Plausibility, Evidence, and the search for Explanations

[Ryan Dahle]

28 minutes ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

I am curious to know what sort of argument you think is an argument for or against the Book of Mormon's authenticity - not just what the argument is, but also how it functions to attack or defend the question of authenticity. And, I think it's important to know what you mean when you use the term "authenticity".

As for authenticity, I mean the various claims about (1) how Joseph Smith miraculously discovered the Book of Mormon and what he learned about it from an angel (2) how he miraculously dictated the text of the Book of Mormon and (3) the essential claims the text itself makes about its authorship, historical production, and narratives. These claims are all interrelated and somewhat logically interdependent. If one concedes that any of them are likely to be true, the probability that they are all true seems to increase (although to varying degrees depending on the claim). Conversely, if any of them turn out to be false, the likelihood that they are all false would substantially increase. And yes, I recognize that none of these claims are assessable via statistical analysis, so I am necessarily speaking of "probability" in the more informal, intuitive sense of the term. 

As for what arguments are arguments for the BofM's authenticity (which seems to be a question of what arguments really count as arguments in this regard), I think that virtually all the standard apologetic arguments qualify. This doesn't mean that they are all of equal value or that they all accomplish the same thing. But I think that they all count, as it were, in the larger landscape of evidence. Likewise, I think that the standard critical arguments against the Book of Mormon's authenticity count. 

As for how they work, they usually attempt to increase or decrease the perceived "likelihood" (again, not talking about statistical likelihood) of one of the three interrelated claims discussed at the beginning of the post. Let's take Ryan Thomas's assessment of the Book of Mormon's plausibility based on metal epigraphy in the ancient Near East. He essentially makes the argument that the Book of Mormon's authenticity is unlikely because the metal plates from which it purports to derive (in addition to the metal recordkeeping practices described in the text itself) don't match the standard length and genre of inscribed metal documents in the ancient Near East, especially from the region of Judah, where metal documents are comparatively rare. For me, that is a valid argument or point, especially when viewed in isolation. 

Now, I fully recognize that Thomas's argument is based on statistically unverifiable assumptions. No one knows how many ancient metal documents actually once existed in the ancient Near East or in Judah. And we don't have a reliable way to even guess that number with any sort of precision. We can be pretty sure that such documents, generally speaking, were rare, based on the uncontroversial assertion that they they required more time, skill, and resources to produce than most other forms of written media. But precisely how rare is a question that can't be answered. What this all amounts to is that if the metal recordkeeping tradition described in the Book of Mormon is authentic, it is likely out of the ordinary for its time and location. Thus, to believe in its authenticity is necessarily to believe in something that is somewhat rare and out of the ordinary. Thomas knows this doesn't render the text's authenticity as impossible. He responsibly doesn't go that far in his argument. There is still quite a bit wiggle room between rare and impossible, especially when rare in this context is fairly nebulous. But that doesn't mean that his argument doesn't count. 

[Benjamin McGuire]

6 minutes ago, Ryan Dahle said:

As for authenticity, I mean the various claims about (1) how Joseph Smith miraculously discovered the Book of Mormon and what he learned about it from an angel (2) how he miraculously dictated the text of the Book of Mormon and (3) the essential claims the text itself makes about its authorship, historical production, and narratives. These claims are all interrelated and somewhat logically interdependent. If one concedes that any of them are likely to be true, the probability that they are all true seems to increase (although to varying degrees depending on the claim). Conversely, if any of them turn out to be false, the likelihood that they are all false would substantially increase. And yes, I recognize that none of these claims are assessable via statistical analysis, so I am necessarily speaking of "probability" in the more informal, intuitive sense of the term.

So I find myself skeptical of what you present here - and this gets back to the topic of this thread. You suggest that:

10 minutes ago, Ryan Dahle said:

He essentially makes the argument that the Book of Mormon's authenticity is unlikely because the metal plates from which it purports to derive (in addition to the metal recordkeeping practices described in the text itself) don't match the standard length and genre of inscribed metal documents in the ancient Near East, especially from the region of Judah, where metal documents are comparatively rare. For me, that is a valid argument or point, especially when viewed in isolation. 

So I need to ask you - how does this argument actually affect any of the three positions you raise? And for the moment, I'll at least pretend to agree with you that your three positions are interelated enough to make them indistinguishable from each other. In other words, how does the size of metal plates in the ancient Near East in the region of Judah impact the claims about (1) how Joseph Smith miraculously discovered the Book of Mormon and what he learned about it from an angel, (2) how he miraculously dictated the text of the Book of Mormon, and (3) the essential claims the text itself makes about its authorship, historical production, and narratives.

I am not worried here about likelihoods - what I want to know is how this argument about metal plates in Judah in the ANE is even relevant to these three points.

[webbles]

On 9/26/2022 at 6:03 PM, SeekingUnderstanding said:

Rather this portion: “We're coming up on nearly 200 years since the original publication of the text, and yet when the chips are down, and when a well-informed person like Daniel Peterson (or Ryan Dahle) argues for the plausibility of the LDS position, we don't get reasoned responses and rebuttals.  We get glib sarcasm.  We get curt dismissals.  We get anything but an engagement of the evidence.”

Though Nevo’s postion (which I believe is Joseph wrote it) seems reasonable to me. Jarman also has his own theory of a manuscript that Joseph had. 
 

I’m not sure what you are looking for in “a coherent counter-explanation”. It seems like the word “coherent” is doing a lot of work for you there, similar to the word “true” in “no true Scotsman”. 

For me, I'd love to see some studies on just the small plates of Nephi (1 Nephi -> Omni) plus Words of Mormon.  If you rule out supernatural means, then that section of the Book of Mormon is almost definitely written by Joseph Smith, Oliver Cowdery, or one of the people involved in the last few months of translation.  The official explanation for that section is difficult to accept (God commanded Nephi 2000+ years to make a set of plates and Mormon being impressed to include them all because Martin was going to loose the papers is a stretch) but since God is involved, anything is possible.  Once you take out the supernatural means, it becomes implausible that someone wrote that section (especially Words of Mormon) before the papers were lost.

Since the papers were lost sometime in the summer of 1828, that gives a 1 year window when it is written.  And we know who is available during that window.  It can't be Rigdon, Spaulding, Pratt, or some other manuscript.

I think we could do several tests to figure out whether Joseph wrote the rest of the Book of Mormon or copied it from an existing manuscript or it was supernatural.

1. Define an authorship detection test that handles translations.  Using texts that were translated by people in the 1800s, ensure that it doesn't assign the translator as the author.  Also ensure that multiple texts translated by the same person aren't considered to have the same author even if it doesn't assign the authorship to the translator.

2. Determine if the author of Words of Mormon is the same author as the inner Book of Mormon.  Could also check 4 Nephi as that would also be the same writer.  If the author is the same, then it rules out an existing manuscript written by someone other than Joseph, Oliver, etc.  If the author is different, then Joseph was probably copying from an existing manuscript that he didn't write.

3. Determine if the author of Words of Mormon is the same author as Enos, Jarom, Omni, Jacob 1 and 7 (the other chapters could have been copied from an existing manuscript), and chapters from 1 and 2 Nephi that aren't prophecies, visions, or Isaiah (because those could have been copied from an existing manuscript).  If the author is the same, then Joseph, Oliver, etc was probably the author and we should test which one matches.  If the author is different, we would need to see if any match Joseph, Oliver, etc in case they each wrote a section.

If test 2 shows the same author and test 3 shows different authors who aren't Joseph, Oliver, etc, then I think the best explanation for the existence of 1 Nephi -> Words of Mormon is supernatural.

[CV75]

4 hours ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

The idea of reading Cinderella as biography is an argument raised by Peter Rabinowitz in his narrative theory. It isn't mine. I am not sure why you think this is snide. In his article, Truth in Fiction, he wrote this:

And if you go back earlier in this thread, you will see that I had been discussing that particular subject earlier, so this isn't coming out of nowhere. It's the continuation of a topic, and it is a relatively serious engagement with other participants here in this forum.

The issue is of some importance to discussions about the Book of Mormon. Why? Because our perception of genre matters. This is a relatively extreme example (but it is useful for that reason - the principle is very clear). If we read the fairy tale as biography it immediately changes what we get from it even though the content of the text doesn't change at all. The same principle is true when we discuss the Book of Mormon. We have to recognize that for those who read the text as fiction, as history, or as some sort of non-historical spiritual text, each approach naturally comes to different meanings about the text because of the assumptions they bring when reading the text.

I think this offers an interesting key (hearkening back to Isaiah 29:11) for determining when a ancient religious text is sealed, figuratively speaking, from the reader; in this case a text translated into English 200 years ago. Perhaps it is good to approach such a book with an open mind, adopting (temporarily at least*) the description provided by the author or at least its cover and introductory pages, and *see where it holds up or falls apart, first according to the author's standards and then by one's own preferred approach as a back-up. That would take some self-control over bias of course.

[Ryan Dahle]

4 hours ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

And for the moment, I'll at least pretend to agree with you that your three positions are interelated enough to make them indistinguishable from each other.

I didn't say they were "indistinguishable from each other." They definitely are distinguishable. I said that they are "all interrelated and somewhat logically interdependent." Let's say, for instance, that multiple historical records surface, in which various individuals describe how they helped Joseph Smith make the gold plates and other artifacts related to the Book of Mormon. And lets say, for the sake of argument, that these documents are absolutely compelling by every widely accepted standard of historical evidence. And let's say that those making the statements in the document seem highly credible, and that their claims are also very persuasive. In my mind, that type of strong historical evidence would substantially threaten Joseph Smith's claim that he was directed to the plates by an angel, that he miraculously translated their contents by the gift and power of God, and that they contained the writings of ancient prophets, as described in the text itself. 

Conversely, imagine if a decipherable ancient Mesoamerican document written on metal plates were to surface in a controlled dig. And imagine if it were to make multiple, unambiguous references to people, places, events and so forth in the Book of Mormon. And then imagine that several other documents from other controlled archaeological sites were to surface with similar data. Such evidence would naturally strengthen Joseph Smith's claim that an angel led him to a set of gold plates, and that he translated them by the gift and power of God. This is what I mean by the claims being "interrelated and somewhat logically interdependent." And, yes, once again I know that we don't know with precision how likely or unlikely it would be for Joseph Smith to create a fictional story that just so happens to match real history in a number of minute and unambiguous details. But I think pretty much everyone would agree that the likelihood of that scenario approaches very close to zero. 

In any case, it seems like the major claims about the Book of Mormon tend to logically rise or fall with one another under different scenarios of evidence. Notice, however, that I used the word "somewhat." The validity of one claim doesn't automatically necessitate the validity of the others. Someone, for instance, might conclude for whatever reason that Joseph dictated the text by the gift and power of God but that it has virtually no basis in actual history.

4 hours ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

So I need to ask you - how does this argument actually affect any of the three positions you raise? ... In other words, how does the size of metal plates in the ancient Near East in the region of Judah impact the claims about (1) how Joseph Smith miraculously discovered the Book of Mormon and what he learned about it from an angel, (2) how he miraculously dictated the text of the Book of Mormon, and (3) the essential claims the text itself makes about its authorship, historical production, and narratives.

I am not worried here about likelihoods - what I want to know is how this argument about metal plates in Judah in the ANE is even relevant to these three points.

If someone believes that a document like the Book of Mormon (as well as the metal recordkeeping practices that it describes) is highly unlikely to have been produced in the milieu that it claims for itself, that would logically cast doubt on Joseph Smith's claim that he was led to such a document by an angel, and that he translated engravings on such a document by the gift and power of God.  

Edited September 28, 2022 by Ryan Dahle

[mfbukowski]

6 hours ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

The idea of reading Cinderella as biography is an argument raised by Peter Rabinowitz in his narrative theory. It isn't mine. I am not sure why you think this is snide. In his article, Truth in Fiction, he wrote this:

And if you go back earlier in this thread, you will see that I had been discussing that particular subject earlier, so this isn't coming out of nowhere. It's the continuation of a topic, and it is a relatively serious engagement with other participants here in this forum.

The issue is of some importance to discussions about the Book of Mormon. Why? Because our perception of genre matters. This is a relatively extreme example (but it is useful for that reason - the principle is very clear). If we read the fairy tale as biography it immediately changes what we get from it even though the content of the text doesn't change at all. The same principle is true when we discuss the Book of Mormon. We have to recognize that for those who read the text as fiction, as history, or as some sort of non-historical spiritual text, each approach naturally comes to different meanings about the text because of the assumptions they bring when reading the text.

A major point in Wittgenstein's later work is discussing "language games" and textual interpretations and as a lesser mentioned, but still often repeated subtopic, how they can affect every aspect of scriptural interpretation.

He sees Christianity itself, from the fall of Adam extending through the gospels, as the story of "a life" with its ascents and descents.

Actually that, reduced to metaphor, describes Wittgenstein's own biography, though I am sure he personally did not see it that way, because he died before most of his best work, imo, was published. In many ways, I could see Wittgenstein's life as a "Cinderella Story".

That now is an established idiom in America English! I wish I had a buck for everytime I heard that phrase in a sports story!

Now Wittgenstein's work is ranked by many, as  among the top two or 3 philosophers of all time.

I have not read Rabinowitz' work but from what you have described, his views seem VERY close to how Wittgenstein saw things.

[mfbukowski]

Error

Edited September 28, 2022 by mfbukowski
Error

[tagriffy]

6 hours ago, webbles said:

1. Define an authorship detection test that handles translations.  Using texts that were translated by people in the 1800s, ensure that it doesn't assign the translator as the author.  Also ensure that multiple texts translated by the same person aren't considered to have the same author even if it doesn't assign the authorship to the translator.

You're going to immediately run into problems here. Translation isn't so simple that one is likely to be able to come up with a detection test that will handle translations. A word in one language very rarely, if ever, has an exact one-for-one translation into another. And just as in English a given word in other languages can have a range of different meanings. This in turn means a translator is going to have to choose from multiple words to render that given term. That means the translator is going to have to interpret the text, and of course the translator would be drawing up their own experiences. And this assumes we're talking about a fairly literal translation. Long story short: the translator is going to almost always be an author of the rendered text in some sense. I wouldn't say it is absolutely impossible for such a test to be devised, but it it is so unlikely as to make effectively impossible.

[JarMan]

20 hours ago, OGHoosier said:

This begs the question against "supernatural" occurrences. The term "supernatural" is an artifact of an outdated materialist paradigm (especially in the context of Latter-day Saint theology) and I don't believe that applying it to events has any meaningful non-prejudicial impact on the assessment of likelihood.

18 hours ago, mfbukowski said:

Then I guess it is a lie that Joseph "translated" it by the power of God.

I thought the church taught that.

Thanks for letting us know it is a logical fallacy.  By the way, what fallacy would that be?

Even if you think that God works within the laws of physics, you still can't measure or observe God in a scientific sense. God is not empirical. Without measurement or observation you can't say anything about the likelihood of God. Empirical phenomena cannot be quantitatively compared to non-empirical phenomena. This is a category error.

[mfbukowski]

3 hours ago, JarMan said:

Even if you think that God works within the laws of physics, you still can't measure or observe God in a scientific sense. God is not empirical. Without measurement or observation you can't say anything about the likelihood of God. Empirical phenomena cannot be quantitatively compared to non-empirical phenomena. This is a category error.

Uh, no.

Where did I say OR deny any of this?You have it exactly backwards. I agree with you here, and I see no disagreement with @OGHoosier either.  Very confusing 

[mfbukowski]

On 9/27/2022 at 9:17 PM, JarMan said:

 

2) Comparing the relative likelihood of a supernatural explanation of x with a natural explanation. There is no such thing as an empirical likelihood or probability of a supernatural occurrence. This type of comparison is meaningless; it is a category error. For instance--it would have been very difficult for Joseph Smith to have created the Book of Mormon, so the more likely explanation is that it was revealed to him by God. I've use this one myself. It's tantalizing, but ultimately fallacious.

It appears here that you are calling the view that God revealed the BOM as "fallacious".

I disagree vehemently.  What am I missing?

[Benjamin McGuire]

18 hours ago, Ryan Dahle said:

I didn't say they were "indistinguishable from each other." They definitely are distinguishable. I said that they are "all interrelated and somewhat logically interdependent."

Right. In any case, I don't think that this matters for my question.

18 hours ago, Ryan Dahle said:

If someone believes that a document like the Book of Mormon (as well as the metal recordkeeping practices that it describes) is highly unlikely to have been produced in the milieu that it claims for itself, that would logically cast doubt on Joseph Smith's claim that he was led to such a document by an angel, and that he translated engravings on such a document by the gift and power of God.  

See, this isn't an argument about evidence. And more importantly, it isn't even relevant. The Gold Plates were allegedly produced some time around 400 AD. They were created in the Americas someplace. How does this logically lead from the practice of using metal plates in the ANE in antiquity? Do you see the issue that I am looking at?

What you are discussing isn't a question of evidence, its the issue that I keep bringing up of possibility. "Highly unlikely" means, for all practical purposes, impossible. I'll quote once more from the book that SeekingUnderstanding linked to at the beginning of this thread:

Quote

He illustrated what he intended by referring to the classic example of the monkeys who, randomly hitting the keys of a typewriter, happen by chance to produce the complete works of Shakespeare. In Borel’s words: “Such is the sort of event which, though its impossibility may not be rationally demonstrable, is, however, so unlikely that no sensible person will hesitate to declare it actually impossible. If someone affirmed having observed such an event we would be sure that he is deceiving us or has himself been the victim of fraud.”

So Borel is relating “very small probabilities” to human scales, and that’s what he means: in human terms the probability is so small that it would be irrational to expect ever to see it happen; it should be regarded as impossible. And, indeed, after stating his “single law of chance” (which, you’ll recall, was that events with a sufficiently small probability never occur ) he added the comment, “or, at least, we must act, in all circumstances, as if they were impossible” [his italics].

He gave a further illustration later in his book: “For every Parisian who circulates for one day, the probability of being killed in the course of the day in a traffic accident is about one-millionth. If, in order to avoid this slight risk, a man renounced all external activity and cloistered himself in his house, or imposed such confinement on his wife or his son, he would be considered mad.”

So the point here is that this is not aimed at proving that the events happened (or were even likely to have happened), but rather at negating the claim that it couldn't have happened (a claim of possibility rather than plausibility).

[Benjamin McGuire]

19 hours ago, Ryan Dahle said:

Conversely, imagine if a decipherable ancient Mesoamerican document written on metal plates were to surface in a controlled dig. And imagine if it were to make multiple, unambiguous references to people, places, events and so forth in the Book of Mormon. And then imagine that several other documents from other controlled archaeological sites were to surface with similar data. Such evidence would naturally strengthen Joseph Smith's claim that an angel led him to a set of gold plates, and that he translated them by the gift and power of God.

I wanted to separate this issue (which is why I used the language I used earlier). I disagree with you on this point that it would "strengthen Joseph Smith's claim". It wouldn't strengthen that claim at all. It could lessen the likelihood of the claim that Joseph's account is impossible (depending on your view of the likelihood of angels visiting people). But this isn't the same as claiming that it strengthens the claim. While I would agree that in some contexts, these ideas are closely related, I think that this is used inappropriately when people do what you do here. Which is why I said let's pretend that you are right - just so this argument isn't a part of the other argument on what constitutes evidence.

[Ryan Dahle]

4 hours ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

See, this isn't an argument about evidence. And more importantly, it isn't even relevant. The Gold Plates were allegedly produced some time around 400 AD. They were created in the Americas someplace. How does this logically lead from the practice of using metal plates in the ANE in antiquity? Do you see the issue that I am looking at?

Based on the text itself, the gold plates can be logically traced back to an ancient Near Eastern recordkeeping tradition. Thus the plausibility of the gold plates existing for the reasons that the text describes depends, in part, on the validity of that founding tradition. One could assume that Joseph simply created the plates himself or found them via non-miraculous means, but I hope you see why that would be a challenge to the standard Latter-day Saint testimony. For most believers, it is important not only that the plates existed, but that they are essentially what the text of the Book of Mormon (not to mention the angel Moroni) claims them to be. Countering that the gold plates were created in the Americas someplace doesn't help much, seeing that evidence for metal recordkeeping is virtually non-existent in the Americas.

Furthermore, a major claim in the text is that a set of records written on brass plates helped preserve religious teachings among Lehi's posterity. That claim would be even more directly threatened if it could be demonstrated that a document like the brass plates most likely never existed in its claimed milieu.

In other words, Thomas's research can be seen as casting doubt on two of the three major claims I outlined previously, one in a direct way (casting doubt on its internal claims about the brass plates) and the other in an indirect although logically valid way (assuming that one agrees that the text itself situates the gold plates as part of recordkeeping tradition that originated in the ancient Near East). Either way, the evidence that he brings up (which is really an absence-of-evidence argument) is clearly relevant to the question of the Book of Mormon's authenticity. 

4 hours ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

What you are discussing isn't a question of evidence, its the issue that I keep bringing up of possibility. "Highly unlikely" means, for all practical purposes, impossible. 

No, "highly unlikely" doesn't mean practically "impossible." And I think this is where your reasoning is repeatedly flawed, as it unnecessarily pushes arguments to the extreme in ways that those making them wouldn't agree with. Thomas certainly isn't claiming that the existence of a document like the brass plates is, for all practical purposes, impossible. You are claiming that for him, and his actual statements in his article directly rebut your characterization.

As I already explained, this is the major weakness in Thomas's argument. He has a point that the brass plates were likely rare for their milieu. I suspect he is right, based on the available epigraphic evidence and the uncontroversial position that such plates would have been a huge investment of time and resources to make. But neither Thomas nor anyone else knows precisely how rare a document like that would have been. The fragmentary nature of the archaeological record precludes precise estimates. Furthermore, even if the brass plates were the only document of its kind in ancient Israel, it still wouldn't be impossible for someone in their society to make them. We know they had lengthy documents on other media, and we know that they wrote on metal. So the main ingredients are there. I think Thomas understands this, which is why his stated position isn't as extreme as you are making it out to be. 

4 hours ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

I'll quote once more from the book that SeekingUnderstanding linked to at the beginning of this thread: 

...

So the point here is that this is not aimed at proving that the events happened (or were even likely to have happened), but rather at negating the claim that it couldn't have happened (a claim of possibility rather than plausibility).

Your quote has nothing to do with Thomas's argument. By comparing his statements to the monkey-typewriter analogy, you are drastically inflating his position. He is simply presenting evidence that he thinks casts doubt on the Book of Mormon's authenticity. And I believe his data, despite its limitations, is certainly valid as evidence. Once, again, Thomas can't prove that is impossible for a text like the brass plates to have existed, and he clearly refrains from overstating the case in the way that you are doing for him. 

3 hours ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

23 hours ago, Ryan Dahle said:

Conversely, imagine if a decipherable ancient Mesoamerican document written on metal plates were to surface in a controlled dig. And imagine if it were to make multiple, unambiguous references to people, places, events and so forth in the Book of Mormon. And then imagine that several other documents from other controlled archaeological sites were to surface with similar data. Such evidence would naturally strengthen Joseph Smith's claim that an angel led him to a set of gold plates, and that he translated them by the gift and power of God.

I wanted to separate this issue (which is why I used the language I used earlier). I disagree with you on this point that it would "strengthen Joseph Smith's claim". It wouldn't strengthen that claim at all. It could lessen the likelihood of the claim that Joseph's account is impossible (depending on your view of the likelihood of angels visiting people). But this isn't the same as claiming that it strengthens the claim. While I would agree that in some contexts, these ideas are closely related, I think that this is used inappropriately when people do what you do here. Which is why I said let's pretend that you are right - just so this argument isn't a part of the other argument on what constitutes evidence.

Wow. Just, wow!

So if multiple, clearly authentic, decipherable ancient Mesoamerican documents surface which talk about Nephites and Lamanites, and which name characters like Alma, Mosiah, Helaman, etc., and which describe events and doctrines that are clearly also described in the Book of Mormon, and which name locations that are mentioned in the Book of Mormon, and which describe Jesus visiting the people, and so on and so forth--you still wouldn't see this as strengthening the case for the Book of Mormon's authenticity (i.e., that Joseph Smith translated a genuine ancient record by the gift and power of God)?

If so, I think we will have to bring this conversation to a close. I'm not even saying this type of evidence would prove the Book of Mormon is authentic. I'm just claiming that such evidence would substantially strengthen the case for the interrelated claims about the text's authenticity. I used an extreme example to see how far you would take your position, and that has helped me see just how far apart we are in our definitional and conceptual assumptions. It's been nice chatting though. I'll let you have the last word. 

Edited September 29, 2022 by Ryan Dahle

[mfbukowski]

40 minutes ago, Ryan Dahle said:

No, "highly unlikely" doesn't mean practically "impossible." And I think this is where your reasoning is repeatedly flawed, as it unnecessarily pushes arguments to the extreme in ways that those making them wouldn't agree with. 

Pushing ambiguous arguments to the extreme? 

The difference here is so incredibly nuanced that it is not going to convince anyone of anything, and it seems to me you are the one pushing extremes

If I remember correctly, this is how we ended our discussions as well.

Edited September 29, 2022 by mfbukowski

[Benjamin McGuire]

1 hour ago, Ryan Dahle said:

Based on the text itself, the gold plates can be logically traced back to an ancient Near Eastern recordkeeping tradition.

It's still a thousand years ... if archaeologists did this, it wouldn't be pretty.

2 hours ago, Ryan Dahle said:

Furthermore, a major claim in the text is that a set of records written on brass plates helped preserve religious teachings among Lehi's posterity. That claim would be even more directly threatened if it could be demonstrated that a document like the brass plates most likely never existed in its claimed milieu.

I agree with this. But understand that you are discussing the issue of threatening a claim not supporting it. That's the issue of possibility/impossibility, not one of evidence. Suppose that Person A is killed by Person B. We know that Person B is left-handed. The fact that Person C is right handed means he cannot also be person B. The fact that Person D is left handed doesn't mean that he is Person B. It means that the possibility still exists. It does mean that Person D is more likely to be the killer than Person C - but only because some chance is greater than no chance at all.

2 hours ago, Ryan Dahle said:

In other words, Thomas's research can be seen as casting doubt on two of the three major claims I outlined previously, one in a direct way (casting doubt on its internal claims about the brass plates) and the other in an indirect although logically valid way (assuming that one agrees that the text itself situates the gold plates as part of recordkeeping tradition that originated in the ancient Near East). Either way, the evidence that he brings up (which is really an absence-of-evidence argument) is clearly relevant to the question of the Book of Mormon's authenticity. 

See, I am not debating the idea that these kinds of arguments work to peel back claims of impossibility. I think that there is a lot of value there. What I am saying is that this isn't positive evidence for Joseph's Smith's claims about the origins of the Book of Mormon. There is no doubt that there are things which make strong arguments about the impossibility of something being the case (see my example above). But those same evidences aren't effective evidence to go beyond that first claim.

2 hours ago, Ryan Dahle said:

No, "highly unlikely" doesn't mean practically "impossible." And I think this is where your reasoning is repeatedly flawed, as it unnecessarily pushes arguments to the extreme in ways that those making them wouldn't agree with. Thomas certainly isn't claiming that the existence of a document like the brass plates is, for all practical purposes, impossible. You are claiming that for him, and his actual statements in his article directly rebut your characterization.

Nope. These aren't extremes. And what Thomas actually says is, "most unlikely". Which in this context (where it isn't being used to describe a comparison of likelihoods) it functions as a meaning of "impossible" (I might suggest that when used as a superlative in this way, 'most unlikely' is even less likely than 'highly unlikely'). So I will keep with my characterization. After all, the question of whether or not a bunch of monkeys sitting at typewriters producing the complete works of Shakespeare is also "most unlikely", wouldn't you agree? Statistically possible? Yes, although the statistics for the monkeys is much easier, I think, to calculate than the question you and Thomas are engaging.

2 hours ago, Ryan Dahle said:

Your quote has nothing to do with Thomas's argument. By comparing his statements to the monkey-typewriter analogy, you are drastically inflating his position. He is simply presenting evidence that he thinks casts doubt on the Book of Mormon's authenticity. And I believe his data, despite its limitations, is certainly valid as evidence. Once, again, Thomas can't prove that is impossible for a text like the brass plates to have existed, and he clearly refrains from overstating the case in the way that you are doing for him. 

See I am not disagreeing with the idea that what Thomas presents could be evidence (assuming that it's all valid). Why? Because, as I noted, we can find issues all the time where a rather general principle or simple fact can be used to show that something is impossible. Evidence of impossibility is some of the easiest evidence to produce. It's one of the reasons why good arguments need to be falsifiable. But, being able to contradict claims of impossibility (or in this case, claims of most unlikeliness) doesn't give us any ability to actually comment on likelihood in a meaningful way. So, even if we had metal plates in Mesoamerica at an appropriate time it wouldn't constitute evidence of Joseph Smith's narrative. It would only make that narrative possible. This is not a process that works equally in both directions, as my example using Persons A, B, C, and D above illustrates.

2 hours ago, Ryan Dahle said:

So if multiple, clearly authentic, decipherable ancient Mesoamerican documents surface which talk about Nephites and Lamanites, and which name characters like Alma, Mosiah, Helaman, etc., and which describe events and doctrines that are clearly also described in the Book of Mormon, and which name locations that are mentioned in the Book of Mormon, and which describe Jesus visiting the people, and so on and so forth--you still wouldn't see this as strengthening the case for the Book of Mormon's authenticity (i.e., that he translated a genuine ancient record by the gift and power of God)?

I won't even bother trying to parse this. Let's just say that this would indeed be positive evidence. But, how is this even remotely comparable to what you are offering. I think that this is part of a bigger real issue here - that you think, somehow, that the fact that we can find writing on metal plates in the Ancient Near East 2,800 years ago, is just as valid a form of evidence for Joseph Smith's origin stories of the Book of Mormon as an "authentic, decipherable ancient Mesoamerican documents ... which talk about Nephites and Lamanites." I think that we have bigger problem.

[Ryan Dahle]

4 hours ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

I won't even bother trying to parse this. Let's just say that this would indeed be positive evidence. But, how is this even remotely comparable to what you are offering. I think that this is part of a bigger real issue here - that you think, somehow, that the fact that we can find writing on metal plates in the Ancient Near East 2,800 years ago, is just as valid a form of evidence for Joseph Smith's origin stories of the Book of Mormon as an "authentic, decipherable ancient Mesoamerican documents ... which talk about Nephites and Lamanites." I think that we have bigger problem.

What!!!!! You think that is the argument I am making???

Sorry, but you just aren't following my various lines of reasoning, on like multiple levels. So this conversation will definitely have to be over for me. Thanks again for your time. 

 

Edited September 29, 2022 by Ryan Dahle

[mfbukowski]

10 hours ago, Ryan Dahle said:

Wow. Just, wow!

So IF multiple, clearly authentic, decipherable ancient Mesoamerican documents surface which talk about Nephites and Lamanites, and which name characters like Alma, Mosiah, Helaman, etc., and which describe events and doctrines that are clearly also described in the Book of Mormon, and which name locations that are mentioned in the Book of Mormon, and which describe Jesus visiting the people, and so on and so forth--you still wouldn't see this as strengthening the case for the Book of Mormon's authenticity (i.e., that Joseph Smith translated a genuine ancient record by the gift and power of God)?

Of course not!

And the entire situation following your "IF" (which I emphasized ) you hypothesize is virtually impossible to imagine after all these years.

I would see this sort of evidence about as valuable as stories or documents  apparently justifying B'hai or Scientology, both of which I "investigated" before converting to The CoJ CLDS.

 Neither of those suggested I should "ask God" which to me is the most logical position, taking into account Radical Empiricism, to find a religious/ philosophical system.

Edited September 30, 2022 by mfbukowski

[JarMan]

19 hours ago, mfbukowski said:

It appears here that you are calling the view that God revealed the BOM as "fallacious".

I disagree vehemently.  What am I missing?

Somewhere along the line you either missed part of my argument or else I just didn't explain it well. I pointed out a fallacy that apologists make, which is that they compare the relative likelihoods of supernatural events with natural events. The example I cited was the conjecture that it's more likely that Joseph translated the Book of Mormon with divine means than that he wrote it himself. Every instance of "how could Joseph know?" somehow makes divine intervention the more likely explanation according to apologists. But since the likelihood of divine help is not quantifiable this line of reasoning is fallacious. No amount of evidence against Joseph's authorship can bolster a supernatural explanation.

Another example of this fallacy is the idea that intelligent life arising by random chance in a chaotic universe is so low that there must be a God who created the universe.

[mfbukowski]

1 hour ago, JarMan said:

Somewhere along the line you either missed part of my argument or else I just didn't explain it well. I pointed out a fallacy that apologists make, which is that they compare the relative likelihoods of supernatural events with natural events. The example I cited was the conjecture that it's more likely that Joseph translated the Book of Mormon with divine means than that he wrote it himself. Every instance of "how could Joseph know?" somehow makes divine intervention the more likely explanation according to apologists. But since the likelihood of divine help is not quantifiable this line of reasoning is fallacious. No amount of evidence against Joseph's authorship can bolster a supernatural explanation.

Another example of this fallacy is the idea that intelligent life arising by random chance in a chaotic universe is so low that there must be a God who created the universe.

Well it would probably take a lot more to discuss this through than either of us is willing spend

1- Define "apologist" : pro or anti LDS?

2- I do not talk about differences between "supernatural" and "natural" events, I think in terms of how humans experience the world which includes the possibilities of both categories in the same experience 

3- I don't know what theory of truth you use to see a lack of quantifiable experience as "fallacious". Religion is not science.  I accept Alma 32 and a neo pragmatic, Postmodern view of truth which essentially says that truth "bears fruit" that works for a specific question, 

 Well I had more to say, but we are SO far apart....

Edited September 30, 2022 by mfbukowski

[SeekingUnderstanding]

9 minutes ago, mfbukowski said:

2- I do not talk about differences between "supernatural" and "natural" events, I think in terms of how humans experience the world which includes the possibilities of both categories in the same experience 

How does a human, that only experiences consciousness, differentiate between natural and super natural stimuli? Isn’t it fair to say that “natural” stimuli are those that we can understand with “science”, those can recreate, poke and prod, etc? And that super natural are the ones that “science” can’t explain? Doesn’t that make it a category error to compare the two?

[Benjamin McGuire]

12 hours ago, Ryan Dahle said:

What!!!!! You think that is the argument I am making???

It was the argument you were making. But, if this is where the discussion ends, then this is where it ends. *shrug*

[CV75]

9 hours ago, SeekingUnderstanding said:

How does a human, that only experiences consciousness, differentiate between natural and super natural stimuli? Isn’t it fair to say that “natural” stimuli are those that we can understand with “science”, those can recreate, poke and prod, etc? And that super natural are the ones that “science” can’t explain? Doesn’t that make it a category error to compare the two?

Humans simply decide what to call their experience (natural or supernatural), and to what they attribute their experience (natural or supernatural source, cause, etc.). The differentiation between the two is their own creation, taking place in their own heads, according to their own standards/criteria. Two people see the same light bulb, which reasonably exists independently of their mental state, but one sees it as a device converting electricity into light, and another a ghost, depending on their respective paradigm ad prior experience.

[mfbukowski]

3 hours ago, CV75 said:

Humans simply decide what to call their experience (natural or supernatural), and to what they attribute their experience (natural or supernatural source, cause, etc.). The differentiation between the two is their own creation, taking place in their own heads, according to their own standards/criteria. Two people see the same light bulb, which reasonably exists independently of their mental state, but one sees it as a device converting electricity into light, and another a ghost, depending on their respective paradigm ad prior experience.

DANG, dude! 

[Ryan Dahle]

5 hours ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

17 hours ago, Ryan Dahle said:

What!!!!! You think that is the argument I am making???

It was the argument you were making. But, if this is where the discussion ends, then this is where it ends. *shrug*

It wasn't the argument I was making. And that is partly why the discussion is ending. *shrug*