Poll Regarding Our View Of Where The Non-Spiritual Evidence Leads

[MichelleD]

I agree with your first paragraph but I would also add in the 2nd, the first doesn't have bearing on if the Church is true or not as well.

What does it even mean to say that the church is TRUE? That has always seemed like an odd statement. For me, the scriptures and teachings contain great true principles to live by...but then, some of the church claims or teachings don't ring so true for me in my life. So saying that the "church is true" seems strange to me.

[pogi]

I can say this, the idea that a Christian people came from Jerusalem, who called themselves Christian even before Christ was born would be concidered a radical interpretation of archeological, sociological and DNA evidence.  Throw in horses, elephants, steel swords, reformed Egyptian, chariots, animal husbandry, etc. You would be hard pressed to have any scientist listen to you.  If it was not for the Book of Mormon, I don't think that any scientist would have come anywhere near such an understanding of the early American peoples based purely on the evidences at hand.  The evidences of the early American people simply would not have been, and are not, interpreted that way.  I personally would not believe in the Book of Mormon without any spiritual evidence. 

[Brian 2.0]

My question goes for those who picked one of the last 3 answers.  There are a handful that picked the 2nd to last option of the evidence STRONGLY SUPPORTING the truth claims on the chruch.

 

The chruch is obviously very small at this point from a population standpoint.  Why do you think that more people are not joining?  Is it mainly because people have not been exposed to these evidences?  If the evidence is that good, shouldn't we have a group joining even though they have no spiritual witnesses?  (maybe we do have this, I know know.)

 

If there was some worldwide broadcast with a huge viewership where you had the evidences laid out for both sides as best as could be laid out... would there be a large influx of membership into the church, even without a spiritual witness?  

[Robert F. Smith]

Take out faith, take out one's spiritual experiences.  Where does the History, study of Doctrine, theology, the evidences and problems.... where do these intellectually lead us?

If I did this right there should be a poll included with this thread.  Where does the Evidence lead you?

If It did not show up the questions are below as well and we can discuss.

 

 

 

Where Do you come out on the evidence?

Taking strictly a logical view at Church history, Doctrine, and theology where does the evidence lead you?  Votes are not public - eliminate spiritual experiences and their weight from your answer.

1.  The evidence leans one to conclude absolutely the Church is not actually installed by God as the Church claims.  It is man made completely.

2. The evidence leads very strongly towards a conclusion the Church is not what it claims.

3.  The evidence is only moderately in favor of the LDS Church not being what it claims.

4.  The evidence is split right down the middle and therefore is entirely a matter of choice.

5.  The evidence is only moderately in favor of the LDS Church being what it claims.

6.  The evidence leads very strongly towards a conclusion the Church is what it claims.

7.  The evidence leans one to conclude absolutely the Church is what it claims to be.

The problem with your poll is that the two extremes demand an absolute conclusion, something a jury doesn't need (beyond a reasonable doubt), and something that no intellectual worth his salt could reach.

 

The question is truly intellectual in nature and requires of the person passing judgment considerable sophistication (something not needed for spiritual judgments).  I would throw out all votes in the extreme categories, just as professors will throw out the high and low scores at test time.  The outliers just skew the data.  What we have here is really just an opinion poll, not a poll rigidly tied to empirical data.  It is far too subjective.  A comparative analysis with a variety of belief systems (religious and non-religious) would be much better.

[Robert F. Smith]

I first voted that the evidence is split down the middle.   Then I read the whole question which says that i have to remove faith and spirituality from the equation.  Logically speaking,  I would have to say that there the evidence against the church outweighs the evidence for it. So I switched my voted to option 5.

 

In my opinion the best evidence in favor of the church are these:

 

1. Eyewitness accounts of the Book of Mormon translation process.

 

2. The three and eight witnesses.

 

3. Nahom

 

The evidence not in favor of the church would be too long of a list.

What in your opinion are the top three objective reasons why not?

[Robert F. Smith]

......................................................   

  I do not believe the Book of Abraham was translated from the papyrus and it seems the church is even leaning towards this now too.

A good many people believe that, mistakenly I think.  I see no evidence to indicate that the LDS Church (the Brethren or the whole congregation?) is leaning in that direction at all.

 

.....................................  Heck, what was considered anti-Mormon even a year ago is now being published in the new essays on lds.org (ie. the head in the hat translation, seer stones, Book of Mormon DNA, multiple versions of the first vision and so on).  I know they were considered to be anti-Mormon because as I brought them up in my discussions with my leaders when I was struggling I was flat out told that those were "anti-Mormon lies".  Now they are written about on the church's own website!

.............................................................  

Your leaders were quite wrong and very poorly informed.  The stone in the hat business has never been a specifically anti-Mormon claim, although anti-Mormons love to exploit the innocent faith of Saints who don't know their history.  In that way, the anti-Mormons show their complete lack of moral and ethical standards.  Honest people never lie to attack or defend.

[Robert F. Smith]

The minute I opened the door to the church possibly not being true is when my crisis began.  Before, I would never have had the ability to even entertain the notion, it just wasn't part of my existence, I'd been programmed since infancy of it's truthfulness, and with parables and teachings taught to me in my youth.  But finding things out about the church that were shocking, opened the door.  Maybe there is a way to shut the door and bask in a surety, but it might take some time.     

 

........................................................ 

Brother Brigham used to say that we shouldn't live on "borrowed light."  At least once we are adults.  He insisted that we need to know for ourselves whether the LDS faith is true or not.  So, welcome to a more challenging faith decision, Tacenda.  That's the way it's supposed to be.

 

Or, as D. Michael Quinn said:  "The unexamined faith is not worth having."

Edited February 14, 2014 by Robert F. Smith

[Bob Crockett]

Your leaders were quite wrong and very poorly informed.  The stone in the hat business has never been a specifically anti-Mormon claim, although anti-Mormons love to exploit the innocent faith of Saints who don't know their history.  In that way, the anti-Mormons show their complete lack of moral and ethical standards.  Honest people never lie to attack or defend.

I will say again that I think that stone in the hat story to be quite improbable.   David Whitmer talks about it but he wasn't a witness.  I just don't see a flowing manuscript, with few corrections, to come from a guy with his face in a hat the entire time.   I work with stenographers all the time and they have a 5 % error rate when they are staring at my lips four feet away.  And I stop for corrections. Cowdery wasn't a stenographer.  

[rodheadlee]

^{You left out the option: This is a stupid poll. I can't vote leaving out faith, I have known Jesus Christ since I was 4 years old.}

[Brian 2.0]

^{You left out the option: This is a stupid poll. I can't vote leaving out faith, I have known Jesus Christ since I was 4 years old.}

Then you kindly restrain from taking the poll instead of belittling a thread some of us enjoy taking part in.

[Rivers]

What in your opinion are the top three objective reasons why not?

BOM anachronisms

Book of Abraham

Priesthood ban

[Kenngo1969]

... But, I don't there's enough evidence to disprove the church claims. Otherwise they'd have been disproven. ... If a religion is demonstrably false then it probably doesn't last long.

Shhh!  Nobody tell Tom Phillips, et al!  (Will you be testifying for the Defense?)

[DBMormon]

I will say I fully expected the answers to be heavily in options 2-5 and yet it fell on the extremes.  I really find options 6&7 to be interesting.  I would love for people who voted in that manner if they are willing, to explain how they see the case so strong. 

[MichelleD]

DBMormon, I've just read that you and FAIR have split.

Are you no longer associated with them? If not, what happened (if you feel you can share that)?

[Buckeye]

I will say I fully expected the answers to be heavily in options 2-5 and yet it fell on the extremes.  I really find options 6&7 to be interesting.  I would love for people who voted in that manner if they are willing, to explain how they see the case so strong. 

 

Because people are naturally subjective and find ways to discard/degrade evidence that conflicts with their view.  The same thing happens with jurors in the US system.  If a jury is hearing a case, odds are there is substantial evidence for both sides.  If the evidence were heavily tilted, the matter would have settled or been plead out.  The major exceptions are criminal cases where the crime is so severe that there can be no "middle ground" on a sentence so the defendant decides he might as well take his chances with the jury. 

 

In a trial, just because the evidence is mixed, most jurors end up siding strongly with one side or the other.  At first they are neutral.  But once they hear some evidence that resonates with them, they become attached to that position and discount anything that challenges their view.  Watch 12 Angry Men sometime to see this effect. 

 

PS - DB, glad to see you're back with the living (referring to your avatar, not FAIR  )

Edited February 14, 2014 by Buckeye

[ALarson]

DBMormon, I've just read that you and FAIR have split.

Are you no longer associated with them? If not, what happened (if you feel you can share that)

I'd like to know if this is true as well.  I have seen this mentioned on other forums, but didn't know how accurate it was.

[DBMormon]

DBMormon, I've just read that you and FAIR have split.

Are you no longer associated with them? If not, what happened (if you feel you can share that)?

Michelle, Thank you for your concern.  I am going to refrain from commenting on this at the moment.  I am sure in the near future you will hear more.

Thanks

Bill

[stemelbow]

I will say I fully expected the answers to be heavily in options 2-5 and yet it fell on the extremes.  I really find options 6&7 to be interesting.  I would love for people who voted in that manner if they are willing, to explain how they see the case so strong. 

 

How are you supposed to eliminate the spiritual evidence when considering this?  What is spiritual and what is not when it comes to evidence? 

 

Is it merely spiritual evidence when one considers the philosophy of the gospel as presented by Mormonism? 

Is the spiritual only that which is the Spirit working with you personally? 

Is living the gospel and getting confirmation of it's usefulness spiritual or is that practical and applied? 

 

 

While you may see clear lines between the spiritual and otherwise I think Mormonism generally and people often see them overlapped and intertwined. 

 

I don't think I even voted, mostly because I think hypotheticals can't possibly represent reality most often.  But I imagine the type of struggle people had when facing your question was, how can we possibly separate out the spiritual when I don't know what is spiritual and what is not.

[mfbukowski]

I respectfully abstain from the poll because I find its central premise erroneous.

 

If we were going on evidence of the kind required in the first place, there is no God.

 

So the whole question is contradictory.

 

Based on evidence alone how could an entity which does not exist "install" ANY organization of any kind as "correct"?

 

Religion has nothing to do with evidence.  DB please revisit that Rorty video.

[DBMormon]

I respectfully abstain from the poll because I find its central premise erroneous.

 

If we were going on evidence of the kind required in the first place, there is no God.

 

So the whole question is contradictory.

 

Based on evidence alone how could an entity which does not exist "install" ANY organization of any kind as "correct"?

 

Religion has nothing to do with evidence.  DB please revisit that Rorty video.

 

I hear you and agree, again I had a purpose in this poll which was to me important.  The poll turned out different then I expected but I still learned something from this.  It was more about those answering then the answers if that makes sense.

[mfbukowski]

Just want everyone to know that I just got a memo from God on this.  I think you all got it too - check your spam folders.

DEAR CHILDREN

 

YOU KNOW I DIDN'T GIVE YOU EVIDENCE OF MY EXISTENCE FOR A REASON.

 

WHY DID YOU THINK I WOULD GIVE YOU EVIDENCE THAT A CHURCH IS TRUE IF I DIDN'T EVEN GIVE YOU EVIDENCE OF MY EXISTENCE?  TRUST YOUR HEART, I KEEP TELLING YOU THAT MY KINGDOM IS IN YOUR HEART BUT NOBODY LISTENS.

 

BEST REGARDS

 

FATHER

[Mola Ram Suda Ram]

You forgot one option. This poll is stupid.

[Duncan]

I voted but now that i really think about it I don't think you can take out the spirit and "My sheep hear my voice" element. my Mum was born and raised in northern Nowhere and never heard of the Church before or met a Mormon before except for one instance.My Mum 's family always went to church and has several relatives who were ministers and stuff. Anyways, when my Mum was growing up she knew a family that drove to California and went through Utah. This family attended Temple square and the tabernacle and even attended Church. They were surprised when at Church someone closed the chapel doors, which was a little unnerving considering that this visiting family weren't members and didn't know what to expect. As their time in Utah was being told to my Mum, she somehow knew exactly what they were talking about as if she has seen all these places and was familiar with them and so when my Mum married my dad and took the discussions, it was a fairly easy transition in the Church and she has been grounded there ever since. Funnily enough when she did join our Church some minister friend of hers tried to Anti her and he had some book on the Church. She was in his office and he had this big bookcase and he tried to find this anti book and he couldn't find it, she saw it but for some reason she didn't tell him where it was!

[saemo]

Is there a "What evidence?" choice. 

Edited February 14, 2014 by saemo

[Brian 2.0]

You forgot one option. This poll is stupid.

 

You forgot one option as well... quietly not taking part.

 

See mfbukoski's post on how to respectifully disagree with the poll.