How Now Lolcow? A Daniel Peterson Thread

[_honorentheos]

I suspect this is skipping ahead, but his testimony Stak links to explains it quite well. And you'll recognize the echos of it in his repeated attacks on the amorality of atheism. Put simply, his ego found Mormonism offered immortality and godhood where atheism can only offer the temporary and impermanent. Some people are not equipped to confront their own insignificance.

[_Tator]

But, the fact remains, as to whether or not DCP has his head up his ass, or not.

Are you seriously questioning this?

I just wonder if he can wiggle his ears or blink with his head up there.

[_Doctor Scratch]

Superb work, Mr. Stak. I knew that we were in for a treat when you launched this thread, and the second installment certainly lives up to expectations. You have utterly exploded one of Peterson’s favorite self-perpetuated myths: I.e., that he is from the “proletariat.” He’s not. If his Dad owned the construction business, then he was the boss’s kid, and not some “lowly” blue-collar working stiff.

This is absolutely groundbreaking, devastating work. Your analysis has destroyed this myth so powerfully that I am reminded of the time, perhaps ten years ago or so, when it was proven beyond any doubt that DCP was financially compensated for Mopolgetics.

[_Philo Sofee]

I suspect this is skipping ahead, but his testimony Stak links to explains it quite well. And you'll recognize the echos of it in his repeated attacks on the amorality of atheism. Put simply, his ego found Mormonism offered immortality and godhood where atheism can only offer the temporary and impermanent. Some people are not equipped to confront their own insignificance.

It is THE only attraction Mormonism has ever had, the ultimate Superman package awaits you in heaven! But first ya gots to pays us ones here and keeps our views and ideas foremost in your little minds. Later on when you gain the Elohim strain you can think for yourself, but for now, the money and your mind belongs to us, your leaders.......
Can one even begin to fathom the ultimate terror if Lou Midgley actually becomes an Elohim hisself?! My gawd, Jehovah will look like a panty waist compared to the Great and Might Elohim Lou. You think Yahweh was intolerant to the poor little guy who gathered sticks on Sunday? Wait til ya see the Mighty, All Powerful Lou act in his own style of vengeance on someone he has created who accidentally helps a little old lady across the street using his right arm instead of his left if that was one of Holy Lou's commandments! The pain and suffering that poor sap will undergo is unrepeatable.
Can one possibly imagine the chagrine and holy, righteous anger of Holy Lou when his own church forgets to use his name for absolutely everything they do like Jehovah has in our day? Russell Nelson ought to be counting his blessing to be serving under his Patron Yahweh/Elohim, rather than under Lou/Peterson! There will be no Mr. Rogers kindness and love in Holy Mighty Lou's Celestial Kingdom, that's for sure.

[_MrStakhanovite]

MrStack,

This is quite some research you've done. I'm not sure where you're going with it, and I apologize if I'm interrupting the journey, but your discussion made me feel as if there's a heck of a lot of post-hoc redaction going on. More on that later, but could you help me understand one point? The early Dan is shown to be saying contradictory things (imagine that) but I don't know if that's because he is, or because I'm off on the periods in question. In high school, are you saying that he was agnostic and bored with church, or deeply impressed by the foundations of Mormonism -- eye witness testimony?

Dean,

I think the story Daniel wants to tell was that he was a precocious kid who plowed through the Western Canon during his years as a young adult and by the end of high school had blossomed into a faithful Mormon because Nephi Anderson convinced him there was grandeur in his mom’s religion. This gets confirmed for him throughout his undergraduate years, his mission, graduate school, and into his career as a Mopologist. I don’t want to question the authenticity of that story.

What I want to question is how Daniel presents himself as an intellectual and scholar. What I hope to draw attention to was how Daniel used Marx to tell that story, which was painfully inept. Did he really read Marx during his lunch breaks while working for his dad? Sure, why not. Has Daniel ever studied Marx in a meaningful sense? Never. That is why he made the basic category error.

I have to apologize for the disjointed nature of my entries. I’m simply drafting them and then posting them when they get to a certain length. I fear that if I used my usual methods of composition I would never actually finish a piece on Daniel and nothing would see the light of day.

[_Doctor Scratch]

I suspect this is skipping ahead, but his testimony Stak links to explains it quite well. And you'll recognize the echos of it in his repeated attacks on the amorality of atheism. Put simply, his ego found Mormonism offered immortality and godhood where atheism can only offer the temporary and impermanent. Some people are not equipped to confront their own insignificance.

I doubt that it’s possible to put it any better or any more succinctly than this. It sums up what’s so tragically funny about DCP: he has put all his eggs into this basket, and yet the LDS concepts of heaven and godhood are totally bankrupt and devoid of meaningful detail. I mean, what does he think he’s going to get? I believe I’ve seen him say that he hopes to see deceased loved ones again, but you can get that in other theological systems, and for far less money. No: Mr. Stak is correct—this is a guy who wants to seem smart but who believes in a version of heaven and the afterlife that is demonstrably stupid. This has been made abundantly clear via discussions on things like the “TK Smoothie” and the notion that Heavenly Father used “artificial insemination” to impregnate Mary (the latter of which DCP actually said that he might believe). I mean: just think how deflating and lame that is. You are a God, and yet you have to beat off into a test tube in order to produce the Messiah?

Suffice it to say, I don’t get it. For whatever reason, the Mopologists view this sort of thing as being not just an OK element of their theology, but something that is presumably attractive, and worth paying 10% for, along with all the meetings Midgley hates, and so on.

[_MsJack]

It is THE only attraction Mormonism has ever had

Oh, I don't know about that. Polyandry was a pretty good idea.

[_EAllusion]

I mean I was a member of the working class, why not read Marx? It was interesting to me that none of the people around me found it even slightly interesting. The real working class didn’t seem to care about Karl Marx. They were all busy planning their weekend adventures in their campers and motor homes.

The subtle jab here is that this is how the trope-Marxist Daniel is invoking thinks, that those people working for his father didn’t care about Marx because they had interests apart from Daniel’s. This also serves to buttress Daniel’s sub-narrative about his youthful alienation and intellectual prolictivities; Daniel is searching for something, that is why he has his nose in a book during lunch.

Sadly Marx had an explanation for young Daniel as to why his father’s employees spent their lunchtime planning their fun instead of jumping into dialogue with him about their exploitation:

I interpreted Dan's comment here as a quip meant to point out that the working class in America enjoyed relative luxury because they lived in a capitalist country that rejected Marxism. They're too busy not being oppressed to read Marx. He's setting himself up as a bookish intellectual while taking a jab at the economic despair of Marxist countries.

I think your interpretation gives the line too much credit.

[_EAllusion]

There is a common trope in evangelical apologetics where the apologist lends credibility to their stance by having a particular biography as a bright former atheist who has since seen the light.

The essential beats of it establish that 1) the person was at one point an atheist/agnostic/secularist who lived a 2) vaguely amoral/hedonist/selfish lifestyle, was 3) very smart/educated, and thought that 4) evangelical religion was ignorant or unworthy of attention. Then after a period of intense study or a major life event the person develops an epiphanic awareness that 5) secular reasoning is fundamentally inadequate for spiritual questions and that 6) evangelical religious beliefs are true. However, that still very bright former atheist applies the tools of secular reasoning with a newfound deeper awareness and comes to 7) discover that they prove the faith was true all along.

Want to make a buck grifting evangelicals? Have or make up a biography that follows these beats, then go on a speaking tour as a creationist or whathaveyou. You were valedictorian of your highschool. You want to an ivy league school where you majored in super-science. It was so easy for you that you spent most of your time partying. But one day, something terrible happened. Your beloved uncle, who was a good man, but not much for book-learning, was in a serious car accident. You visited him in the hospital and spoke with him before he died. He was in such peace. A peace you never knew. He implored you to find Jesus. You never thought highly of this, but out of respect for your uncle and a dedication to doin' experiments, you with sincere heart asked Jesus into your heart. And right then and there you saw the folly of your previous ways as the power of Christ washed over you. You renounced your former beliefs. You told your super-smart friends, but they laughed at you and lorded their science over you. So you set about studying what science really has to say about the Bible and discovered that creationist arguments kick your poser friends' ass. And now you dedicate your life to sharing those same arguments on a tour for a very reasonable speaking fee.

Call it the religious anti-intellectual's hero's journey. It's essential that the person was once one of the hated secular intellectuals and also very bright to prove that he gets what they think as well as they do and cannot be dismissed as unintelligent. Not uncoincidentally, anti-intellectuals tend to have a deep insecurity about being dismissed as dumb or ignorant. It's also essential that this person establishes that the toolbox of secular reasoning (science, academic institutions, etc.) plays second fiddle to a higher spiritual awareness. Once that is accomplished, the apologetic anti-intellectual gets to best the intellectuals on their own terms and thus gives the audience the moral stature necessary to dismiss them too. It turns out they were were the real intellectuals all along.

Daniel Peterson, at least as long as I've known him, is infatuated with evangelical apologetics and tends to incorporate the themes and arguments of evangelical apologetics in the bulk of his work.

[_Gadianton]

Thank you Mr. Stak. I don't mean to derail with something out of scope then, but do either you or EA know when the idea of "Eyewitness testimony" in EV circles cropped up for the first time? I did a quick search and found a book by Craig in 1994 Reasonable Faith ( A reasonable leap into the light?) that may be the go-to resource for the resurrection as credible based on eye-witness testimony. Ms. Jack?

I reject his account that at a young age he was distinctly impressed by the veracity of eye-witness testimony. There is an LDS idea of "the law of witnesses" and there is a big deal about "testimony" in general, but there never was, and I don't think there is now, a current of thinking in Mormon mythology land regarding the credibility of the witnesses as "sworn in" testifiers of the Gold Plates. There was "Trial of the Sick of Joseph" that goes back to 1954. But that is Dale type of evidence, and not about the witnesses.

In fact, I don't recall anything at all from FARMS about the unusually powerful case of the witnesses as "eye witnesses" to the Gold Plates? Well, I'll have to send a PM to the great knower of all things FARMS. I don't even recall DCP talking about this until very recently, within the last 5 years? Craig has also exploded in popularity. Even this crazy right wing friend that I have one day was in a huff and told me he thought it was "pretty good" that there were "500 witnesses" to the resurrection. I came across the idea as it seemed to have been exploding in blog topics incidentally a while back, and I figured this is where he was getting it from -- the viral counterpart in Evangelical Christianity.