The Interpreter; Bayes Theorem; Nephites and Mayans

[_Physics Guy]

So any misuse of the Theorem can only have been deliberate.

Nah, not necessarily. I looked up Brian Dale on ResearchGate and what he has are 80 very narrow, technical papers on specific medical applications of MRI. Eighty papers would be a fairly large number of publications for someone his age in my field, but this is the kind of thing that differs a lot between fields. He actually works for Siemens, and I think corporate researchers tend to pump out a lot of stuff pretty steadily. Most of his papers also seem to have quite large author lists, so his individual contribution to each project may have been very specific.

I'm sure he's a very competent guy at what he does for a living. To be that, though, he likely doesn't have to have a clear grasp of how and why Bayesian inference fundamentally works. Quite a lot of unsalvageably bad analysis happens when a narrowly expert technician naïvely applies familiar methods in an unfamiliar field. Even though the glaring errors in this paper are outrageously glaring, they're very likely the kind of errors that just never come up in medical imaging. So Dale's never had to think about them before, and he figures he's an expert in this kind of method, so he didn't stop to think of them now, either.

[_DrW]

/
So any misuse of the Theorem can only have been deliberate.

Nah, not necessarily. [SNIP]
Even though the glaring errors in this paper are outrageously glaring, they're very likely the kind of errors that just never come up in medical imaging. So Dale's never had to think about them before, and he figures he's an expert in this kind of method, so he didn't stop to think of them now, either.

While I tend to agree with Physics Guy on the issue of deliberate misuse, its hard to imagine that two authors, especially with the kind of experience the Dales apparently have, would not have taken a moment to step back and consider some of the truly fantastical conclusions and claims in their paper.

Does anyone think, for one second, they would have let this kind of nonsense go out the door to one of the peer reviewed journals in which they publish professionally?

The authors have shown tremendous disrespect for their intended audience here. If they had a shred of professional integrity, they would withdraw the paper, ask the Interpreter to take it down, and write an apology.

I would like to think that if they ever read this thread, they would do just that.

As a self proclaimed scholarly publication, the Interpreter should have never accepted this hot mess for publication in the first place. The editors there have the same kind of responsibility to their readership as do the authors.

[_Analytics]

So any misuse of the Theorem can only have been deliberate.

Nah, not necessarily. I looked up Brian Dale on ResearchGate and what he has are 80 very narrow, technical papers on specific medical applications of MRI...

It reminds me of what Nicholas Butler once said, "An expert is one who knows more and more about less and less until he knows absolutely everything about nothing."

The Dales really should have stuck to their field.

[_Analytics]

Continuing on. Point 1.4 cites the existence of art, culture, science, and other cultural refinements. Their cause for noting this as a point for is the description of institutions in the Book of Mormon. But where is the evidence of culture? Art? Refined civilization and sciences? Where is the actual hit in the Book of Mormon that shows something there which was beyond the experience and cultural level of the imagnations of Joseph Smith? Elsewhere they note the assumption that culture in the classic period could appear in proto form earlier in the period overlapping when the Nephites supposedly existed. So, where is it? Smith playing post office in his mind isn't a hit matching what Coe describes in the cited parallel. So far, it seems like 4 misses that should be against not for historicity.

These "hits" are hilarious. You ought to start a new thread the focuses on discussing these numbered points. You could call it, "The Dales' Greatest Hits."

[_Analytics]

I'm sure he's a very competent guy at what he does for a living. To be that, though, he likely doesn't have to have a clear grasp of how and why Bayesian inference fundamentally works. Quite a lot of unsalvageably bad analysis happens when a narrowly expert technician naïvely applies familiar methods in an unfamiliar field.....

This is the most likely explanation here. If we were using Bayesian analysis to score elements on an MRI, deciding whether the elements are "specific, detailed, and unusual" might be a perfectly valid way to estimate a likelihood ratio. However, applying the same heuristic to Book of Mormon authorship results in hilarious conclusions. The mention of cities in the Book of Mormon is allegedly specific, detailed, and unusual, therefore it is 50 times more likely to be written by ancient Mayans than by an American?!

[_Dr Exiled]

I guess this failure is an additional reason as to why a fictional model is inevitable. I wonder what the authors were thinking during their "research" for the article? Maybe they aren't good at navigating the religious thinking area, causing some obvious blind spots as so many have pointed out? Desire to believe plus faith can certainly lead to irrational conclusions and one needs the outside world as a check on religious enthusiasm, otherwise this nonsense gets pushed as something real. This type of thinking just doesn't work in the real world and should be extremely limited.

[Anonymous]

The authors have shown tremendous disrespect for their intended audience here. If they had a shred of professional integrity, they would withdraw the paper, ask the Interpreter to take it down, and write an apology.

I would like to think that if they ever read this thread, they would do just that.

As a self proclaimed scholarly publication, the Interpreter should have never accepted this hot mess for publication in the first place. The editors there have the same kind of responsibility to their readership as do the authors.

Excellent points. The authors not only made fools of themselves, they made fools of the Interpreter, its supporters, and the readers who bought into this and assumed it was serious. They also made fools of the alleged peer reviewers, who are saved from the embarrassment of having given this a thumbs up. by hiding behind their anonymity.

[_Physics Guy]

It is indeed a sad situation for Interpreter. If they've been trying hard to be seen as a legitimate academic journal, this will set them back a long way. Whoever did peer review on this really let them down badly.

Though to be honest their editors probably deserve a good share of the blame, for not choosing better peer reviewers, and especially for not twigging that odds of 10^132 against the Book of Mormon being unhistorical might just be too good to be true. If the Interpreter editors really thought it so plausible that statistical wizardry might deliver a result like that, that they didn't find a serious expert to get a second opinion, then the impression that Interpreter is only a Mormon bubble journal has to have a certain amount of truth ipso facto.

This may be hard to live down.

[_Analytics]

It is indeed a sad situation for Interpreter. If they've been trying hard to be seen as a legitimate academic journal, this will set them back a long way. Whoever did peer review on this really let them down badly.

Though to be honest their editors probably deserve a good share of the blame, for not choosing better peer reviewers, and especially for not twigging that odds of 10^132 against the Book of Mormon being unhistorical might just be too good to be true. If the Interpreter editors really thought it so plausible that statistical wizardry might deliver a result like that, that they didn't find a serious expert to get a second opinion, then the impression that Interpreter is only a Mormon bubble journal has to have a certain amount of truth ipso facto.

This may be hard to live down.

The editor ought to be fired.

[_I have a question]

Mr Blanco writes...

Mr. Dale,

Doesn’t the Bayes Theorem show that Jesus didn’t exist? It seems problematic that you are attempting to use the Bayes Theorem to show a historical Book of Mormon when the tool you are using also shows there was no Jesus. Thoughts?

Ouch!