long ago ideas

“When we are tired, we are attacked by ideas we conquered long ago." - Friedrich Nietzsche Long ago, Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery conquered false claims that the Book of Mormon was fiction or that it came through a stone in a hat. But these old claims have resurfaced in recent years. To conquer them again, we have to return to what Joseph and Oliver taught.

Thursday, September 9, 2021

No map is better than the wrong map

This wisdom borrowed from another context should be adopted by BYU and CES:

"No map is better than the wrong map" - Nassim Taleb 

Instead, the M2C citation cartel has managed to enforce their M2C interpretation of the text as the only allowable interpretation. 

By any reasonable academic standard, a serious scholar would acknowledge multiple working hypotheses. But the M2C citation cartel refuses to do so. 

Latter-day Saints would be far better informed with no map than with a map that intentionally defies and repudiates the teachings of the prophets about the New York Cumorah.

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Here's some history.

Several years ago, BYU administration told the faculty to stop teaching M2C. The usual suspects objected. William Hamblin, in particular, wrote an infamous blog post criticizing the new direction.

How BYU Destroyed Ancient Book of Mormon Studies

I maintain that numerous policies adopted by a wide range of BYU administrators over the past thirty years have had the effect—intended or unintended—of destroying ancient Book of Mormon studies as a fledgling discipline. 

You can read his post with my comments here:

http://www.bookofmormoncentralamerica.com/2015/09/how-byu-destroyed-ancient-mesoamerican.html

Not to be deterred, the M2C citation cartel found a work-around. 

They used the M2C interpretation of the text (with Cumorah far, far from New York) to develop a fantasy map that imprinted the M2C interpretation on the minds of all their students. 

And they're still using it.

https://bom.byu.edu/





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