The Book of Mormon is True -9

Background Context and Assumptions

By true I mean that it really was somewhat inspired by God. That the stories in the Book of Mormon happened pretty much the way they are written, except if Joseph Smith made some of it up, if he was having a bad day, but in general most of it is true.



As you see, I am trying to present both sides, and go where the algorithm takes me, but don't tell me that everything in the Bible is 100% true, and non contradictory. Were there two angels or 3 at the Tomb? Which version of Jesus's ancestry was accurate? What about all the other differences between the Gosples. There are hundreds if not Thousands.



No one on this planet who is smart accepts that every single word in the Book of Mormon or Bible are 100% accurate.



Reasons to agree (that the Book of Mormon is "true"): +5

1. It is acceptable to define true as inspiring.+0 If you define true as inspiring, you can say the Book of Mormon is true. 


2. The theory that the Book of Mormon is an ancient American history is deemed to fall outside the pale of academic credibility. 


3. If you ask God if the Book of Mormon is true, and you are righteous, he will tell you that it is by giving you a comforting warm feeling.  


4. A man will get nearer to God by abiding by the Book of Mormon's precepts than by any other book.

Reasons to disagree: -5

1. The book of Mormon contains too many 19th century points of view to be what it claims to be: an ancient text. 


2. There are too many historical problems with the book of Mormon to say that it is "true". -11


3. The Book of Mormon has so many problems with it, that personal belief that God told that it is true must be inaccurate. 


4. A warm and fuzzy feeling when reading or praying about the Book of Mormon should not be taken as evidence of the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon unless individually you have weighed the problems of the historicity of the book. 


5. There are not enough inspiring stories in the Book of Mormon to think that God would go to all the problem of bringing it forward. 

Score:

# of reasons to agree: 4

# of reasons to disagree: -5

# of reasons to agree with reasons to agree: +2

# of reasons to agree with reasons to disagree: -11

Total Idea Score: -10

Don't like the score? It is easy to change the score. Just post a reason to agree or disagree with the overall idea, or any of the reasons and the score will change

Reasons to agree

1. The Book of Mormon is True, and so the LDS church is true. 


2. Joseph Smith was inspired, and so the LDS church is true. 


3. Joseph smith's motivations were pure


4. If you say that Joseph Smith was evil, then you have to say that many of the Popes were evil

Reasons to disagree

1. LDS Church leaders have made too many contradicting statements for the Church to be true. 


2. LDS leaders claim to have God's authority when they tell people what to do, however they claim they never said they were infallible when they want to change their minds


3. Joseph Smith lied about the Book of Abraham

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Score:

# of reasons to agree: 0

# of reasons to disagree: -0

# of reasons to agree with reasons to agree: 0

# of reasons to disagree with reasons to agree: 0

Total Idea Score: 0

Don't like the score? It is easy to change the score. Just post a reason to agree or disagree with the overall idea, or any of the reasons and the score will change

LDS church leaders shouldn't claim they are prophets without giving any prophecies

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Score:

# of reasons to agree: 0

# of reasons to disagree: -0

# of reasons to agree with reasons to agree: 0

# of reasons to disagree with reasons to agree: 0

Total Idea Score: 0

Don't like the score? It is easy to change the score. Just post a reason to agree or disagree with the overall idea, or any of the reasons and the score will change

LDS Prophets have not prophesied anything important +2

Brigham Young believed that the moon and sun were inhabited.

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Reasons to agree

1. "Who can tell us of the inhabitants of this little planet that shines of an evening, called the moon?...when you inquire about the inhabitants of that sphere you find that the most learned are as ignorant in regard to them as the ignorant of their fellows. So it is in regard to the inhabitants of the sun. Do you think it is inhabited? I rather think it is. Do you think there is any life there? No question of it; it was not made in vain." (Journal of Discourses, vol. 13, p. 271)

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1. http://exmormonskeptic.blogspot.com/2007/07/quakers-on-moon.html

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Score:

# of reasons to agree: 0

# of reasons to disagree: -0

# of reasons to agree with reasons to agree: 0

# of reasons to disagree with reasons to agree: 0

Total Idea Score: 0

Many LDS Church leaders were chauvinistic

LDS teaching and doctrine are sexist and chauvinistic

(2) The LDS church creates psychology problems in the lives of its members

Reasons to agree

1. Many people in the LDS church feel guilt when they do not keep all the commandments. None of them sound too bad by themselves but the list complete list is impossible. For any of the The Church will say "look at all that Jesus did for you, and you can't even do x". But that trump card doesn't lead to good lives. We don't all have to be a martyrs. You shouldn't sacrifice your life for a Church that is not going to sacrifice for you. But the church doesn't addresses the thorny issues of its past, apologizes for them, or fixes them. The LDS church tells its member to do all the things other Christians do plus:




1. Striving for earthly perfection


2. Genealogy


3. Temple Work


4. Having lots of Children


5. Home teaching


6. Visiting Teaching


7. Giving Talks in Church


8. Church callings including bishopric, teaching classes, Sunday schools, etc, 




2. Telling people that Masturbation is wrong, creates guilt for a normal behavior, and guilt often leads to addiction, and perversion. 


3. The LDS church does not work well for people with social anxiety. 

Reasons to disagree

1.  The LDS Church works well for people that fit into the culture. 


2. People in Utah seem pretty happy

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Interest of those who disagree: -

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Score:

# of reasons to agree: 3

# of reasons to disagree: -1

# of reasons to agree with reasons to agree: 0

# of reasons to disagree with reasons to agree: 0

Total Idea Score: 0

Don't like the score? It is easy to change the score. Just post a reason to agree or disagree with the overall idea, or any of the reasons and the score will change

The LDS church is too authoritarian.

Images That agree

1. "In our system of Church Government... criticism of leaders by members is always negative. Whether the criticism is true or not" Elder Dallan H. Oaks, "Criticicm" Ensign, Feb. 1987, p.68. 

Reasons to agree

1. The LDS church over emphasizes the stories about (blind or inspired) obedience: such as the story of Adam doing sacrifices before he knew why, the messed up Abraham story, Joseph asking people for their wives, etc. But David O. McKay told Bruce R. McConkie not to publish Mormon Doctrine, but he did it any way. It seems as though Church leaders want authority when they tell others to obey them, but don't really like having the authority of others usurped over their free will. 

Reasons to disagree

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Score:

# of reasons to agree: 0

# of reasons to disagree: -0

# of reasons to agree with reasons to agree: 0

# of reasons to disagree with reasons to agree: 0

Total Idea Score: 0

Don't like the score? It is easy to change the score. Just post a reason to agree or disagree with the overall idea, or any of the reasons and the score will change

Images as reasons to agree and disagree

A picture says a thousand words. Why would we keep them out of a debate? Why not have the top 10 pictures that support AND oppose the same issue.


When you do a Google image search, they are returned to you based on an algorithm. For each set of words, Google lists the best images that match their words based on their algorithm.

Similarly, I want to use an algorithm to rank the top images that agree and disagree with different positions.

Political cartoons might be used for political positions. In this case, you have the top 10 political cartoons for a presidential candidate in one column and the top political cartoons against a presidential candidate in another.

For instance, the issue of Drug Legalization:


Anti:

Pro

The world is not 8000 years old

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Score:

# of reasons to agree: 0

# of reasons to disagree: -0

# of reasons to agree with reasons to agree: 0

# of reasons to disagree with reasons to agree: 0

Total Idea Score: 0

Don't like the score? It is easy to change the score. Just post a reason to agree or disagree with the overall idea, or any of the reasons and the score will change

The LDS Church is not successful

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Reasons to agree

1. Scientology has only been around for 1/2 the time, they are crazy, they don't have full time missionaries, and they have experienced about the same amount of Growth. The LDS church has 13 million and they were started April 6, 1830, or 181 years ago. Scientology has 8 million, and they started in 1953 or 58 years ago. We have been around 3.12 times as long as them, and we only have 50% more people than they do. I spent 2 years of my life. My Grandpa spent 3 years in Hawaii, back in the early 1900s. My other grandpa spent time in Germany after he got married on a mission. All this, and we only have 50% more than Scientology? WTH (what the heck)? We had polygamy to give us a head start. We were able to multiply while the rest of the country was killing themselves during the civil war. We reproduce like rabits. We had our own little country for a while, and we only have 50% more people than Scientology? I know you are going to say that our stuff sounds crazy too, if people have not heard it before, but I'm sorry their is no comparison. Xemu, was, according to the founder of Scientology and science fiction writer L. Ron Hubbard, the dictator of the "Galactic Confederacy" who, 75 million years ago, brought billions of his people to Earth in a DC-8-like spacecraft, stacked them around volcanoes and killed them using hydrogen bombs.

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Score:

# of reasons to agree: 1

# of reasons to disagree: -0

# of reasons to agree with reasons to agree: 0

# of reasons to disagree with reasons to agree: 0

Total Idea Score: 0

Don't like the score? It is easy to change the score. Just post a reason to agree or disagree with the overall idea, or any of the reasons and the score will change