Defending Mormonism for fun and profit

[_mbeesley]

You can read Ben McGuire's postmodernism on this thread:

http://pacumenispages.yuku.com/topic/89 ... etics.html

I was posting as seven of niine.

The problem in following the argument is that Ben is now listed as "unregistered". Once ezboard switched to yuku, unless posters took the time to register again, their comments are listed as "unregistered".

You can see me refer to him as Ben throughout the thread, however. Ben labels himself a postmodernist openly.

He does say what Tal attributes to him. The difference is that he doesn't believe it causes problems for Mormonism.

Here's one of his statements from that thread:

This is right. But I think that this is only a part of that issue. There cannot exist a "True" church, primarily because Truth is largely inaccessible in such a sense. In the same way, this is only one view of the church (which does make such procclamations, I admit).

i did not read the entire thread. However, I did read the post from which you extracted the quip above. i don't think he says what Bachman attributed to him. Bachman's attribution is much broader, i.e. we cannot actually "know" the truth about anything at all.

McGuire said,

This is right. But I think that this is only a part of that issue. There cannot exist a "True" church, primarily because Truth is largely inaccessible in such a sense. In the same way, this is only one view of the church (which does make such procclamations, I admit). The other view, which can also be found in official sources is that the church does not have all Truth, that new revelations can be received at any moment which can overturn even thigns formerly held as being True, and so on. The foundational notions of Truth, of the revelation of Truth, and so on, particularly in its canonized sources tend to take a distinctly different view on authority (as I noted in my first set of comments here), and so I, as a postmodernist, tend to see these authortitative claims as more of a social construction than as an expression of Truth in the church. And the Church is a social construct. It is a social construct even if we accept claims of divinely assisted leadership. And so the Church needs to be viewed as distinct from the Gospel, and so on.

More to the point, while the church claims to be able to provide the ordinances to obtain salvation, it admits that it is not the final arbiter of who gets into heaven. It cannot be the final arbiter, and so it isn't athoritative in that regard.

What I see McGuire saying is that certain, discrete truths may change, based on continuing revelation. However, i do not see him saying that all truth is subject to such modification. If Joseph Smith was God's prophet, that is a truth that is not subject to change based on some future revelation.

So, no, I don't see any support for Bachman's accusation yet.

[_Coggins7]

Folks like Bitton, Peterson, McGuire, Juliann, sometimes base their church defenses on claims that it is not clear that we can actually "know" anything at all.

I'll let Ben and Juliann speak for themselves, but, in my case (and, I'm very nearly as confident, in the case of my late long-time friend Davis Bitton), this statement is flatly false.

I hold no such view, and never have.

Foucault has been used by some (and my philosophy professor brought this up just last semester (to indicate a possible place for religion in the modern world precisely for the reason that Post-Modernism destroys the possibility of knowing anything, including empirical scientific facts, with any degree of certainty, even the empirical knowledge gained from those sciences being "socially constructed". Faith here, in the religious sense, seems to be a kind of benign substitute for the will to power that would otherwise be the normative response to the relative and arbitrary nature of all human perception.

Its not that Post-Modernism accepts religion as any more legitimate than any other "discourse", but that religion is no less justifiable a response to the world than science (or, in a more negative light, no better or no worse).

As I think Dr. Peterson would agree, I do not see the Post-Modern template as a viable place for which apologists to tie up their horses.

[_beastie]

You need to read the thread, Beesley.

Also read Juliann's essay here:

http://www.fairlds.org/Misc/Critics_in_ ... Glass.html

[_Coggins7]

Another funny tactic, best exemplified over here by Coggins7, is to fault others for not being rational enough in their discussions of Mormonism, while announcing that the creator of the universe informed you that Mormonism was the only true religion in the universe

I'm not at all sure I see the connection between poor reasoning abilities, whether one is LDS or a critic, and the claims of testimony. If and until secularists make some attempt to comprehend the probationary nature of mortality, as understood in the Church, and the need for faith during that period, the continuing infatuation with subjecting the Gospel to the verificational tests suitable for Bacteriology or Molecular Genetics spells doom for LDS apologists and secularists, and in particularly, those who, like some here, have, for all intents, taken a fundamentally religious attitude toward their own secular faith, from doing much more than talking past each other.

I understand empiricism. Tal, and others here, stubbornly refuse any attempt to understand any other paradigm, even in theory.

- so that no disconfirming "evidence" or "logic" could ever matter, since you "now know that there can be no such thing as 'disconfirming evidence of Mormonism, since I already know it's all it claims'". No problem there, right?

This is the same classic misunderstanding of what the Gospel is saying as well as a circular argument, Tal having already assumed at the outset that there are, in point of fact "disconfirming' evidences against the Gospel (leaving aside for the moment the possibility that its not the evidences themselves that lead Tal to think they are solid rebuttals to the Church's truth claims, but only his interpretation of them).

This brings to the fore the question of whether Tal is claiming he knows the Church is not true, or making a claim of belief only.

[_guy sajer]

You can read Ben McGuire's postmodernism on this thread:

http://pacumenispages.yuku.com/topic/89 ... etics.html

I was posting as seven of niine.

The problem in following the argument is that Ben is now listed as "unregistered". Once ezboard switched to yuku, unless posters took the time to register again, their comments are listed as "unregistered".

You can see me refer to him as Ben throughout the thread, however. Ben labels himself a postmodernist openly.

He does say what Tal attributes to him. The difference is that he doesn't believe it causes problems for Mormonism.

Here's one of his statements from that thread:

This is right. But I think that this is only a part of that issue. There cannot exist a "True" church, primarily because Truth is largely inaccessible in such a sense. In the same way, this is only one view of the church (which does make such procclamations, I admit).

I did not read the entire thread. However, I did read the post from which you extracted the quip above. I don't think he says what Bachman attributed to him. Bachman's attribution is much broader, I.e. we cannot actually "know" the truth about anything at all.

McGuire said,

This is right. But I think that this is only a part of that issue. There cannot exist a "True" church, primarily because Truth is largely inaccessible in such a sense. In the same way, this is only one view of the church (which does make such procclamations, I admit). The other view, which can also be found in official sources is that the church does not have all Truth, that new revelations can be received at any moment which can overturn even thigns formerly held as being True, and so on. The foundational notions of Truth, of the revelation of Truth, and so on, particularly in its canonized sources tend to take a distinctly different view on authority (as I noted in my first set of comments here), and so I, as a postmodernist, tend to see these authortitative claims as more of a social construction than as an expression of Truth in the church. And the Church is a social construct. It is a social construct even if we accept claims of divinely assisted leadership. And so the Church needs to be viewed as distinct from the Gospel, and so on.

More to the point, while the church claims to be able to provide the ordinances to obtain salvation, it admits that it is not the final arbiter of who gets into heaven. It cannot be the final arbiter, and so it isn't athoritative in that regard.

What I see McGuire saying is that certain, discrete truths may change, based on continuing revelation. However, I do not see him saying that all truth is subject to such modification. If Joseph Smith was God's prophet, that is a truth that is not subject to change based on some future revelation.

So, no, I don't see any support for Bachman's accusation yet.

There's a bunch of threads (or long threads) in which Ben argues for a post-modern understanding of Mormonism. Taking Ben's body of work in totality, Tal's critique of Ben is spot on.

[_solomarineris]

I read this twice, and still haven't figured out what your point is?

Are you asking if the church pays the "proffesional" apologists?

Are you asking if apologists have testimonies?

Are you stating that if a person has a witness of the spirit they shouldent spend their time showing theological connections?

Whats your point?

What?
What exactly you're looking for? Forget about reading one more time, you'll waste your time.
Move along and spend your time reading more sensical posts.
No offence intended.

[_Trevor]

I don't ever recall DCP making this kind of argument, but then I don't go to MAD much. McGuire does, however, advance this argument. Some time ago on this board he and I debated this at length. I guess the irony of a post-modernist argument to support the history/doctrines of a literally minded religion, whose epistemic approach is to claim sole possession of knowledge about absolute truth, is apparent to everyone but Ben.

A load of rubbish is what it is. Post-modernism in the service of absolute truth. Hah! Calling Coggins, calling Coggins!