6th Century BC Horse Harness in North America

[The Nehor]

5 hours ago, canard78 said:

- If you were to start from the other end of the process...  the archaeology, not the BoM, is there any evidence at all that would lead someone to believe that Hebrews lived in a great population in Mesoamerica?

Nope.

5 hours ago, canard78 said:

- Anything that suggests that these Hebrews converted to Christianity. 

You have the few reported parallels to Judeo-Christianity reported but they are not conclusive by any means.

5 hours ago, canard78 said:

- Anything to lead someone to independently conclude that these Hebrews are among the ancestors of today's native Americans. 

Probably not.

5 hours ago, canard78 said:

I suggested that there is nothing concrete that leads an independent scholar to conclude any of the above. 

Agreed, without the Book of Mormon at the present time the evidence does not (independent of the Book of Mormon itself) suggest that the Book of Mormon is true.

I find it plausible but many disagree.

[Storm Rider]

12 hours ago, theplains said:

Now you have to show a Nephite/Lamanite connection instead of some other race.

Jim

Hello Jim, in the context of this thread my position is as I stated in my first post - archaeology is always discovering new things that change the way we thought about the past.  Too often individuals, including scholars, become set in what they think they know about the past only to find out that they did not have it correct.  My statement was not directly correlated to the Book of Mormon history, etc.  

I see history as still in flux.  Some parts of the world are well know and other parts of the world remain hidden because there is a lack of knowledge and representative records, etc. that explain that areas culture, peoples, and history.  It is fascinating when they discover new things.

 

Edited June 15, 2016 by Storm Rider

[rodheadlee]

On 6/13/2016 at 6:50 PM, jkwilliams said:

Well, I never rule anything out, but I don't see any evidence of horses anywhere in the time period described, so I don't know how one can be convinced of something with no evidence. 

Funny, they keep throwing them out and calling them anomalies.

[sunstoned]

On 6/14/2016 at 11:23 AM, jkwilliams said:

I did mention the dwarf mammoths of Wrangel, but I am blissfully unaware of any evidence of New World horse remains from Book of Mormon times. Perhaps you can point me to the thread where it was discussed. 

You are not alone John. I am unaware of any credible evidence of horse bones found that date to BoM time.  The same holds true for Elephants.  Judging from real peer reviewed literature, it seems the only proponents of horses in BoM times are a few really desperate Mormon apologists.  When you really think about it, it is kind of sad. 

For those who disagree with this, you can always submit your FAIR research on horses, elephants, cureloms, cumoms and metal smelting, to a refereed publication and see what feedback you get.

Edited June 17, 2016 by sunstoned

[James Tunney]

1 hour ago, sunstoned said:

You are not alone John. I am unaware of any credible evidence of horse bones found that date to BoM time.  The same holds true for Elephants.  Judging from real peer reviewed literature, it seems the only proponents of horses in BoM times are a few really desperate Mormon apologists.  When you really think about it, it is kind of sad. 

For those who disagree with this, you can always submit your FAIR research on horses, elephants, cureloms, cumoms and metal smelting, to a refereed publication and see what feedback you get.

Are there any refereed articles at all supporting historicity?

[Kevin Christensen]

4 hours ago, James Tunney said:

Are there any refereed articles at all supporting historicity?

Of course.  Thousands.   Unless of course, you restrict your choice of referees to those disinclined to consider even the questions valid, as though they are the best qualified to judge and issue a proper "license for seeing."  And even then, we have things like Givens' By the Hand of Mormon published by Oxford University Press.  And a little essay by one Margaret Barker and myself also published by Oxford University Press in Joseph Smith Jr. Reappraisals After Two Centuries.  And if you don't think such publications in from the most prestigious Press in the world don't count as refereed?

Neal Rappleye compiled this list of significant publications:

http://www.studioetquoquefide.com/2015/07/ancient-book-of-mormon-studies-selected.html

Consider this on referees in journals in general.

http://christpantokrator.blogspot.com/2012/11/by-margaret-barker-what-do-i-say.html

FWIW

Kevin Christensen

Bethel Park, PA

Edited June 17, 2016 by Kevin Christensen
Added Neal Rappleye's list

[jkwilliams]

5 hours ago, sunstoned said:

You are not alone John. I am unaware of any credible evidence of horse bones found that date to BoM time.  The same holds true for Elephants.  Judging from real peer reviewed literature, it seems the only proponents of horses in BoM times are a few really desperate Mormon apologists.  When you really think about it, it is kind of sad. 

For those who disagree with this, you can always submit your FAIR research on horses, elephants, cureloms, cumoms and metal smelting, to a refereed publication and see what feedback you get.

As far as I can see, the kind of apologetics Kevin C. and Robert are advocating is akin to taking a painting and overlaying a translucent sheet with another painting and cataloging the places where the lines or contents or colors match. True, I think a lot of the overlap is, well, overstated, but there are some correlations, such as those Kevin and Robert have mentioned. But when you step back, you're still looking at two different paintings. The big picture doesn't match, and for all the possible "bullseyes," there is an infinite number of points that do not match. 

The big picture for the Book of Mormon is the existence of an exiled Hebrew, later proto-Christian, community that became a dominant political, social, and military presence somewhere in the Americas for over a thousand years. Sure, you can find points of convergence, as John Clark put it, but, so far, nothing in the archaeological record suggests that such a community existed, let alone had any impact on the broader culture. I'm sure I'm going to get attacked for saying that, but it's how I see it.

[Kevin Christensen]

21 minutes ago, jkwilliams said:

As far as I can see, the kind of apologetics Kevin C. and Robert are advocating is akin to taking a painting and overlaying a translucent sheet with another painting and cataloging the places where the lines or contents or colors match. True, I think a lot of the overlap is, well, overstated, but there are some correlations, such as those Kevin and Robert have mentioned. But when you step back, you're still looking at two different paintings. The big picture doesn't match, and for all the possible "bullseyes," there is an infinite number of points that do not match. 

The big picture for the Book of Mormon is the existence of an exiled Hebrew, later proto-Christian, community that became a dominant political, social, and military presence somewhere in the Americas for over a thousand years. Sure, you can find points of convergence, as John Clark put it, but, so far, nothing in the archaeological record suggests that such a community existed, let alone had any impact on the broader culture. I'm sure I'm going to get attacked for saying that, but it's how I see it.

Notice that it's the metaphors and background assumptions that do the real work here.   That is how ideology and paradigm works.  To actually expose the critical implications of your guiding ideology, how they frame both where you look and how you assign significance and value to what you see, and define how you decide what counts as evidence and what is merely "some things they have guessed right among so many", to deal with what Barbour shows are "networks of assumptions" and to actually test the paradigms requires far more work and more risk.

Just saying.

Kevin Christensen

 

[jkwilliams]

1 minute ago, Kevin Christensen said:

Notice that it's the metaphors and background assumptions that do the real work here.   That is how ideology and paradigm works.  To actually expose the critical implications of your guiding ideology, how they frame both where you look and how you assign significance and value to what you see, and define how you decide what counts as evidence and what is merely "some things they have guessed right among so many", to deal with what Barbour shows are "networks of assumptions" and to actually test the paradigms requires far more work and more risk.

Just saying.

Kevin Christensen

 

Sure, we all operate under ideology, whether or not we think we do. Your ideology, for example, asserts that I would say something like "some things they have guessed right among so many." Either way, it seems rather presumptuous to say that someone else hasn't done the work to test the paradigms. I fully recognize that my paradigm is my own, but I refuse to suggest that someone else is narrow-minded and unwilling to work and take risks because their paradigm is different.

[Kevin Christensen]

It's good that you're not even hinting that I am narrow minded and unwilling to work and take risks because my paradigm is different.

And there is no conceptual similarity between the notion that " Sure, you can find points of convergence" and "some things they may have guessed right, among so many."

I see elaborate details that matter, not random parallels, but elaborate meaningful convergence.

http://ldsmag.com/article-1-1644/

And a setting that works and therefore, adds to the meaning and complicates the convergence.

http://www.webring.org/l/rd?ring=mormonsites;id=2;url=http%3A%2F%2Fbomgeography.poulsenll.org%2F

Which problems are more significant to have solved?  For that matter, how do we go about defining what is a problem and what is significant?  I notice that Coe has exactly nothing to say about any of this. He doesn't notice, doesn't account for it, doesn't come up with any kind of explanation for it, other that Joseph was a fraud who made it all up, was a genius, and got caught up in his own mythology.  He's paying attention to different things, making different assumptions, and in many obvious cases, badly misreading the Book of Mormon, even though he did actually read it once upon a time. 

It's not just about work, but the kind of work, the kind of awareness sought, the kinds of comparisons made, the self-reflection, the willingness to explicitly state and expose assumptions, and explore the implications of those assumptions, for instance, that this exiled community, the thirty or so refugees who likely did not spent their eight years in the desert and a long sea voyage going to Jerusalem architectural school, is going to produce an archeologically distinctive culture and iconography rather than simply taking on the local material culture they found when they arrived.  My Dad showed us the foundations of a few houses and a few yards of sidewalk, which were all that remained of one of the towns he grew up in in Central Utah.  Exactly how much of the faith, belief, and social life of that town could you get from that?  Would you know that they used to spread a big sheet on the floor of the community hall under the folding chairs they used to make it easier to clean up the shells of pine nuts that they snacked on during movies?  Would you know what movies they showed?  Would you know who got drunk and got into a fist fight every Saturday night?  Could you tell who was Catholic or Mormon or Protestant or Irish, Greek, Scandinavian, or Black?  And that is only 90 years ago.

FWIW

Kevin Christensen

Canonsburg, PA

 

[jkwilliams]

1 minute ago, Kevin Christensen said:

It's good that you're not even hinting that I am narrow minded and unwilling to work and take risks because my paradigm is different.

And there is no conceptual similarity between the notion that " Sure, you can find points of convergence" and "some things they may have guessed right, among so many."

I see elaborate details that matter, not random parallels, but elaborate meaningful convergence.

http://ldsmag.com/article-1-1644/

And a setting that works and therefore, adds to the meaning and complicates the convergence.

http://www.webring.org/l/rd?ring=mormonsites;id=2;url=http%3A%2F%2Fbomgeography.poulsenll.org%2F

Which problems are more significant to have solved?  For that matter, how do we go about defining what is a problem and what is significant?  I notice that Coe has exactly nothing to say about any of this. He doesn't notice, doesn't account for it, doesn't come up with any kind of explanation for it, other that Joseph was a fraud who made it all up, was a genius, and got caught up in his own mythology.  He's paying attention to different things, making different assumptions, and in many obvious cases, badly misreading the Book of Mormon, even though he did actually read it once upon a time. 

It's not just about work, but the kind of work, the kind of awareness sought, the kinds of comparisons made, the self-reflection, the willingness to explicitly state and expose assumptions, and explore the implications of those assumptions, for instance, that this exiled community, the thirty or so refugees who likely did not spent their eight years in the desert and a long sea voyage going to Jerusalem architectural school, is going to produce an archeologically distinctive culture and iconography rather than simply taking on the local material culture they found when they arrived.  My Dad showed us the foundations of a few houses and a few yards of sidewalk, which were all that remained of one of the towns he grew up in in Central Utah.  Exactly how much of the faith, belief, and social life of that town could you get from that?  Would you know that they used to spread a big sheet on the floor of the community hall under the folding chairs they used to make it easier to clean up the shells of pine nuts that they snacked on during movies?  Would you know what movies they showed?  Would you know who got drunk and got into a fist fight every Saturday night?  Could you tell who was Catholic or Mormon or Protestant or Irish, Greek, Scandinavian, or Black?  And that is only 90 years ago.

FWIW

Kevin Christensen

Canonsburg, PA

 

I'm not suggesting anything about you. I appreciate that you see meaningful convergence where others don't, but I reject the notion that not seeing it makes someone lazy or narrow-minded or incapable of self-reflection, as is clearly the unsubtle thesis of your recent posts. 

[James Tunney]

2 hours ago, Kevin Christensen said:

Of course.  Thousands.   Unless of course, you restrict your choice of referees to those disinclined to consider even the questions valid, as though they are the best qualified to judge and issue a proper "license for seeing."  And even then, we have things like Givens' By the Hand of Mormon published by Oxford University Press.  And a little essay by one Margaret Barker and myself also published by Oxford University Press in Joseph Smith Jr. Reappraisals After Two Centuries.  And if you don't think such publications in from the most prestigious Press in the world don't count as refereed?

Neal Rappleye compiled this list of significant publications:

http://www.studioetquoquefide.com/2015/07/ancient-book-of-mormon-studies-selected.html

Consider this on referees in journals in general.

http://christpantokrator.blogspot.com/2012/11/by-margaret-barker-what-do-i-say.html

FWIW

Kevin Christensen

Bethel Park, PA

That's it? So is this why you need to argue for a paradigm shift?

[jkwilliams]

Just now, James Tunney said:

That's it? So is this why you need to argue for a paradigm shift?

Kuhn argues that paradigms shift when they are no longer sufficient to explain a growing number of anomalies. What I see here is someone trying to come up with anomalies in order to persuade people to shift their paradigm, which is kind of backwards.

[Kevin Christensen]

So "That's it?" is a careful consideration and examination?  You asked for this kind of thing, relevant studies in refereed publications.  Did you actually read all of them?  Or any?

My pointing to Barker's interesting view is to highlight the role of paradigms in the formation of journals and what they take seriously, or not, and who and what gets published.  To simply assume that they have no ideological stake and are operating under pure objectivity and pursuit of truth, come what may, and never mind anything else, strikes me as naive.

I've been writing extensively about paradigms and paradigm debate for years.  It's important to know what is at stake, and how and why an individual can change paradigms, and just as importantly, how and why communities form, grow or not, and succeed or not.  Paradigm debate is a value-based decision, not a rule based decision.  It is important then to think about whether the values and evidence under consideration are paradigm-dependent, that is, self-referential.  And a consideration of "which paradigm is better?" necessarily involves comparison against a set of values that are not paradigm dependent.  "Not us" is a different issue than seriously considering "Why us and why them?"

Testability, accuracy of key predictions (and consideration of which door a person wants to open is a factor in deciding what is key), comprehensiveness and coherence, fruitfulness (unexpected novelty, seeing things in a new paradigm that a person would never have sought or imagined under the old, simplicity and aesthetics, and future promise, that is, considering which paradigm to follow in dealing with problems that neither candidate has yet solved.

Appealing to tradition, or a favorite teacher or set of authorities, or narrowing the field of discussion of one's own pet problem, doesn't fully engage what really goes on and what really matters most.

If all you see here is someone "trying to come up with anomalies" you have not been paying close enough attention to arguments and evidence and perspectives I have been pushing 35 years.  Here for instance, from 1995.

http://publications.mi.byu.edu/fullscreen/?pub=1436&index=8

Just saying.

Kevin Christensen

Canonsburg, PA

Edited June 17, 2016 by Kevin Christensen

[James Tunney]

37 minutes ago, jkwilliams said:

Kuhn argues that paradigms shift when they are no longer sufficient to explain a growing number of anomalies. What I see here is someone trying to come up with anomalies in order to persuade people to shift their paradigm, which is kind of backwards.

It looks like shifting the burden of proof too

[Rajah Manchou]

1 hour ago, Kevin Christensen said:

And a setting that works and therefore, adds to the meaning and complicates the convergence.

http://www.webring.org/l/rd?ring=mormonsites;id=2;url=http%3A%2F%2Fbomgeography.poulsenll.org%2F

I've had this question for a long time, ever since my days when I was trying to make the Meso model fit. I really don't understand the directional system in the Meso model. Its not for lack of wanting or trying, its just not very intuitive. Maybe someone on the board can explain to me like I'm five.

Why are northward and southward given so many more degrees than eastward and westward?

http://bomgeography.poulsenll.org/images/Alma_22_coded.jpg

That's an oval, not a circle. Why?

Edited June 17, 2016 by Rajah Manchou

[ksfisher]

18 minutes ago, Rajah Manchou said:

I've had this question for a long time, ever since my days when I was trying to make the Meso model fit. I really don't understand the directional system in the Meso model. Its not for lack of wanting or trying, its just not very intuitive. Maybe someone on the board can explain to me like I'm five.

Why are northward and southward given so many more degrees than eastward and westward?

http://bomgeography.poulsenll.org/images/Alma_22_coded.jpg

That's an oval, not a circle. Why?

Your last question could be answered by asking "why a cirlce, not an oval?"  Different cultures have different ways of solving problems. 

Brant Gardner does a good job of describing the mesoamerican directional system in this article.

http://www.mormoninterpreter.com/from-the-east-to-the-west-the-problem-of-directions-in-the-book-of-mormon/

[theplains]

On 15/06/2016 at 1:14 AM, Storm Rider said:

It is fascinating when they discover new things.

It will be more fascinating when they can actually show a Nephite or Lamanite connection. In 
the meantime, I would suggest people hold off on going on any Book of Mormon tours.

Jim

[Darren10]

On June 13, 2016 at 3:26 PM, phaedrus ut said:

This is at Cape Espenberg on the north west coast of Alaska at the Bering land bridge.  If we are willing to include anywhere withing a 5000 mile radius of speculated Book of Mormon lands we can also include Western Africa, Spain, and Portugal. 

Phaedrus 

But if it made its way to the Americas, why not further down towards Central America? 

[Darren10]

On June 17, 2016 at 11:05 AM, ksfisher said:

Your last question could be answered by asking "why a cirlce, not an oval?"  Different cultures have different ways of solving problems. 

Brant Gardner does a good job of describing the mesoamerican directional system in this article.

http://www.mormoninterpreter.com/from-the-east-to-the-west-the-problem-of-directions-in-the-book-of-mormon/

Correct. To understand the directional system of the Book of Mormon as outlined in the Mesoamerican model, it Brandt Gardner showed that we should implament the ancient Mesoamerica concept of directions. Forget facing North making it directly ahead, loaationg South directly behind, West to the left and East ot the right. Instead, the Aztecs thought of 45 degrees. Everything within a 45 degree arch in front of you is "North". Same goes for South, West, and East. That places the hypothetical locations of the Book of Mormon cities and waters precisely where they should be in the Mesoamerican model. It is very interesting that an ancient Mesoamerican system of thought helps to iron out discrepancies in making the Mesoamerican model work. 

[Damien the Leper]

I'm still privy to this theory: