K. Shirts Caught Plagiarizing on Sciforums

[_LifeOnaPlate]

I had to copy/paste it, but I got it.

[_cksalmon]

For Trevor:

[_moksha]

I think a better title to this thread would have been "Mopologist fails to put a quote in a quote box, though he cited the actual reference."

Maybe all the academic types know about proper citations, but for us lay folk saying it is from so and so is adequate. Isn't Kerry actually a Mountain Man who is more at home doing crafts in his cabin and skinning bears, than someone who worries about such stuff?

[_Mister Scratch]

Come on, this is a post on a message board, not a doctoral dissertation. To claim he plagiarized because he didn't rigidly hold to every requirement of some manual of style is kind of absurd.

As to the question of plagiarism, the venue is irrelevant. Does the fact that this act was performed by Mr. Kerry Shirts, a well-known loose cannon and all-around Mopologetic wonk, on a messageboard, apparently in haste, help to assuage the "seriousness" of the act? Yes, of course.

[_Mister Scratch]

I think a better title to this thread would have been "Mopologist fails to put a quote in a quote box, though he cited the actual reference."

Maybe all the academic types know about proper citations, but for us lay folk saying it is from so and so is adequate. Isn't Kerry actually a Mountain Man who is more at home doing crafts in his cabin and skinning bears, than someone who worries about such stuff?

Lol. I agree with you, Moksha, except that Mopologists insist almost uniformly that their "work" (including Shirts's insane podcats) is "academic." If they want to say, "Aw, shucks, we are all just a bunch of dabblers. We aren't seriously interested in proving that the Book of Mormon is legit history. It's more of a hobbyist's interest for us! And, anyways, we never make piddling little observations about whether this or that citation was 100% accurate in this or that book by Grant Palmer or Dan Vogel," then I'll happily concede that I'm "grasping at straws."

[_Trevor]

Lol. I agree with you, Moksha, except that Mopologists insist almost uniformly that their "work" (including Shirts's insane podcats) is "academic." If they want to say, "Aw, shucks, we are all just a bunch of dabblers. We aren't seriously interested in proving that the Book of Mormon is legit history. It's more of a hobbyist's interest for us! And, anyways, we never make piddling little observations about whether this or that citation was 100% accurate in this or that book by Grant Palmer or Dan Vogel," then I'll happily concede that I'm "grasping at straws."

Just because they act like pricks doesn't mean we need to compete with them in that.

[_KimberlyAnn]

There are things genuinely deserving of critique in Shirts's apologetics, but not his citations on an internet message board, in my opinion.

KA

[_Dr. Shades]

Yeah, it was extremely, EXTREMELY sloppy.

But then again, it was only Kerry Shirts and not, say, Daniel Peterson.

[_Mister Scratch]

There are things genuinely deserving of critique in Shirts's apologetics, but not his citations on an internet message board, in my opinion.

KA

And yet, oddly, the TBMs responding to the OP avoided the those "things" (i.e., the argument against his theories) as if they were the plague. Instead, they found it more interesting/provocative/productive to focus on the en passant mention of Shirts's minor "plagiarism."

On a sidenote, it seems there is a 2nd Sciforum thread in which KS embarrassed himself (special thanks to the "little birdy" who alerted me to these two links):

http://www.sciforums.com/showthread.php?t=51144

[_solomarineris]

This is one of those outrageous claims I was telling Harmony about that drives people into our Church...

And you know this because of your extensive research? You are, after all, such a careful and thorough researcher you'd never make claims based on limited, biased evidence, now would you?

Not at all, everything we do is Peer-Reviewed.
Apoplogetics