Faithful TBM to doubter in 6 hours on ex-Mormon Reddit

[Philo Sofee]

I find some aspects of KevinSim's postings quite strange. This is at least the third time in just a couple of pages where he either has totally ignored what is being said to him, or has misquoted or incompletely quoted someone to the extent that what he did quote completely distorts the quotee's point.

Malkie, I responded to that post of Marcus'. Did you see my response?

I think that, as I now do with MG, I should not bother to try to engage with him. It's a waste of time and mental energy.

This forum is for discussing Mormonism. Malkie, are you saying that you are only willing to discuss Mormonism with Latter-day Saints who think the same way as you do? And are you saying that you find it impossible to reason with MG, and therefore it would be impossible to reason with me?

KevinSim, you ARE MG. It is soooooo obvious, you can quit pretending now.

[Doctor CamNC4Me]

*formatting issues corrected below*

[Doctor CamNC4Me]

Dr. Shades, in one sense there is no need; I can't prove that anyone is going to suffer and die because humans are no longer around.

What does that nonsense statement have to do with anything? You can literally prove, right now, that humans cause other humans and other things to suffer and die because we’re here. A Russian soldier just castrated a Ukrainian POW, on video, and posted it. The identified Russian soldier has been mutilating Ukrainians (snipping off extremities) any time he could get his hands on one. In fact, it’s suspected this soldier has been doing this in prior conflicts where he’s been assigned.

That’s one human out of billions, living and dead, that have all suffered and died because that’s the human experience. There’s no alleviating that unless you train your mind and body to detach from it. Other than a few souls who’ve transcended the human condition this will not change the fact billions upon billions will live and die and suffering is a fact of exist. Humans will never alleviate existential suffering, but we sure as heack are going to be the cause of much of it.

But in another sense I think humans have a need to make a difference in the universe, in the short term and the long term.

“Make a difference.” What does that even mean? Do you mean consume space and resources so we can make more humans and so on? Even if humans became a Type II civilization what does “make a difference” mean to anything being acted upon by a human?

And there's also the matter of conscience. I think humans need to satisfy their consciences, and their consciences can't ignore the generation of real people, with hopes and dreams like you and I have, whose hopes and dreams are not going to be fulfilled because we chose to not work towards them.

Future humans are a direct and indirect result of actions taken by everything on and off this earth. What does ‘we should make a better world for our kids’ have to do with anything that you’ve claimed on this thread with regard to atheists creating a god for themselves?

See? This is the BS you do, MG. You show up, disrupt a thread, make it all about you, lie about your motivations (or even who you are), just suck up all the attention you can get, pretend that you’re just ‘mulling things over - ‘taking a nuanced approach to Mormonism’, and all the while playing nonsense games with the quote feature and messing with posters.

You’ve done this for twenty years, and you’ll do this until you’re dead. Mormonism isn’t “true”. It isn’t even truthy. And now you’re creating fantastical worlds full of fantastical people to which you can assign your motivations all in order to ignore the clear and obvious falsity of your religion where, like the example with evolution, you can ignore 100 prophets and glom onto 1 in order to preserve your right to larp.

- Doc

[huckelberry]

And MG wonders why he’s been labeled a liar, a deceiver, and a troll. Mods, would you please hold MG to one handle, please?

- Doc

There is no reliable evidence at this point that the same person is posting on both accounts.

Even if they were, both accounts pre-date the sock puppet rule, and so are grandfathered as "legal" sock puppets. There is no rule that requires a person with more than one "legal" account to stick to one or the other.

I am certainly not all knowing here but my estimate is that MG and Kevinsims are two entirely different people. Their style of speech and thought are quite different to my ears anyway. Perhaps they both miss counter arguments which can be frustrating .

[Res Ipsa]

There is no reliable evidence at this point that the same person is posting on both accounts.

Even if they were, both accounts pre-date the sock puppet rule, and so are grandfathered as "legal" sock puppets. There is no rule that requires a person with more than one "legal" account to stick to one or the other.

I am certainly not all knowing here but my estimate is that MG and Kevinsims are two entirely different people. Their style of speech and thought are quite different to my ears anyway. Perhaps they both miss counter arguments which can be frustrating .

I don't see the similarities either. Both have very different theologies. Both speak with different voices. Their argument style isn't similar. The only significant thing I see that they have in common is that they appear to have raised the ire of the same community members.

[Doctor CamNC4Me]

I am certainly not all knowing here but my estimate is that MG and Kevinsims are two entirely different people. Their style of speech and thought are quite different to my ears anyway. Perhaps they both miss counter arguments which can be frustrating .

I don't see the similarities either. Both have very different theologies. Both speak with different voices. Their argument style isn't similar. The only significant thing I see that they have in common is thatthey appear to have raised the ire of the same community members.

-_-

[malkie]

I find some aspects of KevinSim's postings quite strange. This is at least the third time in just a couple of pages where he either has totally ignored what is being said to him, or has misquoted or incompletely quoted someone to the extent that what he did quote completely distorts the quotee's point.

Malkie, I responded to that post of Marcus'. Did you see my response?

I think that, as I now do with MG, I should not bother to try to engage with him. It's a waste of time and mental energy.

This forum is for discussing Mormonism. Malkie, are you saying that you are only willing to discuss Mormonism with Latter-day Saints who think the same way as you do? And are you saying that you find it impossible to reason with MG, and therefore it would be impossible to reason with me?

That and his apparent insistence that what he has decided to believe must represent reality in spite of lack of even marginally convincing evidence have made me conclude that, although he is somewhat more polite and pleasant in tone than MG, he is a virtual clone of MG.

Yes - I saw your response to Marcus, and virtually rolled my eyes.

I think I was quite clear about my reservations about engaging you, and it has nothing to do with my being "only willing to discuss Mormonism with Latter-day Saints who think the same way as [ I ] do".

If you read the words I wrote, you may be able to tease out my reasoning. Hint:

• ignore
• misquote
• incompletely quote
• distort
• lack of even marginally convincing evidence

Add to that list my previous identification of a pattern of behaviour - that is, I'm not talking about a single instance of any of these points.

Perhaps you and others are willing to continue with someone who: ignores what you say; and/or misquotes or partially quotes you; and/or distorts what you say; and/or thinks that simply saying they choose something without evidence (or in spite of contrary evidence) constitutes discussion.

As for me and my house, I have a distinct reluctance at this point. I don't see it as a productive use of my time.

I made reference to MG because I told him a while ago that I was unlikely to engage further with him - for similar reasons, though I don't think I laid them out as a bulleted list.

Can I be any clearer?

Of course, I reserve the right to change my mind if you say something I wish to discuss.

[Res Ipsa]

I don't understand why you claim that "humans need God," so I'd like to see the argument behind that.

God for me is someone who knows how to preserve forever some good things.

That seems to me consistent with lots of versions of God that lots of people believe in. Does God have any other defining characteristics for you, or is that the extent of how you define God?

Without such a being, humanity is going to eventually completely die out, like every other form of life that has ever existed is going to die out.

I think that's likely. If the universe keeps expanding at an accelerated rate, eventually no energy source will exist that could sustain human life. But, even if God exists, it will still be likely unless God sees humanity as a good that it chooses to be preserved forever. Given what we know about the universe, what do you think are the odds of that? Or even on this planet, maybe dolphins are the good thing God chooses to preserve.

I think humanity needs to find some lasting difference between its contribution to the universe and the contribution of every other form of life.

Why? Individually, I don't feel that need. Do you? If so, why? And if you think I do, why?

It just really strikes me as ironic that the one species that came up with the idea of forever might never produce anything good that will last forever.

Maybe. i'm not sure we even have a good grasp on what "forever" actually means. But the human mind can imagine all sorts of things that it never can create. I'm not sure that it's ironic that we can't make everything we imagine real. But I don't find the irony you see as a good reason to believe in the existence of God. It seems to be a part of the human condition that we can imagine things that we can't make happen. I can even imagine a God, but I can't create one. Is that a good reason to believe that the God imagine exists?

I can understand each of your sentences separately, but I don't understand how they fit together. And I don't see how what you say here fits together with your view that humans have some obligation to preserve the human race forever and what that has to do with whether God exists. I think you see how it all fits together. I'd like to be able to understand how you see it.

[KevinSim]

So, if the human race itself figures out how to persist forever, does that make the human race God?

Res Ipsa, are you talking about the human race as a whole, or are you talking about a large subset of the human race? Either way, the answer is yes, absolutely.

[KevinSim]

Is this some kind of deep Mormon doctrine I was unaware of?

I have never heard it taught in Primary, Sunday School, or Institute. It's just what I, a Latter-day Saint, personally believe. But I think it fits in pretty well with what I know of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.