A Theory Of Lds Evolution (Add Yours Here)

[cinepro]

Other than believing in God the Eternal Father, His Son Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit, that Joseph Smith was and Thomas Monson is a prophet, and the the LDS Chruch is God's authorized church, there is very little in terms of beliefs that are required to be a member in good standing.

 

Behaviors and actions on the other hand include a longer list like the Word of Wisdom, Chastity, Tithing, Honesty, etc.

 

We really don't do blasphemy short of public apostasy.

 

If you keep your mouth shut, you can believe (or disbelieve) anything you want and still be "a member in good standing" (whatever that means).

 

I'm still curious about how LDS who believe in evolution view the religious/LDS stories of creation, Adam and Eve, and the Fall.  If anyone else wants to explain their "version" of things (if it's different than the OP), please go ahead.

[The Nehor]

Oops, my mistake.  I was equating billion years with a light-year.   I should have asked instead:  "What if a photon has a lifespan of only 12 billion years?"

 

Okay, yeah, that makes a little more sense. Your first question would mean we would only be able to see a hundred or so stars period. I was struggling with how to answer it.

 

Photons also do not seem to have any mass (that we can detect) and you need mass to decay. It has been calculated that if they do have some mass they would take at least three years to decay at rest. This seems quick but photons are travelling at relativistic speeds so photons have at least a minimum life from our perspective of 1,000,000,000,000,000,000 years. That is a long time. This still assumes they have mass. We are pretty sure they do not. We have also detected light that is about 13 billion years in travelling to us.

 

I am not sure what you are trying to say though.

Edited February 6, 2014 by The Nehor

[Rob Osborn]

I didn't read any of this but as Rob has disagreed, I take the opposite position of Rob Osborn

I believe in God, are you then an atheist?

[longview]

Okay, yeah, that makes a little more sense. Your first question would mean we would only be able to see a hundred or so stars period. I was struggling with how to answer it.

 

Photons also do not seem to have any mass (that we can detect) and you need mass to decay. It has been calculated that if they do have some mass they would take at least three years to decay at rest. This seems quick but photons are travelling at relativistic speeds so photons have at least a minimum life from our perspective of 1,000,000,000,000,000,000 years. That is a long time. This still assumes they have mass. We are pretty sure they do not. We have also detected light that is about 13 billion years in travelling to us.

 

I am not sure what you are trying to say though.

 

Neutrinos have next to zero mass, barely detectable.  They have to use a large tank of special fluid (I don't remember what it was) deep underground to be able to observe it.  I watched a Nova show years ago about a scientist predicting a neutrino surge prior to a Supernova event.

 

It seems a photon would have more mass than a neutrino.  It has properties of both wave and particle.  My point is that all particles have finer (more minute) components such as quarks and subquarks.  A photon could be losing a infinitesimally small component per unit of time of travel.

Edited February 6, 2014 by longview

[The Nehor]

Neutrinos have next to zero mass, barely detectable.  They have to use a large tank of special fluid (I don't remember what it was) deep underground to be able to observe it.  I watched a Nova show years ago about a scientist predicting a neutrino surge prior to a Supernova event.

 

It seems a photon would have more mass than a neutrino.  It has properties of both wave and particle.  My point is that all particles have finer (more minute) components such as quarks and subquarks.  A photon could be losing a infinitesimally small component per unit of time of travel.

 

A photon does not have more mass then a neutrino. If it has any mass (which is doubtful) it is a very very small amount even compared to a neutrino.

 

And yeah, supernovas are weird. If you were on a planet going around a star that went supernova there is enough neutrino radiation to kill you (only time neutrinos could possibly affect a human). Admittedly the neutrino radiation would be one of the least of your concerns as all the rest of the stuff coming out of the supernova would kill you much faster.

 

It is very likely that photons are massless. That is the current consensus and we have seen nothing to indicate otherwise.

[changed]

please share your personal theory if it diverges from this one:

 

 

 

 

And worlds without number have I created...For behold, there are many worlds that have passed away by the word of my power. And there are many that now stand, and innumerable are they unto man;

In short, my theory is that new worlds get built on the ruins of older ones, that our current world was built on the ruins of other older worlds, that Adam and Eve came from heaven (Eden - perfection) to bring a new era, or a new world, to this planet.

 

 

And there shall be a new heaven and a new earth; and they shall be like unto the old save the old have passed away, and all things have become new.

 

[JeremyOrbe-Smith]

One of my current theories, which is amenable to change with further information:

"First Parents" is a relative, tribal term. 

 

In Helaman, we are told of the "First Parents" of a certain group of people:

 

"Behold, I have given unto you the names of our first parents who came out of the land of Jerusalem; and this I have done that when you remember your names ye may remember them; and when ye remember them ye may remember their works; and when ye remember their works ye may know how that it is said, and also written, that they were good."

 

 

In Omni, we find the same usage:

 

"And it came to pass in the days of Mosiah, there was a large stone brought unto him with engravings on it; and he did interpret the engravings by the gift and power of God. And they gave an account of one Coriantumr, and the slain of his people. And Coriantumr was discovered by the people of Zarahemla; and he dwelt with them for the space of nine moons. It also spake a few words concerning his fathers. And his first parents came out from the tower, at the time the Lord confounded the language of the people."

 

(The Tower is a whole other can o' worms, don't get distracted.) 

 

Jacob actually refers to his own generation as the "First Parents" of preceding generations: 

 

"But whatsoever things we write upon anything save it be upon plates must perish and vanish away; but we can write a few words upon plates, which will give our children, and also our beloved brethren, a small degree of knowledge concerning us, or concerning their fathers -- now in this thing we do rejoice; and we labor diligently to engraven these words upon plates, hoping that our beloved brethren and our children will receive them with thankful hearts, and look upon them that they may learn with joy and not with sorrow, neither with contempt, concerning their first parents."

 

These are not the First Parents of the entire planet, and not the First Parents who ever existed. In the same way, I don't see why Adam has to be the "First Man" in an absolutist sense. Eve doesn't have to be the First Woman who has ever lived in an absolute sense. The author of the scripture calls her "the Mother of All Living", but that's relative to their tribe, history, amount of knowledge, etc.. They're the First Parents of a particular tribe, and their memory/authority is used in coronation ceremonies, initiation rituals, etc.. Historically speaking, we only have "a small degree of knowledge" concerning them. Adam is called "many" in the Pearl of Great Price; so is Eve: "thus have I, the Lord God, called the first of all women, which are many." It's just talking about humanity, men and women in general. It's a model. 

 

(And do remember that bit I wish they still included in the Temple: "the work of the six creative periods will be represented. They will organize man in their own likeness and image, male and female. This, however, is simply figurative, so far as the man and the woman are concerned.") 

 

D&C 130 teaches that "When the Savior shall appear we shall see him as he is. We shall see that he is a man like ourselves." Gods are humans with a particular stewardship (think of all the "Divine Kings" in history), and if Adam was a Son of God, then clearly there were human "pre-Adamites." 

 

In the Temple, we are all Adams and Eves. There are many, just like there is an Eden here in the Portland Temple and there is an Eden in the Salt Lake City Temple and there was an Eden in Solomon's Temple. So it wasn't so much a literal death that is genetically introduced to the literal First Humans Adam and Eve -- it was the knowledge of good and evil, a knowledge of death (see Kant, etc.) and life that makes men and women like Gods. 

 

(Notice that at no point is it ever claimed that Adam and Eve are immortal - that's a Miltonian innovation not present in the text. The Original Sin isn't Biblical. Even "the Fall" is terminology not found in Genesis - and in the Book of Mormon, a "Fall" is also used to describe the Fall of the Great And Spacious Building (Temple?), so maybe our speculations on worldwide genetic catastrophes represented with the same word aren't warranted. Nibley has a lot in his book on the Egyptian Endowment about the Garden being a representation of the womb - we are taken from one world, placed in a protected Garden, and then born into this world; Eves are the ones who take the Fruit and offer it to Adams. Our "fall" is a fortunate fall, though our birth separates us from God into our individual mortal bodies; in our infant state, we're again innocent before God. The story of Adam and Eve becomes a sort of Hero's Journey type initiation thing conveyed in symbolism.)

 

The Creation accounts in our scriptures are closely related to Temple worship ceremonies; you create a world in seven days by making a model of it, a ritual drama, which of course is part of the Sacred Calendar.  (See Hamlet's Mill for more on the Calendar)

 

When, in the D&C, Joseph talks about the "Seven Seals", the "temporal existence" he is talking about is concerning "the hidden things of [God's] economy." He's discussing a particular dispensation relative to a certain chunk of time, not the literal age of the physical planet eath. God's works are continuous; there have clearly been dispensations and "economies" that preceded the "in the beginning" of our own. The physical planet earth is billions of years old, but we have to organize our social lives according to one calendar or another. The thing is, calendrical systems are all relative; that is, the Julian and Gregorian can "exist" at the same time, they're just geared as different systems. We create them. 

 

We have absolutely zero evidence except the testimony of people who claim to have been taught by God that humans have "spirits", some sort of consciousness which can exist separate from the body. That's what we have to take on faith for now, and it's the tough one. (None of the contemporary ghost stories I've ever heard sound remotely plausible, so I'm really leaning on the records of that empty tomb, here. More's the pity, knowing how fallible human records can be.) In the D&C, we learn that our spirits are composed of some sort of refined matter that's currently undetectable by present means, but the point is to counter the usual sort of immaterialist Cartesian Duality that is used to conceptualize "spirituality" - in principle, we could discover where our consciousnesses are hiding out, and move them from place to place, body to body, like (presumably) God (somehow) does. 

 

(I don't know how! That's the question! I want to know, too! Instead of wasting money on wars and contentions, let's study brains and quantum physics and the basis of consciousness and find out, so our doctors and scientists can obliterate senescence and contribute to God's work of bringing to pass the immortality and eternal life of humankind!)  

 

If this is so, then humans are somehow composed of our cute little primate bodies (the natural man, a part of a long mammalian tradition) which are woven in with the preexisting spirit (symbiosis, not parasitism in need of creepy-movie exorcisms) which, together, form the individual soul. You can see the "fall" as our spirits entering our bodies from one world to another, or whatever.

 

This is fantastically weird, but pretty cool, too. 

 

Some quotage on the theme: 

 

Brigham Young:

"I am not astonished that infidelity prevails to a great extent among the inhabitants of the earth, for the religious teachers of the people advance many ideas and notions for truth which are in opposition to and contradict facts demonstrated by science, and which are generally understood. You take, for instance, our geologists, and they tell us that this earth has been in existence for thousands and millions of years. They think, and they have good reason for their faith, that their researches and investigations enable them to demonstrate that this earth has been in existence as long as they assert it has. [...] In these respects we differ from the Christian world, for our religion will not clash with or contradict the facts of science in any particular. You may take geology, for instance, and it is true science; not that I would say for a moment that all the conclusions and deductions of its professors are true, but its leading principles are; they are facts -- they are eternal; and to assert that the Lord made the earth out of nothing is preposterous and impossible. [...] How long it's been organized is not for me to say, and I do not care anything about it. As to the Bible account of the creation we may say that the Lord gave it to Moses. If we understood the process of creation there would be no mystery about it, it would be all reasonable and plain, for there is no mystery except to the ignorant."

 

James Talmage:

 

"From the fossil remains of plants and animals found in the rocks the scientist points to a very definite order in the sequence of life embodiment, for the older rocks, the earlier formations, reveal to us organisms of simplest structure only, whether of plants or animals. These primitive species were aquatic; land forms were of later development. Some of these simpler forms of life have persisted until the present time, though with great variation as the result of changing environment.

 

Geologists say that these very simple forms of plant and animal bodies were succeeded by others more complicated; and in the indestructible record of the rocks they read the story of advancing life from the simple to the more complex, from the single-celled protozoan to the highest animals, from the marine algae to the advanced types of flowering plant--to the apple-tree, the rose, and the oak. [...]

 

In due course came the crowning work of this creative sequence, the advent of man! Concerning this all-important event we are told that scientists and theologians are at hopeless and irreconcilable variance. I regard the assumption or claim, whichever it be, as an exaggeration. Discrepancies that trouble us now will diminish as our knowledge of pertinent facts is extended. The creator has made record in the rocks for man to decipher; but He has also spoken directly regarding the main stages of progress by which the earth has been brought to be what it is. The accounts can not be fundamentally opposed; one can not contradict the other; though man's interpretation of either may be seriously at fault. [...]

 

This record of Adam and his posterity is the only scriptural account we have of the appearance of man upon the earth. But we have also a vast and ever-increasing volume of knowledge concerning man, his early habits and customs, his industries and works of art, his tools and implements, about which such scriptures as we have thus far received are entirely silent. Let us not try to wrest the scriptures in an attempt to explain away what we can not explain. The opening chapters of Genesis, and scriptures related thereto, were never intended as a text-book of geology, archaeology, earth-science or man-science. Holy Scripture will endure, while the conceptions of men change with new discoveries. We do not show reverence for the scriptures when we misapply them through faulty interpretation. [...]

 

Geologists and anthropologists say that if the beginning of Adamic history dates back but 6000 years or less, there must have been races of human sort upon earth long before that time -- without denying, however, that Adamic history may be correct, if it be solely regarded solely as the history of the Adamic race.

 

Brigham Young again: 

"Let me open the eyes of your understanding. There has never been a time when the creations of worlds commenced. They are from eternity to eternity in their creations and redemption. After they are organized they experience the good and the evil, the light and the dark, the bitter and the sweet as you and I do. There never was a time when there were not worlds in existence as this world is, and they pass through similar changes in abiding their creation preparatory to exaltation. Worlds have always been in progress, and eternally will be."

 

In Nibley's lecture on The Council, he makes some important points about the related Egyptian view of things:

 

"Interestingly, as Bonnet says, the creation of man doesn't enter into the story. "We have no problem about the creation of man," he says, "because that is going on every day. If you want to know how people are produced, you ask your old man." But we know how that happens, so he says we don't have to have mysteries. They don't have mysteries and stories about that at all. Mary Carr, the great sage, said, "All persons are images of the creator, who have come out of his own members. Man is in his express image." So that didn't bother them. That wasn't part of the creation. In other words, it's not part of cosmogony. Man is there too, like the other stuff."

 

More Brigham:

"You believe Adam was made of the dust of this earth. This I do not believe, though it is supposed that it is so written in the Bible; but it is not, to my understanding. You can write that information to the States, if you please -- that I have publicly declared that I do not believe that portion of the Bible as the Christian world do. I never did, and I never want to. What is the reason I do not? Because I have come to understanding, and banished from my mind all the baby stories my mother taught me when I was a child." 

 

"I have heard some make the broad assertion that every word within the lids of the Bible was the word of God. I have said to them, "You have never read the Bible, have you?" "O, yes, and I believe every word in it is the word of God." Well, I believe that the Bible contains the word of God, and the words of good men and the words of bad men; the words of good angels and the words of bad angels and words of the devil." 

 

Even Joseph Fielding Smith was willing to say:

 

"Even the most devout and sincere believers in the Bible realize that it is, like most any other book, filled with metaphor, simile, allegory, and parable, which no intelligent person could be compelled to accept in a literal sense. […] The Lord has not taken from those who believe in his word the power of reason. He expects every man who takes his “yoke” upon him to have common sense enough to accept a figure of speech in its proper setting, and to understand that the holy scriptures are replete with allegorical stories, faith-building parables, and ar-tistic speech. […] Where is there a writing intended to be taken in all its parts literally? [...] To expect a believer in the Bible to strike an attitude of this kind and believe all that is written to be a literal rendition is a stupid thought. No person with the natural use of his faculties looks upon the Bible in such a light."

 

Brother Kimball quoted a saying of Joseph the Prophet:

 

"That he would not worship a God who had not a father; and I do not know that he would if he had not a mother; the one would be as absurd as the other. If He had a Father, he was made in his likeness. And if He is our Father we are made after his image and likeness. He once possessed a body, as we now do; and our bodies are as much to us, as His body [is] to Him. Every iota of this organization is necessary to secure for us an exaltation with the Gods. We believe in our Father, and do not apply this term to a nonentity - to a fancied something that never existed; the application would not be correct. We do not so use language. We use this term to [refer to] a Being, and we claim this title as children. He is our Father; He is our God, the Father of our spirits; He is the framer of our bodies, and set the machine in successful operation to bring forth these tabernacles." (President Brigham Young's Doctrine on Deity Vol. 1 by Fred Collier) 

 

On the question of pre-Adamites, etc., I like what Hugh Nibley says in his book One Eternal Round, where he discusses the magnificent cave-paintings in the Lascaux cave from around 15,000 B.C. which he believes "seems to be describing a holy man's ascension":

"Where do these people (since we cannot deny their existence and can only speculate on their activities) fit into the gospel plan? We can thank the Pearl of Great Price for a clear-cut solution. Abraham and Moses hold the door open to all who desire to enter the company of the Lord, regardless of when and where they lived. The barriers of space and time are removed in both books: "millions of earths like this ... would not be a beginning to the number of thy creations" (Moses 7:30). "There are many worlds that have passed away by the word of my power. And there are many that now stand, and innumerable are they unto man" (Moses 1:35).

 

There are other creatures and other people of whom we know nothing, for the world was designed for multiple use. We are told that the people who made the paintings of Lascaux displayed "high intelligence, cognition, rationality, knowledge and technical skill." And yet apparently they lived in another world from ours - it is safe to say that an Ice Age made this the equivalent of another planet in those days. 

 

When Moses wanted to see what was going on everywhere, God told him: "For mine own purpose have I made these things. Here is wisdom and it remaineth in me" (Moses 1:31). "But only an account of this earth, and the inhabitants thereof, give I unto you" (Moses 1:35). That was none of Moses' business - pity the species in which the human race shows too much interest! Those other worlds need not be all other planets; there have been on this earth "holy men ye know not of" (D&C 49:8 ). The Lord himself has "other sheep," unknown to any of our race (3 Nephi 15:17; John 10:16). There have been occupants here long before our time.

 

The new perspective which the Books of Abraham and Moses give us is actually the old one, rejected by the doctors of the schools and well-nigh obliterated by the fourth century. And then there is the matter of dispensations. The Pearl of Great Price alone of all our scriptures gives us original testaments from seven great dispensations, all personal testimonies written in the first person: Adam, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Moses, Jesus Christ, and Joseph Smith. 

 

Fortes erant ante Agamemnonem ["There were mighty men before Agamemnon"] 

 

Are all seven dispensations necessary? Is it impossible for there to be more? After all, they all lay down the same principles and tell the same story, and the countless worlds, "worlds heretofore formed," we are told, are composed of the same substances and on the same pattern and subject to the same physical laws as our own. [...]

 

So, why should those clever people living ages before our Adamic takeover not be permitted to live without our approval? One beauty of the hypocephalus is the broadening of our mean provincial existence. We ignore the fall of the sparrow, but strangely, God does not; we "suffer the hungry, and the needy, and the naked, and the sick and afflicted to pass by [us], and notice them not" (Mormon 8:39). We are not even interested in our own world except where it concerns our immediate success and comfort; we refuse even to consider the doctrines the Prophet Joseph has given us about the lives of other creatures in their respective sphere and element. It is the singular value of the Pearl of Great Price that it recognizes the reality of races, peoples, civilizations, and great empires, which everyone knows have existed through the ages but to which modern Christianity grants no access to salvation - to the Christian world it is as if they had never existed, though they represent at least ninety percent of the world's population."

 

There are obviously still endless holes and questions, but I just don't see why we can't believe in geological time and biological evolution and science and history and God all at the same time. 

Edited February 6, 2014 by JeremyOrbe-Smith

[JeremyOrbe-Smith]

Yikes, sorry for the novel. 

[longview]

A photon does not have more mass then a neutrino. If it has any mass (which is doubtful) it is a very very small amount even compared to a neutrino.

 

And yeah, supernovas are weird. If you were on a planet going around a star that went supernova there is enough neutrino radiation to kill you (only time neutrinos could possibly affect a human). Admittedly the neutrino radiation would be one of the least of your concerns as all the rest of the stuff coming out of the supernova would kill you much faster.

 

It is very likely that photons are massless. That is the current consensus and we have seen nothing to indicate otherwise.

 

Regardless of the photon's mass, it contains energy.  The higher its frequency, the higher its energy.  My point is that if the photon has infinitesimal components that is separating, that would account for the red shift.

 

If the photon is not composed of finer pieces, I have another theory.  What if the photon has to pass through all kinds of fields that cause it to gradually lose energy that accounts for the red-shift?  There are regions of "dark matter" that physicists have yet to describe in terms of their nature and who knows what other phenomena.

[BCSpace]

As far as I can tell, this is the predominate theory among such people.  If you consider yourself a believing LDS who also believes in macro-evolution, please share your personal theory if it diverges from this one:

 

The OP is basically my own hypothesis with the local Garden twist(I can accept a global Garden state too).  You have remembered well cinepro.

 

However, I pretty much have to go with a local Flood and don't need a global one to 'kill off' anyone surviving around a local garden.

 

 

Completely counter to all of LDS doctrine. This can't even be considered in part anything representing LDS belief.

 

I've yet to encounter a Creation doctrine that is in opposition to my hypothesis.  I will grant you that I am in opposition to LDS doctrine on the Flood.  I am, after all, approximately 5% apostate by my own calculations.

 

Edited February 6, 2014 by BCSpace

[The Nehor]

Regardless of the photon's mass, it contains energy.  The higher its frequency, the higher its energy.  My point is that if the photon has infinitesimal components that is separating, that would account for the red shift.

 

If the photon is not composed of finer pieces, I have another theory.  What if the photon has to pass through all kinds of fields that cause it to gradually lose energy that accounts for the red-shift?  There are regions of "dark matter" that physicists have yet to describe in terms of their nature and who knows what other phenomena.

 

The two huge question marks in physics are dark matter and dark energy but dark matter does not appear to absorb or interact with light (photons). That is assuming they exist. They are inferred because "something" is causing what we see.

 

In any case the main direct evidence for the Big Bang is not light but cosmic background radiation.

[Rob Osborn]

The OP is basically my own hypothesis with the local Garden twist(I can accept a global Garden state too).  You have remembered well cinepro.

 

However, I pretty much have to go with a local Flood and don't need a global one to 'kill off' anyone surviving around a local garden.

 

 

I've yet to encounter a Creation doctrine that is in opposition to my hypothesis.  I will grant you that I am in opposition to LDS doctrine on the Flood.  I am, after all, approximately 5% apostate by my own calculations.

 

Given that at least you believe in Noah and a flood I would say move it down to 4%.

[BCSpace]

Given that at least you believe in Noah and a flood I would say move it down to 4%.

 

Thanks, but better not.  For example: 

 

I also don't accept that the earth literally fell in space, say from orbiting Kolob to orbiting the Sun.  While perhaps not consistently taught, it is mentioned in doctrinal sources.

 

I don't accept a Fall date of around 4000 B.C.  I think the Church is merely going with Ussher's chronology in the absence of specific revelation.

 

I don't accept that the continents were separated shortly after the Flood.

 

I question the notion that the garden was here in Missouri or anywhere in the Americas because such is based on two verses that don't say any such thing.  The ancient Greeks, however, did say that the location of the garden of the Hesperidies, an analog of Eden, was in the "far west".

 

Perhaps a few other minor issues (North Pole tribes of Israel?) and policies.

 

My judgement of what is major/important doctrine leads me to the 5% figure.  Others certainly might attach more importance to them than I do.

Edited February 6, 2014 by BCSpace

[Stone holm]

Heavenly Father and Heavenly Mother create Adam and Eve via procreation and place them in a limited area known as the Garden of Eden.  God terraforms the Earth and allows evolution to do its thing, possibly tweaking it from time to time which gives rise to various types of humanoids.  God places a tree in the Garden of Eden which either has some form of virus or chemical which causes a change in Adam and Eve's physical make-up when eaten.  Adam and Eve happily play in their nudist colony for possibly billions of years, but eventually they eat the fruit.  By this time the Earth has evolved to a State in which Adam and Eve can survive and thrive.  They are expelled from the Garden of Eden into this comparatively "lone and dreary world."   The Earth being relatively uncontaminated by agricultural practices, they live an extraordinarily long life span as do some of their descendants.  Some of their descendants break covenants and interbreed with the humanoids which developed outside of the Garden.   Modern geneticists have difficulty sorting it all out, but determine that Homo Sapiens did interbreed with at least Neanderthals and probably others.  Humans become science deniers and eventually trigger WWIII because of their stupidity.  Earth becomes uninhabitable for hundreds of thousands of years.  God starts the cycle all over again.  End of story.

[Rob Osborn]

Thanks, but better not.  For example: 

 

I also don't accept that the earth literally fell in space, say from orbiting Kolob to orbiting the Sun.  While perhaps not consistently taught, it is mentioned in doctrinal sources.

 

I don't accept a Fall date of around 4000 B.C.  I think the Church is merely going with Ussher's chronology in the absence of specific revelation.

 

I don't accept that the continents were separated shortly after the Flood.

 

I question the notion that the garden was here in Missouri or anywhere in the Americas because such is based on two verses that don't say any such thing.  The ancient Greeks, however, did say that the location of the garden of the Hesperidies, an analog of Eden, was in the "far west".

 

Perhaps a few other minor issues (North Pole tribes of Israel?) and policies.

 

My judgement of what is major/important doctrine leads me to the 5% figure.  Others certainly might attach more importance to them than I do.

Lets move to 7% based upon the lost tribes really being in the north country.

[David T]

I hold something very similar to this amazing and poetic Epic of Creation by Steven Peck (the Gilda Trillim frame story is just that - a fictional frame story - the poem is Peck's).

 

God watched. Observed. Found. Guided. Let nature also run its course. The Earth was created the way a business is created - a purpose-less building that is already standing is filled with people who had not been given a united purpose before - and then they are all given purpose, and something New is born.

 

God found a world whose conditions would be perfect as a place to unite his spirit children (who he also found and adopted) and guide them through progression. A world where consciousness was emerging, a world where beautiful and freely evolved human life and conscience would be able to react, respond, and work with God's spirits. In uniting emerging humanity with his children, and giving the world a new purpose - a training ground, a school - the Earth was divinely created as a place for spirits to grow and progress in the midst of brutal natural laws of entropy and decay.

 

Tribes and groups arose, looked around them, started grasping at the unknowable. Asked questions, told stories. They formed their own frameworks of worlds - and God, piece by piece, revealed himself at work in those worlds.

 

Eventually, a few tribal nations formed themselves into a united pact, and became Israel. They shared many of the stories of their neighbors, but also understood things differently. Their poets and prophets began to revise, add, and re-interpret the stories in light of their experience and divine light. Once again, a new conceptual world was created, and God revealed his hand in that world, as they conceived it. Genesis 2 moving forward expresses our earliest look at this world.We see the raising of a clay-created man into one who is "like the gods". We see the explanations of observable mysteries in nature (why do human women yell in childbirth while animals don't appear to have pain? Where did music come from? Who made wine? Why are there different nations? Why are there different languages? Why are we fighting with these nations? How are we unique?)  - in all the answers, the consistent theme was that God was involved in the development of their lives and cultures. That he had an interest in them. God, in these early stories, was in control, but also had doubts, he could be persuaded, he could be calmed down, he could be reasoned with.

 

As Adam Miller, author of the Maxwell Institute's latest book Letters to a Young Mormon put it, "I believe in a literal reading of this text. I believe the Hebrews literally thought the world was like that, and I believe that God literally ran with it and revealed his grace at work in their lives through it.  More, I believe that God is just as literally showing himself to us in and through the continually rolling revelation that is science as we know it.  The world given to us is not the same world given to them.  We have two worlds here.  But though our worlds diverge, it is the same God peeping through.  Believing that the God of their world is just as surely the God of ours doesn’t commit us to believing in their version of the world.  Rather, it commits us to believing in a God whose grace is full enough to fill them both.” "

 

As life progressed, aspects of the story and their paradigms had to shift with the reality of strife, war, and unexpected defeats. Old understandings had to be pondered, reconsidered. New light was sought, new meanings from the old. Prophets condemned kings and the citizens alike for clinging to mindless tradition over dealing with the problems of the suffering there and now. Conceptual frameworks of worlds would pass away, but God would not. God could inhabit all paradigms, all worlds. Cataclysmic events were in many ways 'the end of the world' - worldviews, expectations, and paradigms were shattered, and new worlds had to be crafted again, often times using the foundations of the explanations and texts describing the old. The texts were 'translated' from a context of the old world to the new present and living world.

 

Humanity progressed in light and knowledge, and God helped them see Him at work in the new world, and how he helped them move from the former to the latter.

 

When Jesus was born, God revealed his true nature in him. A unique Son of God revealed, through his life and actions, that many characteristics which had been attributed to God in the past were not correct. The inklings of the central relationshiip of God as the ideal, loving Father of all began to be revealed. A God who wasn't a king who forced his subjects to commit violence, but a God who was subject to the violence and passions of man. The old scriptures were again seen in a new light, re-interpreted to showcase this new knowledge of God.

 

And the same continues in our day, with Christ and his life as the Zenith, the standard. New prophets given new light and knowledge. The world sciences and observation and abilities have led to ourselves being found in a new world than that of the ancients, and yet our telling of the sacred story is "patterned after the old one where we used to live".  Joseph retranslated the Bible into the language of his doctrinal and lived worldview. We live in a new world. And God is pouring out his spirit on not just our Prophets, but all flesh.

[Nofear]

 

Apparently Mormons don't really believe in evolution.

 

For my part, I think evolution is real and used in the Creation of worlds. It is, however, a necessarily incomplete account of humanity -- a species which spans countless star systems (as do other species as well).

Edited February 6, 2014 by Nofear

[longview]

The two huge question marks in physics are dark matter and dark energy but dark matter does not appear to absorb or interact with light (photons). That is assuming they exist. They are inferred because "something" is causing what we see.

 

In any case the main direct evidence for the Big Bang is not light but cosmic background radiation.

 

Seems to me that red-shifting of stars and galaxies is what led to the Big Bang Theory.  Outermost objects are thought to be receding from us at much higher velocity than intermediate objects.  According to related Wikipedia articles, observations of receding galaxies started in the 1910's.  Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) was first predicted in 1948.  It consists of lower frequency spectrum as explained in the article:

 

Cosmic background radiation is electromagnetic radiation from the sky with no discernable source. The origin of this radiation depends on the region of the spectrum that is observed. One component is the cosmic microwave background radiation. This component is redshifted photons that have freely streamed from an epoch when the Universe became transparent for the first time to radiation. Its discovery and detail observations of its properties are considered one of the major confirmations of the Big Bang.

The Sunyaev–Zel'dovich effect shows the phenomena of radiant cosmic background radiation interacting with "electron" clouds distorting the spectrum of the radiation.

There is also background radiation in the infrared, x-rays, etc., with different causes, and they can sometimes be resolved into an individual source.

 

I still am interested in finding out if photons could be red-shifted to due to two possible causes:  steady splitting of subquark components and/or passing through various kinds of fields.  Either could account for the steady increase in the wavelength as a function of time/distance.  The CMB could possibly represent the latter end of the lifespan of those particular photons as they "fade out."  Hence the limiting radius of observable region of the Universe.

[thesometimesaint]

 

I had this conversation with a co-worker years ago:

 

him:  I believe evolution is fact.

 

me:  What do you think will happen when you die?  Will there be no trace left of you when your body crumbles completely to dust?  Will there be any "essence" remaining of you?  Will it be as if you never existed?

 

him:  hmmmm, I think there will be something . . .

 

me:  Do you believe that your spirit person will separate from your body at the time of death?

 

him:  Yes.

 

me:  Then what conceivable reason (or need) would evolution have for "creating" a spirit essence or person?

 

him:  [speechless] with shrugging of shoulders.

 

 

======================================================================

 

 

A question for doctors of physics:

 

Did the Big Bang happen?

 

Is the only evidence for it based on the "red shift" seen in photons reaching our eyes from various places in the Universe?

 

We know that elements decay at a certain rate where sub-atomic particles are emitted.  Could the same thing happen for photons?  If so, the wavelength within the photon would become longer (indicating loss of energy).  The longer the photon has to travel, the more steadily would it be decaying and shifting to the longer wavelengths.  The shift would be much greater for a photon that has been traveling for 15 light-years than for one that traveled for 5 light-years.

 

What if the "lifespan" of photons is less than 30 light-years?  Then we would not be able to visually observe anything of the Universe beyond the radius of 30 light-years.  What if God is able to see in other set of dimensions?  That we are unable to access these things?  Also, God would not be constrained by time delays regardless of distances of various parts of the Universe?

 

 

======================================================================

 

 

Religion does not have a conflict with science.  All "scientific" truths are wholly contained within God's truths.  The only problem with science is that scientists are forced to make numerous assumptions and projections about all kinds of factors in order to develop their theories.  We do not know how God performed His creative works but we can learn a few of the details, some figuratively, some literally.

 

Global warming false hysteria?  CO2 only makes 0.000397 of the atmosphere (trace gas) but it is critical for plants and animals.  Makes you question why would the EPA want to classify CO2 as a "pollutant" ?  Water vapor (not droplets) is a much more powerful greenhouse gas than CO2 (even considering equal volumes of vapor and CO2, vapor still has multiples stronger effect than CO2).   Scientists have observed simultaneous rise in temperatures in all the planets in our Solar System.  It is NOT due to global warming but most definitely caused by cyclic changes in the Sun.  But the alarmists refuse to discuss the Sun.  The Michael Mann "hockey stick" projection of global warming?  He deliberately left off the data from the Medieval Warm Period (about 1000 A.D, the "Little Ice Age" occurred about 1300 A.D.) and misreported the temperature readings in various locations (such as stations in "heat islands" of major cities).  Computer projections of Global Warming?  Those people refuse to allow impartial review of the programming code for how calculations are being made.  Why?  Because it is bunk.  Remember the kerfuffle at the University of East Anglia?  The hundreds emails that were unearthed showed the cynicism of the so called scientist who make their living off Government funding and phony research grants).

 

I could go on and on about various abuses various kinds of professors and researchers and scientists.  The debate is NOT settled.  Do not be fooled.  Keep questioning.

 

 

I'm not a Doctor of any type. My specialty is Social Work. But I'll answer your questions as best I can.

 

Yes the Big Bang did happen some 13.798 ± 0.037 billion years ago.

http://science.nasa.gov/astrophysics/focus-areas/what-powered-the-big-bang/

 

No it is not based only on the Red Shift. There is lots of other evidences for it.

http://www.ugcs.caltech.edu/~yukimoon/BigBang/BigBang.htm

 

Yes protons decay. But on far longer time scales.

https://van.physics.illinois.edu/qa/listing.php?id=1207

 

By definition science can't posit any God or Godlike force. Individual scientists however are free to believe or not believe as they choose.

 

The burning of any carbon based material combines oxygen with carbon to produce CO2. CO2 is a pollutant to animals.That is basic chemistry. We breathe out CO2 with every breath. Basic biology.

 

Water vapor is a trailing indicator. It merely reflects the action of heat on water. That is basic chemistry.

 

Sun light has an effect. That is well accounted for. It is however NOT the primary force of Global Warming CO2 is.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O4BJDwI8zSk#t=193

 

CO2 is a known FACT to trap heat. That was established in 1898. The known amounts of CO2 in the air have varied over time. From the lows of 180ppm(Ice Age)  to highs of 280 ppm(interglacial warm periods). We've blown right passed 380 ppm with no slow down in sight.  We've been recording temperatures for over 150 years. The earth is heating up.

 

We know precious little about other planets. So to posit that because Mars is heating up because of increased sun activity is speculative at best. http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2005/10/global-warming-on-mars/

 

The "Medieval Warm Period" was specific to Europe. NOT the entire earth.

http://www.ipcc.ch/ipccreports/tar/wg1/070.htm

 

The East Anglia research has been vindicated.

http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/jul2010/2010-07-08-01.htm

 

I'm always open to questions, and will endeavor to back up what I say from recognized scientists and scientific organizations.

[thesometimesaint]

 

Apparently Mormons don't really believe in evolution.

 

For my part, I think evolution is real and used in the Creation of worlds. It is, however, a necessarily incomplete account of humanity -- a species which spans countless star systems (as do other species as well).

 

Depends on how the question was asked. IIRC the question specifically refused God as a factor. That is a prejudicial question for LDS, and would be an automatic exclusion.

[Nofear]

Yes protons decay. But on far longer time scales.

https://van.physics.illinois.edu/qa/listing.php?id=1207

 

He asked about photons, not protons. In which case you would have replied, no photons do not decay.

[Nofear]

Depends on how the question was asked. IIRC the question specifically refused God as a factor. That is a prejudicial question for LDS, and would be an automatic exclusion.

 

Agreed. The question did not lend itself well to the nuances of LDS thought. Though, given many of the replies in this thread, we still see a great deal of unnecessary skepticism.

[The Nehor]

Seems to me that red-shifting of stars and galaxies is what led to the Big Bang Theory.  Outermost objects are thought to be receding from us at much higher velocity than intermediate objects.  According to related Wikipedia articles, observations of receding galaxies started in the 1910's.  Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) was first predicted in 1948.  It consists of lower frequency spectrum as explained in the article:

 

Cosmic background radiation is electromagnetic radiation from the sky with no discernable source. The origin of this radiation depends on the region of the spectrum that is observed. One component is the cosmic microwave background radiation. This component is redshifted photons that have freely streamed from an epoch when the Universe became transparent for the first time to radiation. Its discovery and detail observations of its properties are considered one of the major confirmations of the Big Bang.

The Sunyaev–Zel'dovich effect shows the phenomena of radiant cosmic background radiation interacting with "electron" clouds distorting the spectrum of the radiation.

There is also background radiation in the infrared, x-rays, etc., with different causes, and they can sometimes be resolved into an individual source.

 

I still am interested in finding out if photons could be red-shifted to due to two possible causes:  steady splitting of subquark components and/or passing through various kinds of fields.  Either could account for the steady increase in the wavelength as a function of time/distance.  The CMB could possibly represent the latter end of the lifespan of those particular photons as they "fade out."  Hence the limiting radius of observable region of the Universe.

I agree that red-shifting is what led to the theory but the radiation is the best evidence for it.

I do not think you are going to find any support for your red-shifting ideas. A field of what would be my question?

[thesometimesaint]

He asked about photons, not protons. In which case you would have replied, no photons do not decay.

 

Fumble eyes betray me again. You are right of course. Photons don't decay.

[Grudunza]

I just listened to the Mormon Matters podcast #48; Mormonism and Evolution. Some very interesting take aways there, including:

That Mormons historically were very open and embracing of science and the idea of evolution, but around 1911 the Church started to be careful not to point one way or the other, and all official declarations about the subject ultimately state as much. Some prominent evolution embracing professors at BYU at the time were dismissed or forced to resign, but were later vindicated by David O' McKay. One was asked to teach again at BYU in 1921, unfortunately on the day he died.

That the bulk of anti-evolution sentiment and belief in the church seems to stem from the 50's with publications and statements by Joseph Fielding Smith and Bruce McConkie, both of which the Church officially deemed to be stating their own opinions on the matter. But riding a wave of creationist thinking, those views seemed to become ingrained into our theology, creating a sharp conflict at BYU between the biology and theology departments that lasted until the 80's or so.

That our theology seems perfectly suited, moreso than most others, to embrace evolution.

That wording in the JST suggests that not only is God meant to be plural in Genesis, but so is Adam.

---

My personal feeling is that God uses the process of evolution as an engineering tool for populating worlds, or at least this one, in which its application seems certain. If we are eternal spirits placed into mortal bodies, then those bodies being formed by an evolutionary process seems perfectly justifiable to me, and my body is no less sacred or important to me because of that.

I take some scriptures like the creation story as a combination of literal events and inspired poetry... We are all Adams (or Eves, for the ladies) in a broad sense of how what went down there (literally or not) applies to us. It resonates to all mankind.

I also apply some measure of grapevine fudging to some scriptural stories, in particular the flood (but also possibly the creation/fall). Was a man inspired by God to build a large vessel to protect his family and as many animals as he could fit from a large and devastating flood? And were others warned about the flood who scoffed? Sure, that all seems reasonable. But I can see where things could have been embellished as the story was shared to a point where it was a worldwide flood and two of every animal was taken. The take away from the story (trust God, be prepared, repent) is no less important, either way. But one is the Hollywood "based on a true story" (i.e., not very true), and one is the true story (probably).

I believe that there is a truth to all things, that there are laws that govern all things, and that God adheres to those laws. People and their ideas and thoughts can be manipulated, but there's a truth that exists which everything is accountable to. True science will merge with true religion, if we can ever understand both well enough. So all that God has done and all that we consider "miracles" are things that have some basis in laws of physics and biology and astronomy, but which we have no real understanding of to appreciate. Jesus, though, having created the world and all things, knows the science of all things and ways to walk on water, heal people, etc. The power of the priesthood is a real power, just with a source that we and the world can't fully grasp or define in scientific terms. As JS said, all spirit is matter, just more fine and not detectable or measureable with our current abilities.