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Still! Still! Still!

Still! Still! Still!

Last updated on: December 6, 2024 at 1:52 pm by Dan Peterson

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Still! Still! Still! 2024-12-06T13:52:06-07:00 Dan Peterson

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A view of Innertkirchen and the Aare River (from the beginning of the spectacular Aareschlucht, in the Berner Oberland area of Switzerland) on a summer day. My strongest memory of Innertkirchen, though, is of a winter night near Christmas 1973, with a perfectly clear, star-studded sky above and newly-fallen white snow all around. It was perfectly serene, and it remains, still to this day, one of my memories of a virtually ideal Christmas. (Wikimedia Commons public domain image)

Two new articles went up today (Friday) on the website of the Interpreter Foundation. The first of them represents the 646th consecutive Friday on which a new article has appeared in Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship:

“What Can Artificial Intelligence Tell Us About the Literary Skills Needed to Dictate a Text Like the Book of Mormon?” written by Brian C. Hales

Abstract: The first oral draft of the Book of Mormon dictated by Joseph Smith reflected remarkable literary refinement and complexity. Such observations demonstrate that he exhibited highly developed composition and oratory skills. To date, no scholar has attempted to describe the specific skills Joseph manifested while dictating. This essay addresses whether Artificial Intelligence (AI) could generate an accurate list of the skills necessary. It begins by identifying and informally testing eleven chatbots to see if they can accurately predict the skills needed to perform a task. Seeing success, they are next asked a long question about the skills needed to dictate a book like the Book of Mormon. Fifteen skills are common in the responses from the eleven chatbots, which are compiled into a list. The list is then validated by appealing to experts in the field of literary composition. Next, his documentable 1829 skills are cross-referenced to the list. The historical reality is that none of Joseph’s personal acquaintances describe him as accomplished with the skills that AI calculated would be needed. This AI “fail” deserves additional investigation. If eyewitnesses accurately reported he lacked the predicted skills, what skills did AI miss and what skills enabled him to dictate the Book of Mormon?

“Interpreting Interpreter: AI Skill Detection,” written by Kyler Rasmussen

This post is a summary of the article “What Can Artificial Intelligence Tell Us About the Literary Skills Needed to Dictate a Text Like the Book of Mormon?” by Brian C. Hales in Volume 63 of Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship. All of the Interpreting Interpreter articles may be seen at https://interpreterfoundation.org/category/summaries/. An introduction to the Interpreting Interpreter series is available at https://interpreterfoundation.org/interpreting-interpreter-on-abstracting-thought/.

A video introduction to this Interpreter article is now available on all of our social media channels, including on YouTube at https://youtube.com/shorts/SULd7DFT5gs.

The Takeaway: Hales consults AI to build a list of skills that would be required to write a book like the Book of Mormon, concluding that there is very little historical evidence that Joseph Smith had any such skills.

On Thursday — which alert members of the public will recognize as a wholly different day than Friday — an article that had previously appeared in print form was published on the website of the Interpreter Foundation website. Discerning readers will quickly discover that it is completely distinct from the articles by Brian C. Hales and Kyler Rasmussen that are mentioned above. It even has a different author:

The Temple: Past, Present and Future: ““That They May Be Purified in Me”: Ritual Purification in 3 Nephi 19 and the Implications of Holiness as “Purity,”” written by Matthew L. Bowen

Part of our book chapter reprint series, this article originally appeared in The Temple: Past, Present and Future, edited by Stephen D. Ricks and Jeffrey M. Bradshaw. For more information, go to https://interpreterfoundation.org/books/the-temple-past-present-and-future/. For video and audio recording of this conference talk, go to https://interpreterfoundation.org/conferences/2020-temple-on-mount-zion-conference/videos/bowen/.

“Using a close reading of 3 Nephi 19, I will examine the interrelated and additive nature of each of the rituals in their temple context as described in 3 Nephi 19, culminating in Jesus’s high priestly intercessory prayer and discuss Mormon’s possible authorial intent in his presentation of these rituals. I will further explore the relationship of ritual purification and sanctification in the Hebrew Bible (and elsewhere in scripture) and the previous lexicography of q-d-š. I will compare the high priestly prayers of Jesus in John 17 and 3 Nephi 19, and analyze the results of Jesus’s prayer in 3 Nephi 19 on the worshipers at the temple in Bountiful. Lastly, I will explain the aforementioned implications q-d-š—sanctification and holiness—as a state of divine belonging (cf. qdš lyhwh = ‘a state of divine belonging to the Lord’) for ordinances and temple worship and our identity as ‘Latter-day Saints.’”

Bozo the Clown, with abundant red hair and four friends, in 1963
(Wikimedia Commons public domain image)

Well, the initial claim (in this most recent cycle on the Peterson Obsession Board) was that I’m a liar. And what is the proof that I’m a liar? It is that Interpreter’s long and unbroken record of publishing at least one article in our journal every single Friday since early August 2012 has only been achieved by (on Thursdays) stealthily substituting book-chapter reprints for genuine articles (which always appear on Fridays). But that claim was quickly and easily shown to be false. So, without missing a beat, a new allegation was instantly devised to replace it. Now, it seems, I’m a liar. And what is the proof that I’m a liar? It is that what we’ve published every Friday has sometimes included book reviews and personal essays, which, they say, don’t really count as articles. The important thing, obviously — the Prime Directive of the Obsession Board, as it were — is that I be exposed as a liar. Merry Christmas!

Here is a related email exchange (from Wednesday and Thursday) between two of those who are responsible for the production and regular appearance of the Journal. It was copied to me, and I reproduce it here with their permission. My point is to share the attitude felt by those who actually know what’s going on at Interpreter:

The idiots (or, if you prefer, “obliviots”) over at the GSTP [the “Great and Spacious Trailer Park” -dcp] are still ranting and raving that Dan is being dishonest in his claims of unbroken Friday publishing. They are basing it on this:

https://journal.interpreterfoundation.org/category/article/?journal

This URL, they are claiming, because of the title “Journal Articles,” lists everything considered a Journal article. And, there are gaps in the listing.

The discrepancy is that we, in-house, consider book reviews to be Journal articles, as well. But they don’t show up in the list at the above URL because they aren’t categorized as “Journal articles.”

In their puckered, clenched, and condensed world, a book review doesn’t count as a “Journal article,” and therefore we don’t publish a “Journal article” every Friday, as Dan claims. The category list on our website proves it. It is a smoking gun, to their way of thinking, that proves Dan is a liar. Period. End of story.

Who would have thought that such great minds could parse categories so carefully and brilliantly?

Idiots.

To which a colleague responded:

So, none of Dan’s essays are articles, either.

And here is a reply from the first writer, which I’ve redacted slightly (and as indicated):

[The pseudonymous Obsession Board cast member whose moniker approximates “Dumb Dud”] is, I think, cognitively challenged. Yesterday he/she rightly said that we “categorize postings into 3 groups: articles, essays, and reviews.” He/she then counts up what appears in each category and concludes “Interpreter can easily be seen as a ‘junk journal’ in almost half of the ‘articles’ aren’t even original research . . . I think they would struggle to proffer a single example of one of Interpreter’s articles being cited in another journal.”

Obviously, [“Dumb Dud”] (and the other denizens of the GSTP/POB) haven’t read Newell Wright’s article back in 2023. It is technically a book review (gasp!), but it also includes original research. (Two things! In one article! Perish the thought!) To quote Wright:

“Articles in Interpreter are likely to be cited twice as often as articles appearing in the [Maxwell Institute’s former] Journal of Book of Mormon Studies. Using Harzing’s Publish or Perish software, I pulled all articles that have citation data from Google Scholar from 2012 to 2018 from the Journal of Book of Mormon Studies and compared them with articles about the Book of Mormon published in the Interpreter during the same period. Newer articles are cited less frequently than older articles, so I did not include anything newer than 2018. Also, older articles are cited more frequently, as they have been around longer, so I did not look at articles published before 2012.

“The Journal of Book of Mormon Studies published 35 articles of all types that were cited at least once during that time period, for a total of 91 citations, or 2.68 citations per article. Interpreter published 69 articles focusing on the Book of Mormon that were cited at least once during that time period, for a total of 391 citations, or an average of 5.75 citations per article — more than double the citation rate of the Journal of Book of Mormon Studies.”

In the course of comparing citations to articles in two LDS-oriented academic journals, Wright easily disproves [“Dumb Dud’s”] gleefully hyperbolic conclusion that Interpreter would “struggle to proffer a single example” of citations to our articles.

The inability of people at the GSTP/POB to grasp anything outside of their myopic worldview is breathtaking.

A nighttime view of the Old City portion of Salzburg, overlooked by its iconic fortress and with the River Salzach running through it. (Wikimedia Commons public domain photo)

But enough of that bunch! They can keep the Christmas holidays in their way; I’ll keep Christmas in mine.

One of my favorite Austrian Christmas carols is “Still, Still, Still,” which apparently comes from the area of Salzburg. I like it in almost any form, but the way in which I became familiar with it was in a specific recording — he recorded it more than once — by the late Peter Alexander. (I own the 1972 album, Wunderschöne Weihnachtszeit.) Peter Alexander was big during my mission and in the years immediately following it. Some will perhaps dismiss this version of “Still, Still, Still” as kitschy, as schmaltz, but I like it and I’m not embarrassed to say so. Here it is, followed by my transcription of the lyrics he sings (which are different than any that I’ve found online) and by my rough and unpoetic translation of them:

“Still, Still, Still”

Still, still, still, weil’s Kindlein schlafen will.
Ihr dürft bei Ihm in Andacht stehen
Und in seiner Krippe sehen.
Still, still, still, weil’s Kindlein schlafen will.

Schlaf, schlaf, schlaf! Mein liebes Kindlein, schlaf!
Du kommst von hohem Himmel her.
Dein Weg auf unsrer Welt wird schwer.
Schlaf, schlaf, schlaf! Mein liebes Kindlein, schlaf!

Hört, hört, hört! Nun wird die Ruh’ gestört.
Da klingen unserem Kind zur Ehre
So freudig schon die Weihnachtschöre.
Ja! Ja! Ja! Das Jesuskind ist da!

Still, still, still. For the little child wants to sleep.
You may stand reverently by
And look into his cradle.
Still, still, still. For the little child wants to sleep.

Sleep, sleep, sleep. My dear little child, sleep.
You come down from highest heaven.
Your way in our world will be difficult.
Sleep, sleep, sleep. My dear little child, sleep.

Listen! Listen! Listen! Now the quiet is broken.
The Christmas choirs
Sing joyously in honor of our Child.
Yes! Yes! Yes! The Jesus Child is here!

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