Top 10 LDS 'Intellectuals' | Deseret News

[_harmony]

And good seeing "Dan I Won't Post Here Anymore Peterson" coming to the defense of Packer! Harmony called it! You can set your watch to Petrrson's "I need attention" intervals!!

Incorrect. Dan appears whenever whatever I say to slam Packer on any given day is something Dan feels necessary to correct. His "I need attention" interval has nothing to do with it.

[_EAllusion]

I'm sure Elder Packer would love intellectuals like Micheal Behe, Gary Habermas, or our very own DCP, but not so much Simon Blackburn or Issac Asimov. It's not a hard to predict pattern. Who is a "so-called" intellectual is just going to depend on not how they think so much as whether they flatter his fundamentalist preconceptions. Hence rants that sound like your slightly crazy uncle who listens to too much religious right radio.

[_EAllusion]

Unskilled and Unware of it is still easily accessible online:

http://www.superfrink.net/athenaeum/www ... 61121.html

One of my favorite psych papers ever.

[_Blixa]

Unskilled and Unware of it is still easily accessible online:

http://www.superfrink.net/athenaeum/www ... 61121.html

One of my favorite psych papers ever.

Ah, thanks! After you reminded me about it the other night, I remembered I had been introduced to it via Morris's series in the Times. So that's where I picked up my citation.

It is a wonderful paper.

[_Doctor CamNC4Me]

Hello,

Apparently, I'm ignorant of US Copyright Law because I can't convince Dr. Shades to reinstitute the Image link for this board.

V/R
Dr. Cameron

[_EAllusion]

Ah, thanks! After you reminded me about it the other night, I remembered I had been introduced to it via Morris's series in the Times. So that's where I picked up my citation.

It is a wonderful paper.

I actually read the paper in its originally published format. I was 19 and a sophomore psych major at the time. I thought it was one of the coolest things I had every seen in a science journal. The writing style is quite accessible, too.

[_sock puppet]

Funny, you ventured to begin a list of JSJr's ignorances but not your own.

Well, since the topic seems to fascinate you so, here are ten (10) areas of my ignorance, chosen at random:

Tensor analysis, Tibetan history, the paleobotany of the Australian Outback, Venezuelan cooking, Hindustani, Kansas politics, South Carolina poets, nuclear chemistry, Swiss tax law, and the entomology of southwestern Iceland.

There are tens of thousands of similar blank spots in my knowledge.

You really should look into and learn up a bit on Venezuelan cooking.

[_sock puppet]

3. Arriving miserably at this haplessness of nothingness we can deduce that Boyd K. Packer is a false apostle of the darkest dye who perpetuates a stupendous error with arrogance to the extreme under a sheep'scoat of mild mannered superiority.

Well, I dunno. At least, in the tradition of Brigham Young, Packer got rich and lived a long life while doing it. Joseph Smith, on the other hand, just accumulated wives.

Yes, and another telling contrast is that Packer has shown sexual frustration (all that little factory talk) that JSJr found an outlet for (he called it polygamy and 33 wives).

[_aussieguy55]

One interesting LDS intellectual was Eugene England. I rememeber first hearing about him in Time mag 1966 when he and others started Dialogue. He was classed as a liberal, had some interesting exchanges with B R McConkie. Someone said at the time that a Mormon "liberal was a member of the church without a testimony".
In a letter to me in 1971 :
"I believe the Gospel itself, through revelations given to Joseph Smith and to every prophet since calls me to use my mins to its fullest capacity as part of my faith. When i do so I discover problems. I find that members of the Church including some leaders do not live up entirely to these ideals, that even some of our official practices, such as denying the priesthood to the Negro or advocating absolute loyalty to the government or establishment that we happen to be in does not square with our basic teachings. If I am honest and true to the qualities of the mind God has given me I can't just ignore these discrepencies but at the same time if I am true to my faith and the spiritual experiences I have I can't just criticize my way out of the Church. I remain fully committed, doing alll I can to try and express my concerns as openly and honestly as I can and provide opportunities such as Dialogue for others to do the same.

England allowed the publication of such articles on the revival question by Wesley P Walters, the papers in the papyri, and others. Interesting Mormon 'intellctual' He had differenes with McConkie over AdamGod theory.

[_gramps]

Daniel Peterson always plays a little coy on this board, but seems much more willing to speak out in other forums. This gives us some idea about certain intellectuals on the list anyway. When Oman asks for opinions about the most over-rated books by Mormon intellectuals, he can't help but get in some personal digs in his remarks concerning McMurrin and Bennion, both listed as top intellectuals in the original polls:

http://timesandseasons.org/index.php/2004/03/most-overrated-books-in-mormon-studies/#comment-17753

I heartily endorse Nate’s choice of Sterling McMurrin. I once sat in the back of a session at Sunstone where, with Professor McMurrin himself beaming beatifically from the stage, the man was not merely canonized by acclamatio but nearly deified. I found it utterly baffling.

However, right up there I would put just about anything ever published by Lowell Bennion. And I feel really bad about that. By all accounts — including from several folks I know well and greatly respect — he was a wonderful person. He clearly had a huge impact on a great many people, but maybe it was exposure to him in person that made the difference. (I never met him.) I’ve also been told about his brilliance, his wonderful dissertation on Max Weber at Strasbourg, etc., etc. He has been characterized to me as one of the leading Mormon intellectuals of all time. But I just can’t see it. Everything I’ve ever read by him seemed, well, pedestrian.

I realize that he devoted much of his time and energy to charitable endeavors, to service and to teaching. And I have no doubt that that is choosing the better part. In hundreds of thousands of cases, the world would be better off if the wood used to produce books had been left in the forest and the time and energy of their authors had been devoted to charity, instead. But, while Brother Bennion may have been a saint, his writing leaves me, at least, entirely cold.

This is a pretty nasty exercise. I’ll probably have to answer for it on Judgment Day.

Well, now we know who he doesn't see as much of an intellectual, anyway.

Pretty nasty stuff, indeed. I wonder if he is just jealous that he hasn't made the list yet?