Lets talk fact not fiction....

Apparently, you have not studied the *Mormon* view of this subject very much.

The general view (I wouldn't call it a consensus) is that the Americas have always been populated by a variety of peoples. MesoAmerica in particular is a melting pot of races, cultures and languages. The Jaredites would form the earliest known group, but disappeared as a nation about the time that Lehi and his family arrived south of them. There must have been others already here, which formed the population "base" of both the Lamanite and Nephite nations: ie. Laman and Nephi became essentially kings over an indigenous population of a lower order than themselves: the "Nephites" elevated those who followed them, creating towns and a grain based culture; while the "Lamanites" remained low, nomadic, hunter/gatherer types, unclothed and sunburnt, etc. Over the centuries the "Nephites" further melded with the "Mulekites", a group of those from around Jerusalem who had arrived here separately a few years later and were discovered by the "Nephites" wandering in exile with the legitimate king (Mosiah the first): again, the higher Nephites became the rulers of the lower order Mulekites, and Mosiah was accepted as king of the lot. The Mulekites learned the language of the their fathers (having corrupted it in a few centuries until the people of Mosiah could not understand them when they first met): they did not have a written language of their own, while Mosiah brought the brass plates and the records of his own people since their arrival in the Americas. The whole race became known as the "Nephites", although amongst themselves for the first few generations the Mulekites and Nephites remained a distinct people under the Nephite kings and later judges.

How this all relates to beards and lost lore remains a mystery: but you can see the great complexity implied in the B of M: far more complex than the simple, straight-forward account as given. There must have been a large and scattered and unorganized population of indigenous peoples, the remnants of Jaredites (who numbered in the millions before being virtually annihilated) and even others who had been here before and came after.

Mining and grain culture and animals (notably the horse) refered to but never found remain mysteries that we await answers for. But when you consider how huge the implied area and time frame are for the B of M, and the fact that archeological evidence is still in its infancy - with the vast majority of land involved still untouched - it is easy to assume that much remains to be discovered about all the peoples who have inhabited this hemisphere.

It should be remarked upon too, that the B of M doesn't pretend to be anything like an overview history of the Americas as a whole: but only a particular and rather small group and their enemies. The land mass implied in the narrative cannot have been very large: at least nothing like North and South America, with the Isthmus of Panama forming the "narrow neck of land" spoken of: yet this was the original consensus view of Joseph Smith and the other early memebers of the church. Joseph Smith obviously did not receive particular revelation upon this subject, and was left to guess about details like the rest of us.

Therefore, the answer of disappearing beards, repidly changing language, a paucity of modern evidence concerning things mentioned in the B of M (like mining remains, grain culture and horses), and even the actual location in the Americas of the Nephite kingdom, remain unanswered questions.

But before you gloat and return with a quick and disparaging reply, consider a similar Biblical problem: the antiBiblical group (composed mostly of atheists) enjoy attacking the veracity of the Bible by claiming that there is no outside evidence of the truth of the Bible story: none whatsoever. For instance, the story of a captive Israel, slaving away in Egypt and building the monuments for them, is not supported by even so much as one scrap of archeological evidence: there is written evidence that a laboring, lower class of Egyptians were paid to build Ramses II's monuments, but nothing at all about a slave population who rose up and migrated away in their millions after despoiling Egypt. Ergo, the Bible is only a concocted story by Israelites to show the world why they had a legitimate claim upon their promised lands. It is no more true in detail than Homer: and therefore as a legitimate history of real events it is worthless.

Now, you can believe in the Bible literally, or you can temporize it to you heart's content. And the B of M remains in the same "dilemma": either you believe it according to the Spirit bearing witness to its truthfulness, or you don't. I gather from the rather deliberate lack of physical evidence for the Bible and the B of M, that God intends his believers to depend upon these unseen evidences of the heart, and not upon physical findings, in order to believe. Later, after it has become moot, the physical evidence will be discovered (revealed) to everyone's satisfaction. Until then, we must study and pray as the record demands, and want to know if it is true or not: not just make up our minds ahead of time.