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Claim
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Response
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Author's sources
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DVD 2:31
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- The narrator uses the reference in Alma 22:31 to "wild beasts" which had "come from that land northward looking for food" and claims that these are buffalo.
- Ether 9:34 states that "the people did follow the course of the beasts, and did devour the carcasses of them which fell by the way." This is used by the narrator to support the claim that the Lamanites were a migratory people who were following the buffalo.
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- Looking at Ether 9:30-31, we can see the context in order to understand why the animals were moving:
And it came to pass that there began to be a great dearth upon the land, and the inhabitants began to be destroyed exceedingly fast because of the dearth, for there was no rain upon the face of the earth. And there came forth poisonous serpents also upon the face of the land, and did poison many people. And it came to pass that their flocks began to flee before the poisonous serpents, towards the land southward, which was called by the Nephites Zarahemla. (Ether 9:30-31) (emphasis added)
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DVD 2-2:31
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DVD 6:05
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- The narrator claims that the bones of 60 million buffalo disintegrated on the plains, and therefore it is reasonable to expect the bones of the Nephites to have disintegrated as well.
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- The claim is false: The bones of the buffalo aren't on the plains because they were worth money—they were gathered up, packed into boxcars, and shipped to the east for use in industrial processes and agriculture on a vast scale.
- The DVD miscites its source: estimates for the number of buffalo are actually less than thirty million, not sixty.
- Reviews of DNA Evidence for Book of Mormon Geography, Section 7: Buffalo, FAIR (2009).
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