BomDB: a tool for Book of Mormon Researchers

[_canadaduane]

For anyone who uses computers to aid their research in the Book of Mormon, this may be useful:

https://github.com/wordtreefoundation/bomdb

BomDB was built out of frustration that early editions of the Book of Mormon were not easily available in computable form. It has multiple editions of the Book of Mormon, and can be used for things like "show me all non-biblical verses in the Book of Mormon" or with more advanced usage (i.e. if you can do some programming in Ruby), replicate Brent Metcalfe's Mosiah Priority data.

[_DrW]

For anyone who uses computers to aid their research in the Book of Mormon, this may be useful:

https://github.com/wordtreefoundation/bomdb

BomDB was built out of frustration that early editions of the Book of Mormon were not easily available in computable form. It has multiple editions of the Book of Mormon, and can be used for things like "show me all non-biblical verses in the Book of Mormon" or with more advanced usage (i.e. if you can do some programming in Ruby), replicate Brent Metcalfe's Mosiah Priority data.

This is a very nice application. Looks like a convenient and powerful tool for those with a bit of coding know-how and an interest in the history and evolution of the Book of Mormon.

If the Book of Mormon were what the LDS Church represents it to be, then apologists should be overjoyed at having such a convenient means of quickly testing the hypotheses with which they hope to demonstrate that the Book of Mormon came into being in the manner that the LDS Church claims.

Instead, Book of Mormon apologists (if there are any of them still left by now) have been presented with another coffin nailing device against which they will eventually be obliged to defend their fraudulent book.

[_canadaduane]

This is a very nice application. Looks like a convenient and powerful tool for those with a bit of coding know-how and an interest in the history and evolution of the Book of Mormon.

If the Book of Mormon were what the LDS Church represents it to be, then apologists should be overjoyed at having such a convenient means of quickly testing the hypotheses with which they hope to demonstrate that the Book of Mormon came into being in the manner that the LDS Church claims.

Instead, Book of Mormon apologists (if there are any of them still left by now) have been presented with another coffin nailing device against which they will eventually be obliged to defend their fraudulent book.

My hope, and the mission of WordTree is to make it easier to do just that. Eventually, I'd like to see this kind of tool available as a web app with a nice user interface (rather than a programmers-only garden). A little bit at a time, though, and I think we'll get there.

Thanks for the encouragement.

[Guest]

For verification, see here:

http://www.withoutend.org/book-mormon-v ... ty-mosiah/

My "whosoever" graph differs from yours for 3 Nephi. Here are my numbers for that data point: 5/24580. It appears I excluded chapters 12, 13, 14, 22, 24, and 25. Did I miss something, or did you?

[_CaliforniaKid]

I did my programming in Visual Basic, intending to make it downloadable on the Internet for general use, but my goals were probably too ambitious and I never finished. (My program can do word frequencies, but I was working on getting it to analyze chiasmus, too.) So I'm glad to see somebody else working on this.

[_canadaduane]

For verification, see here:

http://www.withoutend.org/book-mormon-v ... ty-mosiah/

My "whosoever" graph differs from yours for 3 Nephi. Here are my numbers for that data point: 5/24580. It appears I excluded chapters 12, 13, 14, 22, 24, and 25. Did I miss something, or did you?

Thanks! I very much appreciate this. Whenever I do statistical work I'm always checking myself, but it's so much better to have another set of eyes on it as well.

I didn't exclude these chapters. It looks like I need to update the "New Testament" references in BomDB and exclude chapters and verses that are borrowed from the sermon on the mount, etc.

[_bschaalje]

Dr. W,
“If the Book of Mormon were what the LDS Church represents it to be, then apologists should be overjoyed at having such a convenient means of quickly testing the hypotheses with which they hope to demonstrate that the Book of Mormon came into being in the manner that the LDS Church claims.

Instead, Book of Mormon apologists (if there are any of them still left by now) have been presented with another coffin nailing device against which they will eventually be obliged to defend their fraudulent book.”

canadaduane,
“My hope, and the mission of WordTree is to make it easier to do just that.”

I have only looked at bomdb briefly, but at first glance it looks nice and useful. My thanks to the WordTree foundation. I was indebted to Uncle Dale’s collections of writings of early Mormon leaders a few years ago in the Book of Mormon stylometric work I did.

There is at least one Book of Mormon apologist left (at least in my opinion). But being a self-admitted apologist, my work was criticized by some here as unscientific because of my faithful preconceptions about the Book of Mormon. It looks from the above like I am not the only researcher with preconceptions. I’m glad you are so open about that.

By the way, what is controversial about the ‘Mosiah priority’?

[_DrW]

Dr. W,
“If the Book of Mormon were what the LDS Church represents it to be, then apologists should be overjoyed at having such a convenient means of quickly testing the hypotheses with which they hope to demonstrate that the Book of Mormon came into being in the manner that the LDS Church claims.

Instead, Book of Mormon apologists (if there are any of them still left by now) have been presented with another coffin nailing device against which they will eventually be obliged to defend their fraudulent book.”

canadaduane,
“My hope, and the mission of WordTree is to make it easier to do just that.”

I have only looked at bomdb briefly, but at first glance it looks nice and useful. My thanks to the WordTree foundation. I was indebted to Uncle Dale’s collections of writings of early Mormon leaders a few years ago in the Book of Mormon stylometric work I did.

There is at least one Book of Mormon apologist left (at least in my opinion). But being a self-admitted apologist, my work was criticized by some here as unscientific because of my faithful preconceptions about the Book of Mormon. It looks from the above like I am not the only researcher with preconceptions. I’m glad you are so open about that.

By the way, what is controversial about the ‘Mosiah priority’?

Hello Dr. Schaalje,

Thanks for dropping in. Glad to see that there is at least one Book of Mormon Apologist left.

Assuming you are referring to yourself, my comment would be that if there were (or had been) more defenders of the faith like you, LDS apologia overall might not be in the unfortunate situation in which it now finds itself in the wake of the Essays.

[_canadaduane]

I have only looked at bomdb briefly, but at first glance it looks nice and useful. My thanks to the WordTree foundation. I was indebted to Uncle Dale’s collections of writings of early Mormon leaders a few years ago in the Book of Mormon stylometric work I did.

There is at least one Book of Mormon apologist left (at least in my opinion). But being a self-admitted apologist, my work was criticized by some here as unscientific because of my faithful preconceptions about the Book of Mormon. It looks from the above like I am not the only researcher with preconceptions. I’m glad you are so open about that.

Thanks, Dr. Schaalje. I admire your style and especially, from past encounters, your willingness to understand our methodology before considering its weaknesses.

By the way, what is controversial about the ‘Mosiah priority’?

I'm not sure if it's controversial. From my perspective, it was surprising, however. I had always considered Joseph's "translation by the power of God" to be a linear 1Ne-thru-Moroni effort. Discovering the wherefore-therefore transition was important to my model of how Joseph worked (and also to my now belief that it was authored by a single person, i.e. Joseph).

[_canadaduane]

My "whosoever" graph differs from yours for 3 Nephi. Here are my numbers for that data point: 5/24580. It appears I excluded chapters 12, 13, 14, 22, 24, and 25. Did I miss something, or did you?

Ok, I'm getting 5/24360 now. The difference was that I should have been excluding the borrowed New Testament verses in ch. 12, 13, and 14. The discrepancy of 200 or so words that I'm excluding that you aren't may be due to the following:

Code: Select all

Micah 5:8 => 3 Nephi 20:16*
Micah 5:9 => 3 Nephi 20:17*
Micah 4:12 => 3 Nephi 20:18*
Micah 4:13 => 3 Nephi 20:19*
Micah 5:8 => 3 Nephi 21:12*
Micah 5:9 => 3 Nephi 21:13*
Micah 5:10 => 3 Nephi 21:14*
Micah 5:11 => 3 Nephi 21:15*
Micah 5:12 => 3 Nephi 21:16*
Micah 5:13 => 3 Nephi 21:17*
Micah 5:14 => 3 Nephi 21:18*