Darth J wrote:Hi there, Stemelbow. I see that you are off again on your red herring about personal attacks and people hating Mormons. Let's prove to everyone that you're not yet another Mormon internet warrior who defends the faith by being a passive-aggressive troll who mischaracterizes issues and misrepresents what people are saying. A good way to start would be if you stop avoiding the following:
1. Let's watch and see if stemelbow ever admits that the facts and circumstances of how the testimony of the Eight Witnesses was procured is evidence (but not proof!) that the Book of Mormon is a hoax---or if he continues to axiomatically insist no, if he can explain why not.
2. Stemelbow, from now on I want you to join with me and the rest of the board in referring to Joseph Smith, Jr. (1805-1844) as "Joseph Smith, the Child Molester." Joseph Smith has been called a child molester by some people because of his relationship with teenage girls such as Helen Mar Kimball.
We're not making any claims; we just want to identify who we're talking about. So from this point forward, for the simple purpose of identification, we're all going to refer to the founder of Mormonism as "Joseph Smith, the Child Molester."
Will you agree to this? If not, why not?
And by the way, Stemelbow, what happened to the "pep pep, nuthin' much" schtick? It's just so curious that you've abandoned it.
stemelbow wrote:Hey DJ, You've already helped my case when you stated, "No, I don't dispute that the Testimony of the Eight Witnesses is evidence that Joseph Smith showed them a set of plates."
No, I didn't, because neither you nor the LDS Church is merely trying to prove that Joseph Smith, the Child Molester, had a set of plates. (You never responded to my suggestion that for the simple purpose of identity, we refer to "Joseph Smith, the Child Molester." So I am taking that to mean that you conceded the point.)
It's really sad that Mormonism's truth claims are so indefensible that you think you've scored a point by stating a tautology. "Evidence that Joseph the Child Molester had metal plates is evidence that Joseph the Child Molester had metal plates." (I am not making any affirmative claims; I just want to be clear who I'm talking about. Thus, "Joseph the Child Molester.")
So Joseph Smith had desired, or God did, to have evidence that plates existed. His claim of having such plates, is supported by evidence.
And if he ended his claim at, "I, Joseph the Child Molester, have some metal plates," then you would indeed carry the day on this undisputed point. But as Joseph the Child Molester did not end his claim there, your victory is so banal that only your desperation to grasp at anything explains why you keep talking about it.
You an avowed critic agrees that he had plates. I suggest you aren't taking into account your own words in your previous explanation of relevance and foundation.
That's because you are being deliberately obtuse. If the Book of Mormon is not a real historical account of pre-Columbian America, it doesn't matter if Joseph the Child Molester showed 8 of his close friends and relatives who already believed his story some unidentifiable metal plates. On the other hand, if you believe Joseph the Child Molester's story, you necessarily believe that an undead Hebrew American prophet gave him some plates, so you don't need the testimony of the Eight Witnesses. In addition to lacking foundation to the claim at issue (that the Book of Mormon is true), their testimony is irrelevant to the claim.
The 8 Witnesses testifies of seeing the plates.
And that testimony has no foundation, because they could not possibly have known if what they were shown were "the" plates.
They ddi not testify that Joseph Smith' translation was true or correct.
Yes, they did, and I am not going to play your game that they were merely trying to identify who Joseph Smith was. They also had to believe Joseph Smith the Child Molester's story as a precondition to be shown the object he purported to be the plates, and the LDS Church touts their testimony as evidence of the divinity and authenticity of the Book of Mormon.
Thus, we can be sure that the data here can be evidence of that which it claims to be--evidence that Joseph Smith had plates, ancient in appearance, and had writings on them.
See, the reason it's obvious you're being disingenuous is that you keep returning to the same rhetorical sleight of hand. There is no foundation for the claim that the object Joseph the Child Molester's dad and older brother and so on were shown was "ancient in appearance." They would have had no way of determining what ancient plates would look like, and they never said
how the plates they were shown looked "ancient." A conclusory statement with no explanation is not evidence of anything. The same is true with "writing." They had no possible way of knowing if the scratchings or etchings or whatever on the object they were shown were real, actual writing from another (non-English) language.
But I am perfectly happy for our internet Mormon warriors to make themselves look foolish and disingenuous to any reasonable observer who is browsing message boards like this one. So by all means, please continue as you have been.
EDIT: minor typographical corrections that in no way affect the truth that the foregoing was the most correct post on Earth.
