How Did I Stop Believing My Own Evidence for the Book of Abraham?!

[Jersey Girl]

Ultimately, it is the literalism and fundamentalism that is problematic. People have all sorts of unprovable and even false beliefs, but as long as they don't try to mandate that others share these beliefs or genuflect before them, it mostly doesn't matter, as far as I'm concerned.

Yes, I know. That wasn't my issue but okay.

[hauslern]

Here is a copy of Michael Rhodes paper on the hypocephalus.

Note he makes no comment that any part has been filled with material that does not belong there.

https://documentcloud.adobe.com/link/re ... #pageNum=1

[Philo Sofee]

Philo, long time, no see in person. We should correct that with our good friend from the near south. Now, on to your post--

Do you want to regain faith (belief in the absence of evidence)? Why? Would it satisfy an emotional need?
Now that you have opened Pandora’s Box, do you think it is possible to go back to accepting religious propositions uncritically?
I for one like that you use terms “correct and accurate” rather than “truth.”

I understand your argument about diminishing the ratio of probability of any one apologetic by the addition of a new apologetic. However, if apologetic A, B or C does not strike your mental/logical fancy, then maybe D, E or F will. Their aim is not a pure logical exercise. It is to try to develop and advance apologetics to keep members in the fold. Of say 150,000 (1% of the 15 million total) members that have concerns about the Book of Abraham, E might be appealing to 3,500 for which none of A, B, C, D or F is.

A long, long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away…I attended some of Nibley’s informal lectures at the Wilkinson Center. For me, it seemed Nibley just rattled off one parallelism after another, leaving the adulating BYU students with ‘sugar plums’ dancing in their heads. It was like a gatling gun. With any one student, he didn’t need to get a hit with each round he fired off so long as any one round landed on target. In fact, I think more than that, it was the rapid spray of bullets, fired off so quickly by his quick mind, that dazzled and prevented most of those students from going over them, one by one, and critically pulling them apart. Most of the listening students would walk away, surer in their faith and their doubts pushed into the back ground thinking, if not voicing, there were so many that there must be some of Nibley’s points that can withstand scrutiny. So without thinking about them any further, they marched off to their secular studies with a bit more faith arrogance. Nibley did not seem intellectually honest enough to use his keen mind to explore the problems, or if he did, he dishonestly presented his case without acknowledging those problems. In any event, the more tidbits of apologetics that he could have on the tip of his tongue, the more effective he was at misleading those young BYU minds.

98%? Hmmm. So, if there’s a 2% chance of LDS theology propositions being accurate (49:1 against), and you are on this planet for 85 years compared to eternity afterwards (85 years:∞), that sort of begs for buying into and living according to LDS theology since ∞:85 years is infinitely greater than 49:1. At least making it worth a Pascal’s wager, right?

“Epistemic belief”? Belief in knowledge, to the extent it can be validated, right? While sound, I think it undercuts your ability to fool yourself back into faith. With the Book of Abraham, it seems the apologists are down to their ride: the unprovable/non-disprovable catalyst theory. It takes a leap of faith.

Excellent ideas Sock! We can go get the cup of coffee soon and talk through this some more, I would LOVE that! I would love to see yer ugly mug again soon...

No, I am not leaving anything open to returning. I am being probabilistic. There is always a probability things will change, that is all I was noting.... Great to see you here again!

[Philo Sofee]

Hi Kerry,

I just read your post detailing your process for realizing you had been wrong about the Book of Abraham. I think it would be valuable for a non-Mormon audience if you could write something more formal, which I would love to publish.

While we do publish reporting and analytical pieces, we also do publish personal experience ones as well. For one example, please see the following link:

https://flux.community/chrissy-stroop/2 ... angelicals

In working with the author of that article, it became apparent to me just how much ex-evangelicals have in common with ex-Mormons. We both went through very similar exit processes, largely because we were inculcated with an attitude of presuppositionalism, the notion that all human knowledge and reason is ultimately useless because the real truth is in the scriptures, even if they don't seem to be historical.

If you're interested in writing something about realizing how defective your former epistemology was, I would definitely love to publish it. We also pay for articles as well. Please let me know you are interested.

Thanks,
Matt

Oh hey... well... this sounds like opportunity knocking eh? Man it's an absolute boatload of work to do since it has gone on for decades and decades, but I could make it much more formal with footnotes and more detailed reasons why. It may take me a few months, but I would do this I think... let me ponder and I shall get back with you, but for now, I'm more in than out...

[Shulem]

Here is a copy of Michael Rhodes paper on the hypocephalus.

Note he makes no comment that any part has been filled with material that does not belong there.

https://documentcloud.adobe.com/link/re ... #pageNum=1

And he said this down in the Conclusion:

Nevertheless, as this study has shown, many of the prophet's explanations of the hypocephalus illustrated in Facsimile 2 are supported by our present understanding of ancient Egyptian religion and are in fact especially typical of Late Egyptian religious writings. One or two could conceivably be dismissed as mere chance or lucky guessing, but the many correct interpretations taken together are impossible to ignore. It is clear that Joseph Smith knew what he was talking about. This only reaffirms what every honest person can learn in earnest prayer, that Joseph Smith received these things from God, even as he claimed.

Time to go back to Church, Kerry!!

[Philo Sofee]

Shulem
Time to go back to Church, Kerry!!

And Ritner has entirely dismantled all of this, as has the Egyptologist who wrote to Hauslern..... Mormons just don't get it. There is nothing here that supports Mormon/biblical cosmology... when all you do is use the data which only supports your conclusions you are enslaving yourself to confirmation bias, not actual scholarship. I did that using Nibley's method (Rhodes fatal error too!) for years.

[Alphus and Omegus]

A long, long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away…I attended some of Nibley’s informal lectures at the Wilkinson Center. For me, it seemed Nibley just rattled off one parallelism after another, leaving the adulating BYU students with ‘sugar plums’ dancing in their heads. It was like a gatling gun. With any one student, he didn’t need to get a hit with each round he fired off so long as any one round landed on target. In fact, I think more than that, it was the rapid spray of bullets, fired off so quickly by his quick mind, that dazzled and prevented most of those students from going over them, one by one, and critically pulling them apart. Most of the listening students would walk away, surer in their faith and their doubts pushed into the back ground thinking, if not voicing, there were so many that there must be some of Nibley’s points that can withstand scrutiny. So without thinking about them any further, they marched off to their secular studies with a bit more faith arrogance. Nibley did not seem intellectually honest enough to use his keen mind to explore the problems, or if he did, he dishonestly presented his case without acknowledging those problems. In any event, the more tidbits of apologetics that he could have on the tip of his tongue, the more effective he was at misleading those young BYU minds.

That is a great description of Nibley's technique. The rate at which he would invent and discard theories suggests to me now that he never really believed in any of them. He was like a soft-spoken Donald Trump in that regard, always saying whatever worked best in the moment, regardless of if he actually believed it.

I don't know if Nibley ever did high school debate, but his technique was not impressive to me, even as a Mormon. I had seen a number of crappy debaters who would do the exact same thing.


Lots of Protestant creationists do this as well in formal debates, hoping to make so many arguments that they overwhelm critics. Atheism advocates call it Gish galloping after one creationist who did it frequently.

[hauslern]

Tamas Mekis had commented on Facsimile 3 especially the depiction of the "slave"
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1hy4 ... OJ5qM/edit

[hauslern]

Tamis shared holdings in museums of hypocephalus. So many examples exactly the same as Fac 2 except for the false insertions. Some are just partial others complete
The pleasure is that you can see more detail when you expand them.
Great museums have their online database and thus their hypocephali are available for research.
https://www.britishmuseum.org/collectio ... 5hzRooFkQA
The Louvre: https://carteles.louvre.fr/en/recherche ... C3%A9phale
Petrie Museum. London: https://petriecat.museums.ucl.ac.uk/brief.aspx
Museo Egizio Turin: https://collezioni.museoegizio.it/it-IT ... =&pharaoh=
Global Egyptian Museum (Brussels, Firenze, Leiden):
http://www.globalegyptianmuseum.org/adv ... ton=Search
Kunsthistorisches Museum (Vienna):
https://www.khm.at/en/objectdb/?id=1122 ... ore%3Adesc
Papyrus Sammlung Vienna: https://search.onb.ac.at/primo-explore/ ... B&offset=0

[Philo Sofee]

Tamis shared holdings in museums of hypocephalus. So many examples exactly the same as Fac 2 except for the false insertions. Some are just partial others complete
The pleasure is that you can see more detail when you expand them.
Great museums have their online database and thus their hypocephali are available for research.
https://www.britishmuseum.org/collectio ... 5hzRooFkQA
The Louvre: https://carteles.louvre.fr/en/recherche ... C3%A9phale
Petrie Museum. London: https://petriecat.museums.ucl.ac.uk/brief.aspx
Museo Egizio Turin: https://collezioni.museoegizio.it/it-IT ... =&pharaoh=
Global Egyptian Museum (Brussels, Firenze, Leiden):
http://www.globalegyptianmuseum.org/adv ... ton=Search
Kunsthistorisches Museum (Vienna):
https://www.khm.at/en/objectdb/?id=1122 ... ore%3Adesc
Papyrus Sammlung Vienna: https://search.onb.ac.at/primo-explore/ ... B&offset=0

Excellent, excellent work here Hauslern!