A Global Faith and Working on the Railroad - Unraveling One of the Most Interesting Threads To Appear On LDSFF

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endlessQuestions
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Re: A Global Faith and Working on the Railroad - Unraveling One of the Most Interesting Threads To Appear On LDSFF

Post by endlessQuestions »

Very insightful, HVDC... let's finish up our research on this portion of AGF's narrative over the next couple of days...

Union Pacific failed to live up to their end of the bargain, and negotiations continued:

"failing to comply with the agreement in either providing the referee in time or paying the additional claims after the forfeiture the compary left two avenues of action open to young he could seek another settlement which would probably result in a compromise or he could seek redress through court action..."

"...evidence would indicate that Young would choose the former alternative placing both parties in a situation not to dissimilar from the one in which they had been one month earlier before the agreement had been reached in this position the union pacific at least had a chance of reducing the claims at the time the new talks began"

endlessQuestions
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Re: A Global Faith and Working on the Railroad - Unraveling One of the Most Interesting Threads To Appear On LDSFF

Post by endlessQuestions »

"after presenting the claims the members would only consent to pay $70,386 on the asked bishop sharp apparently on previous approval from young to accept any reasonable offer agreed to it it was decided that $35000 of the settlement was to be paid in cash with the remainder payable in notes of $5,000 each and maturing in three months..."

"the settlement of all Young's claims against the union pacific was now completed once the three month notes were paid the work begun over two years ago would be at an end these notes were all met by november 1870 at which time brigham put his hand to a document releasing the union pacific railroad company its trustees and directors from any claim regarding services he performed for the company"

That was nice of him.

Wonder how all the people who had done the work and not been paid felt about it.

endlessQuestions
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Re: A Global Faith and Working on the Railroad - Unraveling One of the Most Interesting Threads To Appear On LDSFF

Post by endlessQuestions »

Like I said, a FAMILY BUSINESS had sprung up...

...despite his inability to secure payment for their earlier work, Young and his son and apparently developed a taste for railroading...

------------------------------
"when it was determined by the union pacific that the main line of their transcontinental track would not pass through salt lake
as young had hoped it would he began to formulate plans for a spur line
from ogden to salt lake by late 1868 several months before the union
pacific work was completed young had survey crews in the field in an
effort to determine the most feasible route..."

"the company was formally organized in march 1869 at which time Brigham Young was elected president and joseph A young, general superintendent"

endlessQuestions
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Re: A Global Faith and Working on the Railroad - Unraveling One of the Most Interesting Threads To Appear On LDSFF

Post by endlessQuestions »

Sounds like our current prophets took a page from Brigham with the whole "good global citizens" schtick:

Young is quoted as saying:

"our work is not one for individual benefit but it is an
aid to the development of the whole country and tends to the
benefit and prosperity of the whole nation of which we form
a part.

to all present I would say let us lay aside our narrow
feelings and prejudices and as fellow citizens of this great
republic join in the celebration of this happy day."

Must have been some LDSFFers of the day who were confused... from escaping the republic to being fellow citizens in the blink of an eye.

Because the Lord said to do it.

Wait, he didn't?

Oh.

endlessQuestions
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Re: A Global Faith and Working on the Railroad - Unraveling One of the Most Interesting Threads To Appear On LDSFF

Post by endlessQuestions »

I think we call this a "Ponzi scheme" these days...

"at the time the utah central was completed there
was still about $400,000 owed to the subcontractors. in order to pay
off this debt young as previously indicated had determined to once
again attempt to sell bonds on the utah central after its completion."

endlessQuestions
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Re: A Global Faith and Working on the Railroad - Unraveling One of the Most Interesting Threads To Appear On LDSFF

Post by endlessQuestions »

Looks like things might get interesting here:

"the following february 1871 bishop sharp was authorized by young to borrow $200,000
from any available source for young's personal use...."

"...at this point the subcontractors had still not been completely paid off and it can only be assumed that the money was to be used for this purpose..."

"As it beameecame apparent that the bonds were not going to be disposed of as rapidly as anticipated the school of the prophets a group made up of most of the leading Mormon financial and spiritual leaders in salt lake city took the matter under advisement..."

"the resolve of the group was the organization of a committee whose purpose it was to impress upon church members the necessity of purchasing
utah central bonds"

Sounds legit.

endlessQuestions
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Re: A Global Faith and Working on the Railroad - Unraveling One of the Most Interesting Threads To Appear On LDSFF

Post by endlessQuestions »

The author of the paper tries to put it nicely:

"young seems to have changed his method of operation at this point
resolving debts incurred by the formation of the Utah central railroad
were now not only necessary to free young from his creditors and pay the
men who had labored to build the union pacific line but they began to
take on tones of a religious obligation with high ranking church officials sent out to administer the policy"

Isn't there a word for this?

endlessQuestions
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Re: A Global Faith and Working on the Railroad - Unraveling One of the Most Interesting Threads To Appear On LDSFF

Post by endlessQuestions »

The strong-arming and gaslighting begin:

"if the brethren who have agreed to assist me in throwing off this
burden prefer this way of doing it and will take upon themselves
the responsibility of introroducing duin into our midst such another
strong engine of gentile influence instead of controlling the
road themselves I would be pleased to have them say so in order
to settle this matter without further delay"

I'll translate:

"I invited the wolves in..."

"Now they're going to eat me..."

"And don't blame me for all the wolves around, because it's your fault for not saving my skin."

endlessQuestions
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Re: A Global Faith and Working on the Railroad - Unraveling One of the Most Interesting Threads To Appear On LDSFF

Post by endlessQuestions »

"the union pacific which was his antagonist in fighting against time to pay his subcontractors was also his
salvation..."

"due to financial difficulties in successive years the union pacific ultimately acquired the majority of youngs stock in the utah central obtaining a considerable portion of it as early as 1872..."

"...regardless of what else might be said of the young union pacific relationship it was mutually beneficial..."

The thing about mutually beneficial is that it's usually for beneficial for only one of the mutuals.

endlessQuestions
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Re: A Global Faith and Working on the Railroad - Unraveling One of the Most Interesting Threads To Appear On LDSFF

Post by endlessQuestions »

Well, we're to the concluding chapter of the paper. I don't want to include too much from that section, as it's less data and more opinion, but this seems appropriate to share:

"the negotiations with the union pacific as carried out by bishop john
sharp and joseph A young demonstrates that they were well liked and
highly respected by company officials

this is evidenced by the fact that sharp was later elected to a position on the union pacific board
of directors

if an instance arose in which young needed political
muscle in the east he might and possibly did obtain it from the company"

Indeed.

endlessQuestions
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Re: A Global Faith and Working on the Railroad - Unraveling One of the Most Interesting Threads To Appear On LDSFF

Post by endlessQuestions »

What a strange thing to say about a prophet of God:

"As a businessman he (Young) was certainly not above employing tactics to further the economic prosperity of utah by any legal means although such tactics may have come into moral question..."

endlessQuestions
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Re: A Global Faith and Working on the Railroad - Unraveling One of the Most Interesting Threads To Appear On LDSFF

Post by endlessQuestions »

And the final word:

"the grading contract and the final settlement withthe union pacific was a steppingstone to future mutually beneficial business dealings between the company, brigham young, and the mormon church."

Couldn't have put it better myself.

And sounds an awful lot like what AGF was trying to tell us we should look at, yes?

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InfoWarrior82
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Re: A Global Faith and Working on the Railroad - Unraveling One of the Most Interesting Threads To Appear On LDSFF

Post by InfoWarrior82 »

endlessismyname wrote: November 23rd, 2022, 10:02 am

So why did AGF choose this particular photo?

We'll start our investigation there...


I get the feeling it's a fake photo of a fake person that doesn't exist. Probably generated from: www.thispersondoesnotexist.com

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tmac
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Re: A Global Faith and Working on the Railroad - Unraveling One of the Most Interesting Threads To Appear On LDSFF

Post by tmac »

I’ve known this for quite some time, but the bottom line is there is more (perhaps much more) to the equation than might otherwise meet the eye.

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FoxMammaWisdom
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Re: A Global Faith and Working on the Railroad - Unraveling One of the Most Interesting Threads To Appear On LDSFF

Post by FoxMammaWisdom »

InfoWarrior82 wrote: November 29th, 2022, 12:37 pm
endlessismyname wrote: November 23rd, 2022, 10:02 am

So why did AGF choose this particular photo?

We'll start our investigation there...
I get the feeling it's a fake photo of a fake person that doesn't exist. Probably generated from: www.thispersondoesnotexist.com
I was asked to investigate the photo and check gender markers best I can with an angled suited high headshot that doesn't leave me tons to work with. I've been a bit distracted this week but the time I did spend on it led me to believe it might be a faked photo like in the link. AI DOES also blend genders when they make those fake people photos, so that might be adding to my confusion on this one. The photo is super low quality too - if I took a picture of a picture of a picture on my computer screen it would be a thousand times better quality than AGF's pic.

endlessQuestions
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Posts: 6426

Re: A Global Faith and Working on the Railroad - Unraveling One of the Most Interesting Threads To Appear On LDSFF

Post by endlessQuestions »

FoxMammaWisdom wrote: November 29th, 2022, 3:07 pm
InfoWarrior82 wrote: November 29th, 2022, 12:37 pm
endlessismyname wrote: November 23rd, 2022, 10:02 am

So why did AGF choose this particular photo?

We'll start our investigation there...
I get the feeling it's a fake photo of a fake person that doesn't exist. Probably generated from: www.thispersondoesnotexist.com
I was asked to investigate the photo and check gender markers best I can with an angled suited high headshot that doesn't leave me tons to work with. I've been a bit distracted this week but the time I did spend on it led me to believe it might be a faked photo like in the link. AI DOES also blend genders when they make those fake people photos, so that might be adding to my confusion on this one. The photo is super low quality too - if I took a picture of a picture of a picture on my computer screen it would be a thousand times better quality than AGF's pic.
Thanks for the analysis...

It takes some effort to make such a low quality picture, in my opinion.

Which, again, leads me to believe AGF was leaving us a clue by using that avatar pic.

As previously mentioned, it could be as simple as, "things aren't always what they seem"...

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The Red Pill
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Re: A Global Faith and Working on the Railroad - Unraveling One of the Most Interesting Threads To Appear On LDSFF

Post by The Red Pill »

Interesting thread. It makes a lot of sense when viewed from 40,000 feet. The church has certainly taken a STRONG turn to the left. Even if we put the church covid train wreck aside for the sake of argument...It just doesn't feel right, It doesn't feel like the Church I grew up in. Things did start to change with Hinkley.

I personally, write off Brigham through Grant because of polygamy and other crap introduced by Brigham.

There were presidents of the church that I believe were sincere and really tried to follow the Lord...like Benson, Kimball and Hunter...but RMN is the ghost of Brigham...and I don't even want to think about Oaks.

3Nephi18:25
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Re: A Global Faith and Working on the Railroad - Unraveling One of the Most Interesting Threads To Appear On LDSFF

Post by 3Nephi18:25 »

What would happen if one were to create a semi-transparent overlay from pics of Nelson and Oaks? I don't know why I am thinking about that, but trying to understand AGF's avatar pic has led me to it. I do believe there is something to be gathered by this avatar, but who knows? Fascinating discussion thread.

endlessQuestions
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Re: A Global Faith and Working on the Railroad - Unraveling One of the Most Interesting Threads To Appear On LDSFF

Post by endlessQuestions »

3Nephi18:25 wrote: November 29th, 2022, 5:24 pm What would happen if one were to create a semi-transparent overlay from pics of Nelson and Oaks? I don't know why I am thinking about that, but trying to understand AGF's avatar pic has led me to it. I do believe there is something to be gathered by this avatar, but who knows? Fascinating discussion thread.
I think on the original Railroad thread somebody attempted something along these lines.

As for me, I don't see any Oaks or Nelson in that photo - but I'm no expert.

nvr
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Re: A Global Faith and Working on the Railroad - Unraveling One of the Most Interesting Threads To Appear On LDSFF

Post by nvr »

If a person spends most of their time qualifying their message - giving their background, establishing credibility, excessive backstory etc. it's likely they don't have anything useful to say. I believe AGF's thread was an effort along the same lines as those 'Q' drops people went crazy over. I think they're meant to simply tie up people's time and energy for the poster's own amusement / benefit. The meat of many of AGF's posts appeared to contain AI-generated fluff (excused as elderly rambling). He liked to sprinkle starts of juicy tidbits every few days, but these were nothing more than rehashed info from publicly-available sources. He never had to fill in the rest of the theory, as the goal was simply to tie up people's attention - he'd revert into ramble-mode or infighting with impatient responders in the between times.

His avatar also looks to me like a generative adversarial network (GAN) - created image (there's another fellow here who has a similar artificial-appearing avatar.)

I tried checking the avatar using this extension- it said 100% real, but it's only geared to detect one version of AI-generated imagery (it's a constant race).

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FoxMammaWisdom
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Re: A Global Faith and Working on the Railroad - Unraveling One of the Most Interesting Threads To Appear On LDSFF

Post by FoxMammaWisdom »

3Nephi18:25 wrote: November 29th, 2022, 5:24 pm What would happen if one were to create a semi-transparent overlay from pics of Nelson and Oaks? I don't know why I am thinking about that, but trying to understand AGF's avatar pic has led me to it. I do believe there is something to be gathered by this avatar, but who knows? Fascinating discussion thread.
That's funny I thought of doing something similar to see if he might be a blended version of some general authorities.

endlessQuestions
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Re: A Global Faith and Working on the Railroad - Unraveling One of the Most Interesting Threads To Appear On LDSFF

Post by endlessQuestions »

nvr wrote: November 29th, 2022, 5:51 pm If a person spends most of their time qualifying their message - giving their background, establishing credibility, excessive backstory etc. it's likely they don't have anything useful to say. I believe AGF's thread was an effort along the same lines as those 'Q' drops people went crazy over. I think they're meant to simply tie up people's time and energy for the poster's own amusement / benefit. The meat of many of AGF's posts appeared to contain AI-generated fluff (excused as elderly rambling). He liked to sprinkle starts of juicy tidbits every few days, but these were nothing more than rehashed info from publicly-available sources. He never had to fill in the rest of the theory, as the goal was simply to tie up people's attention - he'd revert into ramble-mode or infighting with impatient responders in the between times.

His avatar also looks to me like a generative adversarial network (GAN) - created image (there's another fellow here who has a similar artificial-appearing avatar.)

I tried checking the avatar using this extension- it said 100% real, but it's only geared to detect one version of AI-generated imagery (it's a constant race).
Thanks, nvr, you made your position pretty clear on the original thread as well.

I, for one, have already learned several important things from AGF’s “ramblings”, and will therefore proceed to pick out what I think is useful and see where it leads.

Have a wonderful night!

blitzinstripes
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Posts: 2294

Re: A Global Faith and Working on the Railroad - Unraveling One of the Most Interesting Threads To Appear On LDSFF

Post by blitzinstripes »

I thought that A Global Faith changed his name and was posting (relatively) recently in some of the polygamy threads? I'm sorry,I can't remember the username at the moment.


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Luke
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Re: A Global Faith and Working on the Railroad - Unraveling One of the Most Interesting Threads To Appear On LDSFF

Post by Luke »

blitzinstripes wrote: November 29th, 2022, 8:20 pm Was it Magnus Macleod?
They’re different people.

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