This probably has been put up before but I thought I'd do this to provide basic common sense information:

The "plates" were said to be a stack of gold metal sheets "as thick as common tin" six by eight inches in size and six inches high. Gold is a very dense metal -- density 19.3 times more than water which weighs sixty four pounds per cubic foot. This alone would be enough for the story not to pass the smell test but if you need more proof, here's the analysis:

Density of Gold: 19.3 g/cm^3

Volume of Plates: 6" x 8" x 6" = 288 in^3, 4719.474432 cm^3

Plate Thickness, "thick as common tin," 1/64" = 0.015625" = 0.396875 mm, approx 0.4 mm

Number of Plates: stack 6" high, 152.4 mm / 0.4 mm = 381 plates

Volume of Plate: 6" x 8" x 1/64" = 0.75 in^3 = 12.290298 cm^3

Mass of Gold Plate: 12.290298 cm^3 x 19.3 g/cm^3 = 237.2027514 g = 0.522 lbs

Total Mass Of Gold Plates: 381 x 237.2027514 g = 90.374 Kg = approx. 200 lbs

Running or casually carrying a small dense stack of gold sheets weighing two hundred pounds would be absolutely impossible.


But wait, now say the Mormons. The plates weren't really made of gold as they were previously said to be to be but were actually the copper/silver/gold alloy called by the ancient Greeks orichalcon and called in the New World tumbaga. Estimates vary but a composition consisting of eighty per cent. copper, fifteen per cent. silver and fiver per cent. gold has been proposed. Using this metal we now have the following estimate:

Copper 8.96 g/cm^3 80%
Silver 10.49 g/cm^3 15%
Gold 19.3 g/cm^3 5%
===============================
Tumbaga 9.7065 g/cm^3


Total Mass Of Tumbaga Plates: 381 x 119.29578g = 45.452 Kg = approx. 100 lbs

Joseph Smith would have to be unusually strong to carry and run with a small dense object weighing a hundred or two hundred pounds or more. To paraphrase Terryl Givens, that's the "price you pay" to believe in a made up fantasy religion like Mormonism.

I would assume that these weren't perfectly flat plates. It's more likely that they were bent and that there were far fewer than 381 of them.

What about tin? Emma claims to have felt the plates under a sheet and Martin harris claims that he "hefted" the plates, so we know Joseph had some sort of prop. There was a tin-working shop at the Smith home, so how much would the actual tin plates that Joseph made have weighed?

Isn't there a quote about the pages making a rustling noise or something from Emma or Lucy?

I agree. Conceivably there were, say, 250-300 sheets, not 381, because of irregularities from sheet to sheet causing inter-sheet air pockets to form. Tin, being stiffer and much less dense than gold would have lent itself to this occurring and having something that could be described as "heftable". Even with strong farm boy arms 100-200lbs is heavy to really heavy.

Video showing people trying to run with just 50lb weight. They do a good job telling the history of the the 3-mile run while being chased and fending off attackers.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08wRRff8x0k

Of course the TBM response is that JS was blessed with super speed as needed, but that doesn't really explain Emma pushing them around the dinner table and other anecdotes of people holding the box without too much problem.

The other point that they bring up, that I always had a problem with but never really thought about until I left the church is that if there were 381 plates, and a third of it was sealed, then we're talking just over 120 plates compose the entire BOM (plus the 116 lost pages).

When you start to think about it, the story breaks down fast.

For with God nothing is impossible, even if it is stupid.

He would have had to have been blessed with super speed. He waked with a pretty good limp, and with a cane at times, throughout his life. Why didn't Moroni just fly down and pick him up to transport him home? Or, better yet, why didn't Moroni just bring the plates to Joseph?

Martin Harris told a story of riding in a wagon with Joseph and coming across a man walking with a satchel. I believe that they asked where he was headed and if he needed a ride. The man replied that he was going to Cumorah. He went on his way and Joseph and Martin went on their way, and then Joseph told Martin that the man was the angel Moroni. Martin ate it up...OF COURSE an angel would just walk down the dirt road in the form of a dirty old man...

IF NOTHING ELSE, Wht didnt moroni or any angel, smite them !?! Why didnt an angel w/a flameing sword, fend them off? If JS prodginy and "godhood" where that important.Wouldnt an angel w/a flameing sword protect the plates?

duh. that's why god gave him the magic rock.

I WOULD LIKE TO THROW SOMETHING ELSE INTO THE MIX. Josephs bad leg. My reason being that I Have a bad leg! Walking on uneven ground is awkward. RUNNING 3mil. though a dark country field WITH UNEVEN TERRAIN WOULD BE TERRIFYING!! EVEN FACTORING tha he was a fit farm boy. Even if you buy into the idea that they were really tin alloy(which I believe possible,since people felt somthing) RUN through an uneven terrain, in the dark w/a bad leg would be nearly impossible!...

If the Nephites were observant Jews, wouldn't they have two sets of plates?

Ba-dum-bump

Thank you thank you, I'll be here all week--don't forget to tip the waiters.

arrgh.

Going to try this one on my mother.

The impossible is a Flying Jesus...........

If apologists are saying the plates were 80% copper, wouldn't they have turned green after being underground for 1400 years? I had a ring once that turned my finger green. Smith said they had the appearance of "pure gold."

I am guessing the tumbaga alloy would be largely resistant to corrosion.

The Emperor's new clothes were spun from "pure gold", coincidence? I think not. I think the clothing and the plates had a lot in common.

I always love the response to this question:

Me: Where are the plates now?

TBM buddy: Umm, an angel took them back up to heaven....that's it.

Me: What? They were never in heaven. Humans made them so other humans could learn from them, right?

TBM: Yeah.....well, it's just one of those things we'll learn more about in the next life. But I can absolutely testify to you with 100 percent truth that JS was a prophet...

I never believed the plate story, but I did manage to keep it on the shelf for many years. God I was dumb.

Don't forget, he ran with the plates while fending off attackers:

From the Jan., 2001 Ensign:

As he was jumping over a log, a man sprang up from behind and gave him a heavy blow with a gun. Joseph turned around and knocked him to the ground, and then ran at the top of his speed. About half a mile further, he was attacked again in precisely the same way. He soon brought this one down also and ran on again, but before he got home, he was accosted the third time with a severe stroke with a gun." Joseph struck this third and final attacker with such force that he dislocated his own thumb. He continued running, "being closely pursued until he came near his father's house," at which time his assailants, "for fear of being detected," broke off the chase. Reaching a fence corner, he "threw himself down … to recover his breath," then rose and continued running until he reached the house.

https://www.lds.org/ensign/2001/01/take-heed-continually-protecting-the-gold-plates

If that doesn't sound like a stupid made up story then I don't know what does. Those were the kinds of stories I made up when I was like...EIGHT!

Smith told his family that anyone who saw the plates with being invited by God to do so, would die instantly. So, when he was being chased by the men who wanted the plates, why didn't he simply stop, put them on the ground, uncover them, and say, "OK, guys! LOOK!"

I have never heard a Mormon respond to that question.

Good point.

He should not have needed to hide them in logs and barrels of beans at all.

Look to the text of the BoM for your guide. There were 24 plates recovered from the Jaredites and they were made of pure gold. The Book of Ether was an abridgement of those plates, which accounted for less than 1% of what Ether had recorded. These plates were also known to include the Old Testament scriptures up until the Tower of Babel AND the vision received by the brother of Jared of all things past and future. So you see, it does not take that many plates to record the things of God--just a lot of faith.

The brother of Jared also sealed up the urim and thummim with the Jaredite record. This translator was apparently missing when the plates were found, because they had to seek out Mosiah to translate the plates with HIS urim and thummim. If I fashion a urim and thummim out of metal and glass, do you think I could sell it to the church for $2 million? They would certainly reply, "Nice try. Moroni took it back...Joseph didn't even translate the plates with it." To which I would reply, "No, not THAT Urim and Thummim...I have the brother of Jared's urim and thummim."

And you know the most interesting thing about those "plates"?? Faith that they existed didn't require anyone to measure them and weigh them, but to "see" them with their "spiritual eye".

And it's still working!

That's the power of supernatural, metaphysical claims. They can top physical evidence every time!

You can run VERY FAST with IMAGINARY PLATES! :-) (Or something JS constructed out of light weight materials!)

Knowing this information, Marlin Jensen - in the Swedish Rescue meeting - was asked point blank about the plates, and he said they weighed about 50 lbs.

How does he get 50 lbs you might ask? I don't really know, but he is obligated to make them lighter so as to allow Joe the ability to run with them with relative ease - in spite of the above facts of gold or tumbaga in the original post.

I think critics will err on the heavy side while apologists will go light— hence the 100 to 60 lb spread.

In any case I don't see JS being able to run and fight off 3 men while holding 60 lbs. I'm somewhat smaller than JS was but have hefted 60 lb bags of gravel and don't buy the story. That shit is pretty heavy

That said I think the weight of the plates, while interesting to add to mountain of things that don't really work, isn't one of the better arguments against the BoM. Hell, the content of the book itself to me is far more damning than plate weight.

What about the binding and the strap that sealed part of the plates? That all adds in. Then you also have to add in the UT, brest plate and whatever else JS had to take with him. What about the language? If you could guestament the number of plates, the number sealed and unseald, Could the whole BM text fit? Did Mormon write really small?

They spoke Hebrew. They recorded in Reformed Egyptian, due to the lack of space. You didn't know that every Jew around 600 BC was fluent in Reformed Egyptian?...I think it's something like Klingon. In any case, I think we can safely assume that each Reformed Egyptian character equals one full verse in the BoM...maybe 2 verses.

Let's not forget-the angel Moroni told Joseph Smith at his bedside that the plates were made of gold. You can look it up in the Pearl of Great Price. An Angel wouldn't lie!

Another big problem is fitting all of the text on such little space.

2/3 is sealed.

So you have something like 30-40 leafs to fit the entire text of the BoM and the source of the lost 116 pages.

This becomes an even bigger issue when people try to claim that there was lots of dead space between the plates - that leaves less leaves to contain an impossible amount of text.


Another huge problem is that according to the text of the BoM Nephi wrote the small plates 1,000 years before Mormon/Moroni wrote the rest and Mormon just tacked them on. However this means that Nephi's plates had to be the exact same size and fit on the exact same rings as Mormon's abridgement. In addition it had to be made out of the same material.

Shouldn't there be other examples of writings in reform Egyptian? How can you pass down reading and writing skills with just one book and to only 1 person?