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The Jaredite Barges


LeSellers

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Okay. I admit that I could have stated it more diplomatically.

However, you have to admit that the description given by the good Capt'n would carry a lot more weight if he had not essentially born his testimony in his writings. This puts the author among the ranks of apologists rather than among the ranks of those with expertise who are also unbiased and objective.

Not at all. The facts will rise or fall on their own merits, and rejecting somebody out of hand because you don't like the Testimony they're wrapped in makes one question your motives. If the good Cap'n is wrong, tell us why he's wrong, not that he can't be trusted because he's a believer. Gov't cannot yet refuse people positions or voting rights because of antireligious tests.

As for this unpleasant person, I see myself as a skeptic when it comes to religion, not as an anti-religionist. There is a difference, I think.

I quite agree there's a difference. Nobody here, however, accused anybody else of incompetence or fudging data on the skeptical side of the aisle. We see a whole lot of "If a Mormon said it, it's a lie" from that there side, however.

I am willing to completely accept and support any good that is done for society by religious groups. What I am not willing to do is tacitly accept those claims of religious groups that are completely unfounded, or demonstrated to be mere myth and misrepresentations, as truth.

"Mere myth" is a rather silly way of putting it. "Mere myth" assumes a radical materialism and ignores the offerings of the vast majority of folks who ever lived, since the mythic has been, is, and will continue to be of great value to most folks. If you choose to reject the mythic as a legitimate means of communication between most folks, that's fine, but you really ought to respect that some very bright folks do accept it. If you choose to disparage them, you make the majority your enemy for no other reason than vanity.

If that is unpleasant to you, then I apologize.

For the unpleasantness or the willfulness behind the unpleasantness?

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Show me where a law of nature was broken in communication with Deity. Do you break the laws of nature every time you talk to your pet, another human, or to your computer when it annoys you?

Are you saying that you do not believe that Deity is supernatural? Anything supernatural is not in accordance with natural law. That is pretty much by definition.

Who said repairs were done while underway?

As I recall, you did

There's nothing first order about it at all. seriously. Here's the equation for wind velocity and wave height using PM Wave spectrum:

eq16-30.gif

Okay. I see by the equation you provided that we are not talking about a formal mathematical first order effect. Assuming your equation is correct, you were correct. Nonetheless, as you have sailed, I am sure you have associated increasing wind speed and direction of the wind relative to currents with increasing wave height and energy. If you really have not done this, then I would like to know where you have sailed and under what conditions.

If this is simple sailing 101 stuff why don't you understand that wind waves are unstable when they become large.

I have said nothing about the stability of large waves.

Sailing of 40 ft monohulls and other small craft, passenger on multiple large ships (well over 100m), data generation and recording on >60ft military craft, I can go on if you'd like but I find the exercise futile as you'll discard it out of hand.

Why would you say that I would discard your experience out of hand? After all, I asked you what experience you had. I am happy to hear that you have 40 foot monohull experience.

Your expertise is wanning even further.

Actually, my expertise is exactly what it was when this thread started.

Additionally you discredit the captain who has far more real world experience than yourself simply because he believes. Talk about poisoning the well if there was ever a case for it. Notice I didn't discredit DrW's posts because he didn't think it was possible, I just took issue with his premise. It's a shame you can't be objective in a discussion without interjecting your assumptions without a validation of them.

I in no way discredited the captain. I simply pointed out that he may be less than objective in his remarks and then went on to show that this was indeed the case. The experienced Captain made unwarranted assumptions about sea drogues and stopping for re-supply mid journey in unpowered craft. He also apparently ignored the sea conditions described in Ether in providing his narrative. I am sure that the Captain is a very nice man and that if I met him, I would greatly enjoy his sea stories.

I'm still waiting on the weight of evidence you have yet to provide for your stance on a constant high level sea state and other barge issues (consider this a formal request for CFR for your numerous allegations).

Sorry. You will need to be more specific as to your CFR request in support of "numerous allegations" (did you mean assertions). WIth regard to the sea state, I would think the fact that Ether relates that furious winds blew without ceasing and that there were mountainous waves crashing down on the craft would be a pretty clear indication of the sea state.

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Not at all. The facts will rise or fall on their own merits, and rejecting somebody out of hand because you don't like the Testimony they're wrapped in makes one question your motives. If the good Cap'n is wrong, tell us why he's wrong, not that he can't be trusted because he's a believer. Gov't cannot yet refuse people positions or voting rights because of antireligious tests.

I did not reject what the good Captain said. I merely pointed out that that he made unwarranted assumptions based on the text of Ether and did not address what seems to be the main issue at hand here, and that is the behavior or even survivability of unpowered wooden craft during 344 days of unceasing furious winds and crashing waves.

I quite agree there's a difference. Nobody here, however, accused anybody else of incompetence or fudging data on the skeptical side of the aisle. We see a whole lot of "If a Mormon said it, it's a lie" from that there side, however.

If you will review the current thread, I think you will see that the posturing rhetoric is pretty evenly distributed between the two "sides".

"Mere myth" is a rather silly way of putting it. "Mere myth" assumes a radical materialism and ignores the offerings of the vast majority of folks who ever lived, since the mythic has been, is, and will continue to be of great value to most folks. If you choose to reject the mythic as a legitimate means of communication between most folks, that's fine, but you really ought to respect that some very bright folks do accept it. If you choose to disparage them, you make the majority your enemy for no other reason than vanity.

I have no problem with myths per se. I enjoy the relating of a tall tale or legend as much as the next person. I understand and accept the fact that myths are a part of our culture, and probably have been since hominids first gained speech and sat in groups around the evening fire. The problem, and it as an increasingly serious one, comes when individuals base their worldview on myth and then attempt to imposed these myth-based beliefs onto others.

For the unpleasantness or the willfulness behind the unpleasantness?

If being forced to choose, I would say the unpleasantness.

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Are you saying that you do not believe that Deity is supernatural? Anything supernatural is not in accordance with natural law. That is pretty much by definition.

See this thread: Here

As I recall, you did

Yup, I sure did, and you haven't shown otherwise. Nor have you shown that they stopped while on their journey. Care to elaborate on those points?

Okay. I see by the equation you provided that we are not talking about a formal mathematical first order effect. Assuming your equation is correct, you were correct. Nonetheless, as you have sailed, I am sure you have associated increasing wind speed and direction of the wind relative to currents with increasing wave height and energy. If you really have not done this, then I would like to know where you have sailed and under what conditions.

And as I have said sea states are not directly correlated to wind speed. If you read up on it (what I gave was the--hang on have to look up how to spell the freakin' names--Pierson-Moskowitz Spectrum) you'll come to discover that the surface effect of the wind is 'minimal' when compared to the size of deep water waves--which are derived from currents. That's not to say they do not have an effect on the H_1/3, they do, but it is not its sole progenitor to significant wave height and is quite misleading to assume such. For an example if you have areas of high and low pressure about to crash into each other the temperature of the water and hence some of the oceanic currents alter, thereby altering the sea state. Without going into exhaustive detail deep water waves are going to be caused by a number of reasons themselves (not only currents, though currents are a large contributor to them), everything from water temperature, tectonic movement, etc. can instigate various water waves. I hope that helps.

For further reference; I am an avid windsurfer as well. I look for days with a sea state of 0 to 1 and a strong wind. They're rare, but they do occur and evidence in my mind--beyond the PM spectrum--as to why wind and sea states are not as straight as they seem.

I have said nothing about the stability of large waves.

You have not, but that is the issue you run into running with your criticism. Large waves will not last and by necessity become unstable the larger they become. Instead of having a constant sea state 6 or 7 the interference is more likely to be digital (for lack of a better word--my brains a bit fuzzy at the moment; I think i'm coming down with a fever). It will rage for a time and then go away, then it will rage for a time, and go away.

Why would you say that I would discard your experience out of hand? After all, I asked you what experience you had. I am happy to hear that you have 40 foot monohull experience.

Tone and experience in this thread. If you do not I appreciate it, but I would like some trust as I do not doubt someones credentials or experiences unless given cause to do so.

Actually, my expertise is exactly what it was when this thread started.

Touch
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Well last time I checked the major ingredient in glass is quartz powder. It doesn't take much imagination to grinde quartz crystals, which are extremely abundant in the area, into powder and then heat them and refine them into glass. Thats moltening them out of a rock.

Glass was being produced all over the middle east from as early as 1600 BC.

In Egypt and the rest of the Middle East in the 13th century B.C.' date=' bronze was the heavy metal of power, and glass the rare commodity coveted by the powerful, who treasured glass jewelry, figurines and decorative vessels and exchanged them as prestige gifts on a par with semiprecious stones.

But definitive evidence of the earliest glass production long eluded archaeologists. They had found scatterings of glassware throughout the Middle East as early as the 16th century B.C. and workshops where artisans fashioned glass into finished objects, but they had never found an ancient factory where they were convinced glass had been made from its raw materials.

Two archaeologists now report finding such a factory in the ruins of an Egyptian industrial complex from the time of Rameses the Great. The well-known site, Qantir-Piramesses, in the eastern Nile delta, flourished in the 13th century B.C. as a northern capital of the pharaohs.

In an interview by e-mail last week, Dr. Thilo Rehren of the Institute of Archaeology at University College London said, "This is the first ever direct evidence for any glassmaking in the entire Late Bronze Age."

Other experts familiar with the research said the findings were important for reconstructing the ancient technology of glassmaking. But some questioned the claim that Qantir represented the first evidence of primary glass production, citing previous findings in Egypt at Amarna, which are dated a century earlier.

[/quote']

http://www.nytimes.c...nce/21glas.html

So here we have a jar.

Put some fire flies in the jar and wha la. Glow in the dark luminosity, without a flame.

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Thanks for responding.

Well last time I checked the major ingredient in glass is quartz powder. It doesn't take much imagination to grinde quartz crystals, which are extremely abundant in the area, into powder and then heat them and refine them into glass. Thats moltening them out of a rock.

Glass was being produced all over the middle east from as early as 1600 BC.

Okay, so the stones described as "clear... as transparent glass" may have been actual glass.

Perhaps you are right. It does seem to require a lot of expertise for an early Bronze Age dude, who was supposed to have lived about a thousand years earlier than the glass factory found in Egypt, but it is an answer.

.

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See this thread: Here

I think that is enough for me today (I'm really not feeling all that well, was 28F this morning when I got up)

Vex,

Okay.

Probably time for me to quit as well.

Hope you are not coming down with anything serious and that you feel better soon.

BTW: I really have listened to what you have had to say, and plan to read up on (water) wave mechanics, thanks to your comments and your equation. We are headed out on a passage (Miami to BVI) this weekend, and we will probably be sailing to weather much of the way. So some additional insight to the waves we will be facing, especially downwind from some of the islands, could be of help.

This thread has not convinced me that the Jaredite journey, as described in Ether, did happen or could have happened. In fact, considering that this thread may well represent the best that the apologists have to offer on the subject, I would say that the effect has been the opposite.

I understand that the discussion has not changed your viewpoint either. Perhaps, however, you will even be better able to defend your position as a result of our little discussion.

I know I will.

Again, best wishes.

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Thanks for responding.

Okay, so the stones described as "clear... as transparent glass" may have been actual glass.

Perhaps you are right. It does seem to require a lot of expertise for an early Bronze Age dude, who was supposed to have lived about a thousand years earlier than the glass factory found in Egypt, but it is an answer.

.

Do we really know the precise date of the Building of the Tower?

"It was an important trading center and capital of the ancient kingdom of Babylonia. Babylon stood about 60 miles south of Baghdad on the banks of the Euphrates River where the present city Al Hillah, Iraq, now stands. Babylon means gate of God. The Biblical or Hebrew word for Babylon was Babel. The ziggurat, great Tower of Babel, was a terraced pyramid that stood in the temple area. It first became an important city about 2,000 B.C. until its fall in 539 B.C. prophesied by the Book of Daniel in the Old Testament." -- The World Book Encyclopedia "BABYLON."

"Babylonia was an ancient region in southern Iraq. A great civilization existed in the region between 2700 B.C. and 500 B.C. It produced some of the first forms of writing, a set of laws, and studies in mathematics, astronomy, and other sciences. Great leaders, such as Hammurabi, Nebuchadnezzar, Cyrus the Great, and Alexander the great, were rulers of Babylonia.

Seems to me that 1600BC puts it smak dab in the middle of the Babylonian empire.

And besides glass production predates these finds by thousands of years.

The discovery of glass

Natural glass has existed since the beginnings of time, formed when certain types of rocks melt as a result of high-temperature phenomena such as volcanic eruptions, lightning strikes or the impact of meteorites, and then cool and solidify rapidly. Stone-age man is believed to have used cutting tools made of obsidian (a natural glass of volcanic origin also known as hyalopsite, Iceland agate, or mountain mahogany) and tektites (naturally-formed glasses of extraterrestrial or other origin, also referred to as obsidianites).

According to the ancient-Roman historian Pliny (AD 23-79), Phoenician merchants transporting stone actually discovered glass (or rather became aware of its existence accidentally) in the region of Syria around 5000 BC. Pliny tells how the merchants, after landing, rested cooking pots on blocks of nitrate placed by their fire. With the intense heat of the fire, the blocks eventually melted and mixed with the sand of the beach to form an opaque liquid.

http://www.glassonli...rv/history.html

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Perhaps you are right. It does seem to require a lot of expertise for an early Bronze Age dude, who was supposed to have lived about a thousand years earlier than the glass factory found in Egypt, but it is an answer.

From wikipedia:

The history of glassmaking can be traced back to 3500 BCE in Mesopotamia.

That's before he set off, I believe. Not 1600 BCE. 3500 BCE.

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Must we accept that the voyage actually took 344 days at sea? Could that number include either time at various islands to clean and resupply or be an error in Ether's sources?

Yours under the mega_shok.gifoaks,

Nathair /|\

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Could [344 days ] include either time at various islands to clean and resupply or be an error in Ether's sources?

I have, for many years, assumed that the 344 days had to have included resupply stops. The narrative almost demands it, and the requirements of the voyage and limitations of the barges support the assumption.

Lehi

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And besides glass production predates these finds by thousands of years.

Okay, I can accept that. Let's say the material was actually glass. Any idea why the prophets would describe glass balls as stones that were as transparent as glass?

Also, that creates a serious problem for attempted naturalistic explanations for why they might glow, don't you think? Clear glass seems unlikely to contain any material that could be made to naturally glow.

.

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Okay, I can accept that. Let's say the material was actually glass. Any idea why the prophets would describe glass balls as stones that were as transparent as glass?

Also, that creates a serious problem for attempted naturalistic explanations for why they might glow, don't you think? Clear glass seems unlikely to contain any material that could be made to naturally glow.

.

Glass balls? They could just as easily be Glass Jars, and God did touched them after all. Removing the super natural elements of the story, what did he put into them? Phosphorecent sea alge comes to mind.

And besides ALL that... this isn't the first time that glowing stones were used as lights in ancient sea voyages. Some recountings of Noahs flood have Noah receiving clear pearls (stones?) from God to light his Ark.

Jewish Seafaring and the Book of Mormon

Patai cites some of the early Jewish texts that speak of Noah's hanging glowing pearls or stones inside the ark to provide light (see p. 9).10 Though he deals with this nonbiblical aspect of the Noah story, Patai's main point is that the description of the ark was probably patterned after later ships known to the author of Genesis.11

...

10. As early as 1927, LDS writer Janne Sjodahl had compared the Jewish traditions with the glowing stones used in the Jaredite barges, as noted in Ether 3:1

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Glass balls? They could just as easily be Glass Jars

So "stones" are now really "glass jars"? Come on now. That stretches plausibility well beyond the breaking point.

The best practical explanation for these glowing stones is that it's another manifestation of Smith's obsession with magic stones, such as those that tell the future, provide revelation, or find buried treasure.

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I'm always drawn to the Hopi creation myth when hearing of the Jaredite barges. In the Book of the Hopi, one version of that myth has the people being sealed inside hollow reeds for the trip across the ocean to the 4th World, presumably the Americas. From the Wiki based largely on the Book:

Ah, yes, Spider Woman.

Able to go anywhere a spider can, like Spider Man.

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So "stones" are now really "glass jars"? Come on now. That stretches plausibility well beyond the breaking point.

The best practical explanation for these glowing stones is that it's another manifestation of Smith's obsession with magic stones, such as those that tell the future, provide revelation, or find buried treasure.

Nice opinion. Would be plausible if the stones in the narative of Ether where used in one of the ways you describe.

However, since they were used for providing light inside the barges and several ancient sources describe essentially the same thing (re. Noah, Jonah) a better and more plausible explanation is that the BOM is exactly what it claims to be.

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Also, that creates a serious problem for attempted naturalistic explanations for why they might glow, don't you think? Clear glass seems unlikely to contain any material that could be made to naturally glow.

.

Why do we need a naturalistic explanation for the glowing stones (if by naturalistic, you mean it can be explainable by known laws of physics)? I could describe a perfectly valid mechanism by which pure obsidian, for example, could be prepared so as to give light, but it requires the acceptance of nonCartesian forces (the Chinese call it chi) that martial artists, hermeticists, and others work with every day.

Yours under the esoteric oaks,

Nathair /|\

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Why do we need a naturalistic explanation for the glowing stones (if by naturalistic, you mean it can be explainable by known laws of physics)?

You don't. If you look back you will see I have been confused at that effort. Why not say it's what the story appears to say, which is that God touched them and they magically began to glow, then maintained that glow for a year? 'Nuff said. Either accept it or don't, and that's the end of it. I don't, but that's mainly because I consider YHWH a mythical creation of ancient humans. Plus, the whole Jaredite story falls apart at the beginning for me, with the assertion that the Tower of Babel and confounding of languages story actually happened (also, references to Noah's ark as reality).

Mahonri, of course, ought to be constrained by the ability that a single human in the early bronze age would be reasonably expected to display in his creation of sixteen clear "stones" by melting them from a rock. If that assumed level of ability includes grinding quartz crystals into dust and creating glass balls (or jars, as Zakuska surmises -- does that imply glass blowing as well?) that look like stones, then so be it. I think it's a stretch that a lone man from that long ago would be able to pull that off by himself, but that's just my opinion.

And it still seems unlikely that the author would describe glass objects as glass-like.

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You don't. If you look back you will see I have been confused at that effort. Why not say it's what the story appears to say, which is that God touched them and they magically began to glow, then maintained that glow for a year? 'Nuff said. Either accept it or don't, and that's the end of it. I don't, but that's mainly because I consider YHWH a mythical creation of ancient humans. Plus, the whole Jaredite story falls apart at the beginning for me, with the assertion that the Tower of Babel and confounding of languages story actually happened (also, references to Noah's ark as reality).

Mahonri, of course, ought to be constrained by the ability that a single human in the early bronze age would be reasonably expected to display in his creation of sixteen clear "stones" by melting them from a rock. If that assumed level of ability includes grinding quartz crystals into dust and creating glass balls (or jars, as Zakuska surmises -- does that imply glass blowing as well?) that look like stones, then so be it. I think it's a stretch that a lone man from that long ago would be able to pull that off by himself, but that's just my opinion.

And it still seems unlikely that the author would describe glass objects as glass-like.

Though I am learning to be a hermetic mage, I am unwilling to commit either way on classifying the activities of YHWH as "magic." They are not always explainable by current principles of physics, but I don't know if He does things the same way as we do.

The only material I can think of with my limited knowledge of mineralogy that could fit the requirements and be called "like" glass rather than simply glass is obsidian. (Must clear mean colorless?) I am open to other explanations.

The Tower of Babel story could be explained the same way as the flood story often is: that is, as a localized phenomenon rather than global.

To accept the story, one must accept Christ, but to promote non-acceptance of the story, one has an obligation to provide an alternative explanation that fits the known facts.

Yours under the pondering oaks,

Nathair /|\

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it still seems unlikely that the author would describe glass objects as glass-like.

Why?

"Glass" means something, somethings, actually. What any word means to the person using it may not be clear (pardon the pun) to those hearing it. So, let's assume for a moment that one of the writers (Mahonri, Ether, or Moroni) had the concept of "glass" that included a smooth surface, transparency (or nearly), colorlessness (excluding "white") and so on. What we'd envision if we were talking about a window pane. However, "glass" is much broader than that, and can be opaque, rough-surfaced, and of any color.

What Mahonri saw could have been a glass that did not conform to his (or one of the other's) image of "glass". He'd be inclined to say it was "white and clear, even as transparent glass".

By the way, do LEDs break natural laws? Just because Mahorni did not have the technology to make LEDs (with embedded power sources) does not mean the God did not.

Remember Jesus touched these stones, and as you are wont to remind us, DrW did stipulate that they were, more or less by definition, miraculous from the text itself.

Lehi

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The only material I can think of with my limited knowledge of mineralogy that could fit the requirements and be called "like" glass rather than simply glass is obsidian. (Must clear mean colorless?) I am open to other explanations.

Even if transparent doesn't mean transparent, would you get an obsidian stone by melting it "out of a rock"?

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