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You are accusing honorentheos of bias, because he is weighing evidence, while you are doing the same? Brother Jake explained this to you once before, when you expressed concern that Jenkins' 'bias' made him untrustworthy in the Jenkins-Hamblin debate:

honorentheos is of course entitled not to value the Book of Mormon. Does that color his view of the book? Indubitably. I don't think his bias is a sufficient defense of the antiquity of the book, however. The evidence against the antiquity of the book is overwhelming. The choice to see it as worthless is a different matter.

Kishkumen wrote:My biggest problem with the Book of Mormon is not the fact that Joseph Smith and friends wrote it in the 19th century. My biggest problem with the text is that it is obviously racist. The only way it can be redeemed from its racism in any way is to acknowledge that it is racist and read the text as a warning against racism. That would require: 1) recognition of the problem; and 2) a conscious, deliberate, and sustained choice to read the text against its racism.

A couple other issues about the church which the Book of Mormon contradicts with later doctrine. For example; The nature of the Godhead and Polygamy.

Kishkumen wrote:

You are accusing honorentheos of bias, because he is weighing evidence, while you are doing the same? Brother Jake explained this to you once before, when you expressed concern that Jenkins' 'bias' made him untrustworthy in the Jenkins-Hamblin debate:

honorentheos is of course entitled not to value the Book of Mormon. Does that color his view of the book? Indubitably. I don't think his bias is a sufficient defense of the antiquity of the book, however. The evidence against the antiquity of the book is overwhelming. The choice to see it as worthless is a different matter.

My comments on mg's incorrect use of the term 'bias' were directly based on this:

mg wrote:Your views in regards to Grant Hardy's work and others demonstrates that you have a particular bias that is in favor or leans towards the evidence that you see as 'proof' of the Book of Mormon's fraudulent nature.

Weighing evidence and coming to a conclusion is not 'bias,' if it were then every single person would be equally 'biased' and therefore no one's 'bias' would be relevant. Falsely accusing only one side of bias (the side that disagrees with you, of course) in such a process is baseless.

I disagree with your assessment of honor's position, but I'll leave that up to him if he wants to comment.

MG is very closed minded on discussions about LDS truth claims. When is says he had his faith crisis he did not solve it with any inquiry of the facts, most of which he is ignorant about. He says he solved it by just choosing to believe. He wants to believe the Book of Mormon is true and historical. He admits that he goes into any discussion with the assumption that the Book of Mormon is true. The problem though is that assumption is not to be questioned. This is why he is not interested in pursuing knowledge in all the areas relevant to whether that assumption is true. Since he will not question the assumption he will only look at things he hopes will support that assumption. This is no different then those who will not question if the earth is much older then thousands of years or if human caused global warming is occurring. These are classic signs of a closed mind on a particular issue.

No surprise why he avoids the Book of Abraham issue.

Lemmie wrote:I disagree with your assessment of honor's position, but I'll leave that up to him if he wants to comment.

Thanks Lemmie. I'm not sure what Kishkumen thinks of my position on the Book of Mormon, but it wouldn't be inaccurate to say it has fallen far out of favor in how much I may value it as a text, religious or otherwise. As noted in MG's new thread, its value as biblical pseudepigrapha is minimal, in my opinion, and is most likely derived from a person finding it familiar rather than insightful.

Given the mountain of texts I'll never get to in my life, and the riches buried in them, I'm fairly confident I won't spend much time in it again.

As to the topic of bias, I think you hit it out of the park.

I hope Bro Jake continues his recovery. His bias comments were excellent and I'll have to remember them for future use. Thanks Lemmie.

As for the Book of Mormon being profound, that has to come from the group and group pressure. My stick figure drawings are surely the finest artwork when the army of art critics I hired say so. The power of the group to shape opinion cannot be underestimated. It works as conformity experiments show and is the basis of the book being viewed as "profound." Really, opinion/testimony is all they got anyway as it is pretty boring reading. Most who read it aren't impressed and it takes pressure from missionaries to convince the targets otherwise.

Exiled wrote:I hope Bro Jake continues his recovery. His bias comments were excellent and I'll have to remember them for future use. Thanks Lemmie.

As for the Book of Mormon being profound, that has to come from the group and group pressure. My stick figure drawings are surely the finest artwork when the army of art critics I hired say so. The power of the group to shape opinion cannot be underestimated. It works as conformity experiments show and is the basis of the book being viewed as "profound." Really, opinion/testimony is all they got anyway as it is pretty boring reading. Most who read it aren't impressed and it takes pressure from missionaries to convince the targets otherwise.

As an active member of the church my first priority in regards to the Book of Mormon isn't whether or not it is "profound" but is it true. As in, is it the result of a translation of ancient records which hold the narrative of a group of real people who had prophets among them that received revelations from God. And whether or not a resurrected Christ appeared to a group in the Western Hemisphere as the Book of Mormon record describes. Yes, it may have some "profound" teachings about faith and the atonement of Christ, etc. But what I think seals the deal is whether or not the Book of Mormon is an artifact from an ancient world which had direct dealings with the God of the Universe through His Son and the Holy Ghost. That's what makes all the difference.

Regards,
MG

Lemmie wrote:Weighing evidence and coming to a conclusion is not 'bias,' if it were then every single person would be equally 'biased' and therefore no one's 'bias' would be relevant. Falsely accusing only one side of bias (the side that disagrees with you, of course) in such a process is baseless.

I disagree with your assessment of honor's position, but I'll leave that up to him if he wants to comment.

We all bring our preferences and biases to questions like these. There is no such thing as a truly objective conclusion. I honestly don't know what honorentheos' position on the Book of Mormon is, and that doesn't really matter. My point was that, whatever bias he might or might not have, the case for the Book of Mormon's antiquity is so poor that bias alone cannot be blamed for his view that the book is not ancient.

honorentheos wrote:Thanks Lemmie. I'm not sure what Kishkumen thinks of my position on the Book of Mormon, but it wouldn't be inaccurate to say it has fallen far out of favor in how much I may value it as a text, religious or otherwise. As noted in MG's new thread, its value as biblical pseudepigrapha is minimal, in my opinion, and is most likely derived from a person finding it familiar rather than insightful.

Given the mountain of texts I'll never get to in my life, and the riches buried in them, I'm fairly confident I won't spend much time in it again.

As to the topic of bias, I think you hit it out of the park.

Thanks for clarifying your position on the Book of Mormon, honor. I disagree with you and Lemmie on the issue of bias. I don't think that it is possible to be free of bias, but I also think that sufficient evidence regarding an issue should lead us to better conclusions. Bias that is overwhelming of the preponderance of the evidence is to be avoided.

Kishkumen wrote:

Lemmie wrote:Weighing evidence and coming to a conclusion is not 'bias,' if it were then every single person would be equally 'biased' and therefore no one's 'bias' would be relevant. Falsely accusing only one side of bias (the side that disagrees with you, of course) in such a process is baseless.

I disagree with your assessment of honor's position, but I'll leave that up to him if he wants to comment.

We all bring our preferences and biases to questions like these. There is no such thing as a truly objective conclusion. I honestly don't know what honorentheos' position on the Book of Mormon is, and that doesn't really matter. My point was that, whatever bias he might or might not have, the case for the Book of Mormon's antiquity is so poor that bias alone cannot be blamed for his view that the book is not ancient.

I see, thank you. That's a very good point. Was it Smoot who recently said the day historicity is no longer the official lds position is the day he will leave? I remember reading that and feeling a twinge of pain for him, thinking that's going to hurt when he has to figure out a way to retract that, because I really think the lds church is moving in that direction. It's just too impossible of a position to maintain.