Appendix

Main Sources of CoJCoLDS Leader Quotes 

Joseph Smith Papers 

Journal of Discourses 

History of the Church 

CoJCoLDS General Conference Corpus 

Critical Evaluations of CoJCoLDS Leaders 

LDS Discussions 

Letter for my Wife 

CES Letter 

CoJCoLDS Apologetics 

FAIRLDS—Apologetic branch of the CoJCoLDS  

A New Narrative—Improving expectations of CoJCoLDS leaders 

Faith Matters Foundation—Discussion on the reliability of CoJCoLDS leaders 

Evaluating Doctrine—Research on comparative reliability of CoJCoLDS doctrines 

Adjacent Topics 

Hermetically Sealed Systems of LDS Thought—Diagrams that inspired the confirmation algorithm

Street Epistemology—Resources for everyday epistemic conversations 

Yourbiasis—List of 24 common cognitive biases 

How Minds Change—Book on influencing others despite cognitive bias 

The Bite Model—Framework for evaluating ethics in religious organizations 

NonStampCollector—Noah’s Ark—Humorous video on the historicity of Genesis

Models of Prophetic Revelation—List of 10 viewpoints on prophetic fallibility   

An example set of five standards to distinguish true prophets was laid out previously. Another important standard was considered but ultimately omitted: 

6. A true prophet will either:  

• Make a reliably observable true prediction of which only an omniscient god could have informed them, or 

• Perform a reliably observable miracle in which only an omnipotent god could have aided them. 

Standard 6 may be even more useful than the other five for determining whether someone is a true prophet. It sets a high bar for entry into the realm of true prophets, whereas the other standards mainly exclude prophets based on false, contradictory, or unethical statements. One ironic disadvantage of standards 2-5 is that most babies meet them due to their inability to make false/contradictory/unethical statements. In contrast, Standard 6 immediately screens out most of the world’s population in search of someone with superhuman abilities. It also places a significant burden of proof on those who claim the standard is fulfilled. 

President Hugh B. Brown seemed to affirm the usefulness of this standard when he taught that a true prophet “would be able to do superhuman things — things that no man could do without God’s help. The consequence or result of his message and work would be convincing evidence of his prophetic calling: ‘By their fruits ye shall know them’ (Matthew 7:20).” 

It may be argued that Standard 6 is unfalsifiable because one can never rule out the possibility that an individual did such a miracle/prediction in an unobservable way (e.g., in private or without leaving a reliable record). This is correct—even an exhaustive search couldn’t rule out such unlimited possibilities (e.g., Perhaps the individual blew up the entire universe yesterday and reformed it again without leaving a trace of their activity.).  

For this reason, the words “reliably observable” are included in Standard 6. This limits the list of predictions/miracles to those we can ensure were truly performed, and falsifiability is regained. For example, if someone publicly announced on the radio that the Red Sea would dry up overnight, both the prediction and miracle would be observable and falsifiable (i.e., We would be able to tell whether they had occurred or not.). Alternatively, if the Red Sea dried up overnight, with nobody publicly predicting this beforehand, and someone came around afterward saying, “I told you this would happen!” then that person’s claim would neither be reliably observable nor falsifiable (i.e., Maybe the person made the prediction beforehand, but we don’t have a reliable way to tell whether they did or not.). Thus, with the added stipulation of miracles/predictions being “reliably observable,” Standard 6 not only becomes falsifiable, but sets a high bar for entry into the realm of true prophets, placing a significant burden of proof on those who claim the standard is fulfilled. 

Despite its potential utility, Standard 6 was excluded here for two reasons:  

1. Cultural irrelevance—The CoJCoLDS has had at least 120 people sustained as “Prophets, Seers, and Revelators.” I estimate that very few CoJCoLDS members hold all 120 of them (except perhaps Joseph Smith) to this high standard. 

2. Redundance—Evaluations of specific miracles/predictions of Joseph Smith already exist (see "References and Useful Links" in the appendix).