Falsification of the Mormon Church

[Guest]

finally a chance to share my all-time favorite clip from planet earth:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XgnOQqLhrlw

When I watch things like this, it "testifies" to me of the power of evolution. I mean, really. I think a godbeing pales in comparison.

YES! Precisely! That it snapped into being with a loud hand clap from a Mighty Man pales in comparison to the wonder of evolution.

Beastie, have you seen this website PBS did on evolution? They have some good videos, as well.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/evolution/

[_Jersey Girl]

Huh. My magical thinking goes in the opposite direction. When I see beauty in nature I am awed by nature, and it alone.

What about the origins and development of what you see? You don't think about that?

I don't attribute it to an invisible entity. Yet, I do wonder about it (and read up on it)-- just not in the realm of the supernatural.

~Edited to add~

It just occurred to me that I really am a heathen. Even as a child when I felt God I never attributed the world or human life to his making. God was just something I felt. So, if I was to all of a sudden look about and think God created anything that would be a huge leap from grounded to orbit.

What do you attribute it to?

[_Moniker]

Huh. My magical thinking goes in the opposite direction. When I see beauty in nature I am awed by nature, and it alone.

What about the origins and development of what you see? You don't think about that?

I don't attribute it to an invisible entity. Yet, I do wonder about it (and read up on it)-- just not in the realm of the supernatural.

~Edited to add~

It just occurred to me that I really am a heathen. Even as a child when I felt God I never attributed the world or human life to his making. God was just something I felt. So, if I was to all of a sudden look about and think God created anything that would be a huge leap from grounded to orbit.

What do you attribute it to?

I'm cool with not knowing. There's lots I don't know. I've gotten used to it. :)

I attribute feeling God to my brain chemistry.

[_Jersey Girl]

Huh. My magical thinking goes in the opposite direction. When I see beauty in nature I am awed by nature, and it alone.

What about the origins and development of what you see? You don't think about that?

I don't attribute it to an invisible entity. Yet, I do wonder about it (and read up on it)-- just not in the realm of the supernatural.

~Edited to add~

It just occurred to me that I really am a heathen. Even as a child when I felt God I never attributed the world or human life to his making. God was just something I felt. So, if I was to all of a sudden look about and think God created anything that would be a huge leap from grounded to orbit.

What do you attribute it to?

I'm cool with not knowing. There's lots I don't know. I've gotten used to it. :)

I attribute feeling God to my brain chemistry.

You bring up an issue that is of interest to me. I admittedly am feeling too sick today to engage at length but having said that, I think you're talking about what people describe as brains being hardwired for God belief and that sort of thing. I often think of it as simply intuition. That is to say, that some of us intuit God.

Here is my question though, what about those who attribute God belief or God "sensing" to brain chemistry, who lose their belief in God? Does that mean that their brain chemistry changed and how does that loss of belief impact those who believe or think there is a God gene?

I hope that made some kind of sense but I don't expect to make much sense today. Could be a good topic for a thread. I won't initiate it today though since I don't think I have the wherewithal to see it through at the moment.

[_beastie]

Sure, apologists for the Book of Mormon "see things differently" the way young earthers "see things differently".

The combination of the "loose translation" theory which (supposedly) renders irrelevant serious anachronisms in the text and the willingness to creatively reinterpret what the Book of Mormon text says results in an unfalsifiable text, as far as being a genuine ancient Mesoamerican document is concerned.

You can read my website for more detailed explanation of these points.

John Clark asserted that he's tried to convince his colleagues that the Book of Mormon is an ancient Mesoamerican document to no avail, because they read it like an archaeological text. Clark asserts that one must get a testimony FIRST, and then the evidence will become clear. This means that the evidence, in and of itself, is unconvincing. The "spirit" must do the convincing first, and then one will find evidence to support that belief. This speaks volumes.

The Book of Mormon contains enough background information that one can reasonably construct a picture of what that civilization looked like. This can be reasonably compared to what we do know about ancient Mesoamerica. If a text is proposed to originate from a certain time period, scholars can reasonably judge whether or not that is the case. In other words, it can be falsified. For the defense of the Book of Mormon to rest on creating an unfalsifiable text indicates an awareness that the Book of Mormon would fail if measured in the same manner that other texts that claim to be ancient are measured.

[_Coggins7]

All you've succeeded in doing, Coggins, is demonstrating that you don't believe that it is possible for the church to be falsified.

What is there to falsify?

[_Coggins7]

So far none of the things you list above have been empirically proven by those who make the claim. They are matters of faith.

The final collapse comes. Jason now demonstrates here...finially, that he is really no more a Latter Day Saint than is Harmony, whether or not either of them are members in name.

Whether this was witting or unwitting, I have no idea.

[_Coggins7]

wenglund wrote:


Why is unfalsifiability "not a good thing"?

Thanks, -Wade Englund-

---THAT is the funniest thing I've ever read on this board! LOL I have to use it as a tag on my posts from now on lol.

Gadianton is exactly right in saying that what Coggins has done is shoot a Howitzer shell into his own foot (not that Coggins knows or cares).

It is a pity, but all this thread has shown is that I was right about Cog (and several others) all along. In terms of ever coming to grips with what Mormonism can and cannot be, Coggins is in the "write-off" file, at least for the foreseeable future.

Verdict: Coggins deserves Mormonism, and Mormonism deserves him.

Why not just admit Tal, that Wade's careful philosophical reasoning and depth, and his close questioning of claims and evidential linkages in arguments are simply so far beyond either your intellectual abilities or psychological temperament that the only thing you can do is act like Scratch and attack people' intelligence post after post, while all the while belying that you have fled the arena of ideas for greener and, as always in your case it seems, easier pastures.

[_Jersey Girl]

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints could be falsified if:


1. It could be shown in an unequivocal, empirical manner that Jesus Christ did not rise from the dead.

2. It could be shown in an unequivocal, empirical manner, that God does not exist.

3. It could be shown in an unequivocal, empirical manner, that the First Vision never occurred.

4. It could be shown in an unequivocal, empirical manner, that there is no life after death.

5. It could be shown in an unequivocal, empirical manner, that the witness of the Spirit is explainable
purely by mechanistic, neurobiological processes.

6. It could be shown in an unequivocal, empirical manner, that Book of Mormon peoples never existed.


We could go on and on, but what is the point? We've been arguing falsification with the secularists here since the beginning. What will be different about this thread?

Oh well. OK Tal, draw...

7. It could be shown in an unequivocal, empirical manner that the Book of Mormon was not translated by Joseph Smith from Gold Plates and that it was a fabrication produced by Rigdon and others.

Would that work, Loran?

[_Coggins7]

Good lord Cog, you basically gave us the same lecture that Carl Sagan did on why religion can't be taken seriously. Because it is unfalsifiable. No one disagrees with you Cog on that point, it's just that, this is a bad thing for your position, not a good thing, lol!

Its also utterly, completely, and without exception irrelevant. The Gospel isn't science. The truths are deeper (when, that is, science can be said to be actually getting at "truth"). Science seeks the mechanics of the physical world, the cause and effect relationships between empirically apprehended phenomena. Religion is about much more fundamental truths; the truths of who we are, why we are here, and the nature of our ultimate destiny. It is Sagan who's scientism cannot be taken seriously because Sagan drove science itself into the realm of religion and attempted to use it to answer questions vastly beyond its analytic or explanatory power.

Moroni's challenge implies both verification and falsifiability, but not in an empirical sense (and who, pray tell, made empirics the sole legitimate path to knowledge?).

Oh, but of course, this question returns us again to the unverifiable and unfalsifiable assertion of metaphysical naturalism that the material universe is all that exists, doesn't it.

Indeed, that's what this entire argument is really all about, not a falsifiability test for the Church, but a falsifiability test for scientism, materialism, and naturalism.