Birds-eye View of Book of Mormon Evidence

I've decided to lay out my evaluation of evidence for and against the Book of Mormon having been written by ancient, real people. Details are a discussion I'm more than willing to enter into individually and in private, but this is a debate I'm reluctant to enter online. There are plenty of other places where details are debated, so I'll just have my irresponsibly non-academic say and keep it to my own blog until I'm willing to do the work to substantiate the claims.

1. Physical evidences against the Book of Mormon being a Mesoamerican record are 100% negative (we haven't found X, so X wasn't there). I couldn't find a single positive contrary evidence on two rather extensive online lists of criticisms of the Book of Mormon. The list of such evidences has also shrunk consistently over the last several decades (although the list writers aren't necessarily aware of it). I'll give only two examples. We're going from 'No Horses' to physical remains of horses reported sporadically in primary academic reports. We've gone from 'No or Insignificant Transoceanic Contact' to an academic journal devoted to pre-Columbian transoceanic influences, and evidences for many transoceanic voyages and possible cultural influences. The trend is more and more that critics of Book of Mormon historicity are the ones claiming that "all the evidence we don't have supports our view" (a quote I really hate that has sometimes been used by people I consider friends). I believe this trend is documentable, and significantly documented in John Sorensen's book, Mormon's Codex.

2. a. Supposed positive physical evidences against the Book of Mormon are all against superficial or sloppy readings of the text, or against modern impositions on the text, and not evidences against the text itself. Very often these are readings believed by many LDSs, and even pronouncements made by latter-day prophets, including Joseph Smith. This may make them rational reasons for doubting the LDS church, but does not make them relevant for judging Book of Mormon historicity. Examples include DNA evidence, unrealistic geographies, apparent absence of surrounding cultures, and others.
    b. Alternatively, the positive contrary evidences are based on unrealistic beliefs about what science can discover. 90% of the ancestors of late 20th century Icelanders--ancestors identified from genealogical records of the late 18th century--can't be seen from mitochondrial and Y-chromosome DNA sequencing. This was with a thorough sampling of Icelandic DNA. Physical evidences of the Battle of Hastings--which happened in 1066 and at a known location--consists of only a handful of bones and no weapons or armor. Similar questions regarding the Book of Mormon shouldn't even be on the table for a rational seeker of the truth regarding the Book of Mormon. The objective seeker must do the work to examine and understand what hypotheses are rigorously consistent with the Book of Mormon and then evaluate if the hypotheses have been adequately addressed by the scientific community. In most cases, the scientific community has neither presented viable hypotheses from the Book of Mormon, nor sought the data necessary to test the hypotheses. Very few non-LDS scientists have shown the both the interest in and knowledge of the Book of Mormon needed to test historical Book of Mormon assertions. Despite this disconnect between supposed evidence and valid hypotheses, many such items are included in long lists of 'problems' with the Book of Mormon. The rational seeker would remain agnostic on such issues. To reference another analogy I find frequently misapplied, any scientific inquiry is going to put more questions on your shelf than it ever takes down. That's the lived reality of science.
    c. Another common imposition on the Book of Mormon is linguistic. When real cultures collide, including in translation, a certain number of words are always used in new ways. New things are given old names because they are somewhat similar. The Book of Mormon is often required to mean one particular thing despite documented examples of alternative meanings. For example, the Spanish calling wood and obsidian weapons swords, or describing materials from other fibers as silk or linen when they encountered them in Central America.

3. Evidences that supposedly favor 19th century origins for the Book of Mormon are all linguistic, narrative, thematic, or otherwise superficial as regards historicity. Most (and maybe all) 19th century linguistic parallels are exactly what would be expected for a translation of a religious text into 19th century religious/scriptural language (See similarities with the Late War). This is also likely true of biblical influences. Narrative and thematic elements are mostly (perhaps completely) superficial coincidences or parallels that break down upon more careful examination, or they are consistent with ancient origins. One example of this is supposed 19th century republicanism and democracy in the Book of Mormon. As discussed by Richard Bushman, Book of Mormon government and political narrative are much more in keeping with Biblical government and political systems than with 19th century rhetoric. I'm less versed in this type of analysis, but I have seen this pattern on multiple occasions with LDS scripture. Apparent 19th (or 20th) century parallels agree superficially, but examination in detail reveals better agreement with ancient parallels. I trust that a concerted study of such parallels would return a similar result to physical evidences, namely, that evidence for 19th century origins is shrinking, while detailed evidence of ancient convergences is growing.

4. Positive physical and linguistic/thematic/narrative evidences for Book of Mormon historicity are growing. These are typically dismissed (when not dismissed ignorantly) by claiming that the evidences are no stronger than the similar parallels drawn for 19th century origins. Alternatively, they are dismissed by imposing particular readings on the Book of Mormon text that are not justified. I've referred to a couple of examples, above. Rebuttals by literary and historical analysts also frequently show a lack of understanding of statistics and probability (responses to chiasmus and stylometric conclusions come specifically to mind), finding more significance in superficial patterns and less confidence in subtle but objective statistics than are rationally merited. It is also common to treat all parallels as equally valid or invalid despite substantive differences in usage. A 19th century parallel used to claim that Joseph Smith derived the Book of Mormon from a particular text is given the same weight as an ancient convergence used simply to demonstrate that the Book of Mormon is true to ancient cultures.

5. Stylometry strongly and objectively favors multiple authors. It also identifies the styles in the Book of Mormon as significantly different from other writings of proposed 19th century authors. These observations, together with a broader understanding of the effectiveness of stylometric methods, favor conclusions of multiple authorship translated into 19th century pseudo-biblical english, or intentional fraudulent multiple authorship signatures generated by Joseph Smith. I think the latter is very difficult to maintain, since there are no other similar examples in the world.
So to summarize my conclusions? There is no evidence against Book of Mormon historicity--only against certain understandings of the Book of Mormon which I believe are wrong. There is significant, positive evidence that the Book of Mormon emerged from an ancient, Mesoamerican context. I would place the (minimally) dozens of positive convergences against hundreds of negative evidences any day.

I will add that I believe there are good reasons to reject the religious authority of the Book of Mormon while still admitting that it appears to be ancient. The strongest of these, to my mind, is doubting the existence of God. That greatly increases the likelihood of atheistic explanations of its origins. I will admit that much value can be had from the Book of Mormon without believing its historicity. I know people who are examples of this. I also believe there are good reasons for not putting in the time or effort to come to my same conclusions. The main one of these is that it doesn't necessarily increase one's love for his neighbors, although I hope the Book of Mormon has contributed to increasing mine. I believe there are good reasons to not belong to the LDS church even if you do believe the Book of Mormon is ancient and inspired. The one I respect most here is when the institution hurts you or someone you need to support. I hope further historical study can reveal some interesting things about Zion that might improve the world, and I hope it can improve how believing Latter-day Saints understand our own religion. I think it can, but that's for some future posts.