This story, told in General Conference, has all the hallmarks of BS. Feels good, single source that was a friend of someone who was present when the story was told 50 years later by a woman who was in her 90s, etc.
http://www.lds.org/general-conference/2012/10/by-faith-all-things-are-fulfilled?lang=eng
The original story comes from her fireside biography:
http://williehandcartcompany.blogspot.com/2011/05/following-is-said-to-be-autobiography.html
Maybe it happened, maybe it didn’t. I’ll give a short list of things that have more sources than this that are more stable:
- Brigham Young’s cane was Oliver Cowdery’s dousing rod (2 sources, both eye witnesses to the cane).
- Joseph Smith, Jr. had John C. Bennett perform abortions (3 sources, contemporary).
- Thomas B. Marsh witness Joseph Smith order the destruction of the town Gallatin and the theft of property of the exmormons that were driven out of their homes in early winter (2 sources, signed affidavit).
- Joseph Smith ordered Porter Rockwell to assassinate Governor Boggs (14 sources, all second hand).
You see, it’s not so much that you can’t tell a nice feeling story. It’s that there is a bias against good information with lots of sources, and to pick badly sourced information that is faith promoting, that I have an issue with. They then use these “probably didn’t happen” stories to encourage people to take real action in the physical world, action that could get them hurt, and, incidentally making comparisons of faith and reason like this:
faith and reason are like the two wings of an aircraft. Both are essential to maintain flight. If, from your perspective, reason seems to contradict faith, pause and remember that our perspective is extremely limited compared with the Lord’s.
Faith, founded in untrue stories and false anecdotes, is not, in any way, like a wing on an aircraft. Reason, logic, and science built the aircraft. Faith in god would have us still saying things like:
If man had been meant to fly, he would have been born with wings.
When I was a member I remember enjoying stories like this, if only because they were *different* than everything else that had been told before. Boredom is no excuse though, stories are possibly the most important tool we have in society to perpetrate our knowledge and values. Despite whatever I may feel towards the LDS Leadership, the initial part of the quote “Faith and Reason are necessary for the airplane to fly” are correct. Technically. Terry Pratchett in “Hogfather” says it much better than me in a conversation between Death and his daughter.
“YOU HAVE TO START OUT LEARNING TO BELIEVE THE LITTLE LIES.
“So we can believe the big ones?”
YES. JUSTICE. MERCY. DUTY. THAT SORT OF THING.
“They’re not the same at all!”
YOU THINK SO? THEN TAKE THE UNIVERSE AND GRIND IT DOWN TO THE FINEST POWDER AND SIEVE IT THROUGH THE FINEST SIEVE AND THEN SHOW ME ONE ATOM OF JUSTICE, ONE MOLECULE OF MERCY. AND YET—Death waved a hand. AND YET YOU ACT AS IF THERE IS SOME IDEAL ORDER IN THE WORLD, AS IF THERE IS SOME…SOME RIGHTNESS IN THE UNIVERSE BY WHICH IT MAY BE JUDGED.
“Yes, but people have got to believe that, or what’s the point—”
MY POINT EXACTLY.”
Stories make up how we understand the world around us, its how we learn to trust police as children, despite the fact that we’re more likely to be killed by a police officer than a terrorist. Its how I understand biology, math and family. We need these stories to understand the world around us because some of these concepts are imaginary but necessary. With that being said, there’s no excuse for the crap that some of these GA’s are pulling. In my mind it just makes it that much worse.
Okay, off my soapbox.
I love Pratchett. That sequence (Available in movie format here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1o1rciKAZPQ
(Or maybe part 22)