[Evidence that the Priesthood ban began with Joseph Smith]

3 minutes ago, zil2 said:

Anywho, I'm now waiting for you to reveal the scripture that says we're all wrong and here's the real story.

That's easy enough to do. D&C 139:22 makes it very clear you should just listen to MOE and send him your life savings.

[Evidence that the Priesthood ban began with Joseph Smith]

47 minutes ago, zil2 said:

The Guide to the Scriptures does not say that Egyptus was descended from Cain.  And black skin or blackness cannot be used to prove a relationship between Cain and Canaan - were that the case, it would also have to prove a relationship between Cain and the Lamanites.

I was going off an assumption (Egyptus' lineage) that I thought was scriptural, but it's not.  So there's no way to know either way whether there's a relationship there.

I hate to do this to you, because I really don't want you to think I'm picking on you. 

But.....(here I go picking on you anyway)...in fairness, the Guide to the Scriptures does in fact say "Ham’s wife, Egyptus, was a descendant of Cain;" https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/scriptures/gs/ham?lang=eng

when you look at the sources on that, one of them is Abraham 1:23, 25...one that we already showed doesn't actually state that Egyptus is descended from Cain. That additional nugget is quite literally extra-scriptural.

The other two sources it uses for justification are from Psalm and basically just call Egypt the land of Ham. It doesn't make any tie between Ham's wife and Cain.

So you end up in a position of having to decide how faith you put into the "Guide to the Scriptures." Seeing as it isn't canonized, I put it in the 'tread carefully' category.

[Evidence that the Priesthood ban began with Joseph Smith]

31 minutes ago, Carborendum said:

Between Noah and Joseph of Egypt, there was sufficient intermarrying that all of Egypt had mixed ethnicity.  And certainly, the aristocracy of Egypt would have been from the line of Egyptus/Ham. By the time of Jacob's son, Joseph, the Egyptians were a completely multi-ethnic people.  

Joseph took an Egyptian princess (Potiphar's daughter, Asenath) to wife.  She gave birth to both Ephraim and Menasseh. 

If we believe that the "curse" (if any) was transferred to the Egyptians through Egyptus, then we must also believe that all the restoration of the Gospel should never have happened through the line of Ephraim.

Since it did happen, we must conclude that this purported curse was not transferred to Ephraim.  If that is possible, the "one drop rule" is debunked.

We can have more fun with this with genetics research. Genetics indicate that all humans came out of Africa, and that we all descended from black ancestors. 😁

[Evidence that the Priesthood ban began with Joseph Smith]

3 minutes ago, zil2 said:

Confused by the first sencence.  I thought I was clearly laying out the reason I thought Canaan was related to Cain (via Egyptus).  [goes back to re-read stuff] Oh, you're right.  The idea of Egyptus being descended from Ham is so subconscious that I thought it was in the BD entry.  Well, that'll teach me to read instead of remember.   Huh.  Where on earth did I read that - I wouldn't have remembered it had I not read it (things I hear don't stay in my brain).  I'll have to poke around later, but for now, you're quite right.  Mistaken assumption.  Thanks!

It's completely understandable. If you're my age or older (I sure hope you're not older than me..no one should have to suffer that indignity), you kind of grew up hearing these things. It happens to me, too.

[Sacrament meeting talk. Topic is tabula rasa. Suggestions?]

1 hour ago, Vort said:

Just curious what you would talk about or what you think would be a good topic.

Just go along with the assignment.

Tabula (game) - Wikipedia

[Evidence that the Priesthood ban began with Joseph Smith]

oh boy....

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While there's no scripture that specifically states that Canaanites were descendants of Cain, there is a scriptural basis for it, which I will explain. I will also add here that the Lord said in D&C 68:

4 And whatsoever they shall speak when moved upon by the Holy Ghost shall be scripture, shall be the will of the Lord, shall be the mind of the Lord, shall be the word of the Lord, shall be the voice of the Lord, and the power of God unto salvation.
5 Behold, this is the promise of the Lord unto you, O ye my servants.

So doctrinal statements and teachings by church leaders, particularly church presidents and apostles, when they were given to them by the Holy Ghost are also considered scripture. 

You've still got a problem here. You have to demonstrate that those interpretations were given when they were "moved upon by the Holy Ghost." You haven't managed to do that. You've only made the statement that you think they were. Contemporary church leaders would disagree with you.  Who should I believe? (that's a rhetorical question)

Quote

Moses 7 doesn't say that the curse fell upon them after this event. That's your interpretation.

Moses 7:7-8 says

7 And the Lord said unto me [Enoch]: Prophesy; and I prophesied, saying: Behold the people of Canaan, which are numerous, shall go forth in battle array against the people of Shum, and shall slay them that they shall utterly be destroyed; and the people of Canaan shall divide themselves in the land, and the land shall be barren and unfruitful, and none other people shall dwell there but the people of Canaan;

8 For behold, the Lord shall curse the land with much heat, and the barrenness thereof shall go forth forever; and there was a blackness came upon all the children of Canaan, that they were despised among all people.

Enoch uses words that indicate the curse will happen in the future. To conclude that they are the same curse, you will need to demonstrate that Enoch lived before Cain killed Abel.

Quote

Many black Africans also lived in barren areas and most of Egypt is barren and unfruitful accept for around the Nile and especially the Nile delta. 

This doesn't really bolster your argument at all. You're effectively saying, "well, the land was cursed except for where it wasn't." 

Quote

Yes, ancient Egypt had diverse people living in it from different lineages and with different skin tones, etc. Abraham 1 is referring the the first Egyptians being Canaanites, not all subsequent people who lived in Egypt. As a bit of a history lesson, the original Egyptians weren't in power during the time that the children of Israel came to Egypt to escape the famine in the days of Joseph. Egypt had been conquered by the Hyksos who are believed to have been from a similar ethnic background as the Hebrews.  Later original Egyptians returned to power and drove out the Hyksos. It was these original Egyptians who enslaved the Hebrews. 

Again, not helping your case. The Hyksos wouldn't have been interested in the area if it didn't have value. What it seems like you're saying is that Egypt was barren until Hyksos kicked out the Canaanites. And then Egypt flourished. And then the Egyptians (Canaanites) came back, and the land continued to flourish.  Why didn't the curse return?

Quote

Moses 7 has this to say about the descendants of Cain:

22 And Enoch also beheld the residue of the people which were the sons of Adam; and they were a mixture of all the seed of Adam save it was the seed of Cain, for the seed of Cain were black, and had not place among them.

From this we see that the seed of Cain was despised by the rest of the descendants of Adam and were mixed with them or dwelt with them. This is actually strong evidence that the two people and curses were the one and the same. 

See above where it is clear that the curse against Cain and the curse against Canaan are not the same curse. Furthermore, this doesn't establish a lineage between Cain and Egyptus. 

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Like @Vort, I categorically reject that the Nephites were "racist" and that their erroneous "racist" beliefs are taught in the Book of Mormon as divine truth. Some Nephites may have been prejudiced towards the Lamanites because of their darker skin, but the Book of Mormon plainly tells us that the darker skin was put upon them by God in order to keep the Nephites from intermarrying with them.

 You can go make your arguments against my logic in the referenced thread. I won't entertain them here.

Quote

It's a relevant data point, but doesn't in and of itself prove that Joseph Smith disapproved of black men being ordained to the priesthood. Probably the most significant of the black men in Nauvoo who weren't ordained to the priesthood is Isaac Lewis Manning, the older brother of Jane Manning James. The James family was well acquainted with Joseph Smith. The fact that he was not ordained is possible evidence that Joseph Smith was opposed to ordaining him on account of his lineage. 

to be clear, my claim is not that this says something about Smith's attitude. My claim is that there is no evidence from Smith either way. It is at best inconclusive and uninformative. You should avoid saying anything that suggests it is. When you do, you look like you're proof texting.

Quote

We don't know enough about the worldview of the Israelites in Moses' day to know how they would have interpreted what Moses wrote concerning the curse put upon Canaan in Genesis 9 or what he wrote in Moses 7 that was restored by Joseph Smith in his inspired translation of the bible. What we know is how the Lord's seer who brought forth these scriptures to us understood them. 

That's really not as true as you think it is. but okay. Regardless, what the Lord's seer brought forth does not support your conclusion.

[Evidence that the Priesthood ban began with Joseph Smith]

45 minutes ago, Vort said:

I was right with you in your analysis until I reached this. I believe this is patently false, and I believe that any in-depth reading of the Book of Mormon shows that, as a culture and through time, the Nephites were in fact much less racist than they have been portrayed. Frankly, they are notable not for their racism, but rather for their lack of racism.

I'm going to have a little fun with you here, because if you go back to my original posting where I lay out the justification of my claim of Nephite racism, you're among the people who liked it. At the time you seemed to have no objection. 

So what changed? 😝

 

Honestly, this is one of those areas I think we can have reasonable disagreement on the matter. I'm going to assume we could agree that the one paragraph could be removed and the remainder of my analysis is sound. (Correct me if I'm wrong)

[Evidence that the Priesthood ban began with Joseph Smith]

1 hour ago, zil2 said:

I don't think anyone argued Canaan (the word) relates to Cain (the word).  Rather:  Egyptus (female descendant of Cain after some number of generations) + Ham (by marriage) --> produced Canaan (4th son of Ham), after whom the land of Canaan is named (or so the Biblical scholars say - it's not clear from the Bible Dictionary).  Since his mother is descended from Cain, Canaan is descended from Cain...  Links are to the Bible Dictionary entries.

I very much appreciate your comments.

If your assumption that Canaan is not related to Cain, then you have a different problem. Because nowhere in the Book of Abraham does it specify that Egyptus is a descendant of Cain. I have only ever heard two justifications for claiming the Egyptus preserved the curse of Cain are 

1) The Canaan is a derivation of Cain, which we seem to agree is not true.

2) That because 'through her the curse was preserved' therefore she must be a descendant of Cain. But this is problematic because the curse being discussed is the curse against Canaan, not against Cain. 

 

The source material simply doesn't support the conclusion, and the contemporary interpretations of the time to justify it are based on a flawed interpretation of biblical history. 

54 minutes ago, Maverick said:

Exactly right. This is how I understand and the point I was trying to make. I must not have done a very good job, since it appears my comment regarding the guide to the scriptures was misunderstood. Thank you for explaining it better than I did.

I'm going to point out here that out of 7 paragraphs of referenced and sourced discussion showing the flaws in concluding the curse of Cain was preserved through Egyptus, you've only taken issue with one of those...one that can be demonstrated not to support your logic anyway. 

[Thought: An Abbreviated Canon]

2 minutes ago, laronius said:

Even with all of the books of the Bible it still ended in apostasy and loss of precious truths. It's living prophets that keep us on the right path. Did any prophets survive your apocalypse?

Ah, but the question wasn't about apostasy. With the Bible, even with the apostasy, Christianity was and is very much alive (and would be even absent the Restoration).

[Thought: An Abbreviated Canon]

Interesting hypothetical. 

A simple answer: none of it.

Genesis is entirely non-sensical without Exodus. Leviticus has no foundation without Exodus. The very premise to the entire Pentateuch is Exodus. Without the Pentateuch, the rest of the Old Testament is useless. (Not that it survived this scenario anyway).

Without the Old Testament, there's no context for Jesus's ministry, which is entirely absent from this Bible. Without the teachings of Jesus, none of the rest of those books carry weight. It's a bunch of advice based on a missing fantasy at that point. 

With just this version of the Bible, Christianity is dead.

[Evidence that the Priesthood ban began with Joseph Smith]

There is no scriptural basis that directly ties the Canaanites to Cain. The word Canaan is not derived from the word Cain. There is no historical nor logical ground on which to draw the connection of Canaan to Cain, regardless of what the Guide to the Scriptures has to say about it. 

One must consider many other issues related to this topic

First, the "Curse of Canaan" fell on them after they went against the people of Shum in war. The curse had two components. The first was that their land was cursed and unfruitful. The second was that their skin turned black so they would be despised of all people. If you evaluate these curses critically, they don't hold up well. Remember that the Book of Moses suggests that the land of Egypt was found by a daughter Ham and Egyptus. She settled there, and "and thus, from Ham, sprang that race which preserved the curse in the land." But the first condition of the curse--the barren and unfruitful lands--can't be applied to Egypt, which became an agricultural power house and regional power. The other condition of the curse--black skin--is known to be historically inaccurate. Egyptians likely had a large diversity in skin tones as they were a cultural cross roads that would intermarry with African, Mediterranean, and Middle Eastern cultures.

Next, let's look at the actual curse that was applied to Cain. Genesis 4:9-14 gives the story of Cain's curse. While it holds the same condition of unfruitful crops, keep in mind that Cain was first a foremost a farmer who was reluctant to sacrifice his best crops. What's more, the curse as described in Genesis gives no indication that it would perpetuate beyond Cain. Nor does Smith's translation in Moses 5 apply this any further. To be clear, neither Moses nor Smith felt any compulsion to describe the curse of Cain being extended into his posterity. 

Continuing with the curse against Cain, the mark against Cain was not a curse. In fact, it was given specifically for his protection. "Therefore whosoever slayeth Cain, vengeance shall be taken on him sevenfold. And the Lord set a mark upon Cain, lest any finding him should kill him." (Genesis 4:15). In contrast to this, the curse against the Canaanites was given so that they were "despised among all people" (Moses 7:8). These two curses are incongruent in this aspect, which would indicate that they are not the same curse.

Another minor quibble you can take up is that the lands described in Genesis (and by extension, Moses) are the names of the lands that would have been familiar to Moses's target audience. Those would be the Israelites of his time. So it would be prudent to understand the nature of the word Canaan, which is unclear among biblical scholars. It is derived from a word root that can mean "low" or "subjugated." The most prevalent interpretations among scholars are that it refers to the low-lying lands near the Mediterranean Sea (in contrast to the Aram or Aramaic lands, meaning the highlands further away). Some also interpret is as subjugated as it was a provincial territory controlled by Egypt at the time of Moses when his audience would recognize it). The fact that Canaan and Cain have a homophonic root is coincidence, not etymological.

Regarding the use of the Book of Mormon to justify curses of black skin and any related consequences, we should keep in mind a few things. For instance, the Nephites were objectively a racist culture. And while the Nephites are often portrayed as the protagonists, they were also very often the villains. Moroni stated pretty clearly that there were faults in the Book of Mormon. We might we wise to assume those faults are not limited to the translation, but also to the people themselves, and maybe we ought not perpetuate some of their mistakes. (You can read more detail about this in a separate comment I made some time ago)

Regarding the belief that the curse of Cain was preserved through Ham, this was a common folklore that gained popularity in Christian circles to justify slavery. It is not Hebrew in origin. There's no indication that the Israelites believed this. And even if it were true, if you go back to the original curse against Cain, the mark was given for his protection. If you apply that curse (and that protection) to his descendants, it is on you to explain how using the Bible to justify slavery and the denial or priesthood to repentant individuals satisfies the condition of protecting his descendants.

Lastly, the existence of black men who weren't ordained to the priesthood in Smith's time does not say much at all about whether he approved or disapproved of it. Men weren't ordained to priesthood service on the scale to which we are accustomed. In fact, even ordination to the Aaronic priesthood tended to happen in the same manner in which we ordain men to the office of High Priest now. That is, they were ordained when they were asked to fulfill some leadership position or specific service to the church for which priesthood authority was required. It isn't a big stretch of the imagination to think that even antebellum white religious leaders would be hesitant to call black skinned individuals into church leadership. If they were using the justification that black skinned people were descended from Ham, they were using a racist justification that was prooftexted into Christian theology in the 17th and 18th centuries; it is not a justification that is supported by scripture nor would have been interpreted by the audience to whom Genesis was first written.

[Sharing Temple Insights?]

On 9/23/2024 at 6:25 PM, Carborendum said:

Through much prayer and study, I've come across some ideas about interpreting the temple symbols that I wanted to share with my family.  But just to make sure I wasn't saying things I shouldn't say outside the temple, I invited my wife and all my endowed children to a family meeting in the Celestial room.

I already think you're being overly conservative in how you go about sharing your insights. If you pay close attention to the covenants you make in the temple, the only things you covenant not to reveal outside of the temple are the names, signs, and tokens you receive as part of the ordinance. There is nothing wrong with discussing the covenants, insights, or lessons gained in the temple with others outside the temple. 

Note: I'm not advocating for sharing every detail willy-nilly. As open as I am about sharing my experiences in the temple, I still try to keep my discussions respectful and relevant. But I have very few reservations about sharing my insights with close friends and family that have made the same covenants.

I'm also aware that there is a lot of advice and counsel out there about not sharing details of the temple ordinances. Lots of it from various prophets, apostles, and general authorities. I'm still going to stand strong on the text of the actual covenants made, and posit that there are times when more openness is warranted than what is culturally recognized.

Quote

When I did so, one son said that he had been counseled that any special revelation or insights we receive about the temple symbols should be kept to ourselves.  They are not meant to be shared (in or out of the temple).

I could get on board with "some special revelation or insights." But "any"? That's squarely in the realm of preposterous. Your son got bad advice from someone he trusted. I hope you're able to persuade him otherwise. 

I'm going to say this, and it will sound a little braggy, but I promise I don't mean it to. It just sets context for my point. When I was younger, I was an ordinance worker on an early morning shift where I would officiate either two or three endowment session each shift (I was the young guy...). I estimate that in the three years I was an ordinance worker, I officiated somewhere between 150 and 200 endowment sessions*, as well as hundreds of additional sealings, initiatories, baptisms, and confirmations. Now my point: with all that time and exposure, nothing has enhanced my understanding of the temple more than conversations with my parents, close friends, and other workers. Hearing their insights and perspectives was absolutely essential in inspiring new questions to ponder when sitting in the temple. 

 

* I know that isn't actually a lot. A person who attends the temple once per week for an endowment session will hit 150 sessions in three years and 200 in four years. At the time, however, I lived two hours away from the temple and was both a full time student and full time employee. But another way to look at it is this: the typically weekly patron will spend about eight hours per month in the temple. Between my two shifts, I would spend twelve to fourteen hours in the temple each month. And I still needed to talk to other people to really develop an understanding and appreciation for what I was experiencing.

[Universal Basic Income Has Never and Will Never Work OR Where Does Wealth Come From?]

As a bleeding heart liberal, I don't love UBI. In fact, I rather suspect UBI to be a last ditch effort to prevent that total demise of a failing society. 

@Carborendum is correct, to a point, that wealth cannot be generated without labor, and UBI encourages removing labor from the system. What would happen, however, if that assumption proved to be false?  What if wealth could be generated without labor?

The nightmare scenario happens with the introduction of technologies that can replace labor. What happens with automation eliminates the need for food service workers, logistics and transportation (delivery of goods), or retail?  There has been a facility built near where I live that farms tomatoes and heavily automates the process of monitoring the tomatoes and harvesting them at the ideal time. Automation continues to grow in manufacturing sectors. And by most measures, automation produces more consistent, reliable products. And while we may never automate all humans out of an industry, it isn't unreasonable to believe cut the workforce by a third, or half. And as automation expands, the trend seems to be that the wealth generated from automation flows up toward the wealthy, not toward those who are being replaced.

If we reach the point in society where there are significantly more people than there are jobs for them to work, UBI may become a necessary evil to prevent the blood bath of those who can't afford to live clawing back the ability to live from those who are concentrating the wealth. In other words, UBI is how you prevent the French Revolution. 

I don't want to discuss the downsides of UBI, because I largely agree with most here that it's a bad idea, and probably ought to be avoided. But I do think the growth of automation breaks the assumption that generating wealth requires labor, and we need to do some thinking about how to address that. (probably a separate discussion from the direction this thread has taken on taxation)

 

MOE's Twisted Theories on Taxation

I'm a little weird on the topic of taxes. I think sales taxes are dumb. I can get behind some use taxes, but largely, my preferred form of taxation is income tax. If I had it my way, income tax would be the only tax levied.  But let's dive down the rabbit hole.

The first foundational principle of MOE's taxation philosophy is that Taxes Must Be Transparent. By this, I mean that it should not take very long to figure out how much tax you're paying. As it is now, to determine the total taxes I pay I have to add up income tax, property tax, vehicle taxes, sales taxes, taxes on my utilities, and probably a host more that I can't even think of. This is absurd.

The second foundational principle of MOE's taxation philosophy is that Businesses Do Not Pay Taxes. Even if you have a corporate tax, and corporation with half a brain cell will estimate what their tax liability is, adjust prices to cover it, and claim whatever exemptions they can to reduce liability, then take the difference as profit. A corporate tax is nothing more than a hidden tax on the consumer. This also bleeds into why I'm not a big fan of property taxes. Property owners who use their property will pay taxes, while those who lease their property pass those costs to their tenants. It's an unbalanced system and creates hidden taxes for tenants, which violates the first principle.

The third foundational principle of MOE's taxation philosophy is that Governments Should Be Limited to Providing Universal Services. The military is an easily agreed upon example. I think Police, Fire, and EMS are relatively easy to agree upon. Personally, I would argue for including electrical, water, and internet (ISP only, not content). I think there's a good case for some portions of health care to be universal (specifically, annual physicals, well child visits, maternity care, and vaccinations). Lastly, I would personally prefer a well funded and highly competitive education system (and by competitive, I mean public school teacher positions should be well paid, highly sought after, and sensibly evaluated...again, another topic for another time)

Whether you agree on the inclusion of all of those services is an interesting discussion, and actually a rather valuable discussion for a society to engage in. These principles, in my opinion, make it much easier for people to engage in the discussion of "what services does our society value, and how much do we need to contribute to pay for them?" 

 

So why do I prefer the income tax? Mostly for the pragmatic purpose of it being relatively easy to track. (Admittedly, not as easy as land, but hidden taxes and all). And it wouldn't really work unless we are willing to divorce "corporation" and "person." Otherwise you get people able to claim negative income, and other weird shenanigans. It only works if income is synonymous with "new wealth" and only corporations are able to make a profit or take a loss. 

I've gone on too long. make me your new punching bag.

[Adopting a BIC Child?]

2 hours ago, Carborendum said:

...... all the stuff you said....

First and foremost, let me state my profound gratitude that you would take her in. Children who grow up in abusive homes almost never fully heal, but their lives are immeasurably better when someone can help them escape the patterns they learned from being abused.

And that's all I'll say. Because while this has some fascinating contours as an academic discussion, I don't want to run down that route if you might still be in any phase of emotional processing. I'm not emotionally deft enough to not say something that would come out weird, and you don't need me debating the finer points of sealing theory when you're living through some pretty hefty upheavals. In other words, it isn't that I don't care, but I like to think I care enough not to open my big mouth.

Quote

The mother re-married to a man who is not overtly abusive.  But he does things that just aren't right.  I wouldn't call it "emotionally abusive" behavior (my non-professional assessment).  Perhaps it is "emotional blackmail" -- and that may be too strong.  But I can't think of a more accurate term.  

I'd probably go with "emotionally manipulative." I still classify that under the umbrella of abuse, though less offensive than outright emotional sabotage.

[Christmastime Music/Spiritual Thoughts 2023]

17 hours ago, Vort said:

I trust that, not many years hence, I will....

Today's edition of "tell us you're old without using the words 'I'm old'" 

[Christmastime Music/Spiritual Thoughts 2023]

On 12/1/2023 at 1:06 PM, Carborendum said:

Ah!  Of course!  That's even closer than Greensleeves.

The lyrics of Come Thou Long Expected Jesus and In Humility Our Savior can both be sung to the tunes of What Child is This.

Music can be oddly fungible. Thy hymn book has an entire section about which hymns can be sung to which lyrics (See Title, Tune, and Meter, though the online version is not has user friendly as the printed version, if I recall).

For a fun mashup, try singing the lyrics of If You Could Hie To Kolob to the tune of Come Thou Fount

[Christmastime Music/Spiritual Thoughts 2023]

On 11/27/2023 at 9:51 AM, zil2 said:

This sounds like a variation on the tune for In Humility, Our Savior.

Incoming details that nobody wanted.

Come Thou Long Expected Jesus is my favorite Christmas carol. The lyrics were first published in 1744 by Charles Wesley. Apparently history has lost what music he intended for it. The tune you commonly hear with it is Hyfrydol (Rowland Prichard), a Welsh tune first published in 1844. Prior to that, and still commonly today, it is sung to Stuttgart (Christian Friederich Witt). 

The lyrics for In Humility Our Savior were written in 1910 (Mabel Jones Gabbott) and set to Hyfrydol.

I've heard the Hyfrydol used for various hymns in LDS, Protestant, Episcopal, and Catholic services I've attended. It's a pleasant and well liked tune. It's pleasant nature and existence in the public domain make it a popular choice for new hymns where an old feel is desired.

 

Sources: 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Come,_Thou_Long_Expected_Jesus

Hyfrydol - Wikipedia

In Humility, Our Savior (churchofjesuschrist.org)

[Reverence Children in Sacrament Meeting]

19 hours ago, M Tolm said:

This is old information.  The 2023 Handbook actually indicates that prelude and postlude music should be provided.

I'll give up my 2009 Handbook when you pry it from my cold, dead hands

[Adopting a BIC Child?]

27.4

Sealing Living Children to Parents

Children who are born after their mother has been sealed to a husband in a temple are born in the covenant of that sealing. They do not need to receive the ordinance of sealing to parents.

 

38.4.2.3

Adopted or Foster Children Who Are Living

Living children who are born in the covenant or have been sealed to parents cannot be sealed to any other parents without First Presidency approval.

https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/general-handbook/38-church-policies-and-guidelines?lang=eng#title_number81

==========================================================

If the family wants the child sealed to them, they will need to meet with their bishop and ask that he make a request to the First Presidency. The Handbook is silent on what conditions are required for this to be considered. They should not expect quick answers, as the bishop will likely want to ask the Stake President, who--unless he has encountered this scenario before--will probably ask the Area Presidency. 

They should be emotionally prepared to be told "no."  I can't say what the First Presidency would look for to authorize this, but the lack of wiggle room the Handbook suggests a low probability of success.

[Pew Studies LDS are Non-judgmental]

11 hours ago, LDSGator said:

As a former Catholic, I highly advise you to go into a Knights of Columbus hall and inform them you are a believing LDS. Then return and report to us how Catholics treat and think of LDS. 

Your mileage may vary. I have the master key to the local Catholic parish. And I'm quasi in charge of tending the fire to kick off their Easter vigil. 

[More temple changes]

4 minutes ago, The Folk Prophet said:

Nah. I'm steadily moving into the bitter-old-man stage of my life.

I'm confused about why you're using language that implies a present tense.  Past tense would seem more appropriate. 

[AI]

14 minutes ago, Vort said:

Not sure they can be taught to avoid them. I have read many summaries of AI activity, such as in stock market trading and oncological analysis (it appears that AI is much better than even the best oncologists at diagnosing cancer), where the people responsible for the AI freely admit that they have no idea how the algorithm is parsing and sorting through the data to come to its conclusions. It's all black box, with a high probability that, at least in some cases, the subtle mechanisms of rote data sifting are not obvious to, and perhaps incomprehensible by, the human mind.

"Teaching" AI has a few interpretations, depending on what information you consider essential. In the Amazon example, removing sex from the database would be sufficient, and thus forcing it to focus on other factors. Instead, Amazon seems to have abandoned the project altogether. I would imagine it wasn't very successful at picking good employees, which is another way of saying that Amazon didn't have the data available to correctly identify them*.

Stock selection and disease diagnosis are areas I would expect AI to excel. There is a wealth of relevant data available, and they aren't moral decisions. It also keeps a focus on "high density" areas (where most of the mass of a probability curve lives). AI is good in these areas, and will make odd decisions in low density areas. There's an interesting manifestation of this in things like AI art, where you get some impressive looking drawings, but some of the finer details are a little odd.  It's a bit of a running joke right now that AI art struggles with the placement of fingers.

 

* an interesting result in itself, as it suggests that what makes a good employee is not captured on resumes or applications.

[More temple changes]

10 minutes ago, The Folk Prophet said:

Okay...triggered rant over.

Great! So if and/or when we get non-caucasian temple presentations, you and I can team up to mentor people in how to see themselves in other racial presentations!

I get that there are people that don't feel the need for the person on the screen to look like them in order to relate. It isn't particularly important to me either. But I do understand that it is impactful to some people. And it's such an unimportant detail, that I'd like to give it to them.

Not a temple example (for obvious reasons), but sometimes it can be interesting to view the world through the eyes of people who haven't spent their whole lives seeing the majority of media looking like themselves: Star Wars: Rogue One

So I'd encourage you to try to think less about why it bothers you and more about what impact it could make for others. I believe that when we have a reasonable ability to do things to improve another's ability to grow in the gospel, we should do them.

 

 

[AI]

I've enjoyed a lot of the things I've seen that have come from ChatGPT. I haven't played with it myself at all, but I certainly appreciate the engineering behind it. 

Artificial Intelligence has a lot of potential, and there are a lot of things that it can do far better than humans are able to. But it also has some pretty hefty weaknesses that needs to be understood and, yes, restrained.

First and foremost, we need to understand that AI is not actually intelligence. It's high speed bayesian analysis. What it is returning (in grossly oversimplified terms) is the result that has the highest posterior probability from a new set of data applied to a model based on a training data set. The fact that ChatGPT works as quickly and as well as it does is, in my opinion, more impressive on a technical level than it is on a mathematical level. 

Next, we need to understand the idea of "training data." Any AI/Machine Learning model is subject to the "Garbage In/Garbage Out" rule. ChatGPT seems to have a pretty good training data set. But what gets put into a training dataset has a huge impact on what the model spits out. Consider Amazon's hiring AI (Amazon scraps secret AI recruiting tool that showed bias against women | Reuters) that was trained on its recruiting and hiring data. Based on the training data, Amazon hired more men than women, and the posterior probabilities ended up showing men as having a higher probability of being hired than women. So it stopped flagging applications from women to be considered for employment. To be clear, it wasn't evaluating the qualifications; it saw sex as an influential and heavily weighted predictor and disqualified candidates on that basis alone. (Note: This does not necessarily mean that Amazon had biased hiring practices prior to the AI. It just means that the AI interpreted sex as a good shortcut). AI algorithms can be taught to avoid these kind of pitfalls, but doing so inherently introduces the biases of the programming team into the algorithm, which inevitably opens the door to criticism. 

Very importantly, AI and Machine Learning have no sense of ethics or morality. The Taybot is a good example. My other favorite example, that I can't find a source for right now, is a machine learning program that was intended to study how to minimize forces on pilots landing air planes. After training the model,the algorithm started nosediving planes into the runway. It learned that if it crashed the plane hard enough, it could trigger an integer overflow that would cause the landing forces to be interpreted as negative numbers. And since negative force is obviously better than positive force, crashing the plane was the logical thing to do. Computers will only ever consider values that humans tell them are important.  So whose values do you want your AI to have?

Not coincidentally, this is why many scientists have signed on to letters declaring that AI must never be used in weaponry and warfare. More specifically, it shouldn't be used to automate target selection. Moral and ethical decisions should remain the purview of humans, because our experience has shown that our worst impulses tend to find their way into our machines. And that's probably not good for anyone.

[More temple changes]

3 hours ago, The Folk Prophet said:

True...but not as simple as you imply. Because the dubbing you speak of has to happen concurrently in time with the English version or vice versa, etc., in many cases.

The translated language listener sits with headphones on and listens in their language that plays in time with the English (or vice versa). So the core language and the English still must fill the same amount of time.

You are correct about this. I had more in mind not having to time pauses in the acting with the needed translation. In the current version, the audio can be mixed and blended as needed. With live acting, the actors sometimes had awkward pauses in the dialog that had to be timed in order to allow the dubbing. A move to straight voice acting removes that obstacle*

 

* undoubtedly creating other obstacles.