Darth J wrote: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.)
Your point is merely distraction, as usual, DJ. It's true, even to you, that the testimony of the 8 is evidence that Joseph Smith had metallic plates that appeared ancient. One claim of Joseph Smith? Check. There is evidence for it.
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.")
Yeah yeah little baby. Don't get so sad so fast. This is just one claim that you seem to pout enough about. remember you brought up the issue in your attempted assessment of evidence. Joseph Smith claimed he had metallic plates that appeared ancient and had writings on them. You don't dispute his claim even though you haven't seen them, nor has any other living person. You don't because there is evidence for their existence. You whimper and whine about a tautology when this was all your creation. You dispute evidence for LDS claims. I don't' know why you would think evidence for a given claim is actually evidence against the claim, but that is your reasoning.
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.
How sweet you gave me victory.
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.
Without their testimony there would be that much less reason for you to accept that he had metallic plates that appeared ancient at all. Talk about deliberately obtuse.
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.
Nice try, pouty pants. The LDS Church, which deserves your utter contempt for some reason, couples the two testimonies together and makes their observations. You here are trying to separate them and then pout about the Church's assessment of the two. I know you and your buds are happy playing such deceptive games, but it's only fair I call you on such games.
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.
Oh stop blubbering by now. Of course you are left to complain that the 8 had no special training to know whether the plates were ancient even if they thought they appeared so. Nor are they capable of knowing whether what they saw ont he plates were writings of anyone. So? It's still their observations. You readily now know that Joseph Smith had plates that appeared ancient to untrained eyes and had some sort of scratching or etchings that untrained eyes figured were writings. But there is plenty more data to the whole story. This is just one piece and you have unwittingly confirmed by point over and over. So, we can stop the pain you are causing yourself as you whine about Mormon people again.
