Deceit in the BYU Religion Dept. and Deseret Book?

[_harmony]

Some questions:

1. In practical terms, what is the difference between a Doctorate in Religious Studies (DRS) and a PhD in Biblical Studies?

2. Why would BYU and/or Deseret Books falsely claim a PhD? What do they stand to gain?

3. Why does BYU not list Dr Gaskill's alma maters?

4. Does DCP know Dr Gaskill? What does he say about this?

[_Mercury]

Some questions:

1. In practical terms, what is the difference between a Doctorate in Religious Studies (DRS) and a PhD in Biblical Studies?

2. Why would BYU and/or Deseret Books falsely claim a PhD? What do they stand to gain?

3. Why does BYU not list Dr Gaskill's alma maters?

4. Does DCP know Dr Gaskill? What does he say about this?

1.
Definitions:

The degree of Doctor of Philosophy, a higher degree than an Honours or Masters degree, involving at least two and a half years of supervised research resulting in a thesis. PhD graduates may call themselves “Dr”.
www.vuw.ac.nz/home/glossary/

The abbreviation Drs. (or Drs) may have one of multiple meanings:

* It may be a pluralization of Dr., standing for Doctor, introducing a list of proper names, each of which would otherwise bear this title. For example: Drs. Banting and Best. This would normally be read as "Doctors Banting and Best."
* It may stand for Doctorandus, an academic title used in the Netherlands and Indonesia.
* It may stand for the Italian title of Dottoressa, the female form of Dottore or Doctor.

2.
Roster numbers needed by BYU to keep accreditation? Maybee the person with the "title" Drs. made up this fact? maybe a misprint? Maybe they thought a diploma mill was good enough to teach the class (also see 'unprofessional nature of BYU'). As for Deseret book, who cares. I would be surprised to learn if they are SUPPOSED to make a profit.

3.
I think this is the deal sealer. Its a very interesting fact that this was not done. This is an act of conspicuous impropriety and it would be academically dishonest to deceive paying students by claiming your class was taught by a doctor when in actuality they were being taught by (at best) a grad student and at worst the janitor.

I would like to point out the fact this man is potentially not the first poser professor in the history of BYU.

In Frank Abagnale's autobiography he claims he was a sociology professor at BYU for one year. The 1980 edition of the book has a photograph of him ostensibly in his BYU classroom, with the caption "As a sociology professor at Brigham Young University, Abagnale kept a chapter ahead of his classes."

4.
I would be interested in DCP's take on this. I wonder if this possible poser professor (hehe) knows peterson or vice versa. I assume he has at least met him while in line at Krispy Kreme. Peterson and this man im sure would have a circlejerk about the cruel scary world of publish or perish and how wonderful BYU is fur understanding that the cognitively disabled can be professors too.

[_Mercury]

These are good questions, Harmony that apparently don’t matter to a poster like Alter Idem. If Gaskill writes/teaches in support of LDS theology, who cares what he does. Unfortunately, however, there could be even more serious issues at stake than the quality of education offered at BYU:

“It is precisely because of their inherent value that academic credentials are subject to falsification, forgery, alteration and other fraudulent use. In a technical sense, academic credentials are ‘objective indices of merit;’ as a practical matter, they also serve as "passports." In this "society of credentials, ‘academic credentials’ are often the measure of one's status. In other words ‘. . . [e]ducational credentials are used to label people according to educational accomplishment, thus dramatically affecting how far the door of opportunity opens, if it opens at all. Not only do educational credentials affect the image other people hold of a person, but they also affect that person's self-image.’" Joan E. Van Tol, “Detecting, Deterring and PUNISHING THE USE OF Fradulent Academic Credentials: A Play in Two Acts,” Santa Clara Law Review, Summer, 1990, 791.

BYU and Deseret Book need to state the truth and stop falsifiying Mr. Gaskill's academic credentials. There are legal issues at stake.

Welcome to Shady Acres.

The doors swing wide at BYU for those under the patronage of the Morg. Do you think he had to go through a couch audition to get where he is today?

[_Mercury]

I've never been impressed with degrees. I have his book on Symbolism and it is very informative and interesting. I also gave his book as a Christmas Present because I liked it so much.

As for me, I've never looked on the dust jacket of any book to make sure the writer had a Phd before deciding whether or not I'd read it or buy it.

Wow, his boss, the church, had him write a book. Who was the editor by the way? What if I told you a seminary teacher wrote it, as in someone who has no experience with the academic process but instead has experience towing the party line for MormonCorp?

Seminary and institute teachers are teh ONLY career someone can dedicate their lives to and see a return. It is sold to well meaning but flawed individuals who see a religion where there is only a tithing collection agency?

Without institute the church would see massive dropoff of membership after leaving their parents houses. Ultimately they serve a single purpose - making sure 18 to 23 year old unmarried Mormons are kept on the seminary method. More b***s*** can be raked into the mouths of those who have been eating it every morning for the past 4 years.

Alter, why have you never been impressed with degrees? they are the cornerstone of our professional culture. I think what you meant to say is "I don't understand degrees"

[_richardMdBorn]

Is the level of education available at BYU once again lower than expected?

Your tithing dollar at work.

BYU created the technology that allowed them the world to analyze the origin of the DSS manuscripts. It has been applied to all of them and is the only kind of technology that has done so.

Please explain this. My brother is a prof at Rochester Institute and has worked on both the DSS and the Archimedes Palimpsest. He was in the Nova program about the Palimpsest several years ago and is an expert on using imaging techniques on ancient documents (he is not LDS). I am not aware of BYU creating any such technique.

Richard

[_guy sajer]

Is the level of education available at BYU once again lower than expected?

Your tithing dollar at work.

"Once again"? I've been amazed at the quality of a BYU education. When my wife graduated she immediately had interviews set up for her all over the United States only because she graduated from the Marriott School of Business. Business recruiters rank us first among business schools in the nation. I have studied under two men who own the copyrights on several of the Dead Sea Scrolls, and are considered among the best DSS scholars on the planet. BYU created the technology that allowed them the world to analyze the origin of the DSS manuscripts. It has been applied to all of them and is the only kind of technology that has done so. We are also doing the same with some of the most important early Christian papyri on the planet. Brill is publishing its electronic DSS Library through us. Last semester I had a class from a professor who was valedictorian studying Greek Philosophy at Oxford. You don't have the first clue what you're talking about.

No they don't:

1 Northwestern
2 Chicago
3 Pennsylvania
4 Stanford
5 Harvard
6 Michigan
7 Cornell
8 Columbia
9 MIT
10 Dartmouth

11 Duke
12 Virginia
13 NYU
14 UCLA
15 Carnegie Mellon
16 UNC Chapel-Hill
17 UC Berkeley
18 Indiana
19 Texas - Austin
20 Emory

21 Purdue
22 Yale
23 Washington U.
24 Notre Dame
25 Georgetown
26 Babson
27 Southern California
28 Maryland
29 Rochester
30 Vanderbilt

BYU is not in the top 30. As for the software program a child could have written. the yawn is pretty noticeable from the European document preservationists and translators that I am acquainted with. The limited work BYU has participated in is so passe that they have been milking it for the past several years. Yes yes, they worked on the dead sea scrolls as did MANY other academics.

BYU is lackluster, unnoticeable in academia and generally a cesspool of 50's style baby boom culture in a bottle, an academic freedom wasteland and generally a babysitting service for those in the transition between their parents ward and the ward that will pick up the tithing baton, guaranteeing yet another dupe is dedicated to MormonCorp.

As a rule those who believe BYU to be something special generally point out achievements that are outshined by a vast majority of other schols in the same way LDS believe they can prove the church true via statement of its hyped up charitable donations.

BYU has some first rate scholars, and the Marriott School (where I taught for 13 years) is an up and coming MBA program that is carving out a nice position for itself in the marketplace, while the accounting program is a perrenial top 3 program nationwide. It is a fine university in most respects (aside from, for example, the ongoing pervasive indoctrination and its tendency to treat adult students like little children). It is a solid, reputable, reasonably well-respected university.

But to place it among the "elite" universities in the US, whether graduate or undergraduate, is a bit of a stretch. While there are many well-respected and highly published professors, and some true pathbreakers, on average the faculty is no better than 2d tier or 3rd tier, and in the case of the non-productive deadwood like DCP, 4th or 5th tier. Although to be fair, BYU is systematically rooting out the deadwood in many departments and replacing them with ambitious professors who, unlike DCP, actually publish in peer-reviewed journals.

[_Mercury]

BYU has some first rate scholars, and the Marriott School (where I taught for 13 years) is an up and coming MBA program that is carving out a nice position for itself in the marketplace, while the accounting program is a perrenial top 3 program nationwide. It is a fine university in most respects (aside from, for example, the ongoing pervasive indoctrination and its tendency to treat adult students like little children). It is a solid, reputable, reasonably well-respected university.

But to place it among the "elite" universities in the US, whether graduate or undergraduate, is a bit of a stretch. While there are many well-respected and highly published professors, and some true pathbreakers, on average the faculty is no better than 2d tier or 3rd tier, and in the case of the non-productive deadwood like DCP, 4th or 5th tier. Although to be fair, BYU is systematically rooting out the deadwood in many departments and replacing them with ambitious professors who, unlike DCP, actually publish in peer-reviewed journals.

But all that being said, one cannot expect BYU to be taken more seriously than Bob Jones university. I find it sad that individuals cannot experience what college life is actually like at BYU. Instead they are at the metaphoric sock hop, punching their dance cards and trading their class rings. No self exploration or questioning ones beliefs outside of strengthening ones tie to a "stupidity tax".

[_guy sajer]

But all that being said, one cannot expect BYU to be taken more seriously than Bob Jones university. I find it sad that individuals cannot experience what college life is actually like at BYU. Instead they are at the metaphoric sock hop, punching their dance cards and trading their class rings. No self exploration or questioning ones beliefs outside of strengthening ones tie to a "stupidity tax".

With all due respect, you're damaging your crediblity with this statement. One can and one does expect BYU to be taken more seriously than Bob Jones. The evidence is clear that in the marketplace, both academic and non-academic, it is taken more seriously.

Have BYU degrees was never an impediment for me. Though I am now embarrased of them, they were good enough to get me into one of the top 5 PH.D. programs in the country in my field, and I now consult the US Government, British Government, World Bank, UN, various other governments, numerous beltway bandit types, etc. No one has ever made an issue of my degrees or tenure at BYU, though we often sit back at a bar, quaffing a few frosty ones, and laugh at how silly BYU, and the Mormon Church, are in so many ways.

[_Mercury]

With all due respect, you're damaging your crediblity with this statement. One can and one does expect BYU to be taken more seriously than Bob Jones. The evidence is clear that in the marketplace, both academic and non-academic, it is taken more seriously.

Have BYU degrees was never an impediment for me. Though I am now embarrased of them, they were good enough to get me into one of the top 5 PH.D. programs in the country in my field, and I now consult the US Government, British Government, World Bank, UN, various other governments, numerous beltway bandit types, etc. No one has ever made an issue of my degrees or tenure at BYU, though we often sit back at a bar, quaffing a few frosty ones, and laugh at how silly BYU, and the Mormon Church, are in so many ways.

So your emotionally tied to the subject matter and I understand why you are concerned with my characterization. Programs and points of research are often seen in the mind of the student/alum of BYU as examples of the schools shining example. In reality BYU is no better than Bob Jones for the stifling of creativity. Sorry Guy, but don't you think that the act of stifling personal growth away from ones perceived norms combined with systematic lockstep conformity is reason alone not to take BYU seriously?

im sorry, i cannot see any good from such an institution. Your perceptions of success are not reason enough to assume BYU is above the mundane. A Mormons perception is that BYU is a beacon of high education when in reality it is little better than the schools surrounding it, just another private college without any ivy.

[_maklelan]

Is the level of education available at BYU once again lower than expected?

Your tithing dollar at work.

"Once again"? I've been amazed at the quality of a BYU education. When my wife graduated she immediately had interviews set up for her all over the United States only because she graduated from the Marriott School of Business. Business recruiters rank us first among business schools in the nation. I have studied under two men who own the copyrights on several of the Dead Sea Scrolls, and are considered among the best DSS scholars on the planet. BYU created the technology that allowed them the world to analyze the origin of the DSS manuscripts. It has been applied to all of them and is the only kind of technology that has done so. We are also doing the same with some of the most important early Christian papyri on the planet. Brill is publishing its electronic DSS Library through us. Last semester I had a class from a professor who was valedictorian studying Greek Philosophy at Oxford. You don't have the first clue what you're talking about.

No they don't:

1 Northwestern
2 Chicago
3 Pennsylvania
4 Stanford
5 Harvard
6 Michigan
7 Cornell
8 Columbia
9 MIT
10 Dartmouth

11 Duke
12 Virginia
13 NYU
14 UCLA
15 Carnegie Mellon
16 UNC Chapel-Hill
17 UC Berkeley
18 Indiana
19 Texas - Austin
20 Emory

21 Purdue
22 Yale
23 Washington U.
24 Notre Dame
25 Georgetown
26 Babson
27 Southern California
28 Maryland
29 Rochester
30 Vanderbilt

BYU is not in the top 30.

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