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Comment by hymnsfm | Hacker News Reader

I suggest reading the Book of Mormon. It's a fascinating record of the peoples of ancient America, specifically the Nephites, Lamanites and Jaredites. Where these civilizations lived and fought (there are lots of battles in the book) is uncertain, but it's believed to be mainly Central and South America.

Keep in mind that The Book of Mormon is a primarily a spiritual book: another testament of Jesus Christ. The Lord expects readers to accept the book on faith. When the time is right, the Spirit will testify of its truthfulness and the Lord will bring forth further evidence. For some, this recent discovery is further evidence.

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"The bare facts of the matter are that nothing, absolutely nothing, has ever shown up in any New World excavation which would suggest to a dispassionate observer that the Book of Mormon, as claimed by Joseph Smith, is a historical document relating to the history of early immigrants to our hemisphere." http://mit.irr.org/book-of-mormon-archaeology-full

That's a very narrow and biased paper. "nothing, absolutely nothing, has ever" are loaded emotional words. It would be much more accurate to say "nothing that they know of, in their interpretation, and according to the two theories they cherrypicked and considered would suggest to them, yada yada yada". They seem to consider themselves dispassionate observers, but their analysis indicates otherwise. I am always disappointed, but not surprised, when individuals who consider themselves to be scientists fail to recognize their personal bias.

There are lots of other theories, interpretations, and excavations, some obvious, that they do not consider, and which they either wilfully, or ignorantly, ignore. But that is inexcusable when they use such strong language in an obviously biased analysis, based on their personal belief. As a scientist, it is always healthy to be aware, and open, that you may not know everything, and you might be missing something obvious-- even when dealing with something that you may personally dismiss as incredible.

Due to the obvious interest of Mormons, this isn't exactly an underresearched field. This single quote is obviously just that, a single quote of a single researcher, but to my knowledge it sums up the state of research pretty well.

I'd point out that the article referenced above comes from a group that could hardly be said to be 'dispassionate observers' themselves.

Luckily, bias of the researcher is irrelevant, as this is science and the facts are published. Despite 7 decades of endavours, no evidence whatsoever confirming Smiths claims has been found.

Good grief, even the Mormons in my town (I'm a few hours from Salt Lake City, my area is heavily LDS) don't try to use the Book of Mormon as a history text. Nothing has been validated, none of the cities listed have been found. Keep in mind, we have the Mayan writings and can read them...it is nothing like what is written in the Book of Mormon. Then there is DNA evidence, and nothing matches up there as well.

Of similar historical weight, I recommend The Mysterious Cities of Gold 39-part animated TV documentary.

If possible, watch the version that includes the 1-2 minute live video documentaries at the end each episode.

Other things you could accept on faith is that these are airfields; not monstrously huge ritual grounds.

It's nice to be passionate about something and letting one's imagination run wild, but trying to pull others into it with reference to blind faith comes off as cultish.

Note that even "Ancient Aliens" doesn't ask their viewers to accept anything on blind faith.

With that show it is more or less assumed. You realize many of the viewers of such shows take them seriously and think they are documentary evidence.

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