How Much Money Has Royal Skousen Made from Mopologetics?

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Re: How Much Money Has Royal Skousen Made from Mopologetics?

Post by drumdude »

consiglieri wrote:
Mon Nov 21, 2022 6:50 pm
Is it possible the early modern English Skousen finds in the Book of Mormon might be less a divine prank, and more a clue as to what books other than the Bible young Joseph read with sufficient assiduity as to incorporate the language into his magnum opus?
The apologetic claim, as far as I’m aware, is that Joseph Smith had no access to any such materials that could have produced the specific Early Modern English passages that Royal has found with his Word Cruncher program.

That’s why they keep pushing it, they put the burden of proof on skeptics to find evidence that Joseph could have access to anything to help him produce that specific text.
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Re: How Much Money Has Royal Skousen Made from Mopologetics?

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Great thread and good to see such spirited discussion among such important, world-renowned scholars in the field.

This is a tough call.

I'm also reminded of the eminent Dr. Shades speaking of Skousen, and arguing that Skousen truly is [was?] isolated and in his own universe.

My gut instinct: If Skousen's project wasn't Mopologetics, then he sure hitched his wagon to the wrong train.

Here's the most innocent state of the universe I can imagine:

Skousen is off doing his own thing and discovers this out-there total unexpected oddity that's as political as a meteor fragment containing quartz instead of nickel. Just a brute fact that fills in a scholarly gap and good to know.

Then the reboot of old-school FARMS comes along and picks up financing the project. An independent lung researcher is suddenly funded by Big Tobacco. An independent climate scientist suddenly funded by Exxon. What do we make of it?

Again, sticking with the innocent interpretation, FARMS has done clean projects before like medical text translations. It's very possible they are just interested in building up a portfolio of serious research. There isn't a whole lot else going on, the LGT is dead, for instance, but here's a guy putting serious time into a scholarly Book of Mormon topic. It might have been the only scholarly Book of Mormon research going on at the time that didn't have any links to postmodernism. I can sympathize with the interest.

I think a real case can be made to support the Rev's contention.

But here is where we are now:

"How could he have known!" is the summary statement of Skousen's research by DCP and the apologists.
Kyler included the 15th century stuff in his Bayesian analysis, published by the same folks financing Skousen, showing that the Book of Mormon couldn't be a 19th century work in any way at a degree of magnitude that would split the earth into tiny fragments if we were talking about earthquakes, whereas most of the other results from apologetics taken alone would barely make the weather report on the news.

Ghost committee aside, the narrative is strong that any acceptance of Skousen's research forces acceptance that it isn't 19th century and that Joseph must have been a prophet as he claimed.

A few more specific thoughts on the research later.
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Doctor Scratch
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Re: How Much Money Has Royal Skousen Made from Mopologetics?

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I think it's important to bear in mind that Skousen was instructed *not* to pursue this project by the Brethren, but he did it anyways--perhaps at the (secret) urging of the Mopologists. And DCP and the other apologists have supported this since the very beginning. So, to extend your metaphor, Dean Robbers--it's as if the climate scientist is doing work that undermines the scientific mainstream's views--and, in fact, might set back political efforts to mitigate the problem--and so he willingly climbs into bed with the oil companies as a means of flipping off his old, crusty academic "task masters," because hey, what the hell do they know?

One other detail: the Mainmonides / medical text project was (if I'm not mistaken) an ISPART / METI project, and thus wasn't quite connected to FARMS. All three organizations--FARMS, ISPART, and METI--were housed under the "old" Maxwell Institute, and while the personnel sometimes spanned the different organizations, their actual work of each org tended to be distinct and separate from the others. (E.g., I'm unaware of any METI projects that can be construed as "Mopologetic.")
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Re: How Much Money Has Royal Skousen Made from Mopologetics?

Post by Doctor Scratch »

Billy Shears helpfully linked to an article in BYU Studies in which Grant Hardy takes Skousen to the woodshed:
Grant Hardy wrote:More recently, he has observed that many of the grammatical constructions that were considered nonstandard in Joseph’s day have parallels in Early Modern English. In some ways, this is not surprising. English grammar in the Early Modern Period was more diverse and less regularized than it was in the nineteenth century, and there are large databases of thousands of texts and hundreds of millions of words that are instantly searchable. Consequently, a good number of modern grammatical errors, such as those I see regularly in student papers, will yield hits in Early Modern English. For instance, the earliest text of the Book of Mormon included a number of double negatives, a linguistic phenomenon that was common enough in Joseph’s day to raise the ire of prescriptive grammarians. Multiple negation (the term that Skousen prefers) was much more acceptable in Early Modern English, and there are many, many examples to be found, even in formal writing. This does not mean that people who used double negatives in nineteenth-century America (or even today) had a sophisticated knowledge or even a familiarity with Early Modern English grammar,...

I would be interested in the explicit identification of characteristic features of Early Modern English that are not replicated in the Mormon scripture (such as the frequent use of the demonstrative pronoun yon/yonder). Already I have seen online discussions in which Latter-day Saints excitedly assert that the Book of Mormon is an Early Modern English text (and thus could not have been written by Joseph Smith), as if it were lifted straight from the seventeenth century. This does not seem right to me. It may share some syntactic patterns, and there are a few words that make more sense if they are read with obsolete meanings, but most people would have little trouble differentiating a passage from the Book of Mormon with one from a book actually written in the Early Modern Period. It seems more likely that the language of the Book of Mormon is something of a hybrid, combining linguistic features of modern English and Early Modern English (however one might explain that), while at the same time incorporating hundreds of distinct phrases from both the Old and New Testaments, starting with 1 Nephi (however one might explain that), and also bringing in nonbiblical expressions that were commonly used in the nineteenth century (however one might explain that).
Predictably, DCP immediately goes ad hominem on Hardy:

DCP wrote:Grant is a fine historian but not a linguist, and his comments on Early Modern English in the Book of Mormon bear little relationship to the core argument actually made by Drs. Skousen and Carmack.

Nor, for that matter, do the amusing responses over at the Peterson Obsession Board. (At least Grant is intellectually serious.). It's pretty obvious to me that those folks have little or no first-hand acquaintance with the work that Royal Skousen has actually done. They're typically responding (quite ineptly and inadequately) to their caricature of what they imagine him to have done. It became boring quite some time ago.

Sincere questions aside, I see no point in spending time on folks who can't be bothered even to familiarize themselves with the basics of the subject.
Last I checked, Peterson isn't a linguist, either. Nor is he "intellectually serious" in any meaningful sense.
"If, while hoping that everybody else will be honest and so forth, I can personally prosper through unethical and immoral acts without being detected and without risk, why should I not?." --Daniel Peterson, 6/4/14
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Re: How Much Money Has Royal Skousen Made from Mopologetics?

Post by Alphus and Omegus »

Doctor Scratch wrote:
Mon Nov 21, 2022 9:19 pm
DCP wrote:Grant is a fine historian but not a linguist, and his comments on Early Modern English in the Book of Mormon bear little relationship to the core argument actually made by Drs. Skousen and Carmack.

Nor, for that matter, do the amusing responses over at the Peterson Obsession Board. (At least Grant is intellectually serious.). It's pretty obvious to me that those folks have little or no first-hand acquaintance with the work that Royal Skousen has actually done. They're typically responding (quite ineptly and inadequately) to their caricature of what they imagine him to have done. It became boring quite some time ago.

Sincere questions aside, I see no point in spending time on folks who can't be bothered even to familiarize themselves with the basics of the subject.
Last I checked, Peterson isn't a linguist, either. Nor is he "intellectually serious" in any meaningful sense.
Peterson seems irked that the people who do engaged with Skousen and Carmack's arguments allegedly are not "intellectually serious." We need to "do our own research" and waste hundreds of hours reading drivel, he counsels us. This is exactly the same argument that devotees of QAnon or various other New Age cults say to their critics: "You don't waste your life examining our absurd beliefs so therefore you cannot credibly argue against them."

I am glad that Peterson made this admission, however, since he's basically shown that only a tiny percentage of Mormons take these theories seriously and that the only other people who do are former Mormons posting on under pseudonyms for their amusement. If Skousen's work were actually serious, he would publish it in a non-Mormon academic journal. Of course he will do no such thing.

The idea that neo-fundamentalists like Peterson are "intellectually serious" is pathetically laughable.
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Re: How Much Money Has Royal Skousen Made from Mopologetics?

Post by Kishkumen »

Thank you, gentlemen, for the salubrious pushback on my post. I suppose the Book of Mormon Early Modern English hypothesis is apologetic inasmuch as it is pursuing a line of research that is clearly aimed at supporting LDS truth claims. The thing is, if it is approaching the issue in a methodologically sound manner, it should yield useful results even if Skousen and Carmack are completely wrong in their hypothesis. The fact that Grant Hardy can look at the results and take these guys to the tool shed for having an untenable hypothesis the evidence for which is much better explained in other ways, well, that is, in itself, evidence of some kind of progress made in the problem of Book of Mormon language.

I agree with you that DCP is not a linguist, and, furthermore, I have much more confidence in the general critical thinking skills of Hardy anyways. Hardy is most definitely no Mopologist. DCP shows himself to be acting like a Mopologist in his facile criticism of Hardy. As so often, he talks credentials and disciplinary expertise instead of explaining how it is Hardy is mistaken. This fits a pattern with DCP. We should be inclined not to take him seriously when he does this.

I think I part ways with you guys in not discounting something simply because the scholar’s intention is to bolster LDS truth claims. I believe someone can accomplish worthwhile work while being motivated by a desire to support Mormonism. Such people do not consciously privilege bad arguments and weak evidence over good arguments and strong evidence. Mopologists do. Mopologists will persist in a bad argument because it is currently the best chance of protecting testimonies.

Scholar apologists will probably refrain from consciously using bad arguments and will more likely honestly acknowledge problems. They do not often repair to “asked and answered” just to shut down a conversation.

Skousen can be totally convinced Early Modern English supports Book of Mormon authenticity and yet not be Mopologetic when he does so, in my view. Mopologetic and apologetic, for me, are appreciably different things. Mopologetic is about protecting testimonies and church authorities regardless of the fact that the best arguments and evidence are likely against certain authoritative or cherished positions. Apologetic is making the best honest defense while being candid, if careful, about acknowledging problems. It is not, “Well, the prophet can’t predict what I will buy at the grocery store tomorrow, so, yes, he is not perfect.”
“If they can get you asking the wrong questions, they don’t have to worry about the answers.”~Thomas Pynchon, Gravity’s Rainbow
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Re: How Much Money Has Royal Skousen Made from Mopologetics?

Post by Doctor Scratch »

Kishkumen wrote:
Mon Nov 21, 2022 10:02 pm
I think I part ways with you guys in not discounting something simply because the scholar’s intention is to bolster LDS truth claims. I believe someone can accomplish worthwhile work while being motivated by a desire to support Mormonism. Such people do not consciously privilege bad arguments and weak evidence over good arguments and strong evidence. Mopologists do. Mopologists will persist in a bad argument because it is currently the best chance of protecting testimonies.

Scholar apologists will probably refrain from consciously using bad arguments and will more likely honestly acknowledge problems. They do not often repair to “asked and answered” just to shut down a conversation.

Skousen can be totally convinced Early Modern English supports Book of Mormon authenticity and yet not be Mopologetic when he does so, in my view. Mopologetic and apologetic, for me, are appreciably different things. Mopologetic is about protecting testimonies and church authorities regardless of the fact that the best arguments and evidence are likely against certain authoritative or cherished positions. Apologetic is making the best honest defense while being candid, if careful, about acknowledging problems. It is not, “Well, the prophet can’t predict what I will buy at the grocery store tomorrow, so, yes, he is not perfect.”
I don't really disagree with any of this. I think the Dean is right to reference Dr. Shades's observation about Skousen being "in his own universe." He certainly comes off as something of an "eccentric," and I think you're right that his motives probably aren't "Mopologetic," per se. But his project, at this point, has pretty much been co-opted by the Mopologists, and to refer back to my opening post, he *has* been paid handsomely via Mopologetic funds--Everybody Wang Chung may be right that the sum is close to $1 million. Even if he himself is something of an "innocent babe in the woods," and is just going about his eccentric scholarly work, he is still being used as a tool for Mopologetic ends. Meanwhile, DCP's remarks come across as desperate--like he's scrambling to prove to everyone--including himself--that the Interpreter Foundation hasn't been ripped off by this whackadoole theory. Maybe the title of this thread should have been, "How Much Money Has Royal Skousen Made *off* of the Mopologists?"
"If, while hoping that everybody else will be honest and so forth, I can personally prosper through unethical and immoral acts without being detected and without risk, why should I not?." --Daniel Peterson, 6/4/14
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Re: How Much Money Has Royal Skousen Made from Mopologetics?

Post by Kishkumen »

Well, yes, if I could be paid handsomely to pursue my more arcane research interests without all of the downsides of academia, I would do so in a heartbeat. The academic life is very nearly antithetical to focusing mostly on research, thanks to the bureaucratic red tape and treating students like pampered customers, etc. Unfortunately, none of my esoteric research will make LDS members more numerous and faithful full tithe payers.
“If they can get you asking the wrong questions, they don’t have to worry about the answers.”~Thomas Pynchon, Gravity’s Rainbow
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Re: How Much Money Has Royal Skousen Made from Mopologetics?

Post by drumdude »

You’ve gotta love how predictable DCP is in trotting out that tired line “they haven’t engaged with the argument.”
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Re: How Much Money Has Royal Skousen Made from Mopologetics?

Post by Dr Moore »

Doctor Scratch wrote:
Mon Nov 21, 2022 6:53 pm
You're right that academic is rife with all sorts of silly projects like this, but this is slightly different in that it's being funded by a Mopologetic organization. And maybe I missed it, but I haven't seen any validation of his work from other "serious" Mormon scholars. I mean, have Givens or Hardy or Bushman stepped up to proclaim how great Skousen's Early Modern English "discovery" is? What about the Maxwell Institute?
You are so right. This isn’t an academic field at all. It’s an invented fascination, for which the global collaboration universe is one team. Sort of like, I imagine, finding an A-team to conduct a 10 year deep dive studying the minutest language patterns in the collective sermons of Robert Tilton. Sure, people will stop to look in the widow at the results. However, no serious scholar would ever lend their credentials or time to the pursuit. It’s a dead end.
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