Where your host sounds off on a variety of semi-random topics. Most recent material will be at the top of the page.
The War of Ideas Versus Genetics
I find it useful to consider religions (or other social organizations) as memes, or idea genes, that spread and propagate or eventually wither and go extinct. Fourteen hundred years ago, the Graeco-Roman-Persian world was divided into Christianity and Zoroastrianism, with Christianity on the ascendancy. Islam arrived and more or less wiped out the Zoroastrians and nearly the Christians as well before the Spaniards and the Italians rallied the troops. Islam was more aggressive, proselytizing via both the sword and superior intellectual vigor.
But don't underestimate the power of evolution of the more old-fashioned variety. That is, organisms that reproduce at a greater rate will eventually replace their slower reproducing counterparts. I'm going off the top of my head here, but I believe that Europeans and their kin in the Americas and Australia increased at roughly three times the global growth rate between 1500-1900. This as much as anything is the reason that the Christian/European world reached its peak of power and influence around 1950. Similarly, Islam is the world's fastest growing religion now for no other reason than that they are having more offspring.
The reason I mention this is something that I read in Krakauer. Apparently, the population of the polygamist town of Short Creek/Hilldale/Colorado City is doubling every twenty years due to an incredible birth rate. They have 9,000 people now, but at this rate, they will have a quarter of a million members in less than a hundred years.
The latest copy of Parents highlights a fundamentalist Christian family with fourteen kids under the age of 15, who "let God decide" how many children they should have. Now, let's say that Western culture is so seductive that a fully 50% of their children, grandchildren, etc. go mainstream and never go back. They only have 2 children, while the remaining fundies have a high, but somewhat more believable 8 children each. They will still have a thousand fundamentalist great-great grandchildren. It's a frightening thought for those of us who are somewhat attached to our secular world.
Sorry to keep hammering demographics, but I read an article recently about Israeli Jews and their birthrates. The Orthodox Jews often have 8 or more children compared to two or fewer by the secular Jews. Not surprisingly, the Orthodox are less likely to support a political solution to the Israeli/Palestinian conflict.
Some studies have shown that Denmark will become a majority Moslem state within fifty years if current immigration and birthrate trends continue. Many of these new immigrants have arrived in Denmark for the ironic reason that they were Islamists who advocate Islamic law and were thus booted or fled from their nations of origin. Some have stated their outright goal of imposing Sharia in Denmark when they reach a majority. Denmark, being a liberal democracy, seems powerless to snuff out the seeds of its own destruction.
In short, I think that the humanistic view will win in the marketplace of ideas, but I'm afraid that the fundamentalist view (in all its flavors) is winning the war of the genes. In the end, which theater of battle will prove to be decisive?
From Apologist to Skeptic
A few years ago I would look in on LDS-themed message boards with the idea of defending the church. I was what Dr. Shades might call an internet Mormon, in that I have always believed in evolution, and rather liberally interpreted anything that came from the prophet's mouth.
Perhaps as a result of this liberal viewpoint, while I found it easy to discount the silly, uninformed stuff thrown out there by Evangelicals who refuse to examine their own beliefs with the same scrutiny that they do Mormonism, I found it hard to disagree with the humanist/skeptic types who were either NOMs
or former Mormons. They were usually better informed than I was, for one, and could point to sources that I could not refute.
Almost before I knew it, I was moving to the humanist/skeptic camp myself. I was surprised and more than a little worried when I realized what happened and forced myself to stop until I had thoroughly considered sources such as Compton, Metcalf, etc. To get to the end of the story, I probably attended less than six months more of church once I opened myself to so-called "anti" material. It all made just too much sense. I read the apologists and they really struggled to refute what were, after all, their own sources: Journal of Discourses, Doctrine and Covenants, old Ensign articles, pioneer journals, etc.
Toward a More Healthy Sexuality
One thing I've always appreciated about the church is that it holds both boys and girls to the same standard. I know that sometimes there is more cultural pressure for girls to follow the morality rules--at least in some cases--but boys are taught in YM, priesthood, seminary, etc., that they are just as responsible to follow the rules as the girls.
However, I think there are times when the on/off dichotomy of sex is a mistake. I personally know several couples who have had a difficult time developing a healthy sexual relationship because one or both of the partners (usually the woman) has a hard time shrugging off the "sex is dirty and evil" message. It's been drilled into their heads for so many years that they just cannot get over it.
Another unintended side effect is the foolish and dangerous sexual experimentation of teenagers. They are coping with the highest hormonal levels of their lives at the same time that they are receiving little sexual guidance beyond the dubious variety provided by their peers. Given that many, if not most, are going to experiment a little, it is all too easy for them to tune out the abstinence-only adults in their lives.
Now, I absolutely do not think that high school aged children are ready for the emotional and physical responsibilities of having sex. By college, I'm not so sure. Perhaps in certain circumstances. Continuing with unmarried individuals, it seems silly that a divorced woman in, say, her thirties doesn't have the emotional maturity to know when sex is proper or not. Provided that she protects herself from disease or unwanted pregnancy, where is the harm?
But back to teenagers and young adults. For those who are not going to wait anyway, and for those others who struggle with unhealthy sexual attitudes after marriage, is there some way to transition to a more healthy sexual attitude beyond the all or nothing mentality of Mormonism and other traditional religions?
The Book of Mormon: Ancient or Modern?
It has been argued that the only reasonable explanation for the origins of the Book of Mormon is the authorized version told by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, as well as other Mormon groups. Joseph was an illiterate farm boy, incapable of telling such an intricate story, filled with details consistent with an ancient American setting.
As a writer, I find it quite easy to believe that Joseph Smith wrote the Book of Mormon. People have made the same statements about Shakespeare, and I wouldn't compare the literary merits of the Book of Mormon with Shakespeare's writings. If the Book of Mormon were such a wonderful piece of work, we should be able to find college courses studying it as literature, even if they reject the divinity of the subject matter.
As for the internal consistency of the book, I see the 19th Century on virtually every page. Those rare pages that don't read like the 19th century, were lifted whole cloth from the King James bible.
Others point to how quickly Joseph wrote the Book of Mormon. Length of time is not a positive or negative factor in determining literary quality. Some of the greatest works of literature have taken decades to write, but other masterpieces have been written in a blur of white-hot inspiration. Consider Shakespeare, or Mozart. And Mozart was writing symphonies at the age of 5. That was miraculous. Dictating (not writing) a book that is not read as literature anywhere outside its own religious community is not particularly miraculous at all.
In the end, which is a more reasonable explanation, that an angel brought a set of gold plates to Joseph Smith, which he translated by means of a magic stone placed in a hat, revealing a record that described an ancient Jewish migration to the New World, or that Joseph Smith was a gifted storyteller?
My belief is that he gathered material from other sources--as all writers do--and he crafted a reasonably good story from his own mind. It's been done thousands of times before, often worse, and occasionally better.
Marking an Anniversary of Sorts
It's been roughly six months since I started this website (as of 12/02) and I just wanted to give a little update. There are now eighteen seperate essays or other works on this web site. Things have slowed down a bit, but I'm still adding an essay every month or so and slowly building a body of content, thanks mostly to my generous contributors.
Let's Start Over
Let's admit it. We have a lot of problems with religion in this world. I won't cover historical problems such as the Crusades, the Inquisition, etc., rather than give a nod in that direction, acknowledging that the past was probably worse than the present. It's the present, however, that concerns me, and it's pretty bad. We've got orthodox Jews in the West Bank who believe that God has eternally promised them someone else's land, while they are opposed by enemies who believe that Jews control half the governments of the world and blow themselves up in the name of Allah. In Saudia Arabia, religious police refused to allow rescue workers to evacuate girls during a fire at their school because the were emerging without a complete covering. In Indonesia, sectarian violence between Christians and Moslems has cost thousands of lives. India suffers similar violence, only the Christians have been replaced by Hindus.
I've written elsewhere that it's not the believers of the world that frighten me, but the knowers. All too often, the knowers gather into an irresistable force among some nation or people and then we have women stoned for adultry and airliners directed into skyscrapers. Islam is the principle culprit at the present moment, but a thousand years ago you would have found Christians to be the aggressor and I have seen convincing evidence that it will become so once again. In any event, there is enough blame to go around.
My solution is simple, yet impossible. How about we abolish all religions, here and now? We won't stop at the biggies, but cover everything from Catholicism to Shintoism, from Sunnism to Jainism. All the -isms, even UUism. We may still study all the old religions, but much the same way that we currently study the Greek Pantheon of gods, rather than with the fervor of the true believer.
And then what? Do we just live in a world without religion? Not at all. After a breather, individuals reexamine their spirtuality, organize again as they see fit. Perhaps God really does have a preferred mode of worship, in which case I have little doubt that he will organize his followers again post haste. But I suspect that what will happen is that the entire world will look something like California after awhile. No religion will hold sway. Many, in fact, will practice no religion at all. The happy side effect will be that no one belief will hold sufficient power to force its views on others, and to cause the great quantities of human misery that organized religion has so often brought to this world.
Black Skin and the Priesthood
Church members of African descent were not allowed to hold the priesthood in the LDS church until 1978. Almost every Mormon knows this fact, though many are unaware of the theological supports that propped up this doctrine. It used to trouble me that God would speak so clearly to the prophets on so many other subjects, while the Brethren erroneously followed racist policies that perpetuated the priesthood ban.
This was one of the biggest testimony busters for me. When my wife and I were considering the pre-1978 ban, I kept coming back to this question: If God was going to give any instruction to his prophet, wouldn't that message be that every human being is of equal worth in His sight?
As I saw it, there were two possible ways to answer this critical question. Either God personally commanded, or at least freely permitted the ban--meaning that God himself was a racist at some level--or the prophets were not communicating with God on this important subject, even as they claimed that they were.
Or, as I came to realize, there was a third, more faith-shaking possibility. That is, the self-proclaimed prophets had no more a direct line to God's will than anyone else on this planet.
The Book of Abraham: A Stumbling Block to My Testimony
The Book of Abraham was one of the first issues that proved to be a stumbling block for me. I was serving in the Elder's Quorum presidency at the time, paying tithing, attending the temple regularly, etc. There was no sin in my life more major than sluffing off on my HTing now and then and occasionally arguing with my wife about some trivial thing or other.
So one day I did a search for The Book of Abraham one day, curious about something I'd read while preparing a lesson for EQ. Larsen's book came up, which piqued my curiousity. Of course, I knew it was bad news as soon as I started reading, so I immediately went off and found some more comforting material to read: FARMS apologetics and the like. But this unsettled me more than the Larsen stuff, to be honest. It was defensive, sniping stuff and by the time I got back to "By His Own Hand on Papyrus," I had come to the opinion that the main apologetic tactic went thusly.
1. We know the church is true. We know that Joseph was a prophet. We know that the Book of Abraham was one of his true revelations.
2. The Egyptian documents purported to be the Book of Abraham do not match the actual text in the Pearl of Great Price. How do we reconcile this with #1 above? There must be an answer.
3. Is it possible that these documents are not the real
Book of Abraham, because that would be the only way that 1 & 2 above could both be true.
4. Ah, yes, if we assume thus-and-such, and make this intuitive jump, and perhaps connect these two distant dots together, then we have a theory by which the Book of Abraham might
still be true, and since we know that the Book of Abraham is authentic history, as evidence by #1, above, it must be
And yes, after having read a good deal on both sides of the issue, I think the apologetic answer might be correct. I do not think this is the most likely answer, however. I think that the results of #4 are largely a strong desire to prove that #1 is true.
That is the nature of apologetics.
The Word of Wisdom Reconsidered
With the recent studies showing the overwhelming health benefits that come from drinking green tea, I think we're getting to the point where the Word of Wisdom will be proven to be obedience merely for the sake of obedience. The prohibitions in the Word of Wisdom seem to fall into four categories.
1. Those things that were known to be harmful in Joseph's day (hard liquor, cigarettes) and are still known by the world at large to be harmful.
2. Those things that were not originally prohibited (undistilled alchohol such as beer) but were later proscribed, and are not harmful in moderation.
3. Those things which were proscribed in the original revelation, but no longer considered part of the Word of Wisdom for all intents and purposes (meat outside of winter or famine, grains outside their season, hot drinks like chocolate or non-alchoholic cider)
4. Those things which were and remain proscribed, but are actually beneficial to one's health (green tea) or neutral (coffee).
This Just In
(AP) New evidence shows conclusively that there are trees in Central America, yet another startling correlation with events in the Book of Mormon.
"Joseph Smith was just an uneducated farm boy," said FARMS spokesman John L. Sorenson. "There is no way that he could have known that trees would some day be discovered in the historical land of Bountiful."
Nevertheless, a loose confederation of dissidents at exmormon.org has issued a statement challenging the findings. "The Book of Mormon clearly states that the land of Bountiful also contained water, fruit, and grass," says the communique. "Until FARMS can show these items are present in Central America, we believe that the discovery of trees is just a coincidence."
While FARMS remains quiet on current research, there are rumors that several researchers are deep in the Central American wilderness searching for evidence of water and fruit. Grass, however, may prove a hardier challenge.