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'Lazy learner'


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2 hours ago, sunstoned said:

This is why people are reluctant to discuss their experiences on this board.  

Why can't we all just feel free to share our personal beliefs and opinions and experiences even if other people don't agree with us or believe what we are saying?  Why?  Why is that?

Excuse me, I can, and often do, so I suppose I should be asking why some of YOU PEOPLE can't do that, whether or not others will agree with you.  Why?  Why can't you just do that?

It feels very liberating to just bear my heart and soul to others even if they do not agree with me, and I think you would feel very liberated too if you just open yourself up without any regard to whether or not others will agree with you.

We're not ever going to completely agree with each other anyway so... anyway, just wondering why so many people seem to keep things bottled up inside them instead of just sharing everything with everybody, in general.

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9 hours ago, bluebell said:

The love of my husband for me, or your husband for you (if you are married) is as unproven/provable as the love of God. But it is not intellectual dishonest if I say “I know my husband loves me.” Or if you say the same.

Expressing knowledge of something that cannot be proven as a fact is not intellectually dishonest.  "A very great deal more truth can become known than can be proven.”  -- Richard Feynman, 1965 Nobel Prize lecture

That example does not compare to claims you make about my life though, does it? Or claims President Nelson makes about everyone's lives, or claims of other religionists about everyone's lives.

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4 hours ago, secondclasscitizen said:

Culturally, Mormons use the statements of prophets to judge everyone else. Just the way it is.

People judge others all the time. It is a human thing.  Members of the church, when they do it, are not listening to the prophets or the Savior.

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7 hours ago, Meadowchik said:

That example does not compare to claims you make about my life though, does it? Or claims President Nelson makes about everyone's lives, or claims of other religionists about everyone's lives.

As long as a statement is made generally and isn't specific to anyone, I really don't see the difference.  President Nelson made a general claim that was said to everyone, but was not meant as a judgment or condemnation of everyone.  It is applicable to some of us, but was never meant to be applied to all of us.  We have to be self aware enough, and to be familiar with the prophet and his teachings enough, to know when something is meant for us personally and when it's not.  

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18 hours ago, Rain said:

People judge others all the time. It is a human thing.  Members of the church, when they do it, are not listening to the prophets or the Savior.

Perhaps but if people listened to the prophet on this one they can quote him. He presented no caveat which said not to use it. He used it to create a divide amongst the membership. People can say whatever they want about intent but the bloggernacles are running hot with this one. If he didn’t mean it in a negative way or to give the good members who don’t doubt a reason to judge and avoid others, he needs a new speech writer or the inspiration he got at night wasn’t written down accurately. The messaging sucks but I think it was what he wanted.

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31 minutes ago, secondclasscitizen said:

Perhaps but if people listened to the prophet on this one they can quote him. He presented no caveat which said not to use it. He used it to create a divide amongst the membership. People can say whatever they want about intent but the bloggernacles are running hot with this one. If he didn’t mean it in a negative way or to give the good members who don’t doubt a reason to judge and avoid others, he needs a new speech writer or the inspiration he got at night wasn’t written down accurately. The messaging sucks but I think it was what he wanted.

Very few people say in their talks, "if you don't struggle with this it doesn't apply to you." And that's not just church talks, but nearly every speech I have heard.

I'm sorry you struggled with it. It was the talk I needed to hear.  Surprisingly it was so freeing to me about myself in a way I can't explain.  But I understand why others might struggle with it and I hope you don't find people who judge you from it.

Overall, I prefer to assume both President Nelson and you have good intentions.  

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18 hours ago, bluebell said:

As long as a statement is made generally and isn't specific to anyone, I really don't see the difference.  President Nelson made a general claim that was said to everyone, but was not meant as a judgment or condemnation of everyone.  It is applicable to some of us, but was never meant to be applied to all of us.  We have to be self aware enough, and to be familiar with the prophet and his teachings enough, to know when something is meant for us personally and when it's not.  

It is completely different. If you came to me and told me you had adopted a dog, for example, I might say I know you adopted a dog. It's reasonable, because I don't have experience with you lying about such things, and there's no reason for you to make up a fact that could be easily disproved. 

A man speaking ostensibly as God's representative on earth to the entire world as his intended audience is very different for many different reasons.

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23 hours ago, bluebell said:

As long as a statement is made generally and isn't specific to anyone, I really don't see the difference.  President Nelson made a general claim that was said to everyone, but was not meant as a judgment or condemnation of everyone.  It is applicable to some of us, but was never meant to be applied to all of us.  We have to be self aware enough, and to be familiar with the prophet and his teachings enough, to know when something is meant for us personally and when it's not.  

I think part of the message was specific to doubters, so not everyone, imo. 

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8 hours ago, secondclasscitizen said:

Perhaps but if people listened to the prophet on this one they can quote him. He presented no caveat which said not to use it. He used it to create a divide amongst the membership. People can say whatever they want about intent but the bloggernacles are running hot with this one. If he didn’t mean it in a negative way or to give the good members who don’t doubt a reason to judge and avoid others, he needs a new speech writer or the inspiration he got at night wasn’t written down accurately. The messaging sucks but I think it was what he wanted.

If you think the idea of prophets calling God’s people to repentance and a more sincere desire for spiritual self improvement has any merit and usefulness at all, how do you think President Nelson should have expressed himself in order to spur the members to greater faith while not causing hurt feelings? 

 

Edited by teddyaware
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6 hours ago, Meadowchik said:

It is completely different. If you came to me and told me you had adopted a dog, for example, I might say I know you adopted a dog. It's reasonable, because I don't have experience with you lying about such things, and there's no reason for you to make up a fact that could be easily disproved. 

A man speaking ostensibly as God's representative on earth to the entire world as his intended audience is very different for many different reasons.

I’m sorry, but I really don’t think it is.  Our perspectives and beliefs are too different to come to any kind of agreement on this. 

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1 hour ago, bluebell said:

I’m sorry, but I really don’t think it is.  Our perspectives and beliefs are too different to come to any kind of agreement on this. 

It objectively is. All three are different. 

The "love your spouse" example is an unprovable claim that only concerns a few people.

The "adopted a dog" claim is a provable (independently verifiable) claim that again only concerns a few people.

The voice of a prophet involves unprovable claims that involves millions at minimum, but ostensibly everyone in the world. 

And for the record, if you are going to call Moroni's challenge "independently verifiable," it is still a different kind of "independently verifiable." It requires a predisposed willingness to believe the claim. Whereas if I want to check you really adopted a dog, but don't believe you did, you can still show me the dog and papers to establish your claim.

These are all real epistemological differences that apply to everyone. Whether a person is atheist, Muslim, Christian or whatever, the process applies and the examples are all unprovable, provable, and unprovable, respectively.

So in the long-term, imo more people are going to become more aware of these actual differences and they are going to require religious leaders including President Nelson and his predecessors to respect them and therefore practice that intellectual honesty.

Edited by Meadowchik
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22 minutes ago, secondclasscitizen said:

It was only specific to the doubters who are lazy learners. The takeaway though is that all doubters are lazy.

Well, I could almost bet that most have done more searching out the facts compared to a lot of leaders in the church. Who may be too busy perhaps. Or the regular faithful LDS that don't know hardly any warts in church history. Not including anyone on this board of course. 🙂Each of you remind me of those members that say things in SS that no one has heard of before. I'm sure you all have to remain buttoned up. 

Edited by Tacenda
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2 hours ago, Meadowchik said:

It objectively is. All three are different. 

The "love your spouse" example is an unprovable claim that only concerns a few people.

The "adopted a dog" claim is a provable (independently verifiable) claim that again only concerns a few people.

The voice of a prophet involves unprovable claims that involves millions at minimum, but ostensibly everyone in the world. 

My point of the "love your spouse" example was that something can be knowable without being provable.  And that it's not intellectually dishonest to say that you know something just because it can't be proven. 

As long as the person is being honest in their pursuit of the knowledge, and being honest in the answers they share then they are being intellectually honest, whether the knowledge is verifiable or not. The number of people involved is irrelevant.

Quote

 

And for the record, if you are going to call Moroni's challenge "independently verifiable," it is still a different kind of "independently verifiable." It requires a predisposed willingness to believe the claim. Whereas if I want to check you really adopted a dog, but don't believe you did, you can still show me the dog and papers to establish your claim.

These are all real epistemological differences that apply to everyone. Whether a person is atheist, Muslim, Christian or whatever, the process applies and the examples are all unprovable, provable, and unprovable, respectively.

So in the long-term, imo more people are going to become more aware of these actual differences and they are going to require religious leaders including President Nelson and his predecessors to respect them and therefore practice that intellectual honesty.

 

I reject the premise that something has to be independently verifiable or it is intellectually dishonest to claim knowledge of it.    

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1 hour ago, secondclasscitizen said:

It was only specific to the doubters who are lazy learners. The takeaway though is that all doubters are lazy.

That wasn't my take away. 

I don't think it was applicable to only doubters either.  As I said earlier in this thread, when he said it I knew it was applicable to me, and I'm not a doubter at all.

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36 minutes ago, bluebell said:

Really?  How could you know that?  Sincere question.

I don't mean to speak for Tacenda, and there is really no empirical way to know the answer to that question.  However, speaking only for myself and the wards I was living in during my amateur-apologist and faith collapse days, I would float little trial balloons of church history in classes and conversations to see if there was any kind of reaction (not in some inappropriate way, mind you) and you could certainly tell who was surprised by the comments.  It was clear, at least in my corner of the world, that most members did not know the more...colorful...details of church history.  There was, IMO, an over reliance on correlated materials which were light on the proverbial "meat," if you will.

Edited by ttribe
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54 minutes ago, bluebell said:

Really?  How could you know that?  Sincere question.

Feedback from those that say their bishops or stake presidents were clueless about say JS's polygamy or ?? I've even read or heard that the top leaders don't even know very much because of all of the years things were basically whitewashed or kept under wraps..maybe blame Joseph F. Smith the church historian all those years, and they may have been too into their callings to even have time to read up on those issues.

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32 minutes ago, ttribe said:

I don't mean to speak for Tacenda, and there is really no empirical way to know the answer to that question.  However, speaking only for myself and the wards I was living in during my amateur-apologist and faith collapse days, I would float little trial balloons of church history in classes and conversations to see if there was any kind of reaction (not in some inappropriate way, mind you) and you could certainly tell who was surprised by the comments.  It was clear, at least in my corner of the world, that most members did not know the more...colorful...details of church history.  There was, IMO, an over reliance on correlated materials which were light on the proverbial "meat," if you will.

I agree. That doesn't seem different from my experiences.  What I'm really wondering though about is the implication that the GAs know less about the church and it's doctrine than most doubters.  

If that's not what Tacenda was implying then I've misunderstood her.

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1 minute ago, bluebell said:

I agree. That doesn't seem different from my experiences.  What I'm really wondering though about is the implication that the GAs know less about the church and it's doctrine than most doubters.  

If that's not what Tacenda was implying then I've misunderstood her.

I do wonder if they know though. And could they be lazy learners more so than your average doubter.

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Couple of quick additional thoughts as this thread continues:

  1. When it comes to "if they know," let's just say that I would be happy to put Brother Dallin up against your average doubter - any day of the week. 
  2. I can't believe the amount of whining over President Nelson having said something that might could possibly be construed as having insinuated that some people might be a bit lazy sometimes when it comes to gospel learning. Puh-lease. I'm sure Peter, Martin Harris, or any number of other individuals who had the opportunity to get their rebuking from the Lord canonized are all looking down on you right now and thinking about how tough your life must be. 

 

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1 hour ago, bluebell said:

My point of the "love your spouse" example was that something can be knowable without being provable.  And that it's not intellectually dishonest to say that you know something just because it can't be proven. 

As long as the person is being honest in their pursuit of the knowledge, and being honest in the answers they share then they are being intellectually honest, whether the knowledge is verifiable or not. The number of people involved is irrelevant.

I reject the premise that something has to be independently verifiable or it is intellectually dishonest to claim knowledge of it.    

It is not intellectually dishonest to sincerely believe in something that is not independently verifiable, but it can be intellectually dishonest to treat something that is not provable as provable.

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17 minutes ago, Amulek said:

Couple of quick additional thoughts as this thread continues:

  1. When it comes to "if they know," let's just say that I would be happy to put Brother Dallin up against your average doubter - any day of the week. 
  2. I can't believe the amount of whining over President Nelson having said something that might could possibly be construed as having insinuated that some people might be a bit lazy sometimes when it comes to gospel learning. Puh-lease. I'm sure Peter, Martin Harris, or any number of other individuals who had the opportunity to get their rebuking from the Lord canonized are all looking down on you right now and thinking about how tough your life must be. 

 

To be fair, this thread was not started by anyone complaining about President Nelson's talk. It was an implicit invitation for people to help explain how those words could be hurtful.

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