More on Horses

[mfbukowski]

35 minutes ago, Hamilton Porter said:

No it's not mainly due to church history. It's due mainly to LGBTQ issues.

No, it's more about the huge cultural shift from Dualism which ALLOWED LBGTQ ideas to flourish.

It is about relativism.

Blame Darwin, Einstein, Heisenberg, Wittgenstein, the women's movement, Abraham Lincoln, The Perry Scheme , Kuhn, Hippies, the Civil Rights movement, and millions of others if you want someone to praise or blame.

 

[Teancum]

1 hour ago, Hamilton Porter said:

I don't really care.

Of course you don't.

1 hour ago, Hamilton Porter said:

 

Worldwide church is doing just fine.

If you measure it by it's wealth that is certainly true.  Other metrics not so much.

[mfbukowski]

1 hour ago, Teancum said:

I think it is both.  Regardless, it is a battle religions, especially conservative ones, are losing. Reason to celebrate.

And YOUR arguments are now "conservative" because they are modernist, 18th and 19th centuries.

Matter is now energy, the observer effect is "real", and so is the placebo effect.

Reality can be changed by beliefs.  https://www.scienceabc.com/pure-sciences/observer-effect-quantum-mechanics.html

Edited April 12, 2023 by mfbukowski

[Hamilton Porter]

25 minutes ago, Teancum said:

Of course you don't.

If you measure it by it's wealth that is certainly true.  Other metrics not so much.

Membership is still growing but if it'll make you happy you can keep believing it isn't. 

[mfbukowski]

5 hours ago, Dario_M said:

Whut? Everything always start with the Europeans right?? 

Did you guys know that you are actually also Europeans from a long long time ago??

The present population of the US includes DNA from virtually all peoples on earth.

Yes we know that, thanks.

 

Edited April 12, 2023 by mfbukowski

[Teancum]

2 hours ago, mfbukowski said:

I was  not speaking of "Mormonism", I was speaking of postmodernism which is already altering cultural understanding of positivist leaning members of the church,

I am skeptical most people understand your views on postmodernism and philosophy and unless things have changed with the LDS people I used to run with ( and still do quite with quite a few of them) I don't see anyone approaching these things like you do. Heck I don't see much of it on this board by believing members.  You and maybe a couple of others.

 

2 hours ago, mfbukowski said:

 

 

which is somewhat ironic, since people who want evidence do not believe in ghosts. 

 

Not sure I follow that comment.

 

 

2 hours ago, mfbukowski said:

THAT is the central contradiction of the thinking of church members leaving. They want factual EVIDENCE for God, and DUH, there ain't any!

So we need a theory of truth that does not involve factual evidence, which postmodernism provides .  Alma 32.!!

You are the perfect example of why people are leaving; forgive me but I think you are behind the times culturally and philosophically.

I don't expect irrefutable factual evidence for God. But I do think those who claim to speak for God should be trustworthy. If I am expected to pray about JS fantastical truth claims I want to trust him. IMO he is not trustworthy.  And yes I do think his character matters. I asked you a bit ago if you think Warren Jeff's gets revelation and is he trustworthy. Do you pray to know if he is really the true successor of the religion JS started?  If not why?

And really I don't think I am behind culturally though I admit my grasp of philosophical theories is nominal.

And I am still not convinced that positivism is dead. 

2 hours ago, mfbukowski said:

But the change in the culture is already happening. The church is growing internationally,  not in the US where the old attitudes are still entrenched.

The church is barely growing and internationally where it is growing in poor areas where people lack the education to understand your viewpoints.

[Calm]

2 hours ago, Teancum said:

Reason to celebrate.

You are just trying so hard to endear yourself to us today, Teancum. 🤣

[LoudmouthMormon]

4 hours ago, ksfisher said:

There's the word horse, but as Brant Gardner has observed the horses really don't do anything that we would associate with horses.

Oh, I'm just watching the debate move forward.  I was there in the '90's and 2000's when alternate explanations were sought and cureloms were relentlessly mocked.  But that wasn't all that was produced by LDS apologists.  Brant Gardner notwithstanding, there were plenty of LDS in the "absence of evidence is not evidence of absence" camp.  And now there's evidence.  

Hats off to the horse holdouts of those days!   https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1279&context=jbms, for example.  We endured so much mocking by sarcastic mocking mockers.  I don't think anyone actually gave up on horses, we just did an awful lot of proposing and defending the validity of "but what if it meant something other than horses"-type guesses.  

What did a tapir ever do to you people anyway?  Ya bunch of mocking mockers!

Indeed. 

 

And now, just as back then, it truly doesn't matter how much archaeology swings in favor of a literal BoM reading, critics will not be swayed.  I see y'all picking up the "oh yeah?  Well, well, horses change cultures!" drum.  You're of course, welcome to do so.  But from where I'm standing, even if you wake up tomorrow to learn that non-LDS archaeologists have found the sword of laban, a Reformed Egyptian/Aztec rosetta stone, remains of an army with breastplates and DNA pointing directly to Jerusalem, and the ruins of Zarahemla, half of y'all would still not bend your knee, confess Christ, and either get baptized or report to your bishops for callings.  

 

 

Edited April 12, 2023 by LoudmouthMormon

[mfbukowski]

56 minutes ago, Teancum said:

I am skeptical most people understand your views on postmodernism and philosophy and unless things have changed with the LDS people I used to run with ( and still do quite with quite a few of them) I don't see anyone approaching these things like you do. Heck I don't see much of it on this board by believing members.  You and maybe a couple of others.

 

 

Not sure I follow that comment.

 

 

I don't expect irrefutable factual evidence for God. But I do think those who claim to speak for God should be trustworthy. If I am expected to pray about JS fantastical truth claims I want to trust him. IMO he is not trustworthy.  And yes I do think his character matters. I asked you a bit ago if you think Warren Jeff's gets revelation and is he trustworthy. Do you pray to know if he is really the true successor of the religion JS started?  If not why?

And really I don't think I am behind culturally though I admit my grasp of philosophical theories is nominal.

And I am still not convinced that positivism is dead. 

The church is barely growing and internationally where it is growing in poor areas where people lack the education to understand your viewpoints.

Well, I think we are kindred spirits in a way, but it just doesn't seem to be sticking.

Let's discuss western Civilization in about 200 years, ok? 

 

 

[Hamilton Porter]

5 minutes ago, LoudmouthMormon said:

Oh, I'm just watching the debate move forward.  I was there in the '90's and 2000's when alternate explanations were sought and cureloms were relentlessly mocked.  But that wasn't all that was produced by LDS apologists.  Brant Gardner notwithstanding, there were plenty of LDS in the "absence of evidence is not evidence of absence" camp.  And now there's evidence.  

Hats off to the horse holdouts of those days!   https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1279&context=jbms, for example.  We endured so much mocking by sarcastic mocking mockers.  I don't think anyone actually gave up on horses, we just did an awful lot of proposing and defending the validity of "but what if it meant something other than horses"-type guesses.  

What did a tapir ever do to you people anyway?  Ya bunch of mocking mockers!

Indeed. 

 

And now, just as back then, it truly doesn't matter how much archaeology swings in favor of a literal BoM reading, critics will not be swayed.  I see y'all picking up the "oh yeah?  Well, well, horses change cultures!" drum.  You're of course, welcome to do so.  But from where I'm standing, even if you wake up tomorrow to learn that non-LDS archaeologists have found the sword of laban, a Reformed Egyptian/Aztec rosetta stone, remains of an army with breastplates and DNA pointing directly to Jerusalem, and the ruins of Zarahemla, half of y'all would still not bend your knee, confess Christ, and either get baptized or report to your bishops for callings.  

 

 

I'm someone who thought this was a non-issue, that close to half of all anachronisms have been obliterated with discoveries, and that critics were behaving like Young Earth Creationists who think evolution didn't happen because of missing fossil links. Do I get a prize too?

[Hamilton Porter]

2 minutes ago, mfbukowski said:

Well, I think we are kindred spirits in a way, but it just doesn't seem to be sticking.

Let's discuss western Civilization in about 200 years, ok? 

 

 

I understand you just fine, if you can't tell already.

[mfbukowski]

1 hour ago, Teancum said:

And I am still not convinced that positivism is dead. 

Clearly!

Even though it has been repudiated, largely by its founders.

It has no scientific or philosophical basis.

Wittgenstein repudiated the entire Tractatus. AJ Ayer, it's founder also repudiated it.

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/ayer/

Edited April 12, 2023 by mfbukowski

[mfbukowski]

Anybody else I did not answer?

 

[Dario_M]

1 hour ago, mfbukowski said:

The present population of the US includes DNA from virtually all peoples on earth.

But mostely from Europe.

1 hour ago, mfbukowski said:

Yes we know that, thanks.

 

You re welcome. God bless. ✝️

[ksfisher]

39 minutes ago, LoudmouthMormon said:

nd now, just as back then, it truly doesn't matter how much archaeology swings in favor of a literal BoM reading, critics will not be swayed.  I see y'all picking up the "oh yeah?  Well, well, horses change cultures!" drum.  You're of course, welcome to do so.  But from where I'm standing, even if you wake up tomorrow to learn that non-LDS archaeologists have found the sword of laban, a Reformed Egyptian/Aztec rosetta stone, remains of an army with breastplates and DNA pointing directly to Jerusalem, and the ruins of Zarahemla, half of y'all would still not bend your knee, confess Christ, and either get baptized or report to your bishops for callings.  

So my belief or disbelief in horses in the Book of Mormon is a test of my faith in Christ? 

[mfbukowski]

48 minutes ago, mfbukowski said:

Clearly!

Even though it has been repudiated, largely by its founders.

It has no scientific or philosophical basis.

Wittgenstein repudiated the entire Tractatus. AJ Ayer, it's founder also repudiated it.

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/ayer/

The mature AJ Ayer's view on truth:

He was one of the founders of positivism, and later repudiated it.

This is from the Stanford University's Encyclopedia of Philosophy:

 

"2.2 Truth

In LTL Ayer, following Ramsey (as he thought, but see Field 1986 for a dissenting view), put forward a redundancy (deflationary) view of truth: “…in all sentences of the form ‘p is true’, the phrase ‘is true’ is logically superfluous” (LTL p. 117). The function of such a phrase is simply to mark an assertion (or denial, in the case of ‘is false’), so there is no ‘real’ relation of truth, and so no problem of truth for philosophers to worry about. Similarly, when we say a proposition is probable, or probably true, we are not assigning any intrinsic property to the proposition, nor saying that there is any relation it bears to any other proposition. We are simply expressing our confidence in that proposition, or, more accurately, it expresses the degree of confidence it is rational to possess in the proposition.

This deflationary attitude to truth was supported by his verificationism about meaning; Ayer did not have to provide truth-conditions for the meaning of sentences. Assertions had meaning in virtue of their verification conditions, and propositions were defined just as an equivalence class of sentences with the same verification conditions.

Deflationism about truth replaces a concern for a substantial theory of truth with a concern about which sentences, or utterances, are deemed to be truth-apt. Ayer denied that moral utterances were truth-apt. Given that he thought that asserting that p was equivalent to saying that p was true, he had to deny that moral utterances could be assertions (see section 7).

See the entry on the deflationary theory of truth for further discussion"

 

Edited April 12, 2023 by mfbukowski

[LoudmouthMormon]

15 minutes ago, ksfisher said:

So my belief or disbelief in horses in the Book of Mormon is a test of my faith in Christ? 

Not Christ, but yeah, I've lived through a quarter century of critics using archaeology as a test of their willingness to accept BoM truth claims.  

 

[ksfisher]

4 minutes ago, LoudmouthMormon said:

Not Christ, but yeah,

 

So which is it, no or yes?  Does my disbelief in horses in the Book or Mormon disqualify me, in your judgement, as a believer in Christ? 

[Smiley McGee]

7 minutes ago, mfbukowski said:

The mature AJ Ayer's view on truth:

He was one of the founders of positivism, and later repudiated it.

This is from the Stanford University's Encyclopedia of Philosophy:

 

"2.2 Truth

In LTL Ayer, following Ramsey (as he thought, but see Field 1986 for a dissenting view), put forward a redundancy (deflationary) view of truth: “…in all sentences of the form ‘p is true’, the phrase ‘is true’ is logically superfluous” (LTL p. 117). The function of such a phrase is simply to mark an assertion (or denial, in the case of ‘is false’), so there is no ‘real’ relation of truth, and so no problem of truth for philosophers to worry about. Similarly, when we say a proposition is probable, or probably true, we are not assigning any intrinsic property to the proposition, nor saying that there is any relation it bears to any other proposition. We are simply expressing our confidence in that proposition, or, more accurately, it expresses the degree of confidence it is rational to possess in the proposition.

This deflationary attitude to truth was supported by his verificationism about meaning; Ayer did not have to provide truth-conditions for the meaning of sentences. Assertions had meaning in virtue of their verification conditions, and propositions were defined just as an equivalence class of sentences with the same verification conditions.

Deflationism about truth replaces a concern for a substantial theory of truth with a concern about which sentences, or utterances, are deemed to be truth-apt. Ayer denied that moral utterances were truth-apt. Given that he thought that asserting that p was equivalent to saying that p was true, he had to deny that moral utterances could be assertions (see section 7).

See the entry on the deflationary theory of truth for further discussion"

 

I don’t know how you sit through fast and testimony meeting without biting your tongue so hard you go right through it. All those superfluous “is true” statements. Also wonder if your ward has your Rorty quote memorized yet.

[ksfisher]

1 hour ago, mfbukowski said:

The mature AJ Ayer's view on truth:

So what I’m really itching to know now is, what was the immature AJ Ayer’s view?

🙂

Edited April 12, 2023 by ksfisher

[Bernard Gui]

On 4/11/2023 at 11:35 AM, mfbukowski said:

Nope. Why would it?

Do you worry about Bach's biography in evaluating his music?

I do, but I’m a musicologist.  😘

[mfbukowski]

2 minutes ago, Bernard Gui said:

I do, but I’m a musicologist.  😘

So you must get this stuff well.

Musical communication can change things wordlessly!

Pure Alma 32 can describe rationally, I believe, the "truth or falsity" of a musical experience.

 

[Bernard Gui]

17 hours ago, Smiley McGee said:

You’re proposing something that is philosophically sound but clearly psychologically impossible for most people to accept. For whatever reason, that isn’t how humans justify belief. They want to debate Joseph Smith’s sexual proclivities and horses in the BoM because no one wants their religion to be associated with a philanderer and people need to believe that the stories they like really happened. 
 

Should bach’s personal life matter to the enjoyment of his music? What if you learned he frequently molested children? Would you then enthusiastically attend a concert showcasing his music? Would you be able to attend without denying that he was a pedophile? It should have no bearing on whether you find certain vibrations hitting your ears enjoyable, but it does, because no one wants to enjoy a pedophile’s music. 

Bach was a pedophile? Who knew!

[Teancum]

4 hours ago, Hamilton Porter said:

Membership is still growing but if it'll make you happy you can keep believing it isn't. 

I did not say it is not growing.  But it is growing very slowly. But hey keep patting yourselves on the back.  You know that all is well in Zion thing.

[Teancum]

3 hours ago, Calm said:

You are just trying so hard to endear yourself to us today, Teancum. 🤣

Context is everything.