moinmoin wrote: The Book of Mormon is a lineage record. The limited geography model has it occurring in a relatively small area north and south of the Isthmus of Tehuantapec. Within this area, the Lehite descendant element (which didn't remain distinct and isolated as a people, but merged with and partook of indigenous culture) at times had disproportionate power and influence, but this waxed and waned during the ~ 1000 years of the Book of Mormon (Jaredites excepted; that was previous, and they underwent a large-scale genocide/population reduction with remnants merging with indigenous people). I think, four times Mormon emphasizes that he can't even give a hundredth part of the proceedings and history of the people. It was written from the perspective and for the descendants of that lineage. A record written from the perspective of predominantly indigenous elements would be vastly different.
The cycle of apostasy/prophets/retrenching indicates a tension between "Book of Mormon religion" and native religion. Like modern Mormonism, this appeared to not be the dominant religion, but rather a minority religion. The "big missionary work era" appears to be in Helaman where numbers like 8000 baptisms are mentioned. To the extent that the Lehites partook of native "pagan" religion, they were in apostasy and needed to be exhorted to return by prophets.
It appears that self-designated "Lamanites" trended much more towards the indigenous people's religion and culture.
There are Mormon military and political leaders in the world today, even though Mormons are a numerical minority (like, 1-3% of the population in the U.S, right?). Mormons largely adopt and reflect the larger culture they find themselves in, despite having some unique things that set them apart. I think that this is a direct analogue for Lehites within the larger indigenous culture.
It's quite interesting to observe mopologetics in all it's splendor seek to defend an indefensible position by doing such damage to the very same text in question. And along with this damage that they must inevitably inflict, they also throw their founding prophet (along with anyone else who disagrees with them) directly under the bus in a futile attempt to silence the cognitive dissonance that must be deafening. You would redefine the phrase 'remnant of the house of Israel" as '.00000000000001% of the house of Israel' and 'numbered as the sands of the sea' as 'numbered as the sand I can see....when I squint my eyes together really tight' just to serve your apologetic purpose. There is really no way for the Nephite culture to attain the population numbers described in the Book of Mormon but the closest you could come would be to suggest that they merged with an existing indigenous culture ( which the book never specifically mentions for some odd reason ) and completely took over the religion and traditions of that polity. No amount of hand waving, meandering misdirection or weak posturing can change that fact. All this then leads back to a problem just as serious, if they married deep into the indigenous culture, they would have left a very definite DNA trail due to the breeding privileges of leading and dominating such a large polity.
Themis wrote:This is a huge problem for some of your arguments. A global flood would kill everyone on earth accept Noah and his family. 8 people could not populate the world in this time frame, and it would also mean the America's would be devoid of life just as the Book of Mormon story suggests. You cannot honestly argue both.
Great point. If the flood happened, then the Americas were uninhabited therefore no obliteration if the Lehites. If the Americas were already inhabited with significant indigenous populations sufficient to obliterate the Lehites, then the flood didn't happen. The two positions are mutually exclusive.
“When we are confronted with evidence that challenges our deeply held beliefs we are more likely to reframe the evidence than we are to alter our beliefs. We simply invent new reasons, new justifications, new explanations. Sometimes we ignore the evidence altogether.” (Mathew Syed 'Black Box Thinking')
Themis wrote:This is a huge problem for some of your arguments. A global flood would kill everyone on earth accept Noah and his family. 8 people could not populate the world in this time frame, and it would also mean the America's would be devoid of life just as the Book of Mormon story suggests. You cannot honestly argue both.
Great point. If the flood happened, then the Americas were uninhabited therefore no obliteration if the Lehites. If the Americas were already inhabited with significant indigenous populations sufficient to obliterate the Lehites, then the flood didn't happen. The two positions are mutually exclusive.
Not that I agree with the Mormon promise; however, scientifically there are those who believe in land or ice bridges from Asia to the New World.
Last edited by Guest on Fri Apr 07, 2017 12:16 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Themis wrote:This is a huge problem for some of your arguments. A global flood would kill everyone on earth accept Noah and his family. 8 people could not populate the world in this time frame, and it would also mean the America's would be devoid of life just as the Book of Mormon story suggests. You cannot honestly argue both.
Great point. If the flood happened, then the Americas were uninhabited therefore no obliteration if the Lehites. If the Americas were already inhabited with significant indigenous populations sufficient to obliterate the Lehites, then the flood didn't happen. The two positions are mutually exclusive.
LittleNipper wrote:Not that I agree with the Mormon promise; however, the land masses seem to have split after the Flood. And scientifically there are those who believe in land or ice bridges from Asia to the New World.
What's your point?
“When we are confronted with evidence that challenges our deeply held beliefs we are more likely to reframe the evidence than we are to alter our beliefs. We simply invent new reasons, new justifications, new explanations. Sometimes we ignore the evidence altogether.” (Mathew Syed 'Black Box Thinking')
I have a question wrote:Great point. If the flood happened, then the Americas were uninhabited therefore no obliteration if the Lehites. If the Americas were already inhabited with significant indigenous populations sufficient to obliterate the Lehites, then the flood didn't happen. The two positions are mutually exclusive.
LittleNipper wrote:Not that I agree with the Mormon promise; however, the land masses seem to have split after the Flood. And scientifically there are those who believe in land or ice bridges from Asia to the New World.
What's your point?
My point is that is why there were already natives living here when the Spanish arrived. The Flood didn't prevent man from arriving here and establishing a civilization.
My point is that is why there were already natives living here when the Spanish arrived. The Flood didn't prevent man from arriving here and establishing a civilization.
Of course it did, (according to Mormonism and what moimoin believes) it wiped out humanity 4,000 years ago except for 8 people.
“When we are confronted with evidence that challenges our deeply held beliefs we are more likely to reframe the evidence than we are to alter our beliefs. We simply invent new reasons, new justifications, new explanations. Sometimes we ignore the evidence altogether.” (Mathew Syed 'Black Box Thinking')
Themis wrote:This is a huge problem for some of your arguments. A global flood would kill everyone on earth accept Noah and his family. 8 people could not populate the world in this time frame, and it would also mean the America's would be devoid of life just as the Book of Mormon story suggests. You cannot honestly argue both.
Great point. If the flood happened, then the Americas were uninhabited therefore no obliteration if the Lehites. If the Americas were already inhabited with significant indigenous populations sufficient to obliterate the Lehites, then the flood didn't happen. The two positions are mutually exclusive.
Either Moinmoin got busy or this new development caused him to want the discussion to go away. Why is it unreasonable to believe 3 founding groups to the America's all together numbering in the hundreds could not populate the America's in a few thousand years, but 8 people could populate the whole world in 4-5 thousand years.
Themis wrote:Either Moinmoin got busy or this new development caused him to want the discussion to go away. Why is it unreasonable to believe 3 founding groups to the America's all together numbering in the hundreds could not populate the America's in a few thousand years, but 8 people could populate the whole world in 4-5 thousand years.
I haven't been online all weekend, and school just got out. Doc had the trajectory of the thread pegged pretty well --- on both sides. I don't have anything more to add, really.
One good takeaway thought for me (I forget whose it was) is the one about the difficulty a literal Eve presents for modern diversity in mtDNA (i.e., if it all started with Eve ~ 6000 years ago, then there should only be one mtDNA type today). I had never thought about that, and that appears to be a good point. I still have a literal view of scriptural history (Doc's head just exploded), but that is a good point.
I wonder how LDS geneticists explain that? Granted, I don't think that they subscribe to a YEC worldview.
I have a question wrote:Sorry Lemmie, you're going to be sadly disappointed. (But I suspect you know that and are just highlighting moinmoin's intellectual dishonesty)
People honestly not accepting the same assumptions, and coming to different conclusions, is "intellectual dishonesty?"
