In 1985, I Personally Witnessed Golden Plates

[Analytics]

In another thread , the issue of the eleven witnesses came up in passing. I said something to the effect that their statements were unpersuasive when you look at the totality of the evidence. @smac97 went off on this with insinuations of “intellectual dishonesty, even moral cowardice,” and suggested I was “apparently ditching the entire notion of the examination of evidence” and that I had “arbitrarily, and in a priori fashion, exclude the Witness statements” as being “reliable evidence” because doing so was “convenient.” He found it objectionable that I expressed my opinion in passing and provided “no argument.  No evidence.  No analysis.  No explanation.”

Since hearing the details of my thoughts on this is so important to him, I’ll share some true personal experiences that illustrate where I’m coming from. This will be somewhat long, and I’ll break up my position in about three posts.

In the 1985-1986 school year, I was a junior at Hillcrest High in Midvale Utah. I took release-time seminary, and we were studying Church history and the D&C that year. One day, the instructor stood in front of the class, and there was a cloth covering the lectern that was on the table at the front of the class. He told the class that underneath the cloth and underneath the lecturn, he had a very, very, special object. He said it was a stack of several plates that were gold in color. He said some of them were sealed. He said they were bound together with three rings, that they were of curious workmanship, and that they had characters on them that appeared to be written in an ancient language, perhaps Egyptian or something that could be called reformed Egyptian. Everyone in the class was extremely curious about this—it sounded like he had an exact replica of the original Book of Mormon codex in front of the class.

Everyone in the class really, really, wanted to see what he had underneath the lectern. He asked the members of the class if they believed he really had what he said he had. Some people raised their hand and believed him. However, most did not.

He then said he’d prove to us that he really had what he said he had. He chose eleven people out of the class of about 30 to come up and see the plates. I was lucky enough to be one of the witnesses. He fashioned some sort of a curtain out of the cloth so that he could pull the object out from under the lectern and let eleven of us examine what he had without revealing it to the other 20 people.

We went to the front of the class to see the artifact he had. It was real. He let us touch them. We thumbed through the pages. Everyone else in the class saw us doing this and they were permitted to ask us questions about what we saw. We all answered honestly. There really was an object behind the curtain. The object consisted of a stack of plates. Each plate was about 6” by 8”. They were golden in color. They were bound together with rings. They had antique writing on them. We could thumb through some of the plates, but others were sealed. All eleven of us attested to the rest of the class about what we saw.
After we were done examining the plates, we returned to our seats. The teacher then repeated the question he asked at the beginning: how many students thought the object he claimed to have under the lectern was really there? Everybody raised their hand. And that was the point—twelve people attesting to the reality of the plates was really strong evidence that they really existed.

To be continued...
 

[Analytics]

Part 2

A couple of weeks ago, some attorneys asked me to help them as a non-testifying subject matter expert. There was a legal dispute, and they were going to have a seven hour deposition with somebody who had worked at the company that was the other party in the lawsuit. My role was to review several documents they had gathered in discovery, help the attorneys understand some of the technical subtleties involved, and help them make a list of questions to ask in the deposition. The documents we reviewed included several reports and emails written by the guy who was to be deposed. The attorneys and I got a clear picture of who this guy was and what he thought and believed. We anticipated what he would say under oath and how it would be helpful to their case.

In the deposition, my client, the attorney, asked the gentlemen being deposed questions. It was a full seven hours of questioning, with breaks every 90 minutes that were off the record and off the clock. A lot of the questions were background in nature: who the guy was, where he went to school, when and why did he start working at this company, what he did, how was his career going, what did he think about the people he worked with and worked for, etc. And a ton of questions had to do with specific documents. Did he remember seeing them before. Did he write them. Did he agree with what was said. What was the motivation for writing them. What was the background. What was done about it. The questions went on and on and on, with the goal of making sure we understood all of the nuances about what this guy had witnessed and what he thought.

It turned out that our impression of him from just reading the discovery documents was way off. He hadn’t written some things we thought he had. He didn’t have many of the opinions we thought he did. He cared about things that were different than what we thought he cared about. By going through this process of digging deep into what he thought with follow-up question after follow-up question, a completely different picture of his role in the dispute came into focus that was impossible to get by just looking at the reams of documents that were handed over during discovery.

And I think that is the point. Somebody can write a document and sign it, but that document probably doesn’t contain all of the background information needed to fully understand what the document really means. That’s why things like depositions and cross examinations are things—they are necessary to get to the truth.

To be continued...

[Analytics]

Part 3

If the eleven witnesses were being called to testify in an actual court, I’d expect each of them to be subject to a full 7 hours of deposition in order for the opposing attorney to fully understand the reality of what they were testifying about. Off the top of my head, questions would include topics such as who they are, what are their backgrounds, how long did they know Joseph Smith, how they met, what did they know about his treasure digging business endeavors, when did they first hear of the Book of Mormon, when did they first see the plates, who was set to gain financially from them (e.g. Joseph Smith tried to sell the copyright), why were they chosen to be witnesses, and what they expected to get from it; if Joseph Smith sold they copyright as he tried to do, would he share the profits with the witnesses? Why or why not? Were they promised anything in return for signing this? I’d ask if they agreed with the verse in the Book of Mormon that says anything that increases faith in Jesus is from God. I’d ask them that if they thought a Paul-H.-Dunn style lie was okay if it helped increase faith. I’d ask detailed questions about the specific date and time of day when the witness event occurred. I’d want to know exactly where it happened, how did the plates get there, and what happened to the plates when the viewing event ended. What does it mean to see something with spiritual eyes? And I’d ask excruciating detail about what, exactly, the plates were like. How thick were the plates? How many? What does it mean for them to be “sealed”? What does it mean to see them with “spiritual eyes.” I’d ask why they signed a joint statement rather than writing their own statements. I’d ask if it was it possible for somebody in the 19^th century to have made them? How did they know? And did they know what happened to the plates after all this.

A skilled attorney would spend weeks preparing for these depositions so that we could really, really, understand what the witness statements actually mean. The issue isn’t whether the guys were honest, upright guys. The issue is what do these statements actually mean if you strip out all of our assumptions about what they mean?

And that’s brings me back to that seminary class in the Fall of 1985. When the class ended, I stayed back a little bit, because one of my fellow students was very dissatisfied with this whole thing and desperately wanted to see the golden plates under the lectern for herself. The teacher held his ground and insisted there was no need, because she had heard the witness statements. I found the interaction fascinating, because this student was sure that whatever it was we saw was absolutely spectacular—a near-perfect replica of the authentic golden plates, or maybe, just maybe, they were the authentic golden plates themselves. After all, if they weren’t the authentic golden plates, where would a lowly seminary teacher come up with the gold to make his own replica? And how would he make them? That doesn’t seem plausible, either.

If a skilled attorney would have deposed the witnesses of the golden plates we saw under the lectern, he would have learned a few things the students in the class did not. He’d learn that yes, we saw what we described, but he also would have learned that the plates we saw were ridiculously underwhelming. Once you bought a few thin pieces of balsa wood, some gold colored spray paint, and some nikel-plated loose leaf binder rings, all you’d need was a black sharpie, a table saw, a drill, some glue, and about 2 hours to make your own set of “golden plates.” No serious woodworking or artistry skills required. You’d notice that “sealing” plates with glue was easier than writing on them with a sharpie. The plates we saw were so unimpressive it was comical. Yet because we as witnesses instinctively followed the lead of the seminary instructor when describing what we saw, and because the students didn’t know how to ask the right probing questions, they were left thinking that we saw something that was miraculously impressive.

So what did Joseph Smith’s witnesses see in 1829? I don’t know. I find the joint statements that Joseph Smith wrote and they signed to be intrinsically problematic and in desperate need of a serious cross examination. I don’t know what, exactly, if anything, they saw. I just don’t know. But just because I don’t know what to make of their statements doesn’t mean I don’t know anything at all. One of the things I do know is that if you study the totality of all the evidence, the theory that they saw an authentic Mayan codex that was buried in New York and then dug up by Joseph Smith is the least likely explanation imaginable.  

[webbles]

The 11 witnesses had their name attached to a book that became pretty well known, either as a true book or as a falsity.  They were questioned about it a lot.  We have a few recordings of their statements.  We don't have any where near all of their statements.  Don't you think they were cross examined through out their life?  People wanted to know whether or not it happened.  If, at any time, they had expressed any sort of reservation or deception, don't you think that would have immediately been recorded?  I wish I could cross-examine them.  But I wasn't alive at that time.  But to say they weren't cross-examined just because I wasn't there is a wrong assumption.

Also, I'd ask that you change your last statement to "On of the things I do know is that when I study the totality of all the evidence, ..." (change "if you" to "when I").  Because there are many people who have studied the same amount of evidence that you have and came to the opposite conclusion.

[Analytics]

9 hours ago, webbles said:

The 11 witnesses had their name attached to a book that became pretty well known, either as a true book or as a falsity.  They were questioned about it a lot.  We have a few recordings of their statements.  We don't have any where near all of their statements.  Don't you think they were cross examined through out their life?

I know some of them were. For example, multiple people pressed Martin Harris on the details and according to them, Martin Harris says he saw them with his spiritual eyes, not his physical eyes.

9 hours ago, webbles said:

People wanted to know whether or not it happened.

But “whether or not it happened” is the wrong question. The right question is what, exactly, happened.

9 hours ago, webbles said:

  If, at any time, they had expressed any sort of reservation or deception, don't you think that would have immediately been recorded?

“Reservation or deception” is part of it, but the more important part is clarity on what it is they are claiming. For example, are they claiming that Moroni was a physical, resurrected being, and that actual light rays in the visible spectrum shined out of him and bounced off of him and went into the witnesses eyeballs the way all natural light in the visible spectrum does? Are they claiming that this physical being literally showed them the physical plates that Joseph Smith had? Did they think to ask how this angel got the plates out of Joseph Smith’s possession? Did Joseph Smith ask the angel to be sure to put the plates back where he found them?

When people read the extraordinarily vague witness statements that Joseph Smith wrote, especially from the perspective of Church belief as it now exists, they might not get the correct picture of what the witnesses were actually claiming. 

As far as I know, the best account of the three witnesses experience is the one written by Joseph Smith himself:

Quote

Not many days after the above commandment was given, we four, viz Martin Harris, David Whitmer, Oliver Cowdery and myself, agreed to retire into the woods, and try to obtain by fervent and humble prayer, the fulfilment of the promises given in this revelation; that they should have a view of the pl[ates] &c[.]40 we accordingly made choice of a piece of woods convenient to Mr Whitmer’s [house],41 to which we retired, and having knelt down, we began to pray in much faith, to Almighty God to bestow upon us a realization of those promises. According to previous arrangement, I commenced by vocal prayer to our Heavenly Father and was folowed by each of the rest in succession; we did not yet however obtain any answer or manifestation of the divine favour in our behalf. We again observed the same order of prayer each calling on and praying fervently to God in rotation; but with the same result as before. Upon this our second failure, Martin Harris proposed that he would withdraw himself from us, believing as he expressed himself that his presence was the cause of our not obtaining what we wished for: He accordingly withdrew from us, and we knelt down again, and had not been many minutes engaged in prayer when presently we beheld a light above us in the air of exceeding brightness, and behold, an angel stood before us; in his hands he held the plates which we had been praying for these to have a view of: he turned over the leaves one by one, so that we could see them, and discern the engravings thereon distinctly: He addressed himself to David Whitmer, and said, “David, blessed is the Lord, and he that keeps all his commandments:” when immediately afterwards we heard a voice from out of the bright light above us, saying [HC 1:54] “These plates have been revealed by the power of God, and they have been translated by the power of God; the translation of them which you have seen is correct, and I command you to bear record of what you now see and hear”.— I now left David and Oliver, and went in pursuit of Martin Harris, who I found at a considerable distance fervently engaged in prayer; he soon told me however that he had not yet prevailed with the Lord, and earnestly requested me, to join him in prayer, that he also might realize the same blessings which we had just recieved: we accordingly joined in prayer, and ultimately obtained our desires, for before we had yet finished, the same vision was opened to our view; at least it was again to me, and I once more beheld, and seen, and heard the same things; whilst at the same moment, Martin Harris cried out, apparently in an ecstasy of Joy “’Tis enough, ’tis enough; mine eyes have beheld, mine eyes have beheld”, and jumping up he shouted, Hosanna, blessing God; and otherwise rejoiced exceedingly. 

If we had that type of statement from each of the 11 witnesses, I’d know what they were claiming and could then evaluate it.

Note that Joseph Smith himself expressed some doubt about whether or not Martin Harris really saw the vision. Joseph said “the same vision was opened to our view; at least it was again to me.”   This doubt about whether or not Harris saw the same thing Joseph did while they were both there at the same time corroborates what various people claim Martin Harris told them--that he saw the plates and angel with his spiritual eyes, not his physical ones.

If one looks at how much desire, faith and fervent prayer was needed to see this vision in the first place, and if you consider that they saw what they did with their own spiritual eyes and not their physical ones, and that Joseph Smith wasn’t sure Marin Harris really saw in front of them what Joseph saw, you can begin to understand what they are actually claiming. 

What I’m asking for is eleven more statements like this one that go into detail about what they are claiming happened. With more details, the claims are too vague to evaluate.

9 hours ago, webbles said:

Also, I'd ask that you change your last statement to "On of the things I do know is that when I study the totality of all the evidence, ..." (change "if you" to "when I").  Because there are many people who have studied the same amount of evidence that you have and came to the opposite conclusion.

Point granted, but I’m not sure anybody really has studied the totality of the evidence, properly considered it, and came to the opposite conclusion. A lot of compartmentalized thinking goes in to evaluating this type of thing. Believing in the Book of Mormon is a religious belief, not a scientific one.

[Stormin' Mormon]

12 hours ago, Analytics said:

One of the things I do know is that if you study the totality of all the evidence, the theory that they saw an authentic Mayan codex that was buried in New York and then dug up by Joseph Smith is the least likely explanation imaginable.  

Agreed. It's so unlikely that it's only ever happened to 0.000018% of the people who have ever lived in the United States.

This type of reasoning can tell us what should happen, what is likely to happen, what will happen in the vast majority of instances. But because improbable things happen every day, it cannot tell us what actually did happen in a given, specific instance. It's exceedingly unlikely that I won a million dollar jackpot yesterday, but it's an almost statistical certainty that someone somewhere did.

The Book of Mormon wouldn't have been a marvelous work and a wonder if it were likely or expected.

Edited February 25, 2024 by Stormin' Mormon

[webbles]

2 hours ago, Analytics said:

I know some of them were. For example, multiple people pressed Martin Harris on the details and according to them, Martin Harris says he saw them with his spiritual eyes, not his physical eyes.

Supposedly he also saw an angel.  It makes sense to say he saw them with his spiritual eyes.  I've never understood this contention.

2 hours ago, Analytics said:

“Reservation or deception” is part of it, but the more important part is clarity on what it is they are claiming. For example, are they claiming that Moroni was a physical, resurrected being, and that actual light rays in the visible spectrum shined out of him and bounced off of him and went into the witnesses eyeballs the way all natural light in the visible spectrum does? Are they claiming that this physical being literally showed them the physical plates that Joseph Smith had? Did they think to ask how this angel got the plates out of Joseph Smith’s possession? Did Joseph Smith ask the angel to be sure to put the plates back where he found them?

The way we understand light is completely different from back then in the 1800s.  So if you had asked them whether "actual light rays in the visible spectrum shined out of him", they'd look at you like you are crazy.  But do I believe that people back then asked hard questions in their scientific terms.  I also find it interesting that you are appear to be focusing on the 3 witness experience which is the one that is has angels and such.  That could be because we have the most recorded statements from them (considering there are angels, it makes sense).  What about the 8 witnesses that have no spiritual encounters?

2 hours ago, Analytics said:

If we had that type of statement from each of the 11 witnesses, I’d know what they were claiming and could then evaluate it.

2 hours ago, Analytics said:

What I’m asking for is eleven more statements like this one that go into detail about what they are claiming happened. With more details, the claims are too vague to evaluate.

I'd love to have those statements as well.  But that doesn't mean they never gave statements like that.  It just means they weren't written down.  Considering that there are at least two people (you and me) who would have loved to cross-examine the 11 witnesses to our best abilities, I find it extremely probable that there were many who lived with the 11 witnesses who wanted to do the same and actually did cross-examine them.

2 hours ago, Analytics said:

Point granted, but I’m not sure anybody really has studied the totality of the evidence, properly considered it, and came to the opposite conclusion. A lot of compartmentalized thinking goes in to evaluating this type of thing. Believing in the Book of Mormon is a religious belief, not a scientific one.

Ok, so what evidence have people missed or improperly considered?  I, personally, accept that you have seen the same evidence as me and have come to a different conclusion.  I'd prefer if you give me the same consideration.

[OGHoosier]

2 hours ago, Stormin' Mormon said:

Agreed. It's so unlikely that it's only ever happened to 0.000018% of the people who have ever lived in the United States.

This type of reasoning can tell us what should happen, what is likely to happen, what will happen in the vast majority of instances. But because improbable things happen every day, it cannot tell us what actually did happen in a given, specific instance. It's exceedingly unlikely that I won a million dollar jackpot yesterday, but it's an almost statistical certainty that someone somewhere did.

The Book of Mormon wouldn't have been a marvelous work and a wonder if it were likely or expected.

You know, I'm starting to believe that "likelihood" is a really bad tool for assessing God. "Likelihood" implies a persistent set of rules that govern interactions, a standard by which you can measure how often things can be expected to happen. But we're talking about God here, we're talking about a Being that makes the rules, what hath "likelihood" to do with Him? Seems like invoking the concept of "likelihood" just begs the question. 

It's not for nothing that Pascal, himself the father of probability theory, opined that "Reason's last step is the recognition that there are an infinite number of things which are beyond it." It's a good tool but a poor substitute for God.

Edited February 25, 2024 by OGHoosier

[bluebell]

1 hour ago, Analytics said:

Believing in the Book of Mormon is a religious belief, not a scientific one.

Isn't not believing in the BOM the same though? Not that not believing is a religious belief, but rather that it's a theological belief and not a scientific one.

This seems especially true to me since science is as silent on disproof of it as it is on proof, and since the strength of the evidence in support or against is measured against a bias (that bias being the belief or disbelief in God).

[Pyreaux]

7 hours ago, Analytics said:

I know some of them were. For example, multiple people pressed Martin Harris on the details and according to them, Martin Harris says he saw them with his spiritual eyes, not his physical eyes.

I don't exactly understand, whatever you think Whitmer meant, whatever way 4 people simultaneously see the plates by the angel Moroni, you can't say the same for the 16 others that interacted with the plates who reported no type of spiritual experience. They said no such thing as spiritual eyes. I don't think when Josiah Stowell testified under oath that he saw the plates the day Joseph first brought them home, in court, that he could be taken to mean they were somehow aethereal.

Edited February 25, 2024 by Pyreaux

[LoudmouthMormon]

20 hours ago, Analytics said:

In the 1985-1986 school year

I think the ability to understand just how little stuff there was available in frontier America, is pretty much only held by folks who have spent some time in the 3rd world.  We're swiftly losing the memory of life before online shopping, but yes, happy rich first world American hobbyists lived in, made Analytics' 1985-6 experience totally believable, and the witnesses to the event had hardly experienced a miracle.  While 1830's Fayette New York, as the Industrial Revolution was just beginning it's century-long transformation of the world, such claims were something else entirely.

In short, this is worse than an apples and oranges comparison.  This is more like a 1986 Buick Regal Grand National with a 235-horsepower 3.8-liter turbocharged V6 comparison to, well, a horse.

 vs 

 

Yawn.  

 

Edited February 26, 2024 by LoudmouthMormon

[Nevo]

7 hours ago, bluebell said:

the strength of the evidence in support or against is measured against a bias (that bias being the belief or disbelief in God).

Most contemporaries who rejected the 11 Witnesses' testimonies didn't do so because they didn't believe in God or the supernatural. Most were believing Christians (Mark Twain was the exception rather than the rule).

I think Analytics makes important points in his thread. Certainly, eyewitness testimony of alleged supernatural events is not probative simply because it is eyewitness testimony. Premodern people recounted all kinds of firsthand experiences that many of us now (even believers) would find hard to accept. If you doubt this, may I suggest Carlos Eire's recent book, They Flew: A History of the Impossible. 

Edited February 26, 2024 by Nevo

[bluebell]

31 minutes ago, Nevo said:

Most contemporaries who rejected the 11 Witnesses' testimonies didn't do so because they didn't believe in God or the supernatural. Most were believing Christians (Mark Twain was the exception rather than the rule).

I think Analytics makes important points in his thread. Certainly, eyewitness testimony of alleged supernatural events is not probative simply because it is eyewitness testimony. Premodern people recounted all kinds of firsthand experiences that many of us now (even believers) would find hard to accept. If you doubt this, may I suggest Carlos Eire's recent book, They Flew: A History of the Impossible. 

Oh I know there are a lot of people who reject the authenticity of the Book of Mormon for religious reasons, but because he spoke in terms of science, it felt reasonable to stick to that specific angle of the topic.

And when you’re pitting science against miracles (as it seems analytics was doing), you’re almost always, if not always, having a disagreement between atheism and theism.

So that’s why I brought up the obvious bias that atheism brings to any discussion about the authenticity of the miraculous origin of the Book of Mormon.

[webbles]

1 hour ago, Nevo said:

Most contemporaries who rejected the 11 Witnesses' testimonies didn't do so because they didn't believe in God or the supernatural. Most were believing Christians (Mark Twain was the exception rather than the rule).

How many of these contemporaries actually spoke with the witnesses?  I believe most (if not all) of the written rejections we have are from people who reject it without any personal examination of the witnesses.  There's nothing wrong to do that, but I don't see those rejections as all that useful in determining what happened to the witnesses.

[Nevo]

8 minutes ago, webbles said:

How many of these contemporaries actually spoke with the witnesses?

I imagine quite a few did. Certainly, many heard them testify in person. Ezra Booth said in October 1831 that the Three Witnesses "testify that an angel appeared to them, and presented them the golden plates, and the voice of God declared it to be a Divine Record. To this they frequently testify, in the presence of large congregations." Contemporary newspaper reports corroborate this. It's hard to imagine that no one ever put any questions to them in these meetings.

In March 1831, Abner Cole reported a bunch of claims allegedly made by the Witnesses that go beyond their printed testimony in the Book of Mormon, which implies a personal interaction with them at some point (Cole refers to "our informant").

[webbles]

7 minutes ago, Nevo said:

I imagine quite a few did. Certainly, many heard them testify in person. Ezra Booth said in October 1831 that the Three Witnesses "testify that an angel appeared to them, and presented them the golden plates, and the voice of God declared it to be a Divine Record. To this they frequently testify, in the presence of large congregations." Contemporary newspaper reports corroborate this. It's hard to imagine that no one ever put any questions to them in these meetings.

In March 1831, Abner Cole reported a bunch of claims allegedly made by the Witnesses that go beyond their printed testimony in the Book of Mormon, which implies a personal interaction with them at some point (Cole refers to "our informant").

Oh, I was talking about the contemporaries that reject the witnesses.  I fully agree that people did ask questions to them and that more things were asked then what was written down.

[OGHoosier]

2 hours ago, Nevo said:

Certainly, eyewitness testimony of alleged supernatural events is not probative simply because it is eyewitness testimony. Premodern people recounted all kinds of firsthand experiences that many of us now (even believers) would find hard to accept. If you doubt this, may I suggest Carlos Eire's recent book, They Flew: A History of the Impossible. 

I would argue that it must be considered probative, or else we would simply beg the question against whatever the current vogue defines as "supernatural." 

I have placed an order for that book through my interlibrary loan and am very much looking forward to it.

[Analytics]

20 hours ago, webbles said:

Supposedly he also saw an angel.  It makes sense to say he saw them with his spiritual eyes.  I've never understood this contention.

The point is to simply understand with specificity what they are claiming.

20 hours ago, webbles said:

But do I believe that people back then asked hard questions in their scientific terms.

Yes, some did. John H. Gilbert did, for example. He is one of the sources for the three seeing with their "spiritual eyes" rather than with their "natural eyes."

20 hours ago, webbles said:

 I also find it interesting that you are appear to be focusing on the 3 witness experience which is the one that is has angels and such.  That could be because we have the most recorded statements from them (considering there are angels, it makes sense).  What about the 8 witnesses that have no spiritual encounters?

My point applies equally to the eight and to the three. I wan't to know in detail exactly what they are claiming. 

20 hours ago, webbles said:

I'd love to have those statements as well.  But that doesn't mean they never gave statements like that.  It just means they weren't written down.  Considering that there are at least two people (you and me) who would have loved to cross-examine the 11 witnesses to our best abilities, I find it extremely probable that there were many who lived with the 11 witnesses who wanted to do the same and actually did cross-examine them.

Some did, but asking good questions in a deposition takes a lot of skill.

20 hours ago, webbles said:

Ok, so what evidence have people missed or improperly considered?  

I'll answer this question briefly, and I'd be glad to talk about it more in a new topic, but I'd prefer to keep this thread focused on the eight witnesses.

My general suspicion is that believers compartmentalize their thinking (sometimes by evoking the "non-overlapping magisteria" idea), put an inordinate amount of scientific knowledge as being somehow wrong and left on a shelf hoping that some scientific revolution will come around that will allow them to reconcile their religious beliefs with scientific knowledge, or are simply ignorant of what science knows and how strong the evidence actually is.

For further reading:

Rationality: What It Is, Why It Seems Scarce, Why It Matters by Steven Pinker. This explains how to properly consider the evidence, including the proper application of Bayesian reasoning, and the pitfalls of compartmentalized thinking and confirmation bias.

Who's in Charge?: Free Will and the Science of the Brain by Michael S. Gazzaniga. This goes into a lot of detail about why, in the words of Gazzaniga, "there is no disagreement among the neuroscientists that [the brain enables the mind and the brain is a physical entity]." The implications here are important: neuroscience has positively concluded with a great deal of confidence that there isn't a "ghost in the machine." This isn't a philosophical position or an assumption they make. It is the result of an overwhelming amount of clinical evidence.

 The Big Picture: On the Origins of Life, Meaning, and the Universe Itself by Sean Carroll. This book goes into quite a bit of detail about what science knows and what science doesn't know. He shows how quantum physics proves the same thing that cognitive science proves: there isn't a ghost in the machine. It also proves that just about everything we think of as supernatural is impossible. This isn't merely scientific skepticism and choosing to disbelieve things that haven't been proven yet. Rather, it shows how if the supernatural exists, then quantum field theory is profoundly wrong. His point here is both profound and nuanced, and it takes him several chapters to explain his confidence that "we know some things, and that those things are enough to rule out some other things--including bending spoons with the power of your mind."

So in terms of how to properly consider evidence and the evidence that is missed or improperly considered, I'd start there.

[Analytics]

21 hours ago, Stormin' Mormon said:

Agreed. It's so unlikely that it's only ever happened to 0.000018% of the people who have ever lived in the United States.

This type of reasoning can tell us what should happen, what is likely to happen, what will happen in the vast majority of instances. But because improbable things happen every day, it cannot tell us what actually did happen in a given, specific instance. It's exceedingly unlikely that I won a million dollar jackpot yesterday, but it's an almost statistical certainty that someone somewhere did.

The Book of Mormon wouldn't have been a marvelous work and a wonder if it were likely or expected.

This isn't addressing my actual position in any way. Trusting your math, only about 0.000018% have ever claimed to see Joseph Smith's golden plates. Fine. Point granted. However, I saw some golden plates too. Without lying, I testified in public about what I saw. However, the people who heard my testimony and the testimony of the others who saw the same thing was misleading. I think the seminary teacher was intentionally trying to be misleading--he wanted his claim about plates under the lectern to sound really extraordinary in order to demonstrate that the testimony of eleven witnesses was also extraordinarily strong--if we all agreed that the artifact he described was there, it must have really been there.

My point is that in order to fully understand what to make out of their testimonies, we need more details. As it is, their testimony is quite suspicious, and there are multiple possible explanations. Some of those other explanations are more likely than others.

[Analytics]

19 hours ago, OGHoosier said:

You know, I'm starting to believe that "likelihood" is a really bad tool for assessing God. "Likelihood" implies a persistent set of rules that govern interactions, a standard by which you can measure how often things can be expected to happen. But we're talking about God here, we're talking about a Being that makes the rules, what hath "likelihood" to do with Him? Seems like invoking the concept of "likelihood" just begs the question. 

It's not for nothing that Pascal, himself the father of probability theory, opined that "Reason's last step is the recognition that there are an infinite number of things which are beyond it." It's a good tool but a poor substitute for God.

Probability is an interesting concept. While the mathematics surrounding random variables in statistics is well-defined and precise, what statistical concepts such as probability and likelihood mean in the real world is ambiguous. For example, if I had a coin and told you I was going to flip it, you might say the likelihood of it coming up heads is 50%. This means that if I go through the process of flipping the coin, half the time it will be heads and there is no way of knowing whether this particular flip will be heads or not. In contrast, if I just flipped a coin and covered it up so you couldn't see how it landed, I could ask you what is the likelihood that it is heads. Not knowing how it landed you might say the likelihood of the coin being heads is 50%. In this case, you are describing your own knowledge of the situation. I might be able to correctly say that the probability of it being heads is 100%, based on peaking at it.

In my discussion here, I'm not "assessing God." I am describing the way that I weigh the evidence that I've evaluated. 

[OGHoosier]

8 minutes ago, Analytics said:

In my discussion here, I'm not "assessing God." I am describing the way that I weigh the evidence that I've evaluated. 

Weighing the evidence you have evaluated for the purpose of assessing a potential case of divine action. The distance you have created between the two concepts is artificial.

[Analytics]

19 hours ago, bluebell said:

Isn't not believing in the BOM the same though? Not that not believing is a religious belief, but rather that it's a theological belief and not a scientific one.

This seems especially true to me since science is as silent on disproof of it as it is on proof, and since the strength of the evidence in support or against is measured against a bias (that bias being the belief or disbelief in God).

I think it depends. If "believing in the BOM" means accepting that the BOM "works for you" in a @mfbukowski kind of way, then yes, if somebody "believes in the BOM" they are making a religious claim about a book that's an important source of religious inspiration in their life, and not believing is saying that it doesn't work for you. Those are religious beliefs that have little to do with science.

However, if you take the literalistic approach, believing "the Book of Mormon is true" is encroaching deeply into the magisterium of science. Depending upon how the Book-of-Mormon-is-true hypothesis is construed, it is making claims that have implications on metaphysics, history, anthropology, neuroscience, biology, earth sciences, and quantum field theory.

If you take the approach laid out by Steven Pinker in Rationality: What It Is, Why It Seems Scarce, Why It Matters, then science is far from silent on whether the Book of Mormon's truth claims are actually true.

[Analytics]

4 minutes ago, OGHoosier said:

Weighing the evidence you have evaluated for the purpose of assessing a potential case of divine action. The distance you have created between the two concepts is artificial.

I'm not following. Could you clarify?

[JAHS]

On 2/24/2024 at 7:33 PM, Analytics said:

In the 1985-1986 school year, I was a junior at Hillcrest High in Midvale Utah. I took release-time seminary, and we were studying Church history and the D&C that year. One day, the instructor stood in front of the class, and there was a cloth covering the lectern that was on the table at the front of the class. He told the class that underneath the cloth and underneath the lecturn, he had a very, very, special object. He said it was a stack of several plates that were gold in color. He said some of them were sealed. He said they were bound together with three rings, that they were of curious workmanship, and that they had characters on them that appeared to be written in an ancient language, perhaps Egyptian or something that could be called reformed Egyptian. Everyone in the class was extremely curious about this—it sounded like he had an exact replica of the original Book of Mormon codex in front of the class.

My seminary teacher did the same thing only he had me hold them while I ran around the seminary building just to demonstrate how hard it would have been for Joseph Smith to do it for a longer distance.

[OGHoosier]

7 minutes ago, Analytics said:

I'm not following. Could you clarify?

Sure. In your response to @Stormin' Mormon, you state that "some explanations are likelier than others." This whole discussion about weighing testimony and evidence is inseparable from the backdrop of a mindset of hypothesis-weighing based on the perceived likelihood of various hypotheses. However, I think the conceptual possibility of assessing "likelihood" is dependent on the existence of common rules of reference. Rules which cannot be said to bind God, and which may even originate from Him. 

I should state that my original comment was not in response to your anecdote about seeing golden plates, but was more of an expansion on @Stormin' Mormon's thoughts about using probability to assess so-called "special action" on God's part. If @Stormin' Mormon's comment was not related to your point, then my point wouldn't particularly be related to it either.