It was long thought that native American horses died out 10,000 BC, with the end of the ice age, but many specimens have been found that postdate that event, sometimes by thousands of years. To date, only one horse specimen of the time period covered by the Book of Mormon has been found. Discovered in Florida, it was carbon‑dated to about 100 BC, providing evidence that not all American horses postdate the arrival of the Spaniards. Other horse remains have been found in precolumbian archaeological contexts in Mexico, but none have, as yet, been radiocarbondated. Horse remains from Horsethief Cave, Wyoming, were subjected to thermoluminescence testing some years back and dated thereby to about 1000 BC. Plans are under way to narrow down the date using the AMS (accelerator mass spectrometer) method of radiocarbon dating. Elaine Anderson identified horse bones from Wolf Spider Cave, Colorado, as equine, and the radiocarbon date is AD 1260-1400, thus after Book of Mormon times but prior to the arrival of Columbus. Bones found in a cenote on Cozumel Island, Mexico, by archaeologist Joaquin Arroyo-Cabrales have been radiocarbon dated to AD 1230-1300.
This junk science was authored by infamous potty-mouthed hatchet man John Tvedtnes, whose nasty online behavior has been documented. This article and more can be read at his decently done website:
http://www.bookofmormonresearch.org/
It's interesting to note that much of the text on this website seems (relatively speaking) calm and even-handed, and yet Tvedtnes is an "associate" at the trash repository known as SHIELDS, and he has published extensively in the incredibly tendentious and biased "journal" called FARMS Review. So, what's going on?
In any event, what I really wanted to take note of was the fact that, in a different thread, Dr. Gadianton Robbers suggested that Tvednes was a "hubris-drunk" apologist. Indeed, Tvedtnes's self-promotion on his website seems to bear out that assessment:
(emphasis added)John A. Tvedtnes (MA in Linguistics and MA in Middle East Studies (Hebrew), University of Utah) retired in 2007 as a senior resident scholar with the Institute for the Study and Preservation of Ancient Religious Texts at Brigham Young University. He has taught at the University of Utah and at the Brigham Young University Jerusalem Center for Near Eastern Studies and the BYU Salt Lake Center and has lectured in Israel and the United States. At this writing, he has authored 10 books and more than 300 articles.
Now, 300 is quite a lot. Does anyone besides me wonder what kinds of documents Tvedtnes is counting as "articles"? See for yourself:
“Newly-Discovered First-Century Documents,” a spoof posted on FAIR and other web sites.
“An Anthropologist Looks at the Bible,” a spoof posted on the SHIELDS web site under a pseudonym, “B. Ware Kee,” which treats the Bible the same way critics treat the Book of Mormon.
“Solving the Christian Puzzle,” a spoof posted on the SHIELDS and other web sites, which demonstrates how the tactics of the Southern Baptist Convention’s “Solving the Mormon Puzzle” can be used against any Christian group.
“Did Luke Preach ‘Another Jesus’?” a spoof based on the claim that Latter-day Saints worship a “different Jesus” from the one in the Bible, posted on FAIR web site.
Huh? He is counting the crap on FAIR and SHIELDS as an article? Wow, by this sort of reckoning, many of us here on MDB are top-shelf scholars! Gee, when will I receive my honorary doctorate from FARMS and/or SHIELDS?
Elsewhere, Tvedtnes lists things twice, helping to contribute to the bloated article count:
(emphasis added)Traditions About the Early Life of Abraham (co-authored with Brian M. Hauglid and John Gee) (Provo: FARMS, 2001). ADD CHAPTERS ETC.
“Abrahamic Lore in Support of the Book of Abraham,” FARMS videotape and audiotape with transcript (Paper TVE-99a). Presented as part of the FARMS Book of Abraham Lecture Series, 1999. The statistics given in this presentation became outdated as more ancient texts supporting the Book of Abraham came to our attention. The research reflects findings that ultimately led to the publication of the 2001 book Traditions about the Early Life of Abraham,” co-edited by John Tvedtnes, Brian Hauglid, and John Gee.
C'mon, now. Counting *this* as an article? I don't think so. It just seems quite a stretch. Here are some other examples of Tvedtnes's "articles":
“Scriptural Doubles” (scriptural quiz), The New Era, April 1972
“Identification” (scriptural quiz), The New Era, May 1975
“Calls to Service” (scriptural quiz), The New Era, February 1976. Reprinted in Tambuli, September 1983
Uh, since when is a scriptural quiz on a par with a scholarly article? In any case, readers can see for themselves what Tvedtnes's "300 article" publishing career has been like. Enjoy!