind be open to LDS beliefs?

Once firmly established beliefs about the nature of the universe, for example, have scientists going back to their telescopes. Just one case in point: In March of last year, Europe's Planck spacecraft mapped the oldest light in the universe. What the map found, among other things, was that the universe is 100 million years older than previously thought. (Science at NASA Headline New, "Universe Older Than Previously Thought," 2013)

Your statement suggests that we know all there is to know about ancient horse culture and forged steel in the Americas. That position borders on superstition because it indicates that science is a static discipline.

 

[skyrider44]

Then you consider adopted children and the children of single parents to be victims of child abuse.

You make a conclusion of your own manufacture.

Using your logic, the children of every US Soldier killed in combat are being subjected to child abuse by virtue of being denied the biological parent who died.

Oh, p-l-e-a-s-e.

Assume a child's biological father is dead, and their mother remarries. Is the child abuse sustained by that child better, or worse as a result of the mother remarrying? Your "logic" defines both situations as abusive. which is "worse" by your definition, to have a step-father or no father?

Does such a circumstance come about by legislation or chance?

Since you are following a line of logic that has been abandoned by the LDS, how do you justify holding views so divorced from current LDS thinking?

" . . . a line of logic . . . abandoned by the LDS. . . ." And what would that be?

 

[skyrider44]

"Superstition" and "Mythology" are perfectly reasonable and accurate words for discussing religious beliefs.

Then why are you discussing religious beliefs on this thread?

 

[Giordano]

You make a conclusion of your own manufacture.



Oh, p-l-e-a-s-e.



Does such a circumstance come about by legislation or chance?



" . . . a line of logic . . . abandoned by the LDS. . . ." And what would that be?

Are.you discussing gays having children, again, in this thread? I believe you want the other thread split off expressly for this purpose. You appear to bring this up in one thread until your arguments are shown to be absurd, then you yo-yo to the other thread. Why not just stick to the correct thread from now on?

 

[Giordano]

Then why are you discussing religious beliefs on this thread?

Do you think that agreeing with a religious belief is the only way to discuss it? If so, please discuss Satanism. Thanks.

 

[Slowvehicle]

Once firmly established beliefs about the nature of the universe, for example, have scientists going back to their telescopes. Just one case in point: In March of last year, Europe's Planck spacecraft mapped the oldest light in the universe. What the map found, among other things, was that the universe is 100 million years older than previously thought. (Science at NASA Headline New, "Universe Older Than Previously Thought," 2013)

Your statement suggests that we know all there is to know about ancient horse culture and forged steel in the Americas. That position borders on superstition because it indicates that science is a static discipline.

You continue to tell this lie. Aren't you subject to club rules about lying?

The fact is that there is no reliable evidence, none at all, of any horse culture in the pre-colombian americas. If there were, in fact, evidence, it would have been presented. The same holds for the other BoM anachronisms.

I ask again:

When was it that the exciting events of the BoM (particularly the bits that "took place" in the pre-colombian americas) are to be supposed to have happened?

Where in the pre-colombian americas are the exciting stories to be supposed to have happened?

 

[Slowvehicle]

Then why are you discussing religious beliefs on this thread?

Since this thread exists for the sole purpose of addressing the CJCLDS, discussion of CJCLDS superstitions is, in fact, on topic.

For instance: you have yet to address the "eternal marriage" issue--so different form what Jesus is said to be said to have said.

 

[Olowkow]

Once firmly established beliefs about the nature of the universe, for example, have scientists going back to their telescopes. Just one case in point: In March of last year, Europe's Planck spacecraft mapped the oldest light in the universe. What the map found, among other things, was that the universe is 100 million years older than previously thought. (Science at NASA Headline News, "Universe Older Than Previously Thought," 2013)

Your statement suggests that we know all there is to know about ancient horse culture and forged steel in the Americas. That position borders on superstition because it indicates that science is a static discipline.

And some future cosmologist may claim it is 4.2 million years less than that. That's what scientists do. It's all about precision. But no one is questioning the ballpark figure of 13 billion years.
Science at NASA Headline News links to the article you mentioned.

It's not a very good example of changing "once firmly established beliefs about the nature of the universe." In fact, it is a continuing attempt to increase the accuracy of certain measurements that are widely accepted in the field of astronomy and cosmology.

A better example would be the discovery that our Milky Way galaxy is not the only galaxy in the universe, and Thomas Wright's 18th century discovery which Kant termed Island Universes is continuously enhanced or updated through further research by many astronomers using better and better technology.

The long held belief that there is an absence of evidence for denizens of North America using horses for riding or as beasts of burden before the arrival of Columbus is well established as current state of the art among virtually all experts in archaeology and anthropology. A belief that questions this observable fact by arguing that this is not evidence of absence will require some tangible finding to be considered remotely plausible. Otherwise, it remains just a religious belief or myth rather than a fact.

It is not a question of finding more and more horses to enhance the veracity of the claim, as in better and better accuracy for the age of the universe, or increasing the total number of observable galaxies, but rather a matter of finding one or two horse teeth or bones and harness artifacts associated with a certified dig that exposes human remains and culturally appropriate implements.

The mere questioning of a sectarian claim characterized by a dearth of evidence is by no means an argument that everything is known about the subject of the claim. To argue this is simply fallacious rhetoric. It is not the burden of the party making the request for proof to excavate and rule out every speck of ground to a depth of 1 kilometer in North America before accepting the absence of traces of Equus ferus caballus. It is the responsibility of the claimant to show the horse bones.

If the LDS position is that some day in the future evidence will be found for the anachronisms, then this is just religious doctrine and wishful thinking, not a scientific argument of any probability of the event.

 

[SezMe]

Just one case in point: In March of last year, Europe's Planck spacecraft mapped the oldest light in the universe. What the map found, among other things, was that the universe is 100 million years older than previously thought.

And some future cosmologist may claim it is 4.2 million years less than that. That's what scientists do. It's all about precision. But no one is questioning the ballpark figure of 13 billion years.
Science at NASA Headline News links to the article you mentioned.

Olowkow is indeed correct but let's put some numbers on the table to see just how silly your citation is. The universe is estimated to be about 1.4*10¹⁰ years old. The 100 million years you cited is, in scientific notation 1.0*10⁸. The ratio of these two numbers is 0.007.

Let's be generous and call it .01 or one part in 100. Thus the amazingly huge number you cited is just a tiny correction in current estimates of 1%. Cowabung!

Maybe the LDS and you will be happy with 1% of a horse, do ya think?

 

[Craig4]

Once firmly established beliefs about the nature of the universe, for example, have scientists going back to their telescopes. Just one case in point: In March of last year, Europe's Planck spacecraft mapped the oldest light in the universe. What the map found, among other things, was that the universe is 100 million years older than previously thought. (Science at NASA Headline New, "Universe Older Than Previously Thought," 2013)

Your statement suggests that we know all there is to know about ancient horse culture and forged steel in the Americas. That position borders on superstition because it indicates that science is a static discipline.

There's nothing to know about pre Colombian horse culture. It didn't exist. There are no civilizations that used horses and certainly none that made steel. What you are suggesting would be on par with finding a rail road Imperial Rome. You don't seem to understand the massive impact on the landscape archeology that domesticated horses and wheeled transport would have. It's a bit hard to miss.

 

[halleyscomet]

Then why are you discussing religious beliefs on this thread?

Because it's a thread about a religion.

Duh.

You make a conclusion of your own manufacture.

I am merely taking your logic and applying it to other circumstances. If you reject your "logic" when it is applied to orphans, then why should we accept it when applied to the children of homosexuals?

" . . . a line of logic . . . abandoned by the LDS. . . ." And what would that be?

I am discussing the specific demonizing of homosexuals you engage in. You consider them automatically abusive by the mere act of being parents. This is a concept that the LDS supported when it petitioned heavily to support Prop 8 in California, but has since abandoned, especially as all the "logic" used to demonize gay parents also demonizes single parents.

But this is the wrong thread for this discussion.

Your statement suggests that we know all there is to know about ancient horse culture and forged steel in the Americas.

It does nothing of the kind and you know it.

Mods, is deliberately and obviously lying about what others have said against the TOS in some way?

There's nothing to know about pre Colombian horse culture. It didn't exist. There are no civilizations that used horses and certainly none that made steel. What you are suggesting would be on par with finding a rail road Imperial Rome. You don't seem to understand the massive impact on the landscape archeology that domesticated horses and wheeled transport would have. It's a bit hard to miss.

^ THIS.

 

[skyrider44]

. . . You have yet to provide the least minim of evidence for a culture that "covered the land" for "thousands of years", cultivatng barley and wheat, and kine and swine, and the horse; and making steel.

I'm forced to conclude, then, that you believe everything about the pre-Columbian Americas has been discovered . . . that there is nothing more to be learned about that era. I raised the question before, but it merits repeating: If we already know everything about the PC Americas, why are numerous digs taking place in the relevant countries? Could it be that, contrary to your insistence, we don't know all there is to know about the PC Americas?

Science has been wrong about important issues in the past, and it's likely they are wrong about some important issues even as you read this. Note:

Scientific Facts That Have Changed Since you were in Grade School
elitedaily.com/life/8-surprising-scientific-facts-changed-since-grade-school

7 Historical Facts That Have Changed Over Time
http://www.google.com/?gws_rd=ss1#safe=active&q=scientific+facts+that+have+changed+over+time

Even Theories Change
(Link doesn't work. Enter "Even Theories Change" into your search engine, which will take you to Berkeley's home page. Then enter "Even Theories Change" in the home page search box.)

You fail to provide evidence, you wish me to purchase your invisible pig in a non-existent poke; and when I insist upon evidence you dare call my mind closed?

As the record shows (I could have posted more links), science is fallible, though given sufficient time, it eventually corrects itself. It's obvious that you are unwilling to grant that time; hence, in that context, it's fair to say your mind is closed. It seems to me your position is anti-science. Despite extensive digs throughout the Americas, you insist there is nothing more to learn about the PC Americas. Why are all those archaeologists wasting their time and their sponsors' resources?

 

[RoboTimbo]

I'm forced to conclude, then, that you believe everything about the pre-Columbian Americas has been discovered . . . that there is nothing more to be learned about that era. I raised the question before, but it merits repeating: If we already know everything about the PC Americas, why are numerous digs taking place in the relevant countries? Could it be that, contrary to your insistence, we don't know all there is to know about the PC Americas?

Science has been wrong about important issues in the past, and it's likely they are wrong about some important issues even as you read this. Note:

Scientific Facts That Have Changed Since you were in Grade School
elitedaily.com/life/8-surprising-scientific-facts-changed-since-grade-school

7 Historical Facts That Have Changed Over Time
http://www.google.com/?gws_rd=ss1#safe=active&q=scientific+facts+that+have+changed+over+time

Even Theories Change
(Link doesn't work. Enter "Even Theories Change" into your search engine, which will take you to Berkeley's home page. Then enter "Even Theories Change" in the home page search box.)



As the record shows (I could have posted more links), science is fallible, though given sufficient time, it eventually corrects itself. It's obvious that you are unwilling to grant that time; hence, in that context, it's fair to say your mind is closed. It seems to me your position is anti-science. Despite extensive digs throughout the Americas, you insist there is nothing more to learn about the PC Americas. Why are all those archaeologists wasting their time and their sponsors' resources?

Using the same logic, it is equally likely that Jesus was gay and you just haven't discovered it yet..

 

[Giordano]

I'm forced to conclude, then, that you believe everything about the pre-Columbian Americas has been discovered . . . that there is nothing more to be learned about that era. I raised the question before, but it merits repeating: If we already know everything about the PC Americas, why are numerous digs taking place in the relevant countries? Could it be that, contrary to your insistence, we don't know all there is to know about the PC Americas?

No one is saying that we believe everything about pre-Columbian Americas has been discovered, just that domesticated horses and routine use of iron tools, for example, are so unlikely based on the current facts as to be not worth considering. Finding such things would not simply be adding to what we already know, but would contradict it entirely and would force us to discard much of the evidence we already have. Neither domesticated horses nor iron tools could have existed in the pre-Columbian Americas without leaving their marks in the evidence we do have, and there is absolutely no evidence that either did exist.

We are not discussing something on the order of what colors did the Navaho have available as basket dye: a new color might yet be discovered and that would add to our knowledge, but not contradict it. One might even discover that the North American native Americans had some form of writing; unlikely (as far as I know) and never found, but still not opposite to most of our evidence.

But the claims that you are defending are of the order of claiming the Navaho flew from settlement to settlement in airplanes. The chance of discovering this "fact" is about as likely as discovering the "fact" of the use of domesticated horses in pre-Columbian times: close enough to zero as to be absurd. No airplanes, no terminals, no runways have ever been found, no verbal records, and such a thing would have fundamentally been reflected in many of the things we have already found.

So it's not that we claim that we know everything, just that certain "facts" in the Book of Mormon contradict a lot of things that we do know. Meanwhile you are avoiding the primary responsibility of anyone making a claim: you provide the evidence for it, not that we must somehow provide evidence against it.

 

[Pup]

I'm forced to conclude, then, that you believe everything about the pre-Columbian Americas has been discovered . . . that there is nothing more to be learned about that era. I raised the question before, but it merits repeating: If we already know everything about the PC Americas, why are numerous digs taking place in the relevant countries? Could it be that, contrary to your insistence, we don't know all there is to know about the PC Americas?

The difference is that you have a preconceived idea of what you want discovered, and you're hoping there will be enough of a gap available for it to be discovered and your ideas will be vindicated.

That's not how science work. That's faith, or hope, or the god of the gaps.

How science works is there's a question, and a hypothesis is put forth to suggest an answer, and that hypothesis is tested. Even in anthropology and archaeology, where there can't be experiments like in chemistry, the basic idea holds.

For example, if archaeologists were finding images and remains of saddles and bits, but no horse bones, someone would have to hypothesize why, because that's a puzzle. One might suggest that horses were ritually disposed of so their bones would be found in an odd place. Another might suggest that the saddles and bits were used on some other animal whose bones we were ignoring. Another might suggest they weren't saddles and bits but were actually something else. Each would explore on faith that their hypothesis was right.

But here's the difference. If a particular hypothesis didn't succeed in a reasonable amount of time, a scientist would abandon it. A crackpot would spend the rest of his lifetime looking. Sure, it's subjected, but like porn, people know it when they see it, and there's definitely a line that eventually gets crossed. The crackpot mindset is the mindset people use when they spend a lifetime trying to build perpetual motion machines or free energy machines, rather than accepting the laws of thermodynamics.

The problem is usually shortened to a soundbite: "They all laughed at Christopher Columbus." "Yes, but they all laughed at Bozo the Clown, too." In other words, not every possible hypothesis is right, no matter how hard someone(s) want it to be. The way to get it accepted is to provide evidence that it's right, not demand that others hope for it equally.

 

[Slowvehicle]

I'm forced to conclude, then, that you believe everything about the pre-Columbian Americas has been discovered . . . that there is nothing more to be learned about that era. I raised the question before, but it merits repeating: If we already know everything about the PC Americas, why are numerous digs taking place in the relevant countries? Could it be that, contrary to your insistence, we don't know all there is to know about the PC Americas?

This is remarkably dishonest, even for you. Especially since you have played this card before, even recently,and had the fundamental dishonesty of the gambit pointed out to you.

Do yourself, and the shards of your pretensions to being taken seriously, a favor; read what I have written. Read my actual statements, which I have been making for nearly two years.

I have said:

You have yet to provide the least minim of evidence for a culture that "covered the land" for "thousands of years", cultivatng barley and wheat, and kine and swine, and the horse; and making steel.Without evidence, your exciting stories from the BoM are, in fact, superstitions, and your devotion to them is, in fact, uncritical.

As with the BoA, etc.

You fail to provide evidence, you wish me to purchase your invisible pig in a non-existent poke; and when I insist upon evidence you dare call my mind closed?

Consider Russell; consider Bacon; consider the first steps of reason.

and,

You continue to tell this lie. Aren't you subject to club rules about lying?

The fact is that there is no reliable evidence, none at all, of any horse culture in the pre-colombian americas. If there were, in fact, evidence, it would have been presented. The same holds for the other BoM anachronisms.

I ask again:

When was it that the exciting events of the BoM (particularly the bits that "took place" in the pre-colombian americas) are to be supposed to have happened?

Where in the pre-colombian americas are the exciting stories to be supposed to have happened?

and, to go back a bit:

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=8911571#post8911571

For the record, notice that I have asked you for evidence of the fabulous civilizations described in the exciting stories that are to be supposed to have taken place as described in the BoM. At no point have I claimed to know "everything there is to know" about the pre-colombian americas. I have said, and continue to say, that no evidence for the existence of a culture "covering the land" for "thousands of years", and incorporating the wheel and the horse to the point of using them in battle, and cultivating Hordeum sativa to the point that the value of a barleycorn could be reasonably taken to have been used as the basis of minted currency, and possessing an autochtonous steelmaking industry, in the pre-colombian americas, has been presented for scrutiny and review.

I have invited you to make me aware of such evidence, and you have offered up (for instance) the Spencer Lake Horse Hoax, the gleaning of H. pusillum at one Hohokam site, and the evidence that some NA plains tribes had adopted the horse by the "amazingly early" date of 1600 or so. That, and the alternative suggestion that your 'god' cannot tell a horse form a tapir, etc.

What you have not offered is a single skerrick of actual, practical, empirical, testable, objective, pragmatic evidence of the suite of things claimed for the fabulous civilizations to be supposed to have existed "for thousands of years".

You have obviously completely gone up on my childhood reasons to be fascinated with the subject, and the reasons I would be delighted to have evidence that horse culture pre-dated the Colombian Exchange. I will not,however, settle for the pie-in-the-sky hope that such evidence has just been "overlooked", or "may yet be found". As things stand, there simply is no evidence--and, if we can, for instance, produce and examine evidence of a settlement of 10 families living in an isolated cañon for a few hundred years, one wonders why no evidence has been found of a civilization that "covered the land" for "thousands of years" has yet to be found.

I, for one, would appreciate it if you would not repeat the lie that I claim to know "everything there is to know" about the pre-colombian americas. Why not spend that energy marshaling, and presenting, evidence?

You could start with simply answering a question I have patiently repeated:

Where in the pre-colombian americas are the exciting stories in the BoM to be supposed to have taken place?

When are the exciting stories in the BoM (particularly the american chapters) to be supposed to have taken place?

Science has been wrong about important issues in the past, and it's likely they are wrong about some important issues even as you read this. Note:

Scientific Facts That Have Changed Since you were in Grade School
elitedaily.com/life/8-surprising-scientific-facts-changed-since-grade-school

Let's see:

How does the fact that the definition of the term, "planet" has been modified to reflect the fact that Pluto is no longer considered a "planet" indicate that evidence of autochnotnous steelmaking in the pre-colombian americas will, someday, be found?

How does a quibble about naming the "oceans" (when, in fact, the planet actually has only one ocean, divided into geoploitical areas for convenience), indicate that we have simply overlooked evidence of the domestication of bovine kine throughout the pre-colombian americas?

What makes you think that the shape of maps has "changed", or that orthographic conventions alter reality? How did the invention of the Dymaxion Map (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dymaxion_map) in 1943, or "Cahill's Butterfly" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bernard_J._S._Cahill) in 1909, change the fact that, apparently, either 'god', Moroni, or JS did not know north from east?

...I could go on, but I find it unlikely you will read even this far. Another time, perhaps.

7 Historical Facts That Have Changed Over Time
http://www.google.com/?gws_rd=ss1#safe=active&q=scientific+facts+that+have+changed+over+time

An exercise for the student (or for you, if you want to play):
What caused each of the "Scientific Facts" listed to be "changed"?

Express your answer in a complete sentence...

Even Theories Change
(Link doesn't work. Enter "Even Theories Change" into your search engine, which will take you to Berkeley's home page. Then enter "Even Theories Change" in the home page search box.)

I think I have done enough of your homework for one night.

I encourage you, however, to consider how even a theory gets "changed".

My father, a chemical engineer before he answered a call to the ministry, flew Martin PBMs for the USN in WWII. At the end of the war, he went back to school to finish his degree. In the same room in which he had taken Physical Chemistry before the War, the same professor he had had started his first post-war lecture with, "Gentlemen, tear up your notes--we were wrong." Do you suppose the professor (Dr. Gruene, if I recall) changed his mind at the prompting of superstition, or was something else involved? (HINT: see the answer to the exercise above.)

As the record shows (I could have posted more links), science is fallible, though given sufficient time, it eventually corrects itself. It's obvious that you are unwilling to grant that time; hence, in that context, it's fair to say your mind is closed. It seems to me your position is anti-science. Despite extensive digs throughout the Americas, you insist there is nothing more to learn about the PC Americas. Why are all those archaeologists wasting their time and their sponsors' resources?

I say again, this is a remarkably dishonest pretense at characterizing my position. I ask again: what is always instrumental in properly changing a theory; in altering or amending our understanding?

That is why there are digs in the americas, and in the "holy land", why Antarctica is being explored; and why the human/neanderthal/denisovian genome continues to be investigated. That is, in fact, why I teach high school science. There is an ever-expanding sphere of things to be learned, investigated, and understood--but to say that it is improper to assert that (for instance) an overunity drive cannot be built because one might be developed in the future is to abandon the Baconian Project and embrace superstition.

I, for one, would appreciate it if you would not continue to employ this falsehood.

Perhaps you might answer the questions put to you, instead?

 

[tsig]

I'm forced to conclude, then, that you believe everything about the pre-Columbian Americas has been discovered . . . that there is nothing more to be learned about that era. I raised the question before, but it merits repeating: If we already know everything about the PC Americas, why are numerous digs taking place in the relevant countries? Could it be that, contrary to your insistence, we don't know all there is to know about the PC Americas?

Science has been wrong about important issues in the past, and it's likely they are wrong about some important issues even as you read this. Note:

Scientific Facts That Have Changed Since you were in Grade School
elitedaily.com/life/8-surprising-scientific-facts-changed-since-grade-school

7 Historical Facts That Have Changed Over Time
http://www.google.com/?gws_rd=ss1#safe=active&q=scientific+facts+that+have+changed+over+time

Even Theories Change
(Link doesn't work. Enter "Even Theories Change" into your search engine, which will take you to Berkeley's home page. Then enter "Even Theories Change" in the home page search box.)



As the record shows (I could have posted more links), science is fallible, though given sufficient time, it eventually corrects itself. It's obvious that you are unwilling to grant that time; hence, in that context, it's fair to say your mind is closed. It seems to me your position is anti-science. Despite extensive digs throughout the Americas, you insist there is nothing more to learn about the PC Americas. Why are all those archaeologists wasting their time and their sponsors' resources?

We do know there is no horse shaped hole in our history.

Your claim that we have to know everything in order to know anything is a gigantic straw man riding a straw horse.

 

[Craig4]

I'm forced to conclude, then, that you believe everything about the pre-Columbian Americas has been discovered . . . that there is nothing more to be learned about that era. I raised the question before, but it merits repeating: If we already know everything about the PC Americas, why are numerous digs taking place in the relevant countries? Could it be that, contrary to your insistence, we don't know all there is to know about the PC Americas?

Science has been wrong about important issues in the past, and it's likely they are wrong about some important issues even as you read this. Note:

Scientific Facts That Have Changed Since you were in Grade School
elitedaily.com/life/8-surprising-scientific-facts-changed-since-grade-school

7 Historical Facts That Have Changed Over Time
http://www.google.com/?gws_rd=ss1#safe=active&q=scientific+facts+that+have+changed+over+time

Even Theories Change
(Link doesn't work. Enter "Even Theories Change" into your search engine, which will take you to Berkeley's home page. Then enter "Even Theories Change" in the home page search box.)



As the record shows (I could have posted more links), science is fallible, though given sufficient time, it eventually corrects itself. It's obvious that you are unwilling to grant that time; hence, in that context, it's fair to say your mind is closed. It seems to me your position is anti-science. Despite extensive digs throughout the Americas, you insist there is nothing more to learn about the PC Americas. Why are all those archaeologists wasting their time and their sponsors' resources?

Who has said there is nothing else to learn about pre contact cultures in the Americas? I've said several times the exact opposite. The fact that we have a lot to learn yet does not mean we don't know anything. We still do digs on Roman sites. That's doesn't mean we think that we are likely to find Nero's railroad.

 

[Minoosh]

I got sucked in by the pre-Columbian BYU-ish documentary and was struck by how earnest everyone was - now I've watched some "I was a Mormon" videos and am struck by how earnest everyone is.

Having now spent a couple of hours on YouTube, and having not read the thread:

Both the Mormons at BYU and the testimony of ex-Mormons on YouTube strike me as kind of strange - so nice - and as one female ex-communicant said, the niceness conceals something much darker.

It's all strange to me, I guess because I would have been questioning (was questioning) religion at about age 7 - yet I see a man long past retirement age troubled because his 1830s Book of Mormon contradicts modern versions.

Some version of Christianity - a very metaphorical, non-dogmatic version - might fit my own current beliefs; I might decide to "follow Christ" as a role model, or to fashion a belief system around the concept of redemption. But as far as literal belief, that became impossible for me early in childhood.

I guess Mormonism is nice and cozy and maybe I underestimate the power of niceness and coziness. The church I was sort-of-raised-in was not nice and cozy. To its credit, it did not baptize infants. By the age of consent - 12 or 13 - I knew I could not honestly buy into its beliefs. Yet, I have never fully embraced atheism, either.

 

[skyrider44]

Do you think that agreeing with a religious belief is the only way to discuss it? If so, please discuss Satanism. Thanks.

My point was that if the LDS Church can be characterized as engaging in superstition, why are the Church and its doctrine worthy of discussion? Why spend time on it? Do you spend time discussing Satanism?