Editorial Review at FARMS: New information Comes to Light

[_William Schryver]

DCP:

It seems to me that there are other options than your Hobson's choice of either pronouncing him (or me) a simple liar or declaring one or the other of us delusional and altogether out of touch with reality.

Hey, don’t condemn a good Hobson’s Choice so casually. I have based my parenting on it.

You seem to live in a pretty simplistic universe.

Yes, one of two dimensions. As I have repeatedly observed in this strange apostagetic wonderland.

(Apostagetic -- is that really a word? If so, I need to store it right next to ochlocratic in my quiver of “words to use often in The Great and Spacious Trailer Park™.)

[_Daniel Peterson]

Are you saying that Katherine the Great rejects the historicity of the Book of Mormon? I've never seen her do so. Nor have I seen alter idem do so. I think both of those posters would consider themselves orthodox believers. I think Jason's on the fence about it, but hasn't outright rejected it.

I have no idea.

Do they post much on the topic? If they don't now, would your judgment of them as sane, well-informed, honest, and intelligent survive the test if they began to do so?

Do you believe that atheists' lack of belief rationally founded, intelligent, based upon an honest survey of the evidence, and sane?

I know many atheists (and have read many more, including some prominent advocates of atheism) who strike me as rational, intelligent, informed, and quite sane.

Can you name any prominent advocate of theism and/or Mormonism of whom you can say the same thing?

[Tator]

Amazing. Will and DCP accuse me of being simplistic, as they try to make a case for the irreconcilable nature of these two statements:

Hamblin: I always included these little jokes in my articles that I submitted for Dan to edit for his amusement.

DCP: I never saw a single little joke in any Hamblin article.

being the same as the complexities of entire belief systems.

LOL!

[_beastie]

I know many atheists (and have read many more, including some prominent advocates of atheism) who strike me as rational, intelligent, informed, and quite sane.

Can you name any prominent advocate of theism and/or Mormonism of whom you can say the same thing?

Of course, I already did. Did you even read my comments about Katherine the Great? She is rational, intelligent, informed, and quite sane, as is alter idem, jason, and other believers.

Now let me parse your answer in the same way you parsed mine:

I'm not asking what you think of particular atheists, I'm asking whether you believe atheists' lack of belief rationally founded, intelligent, based upon an honest survey of the evidence, and sane?

[_Daniel Peterson]

I just invented apostagetic. It's something of a mirror image of Scratch's Mopologetic. I have some other neologisms that I may introduce in a while, too.

People can mislead their audiences and not think they are lying at all.

So they're detached from reality.

They feel justified in the slight misleading because future evidence will support their belief anyway.

And intellectually dishonest.

Or they think that the misleading isn't significant enough to matter.

And unethical.

People also are heavily influenced by confirmation biases as well as a host of other logical mishaps.

And, to some degree at least, irrational.

Wow. This is all most impressively postive. A ringing endorsement of the rationality, sanity, and honesty of those who dare to dissent from your position.

You are comparing my statement about the irreconcilable nature of yours and Hamblin's statements to far more complex belief systems. If you have other options to offer explaining the contradiction between your two statements, by all means, offer it.

There's sloppiness of expression, legitimate misremembering that falls far short of "delusion" and "disconnection from reality," etc., etc. You could, if you wanted, contact Professor Hamblin. You could, if you wanted, easily imagine more charitable ways of looking at the situation. You could, if you chose, operate from a different default position than one that presumes that we're either scoundrels or crazy. You don't want to.

Those who disagree with you are either mad, dishonest, or stupid.

[_Daniel Peterson]

I know many atheists (and have read many more, including some prominent advocates of atheism) who strike me as rational, intelligent, informed, and quite sane.

Can you name any prominent advocate of theism and/or Mormonism of whom you can say the same thing?

Of course, I already did. Did you even read my comments about Katherine the Great? She is rational, intelligent, informed, and quite sane, as is alter idem, jason, and other believers.

Are Katherine and the others prominent advocates of Mormonism and/or theism? Are they, in the main on these boards, advocates of it at all?

Now let me parse your answer in the same way you parsed mine:

I'm not asking what you think of particular atheists, I'm asking whether you believe atheists' lack of belief rationally founded, intelligent, based upon an honest survey of the evidence, and sane?

I believe that atheism can be, and, in the hands of good thinkers, often is, rationally founded, intelligent, based upon an honest survey of the evidence, and sane.

Do you believe that belief in Mormonism can be rationally founded, intelligent, based upon an honest survey of the evidence, and sane? Are there any good thinkers -- honest, sane, intelligent, rational, and well-informed -- who argue prominently and publicly (and honestly, sanely, intelligently, rationally, and on the basis of solid information) for the validity of orthodox Mormonism?

[_beastie]

That's really a cool trick, Dan, to ignore anything that is inconvenient to your position. It's even cooler to do it after you requested the information to begin with. But please be clear - I'm saying you are doing this, and not the entire population of the planet who disagrees with me. For example, I've never seen Katherine the Great do it, or alter idem, or Jason. I'm talking to and about you.

There's sloppiness of expression, legitimate misremembering that falls far short of "delusion" and "disconnection from reality," etc., etc. You could, if you wanted, contact Professor Hamblin. You could, if you wanted, easily imagine more charitable ways of looking at the situation. You could, if you chose, operate from a different default position than one that presumes that we're either scoundrels or crazy. You don't want to.

Hamblin wrote his email to Brent right after the event. Just how much time had passed that would enable him to misremember that he always includes such jokes in his articles? If his memory is that bad, that immediately he thinks he was always including those jokes in his articles that he submitted to you, for your amusement, when in reality he had not done so at all, then that is such a horrific memory that yes, he was detached from reality.

Note: I am talking about Hamblin being detached from reality, not the entire population of the planet who disagrees with me. Try not to confuse the two.

Now, I already allowed that YOU could escape the "delusional" due to the passage of time. I said earlier:

If he really did insert these jokes his articles you were editing and you really were amused by them, you're either lying or have an extremely problematic memory as well (perhaps the passage of time will excuse you from the delusional aspect, but Hamblin's statement was made at that time and he has no such excuse).

I understand this is another inconvenient bit of information that you'd rather ignore. I will charitably conclude that your confirmation bias has negatively impacted your attention to the details I have offered in my responses to you.

Now please understand, I'm talking about Dan Peterson's confirmation bias influencing his attention to details, and not the entire population of the planet that disagrees with me. I know it's easy to conflate the two, but try. Try hard.

[_Daniel Peterson]

That's really a cool trick, Dan, to ignore anything that is inconvenient to your position. It's even cooler to do it after you requested the information to begin with.

I don't know what you're talking about, exactly, but I think you're accusing me of intellectual dishonesty.

But please be clear - I'm saying you are doing this, and not the entire population of the planet who disagrees with me. For example, I've never seen Katherine the Great do it, or alter idem, or Jason. I'm talking to and about you.

So whatever it is that's being done is being done by me alone. That's comforting, somehow.

So you think that Bill Hamblin is sane, honest, intelligent, and well-informed? John Sorenson? Hugh Nibley? Jack Welch? Richard Bushman? Terryl Givens?

Hamblin wrote his email to Brent right after the event. Just how much time had passed that would enable him to misremember that he always includes such jokes in his articles? If his memory is that bad, that immediately he thinks he was always including those jokes in his articles that he submitted to you, for your amusement, when in reality he had not done so at all, then that is such a horrific memory that yes, he was detached from reality.

So Bill Hamblin is either dishonest or insane. Got it.

I can only speak for myself, of course, and not for the criminal lunatic Bill Hamblin, but it seems to me easy to imagine that he simply mispoke: I receive jokes and parodies and send-ups galore from him, and have been doing so for many years. I just don't recall ever seeing one actually in an article. Maybe he was wrong on that. Or maybe I've misremembered. It seems rather a bit of overkill to declare either one of us stark raving mad or else brazenly dishonest.

After all, how much really hinged on this? Bill freely admitted inserting the acrostic. I freely admit that I knew about it. I believe I've even publicly described how we came up with the idea while seated next to one another on a transcontinental flight. Isn't that really where the substance of our horrendous crime resides, rather than in the question of whether or not Bill actually ever put a funny footnote about ancient American airfields in anything he sent to me?

I am talking about Hamblin being detached from reality

That is, insane.

not the entire population of the planet who disagrees with me. Try not to confuse the two.

Yet, thus far, it's not clear that you've supplied a single example of anybody who actually defends a position on the existence of God or the character of Mormonism contradictory to yours whom you would agree to be, in that act, sane, rational, well-informed, and honest. Can you think of anybody?

Now, I already allowed that YOU could escape the "delusional" due to the passage of time.

I noted that magnanimous allowance previously.

[_Yoda]

Are Katherine and the others prominent advocates of Mormonism and/or theism? Are they, in the main on these boards, advocates of it at all?

Actually, they are advocates of Mormonism and theism. As far as their prominence, it depends on how you define prominence. Yes, they are active on MAD and some are active here as well. I don't know if any of them are published since they use pseudonyms on the boards.

[_Mister Scratch]

I also speak highly of John Clark, although, as with Brant Gardner, I think he misleads his audience.

Dishonest, in other words.

Let me point out, Prof. P., that this is essentially the same thing you do with Mike Quinn. You repeatedly tell TBMs that his work is "misleading" or "dishonest" and then try to claim that your statements aren't an attack on Quinn's character. If you get a free pass, then I do believe you are going to have to extend the same courtesy to Beastie.