The Problem Of Historicity

[mfbukowski]

Hi Daniel,

It is a unique experience to dialogue with deep philosophical thinkers. What these philosophers think and the ideas they formulate are very clear within their own minds, but when untrained folks get enmeshed in philosophical discussions with trained philosophers it's exceedingly easy for misunderstandings to prevail because words, and their varied definitions and nuances of meaning, get in the way. Mfbukowski (Mark) often speaks of this "tyranny of words." And while I most certainly can't speak for Mark, I believe he would agree that in the end there actually is a very real history of the human race that will one day be unfolded to human view with complete accuracy by God Himself.

But I think what Mark might be trying to say is that that although there is a real history of the human race, for the time being, while all of us are "looking through a glass darkly," whatever that real history might turn out to be is not nearly as important to our spiritual health as are the impressions of the Spirit.

For example, there are many eyewitness testimonies in the Bible that Jesus rose from the dead, just as there are at least 12 eyewitness testimonies that the gold alloy plates that comprise the Book of Mormon actually exist. But the problem is that today there is absolutely no way to verify beyond doubt that either of these two events took place. Even though many years after the fact we have written eyewitness testimonies that Jesus rose from the dead and that the gold plates of the Book of Mormon were in actuality seen and closely examined by 12 men, there is no way either of these two events could be proven to be true in a court of law because, quite simply, there isn't enough evidence to prove they happened (this is one of the reasons why uncorroborated eye witness accounts and testimonies are very often considered unreliable in today's criminal justice system).

So where does this leave us? The only way one can know that Jesus rose from the dead, or that the ancient gold alloy plates that contain the sacred writings of the Nephites are real is not by scientific or collected historical evidence; the only way one can know if either of these two purportedly factual events are true is by the confirmation of the Spirit of God, as it testifies to our spirits -- a process the Latter-day Saints call divine revelation.

 

Until the day when the Lord sees fit to plainly reveal all of His hidden mysteries to His earthly children, the confirming testimony of the Spirit and not history books will have to suffice. But even in that wondrous day, when the Lord reveals all of the hidden mysteries of the past, the recipients of that knowledge will still have to be spiritually minded in order to discern that what is being revealed to them by God is true, because "the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned" For the Latter-day Saints, the following passage from the Book of Mormon sets forth the primary method for discovering and understanding saving truth:

4 And when ye shall receive these things (the Book of Mormon plus anything else that claims to be of God), I would exhort you that ye would ask God, the Eternal Father, in the name of Christ, if these things are not true; and if ye shall ask with a sincere heart, with real intent, having faith in Christ, he will manifest the truth of it unto you, by the power of the Holy Ghost.

5 And by the power of the Holy Ghost ye may know the truth of all things. (Moroni 10)

Yes, thanks for putting it so well! I get so caught up in my jargon that sometimes I do not communicate well.

[mfbukowski]

Just to make things clear. ERayR misread my post to non-member Daniel, and because of that misreading he erroneously concluded I, an LDS Church member, do not believe God the Father has a body. To set the record straight, I do believe God has a body. The whole point of my post to Daniel was to establish the fact that it is reasonable to believe God the Father is material and that He also has a body. Perhaps you misread my post as well? If so, please go back and reread what I said to Daniel in post #165.

I went back and re-read it later and saw that, but forgot to mention it here. Thanks for setting the record straight- I see clearly that what you are saying is correct. I know that ERayR is usually on a similar wavelength so I just went with his interpretation without questioning it, but later saw that he and I both misunderstood. Edited August 16, 2014 by mfbukowski

[mfbukowski]

I am a theist, but my faith rests on different grounds than emotion and direct experience.

 

[Edit to add that I'm leaving to have a better direct experience than stimulating online conversation.  We're off to the Outer Banks for a couple of days for some sand and ocean fishing.  I'll check in as I can.]

I hope you murder a lot of fish.

[mfbukowski]

I agree that stories can change our lives. Whether we view a movie about an extermination event and "get lost" in the story or view a news report of an actual event and believe it to be true, the emotional response is the same.  In either case, we believe the story (temporarily in the case of the movie) and an emotional response is triggered.  In either case, we have an emotion-producing experience and we're changed.  The problem is that the movie experience corresponds to a fictional event.  The news report experience corresponds to a potentially historical event (if the news report is corroborated).  In both cases the emotional response is the same.  The emotions themselves aren't evidence of anything other than evidence that we experienced an emotional event.  Whether the extermination event we witnessed (on the big screen or in the news report) is actually historically real does not depend on the experience of the life-changing emotions themselves.  Emotions can be attached to true and false events, to real and imaginary objects.  They should never be used as evidence of what's real outside of ourselves.  That's why corroboration is important, to help us sort out which of our experiences refer to true events and real objects in the world.

What I have learned from life is that there is no such thing as an objective report about anything. It is all interpretation of data. That is where we differ. I believe there is never an objective description of "reality"- the very act of attempting that distorts "what really happened"

We cannot divorce ourselves from our own sense-data which colors everything- literally and figuratively. The distinction between appearances and "reality" is often very tenuous.

I answered your last post speaking about murdering fish. I did that for a reason. You will be killing fish, yet calling it "murder" makes one think. "Catching fish" is an innocuous activity, "murdering" them makes it a very different statement.

Which corresponds to reality is up for grabs depending on if you are a member of PETA or not.

[ERayR]

What I have learned from life is that there is no such thing as an objective report about anything. It is all interpretation of data. That is where we differ. I believe there is never an objective description of "reality"- the very act of attempting that distorts "what really happened"

We cannot divorce ourselves from our own sense-data which colors everything- literally and figuratively. The distinction between appearances and "reality" is often very tenuous.

I answered your last post speaking about murdering fish. I did that for a reason. You will be killing fish, yet calling it "murder" makes one think. "Catching fish" is an innocuous activity, "murdering" them makes it a very different statement.

Which corresponds to reality is up for grabs depending on if you are a member of PETA or not.

 

To paraphrase an old saying:  Nobody is objective but you and me and I sometimes wonder about you. 

[mfbukowski]

To paraphrase an old saying:  Nobody is objective but you and me and I sometimes wonder about you. 

I don't know how anybody could think that The News is objective in today's world. Every story has someone disputing it, even if you agree with the reporters politics. Was the victim armed or not? Did he reach for his waistband? Did he twitch the wrong way? What angle did the camera cover? What does the blood splatter really show?

If evidence was objective and indisputable there would never be disagreements about any of it. I don't think we have quite made it that far.

I think it's just naive to believe in objective evidence.

We even use the ambiguity of evidence in the church to CREATE "historicity" for our opinions.  We don't have DNA for Nephites because we don't know what Nephite DNA should look like.

 

We don't have Nephite cities because Nephites actually lived among the Maya as a sub-culture.

 

We don't know Book of Mormon geography but it has to be (insert favorite theory) because (insert your favorite) "evidence" shows it to be the case.

 

The plates must be fraudulent because they would have been too heavy.  No, they were not fraudulent because..... whatever.

 

Evidence is manufactured to order every day to fill our preconceived notions of what it is supposed to show.  The universe is expanding because....  No, that evidence actually shows that the universe is contracting.

 

Light is a particle. Light is a wave.  No, light actually is whatever you set up the experiment to measure

 

We are all so busy creating evidence we actually think we are "finding it out there in objective reality" when in fact our perceptions are what is creating that reality.

 

We cannot escape our own human minds- no one can, and it is illusion to think it is possible.   We can't get outside our own perceptions to check them against a "reality" which exists independent of our minds.

 

It just can't be done!  

 

It seems so simple to me- but no one addresses how we get outside of human experience to see if human experience is "correct"

 

Every one of us just has to go with our own best guesses in the long run.

 

If objective evidence was objective, there would never be disputes about it.

 

In fact, ironically science as we know it would not exist.  There would be no need for experiment and the back and forth conversation with results to create a theory.  Experimental results would always agree independent of interpretation.  There would be no theories, just reality completely open to observation.

 

We would just look out at reality and SEE it instantly without ambiguity.  No "It must be like X because A, B and C show us...."    No guesses, no doubts

 

It's not that way!

Edited August 16, 2014 by mfbukowski

[danielwoods]

The fact that we - you and I - know that God hears and answers prayers shows that He is "immanent" and not "transcendent" in the sense of Greek philosophy. This is a definition thing. The problem with standard Christian theology is that it takes an image of a transcendent God from Greek philosophy and then tries to blend it with the God you and I know from our experiences, who is the God of the Bible.

The point I am making is not about God our Father who loves us, who we know hears and answers prayer, the problem I am discussing is about Christian theology and how God has been represented by Christian philosophers like Augustine and Aquinas- both Catholics- so my point is a philosophical one about the definition of "transcendent"

But we would both agree- if we got together and sat down and just talked about it that the God of our experience is our loving Father.

My point is that traditional Christian theology represents God in a confused way because it incorporates Greek pagan philosophy into Christianity.

I have no quarrel with the point you are making, just your use of the word "transcendent" which I suspect "does not mean what you think it does"

The transcendent gods of the Greeks were beyond the reach of mankind, and were ineffable Ideas, not real people.

Since I never believed in the Greek gods the meaning of transcendent simply means to me, the opposite of physical such as a pantheist would believe about God.

[ERayR]

I don't know how anybody could think that The News is objective in today's world. Every story has someone disputing it, even if you agree with the reporters politics. Was the victim armed or not? Did he reach for his waistband? Did he twitch the wrong way? What angle did the camera cover? What does the blood splatter really show?

If evidence was objective and indisputable there would never be disagreements about any of it. I don't think we have quite made it that far.

I think it's just naive to believe in objective evidence.

We even use the ambiguity of evidence in the church to CREATE "historicity" for our opinions.  We don't have DNA for Nephites because we don't know what Nephite DNA should look like.

 

We don't have Nephite cities because Nephites actually lived among the Maya as a sub-culture.

 

We don't know Book of Mormon geography but it has to be (insert favorite theory) because (insert your favorite) "evidence" shows it to be the case.

 

The plates must be fraudulent because they would have been too heavy.  No, they were not fraudulent because..... whatever.

 

Evidence is manufactured to order every day to fill our preconceived notions of what it is supposed to show.  The universe is expanding because....  No, that evidence actually shows that the universe is contracting.

 

Light is a particle. Light is a wave.  No, light actually is whatever you set up the experiment to measure

 

We are all so busy creating evidence we actually think we are "finding it out there in objective reality" when in fact our perceptions are what is creating that reality.

 

We cannot escape our own human minds- no one can, and it is illusion to think it is possible.   We can't get outside our own perceptions to check them against a "reality" which exists independent of our minds.

 

It just can't be done!  

 

It seems so simple to me- but no one addresses how we get outside of human experience to see if human experience is "correct"

 

Every one of us just has to go with our own best guesses in the long run.

 

If objective evidence was objective, there would never be disputes about it.

 

In fact, ironically science as we know it would not exist.  There would be no need for experiment and the back and forth conversation with results to create a theory.  Experimental results would always agree independent of interpretation.  There would be no theories, just reality completely open to observation.

 

We would just look out at reality and SEE it instantly without ambiguity.  No "It must be like X because A, B and C show us...."    No guesses, no doubts

 

It's not that way!

 

Or: The best evidence shows______.  Not to me it doesn't. 

 

The best evidence is usually tainted towards what one wants it to be.  Data interpretation is so fickle.

[mfbukowski]

Since I never believed in the Greek gods the meaning of transcendent simply means to me, the opposite of physical such as a pantheist would believe about God.

Fair enough.  Technically in a philosophical context, that is not usually how the term is used in my experience.  A lot has been written in Mormon discussions making the distinction much more dramatic, so that is the way I am using it.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immanence

http://www.patheos.com/Resources/Additional-Resources/Transcendence-in-Mormonism-James-Faulconer-03-11-2011

[mfbukowski]

Or: The best evidence shows______.  Not to me it doesn't. 

 

The best evidence is usually tainted towards what one wants it to be.  Data interpretation is so fickle.

We are humans with emotions and dispositions and desires and hopes and dreams, and we cannot possibly divorce those aspects of who we are from anything we do.

 

We are all unique individuals- no two of us have the same DNA or more importantly, the same parents, culture, experiences growing up, etc.  Even in the same family, birth order is a huge factor in who we are.  Even identical twins have arguments and different opinions

 

If we all see the same things differently, who is to decide which is "correct" and which is not?  Look at this board- no one here always agrees on every point with anyone. 

[Helen47]

"We don't have Nephite cities because Nephites actually lived among the Maya as a sub-culture."

[danielwoods]

Hi Daniel,

It is a unique experience to dialogue with deep philosophical thinkers. What these philosophers think and the ideas they formulate are very clear within their own minds, but when untrained folks get enmeshed in philosophical discussions with trained philosophers it's exceedingly easy for misunderstandings to prevail because words, and their varied definitions and nuances of meaning, get in the way. Mfbukowski (Mark) often speaks of this "tyranny of words." And while I most certainly can't speak for Mark, I believe he would agree that in the end there actually is a very real history of the human race that will one day be unfolded to human view with complete accuracy by God Himself.

But I think what Mark might be trying to say is that that although there is a real history of the human race, for the time being, while all of us are "looking through a glass darkly," whatever that real history might turn out to be is not nearly as important to our spiritual health as are the impressions of the Spirit.

For example, there are many eyewitness testimonies in the Bible that Jesus rose from the dead, just as there are at least 12 eyewitness testimonies that the gold alloy plates that comprise the Book of Mormon actually exist. But the problem is that today there is absolutely no way to verify beyond doubt that either of these two events took place. Even though many years after the fact we have written eyewitness testimonies that Jesus rose from the dead and that the gold plates of the Book of Mormon were in actuality seen and closely examined by 12 men, there is no way either of these two events could be proven to be true in a court of law because, quite simply, there isn't enough evidence to prove they happened (this is one of the reasons why uncorroborated eye witness accounts and testimonies are very often considered unreliable in today's criminal justice system).

So where does this leave us? The only way one can know that Jesus rose from the dead, or that the ancient gold alloy plates that contain the sacred writings of the Nephites are real is not by scientific or collected historical evidence; the only way one can know if either of these two purportedly factual events are true is by the confirmation of the Spirit of God, as it testifies to our spirits -- a process the Latter-day Saints call divine revelation.

 

Until the day when the Lord sees fit to plainly reveal all of His hidden mysteries to His earthly children, the confirming testimony of the Spirit and not history books will have to suffice. But even in that wondrous day, when the Lord reveals all of the hidden mysteries of the past, the recipients of that knowledge will still have to be spiritually minded in order to discern that what is being revealed to them by God is true, because "the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned" For the Latter-day Saints, the following passage from the Book of Mormon sets forth the primary method for discovering and understanding saving truth:

4 And when ye shall receive these things (the Book of Mormon plus anything else that claims to be of God), I would exhort you that ye would ask God, the Eternal Father, in the name of Christ, if these things are not true; and if ye shall ask with a sincere heart, with real intent, having faith in Christ, he will manifest the truth of it unto you, by the power of the Holy Ghost.

5 And by the power of the Holy Ghost ye may know the truth of all things. (Moroni 10)

 

This topic, call it the "Pragmatist dilemma"(?), illustrates the difference between historical/traditional Christianity and Mormonism. Why? Clearly, Mormonism rests on personal revelation as the final answer (and for the pragmatist, the only answer). For the traditional view, there is a blend of the two. We don't deny revelation, because it must align with known truth. Further, truth always corresponds to history. Mormons also use this though, for example. Why would Joseph Smith triumphantly claim that he had witnesses to the Gold plates if he wasn't interested in truth that corresponds to history? 

IF he had no witness, or if he had witnesses that testified that he had only Tin plates, not Gold plates, then the argument that you are making now ("The only way to know...") wouldn't hold any weight at all. In fact, you'd have people citing references to those problems. So even Mormons use the correspondence theory of truth. 

I honestly don't see how one can get away from it. 

 

Now, in reading this thread, I understand the dilemma. Our perceptions of reality are never perfect, and no one claims they are or ever will be. But, perfection isn't ever claimed either. For example, the claim that the Gold plates even existed doesn't address the myriad of issue that could be talked about, concerning the details of the plates themselves. So perfection is never achieved, but that doesn't mean that correspondence theory is completely done with. Only that we understand that it has it's limitations. Meaning we can talk at length about whether the gold plates even existed without the expectation that one will ever know the exact weight, size, color, etc. etc. of them. And that discussion is based on correspondence theory, which we intuitively know is an acceptable method of getting to the truth of a matter. 

[teddyaware]

This topic, call it the "Pragmatist dilemma"(?), illustrates the difference between historical/traditional Christianity and Mormonism. Why? Clearly, Mormonism rests on personal revelation as the final answer (and for the pragmatist, the only answer). For the traditional view, there is a blend of the two. We don't deny revelation, because it must align with known truth. Further, truth always corresponds to history. Mormons also use this though, for example. Why would Joseph Smith triumphantly claim that he had witnesses to the Gold plates if he wasn't interested in truth that corresponds to history? 

IF he had no witness, or if he had witnesses that testified that he had only Tin plates, not Gold plates, then the argument that you are making now ("The only way to know...") wouldn't hold any weight at all. In fact, you'd have people citing references to those problems. So even Mormons use the correspondence theory of truth. 

I honestly don't see how one can get away from it. 

 

Now, in reading this thread, I understand the dilemma. Our perceptions of reality are never perfect, and no one claims they are or ever will be. But, perfection isn't ever claimed either. For example, the claim that the Gold plates even existed doesn't address the myriad of issue that could be talked about, concerning the details of the plates themselves. So perfection is never achieved, but that doesn't mean that correspondence theory is completely done with. Only that we understand that it has it's limitations. Meaning we can talk at length about whether the gold plates even existed without the expectation that one will ever know the exact weight, size, color, etc. etc. of them. And that discussion is based on correspondence theory, which we intuitively know is an acceptable method of getting to the truth of a matter.

Other than Biblical place names that correspond to modern places believed to be the sites of the same Biblical locales, what other truths from the Bible can be verified with certainty by the correspondence theory of truth?

[brainburn]

Well I think it is much to do about semantics, frankly.  If you want to call the spirit "super sensory" that's fine with me, but how is that supposed to help us understand any of it?

 

It's just changing a variable in the equation "X" instead of "Y" but the equation remains the same.

I'm thrilled, mf. We've reached a mutual understanding. Here's my best definition of a super sensory experience. It's essentially a moment or stream of moments of consciousness.

 

Super sensory experiences are simply experience of what you previously thought was beyond your (active or passive) capacity to sense. 

 

Do you still agree that spiritual experiences and super sensory experiences are both interchangeable elements in the same formula like you mention ("the equation remains the same.")?

 

I would tend to support the idea that a person's universal paradigm (whether highly spiritual, religious, scientific, etc) is just a little bit centrally and critically relevant to whether you consider a powerful experience spiritual or super sensory. Each experience is mentally crafted a story. But the stories you could tell of super sensory experiences include a selection of stories not necessarily similar to stories of spiritual experiences...? I could begin listing examples but...

 

I think I've typed enough. You should let me know if we're still on the same page before I go into detailed support of the differences between the stories of super sensory experiences and spiritual experiences.

 

It IS relevant to the thread in the sense that it points out that paradigms and how we understand them are based on a cultural context.  I suppose "super sensory" sounds more scientific than "spiritual" but in the final analysis I don't think a scientist would see it that way.   They don't believe in anything "super sensory".

 

 

And one more thing.....

You'll begin to understand that I don't really care about what scientists have to do with the mystery of experience. At least, at the moment.

You'll also soon recognize that I'm not trying to persuade you to apostatize from post-modernism. Because...

 

Really I don't either.  I would all define that as a routine brain function we all have, like the "raw feels" Rorty talks about above.   The bottom line is that emotion and meaning are just as much a part of perception and the way we organize our individual worlds of experience as any scientific observation is- it's just that science presently strips away all of that which cannot be replicated by others.

Many have sought a "Phenomenological Science" which would include a scientific description of all of Being, as Heidegger sought to describe.   This is the sort of thing USU is talking about

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Heidegger

I'm looking to take a deep dive down the rabbit hole, as long as someone is there to talk... not really interested in the people you continue to suggest I should be reading up on. I think I know enough. Their points of view are 1) too long winded and 2) too many steps removed from the real intimate discussions I'd like to be having: old school, point-by-point debates on the unsolvable mysteries of experience.

 

[mfbukowski]

"We don't have Nephite cities because Nephites actually lived among the Maya as a sub-culture."

Well I appreciate your ascribing this idea to me, but unfortunately all you are doing is displaying your ignorance of contemporary Mormon scholarship.

If indeed you understood this thread, you would notice that I am actually attacking that premise.  I suggest perhaps a course in reading comprehension.

 

Syncretizing Nephite and Mesoamerican religions had to deal with concepts of deity. On this most fundamental point, where modern monotheists would see tremendous differences with the Mesoamerican polytheists, there were sufficient perceived similarities that the Nephite explanation of deity could accommodate, or be accommodated to, Mesoamerican ideas about the nature of the divine.

Although the Nephites cannot be equated with the Maya, Maya culture was already widespread in Mesoamerica in the Preclassic period (400 BC–AD 250) and appears to have exerted great influence on surrounding cultures.¹⁸ We have the best data for this culture, thanks to the preponderance of carved stone monuments and ceramic vessels painted with historical and mythological scenes and texts that have been preserved archaeologically. As plausibly influential neighbors of the Nephites, the Maya exemplify the kind of religious ideas to which some Nephites accommodated. Though certainly not homogenous, Maya beliefs and practices bear [Page 35]fundamental similarities to other Mesoamerican cultures and therefore exemplify the points of congruence along which our proposed syncretism occurred.¹⁹

http://www.mormoninterpreter.com/the-cultural-context-of-nephite-apostasy/

http://blog.fairmormon.org/2012/12/19/mormon-fair-cast-121a-mark-wright-and-mayan-mysteries/

http://en.fairmormon.org/Book_of_Mormon/Lamanites/Relationship_to_Amerindians/Maya_and_Olmec

 

And on it goes- just google "nephite mayan" for a large number of hits.

[mfbukowski]

Do you still agree that spiritual experiences and super sensory experiences are both interchangeable elements in the same formula like you mention ("the equation remains the same."

 

I think I've typed enough. You should let me know if we're still on the same page before I go into detailed support of the differences between the stories of super sensory experiences and spiritual experiences.

 

In the first statement you say they are the same. In the second you say there are differences.

   

I'm looking to take a deep dive down the rabbit hole, as long as someone is there to talk... not really interested in the people you continue to suggest I should be reading up on. I think I know enough. Their points of view are 1) too long winded and 2) too many steps removed from the real intimate discussions I'd like to be having: old school, point-by-point debates on the unsolvable mysteries of experience.

Take the dive- but I have a life too and no responsibility to help you on your journey.  I always get this feeling like you expect me to help you in some way, but it is up to you to figure out what your beliefs are.

 

But you do not know more about these points than the best minds who have written about them, and if you don't know what they have said and how they have said it, no one will listen to you.  You have to be able to say "rorty says xyz, but I am not sure if he has gotten z exactly correct because he assumes..... etc.

 

And you better get that statement right, or you will have no audience.  If you don't know the vocabulary you can't communicate, and will re-invent the wheel.  I am suggesting a little humility I guess.  You aren't the first to think about this stuff.

[bcuzbcuz]

I don't know how anybody could think that The News is objective in today's world. Every story has someone disputing it, even if you agree with the reporters politics. Was the victim armed or not? Did he reach for his waistband? Did he twitch the wrong way? What angle did the camera cover? What does the blood splatter really show?

If evidence was objective and indisputable there would never be disagreements about any of it. I don't think we have quite made it that far.

I think it's just naive to believe in objective evidence.

We even use the ambiguity of evidence in the church to CREATE "historicity" for our opinions.  We don't have DNA for Nephites because we don't know what Nephite DNA should look like.

 

We don't have Nephite cities because Nephites actually lived among the Maya as a sub-culture.

 

We don't know Book of Mormon geography but it has to be (insert favorite theory) because (insert your favorite) "evidence" shows it to be the case.

 

The plates must be fraudulent because they would have been too heavy.  No, they were not fraudulent because..... whatever.

 

Evidence is manufactured to order every day to fill our preconceived notions of what it is supposed to show.  The universe is expanding because....  No, that evidence actually shows that the universe is contracting.

 

Light is a particle. Light is a wave.  No, light actually is whatever you set up the experiment to measure

 

We are all so busy creating evidence we actually think we are "finding it out there in objective reality" when in fact our perceptions are what is creating that reality.

 

We cannot escape our own human minds- no one can, and it is illusion to think it is possible.   We can't get outside our own perceptions to check them against a "reality" which exists independent of our minds.

 

It just can't be done!  

 

It seems so simple to me- but no one addresses how we get outside of human experience to see if human experience is "correct"

 

Every one of us just has to go with our own best guesses in the long run.

 

If objective evidence was objective, there would never be disputes about it.

 

In fact, ironically science as we know it would not exist.  There would be no need for experiment and the back and forth conversation with results to create a theory.  Experimental results would always agree independent of interpretation.  There would be no theories, just reality completely open to observation.

 

We would just look out at reality and SEE it instantly without ambiguity.  No "It must be like X because A, B and C show us...."    No guesses, no doubts

 

It's not that way!

You make science, (you even include reality), or anything else that seems to qualify as "observable", as an episode of "Family Feud". To every question we just need to shout out loud, " Survey says........."

That truly sounds like a philosophy on coaster wheels, conveniently moved in front of the winds of popular opinion.

[mfbukowski]

You make science, (you even include reality), or anything else that seems to qualify as "observable", as an episode of "Family Feud". To every question we just need to shout out loud, " Survey says........."

That truly sounds like a philosophy on coaster wheels, conveniently moved in front of the winds of popular opinion.

Thanks for your coaster wheels. When did you take your personal survey?

[mfbukowski]

I'm looking to take a deep dive down the rabbit hole, as long as someone is there to talk... not really interested in the people you continue to suggest I should be reading up on. I think I know enough. Their points of view are 1) too long winded and 2) too many steps removed from the real intimate discussions I'd like to be having: old school, point-by-point debates on the unsolvable mysteries of experience.

You want someone to be there to talk to, but you don't want to listen to what they say. That's a problem.

[cdowis]

"We don't have Nephite cities because Nephites actually lived among the Maya as a sub-culture." 

 

Let's get down to basics.

 

Let us suppose that you are standing in an authentic Nephite  city,  Now tell me how you would identify it.  There are buildings, various artifacts.  How does one identify a "nephite" artifact from somebody else's?  You are holding a jade necklace -- tell us how to tell whether a nephite made it, or a mayan artist.

 

Are we going to look for images of the crucifix, pictures of the Masdonna and child, what exactly are we looking for?  Remember that almost all of the written records have been destroyed.  We really really really really need your help here Helen47 ==>> how EXACTLY do we identify nephite artifacts?  We are hypothetically standing  in a nephite city, so what are we looking for.

 

If you decide not to answer, we will understand.  

Edited August 17, 2014 by cdowis

[3DOP]

You make science, (you even include reality), or anything else that seems to qualify as "observable", as an episode of "Family Feud". To every question we just need to shout out loud, " Survey says........."

That truly sounds like a philosophy on coaster wheels, conveniently moved in front of the winds of popular opinion.

Historically, the term agnostic, has described someone who does not know if there is a God. I wonder, if in these "enlightened" times, we might need to extend the term to include those who do not know if there is anything? "If I have senses they falsify the data, and I think I think, but maybe I am deluded."

[bcuzbcuz]

Thanks for your coaster wheels. When did you take your personal survey?

No coaster wheels here. I know what I know,.... I think.....or? Wait, let me get back to you on that. lol

[thesometimesaint]

Historically, the term agnostic, has described someone who does not know if there is a God. I wonder, if in these "enlightened" times, we might need to extend the term to include those who do not know if there is anything? "If I have senses they falsify the data, and I think I think, but maybe I am deluded."

 

Reality is a common delusion. Or as Einstein said: "Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one"."

[Bikeemikey]

I think yours is some new kind of Mormonism, not the kind I was born into and my LDS friends and family believe in. I've never met another Mormon who believes what you believe. Every Mormon I know believes that their representations of Book of Mormon people and places corresponds with actual facts of history.

Well now you have met two Mormons that think this way.

I fully agree with the claims being made by Mark (is that your name Mrz mf?)

That is then Mormonism I believe in. A restored truth that was post-modern before post-modernity was a thing.

Unfortunately we became to culturally Christian and only radicals like mark and I see the restoration for the true brilliance that it is - a rejection of correspondence and dualism and an acceptance of meaning and reality of infinitely greater power. :-) (only being slightly hyperbolic here!!)

[danielwoods]

Other than Biblical place names that correspond to modern places believed to be the sites of the same Biblical locales, what other truths from the Bible can be verified with certainty by the correspondence theory of truth?

 

Other than just the huge archeological finds... The Shroud is a good one. Which is interesting, because if Jesus hadn't been raised, the shroud would still be in the ground, and not have an image on it.