This was the interview that the Mormon Apologists Daniel C. Peterson and John Butler had with radio talk show host Hugh Hewitt. The entire transcript for this interview is available on the "Mormon Truth Interviews" blog.

Here are some highlights from the interview:

HH: And let me begin with you, Dr. Daniel Peterson. What does the Book of Mormon state about the population of North America, six hundred years before the birth of Christ?

DP: THE BOOK OF MORMON DOESN'T REALLY TALK ABOUT NORTH AMERICA. WE DON'T KNOW EXACTLY WHERE THE BOOK OF MORMON STORY TOOK PLACE. Most people who study it now think probably in Mesoamerica.

HH: Where is that, for the benefit of people like me?

DP: Mesoamerica would be essentially Central America. We're talking Southern Mexico, Northern Guatemala, probably.

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HH:...Now I'd like to go, and I'll be back to you in a second, Dr. Butler on the DNA stuff. The Book of Mormon has been studied, debated, criticized, DEBUNKED, attacked, upheld, died for, martyred over, the subject of persecution for years.

DP: RIGHT.

HH: And now, at BYU, and my old friend Neal Maxwell would tell me, there was research going into the discovery of historical affirmation of its text. What's the strongest bit of evidence that the Church puts forward as validating its story?

DP: WELL, I DON'T THINK THE CHURCH IS REALLY IN THE BUSINESS OF PUTTING FORWARD THE EVIDENCE, BUT SOME OF US SCHOLARS WHO ARE INTERESTED(AND WORK FOR MORMON OWNED AND RUN FARMS) IN THIS SORT OF THING, HAVE BEGUN TO DO IT ON OUR OWN. AND THE CHURCH DOESN'T ENDORSE OR DENOUNCE ON THE WHOLE WHAT WE DO OR SAY, SO WE'RE LEFT TO ADVOCATE OUR OWN IDEAS. But here are some things that I see. Now we would say first of all, YOU'RE NEVER GOING TO HAVE DEFINITIVE PROOF OF THE BOOK OF MORMON, or anything else really religiously significant, probably. NOT IN THIS LIFE. YOU HAVE TO GO BY SPIRITUAL WITNESS ON THOSE SORT OF THINGS. But, there are...boy, we could go on for this or with this for an hour or more. To me, some of the most impressive things are the testimonies of the witnesses who saw the plates, who remain faithful to their testimony for the rest of their lives, no matter what happened to them.

HH: That's familiar of Christian APOLOGETICS...

DP: RIGHT.

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HH: Has a structure been discovered, Dr. Peterson, similar to some of the structures of Old Testament and New Testament Bible, that are traced to, say, Jacob's well, or David's escape route? That sort of thing?

DP: Well, you could...our problem in the New World is the archeology is far less developed than in the old. We're talking about the pre-classic period. In most cases, WE DON'T EVEN KNOW THE NAMES OF THE PLACES WE'RE LOOKING AT. The ruins are there. It's not that these people disappeared without a trace. IT'S THAT WE DON'T KNOW EXACTLY HOW TO RECOGNIZE THE TRACES.

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The blog for this podcast on "Mormon Truth Interviews", also contains Simon Southerton's "official response" to John Butler's comments on FARMS.