The CCC wrote:
As I demonstrated the LDS are open to changes in religion. We have a long history of accepting science.
I don't think so, CCC. Talmage, Widtsoe, Roberts are long past.
My former TBM BIL could not get past the idea that there was no death before Adam. As late as 1997 he believed, and taught his large family, that the Grand Canyon was carved out in a day and that fossils are remnants preserved from earlier worlds that the Earth was "organized" from. Whenever he would discuss this subject he would lapse into a hushed "priesthood voice" and say that he had other evidences that were "too sacred to talk about". Franktalk, is that you?
We also have the example of one of the popular writers on Meridian Magazine, and Maxwell Institute author, Warren Aston, is not only the major advocate of the Nahom inscriptions, but is a true believer in UFO contacts, government conspiracies, underground bases, dozens of alien species on Earth, abductions, ET/Human hybrids, the whole X Files pseudoscience trip. He provides us with the first Mormon contactee, a Montana kid named Udo Wartena who said he had contact clear back in 1940. Interestingly enough, Udo didn't record anything about it until 1981, when he wrote to Senator John Glenn about it. Kind of like a "first vision", no? Then there are those famous Mormon "scientists" like John Pratt (Uranus Testifies of Christ), John Heinerman (Space People), Lynn Hilton (Kolob Theorem) with their fantasy astronomy. There are the "free energy" Mormon pseudophysicists that Sterling Allan hangs around with. There is more than a little pseudoscience in the "nutritional supplement" industry that so many Utah MLMs are built upon. There was pseudoscience behind the activities of Mormon antigay activists like Richard Wilkins and Lynn Wardle. It should be obvious that we also have the pseudohistorians of the Mopologetics industry with their parallel methods and body of "knowledge", not to mention the conspiracy theories of Cleon Skousen and even our recent Cliven Bundy and "Captain Moroni".
I could go on, but Mormons as scientific? Evidence is sorely lacking for your proposal. From where I stand, Mormons have swallowed more pseudoscience than even the fundamentalist Christians. I know that there are many thoughtful and scientifically literate Mormons but unfortunately they are nearly mute and have little influence. We are still hearing GC talks trashing evolution in the 21st century. Sorry, but it appears that Mormon insecurity and cognitive dissonance will not allow many of them to accept the authority of science because it might mean releasing their grip on the imagined iron rod of the supernatural.
Mormon culture is structured, rigorous, methodical, technically competent, often energetic. All of these were important attributes for the survival of a theocratic colony and were most of what you needed in the 19th century American frontier, but much of Mormon ideology is now anachronistic. We'll see how the saints handle this problem. They will need to, because the current leadership is too inert and invested in the status quo to be very responsive.