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The Book of Mormon is a conundrum.


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45 minutes ago, JarMan said:

The third is possible. In fact, the third is repeatable. It's not fanciful or unlikely at all compared to the other two possibilities.

I actually don't think it is very repeatable.

One would have to first find an ingenious way to smuggle the text in. I've heard the mini-scroll theory and that seems like a stretch. It took Joseph nearly 60 days of dictation for hours on end each day to produce the text. He was poor and mostly likely didn't have the time to secretly write out the entire text on a manuscript beforehand without being discovered.

Then there is the translation setting itself, where not just two, but often multiple people beheld the process play out. I expect people were coming in and out enough that any sleight of hand trick would have been discovered fairly quickly. Even with one person, it would be difficult to perpetually keep oneself in a position where one could adjust the text. If the scrolls upon which the prepared text were rolled were too big, they would be easily discovered because they wouldn't fit in the hat or a pants pocket. If they were too small, it would require constant manipulation to scroll through the page, manipulation that others would become suspicious about. Harris, for example, switched out the seer stone to test Joseph. Emma said she sat right next to Joseph and felt he couldn't have hidden anything from her. We have a hostile account that says :

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I went there and saw Jo Smith sit by a table and put a handkerchief to his forehead and peek into his hat and call out a word to Cowdery, who sat at the same table and wrote it down. Several persons sat near the same table and there was no curtain between them." (pg. 184)

https://archive.bookofmormoncentral.org/sites/all/libraries/pdf.js/web/viewer.html?file=https%3A%2F%2Farchive.bookofmormoncentral.org%2Fsites%2Fdefault%2Ffiles%2Farchive-files%2Fpdf%2Fwelch%2F2016-04-11%2Fwelch_the_miraculous_translation_of_the_book_of_mormon_opening_the_heavens.pdf#page=1&zoom=auto,-19,792

Then there is the fact that the deception would have to be carried out day after day, hour after hour, for about 60 working days. Every moment of the translation Joseph would have been only a second or two away from discovery. Anyone who briefly saw him shuffling through a paper, manipulating something in his hat or by his legs while reading, would probably question him about. 

Is such a situation really repeatable. Is a someone really going to try to pull off such a scheme for nearly two months of continuous dictation, and find people to try it out on, under unpredictable circumstances where anyone can walk in at any time? I don't think it is very testable and it seems highly unlikely that someone like Joseph Smith could have pulled it off. Of course, then you have the problem of where the text comes from in the first place and how it gets to Joseph Smith. And then there is the problem with the witnesses to the plates and the angel and the voice from heaven, which would have required an impossibly elaborate smoke and mirrors act. Honestly, it is easier to just believe in mass fraud, which is itself simply untenable and unsupportable by any historical evidence.  

 

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1 hour ago, JarMan said:

I really see only three possibilities. 1) Joseph read words off the seer stone. 2) Joseph recited the words from memory or made them up as he went along. 3) Joseph read from a manuscript that was hidden from observers.

The first requires supernatural abilities. The second is ludicrous. The third is possible. In fact, the third is repeatable. It's not fanciful or unlikely at all compared to the other two possibilities.

I'd say (2) is unlikely although folks like Vogel have argued for it on the basis of Joseph purportedly having a eidetic memory. I find the argument questionable, but there are certainly quite a few people who hold it. So I'm not sure it's fair to say it's ludicrous. I believe the main argument is on the basis of a third hand account in the Chicago Tribune

  • One evening in the early part of 1828 Smith senior visited me. He seemed to be such a solemn looking duck that I didn't court his friendship, but he was so entertaining that after conversing with him until after midnight, I told him to call often. He was a slim man about 5 feet 11, and always appeared to be in a deep study. From the time of his first visit until his religious scheme was sprung I don't believe he missed a night without stopping with me for at least three hours. There wasn't a subject he couldn't discuss intelligently, and my opinion of him was high. His memory was something extraordinary. He could repeat several chapters of a book verbatim after it had been read rapidly.

There are a few other sources appealed to, but that's the one that typically comes up. But that's a lot of weight to put on that account. (I should add that I don't recall if Vogel uses that source in his book - I lost my copy and it's not available in Kindle version. ('ve sworn off printed books since they were taking up so much space.)

40 minutes ago, Exiled said:

The entire thing is EmodE? So, when will an independent of the church linguist verify this?

I don't know. It's fairly easy to verify. Presumably the issue is finding someone who cares to verify it who is experienced in that grammar. Feel free to contact people. However the patterns are all listed in Carmack's papers and you can verify them yourself. If you don't want to consult the corpuses he uses just do searches in Google Books. That's what I initially did. It's easy to verify. About the only place you'd need linguistics is in deciding how "wide" one should make the grammatical structures to test for significance.

2 hours ago, hope_for_things said:

There are even noted differences with the first part of their efforts in Mosiah and the last part of their efforts rounding out the 1Nephi - WoM sections, with respect to style and content.  Which I think is understandable in either a naturalistic view of translation like I have or an inspired view, that Joseph's proficiency would evolve throughout the process.  

I'd expect that. There are conflicting accounts to whether Joseph got the spectacles back when he returned to translation. Some say they were never returned and others argue they were. (From Darkness Unto Light goes through this and we've discussed it here before)  If, as I suspect, he initially used the spectacles on Mosiah and then shifted to the seer stone for convenience (or even popped one of the lenses out of the spectacles) then there may be changes in the grammar, KJV use and so forth. I wish we had the 116 pages to compare with it since they may have had a significant amount of text. (As I recall some suggest it could be anywhere from ⅓ the size of our extant text to as big as the same length) 

2 hours ago, hope_for_things said:

I also don't think that its my job personally to do all the heavy lifting in order to earn the right to be skeptical of his findings.  If one researcher has research they produce that overturns or significantly changes the operating paradigms generally accepted in any field of study, the burden of proof if squarely on the shoulders of those researchers who are offering the new explanations to prove their case.

I don't think he overthrew any paradigms. And I think it perfectly fair for a person unversed in linguistics to remain skeptical until others weigh in. It is interesting that none of the standard critics have attacked his findings despite they're being around for some time now. That in itself is perhaps telling. I'd note that most apologetic arguments - particularly weak ones - get addressed fairly regularly. (Witness Egyptian debates) My guess is it's because the data is solid.

Edited by clarkgoble
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24 minutes ago, Robert F. Smith said:

You keep injecting God or god, but I cannot understand why.

We are on a religious site that claims the book of mormon is inspired by God.  Does that help you?

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The research has already been done and fully published.  I can list it for you if you wish.

Why don't you and let me know of the research and if it was done by an independent of the church linguist or not.  As you know, bias should be accounted and checked ..... the point of peer review.

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4 minutes ago, clarkgoble said:

About the only place you'd need linguistics is in deciding how "wide" one should make the grammatical structures to test for significance.

I think this is why I would want an independent linguist to look at this.  Clouds can be made to look like almost anything when one desires to believe.

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20 minutes ago, Exiled said:

I think this is why I would want an independent linguist to look at this.  Clouds can be made to look like almost anything when one desires to believe.

He gives references so you can see whether other linguists use the same structures. So for instance in "The Case of the {-th} Plural in the Earliest Text" he refers to Roger Lass, “Phonology and Morphology”, The Cambridge History of the English Language: Volume III: 1476–1776. While not quite the same as having a linguistic review it, it does show whether it's accepted in major works. So there is a lot you.can do here to verify things. 

Again though it's worth asking why no linguistic critic has engaged with him. I'd note that other linguistic claims like Brian Stubb's work on Semetic influences on Uto-Aztecan have been engaged with in a critical fashion. Why not Carmack? 

From what I can tell most critics don't take it seriously and just dismiss it out of hand. Certainly it has little bearing on supernatural claims. However I think it an interesting question relative to authorship. It seems to me the main counter-argument relates to early revelations of Joseph Smith - particularly those received through the Urim and Thummim. (See this discussion between Carmack and Gardner last week) 

Edited by clarkgoble
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8 minutes ago, clarkgoble said:

He gives references so you can see whether other linguists use the same structures. So for instance in "The Case of the {-th} Plural in the Earliest Text" he refers to Roger Lass, “Phonology and Morphology”, The Cambridge History of the English Language: Volume III: 1476–1776. While not quite the same as having a linguistic review it, it does show whether it's accepted in major works. So there is a lot you.can do here to verify things. 

Again though it's worth asking why no linguistic critic has engaged with him. I'd note that other linguistic claims like Brian Stubb's work on Semetic influences on Uto-Aztecan have been engaged with in a critical fashion. Why not Carmack? 

Thanks for the information. 

How hard has Mr. Carmack tried to engage with other linguists? Has he submitted papers and been refused by journals?  Last thread about EmodE in which I participated, Physics Guy was asking about journal submissions and I think Mr. Carmack said he hadn't tried.

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44 minutes ago, clarkgoble said:

I'd expect that. There are conflicting accounts to whether Joseph got the spectacles back when he returned to translation. Some say they were never returned and others argue they were. (From Darkness Unto Light goes through this and we've discussed it here before)  If, as I suspect, he initially used the spectacles on Mosiah and then shifted to the seer stone for convenience (or even popped one of the lenses out of the spectacles) then there may be changes in the grammar, KJV use and so forth. I wish we had the 116 pages to compare with it since they may have had a significant amount of text. (As I recall some suggest it could be anywhere from ⅓ the size of our extant text to as big as the same length) 

Wait, are you suggesting that the BoM content may have differed with the different stones Joseph was using?  I don’t think I’ve ever heard that idea before, just want to clarify.  

Also, I don’t think the Nephite specticals ever existed as a tangible object that Joseph used in the translation process.  We have accounts of Martin Harris and Emma talking about his other stones and they were involved in the earlier translation effort in 1828.   I believe the concept of Nephite specticals was possibly influenced by Saunders and that they never actually existed as we don’t have a whole lot of evidence to support them, besides the Lucy Smith account.  

50 minutes ago, clarkgoble said:

I don't think he overthrew any paradigms. And I think it perfectly fair for a person unversed in linguistics to remain skeptical until others weigh in. It is interesting that none of the standard critics have attacked his findings despite they're being around for some time now. That in itself is perhaps telling. I'd note that most apologetic arguments - particularly weak ones - get addressed fairly regularly. (Witness Egyptian debates) My guess is it's because the data is solid.

That is an interesting point that I hadn’t considered, the reasons we haven’t seen a whole lot of discussion around these theories in broader Mormon studies.  I had assumed that it might be because the findings are either not very complete or that critics don’t find the theory persuasive.  I’m going to reconsider though, based on your idea.  I may ask around too, not that I’m tapped into any grape vines or anything, I’m mostly just a quiet observer.  Thanks 

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1 hour ago, clarkgoble said:

One evening in the early part of 1828 Smith senior visited

Why would his father's memory be evidence for Joseph having an eidetic memory?  Is it genetic?

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22 minutes ago, hope_for_things said:

Wait, are you suggesting that the BoM content may have differed with the different stones Joseph was using?  I don’t think I’ve ever heard that idea before, just want to clarify.  

I think it has to be kept in mind as a possibility that the methodology changed over time. I'd imagine that'd have reflections in the text. It'd be nice to have the 116 pages to see if there is any evidence of that phenomena. I'm not saying this did happen, just that it should be acknowledged as a possibility.

24 minutes ago, hope_for_things said:

Also, I don’t think the Nephite specticals ever existed as a tangible object that Joseph used in the translation process.  We have accounts of Martin Harris and Emma talking about his other stones and they were involved in the earlier translation effort in 1828.   I believe the concept of Nephite specticals was possibly influenced by Saunders and that they never actually existed as we don’t have a whole lot of evidence to support them, besides the Lucy Smith account.  

But Martin Harris also discussed the spectacles even describing them. Lucy Smith also handled them while they were wrapped in a handkerchief. David Whitmer also claims to have seen them and described them.

It's also worth noting that there's a reasonable amount of evidence that Joseph never intended to translate the plates and that his main interest was in the spectacles.  (This is the Joseph Knight Sr. account)

36 minutes ago, hope_for_things said:

I had assumed that it might be because the findings are either not very complete or that critics don’t find the theory persuasive.  I’m going to reconsider though, based on your idea.  I may ask around too, not that I’m tapped into any grape vines or anything, I’m mostly just a quiet observer.  Thanks 

As I said, Carmack has done a great job identifying the corpus he used, lists linguists who view the structure as significant, and gives examples. You can easily test them against Google Books as I've said. That's how I went from skeptic to convinced. That's not to say there aren't other issues. The main one being oral transcripts that need consulted. However it's really trivial to test out his claims.

1 hour ago, Exiled said:

How hard has Mr. Carmack tried to engage with other linguists? Has he submitted papers and been refused by journals?  Last thread about EmodE in which I participated, Physics Guy was asking about journal submissions and I think Mr. Carmack said he hadn't tried.

He'd have to answer those points. I assume he's engaged with other linguists at BYU but I don't know about non-Mormon ones. I'll ask a few linguists I know who may or may not be familiar with his claims and let you know.

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2 hours ago, Ryan Dahle said:

s such a situation really repeatable. Is a someone really going to try to pull off such a scheme for nearly two months of continuous dictation, and find people to try it out on, under unpredictable circumstances where anyone can walk in at any time?

The witnesses weren't present at all hours of the day for 60 days. It could very well be that Joseph (and Oliver) had certain section memorized that they repeated when somebody did happen to walk in to observe. The witnesses never confirmed that the dictation they heard was unique or that any of it made its way into the final publication. For all we know the dictation that took place while others were present in the room may have been completely unrelated to the text we now have.

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3 hours ago, Ryan Dahle said:

Of course, then you have the problem of where the text comes from in the first place and how it gets to Joseph Smith. And then there is the problem with the witnesses to the plates and the angel and the voice from heaven, which would have required an impossibly elaborate smoke and mirrors act.

There are texts that were discovered and discussed in the decades leading up to the publication of the Book of Mormon. I've mentioned the Book of Gad the Seer before and find it highly relevant to this discussion. It claims to be a Biblical text that was carried by Jews in the 6th century BC to Cochin India, but written around the same time as the closing chapters of the Book of Mormon and yet translated in the late 18th century. 

Most importantly this text, along with others, was carried to London by Claudius Buchanan who had made the claim that Jews had migrated to India in the 6th century BC via southern Arabia with brass plates. Buchanan's accounts of the rediscovered texts of these white/black Jews were discussed at great length in New England.

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There is a pseudepigraphic book by the same title, extant in the form of a manuscript from the Black Jews of Cochin, India. The manuscript now in the Cambridge Library is a relatively recent (19th century) copy. According to Solomon Schechter, this manuscript is copied from a document purporting to be from Rome, and the late linguistic forms and features of the Hebrew manuscript, as well as its substantial similarity with some medieval Kabbalistic literature and some aspects of Christianity, indicate a relatively late date. He regards it therefore as not dating back to antiquity. However, according to Professor Meir Bar Ilan, although some linguistic aspects of the Hebrew manuscript are of late date, there is evidence that the book originated in approximately the 1st or 2nd century C.E.

 

Edited by Rajah Manchou
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6 hours ago, Exiled said:

Perhaps. I'd like to see a linguist confirm that it is even EmodE that was found when it is admitted that only parts contain EmodE. Why only parts? Clouds? Perhaps it is merely due to chance? Also, if it is EmodE, then what, if anything, is the significance? This is also where cloud shapes may appear to be something they are not.

I was going to respond but I se Robert F. Smith has already done so. It would really be helpful if you would read up on the work that Royal Skousen has done on the Book of Mormon Critical Text project where he has been endeavoring to recover the original text of the Book of Mormon as it was dictated to the different scribes. It was during that recovery process that the systemic EmodE in the Book of Mormon was discovered, the serendipity thing, something that they were not looking for. Skousen (and everyone else) expected that the language would pretty much follow the usage of the King James authorized version of the Bible. Stanford Carmack has done a lot of "heavy lifting" in ferreting out the extent of the EmodE in the Book of Mormon and searching a large corpus of relevant texts to find out when that EmodE was prevalent and when it became pretty much obsolete as well as comparing it with Biblical usage. He has published a lot of it in several venues, some of it on the Interpreter and others on YouTube type presentations, which I do not like because it is so difficult to parse and reparse in order to understand just what the points are. But I think that it is necessary to understand those points in order to make valid critical points in rebuttal. Whether something is EmodE or not can be verified. Stanford uses the Oxford English Dictionary as his reference. You can too. Just take any of his EmodE examples and check them out.

Glenn

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3 hours ago, Exiled said:

We are on a religious site that claims the book of mormon is inspired by God.  Does that help you?

Why don't you and let me know of the research and if it was done by an independent of the church linguist or not.  As you know, bias should be accounted and checked ..... the point of peer review.

The articles were all peer reviewed and are fully documented.  I don't think that prejudice against LDS members is called for -- they are after all experts in their field, and anyone can review their work and find fault (if there is a fault).  The articles are readily available online and are not in any way religious in nature.  As I have said repeatedly, this is a secular research endeavor, even though that seems to make you very unhappy.

Just like the Bible, the BofM is subject to secular academic inquiry at all times and in all ways.  Do you disagree?

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27 minutes ago, Robert F. Smith said:

Just like the Bible, the BofM is subject to secular academic inquiry at all times and in all ways.  Do you disagree?

Of course. Please look at it as though a man wrote it.

As far as being disappointed by what you or your colleagues do, I think you are reaching. I am all for secular review of the book of mormon, d&c, p of gp, and bible, if that is what they are doing. I think it'll show how man-made they are.

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6 hours ago, hope_for_things said:

I would argue that he's not just following the data and the conclusions that he makes from observations of the data aren't always justified.  I also don't think that its my job personally to do all the heavy lifting in order to earn the right to be skeptical of his findings.  If one researcher has research they produce that overturns or significantly changes the operating paradigms generally accepted in any field of study, the burden of proof if squarely on the shoulders of those researchers who are offering the new explanations to prove their case.  Peer review, scholarly critique and time will determine how these new findings are viewed.  I'm somewhat conservative by nature and not one to jump on any new research bandwagons.  I stand by my statement earlier that the conclusions drawn about this research constitute a fringe (fridge :lol: ) theory in Mormon studies today.   

Okay, you may argue that Stanford is not just following the data and that the conclusions the draws from the data are not always justified. That is a statement, and by itself that is not an argument. It is just s statement.

So you say that you should not have to do any heavy lifting in order to be skeptical of his findings. So, how is that different from forming an uninformed opinion?

Stanford has already done a lot of "heavy lifting in his research. He has put his data, research methods, and conclusions out there for rebuttal. He has received feedback from LDS scholars with specific criticisms and/or areas where additional research needs to be done. There is not a blanket acceptance among LDS scholars on the subject and there is a continuing dialog with specific points being discussed and researched. Blanket skepticism is no more scholarly than is blanket acceptance. They are both reactions based upon a priori viewpoints.

To head of a possible objection that the EmodE conversation about the Book of Mormon is based upon an a priori viewpoint I would point out that the discovery of the EmodE was serendipitous, arising out of the work on the book of Mormon critical text project by Royal Skousen ans is something that was not expected.

Now, as to a fringe theory theory, I would say not. There are ongoing studies concerning the Book of Mormon currently, but I do not believe that any of them overshadow the work that has been done by Royal Skousen and Robert F. Smith before him on the original language of the Book of Mormon. Stanford Carmack has been the one mainly pursuing and researching the EmodE discoveries. I think they may be the only linguists that are actually working on that that, but they may have others on their staffs. As I have noted in other posts, other LDS scholars have noted the work and some have come to accept the main conclusions that Stanford has reached, mainly the presence of the archaic/obsolete EmodE in the Book of Mormon makes it very highly unlikely that Joseph Smith is or could be the author of the Book of Mormon. Some LDS scholars have reservations and have voiced specific objections, to which Stanford is responding with further research. And further research may uncover data that is contra or even fatal to Stanford's conclusions. Right now the odds really seem to be against it.

Glenn

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20 minutes ago, Exiled said:

Of course. Please look at it as though a man wrote it.

As far as being disappointed by what you or your colleagues do, I think you are reaching. I am all for secular review of the book of mormon, d&c, p of gp, and bible, if that is what they are doing. I think it'll show how man-made they are.

The difference is that real academic inquiry is always open-ended.  The researcher doesn't know what he will find until the data has been obtained and evaluated.  Otherwise confirmation bias steps in and colors all conclusions.  Scientific inquiry cannot be hampered by bias and prejudice.  That just makes it worthless.  In addition, the experiments must be subject to corroboration by other disinterested researchers. Thus far you have been rejecting those demands.

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4 hours ago, Ryan Dahle said:

I actually don't think it is very repeatable.

One would have to first find an ingenious way to smuggle the text in. I've heard the mini-scroll theory and that seems like a stretch. It took Joseph nearly 60 days of dictation for hours on end each day to produce the text. He was poor and mostly likely didn't have the time to secretly write out the entire text on a manuscript beforehand without being discovered. 

I'm not proposing he secretly wrote it out. Most likely it was an existing text that he simply read from.

4 hours ago, Ryan Dahle said:

Then there is the translation setting itself, where not just two, but often multiple people beheld the process play out. I expect people were coming in and out enough that any sleight of hand trick would have been discovered fairly quickly. Even with one person, it would be difficult to perpetually keep oneself in a position where one could adjust the text. If the scrolls upon which the prepared text were rolled were too big, they would be easily discovered because they wouldn't fit in the hat or a pants pocket. If they were too small, it would require constant manipulation to scroll through the page, manipulation that others would become suspicious about. Harris, for example, switched out the seer stone to test Joseph. Emma said she sat right next to Joseph and felt he couldn't have hidden anything from her. We have a hostile account that says :

It doesn't say the people sat around the table or indicate that they were on the same side of the table as Joseph. Most likely they all sat on the other side of the table. Joseph could have prepared a simple contraption fastened underneath the table that swung out with two thin rods to receive a pair of spools. He would only need one hand to advance the spools line-by-line as he read from the manuscript. This would have taken minute manipulation and would have been much less tiresome then holding the hat. As long as the the table was set up so that nobody could come behind him,  it would have been easy to conceal the manuscript, even from someone entering the room unexpectedly. The story about switching out the stone is amusing, but it seems likely Joseph noticed the stone had been switched and then played as if he couldn't continue translating. After all, couldn't God send him the text on any old stone? As for not being able to hide anything from Emma, what about the plates? Didn't he manage to hide them from her? You would have me believe that Joseph was incapable of keeping the manuscript hidden while simultaneously believing he was able to keep the plates hidden. Perhaps the covered plates were simply the hidden manuscripts kept in a box.

4 hours ago, Ryan Dahle said:

Then there is the fact that the deception would have to be carried out day after day, hour after hour, for about 60 working days. Every moment of the translation Joseph would have been only a second or two away from discovery. Anyone who briefly saw him shuffling through a paper, manipulating something in his hat or by his legs while reading, would probably question him about. 

Is such a situation really repeatable. Is a someone really going to try to pull off such a scheme for nearly two months of continuous dictation, and find people to try it out on, under unpredictable circumstances where anyone can walk in at any time? I don't think it is very testable and it seems highly unlikely that someone like Joseph Smith could have pulled it off.

You act like the translation process occurred in the middle of a county fair on the weekend. I would suppose that 99% of the time it was just Joseph and the scribe in the room. Otherwise they wouldn't have been able to get it done so quickly. On occasion he may have needed to satisfy curiosity-seekers by demonstrating the process, but this would have been rare and would have been easy to control by simply having the room set up so that Joseph was in the corner behind a table and everyone else wasn't. This just isn't hard to do.

Why didn't Joseph ever translate without the hat? Why did he always sit behind a table? Answer: he needed those two things for concealment. 

4 hours ago, Ryan Dahle said:

Of course, then you have the problem of where the text comes from in the first place and how it gets to Joseph Smith. And then there is the problem with the witnesses to the plates and the angel and the voice from heaven, which would have required an impossibly elaborate smoke and mirrors act. Honestly, it is easier to just believe in mass fraud, which is itself simply untenable and unsupportable by any historical evidence.  

Well these are different questions altogether. 

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3 hours ago, clarkgoble said:
4 hours ago, Exiled said:

How hard has Mr. Carmack tried to engage with other linguists? Has he submitted papers and been refused by journals?  Last thread about EmodE in which I participated, Physics Guy was asking about journal submissions and I think Mr. Carmack said he hadn't tried.

He'd have to answer those points. I assume he's engaged with other linguists at BYU but I don't know about non-Mormon ones. I'll ask a few linguists I know who may or may not be familiar with his claims and let you know. 

I remember participating in a discussion with a few people including Stanford some time ago, maybe a couple of years on Jeff Lindsay's Mormanity blog where the subject of peer review came up on the subject of EmodE in the Book of Mormon. I have not been able to find that particular discussion, so this is just hearsay at this point, but I remember Stanford saying that he has attempted to have at least one other non-LDS linguist review his work but the guy would not touch it. Maybe Stanford will drop by and comment on the situation. If he does not, please take my comments with that proverbial grain of salt.

Glenn

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43 minutes ago, JarMan said:
5 hours ago, Ryan Dahle said:

 

You act like the translation process occurred in the middle of a county fair on the weekend. I would suppose that 99% of the time it was just Joseph and the scribe in the room. Otherwise they wouldn't have been able to get it done so quickly. On occasion he may have needed to satisfy curiosity-seekers by demonstrating the process, but this would have been rare and would have been easy to control by simply having the room set up so that Joseph was in the corner behind a table and everyone else wasn't. This just isn't hard to do.

Emma Smith said that she sat by Joseph as he dictated the text to her, that he had no other materials than the stone and the hat and that he could not have concealed any other materials from her.

"I cheerfully certify that I was familiar with the manner of Joseph Smith’s translating the book of Mormon. He translated the most of it at my Father’s house. And I often sat by and saw and heard them translate and write for hours together. Joseph never had a curtain drawn between him and his scribe while he was translating. He would place the director in his hat, and then place his [face in his] hat, so as to exclude the light, and then [read] to his scribe the words as they appeared before him." Elizabeth Whitmer Cowdery

It does seem that there was a curtain drawn between martin Harris and Joseph when Harris was acting as scribe. There is an account where Harris tested Joseph's use of the seer stone by swapping it out with another and Joseph could not see anything.

If there was always a curtain between scribe and Joseph a deception is possible. But if Sarah Whitney's account and that of Emma is accurate, deception would be maybe a bit more difficult. However, it is testable.

Glenn

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30 minutes ago, JarMan said:

I'm not proposing he secretly wrote it out. Most likely it was an existing text that he simply read from.

Well, it wouldn't have been in a form conducive to the magic trick you've proposed, so he would have had to find time to write it out, presumably in secret, at the cost of his time and at the risk of someone discovering his very laborious project. 

32 minutes ago, JarMan said:

It doesn't say the people sat around the table or indicate that they were on the same side of the table as Joseph. Most likely they all sat on the other side of the table. Joseph could have prepared a simple contraption fastened underneath the table that swung out with two thin rods to receive a pair of spools. He would only need one hand to advance the spools line-by-line as he read from the manuscript. This would have taken minute manipulation and would have been much less tiresome then holding the hat. As long as the the table was set up so that nobody could come behind him,  it would have been easy to conceal the manuscript, even from someone entering the room unexpectedly. The story about switching out the stone is amusing, but it seems likely Joseph noticed the stone had been switched and then played as if he couldn't continue translating. After all, couldn't God send him the text on any old stone? As for not being able to hide anything from Emma, what about the plates? Didn't he manage to hide them from her? You would have me believe that Joseph was incapable of keeping the manuscript hidden while simultaneously believing he was able to keep the plates hidden. Perhaps the covered plates were simply the hidden manuscripts kept in a box.

If Joseph stumbled across an ancient text with all the amazing features in the Book of Mormon, if he were able to adapt the text so that it prophesied directly of his life and mission and the three witnesses and of the book's own prominence as a sign of Israel's gathering, if he were able to secretly write out the text before hand, if he were ingenious enough to build such a contraption as you mentioned to aid his deception, if he were able to always place himself in an ideal location while translating, if no one else walked in at just the wrong time, if his constant need to manipulate the said device with one or more hands wasn't detected by Oliver or the other scribes (likely 7 more, I think) who helped out here and there, and if he was able to either deceive or conspire with nearly two dozen people who encountered the plates or other Nephite artifacts, and at least 4 who witnessed the angel Moroni under varying circumstances, and if he and and others were willing to stake their lives and reputations on this deception, and to vigorously reaffirm their testimonies throughout their lives, and risk death, and in Joseph and Hyrum's case ultimately die for their testimonies and seemingly sincere religious convictions, your theory may have a chance of perhaps being within the realm of possible.

I just personally find this multiplication of hypothetical scenarios a lot harder to believe than the standard narrative. 

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1 hour ago, JarMan said:

I'm not proposing he secretly wrote it out. Most likely it was an existing text that he simply read from.

The EModE data seems to suggest that to be the most reasonable approach.  In fact, the seerstone in the hat version would even fit that scenario, provided that stone was a solid state device with an LED screen (which is what most of those who were closest to Joseph in effect claimed).

The biggest mystery is where he got that text.  Who provided it to him?  There had to be a middle man between Joseph and someone back in around 1540.

1 hour ago, JarMan said:

It doesn't say the people sat around the table or indicate that they were on the same side of the table as Joseph. Most likely they all sat on the other side of the table. Joseph could have prepared a simple contraption fastened underneath the table that swung out with two thin rods to receive a pair of spools. He would only need one hand to advance the spools line-by-line as he read from the manuscript. This would have taken minute manipulation and would have been much less tiresome then holding the hat. As long as the the table was set up so that nobody could come behind him,  it would have been easy to conceal the manuscript, even from someone entering the room unexpectedly. The story about switching out the stone is amusing, but it seems likely Joseph noticed the stone had been switched and then played as if he couldn't continue translating. After all, couldn't God send him the text on any old stone? As for not being able to hide anything from Emma, what about the plates? Didn't he manage to hide them from her? You would have me believe that Joseph was incapable of keeping the manuscript hidden while simultaneously believing he was able to keep the plates hidden. Perhaps the covered plates were simply the hidden manuscripts kept in a box.

You act like the translation process occurred in the middle of a county fair on the weekend. I would suppose that 99% of the time it was just Joseph and the scribe in the room. Otherwise they wouldn't have been able to get it done so quickly. On occasion he may have needed to satisfy curiosity-seekers by demonstrating the process, but this would have been rare and would have been easy to control by simply having the room set up so that Joseph was in the corner behind a table and everyone else wasn't. This just isn't hard to do.

Why didn't Joseph ever translate without the hat? Why did he always sit behind a table? Answer: he needed those two things for concealment. .....................

These elaborate ruses don't comport with the actual descriptions given by those present.  It would  be more likely that Joseph himself was fooled into believing that God was the ultimate source, a pretended angel the middle man.  Joseph and Oliver are more likely victims in a very sophisticated flimflam.  Both seem all too sincere and credulous.  Yet, given the need for very advanced digital electronics, it might be much easier to accept another explanation.  Even quantum entanglement would be more believable. Would make a great episode of The Twilight Zone, with someone from the future returning to interfere with mundane events.  But with a view to what end?  Altering history just enough to prevent a problem down the line?  What sort of problem?

Occam's Razor, anyone?

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2 hours ago, JarMan said:

Didn't he manage to hide them from her

She chose not to look at them. She described one time the plates were left on the table covered with a cloth and she picked them up and moved them to a more convenient place. 

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5 hours ago, Robert F. Smith said:

The EModE data seems to suggest that to be the most reasonable approach.  In fact, the seerstone in the hat version would even fit that scenario, provided that stone was a solid state device with an LED screen (which is what most of those who were closest to Joseph in effect claimed).

The biggest mystery is where he got that text.  Who provided it to him?  There had to be a middle man between Joseph and someone back in around 1540.

Robert, why does there have to be a middle man in the picture? With the assumption (which is what I go with) that the Book of Mormon was translated by the gift and power of God as Joseph stated, there is no need for any intermediary. God knows all languages perfectly and is able to translate from any language, dialect, or vernacular into any language, dialect, or vernacular.

Another translator or author is needed only if God, or a divinely appointed angel, was not the translator.

Glenn

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1 hour ago, Glenn101 said:

God knows all languages perfectly and is able to translate from any language, dialect, or vernacular into any language, dialect, or vernacular

So why did he choose a language Joseph was not familiar with?

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48 minutes ago, Calm said:

So why did he choose a language Joseph was not familiar with?

Of course, we don't know.

But it should be clarified that while Joseph most likely couldn't have produced the EModE, he and we can still understand it. Carmack and Skousen have talked about the language being massaged for modern audiences. In other words, it doesn't have the type of EModE lexical items that would be completely incomprehensible to a 19th or even a 21st century audience. Its unusual archaism gives it a distinct feeling of antiquity while still being completely comprehensible to modern audiences.

The other thing that should be remembered is that some of its archaism mimics the KJV in ways that are far better than a sampling of known pseudo-biblical texts. In other words the archaism in the Book of Mormon intersects with and yet isn't wholly dependent upon the Bible. It has a feeling of authentic and independent antiquity to it. 

Edited by Ryan Dahle
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