The Definitive MADhouse Quote Page.

[_Stormy Waters]

Anti-Mormons frequently rely upon manufactured quotes attributed to early church leaders. A favourite target for this kind of abuse is Heber C. Kimball. Perhaps the best known example is furnished by Ann Eliza Webb Dee Young Denning, who claimed that Kimball said, at the pulpit of the Tabernacle, "I think no more of taking [another] wife than I do of buying a cow." Arthur Conan Doyle, in a footnote(!) to A Study in Scarlet claimed that Kimball (whose name he consistently misspelled as Kemball) had described his wives as "heifers," which is probably just a mangling of the Ann Eliza fabrication.

And now we notice that Maxrep12, who is particularly exercised upon the subject of honesty -- but only when he can accuse some Latter-day Saint somewhere of not using it -- has the following in his sig:

"The brother missionaries have been in the habit of picking out the prettiest women for themselves before they get here, and bringing on the ugly ones for us; " - Apostle Heber C. Kimball

Like most uninformed people, he assumes that "Apostle" is a title of address. Which, of course it is not and never has been.

But apart from that: Sorry Maxrep, but I'm not feeling the honesty.

If you check out this link you will discover that your signature line is bogus.

Do you care?

Regards,
Pahoran

Does he seriously want to bring up honesty and polygamy? How about we discuss how Joseph lied to his own damn wife? That seems more important to me than the credibility of a single citation.
Keep hiding out where you're coddled by the moderation.

[Guest]

deleted.

[_mledbetter]

...William Schryver stupid quote...blah blah....

So the op of a thread can shut it down at anytime?

Over the past few years, while (off and on) lurking on this forum and the other, I have to say that every time I have felt my heart sink, or have felt a growing despair, it has come while reading either William's or DP's responses to the critics. William seems to me to be the worst of the two. He reminds me of this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NJG75FJkjr8

This thread is such an excellent example:
http://www.mormondialogue.org/topic/456 ... -alphabet/

It has become obvious to me that with these two people at the lead, the apologist are losing the argument. It breaks my heart. I've never felt so much despair and sadness. I can't blame them, however. How do you win an argument where it appears that non of the facts are on your side?
As much as I hate to admit it (or at least I hated to admit it to myself in the past), the most professional people on either side of the Book of Abraham argument have consistently been both Chris Smith and Andrew Cook. I appreciate their scholarship. I'm just tired of the "mental gymnastics" sort of speak. This quote thread is such an excellent example of it. The lengths one goes to in order to stick to preconceived notions are just mind-numbing.

by the way, I'm sure I'll catch crap from TBM's about my movie clip choice. Let it be known that I joined the church at the age of 17 and I'm soon to be 37. My atheist step-father had interesting movie choices, and I'll admit that I found the movie quite enjoyable in my early years and quite memorable for obvious reasons. I'm sure that will be used as a excuse for my growing doubts, however. So be it.

[_Fence Sitter]

It has become obvious to me that with these two people at the lead, the apologist are losing the argument. It breaks my heart. I've never felt so much despair and sadness. I can't blame them, however. How do you win an argument where it appears that non of the facts are on your side?
As much as I hate to admit it (or at least I hated to admit it to myself in the past), the most professional people on either side of the Book of Abraham argument have consistently been both Chris Smith and Andrew Cook. I appreciate their scholarship. I'm just tired of the "mental gymnastics" sort of speak. This quote thread is such an excellent example of it. The lengths one goes to in order to stick to preconceived notions are just mind-numbing.

The length of the scroll argument is a great example of scholarship vs apologetics. Reading The Cook Smith paper one can see they carefully laid out their argument and provided the data to support their argument for all to review.

The apologetic response from Gee was "Hey you're wrong but I won't explain why".

[_mledbetter]

It has become obvious to me that with these two people at the lead, the apologist are losing the argument. It breaks my heart. I've never felt so much despair and sadness. I can't blame them, however. How do you win an argument where it appears that non of the facts are on your side?
As much as I hate to admit it (or at least I hated to admit it to myself in the past), the most professional people on either side of the Book of Abraham argument have consistently been both Chris Smith and Andrew Cook. I appreciate their scholarship. I'm just tired of the "mental gymnastics" sort of speak. This quote thread is such an excellent example of it. The lengths one goes to in order to stick to preconceived notions are just mind-numbing.

The length of the scroll argument is a great example of scholarship vs apologetics. Reading The Cook Smith paper one can see they carefully laid out their argument and provided the data to support their argument for all to review.

The apologetic response from Gee was "Hey you're wrong but I won't explain why".

You are hitting on something that I have one of the biggest issues with. I just couldn't believe that Gee would make such claims without the data to back it up. Line charts mean jack. I was so angry at that, as if the guy thinks the rest of us are too stupid to realize what he's doing. Gee, show me the data! Show me a detailed explanation as to how you came up with those line charts. Not some stupid, "I'll leave it up to the other guys to figure out what I did" nonsense. It was just laughable and embarrassing at the same time. I think that paper was the last straw for me. I couldn't find Andrew's response, so I called Kevin and he sent it to me. You are correct. It was much more detailed and well documented and made sense. The math is pretty straight forward and simple enough to follow or at least get the general idea. Giving clear details about how you came to your conclusions shows credibility. Gee has none, as far as I'm concerned. I'm sure I'm not the only lurker who feels that way.

[_Fence Sitter]

You are hitting on something that I have one of the biggest issues with. I just couldn't believe that Gee would make such claims without the data to back it up. Line charts mean jack. I was so angry at that, as if the guy thinks the rest of us are too stupid to realize what he's doing. Gee, show me the data! Show me a detailed explanation as to how you came up with those line charts. Not some stupid, "I'll leave it up to the other guys to figure out what I did" nonsense. It was just laughable and embarrassing at the same time. I think that paper was the last straw for me. I couldn't find Andrew's response, so I called Kevin and he sent it to me. You are correct. It was much more detailed and well documented and made sense. The math is pretty straight forward and simple enough to follow or at least get the general idea. Giving clear details about how you came to your conclusions shows credibility. Gee has none, as far as I'm concerned. I'm sure I'm not the only lurker who feels that way.

I do not have the math skills to adequately critique Cook-Smith but I do know this, if Gee were to publish his data there are plenty of people out there who do have those skills. This isn't a case where one can argue that a hieratic character can have different interpretations, Gee has accused Cook & Smith of bad math. It should be very easy to verify who is right, if only Gee cared to back up his assertions with actual data.

Isn't Gee the same person who would not allow people to question him on Egyptology unless they passed some sort of test on the subject? He should be held to his own standard when it comes to math.

[_mledbetter]

That's an excellent point. Perhaps Mortal Man can come up with some sort of test over on modialog and see if Gee Is worthy enough to meet the challenge.

[_Stormy Waters]

Are you saying that you agree Dr. Ritner is qualified to asses Joseph Smith's translation/interpretation of the facsimilies?

Are you also suggesting that Dr. Ritner's conclusions about the validity of Joseph Smith's facsimilie related results are valid?

I'm saying that Dr Ritner is certainly qualified to examine the facsimiles and, to the extent that they are legible, tell us what they say as Egyptian pictures.

I'm also saying that he's not qualified to comment on what other uses they might be put to, or what other meanings they might convey, either anciently or modernly.

Regards,
Pahoran

So an Egyptologist is qualified to tell us what the facsimiles mean, expect when he isn't.
Tell us Pahoran, who is qualified then? You and your apologist buddies?

[_Stormy Waters]

The debate is also concerning the accuracy of Joseph Smith's interpretations/translations of the facsimilies. We have Joseph Smith's interpretations of the facsimilies. Dr. Ritner claims the interpretations are in error

And, as an egyptologist, that is entirely within his area of expertise. When Dr Ritner tells us what the facsimiles show and what the text on them says, we should, presuming we are interested in such things, listen.

and the errors are enough to question the Book of Abraham text.
And as an egyptologist, that is entirely outside his area of expertise.

Well, that just goes to show: scholars are human too. They have their failings, including their prejudices. Dr Ritner's particular failing is not simply that he rejects the truth claims of the Church of Jesus Christ; plenty of people do that. His problem is that he tries to leverage his academic standing to support his anti-Mormon attacks.

Which is seriously bad form.

Regards,
Pahoran

Not simply that he rejects the truth claims of the Church of Jesus Christ? God the sheer arrogance of this.
Who should I believe? The scholars or the people trying to rescue their religion? A religion that in the cases of polygamy has proven repeatedly that it is willing to abuse the truth if needed. Who the hell are you to lecture anyone about their prejudices?

[_Cicero]

Who should I believe? The scholars or the people trying to rescue their religion? A religion that in the cases of polygamy has proven repeatedly that it is willing to abuse the truth if needed. Who the hell are you to lecture anyone about their prejudices?

It's perfectly fine to point out the biases of any author and it is true that pure objectivity is a mirage, but what bugs me about apologists is that they sometimes seem to think that pointing out these facts ends the argument in their favor. I guess it does end the argument with those that share the apologist's biases and maybe those are the only people the apologist cares to convince?