The partiality of paternalism

Now that people recognize the mark of M2C as the antithesis of intellectual pursuit and a direct repudiation of the teachings of the prophets about the New York Cumorah, many people are wondering why LDS intellectuals adopted the mark of M2C in the first place.

These intellectuals are smart, credentialed and well intentioned. Some (but not all) of them ostensibly recognize the importance of an open mind. What would lead them to adopt a logo that declares as a fundamental premise that the only permissible discussion of Book of Mormon geography is in the context of a Mayan setting?

There's a simple explanation. These intellectuals simply assumed the prophets were wrong about Cumorah and they fell in love with their theory.

In technical terms, M2C (the Mesoamerican/2 Cumorahs theory) is an example of "the habit of precipitate explanation." 

The reason so many people become emotionally attached to "hastily born theories" such as M2C was explained in 1890 by the geologist T.C. Chamberlin. His paper was reprinted in Science magazine in 1965. A pdf is available here: 

http://www.sortie-nd.org/lme/Statistical%20Papers/Chamberlain_1997.pdf

Chamberlin explained how affection for one's theory create a "blinding influence."

For a time these hastily born theories [such as M2C] are likely to be held in a tentative way with some measure of candor or at least some self-illusion of candor. With this tentative spirit and measurable candor, the mind satisfies its moral sense and deceives itself with the thought that it is proceeding cautiously and impartially toward the goal of ultimate truth. 

It fails to recognize that no amount of provisional holding of a theory, no amount of application of the theory, so long as the study lacks in incisiveness and exhaustiveness, justifies an ultimate conviction. It is not the slowness with which conclusions are arrived at that should give satisfaction to the moral sense, but the precision, the completeness and the impartiality of the investigation.

It is in this tentative stage that the affections enter with their blinding influence. Love was long since discerned to be blind and what is true in the personal realm is measurably true on the intellectual realm. Important as the intellectual affections are as stimuli and as rewards, they are nevertheless dangerous factors in research. All too often they put under strain the integrity of the intellectual processes.

The moment one has offered an original explanation for a phenomenon which seems satisfactory, that moment affection for his intellectual child springs into existence, and as the explanation grows into a definite theory his parental affections cluster about his offspring and it grows more and more dear to him.

While he persuades himself that he holds it still as tentative, it is none the less lovingly tentative and not impartially and indifferently tentative. So soon as this parental affection takes possession of the mind, there is apt to be a rapid passage to the unreserved adoption of the theory. 

There is then imminent danger of an unconscious selection and of a magnifying of phenomena that fall into harmony with the theory and support it and an unconscious neglect of phenomena that fail of coincidence. [In the case of M2C, it started with "unconscious neglect" but now the M2C citation cartel not only neglects but actively suppresses, attacks, and censors facts that "fail of coincidence" with M2C.]

The mind lingers with pleasure upon the facts that fall happily into the embrace of the theory, and feels a natural coldness toward those that assume a refractory attitude. Instinctively there is a special searching-out of phenomena that support it, for the mind is led by its desires. There springs up also unwittingly a pressing of the theory to make it fit the facts and a pressing of the facts to make them fit the theory. [A perfect description of Book of Mormon Central.]

When these biasing tendencies set in, the mind rapidly degenerates into the partiality of paternalism. 

KEY POINT that explains M2C:

The search for facts, the observation of phenomena and their interpretation are all dominated by affection for the favored theory until it appears to its author or its advocate to have been overwhelmingly established.

The theory then rapidly rises to a position of control in the processes of the mind and observation, induction and interpretation are guided by it. From an unduly favored child it readily grows to be a master and leads its author whithersoever it will. The subsequent history of that mind in respect to that theme is but the progressive dominance of a ruling idea. 

Briefly summed up, the evolution is this: a premature explanation passes first into a tentative theory, then into an adopted theory, and lastly into a ruling theory.

When this last stage has been reached, unless the theory happens perchance to be the true one, all hope of the best results is gone. To be sure truth may be brought forth by an investigator dominated by a false ruling idea. His very errors may indeed stimulate investigation on the part of others. But the condition is scarcely the less unfortunate.

As previously implied, the method of the ruling theory occupied a chief place during the infancy of investigation. It is an expression of a more or less infantile condition of the mind. I believe it is an accepted generalization that in the earlier stages of development the feelings and impulses are relatively stronger than in later stages...

The defects of the method are obvious and its errors grave. If one were to name the central psychological fault, it might be stated as the admission of intellectual affection to the place that should be dominated by impartial, intellectual rectitude alone.

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M2C promoters (and Book of Mormon Central employees) will claim that my views (Moroni's America, etc.) are just as defective.

There's a big difference, though. I accept the teachings of the prophets that the New York Cumorah is a fact. When we start with a fact, we avoid "the habit of precipitate explanation."  That's why it is crucial to recognize that Oliver Cowdery was not merely speculating or proposing a theory.

He declared the New York Cumorah was a fact.

By insisting that Oliver merely speculated that it was a fact, the M2C promoters implicitly recognize the fundamental weakness of their position.

Denying facts is the "tell" that M2C is a hoax. 

But plenty of people lead productive lives while believing in hoaxes, and I'm fine with people believing whatever they want. 

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How the M2C logo makes sense

Adapted from a twitter feed:

Once you realize that M2C advocates think of themselves as priests policing heresy rather than investigators seeking truth, the M2C logo and the censorship by the M2C citation cartel will make a lot more sense.

Logos and perspective

This political season is a good time to remember the contents of an 1839 letter that Joseph signed as co-author and personally edited:

We ought always to be aware of those prejudices which sometimes so strongly present themselves and are so congenial to human nature against our neighbors, friends, and brethren of the world who choose to differ with us in opinion and in matters of faith. 

Our religion is between us and our God. Their religion is between them and their God. 

There is a tie from God that should be exercised toward those of our faith who walk uprightly. . .. 

It is without prejudice, but gives scope to the mind, which enables us to conduct ourselves with greater liberality toward all others that are not of our faith than what they exercise toward one another. These principles approximate nearer to the mind of God because they are like God or godlike. 

Those who read my blogs know that I have great respect and fondness for the members of the M2C citation cartel. All those I've met are great people, sincere, dedicated, smart, etc. 

While I disagree with their interpretations of the text and the relevant extrinsic evidence, it doesn't bother me in the least that other people have different opinions. I object strongly to their policy of censorship of alternative ideas, but none of these differences are personal. I'm happy to associate with and interact with anyone despite disagreements about any particular issues.  

Unlike some of my critics, I don't resort to name-calling, accusations of apostasy, etc. Such logical fallacies reflect their insecurity about their opinions and are easily ignored anyway.  

For those who are serious about these topics, many differences of opinion arise from a simple difference of perspective. Once we understand this it is easy to have unity of purpose simultaneously with diversity of thought.

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From Twitter:

Everything you see, hear and know is based on a subjective perspective.

It is all relative to where you stand.

https://twitter.com/BrianRoemmele/status/1317454797516070912

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One highly significant difference of perspective involves the Book of Mormon Central logo, which is the old logo from F.A.R.M.S. 

For some people, this logo represents outstanding, brilliant scholarship. Even the Maxwell Institute, for a time, used a modified version of the logo.

For others (such as me) it represents completely closed minds and bias confirmation presented in the guise of scholarship. 

This logo literally teaches that the Book of Mormon is a Mayan Codex (i.e., Mormon's Codex, which M2C believers hold out as the "high-water mark of scholarship on the Book of Mormon"). 

This logo teaches that the "real Cumorah" is in southern Mexico.

This logo is the antithesis of the Church's position of neutrality.

It would be impossible for any organization or publication that identifies itself with a Mayan glyph to represent the Book of Mormon to even consider, let alone fairly evaluate, the teachings of the prophets about the New York Cumorah. 

That's why the hirelings of Book of Mormon Central spend their time trying to convince Church members that the prophets are wrong.

That logo represents a deliberate choice to repudiate the teachings of the prophets about the New York Cumorah.

The logo of the Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies is composed of characters from four of the main ancient languages and cultures relevant to Book of Mormon research. The Hebrew “aleph” in the upper left corner and the Greek “omega” in the lower right are the first and last letters of the Hebrew and Greek alphabets, standing for “the first and the last” (Isaiah 48:12), who is Jesus Christ.

The Mayan glyph in the upper right is stylized, representing Mesoamerican studies. The Egyptian “Wd3t-eye” in the lower left corner represents Egyptian studies. This character, the pupil of the sun god Re, was an ancient symbol of resurrection, since a myth told how the eye was torn to pieces and then put back together. The round pupil of the eye was also used as the model of the round outline of the hypocephalus placed under the head in royal burials, of which Figure 2 in the Book of Abraham is an example.

You can see the original explanation here.

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Once those who identify themselves with this M2C logo understand how the rest of us perceive it, maybe they will be a little more understanding of our point of view.

Probably not, but hope springs eternal.

Once someone gets a PhD...

 From Nate Silver's twitter feed:

Nate Silver

@NateSilver538

This is not a subtweet of anyone in particular and it's going to annoy some people since I have a lot of PhD followers/friends and also I'm a stubborn guy myself but...one thing I'm noticed is that once someone gets a PhD, it become 10x harder to convince them they're wrong.

https://twitter.com/NateSilver538/status/1316739237258162176

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To this I would add, once someone is hired by a PhD, it becomes 20x harder to convince them they're wrong.

And if they're working on PhD themselves, it becomes 30x harder to convince them they're wrong.

Exhibit A: the employees of Book of Mormon Central who troll faithful LDS who happen to disagree with M2C because they still believe the prophets.

M2C handbook illustrations

The M2C handbook explains how to perpetuate M2C. 

1. Develop a logo that depicts the Book of Mormon as a Mayan codex:

2. Put the logo everywhere:

3. Hire fine young scholars and pay them to flood the Internet with M2C and attacks on faithful LDS members who still believe the teachings of the prophets.

4. Spend millions of dollars to enforce M2C and censor alternatives.

M2CNN-we can't consider it

 

Source Book framing of the issues

We've been discussing Brother Sorenson's Source Book. Today we'll look at how it frames the issues. Brother Sorenson did a great job articulating a useful approach to the issues, but then he stumbled by making M2C-driven assumptions within a few pages of pointing out how such assumptions should not be made!

Bottom line: The M2C citation cartel defies Brother Sorenson's reasonable framework because they do not want Church members to make informed decisions.

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page 210.

If we are to progress in this task, we must chop away and burn the conceptual underbrush that has afflicted the effort in the past. 

Among the conceptual underbrush is the assumption that Joseph and Oliver were ignorant speculators who misled the Church with a false narrative about the New York Cumorah. But what does Brother Sorenson write in the very next sentence?

We must stop asking, as so many do, what have the Brethren said about this in the past? It is clear enough (see Appendix A) that none of them knew the answer (which is what some of them have said often enough).

While Brother Sorenson included Letter VII in Appendix A, look at how he edited it:

p. 372.

Oliver Cowdery. Latter Day Saints' Messenger and Advocate, July 1835, p. 158-159. (Reprinted in The Times and Seasons 2,1841, page 379, and again in The Improvement Era 2,1899, pages 729-734.)

Re. the New York hill Cumorah: "At about one mile west rises another ridge of less height, running parallel with the former .. . between these hills, the entire power and national strength of both the Jaredites and Nephites were destroyed.

Here is the unedited passage:

At about one mile west rises another ridge of less height, running parallel with the former, leaving a beautiful vale between. The soil is of the first quality for the country, and under a state of cultivation, which gives a prospect at once imposing, when one reflects on the fact, that here, between these hills, the entire power and national strength of both the Jaredites and Nephites were destroyed.

By omitting Oliver's statement that the New York Cumorah was a fact, Brother Sorenson accommodated his theory that this was merely Oliver's (incorrect) opinion. 

Today, most M2C followers I've discussed this with have never heard of Letter VII, but even those who have heard of it say it was merely Oliver's opinion. To the extent they're relying on the Source Book, you can see why they think that.

Brother Sorenson didn't mention that Letter VII was also copied into Joseph's history, although he might not have known that. You can see it now in the Joseph Smith Papers, here:

https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/history-1834-1836/90

He also didn't mention that Letter VII was republished in the Millennial Star, the Gospel Reflector (with the express consent of Joseph Smith), and the Prophet (by Joseph's brother William), but maybe he didn't know all of that, either. Other than the scriptures themselves, these essays on Church history that Oliver wrote with Joseph's assistance were the most republished articles in the Church during Joseph's lifetime. Everyone knew about them, including the fact of the New York Cumorah.

There is nothing in Appendix A that suggests, let alone supports, Brother Sorenson's claim that "it is clear enough that none of them knew the answer" about the New York Cumorah. Like all M2C believers do, Brother Sorenson conflates the issue of Cumorah with the rest of the geography issues.

This is a favorite tactic of my critics, too. I've always said that while I don't think Mesoamerica makes sense for several reasons, I don't categorically reject it or any other geography, so long as the proposed geography retains the New York Cumorah of Mormon 6:6. That's the only definite pin in the map the prophets have provided, and everything beyond that is open for discussion.

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Continuing at page 210:

Where we must begin is with the words of Mormon and his associates who kept the original records.

On page 216, Brother Sorenson writes, "6. I assume too that all the relations and phenomena known in present day nature prevailed in Book of Mormon times. That is, water ran from mountains to seas, the "headwaters" of the river Sidon had to be higher in elevation than any point downstream, and the river ultimately debouched into a sea....

"Headwaters" is not a term in the text. It is not one of the "words of Mormon and his associates." 

This is an example of what I call the Sorenson translation. I once had a conversation with a well-known M2C author who referred to the "headwaters" and I said, "That's not a term in the text." He replied, "Of course it is." I asked him to show me. He actually looked! Of course he couldn't find it. After a while, he found "head of Sidon," which, as I pointed out, is a different term that has more than one meaning. There are other examples of the Sorenson translation throughout the Source Book. 

Look at the very next sentence: 

From their words we must derive every scrap of meaning; I assume that their knowledge of geography was so integral and holistic that meanings are tucked into their records at a level below intention.

This is Brother Sorenson's rationale for developing his own translation of the text, which every M2C believer has accepted. They are looking through the text at the hidden meanings that only they, the M2C scholars, can discern. It's fascinating from an psychological perspective to see this degree of lack of self-awareness. 

We must sift for these. We cannot omit any of them, for crucial clues may occur in or between words or lines where we had not seen them before. 

This is good analysis, but not always adhered to. Worse, the hidden meanings come to take precedence over the text itself. 

To summarize, the following steps are necessary, and no other set of steps nor any other order for accomplishing them can solve our problem:

1. Purge our minds as far as possible of preconceptions about where the Book of Mormon lands were.

One well-known BYU scholar has said he "cannot unsee" Mesoamerica when he reads the Book of Mormon. Most, if not all, members of the Church educated by CES or BYU (or Book of Mormon Central) would have to say the same thing because the M2C interpretation has been deliberately imposed on Church members from a young age. 

As most members of the Church to draw a Book of Mormon scene and they'll start with a Mayan pyramid. 

Nearly every time when I show or discuss the Moroni's America framework, people respond by saying "I've never seen that before, but it makes sense." 

In any rational scenario, Church members would be fully educated about alternatives. They would know what the prophets have taught about Cumorah. They would understand why the scholars repudiate those teachings. They would be able to roughly sketch both Mesoamerican and North American settings.

But the M2C citation cartel doesn't want Church members to make informed decisions.

The M2C citation cartel continues to deliberately censor alternatives to M2C. They openly defy Brother Sorenson's step number 1 in solving the problem of Book of Mormon geography. 

The worst of the bunch is Book of Mormon Central, which is spending millions of dollars to enforce M2C and censor alternatives. Their business model only works so long as Church members are kept in ignorance.

2. Analyze as freshly and completely as possible every geographical fact and sound inference which the texts require or make likely.

Once the LDS scholars decided the prophets were wrong, and the RLDS scholars were correct, on the issue of Cumorah, the LDs scholars abandoned any thought of analyzing anything freshly and completely. It has been pure bias confirmation ever since. 

3. Realizing that in fact we cannot completely rid ourselves of preconceptions or make inferences without some factual or logical errors, we should guard against hidden biases or errors by displaying for examination by other students as much of our mental processing as we are able. 

The M2C citation cartel has abandoned this step as well.  

This requires writing out our work in detail; only written communication permits the careful examination by others that such work demands. (The resulting volume of writing may seem tedious to those not sufficiently motivated to the task.)

4. Mutual criticism (again ideally in writing) is essential to reveal points where different students can agree or where they need to improve their thinking or information. This criticism need not be uncharitable, although truth must be the ultimate standard.

The M2C citation has hired fine young scholars to fill the internet with uncharitable, ad hominem attacks against anyone who dares question M2C. They have repudiated Brother Sorenson's reasonable framework just as completely as they have repudiated the teachings of the prophets. 

5. By this repetitive process all should move toward consensus. However, the end result may be a conclusion that the text does not provide enough information, as read at this time, to come to full consensus on a single-text based model. That can only be learned by trying.

The M2C citation cartel has definitely moved toward consensus; that's their justification for ongoing censorship of alternatives. A far better approach is the nominal neutrality articulated by the Gospel Topics Entry on Book of Mormon Geography, which unfortunately is not observed in practice.

6. So far as a single model emerges from this effort, then one-half—the prerequisite half—of the equation has been prepared. Only after this has happened can a definitive search for external correlations be carried out. Until then anything said about external geography, archaeology, linguistics or the like for any location in America can only be prejudicial to the suspension of opinion that we ought to maintain.

The M2C citation has managed to enforce the M2C interpretation of the text that, predictably, produces an M2C "model" reflected by the BYU and CES fantasy maps. The problem, of course, is that the M2C interpretation doesn't really fit the real world; hence the fantasy maps. 

Certainly there are numerous "real-world" maps based on the M2C citation, such as the one on the BYU Studies web page (which guides the editors so they properly comply with M2C in BYU Studies, just as they did in the Saints book). 

But the goal of generating an "internal map" relies on a cascading series of assumptions. It's easy to see why. Imagine someone generating an "internal map" of the Bible with no reference to the real world. No two people could possibly develop similar maps using the scanty geographical information in the text. 

That's why the only rational basis for constructing a map of the Book of Mormon is to start with the one known pin in the map, as declared by the prophets: the New York Cumorah.

Now that the M2C scholars have persuaded everyone to repudiate the teachings of the prophets, though, we end up with the BYU and CES fantasy maps, based on the M2C interpretation, which both implicitly and explicitly teaches students to think of the Book of Mormon in a fictional framework. 

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The end.