KEP Dictation Argument: The Evidence

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_Kevin Graham
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Re: KEP Dictation Argument: The Evidence

Post by _Kevin Graham »

I am delighted to learn that our good friend, Kevin Graham, has taken on educting himself a bit about ciphers, and has advanced far enough in his studies to be able to tell the difference between cipher, encipher, and decipher. This is akin in math to learning the difference between a set and subsets, or in logic the difference between the whole and its parts.

Ah, the typical wade maneuvering where he disengages the discussion by turning his back to the person who was stupid enough to think he was genuine in his original approach, and then addresses some imaginary audience while he explains my education and knowledge in a condescending manner, all for the sole purpose of avoiding refutation of course. Notice there will be no engaging the refutations I provided. Typical Wade Englund.
This little bit of knowledge that he has gained has evidently emboldened him to proclaim: "To decipher, which basically means 'to make out the meaning of something' only pertains to ciphers when used within that context, but in the context of languages it is pretty much synonymous with 'translating.'"

"Little bit" of knowledge compared to...? You act like you're an expert on ciphers when all you did was rush to wikipedia as soon as you figured out that was what Will was going to be pushing for. Stop pretending you're an expert on ciphers wade, all you have demonstrated is an inability to be reasonable on this subject as you conflate ciphers and languages as it suits your apologetic. For you there can be no distinction.

I trust that as Kevin continues his studies, he will realize that ciphers are essentially languages

You insist ciphers and languages are synonymous illustrates precisely why you cannot be taken seriously.
and that in the context of ciphers, the term "decipher" is also synoymous with "translating". Had he read my paper linked to earlier, he would have already discovered this.

Your "paper" is probably just a word document you rambled through after mining wikipedia for a week, and it is only accessible to those with MADB usernames. And why would anyone think you know a damn thing about ciphers? You see only what is apologetically expedient for you.

As he also learns more about the Rosetta Stone, he will realize that the stone wasn't a translation key nor did it immediately provide a means for translation--certainly not in the sense that most languages are translated.

Irrelevant. Just another red herring to avoid dealing with refutation. You insisted that because I conceded the GAEL was used for translation, that this meant it could have only been used to translate the Book of Abraham! All this sidewho nonsense about an irrelevant Rosetta Stone is just your way of dealing with such refutations.
Rather, the stone made it possible for men to, after years of studying the stone, figure out the meaning of the heiroglyphs.

No crap Sherlock. How does this reveal a cipher key in the KEP?
The Egyptian lanuage that was used on the stone couldn't be translated (in the sense that Kevin is using the term) until after the characters had been deciphered or decoded.

And?
In short, the Rosetta Stone did have the context of a cipher.

The "context of a cipher"? What the hell does that mean? It was used to translate an ancient language, period. Your problem is that you see absolutely no distinction. For you, all ciphers are languages when you need them to be, and languages are ciphers when it is apologetically convenient.
In fact, as previously mentioned, the most common idiomatic use of the term "Rosetta Stone" is: to "represent a crucial key to the process of decryption of encoded information, especially when a small but representative sample is recognised as the clue to understanding a larger whole."

So what? I have already explained, four times no less, how I used the term. I'm hardly compelled to use it metaphorically just because others do.

Kevin was astute enough to realize that in order to decipher, there needs to be a cipher key.

And you're dumb enough to keep repeating established points as if you were the one who came up with them.
And, as it turns out, the Rosetta Stone provided just such a key--and this via the other two of three texts on the stone: "the upper one is in ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs, the middle one in Egyptian demotic script, and the lower text in ancient Greek."(ibid).

Is this supposed to be news to us, or do you just like listening to yourself?
By comparing the two Egyptian text to the Greek, and using what little was known of the demotic, men were able to eventually decode the meaning of the heiroglyphs, and from that later create an alphabet and grammar that was then used to translate other Egyptian texts. Again, the Rosetta Stone was very much a cipher context.

But English is not a cipher, it is a language. Will's argument is that the KEP represents an attempt to encipher English translation into a cipher using graphemes from a hodgepodge of Egyptian/Arabic/Masonic symbols. There is no evidence for this and you still lack a cipher key.

Unfortunately, though, Kevin's cipher education only got so far as to inform him about the most simple and basic form of ciphers--i.e. the substitution cipher.

Which was enough to prove my point and make a fool out of you. You have established no "cipher key" from within the KEP. Nowhere does it exist. Nowhere.
And, in spite of his relative ignorance on the matter, he dogmatically exclaimed: "The KEP provides nothing that could reasonably be understood as a 'cipher key'....Moreover, Ciphers do not have an 'alphabet' let alone a 'grammar,' nor do they typically involve 'sounds.'"

It is based in fact, not ignorance. Your problem is that you refuse to understand the differences between ciphers and languages. This is typical of those who refused to be educated.
The hubris of this declaration is as unwarranted as it is mistaken. If Kevin would take a moment to read my paper (which I linked to earlier), he may discover that not only do I show how the KEP have characters in common with noted ciphers

We've already established that Masonic ciphers were used in the counting document, so what? What you haaven't shown is that they were intended to encipher anything.
but they also have the same form as certain ciphers (including alphabets and grammars), but they function like a cipher--including through the use of sounds.

Irrelevant, since you have failed to demonstrate how a cipher key exists within the KEP.
Now, regarding the sounds, it may prove instructive to recall that in the several years leading up to the production of the KEP, there were a few occasions when the "pure language" was SPOKEN

Because it was a language not a cipher! Your problem is that you see no distinction between the two.
, and even interpreted (deciphered). Could that have been the source for some of the KEP sounds? I don't know, but it is something to look into.

Well then you're crap out of luck because I doubt anyone has written an article on wikipedia for you yet.

Since you're so interested in google-type research, maybe you should pay special attention to what dictionaary.com has to say about the distinctions between a cipher and a language:

Cipher:

1. zero.
2. any of the arabic numerals or figures.
3. Arabic numerical notation collectively.
4. something of no value or importance.
5. a person of no influence; nonentity.
6. a secret method of writing, as by transposition or substitution of letters, specially formed symbols, or the like. Compare cryptography.
7. writing done by such a method; a coded message.
8. the key to a secret method of writing.
9. a combination of letters, as the initials of a name, in one design; monogram.

"Language" is conspicuously absent from the long list of valid definitions. That is because "Language" is something altogether different:
1. a body of words and the systems for their use common to a people who are of the same community or nation, the same geographical area, or the same cultural tradition: the two languages of Belgium; a Bantu language; the french language; the Yiddish language.
2. communication by voice in the distinctively human manner, using arbitrary sounds in conventional ways with conventional meanings; speech.
3. the system of linguistic signs or symbols considered in the abstract ( opposed to speech).
4. any set or system of such symbols as used in a more or less uniform fashion by a number of people, who are thus enabled to communicate intelligibly with one another.
5. any system of formalized symbols, signs, sounds, gestures, or the like used or conceived as a means of communicating thought, emotion, etc.: the language of mathematics; sign language.
6. the means of communication used by animals: the language of birds.
7. communication of meaning in any way; medium that is expressive, significant, etc.: the language of flowers; the language of art.
8. linguistics; the study of language.
9. the speech or phraseology peculiar to a class, profession, etc.; lexis; jargon.
10. a particular manner of verbal expression: flowery language.
11. choice of words or style of writing; diction: the language of poetry.
12. Computers . a set of characters and symbols and syntactic rules for their combination and use, by means of which a computer can be given directions: The language of many commercial application programs is COBOL.
13. a nation or people considered in terms of their speech.
14. Archaic . faculty or power of speech.
_wenglund
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Re: KEP Dictation Argument: The Evidence

Post by _wenglund »

Kevin Graham wrote: "revelation"(i.e Smith's FUBARed imagination)


I looked up the acronym above, and it was so offensive as to convince me to discontinue further discussion with Kevin, and to take a break from this board.

Bye.

Thanks, -Wade Englund-
"Why should I care about being consistent?" --Mister Scratch (MD, '08)
_Kevin Graham
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Re: KEP Dictation Argument: The Evidence

Post by _Kevin Graham »

wenglund wrote:
Kevin Graham wrote: "revelation"(i.e Smith's FUBARed imagination)


I looked up the acronym above, and it was so offensive as to convince me to discontinue further discussion with Kevin, and to take a break from this board.

Bye.

Thanks, -Wade Englund-


Oh that's right, you're more at home with Wilbur "Circle Jerk" Schryver. Have you bothered to take notice of his recent attacks on adult women, or have you looked up what "circle jerk" means? Will came to this forum and said the men here were engaged in a circle jerk, whereby they stand around a woman and ejaculate on her. He recently insulted beastie, saying he'd never want to see her naked because she is an old woman. Yeah, Will's your kind of people, right?

By the way, nice excuse for avoiding more embarrassment.
_Kevin Graham
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Re: KEP Dictation Argument: The Evidence

Post by _Kevin Graham »

wenglund wrote:
Kevin Graham wrote:We've known this for decades...


Can you point me to where online you have mentioned this for decades--something from say, 1990 and 1995, and 2000, and 2005 for example?

Thanks, -Wade Englund-


The Marquardt publication has been out for decades idiot. This is hardly news to anyone except the folks at MAD who are too afraid to read anything not sold at their local Church bookstore.
_sock puppet
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Re: KEP Dictation Argument: The Evidence

Post by _sock puppet »

Hugh Niblets wrote:5. Stranger still, the signs that are explained are not found in the real Egyptian documents, where no system is in evidence of the placing of one, two, or three strokes above a sign, for example, and where there is nothing whatever to indicate the remarkably Ogam-like arrangement of symbols in the A. & G.
FARMS article

William Schryver wrote:Nibley did recognize that many of the characters given explanations were not found on the papyri, but he did not, as [beastie] suggested, ever make the claim that the characters were not Egyptian at all.


Not only did Niblets recognize that many of the explained characters were not found on the papyri, they were not found in the real Egyptian documents. As opposed to the unreal ones? Niblets notes that those characters did not come from real Egyptian documents.

And then there is the remarkably Ogam-like arrangement of symbols in the A&G. Ogam is the ancient celtic symbol alphabet.

So let's not leap that millimeter of a chasm Niblets all but closed and state that he was observing that characters in the A&G were not Egyptian. No, that would be the natural reading and conclusion, but let's not go there.

Niblets noted that the characters were not found among real Egyptian documents, but were remarkably like the arrangement of the ancient celtic symbol alphabet. Will, do you actually see Niblets equation this way:

not on real Egyptian documents + celtic looking arrangements = Egyptian characters

Of course Niblets recognized that there were nonEgyptian characters in the A&G. You did not discover that.
_CaliforniaKid
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Re: KEP Dictation Argument: The Evidence

Post by _CaliforniaKid »

wenglund wrote:Critics have, however, claimed that the KEP was, in part, intended to translate the papyri into English. To me, the existence of sounds in the KEP, particularly where there are sounds but no explanations, mitigates against the KEP's intent, in part, as a tool to translate the papyri.

Wade,

In your opinion, does the inclusion of "sounds" in the Crosswalk.com Hebrew-English lexicon militate against its intent, in part, as a tool to translate the Hebrew Bible?

Thanks,

-Chris
Last edited by Guest on Wed Sep 08, 2010 7:25 am, edited 1 time in total.
_CaliforniaKid
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Re: KEP Dictation Argument: The Evidence

Post by _CaliforniaKid »

wenglund wrote:Here, in part, is what is recorded in the blessing given to Warren Parrish in Nov. of 1835: "Behold, it shall come to pass in his day, that he shall see great things show forth themselves unto my people; he shall see much of my ancient records, and shall know of hidden things, and shall be endowed with a knowledge of hidden languages; and if he desire and shall seek it at my hands…" (History of the Church, Vol.2, Ch.23, p.311--emphasis mine)

Wade,

I agree with Kevin that although there is some conceptual overlap between the terms "language" and "cipher", they also have different connotations. Languages, for example, generally have a fixed set of meanings for each symbol in the system, whereas the meanings of symbols in a cipher tend to be systematically interchangeable. Languages tend to emerge organically as the open communication system of a culture, whereas ciphers tend to be constructed for the purpose of restricting communication to a select few. I can understand why you think that "hidden language" might serve as an apt descriptor of a cipher. But hopefully you can understand why it would also have been an apt descriptor of ancient Egyptian in the 1830's. And since the passage you quoted refers to hidden language in the context of seeing "much of my ancient records," it seems more likely in this case that it refers to the language of those ancient records than a constructed cipher used to encode the English translation thereof.

And even if we treat both "cipher" and "language" as acceptable interpretations of the above quote, I still have not seen a single shred of evidence for which the "cipher" interpretation is more likely than the more conventional "language" interpretation.

Peace,

-Chris
_CaliforniaKid
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Re: KEP Dictation Argument: The Evidence

Post by _CaliforniaKid »

William Schryver wrote:An interesting speculation.

Wouldn't it be great if there were actually some evidence to support it? Then you'd really be on to something, huh?

The fact that my interpretation is able to take phrases like "Egyptian alphabet" or "translation of the next page" at something like face value is, in my opinion, a huge point in its favor. Your own highly agenda-driven interpretation relies on some extraordinary conceptual acrobatics to make such evidence fit the theory. I commend you on your creativity, but not so much on your historical reasoning.

Anyway, good luck with that. Peace,

-Chris
_Ray A

Re: KEP Dictation Argument: The Evidence

Post by _Ray A »

wenglund wrote:
Kevin Graham wrote: "revelation"(i.e Smith's FUBARed imagination)


I looked up the acronym above, and it was so offensive as to convince me to discontinue further discussion with Kevin, and to take a break from this board.

Bye.

Thanks, -Wade Englund-


Then obviously your convictions about bad language outweigh your convictions about the truth of the Book of Abraham. Which is surprising, considering William's vulgar mouth and his fetish for naked women.
_beastie
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Re: KEP Dictation Argument: The Evidence

Post by _beastie »

wenglund wrote:
First of all, I am not arguing that the KEP is like the Rosetta Stone. I have suggested no such thing. At best I suggested that the Rosetta Stone inadvertantly functioned as a cipher, but it obviously wasn't produced to be a cipher (it was a decree issued on behalf of Ptolemy V); whereas, it is my studied opinion that the KEP were intended as a cipher or "pure language", and was even intentionally used as a cipher.


Of course I knew you were not intentionally making that argument, but that was the consequence of your argument. I always suspected you were simply blathering on in order to hide the fact that Kevin was right, and that you were confusing ENcipher with DEcipher.

Second, could you point me to Nibley's text-critical argument for KEP dependancy? And, could you point me to Nibley's hypothesis that the KEP were intended as a cipher or "pure language." I ask because absent those two critical elements, you are yet again mistaken about what "seems" to you to be my argument.

Thanks, -Wade Englund-


What the????? Nibley suggested the papyri served as a sort of Rosetta Stone for reverse engineering an understanding of the Egyptian language, and you are suggesting he didn't think that the KEP and Book of Abraham text were interdependent??

I didn't say that Nibley said it was intended as a cipher or "pure language", which is, of course SYNONYMOUS with Egyptian to Joseph Smith et al. I said that your argument centered around making the Rosetta Stone a sort of cipher key had the effect of ending up in Nibley's lap, and out of Will's.

Of course, the more reasonable explanation is that you were blathering away to hide your blunder without thinking about the consequences of your blathering.
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