There is a Mormon faith promoting story (myth) know as Weston’s 17 Points. To quickly sum it up, inspired by Einstein (Einstein’s name usually gets invoked in this type of myth creation), a group of really smart students suddenly decide there must be only one correct Christian denomination and make a list of items that would identify that denomination. Years later, the students reunite to discover they independently became Mormons following the list. The conclusion is that unbiased and highly rational minds will agree that Mormon’s are right.
While researching another item I found that FAIR had addressed a skeptic’s doubt (linked) on the validity of the story: “What this has to do with the validity of Weston’s ‘17 Points’ is not entirely clear, but it seems that the critic is attempting to discredit Weston’s list (and, by implication, the Church) by discrediting Weston himself. This would be a form of the ad hominem fallacy.” (linked)
FAIR suggests the skeptic’s questioning of the story and its timeline is an ad hominem attack because it does not address the validity of the list in the story. However, it is Weston who tells the story in order to give the list and it supposed power credibility. The skeptic was obviously discrediting Weston’s method of validating the list and its power not the actual validity of the list (was FAIR just playing dumb?). FAIR then went onto to essentially concede that outside of Mormonism the list does not have much power. That is the story is told from a unique Mormon world view, (not young, unbiased, but nonetheless highly rational minds) essentially discrediting the story as well.
I pointed the above analysis on the FAIR blog. FAIR has yet to authorize publishing the comment on the blog (link)
While researching another item I found that FAIR had addressed a skeptic’s doubt (linked) on the validity of the story: “What this has to do with the validity of Weston’s ‘17 Points’ is not entirely clear, but it seems that the critic is attempting to discredit Weston’s list (and, by implication, the Church) by discrediting Weston himself. This would be a form of the ad hominem fallacy.” (linked)
FAIR suggests the skeptic’s questioning of the story and its timeline is an ad hominem attack because it does not address the validity of the list in the story. However, it is Weston who tells the story in order to give the list and it supposed power credibility. The skeptic was obviously discrediting Weston’s method of validating the list and its power not the actual validity of the list (was FAIR just playing dumb?). FAIR then went onto to essentially concede that outside of Mormonism the list does not have much power. That is the story is told from a unique Mormon world view, (not young, unbiased, but nonetheless highly rational minds) essentially discrediting the story as well.
I pointed the above analysis on the FAIR blog. FAIR has yet to authorize publishing the comment on the blog (link)
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