New Science Impacts Book of Mormon DNA Studies - Southerton is at it again!

[Ariarates]

You are essentially asserting that one should first leap into the unknown (toss a dart on the map and have that be your starting place/time in ancient American history), and work forward from that guess into the known. That's upside down.

In any exploration of someone's ancestry, the common rule is that you start instead from the known, from established fact, and push outward, one careful step at a time, into the unknown, thereby expanding the known - and carefully documenting your trail for others to follow and weigh your line of research - should they so wish.

Make sense?

Yes, you make perfect sense, I fully agree with the gist of what you're saying - if by starting "from the known, from established fact" you mean the current state of scientific knowledge about the history of the Americas. I'm not sure we are on the same page there.

[charity]

What you are saying is half of the story. It is the half that means you could never prove a candidate was positively Lehi's lineage.

The other half of the story is finding those anomalous candidates in the first place. The new SNP technology offers the opportunity to do that using autosomal DNA. Now, what would you conclude if there aren't even any candidates? In that case, Lehi would have no chance of having living descendants among the Native Americans. Do you agree?

(Then you are left with mfbukowski's argument that the BoM says Laman should have no living descendants. Do you agree with his assessment?)

So I'm saying the issue isn't a non-starter, but rather a non-finisher.

I am saying that when you are comparing two of anything to see if they are alike, you have to have both, not just one. I think you are correct that you can never prove with DNA or SNP that someone was positively a descendant of Lehi.

And to your second point, I know the realities of samplling error. You can never say anything to 100% certainty. Look at the stats. The probability of .99 < or > .01 is in any study a rare confidence number. And most don't get anywhere near that And it just takes one. But even serious scientists have to wink at sampling error because they could never say anything if they didn't.

3rd issue. I think the Book of Mormon authors made statements to the best of their knowledge. I don't think all the Nephites were killed at the final ending battle. I think there were probably quite a few who deserted their combantant brethren and went off to live happily ever after. I don't know about Laman and living descendants. Why not?

[Ariarates]

Here

[hagoth7]

@hagoth 7: you are right, the exclusion of faith is not, in itself, the most objective approach to the BoM.

My respect for your integrity just went up several notches.

(That's not meant as a veiled slight by any means - it simply means I'm starting to understand where you're coming from.)

What I meant to say was that you can take the literal historicity of the BoM as your starting point and interpret evidence according...

OK

...or you can look at what is generally known about New World history (and archeology, biology, etc.) and see if this fits the claim of BoM historicity.

I don't recommend such an approach.

Try tracing the Gepids in European archaeology, biology, etc. - and I would be surprised if you have any success in such an endeavor - even though some of the histories trace them to known locations (something which we don't have w/Nephites in America).

My impression is that, if you follow the latter approach, you will not come to the conclusion that the BoM is historical.

I would agree that such an approach would leave one with more questions than answers. If that's what you mean?

But I believe such would be a flawed approach anyway - as I've suggested in my previous post.

By

[hagoth7]

Yes, you make perfect sense, I fully agree with the gist of what you're saying - if by starting "from the known, from established fact" you mean the current state of scientific knowledge about the history of the Americas.

No actually. That's not what I meant.

The history of the Americas is too far back in the past to be of help this early in the game.

I'm not sure we are on the same page there.

Not yet. But I believe we're starting to understand one another better - which is a good starting point.

[USU78]

Here

[hagoth7]

...we could apply hagoth7

[Bunk]

I am saying that when you are comparing two of anything to see if they are alike, you have to have both, not just one. I think you are correct that you can never prove with DNA or SNP that someone was positively a descendant of Lehi.

I am saying if you've never seen a tropical fruit, and couldn't possibly identify a banana on sight, you could be sure that your barrel didn't have any bananas if you could identify all its contents as apples. So you don't have to know what Lehi's DNA looked like if all our samples are something else.

And to your second point, I know the realities of samplling error. You can never say anything to 100% certainty. Look at the stats. The probability of .99 < or > .01 is in any study a rare confidence number. And most don't get anywhere near that And it just takes one. But even serious scientists have to wink at sampling error because they could never say anything if they didn't.

Here is where I'm not sure about Simon's argument. I think he's over-extending the samples we do have and predicting that all the rest of the samples will look the same for the next twenty years. As I have said a couple of times in this thread, I predict there will eventually be SNP ambiguities that apologists will try to call "Lehi candidates".

3rd issue. I think the Book of Mormon authors made statements to the best of their knowledge. I don't think all the Nephites were killed at the final ending battle. I think there were probably quite a few who deserted their combantant brethren and went off to live happily ever after. I don't know about Laman and living descendants. Why not?

Do you mean you don't see how mfbukowski can say this because Lamanites sure survived and if they had even a drop of Laman's blood then it's just as good as Lehi's blood, so there ought to be candidates (according to the BoM)? Yeah, I don't agree with him either. To me, if you're going to say "seed" is just a spiritual metaphor and not really about lineage, then why not say Lehi is a spiritual metaphor and not really a person, or say the whole Book of Mormon is a metaphor and not really a history? It feels like that's where this is going. (Note to mfbukowski -- you can steal this rhetorical question and make it part of your forward-thinking apologetic if you like.)

[hagoth7]

I am saying if you've never seen a tropical fruit, and couldn't possibly identify a banana on sight, you could be sure that your barrel didn't have any bananas if you could identify all its contents as apples. So you don't have to know what Lehi's DNA looked like if all our samples are something else.

No. You couldn't.

To illustrate, let's use the term curelom - and pretend, just for fun, that it was something edible. And let's try your chorus again:

"I am saying if you've never seen a tropical fruit, and couldn't possibly identify a curelom on sight, you could be sure that your barrel didn't have any curelom, if you could identify all its contents as apples."

How would you know a certain apple type wasn't also a Curelom...if you didn't know what a Curelom did (or didn't) look like, what it was, or what it wasn't? Without a definition of its boundaries, how would you even know whether Curelom encompassed ALL apple types or not?

Or all fruit? Or all produce? Or anything edible?

Without first defining the boundaries of Curelom, it would be the height of audacity to assert that your barrel of apples contains **ZERO** Curelom.

Here is where I'm not sure about Simon's argument. I think he's over-extending the samples we do have and predicting that all the rest of the samples will look the same for the next twenty years.

I agree heartily. That's pretty bad science, with a sampling of only a few hundred people - out of millions.

As I have said a couple of times in this thread, I predict there will eventually be SNP ambiguities that apologists will try to call "Lehi candidates".

I x'd out two words.

I now agree with your prediction.

Do you mean you don't see how mfbukowski can say this...is just a spiritual metaphor and not really about lineage...

Oh, I understand his point. I simply disagree with his assertion that Nephites no longer walk the earth.

So while I understand your frustration - I don't agree with the premise you're objecting to in the first place.

[Bunk]

Hagoth, your analogy pretends we have no idea what a curelom is, and it could even be a type of fruit masquerading as an apple. That's pretty absurd, since we have reason to believe a curelom, if it's a real thing at all, is kind of animal.

Similarly, it is absurd to suggest that Lehi's SNPs are masquerading as an Asian cluster with deep history in the Americas. It sounds like you aren't very familiar with the science or the apologetic responses.

[hagoth7]

So why is it not a plausible idea that Lehi has no living descendants today?

(Excuse me for needing to nix the double negative. I didn't want to pull a brain muscle - my poor little chipmunk on his treadmill up there is running as fast as he can.)

Lehi made very specific promises to his sons - about their seed.

I believe those promises - as concretely as I believe the Book of Mormon to be precisely what it asserts to be.

And those specific promises run counter to your assertion.

It is possible for Lehi's promises to hold true - and for later Nephite assurances of devastation to also be true.

It's actually not an either/or conundrum.

Just as it was possible for Lehi to foretell the destruction of Jerusalem - but was also possible for many of those he loved to be spared from such promised destruction.

[hagoth7]

Hagoth, your analogy pretends we have no idea what a curelom is, and it could even be a type of fruit masquerading as an apple. That's pretty absurd, since we have reason to believe a curelom...

I'm familiar with what a curelom is assumed to be.

I just grabbed a fun word. So if curelom is a stumbling block for you, toss it aside.

If you prefer, plug in "sniggerydoo" instead. Or "merglefitch".

Either would suffice to illustrate the intended point.

[Bunk]

I'm familiar with what a curelom is assumed to be.

I just grabbed a fun word. So if curelom is a stumbling block for you, toss it aside.

If you prefer, plug in "sniggerydoo" instead. Or "merglefitch".

Either would suffice to illustrate the intended point.

By changing the words you are missing my intended point.

You know a banana can't be mistaken for an apple - it should be different. This is the critical point. And LDS apologists with a scientific background know Lehi's SNPs shouldn't be mistaken for an Asian cluster with deep history in the Americas -- it should be an anomaly.

I hope my point clear.

[hagoth7]

By changing the words you are missing my intended point.

Probably not. But just for fun, let's see if I really am illiterate.

Your point, as I understood it, was basically that if an extensive sampling of Native American gene types were someday proven to match types that are believed to derive from regions we now refer to as Asia, then, in your opinion, it would be checkmate for the Nephite record. ? That is your general point, yes?

In other words, in such a scenario, you would assert that the Asian genes MUST be native to Asia.

And CANNOT derive from Palestine.

Have I understood your intended point correctly?

You know a banana can't be mistaken for an apple

Yet...in the example you cited, we supposedly did not know what a banana was.

Circular logic. I would only know it can't also be an apple if I already had an understanding of what a banana was or wasn't. So...which is it? Known? Or unknown?

Perhaps that logical doublespeak illustrates why I went with a more open-ended term?

Are you still of the opinion that I didn't understand your intended point?

And LDS apologists with a scientific background...

You don't need any kind of specialized training to see some of the gaps in Southerton's argument.

[mfbukowski]

Thinking ahead, or trying to make good sense out of the information we actually have? I can vouch for myself as to my motives, thanks. Besides, I already wrote my thoughts on it:

I hadn't seen this before- what a great post! It's great to see this from a real scholar with real evidence for this point of view instead of a guy like me who just wings it off the top of his head! Thanks LOAP!

[mfbukowski]

As to the question whether there are any living descendants of Lehi, raised by mfbukowski, one wonders why God would have bothered to preserve the BoM,

[mfbukowski]

Do you mean you don't see how mfbukowski can say this because Lamanites sure survived and if they had even a drop of Laman's blood then it's just as good as Lehi's blood, so there ought to be candidates (according to the BoM)? Yeah, I don't agree with him either. To me, if you're going to say "seed" is just a spiritual metaphor and not really about lineage, then why not say Lehi is a spiritual metaphor and not really a person, or say the whole Book of Mormon is a metaphor and not really a history? It feels like that's where this is going. (Note to mfbukowski -- you can steal this rhetorical question and make it part of your forward-thinking apologetic if you like.)

I know that Lehi was a real person but there is no need for any apologetic about it because it cannot be proven either way.

And yes, "Lehi" could be both a spiritual metaphor as well as a real person so it really doesn't matter. Paul speaks of Christ being the "second Adam"- there are a lot of examples of this in the scriptures- "Elisha" is another well known example.

[mfbukowski]

(Excuse me for needing to nix the double negative. I didn't want to pull a brain muscle - my poor little chipmunk on his treadmill up there is running as fast as he can.)

Lehi made very specific promises to his sons - about their seed.

I believe those promises - as concretely as I believe the Book of Mormon to be precisely what it asserts to be.

And those specific promises run counter to your assertion.

It is possible for Lehi's promises to hold true - and for later Nephite assurances of devastation to also be true.

It's actually not an either/or conundrum.

Just as it was possible for Lehi to foretell the destruction of Jerusalem - but was also possible for many of those he loved to be spared from such promised destruction.

This was already addressed by LOAP among others.

[hagoth7]

This was already addressed by LOAP among others.

Thanks for the correction.

That should teach me not to engage midstream in a thread without reading the rest of the thread first.

(but let's not hold our breaths on that)

Apologies to LOAP (and "others".)

[Bunk]

Are you still of the opinion that I didn't understand your intended point?

Yes, and after a couple of tries you are still stumbling on the banana. But it doesn't matter since I was talking to Charity and not you.

[ERayR]

Yes, and after a couple of tries you are still stumbling on the banana. But it doesn't matter since I was talking to Charity and not you.

And you are still pretending you know what the banana is. In a correct analogy you would have no idea what it really is.

[charity]

I am saying if you've never seen a tropical fruit, and couldn't possibly identify a banana on sight, you could be sure that your barrel didn't have any bananas if you could identify all its contents as apples. So you don't have to know what Lehi's DNA looked like if all our samples are something else.

Here is where I'm not sure about Simon's argument. I think he's over-extending the samples we do have and predicting that all the rest of the samples will look the same for the next twenty years. As I have said a couple of times in this thread, I predict there will eventually be SNP ambiguities that apologists will try to call "Lehi candidates".

Do you mean you don't see how mfbukowski can say this because Lamanites sure survived and if they had even a drop of Laman's blood then it's just as good as Lehi's blood, so there ought to be candidates (according to the BoM)? Yeah, I don't agree with him either. To me, if you're going to say "seed" is just a spiritual metaphor and not really about lineage, then why not say Lehi is a spiritual metaphor and not really a person, or say the whole Book of Mormon is a metaphor and not really a history? It feels like that's where this is going. (Note to mfbukowski -- you can steal this rhetorical question and make it part of your forward-thinking apologetic if you like.)

Whoa. Look at this logically. When you say "something else" you are stating that you have certain knowledge about Sample 1 so you can compare it to Samp;le 2. You already know that Sample one is "tropical." We don't have any information about about Sample 1. See what I mean about starting a few steps down a path? You don't even know you have already made a choice.

Remember that after a while, lineage did not determine who was a Nephite or a Lamanite. But they were all descendants of Lehi, no matter what.

"Drop of blood" is an inaccuracy. What serious population geneticists mean is whether or not a certain person has a place on a pedigree chart. Back 20 enerations, there are no about 2 million spaces on a a person's pedigree chart. Numbers really add up when you double each generation. There doesn't have to be any blood, just a space on a chart to qualify as an ancestor.

[Ariarates]

It always amuses me how many people (who think like Southerton and his fans) start off three steps down a path, not even realizing they are already headed the wrong direction. That "wrong path" makes an assumption that cannot be verified. "Lehi's DNA is not found in modern day indigenous American genetic makeup, therefore the Book of Mormon is faolse." I know this has been pointed out before, but it is impossible to compare modern populations' DNA to Lehi's because WE DON'T KNOW WHAT LEHI'S DNA WAS! The whole issue should be a non-starter. If Southerton were a scientist, he would know that.

All this talk about bananas is a bit confusing, so correct me if I'm wrong. I thought I'd go back to charity's initial post and ask: who is saying "Lehi's DNA is not found in modern day indigenous American genetic makeup, therefore the Book of Mormon is false"?

I thought the debate centered around (not) finding (traces of) Hebrew DNA in Native American populations. Don't the science people know what Hebrew DNA looks like?

[Bunk]

All this talk about bananas is a bit confusing, so correct me if I'm wrong. I thought I'd go back to charity's initial post and ask: who is saying "Lehi's DNA is not found in modern day indigenous American genetic makeup, therefore the Book of Mormon is false"?

I thought the debate centered around (not) finding (traces of) Hebrew DNA in Native American populations. Don't the science people know what Hebrew DNA looks like?

No Ariarates. They don't know what Lehi's DNA looked like, they don't know what Hebrew DNA 2600 years ago looked like, and really there isn't such a thing as "Hebrew" DNA. But that's not the point.

Bananas aren't the point. It's the apples.

Hebrew DNA isn't the point. It's the Native American DNA.

Is anyone saying that any bit of Native American DNA, be it YcDNA, mtDNA, or an autosomal SNP, is a candidate for Lehi's DNA? Or are they saying all these markers came from Asia around the time of the last ice age? As far as I know, the only apologist who thinks any of this is a candidate is Meldrum, who claims haplotype X (a type of mtDNA) came from the Middle East during Book of Mormon times, but he's peddling pseudoscience for money, so lets not worry about that quack. Everybody else agrees the Native American DNA we've surveyed so far couldn't have come from to America as recently as 600 BC. So you don't have to know Lehi's DNA to conclude something about what's been surveyed so far. Agreed?

And you don't have to know exactly what a banana is as long as you are confident in your apples. That's all I meant to say about the fruit (it was supposed to be a logical demonstration, not an analogy).

[USU78]

[Meldrum]'s peddling pseudoscience for money, so lets not worry about that quack.

I don't know why we need gratuitously to question Meldrum's motives here. For all any of us know he honestly believes in the Hemispheric theory for Lehite population distribution.

It is, moreover, not necessary to conflate the "X" with the Meldrum geography theory. They are not inextricably bound to one another, and each may rise or fall on its own merits.