People will generally accept a bad answer rather than no answer at all. This is part of why religion is so popular.

The religious do themselves a disservice when they attempt to use scientific discovery to justify their beliefs because in so doing they undermine the one thing they've got going for them, the mystery of the unexplained.

In mormonism reference to this sort of magical knowledge is made constantly with terms such as; the veil, the mysteries of god, strange and mysterious ways, things we wont understand in this life...etc. Apologists such as FARMS and FAIR effectively destroy the magical properties of religion. By pointing to supposed evidence that supports religious claims they open the door to scientific scrutiny and suggest that beliefs need to be justified by evidence.

I feel episode one of the new Star Wars trilogy demonstrated this to some degree. In the first three movies (episodes 4-6) the force was always referred to as some mysterious cosmic force. In episode 1, they attempted to explain it scientifically as little bugs that live inside stuff, which some people can communicate with, or something along those lines.

For me this effectively ruined forever the idea of "The Force" Star Wars was cool because it had mysterious and magical properties in addition to the future age space stuff. Thanks to the crap job done in the Phantom Menace, one of the best pieces of science fiction became instead science crap and silly.

Seriously, one of the biggest reasons I was able to leave Mormonism is that when posing a confusing doctrinal problem those trying to help me would immediatly use junk science, or just make crap up to appease me. Scientific apologetics are the enemy of religion which is based in mystery and myth, not scientific discovery and truth.

Or, people will generally accept a bad answer that validates their preconceptions rather than a valid answer that challenges them.

But, yeah, one of the lamest things Mormonism does is try to explain or justify doctrines using temporal reasons. For example, saying polygamy was to take care of widows, or claiming the Word of Wisdom makes medical sense. If Mormons were actually operating on a spiritual plane, the only justification necessary would be that God commanded it. End of story. They'd wear garments just because it's commanded, not because they might be protected from physical harm. They'd pay tithing just because it's commanded, not because they might get blessings.

But Mormons want to appear smarter than those who don't buy their crap. They want to have smart sounding reasons for doing stupid stuff. And the Mopologists are there to help supply them.