Philo Double Standard: Mithraists can Appropriate and Modify Symbols and Stories of Others, but not Hor Papyrus Author

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MG 2.0
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Re: Philo Double Standard: Mithraists can Appropriate and Modify Symbols and Stories of Others, but not Hor Papyrus Auth

Post by MG 2.0 »

Ed1 wrote:
Fri Mar 18, 2022 2:18 pm
Kishkumen wrote:
Thu Mar 17, 2022 11:14 pm
Respectfully, I feel like you are making way too much out of comments that were born of my concern for your possible experience on one podcast with one podcaster, Bill Reel. And, honestly, I am not sure I am being totally fair to Bill. The leap to reading into my comments some kind of larger message about the unbridgeable gulf between your position and that of others, such as Philo and me, is really unfortunate. Your conclusions on why Don Bradley is respected are off base, in my opinion.

What you may be missing here is that relationships matter. Our ability to allow each other to be who we are and be OK with that helps us have positive interactions and form friendships. Rushing to judgment and refusing to extend any trust to others is a way to burn bridges before their construction is complete.

Yes, I am pretty cautious about appearing on podcasts. That does not mean you should not. You might go on Mormonism Live and be treated very respectfully. I am a little worried because of other comments and reactions that have come from Bill Reel in the past. Yes. Sure. But that does not mean I am right. It just means I am cautious, and perhaps too much so. Bill is, at the end of the day, a decent person, and if he does not see eye to eye with you, that is not the end of the world.

I think there is something truly valuable to be found in the symbol of the Great and Spacious Building. Do not let others deter you from your quest for the truth. I am happy that you are not letting others get in your way. What I am not happy about is your apparent haste to withdraw in the face of what amounts to well meaning cautionary advice from me, one guy, on one thread, in regards to one guy, on one podcast.
Well, now that it is a new day, I see what you are saying about relationships. But relationships don't matter here for people who begin by dehumanizing believers. To build them here, is not the place, and trying to build bridges here is a joke. Trying to build a relationship with people like Bill and RFM on the chance that they will be respectful of my reasoning and lay off of epistemological judgements long enough for the sake of looking at the evidence I have, and trying to get them to reason through through the evidence is not a good plan. It's futile.

They start out with harassment and derision like the people here. I keep coming back here and enter my dreamworld over and over that I hope somehow I can get through to someone here. It will be the same there if I try. They don't want relationships with believers because that would take away the object of their derision, to make the believers into the dehumanized fools and children that they want them to be. They can see no reason why people would have real reasons to continue to take seriously what they have left behind.

They want to judge things for the merits of the reasoning. All they care about in the first place is their epistemology, and their own inflated sense of their own personal frame of reference and their own superiority. This is the basis of their respect for others, for those they choose to extend it to. That is the essence of this message board is the dehumanization and minimalization of the reasoning powers of the object of derision: the believers.

When I say that my shelf has broken, I say that I had set aside the idea that trying to have friendly relationships and mutual respect with non-believers and secularists, and suspended the expectation that it wasn't insurmountable. And wanted to try to build relationships here, and would try to reason with people. What did I get out of it? What I should have expected to get out of it. What would happen if I went on to Mormonism Live? Exactly what is predictable.

The belief that I could actually engage with people like this and try to reason with them, and be respected by them, has been broken. I put up on the shelf for a time. The fact that you brought to the forefront the fact that I am looked upon as a child, having childish reasoning, and not respected to begin with for that childish reasoning as they see it, made me see the futility. Its not worth the risk to be put in that position. Sometimes I have my highs and my lows, and in my high points, I start to get so positive in my hopes that I forget who I am dealing with, and start to believe that people actually want to build bridges, but forget that they are not my friends and are not likely to be, ever.

I know one thing for sure though going forward. My trying to give feedback to Philo on these points is not useful, friendship or no friendship. Trying to present my research to a group of non-believers to try to get them to see the reasoning to build a bridge and to try to get them to see the merit of something on its own terms is a stupid mistake, and continues to be. Why did I ever expect a different outcome? Because in my high points, I actually thought people could be reasonable. That is what is broken. So I'm not sure that Sunstone is a good plan, when there are few believers to speak of. And Mormonism Live or Mormon Stories is definitely not a good plan. I should stick to the world I live in that is the safe place, where my research really can help people that it will really serve and do good for.

You are right that I should continue to try to build relationships where relationships have been extended to me. But I should stop trying to present research that is not respected epistemologically to people that do not have respect for that epistemology. Why did I ever believe that it could be different? Why did I try to extend the chance to others to try to reason through things with them, when they never agreed to engage in that kind of reasoning, but rather, were trying to make me the object of derision for the mere difference of epistemological belief? Why did I ever believe the outcome would be different than it has been? That's were reality has finally come to show itself, and where the false belief in the goodness of my fellow beings came crashing down. I somehow thought that people in the post-Mormon world would be more reasonable than apologists. Oh how wrong that supposition was. People are all the same, everywhere. Apologists don't accept my work for epistemological reasons, notwithstanding we believe in the same prophet. But I might as well be in a different religion from theirs. Apologists construct their reality and epistemology around pure lies. The same is so with post-Mormons, although they are more genuine and honest about evidence, and they don't budge on epistemology, and cannot reason outside of it. They don't engage in reasoning outside their preferences. This is the lesson learned, that the analogy of not casting your pearls before swine is not a judgement on anyone to call them "swine" in some way, but rather, is a warning to say, do not try to engage in reasoning or share your gems as you may think them to be, with people that are not of your epistemology that they have no respect for, because you will not have a good outcome. Its that simple. That's where reality has come manifesting itself to me, and showed me the flaw in my previous belief, and the futility of trying to reason in this place.

This is why, I still have a choice to make about Sunstone. I have to seriously think about the fact that the grand majority of people there will not have respect for my epistemology. So is there anything to gain presenting there?

When I shared a "God's hand is in this" type of message at Sunstone last time among the Western Esoteric group presentation, the people that were praising the presentation were just being polite. The majority of people that go to Sunstone are not believers of the same sort I am, even if they have chosen to return to the Church. Their belief in the Church being good or useful or having a truth that is useful to them of some sort is much different from my TBM core beliefs, and at the core, there will never be a respect for the epistemology used by people who are TBM at their core like me.

I don't see a usefulness in presenting at Sunstone this time around, unless I could craft a message that would be respected epistemologically by my audience. That is not the point of the presentation I was going to make. I was going to make a presentation that uses a TBM epistemology. And therefore, there is a problem with presenting such a thing there.

I continue to learn a lot about the people that I am dealing with, even when some of them have returned to the Church.
Reading this thread and after looking at some of your stuff Ed, I must say you are one INTERESTING duck. Your voice along with others needs to be heard. Please don’t let the naysayers discourage you from exercising YOUR right to make your voice heard. For some folks your voice my lend itself towards a sort of bridge between what some might consider “childish” and that which is real. Whatever reality REALLY IS, is truth at its core. We see through a glass darkly. Discerning truth/reality is a lifelong process.

Any insights that help us see through that glass with a lesser degree of opaqueness is welcome. And yes, we all have certain biases that may either encourage greater exploration into those things that are spiritually discerned at their core or discourage us from taking these things seriously. That is a personal preference. But that shouldn’t discourage you from traveling the path you’re on and sharing your insights/research with others. I agree with you that die hard secularists are going to have a difficult time taking you seriously. But that may not be the actual audience you are really talking to.

Keep up your work.

When and through what publisher are you going to get your work out there? I think there are folks that will welcome your contributions to Mormon studies. Especially where it deals with the Book of Abraham and Book of Mormon. Just remember that for your work to have real impact it needs to be understood and appreciated by both scholar AND layperson alike. And both need to know that your work is even out there to be had.

Best wishes,
MG
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Re: Philo Double Standard: Mithraists can Appropriate and Modify Symbols and Stories of Others, but not Hor Papyrus Auth

Post by Marcus »

Marcus wrote:
Fri Mar 18, 2022 4:19 pm
From The Abyss,
Lindsay Brigman:

We all see what we want to see. Coffey looks and …he sees hate and fear.

You have to look with better eyes than that.
Ed1 wrote:
Fri Mar 18, 2022 4:21 pm

I have no idea what your point is. But you have chosen to be my enemy. That's all I know. That's the only thing that matters here. Whatever your point is, is not useful to me, I would presume.
You are making my point for me. I have read several of your papers and I have given serious legitimate comments, and you have, every single time, dismissed my comments, saying I am your enemy. I am not. I am making comments on your work, which I think has serious flaws in reasoning. You see invariably disagreement as hatred, never considering the possibility that you have errors in your work.
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Re: Philo Double Standard: Mithraists can Appropriate and Modify Symbols and Stories of Others, but not Hor Papyrus Auth

Post by Ed1 »

Marcus wrote:
Fri Mar 18, 2022 4:29 pm
Marcus wrote:
Fri Mar 18, 2022 4:19 pm

Ed1 wrote:
Fri Mar 18, 2022 4:21 pm

I have no idea what your point is. But you have chosen to be my enemy. That's all I know. That's the only thing that matters here. Whatever your point is, is not useful to me, I would presume.
You are making my point for me. I have read several of your papers and I have given serious legitimate comments, and you have, every single time, dismissed my comments, saying I am your enemy. I am not. I am making comments on your work, which I think has serious flaws in reasoning. You see invariably disagreement as hatred, never considering the possibility that you have errors in your work.
I don't take any of your comments seriously, because your judgement about what you see as flaws are epistemologically based, nothing more, nothing less. You don't get it, and I don't expect that you would get it, because you can't see anything through any other eyes. There are no flaws in the reasoning, because I reject the basis of the rejection. I don't accept the basis of your rejection of my reasoning, so why would I consider them flaws? The reasoning follows the pattern, and fits the epistemology. You have an epistemological difference, and I won't be judged on epistemological differences anymore, and am not going to engage anymore with this. Because you people don't know how to reason outside of your own preferences. There is no reason for communication anymore on these points.
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Re: Philo Double Standard: Mithraists can Appropriate and Modify Symbols and Stories of Others, but not Hor Papyrus Auth

Post by Marcus »

Ed1 wrote:
Fri Mar 18, 2022 4:35 pm
Marcus wrote:
Fri Mar 18, 2022 4:29 pm
You are making my point for me. I have read several of your papers and I have given serious legitimate comments, and you have, every single time, dismissed my comments, saying I am your enemy. I am not. I am making comments on your work, which I think has serious flaws in reasoning. You see invariably disagreement as hatred, never considering the possibility that you have errors in your work.
I don't take any of your comments seriously, because your judgement about what you see as flaws are epistemologically based, nothing more, nothing less. You don't get it, and I don't expect that you would get it, because you can't see anything through any other eyes. There are no flaws in the reasoning, because I reject the basis of the rejection. I don't accept the basis of your rejection of my reasoning, so why would I consider them flaws? The reasoning follows the pattern, and fits the epistemology. You have an epistemological difference, and I won't be judged on epistemological differences anymore, and am not going to engage anymore with this. Because you people don't know how to reason outside of your own preferences. There is no reason for communication anymore on these points.
My goodness.
:roll:
…There are no flaws in the reasoning, because I reject the basis of the rejection…
Yes, that’s exactly my point.
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Re: Philo Double Standard: Mithraists can Appropriate and Modify Symbols and Stories of Others, but not Hor Papyrus Auth

Post by Ed1 »

Marcus wrote:
Fri Mar 18, 2022 4:48 pm
Yes, that’s exactly my point.
Yes, your point is that you believe one way, and you base your critiques solely on that only. Not on the merits of the argument on its own terms.

This is the same as saying, "your work is stupid because I don't believe it. It has no merit, because my beliefs say its stupid." That is not a critique. That is a declaration of belief. That's not useful.
“Do not seek to follow in the footsteps of the wise; seek what they sought.” ― Matsuo Basho
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Re: Philo Double Standard: Mithraists can Appropriate and Modify Symbols and Stories of Others, but not Hor Papyrus Auth

Post by Marcus »

Ed1 wrote:
Fri Mar 18, 2022 4:54 pm
Marcus wrote:
Fri Mar 18, 2022 4:48 pm
Yes, that’s exactly my point.
Yes, your point is that you believe one way, and you base your critiques solely on that only. Not on the merits of the argument on its own terms.

This is the same as saying, "your work is stupid because I don't believe it. It has no merit, because my beliefs say its stupid." That is not a critique. That is a declaration of belief. That's not useful.
That is absolutely incorrect. My beliefs had no basis in my analysis.

Here is an example of the non-belief-related, logically-based problems I found in your most recent paper, to which you have yet to respond:
Marcus wrote:…I spent some time reviewing your paper. I'd be interested in your response to my comments:
Marcus wrote:
Wed Feb 23, 2022 10:02 pm

I looked a bit at his paper also. It seems he wants the characters in part 11 to represent the numbers 1-12, and therefore time, or a calendar of 12 months.

His logic is a bit off though, even before you get to his unique "pun" interpretations. There are 11 characters in what he is evaluating, and he determines 8 of them represent a number by a pun, and two of them represent TWO numbers, by pun. This gives him the numbers 1 through 12, albeit in a completely random order.

But, what about the 11th character? It's a duplicate of one of the other ten, the one that represents (to him) 7, If I recall correctly, and he says this:
Ed1 wrote: …In the series, the door-bolt glyph ¡s repeated for the second time, but we will move on to the next as we have dealt with that.
What? In his interpretation of section 11, he decides to simply leave out a character? Because it's a duplicate?? No, that's not logical.

So, after all his work, he actually has 13 numbers, 1-12 and an extra 7, randomly distributed. He has to actually drop a character to get to his conclusion that this represents the calendar. And that is before his totally unique pun method is accounted for, and his borderline acceptable conclusion that two of the characters represent two numbers each.

I refer to his 'pun' detection as unique because even though he reviews Ifrah's assessment of puns covering numbers one through about 10, a look at Ifrah's work shows that not a single 'pun' Ed has to come up with matches any of Ifrah's 'puns'. He also relies on what seems to be present-day pronunciation to conclude what words 'sound like' each other, and therefore constitute a pun. His definition of 'sound like' is also extremely loose....
Marcus wrote: I'b be interested in hearing your basis for:

1) choosing to leave one of the 13 symbols out of your analysis, which allowed you to conclude a 12 number result which you compared to a calendar; and

2) why you referenced Ifrah so much, but ultimately not one of your 'puns' matched anything he documented as a pun, even for the same numbers.

Thanks.
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Re: Philo Double Standard: Mithraists can Appropriate and Modify Symbols and Stories of Others, but not Hor Papyrus Auth

Post by Kishkumen »

Ed1 wrote:
Fri Mar 18, 2022 4:10 pm
Thank you. I yet again am leaving this place, and only hanging out where I know it is useful to do so. And hopefully this time around, this series of experiences will teach me to stay away from here. Everywhere else I used to hang out has changed. Like LDS Freedom Forum has also become quite toxic to TBM believers, because it is now representative of the new trending kind of Mormon apostate: right-wing Book-Of-Mormon-believing extremists.

I'm almost certain I see no point anymore in presenting at Sunstone this time around, although I may take a little bit of time before I cancel what I was going to do, because once I do that, I suppose there is no way to get them to reconsider once they have their plans and schedule solidified, If I change my mind again.
I could say more, but I will just wish you the best. I sincerely mean that. Do what you love for the love of doing it, and I don't think you can go wrong. If you want the approval of others, that's where the trouble begins. Yes, there will always be finger-pointers and scoffers. That's just part of the deal. Learn to tune them out. Or learn to have compassion for them.
Last edited by Kishkumen on Fri Mar 18, 2022 7:31 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Philo Double Standard: Mithraists can Appropriate and Modify Symbols and Stories of Others, but not Hor Papyrus Auth

Post by malkie »

Ed1 wrote:
Thu Mar 17, 2022 8:58 pm
...

Let's face it. Don Bradley was able to establish capital with you all in Mormon Studies because he apostatized for a while. He still has that capital built up even though he's a believer again. I can't build up capital with ya'll. Its a foolish thing to try to do. Farewell for now. I am without hope for building bridges, and I will continue to do this stuff by myself, and not waste time trying to share childish things with people that are more grown up than me from now on. I can't build bridges with apologists because they don't give a damn about truth and they are effing liars. I can't build bridges with liars when I'm trying to be truthful. I can't build bridges with people that are grown up when I'm childish, and say, hey, look at my big red truck that I'm playing with in my sandbox, isn't that cool? Oh yeah, Ed, that's a cool toy in your sandbox. Glad you like your sandbox. Now us adults will get on with what is really grown up stuff.
...
Don Bradley's name caught my eye, so I'm responding only to your paragraph I quoted above. I can say with some confidence that you are wrong in what you say about Don.

Don had a great deal of capital here before he temporarily left Mormonism.

He retained that capital after he rejoined the church.

in my opinion, it's worthwhile to think about why that might be, and, by extension, why some others who have had various relationships with the church either have or have not established and/or retained capital here.
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Re: Philo Double Standard: Mithraists can Appropriate and Modify Symbols and Stories of Others, but not Hor Papyrus Auth

Post by Ed1 »

Marcus wrote:
Fri Mar 18, 2022 5:36 pm
That is absolutely incorrect. My beliefs had no basis in my analysis.
The fact that you think your critques are "logic based" is the point. There is no logic to your point. You only want to get away with stupid, nonsense criticisms.

You don't get the point that this is both a list of pictograms, and at the same time actually says something in Egyptian. And that those pictograms have a secondary usage, and that ordering is based on what they say in Egyptian, not what they interpret to as far as numbers go as if a numerical ordering would have significance. There is no need for numerical ordering when it actually has to say someting in egyptian as well. You only care about being able to do an analysis that is like a hit and run driver. When an Egyptian jams crap together that has 2 separate purposes in two separate contexts, yes, those two contexts actually have an effect on each other for the end product. But all you care about is to do a drive by shooting type of analysis. Of course there are two hieroglyphs that are the same, because gramatically to actaully say something in Egyptian as well as have the numbers, the author had no choice. And the point of the repetition is not to add meaning or extra numbers, but to cause a coherent grammar in Egyptian. How would you, because you don't give a rip about technical issues. You only want to make surface observations based on your stupid, anemic lack of vision and lack of understanding of the technical issues involved because you know so much, and you just know that these are "fatal" issues.

You think that each and every pun has to match the puns from Ifrah. Not at all. There are all kinds of puns that are unique to many Egyptian documents, and the point of quoting and showing Ifrah's work is to point out the principle, not to establish the expectation that the puns that exist in the hypocephalus would match Ifrah's. He was just making a point with examples.

But of course you don't give a damn, because you are a drive by shooter and a hit and run driver. You have no concept of an actual critique any more than you would notice if a dog bit your butt. Because you are numb and ignorant to what is actually going on here. And your ignorance is manifest with every continual statement you make. You are not a specialist in this area. I happen to be a specialist in what I have studied for years on this matter. You are not qualified to critique this. And neither is Shulem.
Last edited by Ed1 on Fri Mar 18, 2022 7:25 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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