There are dinosaurs in the Manti Temple. Seriously.

[Anonymous]

Heber13 wrote:

My dad told me he thought that since creation was not ex-nihilo, that parts organized to create this world could come from prior worlds that had dinosaurs or other things.

That’s a possibility to me. Besides, I need gas to drive to the temple.

I heard that one in seminary 40 years ago. I still find it humorous. So god goes to all this trouble to creat the dinosaur planet only to chop it up to make earth for man?

[Anonymous]

Cadence wrote:

I heard that one in seminary 40 years ago. I still find it humorous. So god goes to all this trouble to creat the dinosaur planet only to chop it up to make earth for man?

I hadn’t thought of it that way…more like…the other planets they created and populated had dinosaurs. Then it blew up or something, and the people on those planets had their judgment day and that planet was done. Then it was time for our planet…so the matter was organized from prior worlds, and viola…fossils and dinosaurs from billions of years ago from other planets.

….ok…ya…that’s pretty humorous to think about. :wtf:

[Anonymous]

Heber13 wrote:

Cadence wrote:

I heard that one in seminary 40 years ago. I still find it humorous. So god goes to all this trouble to creat the dinosaur planet only to chop it up to make earth for man?

I hadn’t thought of it that way…more like…the other planets they created and populated had dinosaurs. Then it blew up or something, and the people on those planets had their judgment day and that planet was done. Then it was time for our planet…so the matter was organized from prior worlds, and viola…fossils and dinosaurs from billions of years ago from other planets.

….ok…ya…that’s pretty humorous to think about. :wtf:

Yep. Mental gymnastics. I heard that explanation as a new member of the church over 30 years ago, and I did think it possible then. But I stopped believing it, and some other myths, prior to my faith crisis/transition and stopped believing many “explanations” others since. Is it possible? Yes. Likely? Not a chance.

[Anonymous]

DarkJedi wrote:

Likely? Not a chance.

Is anything in the bible “likely”? Not much. All we have on dinosaurs is speculation.

Perhaps Occam’s Razor is a less zany approach to things. But…I like Terryl Givens approach when asked about the absurdity of mormon thought on the CK and becoming Gods and making new planets…he asked his critic…”tell me your version of heaven” to make the point…isn’t it all zany? Why is mormonism more zany than other traditional zany thoughts?

I’m like you, DJ. I’m now just open to…billions of years and evolution seems to make sense.

[Anonymous]

Heber13 wrote:

DarkJedi wrote:

Likely? Not a chance.

Is anything in the bible “likely”? Not much. All we have on dinosaurs is speculation.

Perhaps Occam’s Razor is a less zany approach to things. But…I like Terryl Givens approach when asked about the absurdity of mormon thought on the CK and becoming Gods and making new planets…he asked his critic…”tell me your version of heaven” to make the point…isn’t it all zany? Why is mormonism more zany than other traditional zany thoughts?

I’m like you, DJ. I’m now just open to…billions of years and evolution seems to make sense.

No, nothing in the Bible is likely, IMO. Living in a fish’s belly three days? Parting the Red Sea and walking across on dry land(no mud?), then closing it up on those pursuing? A talking donkey? (Maybe if it was as funny as the one in Shrek….) Two (or seven) of everything living on the earth fitting on a relatively small boat?

I was just reading an article the other day, and I don’t have tome to go find it again at the moment, by a Christian minister. He was talking about how the OT was never meant to be historical, it was just stories passed down through the ages. He asserted that Jews generally don’t see it as a history. I haven’t asked my Jewish friends about that yet, but it makes sense to me and fits with my current view of most of the Bible being allegorical or very much a bunch of parables with some history (not necessarily accurate) thrown in. It’s sort of like considering Homer’s epics to be history – they’re not and they weren’t meant to be even though they make reference to some historical facts.

[Anonymous]

A bit of a tangent here, but I have heard the term, “Mental gymnastics” and I do think I get what this is supposed to mean. You have to look at polygamy with your head leaning way to the left, the BOM ‘translation’ you have to stand back, blacks and the priesthood you have to … .

I think a much more descriptive term would be, “mental contortions”. Gymnastics to me often looks flowing and graceful (even though I realize how hard it is). But when I look at a contortionist, I think “why would you want to do that?”

[Anonymous]

Quote:

Definitions:

Gymnastics: Complex intellectual or artistic exercises: mental gymnastics.

Contortions: To cause to deviate from what is normal, proper, or accurate.

I prefer mental gymnastics to contortions. It is not just twisting it to fit into something to be different, it is a bit more complex and artistic to make it more meaningful and deeper or nuanced of what is true, not just simple literalism with no imagination.

I think the mental gymnastics, with practice, can flow gracefully and be appreciated, even if it takes effort to make it so.

[Anonymous]

Heber13 wrote:

Contortions: To cause to deviate from what is normal, proper, or accurate.

I disagree with using the word “contortions” as defined as deviations from what is normal and proper. I believe that humans are hardwired for storytelling, shortcutting, and meaningmaking that helps them understand and explain the world around them and that this tendency sometimes/often crosses the line into inaccuracy.

Quote:

Heuristic refers to experience-based techniques for problem solving, learning, and discovery that find a solution which is not guaranteed to be optimal, but good enough for a given set of goals. Where the exhaustive search is impractical, heuristic methods are used to speed up the process of finding a satisfactory solution via mental shortcuts to ease the cognitive load of making a decision. Examples of this method include using a rule of thumb, an educated guess, an intuitive judgment, stereotyping, profiling, or common sense.

More precisely, heuristics are strategies using readily accessible, though loosely applicable, information to control problem solving in human beings and machines. These rules work well under most circumstances, but in certain cases lead to systematic errors or cognitive biases.

Fuzzy logic is a form of many-valued logic; it deals with reasoning that is approximate rather than fixed and exact. Compared to traditional binary sets (where variables may take on true or false values), fuzzy logic variables may have a truth value that ranges in degree between 0 and 1. Fuzzy logic has been extended to handle the concept of partial truth, where the truth value may range between completely true and completely false.

So I agree that these methods lead to inaccurate conclusions, but OTOH they are a big part of the human experience and are thus very normal and proper.

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