Why do atheats spend so much time and energy arguing about something they don't even think exists. Well, I can think of a few answers off the top of my head. One, talking to people that have fundamental disagreements with you can help you practice the lost art of civil conversation and can help maintain channels of communication that are frequently under attacked these days. Two, As philosopher David Hume said, truth
springs from argument amongst friends. That means, among other things, that the truth is more likely to be found when all sides are vigorously represented. Three And this one's actually pretty common among atheists because many people do believe in a god and they bring those beliefs to bear when doing things like voting and doing other things that influence our laws, employment expectations, and social norms. And I'm sure there's plenty of other reasons as well, But in my opinion,
the best answer is who cares? Why does that matter at all? Quit deflecting and just back up the claims that you make. In fact, you can do that right here on Talk Heathen, because that's what the show is all about, and it's starting right now.
Welcome everybody. Today is April thirteenth, twenty twenty five. I am your host, Doctor Ben, and with me today is the wonderful Scott Dickey. How are you doing that?
Doing very well? Doctor Ben? How about yourself?
You know I'm doing okay. It is Palm Sunday, I believe for people who celebrate that, or at least it is in the non orthodox side of Christianity. I know their calendar is a bit different, but I want to hear some calls today related to that. I know we have a pretty heavy Christian presence in this country, and in the side shot of this show, I want to hear you bring some evidence for your claims of the resurrection for Jesus, even going to Jerusalem for the importance
of Good Friday. There's so much to unpack, and if I remember correctly, you all have a duty per your scripture that you should be spreading the word of Jesus Christ, and this is your time to do it. We have open lines. We're also here happy to talk about secular humanism, cosmology, philosophy, science, history, life, anything else that's kind of going on your in your
mind today related to religion and all of that. So get your calls in talking Then is a product as a production of the Atheist Community of Austin, a five oh one C three nonprofit organization dedicated to the promotion of atheism, critical thinking, secular humanism, and the separation of religion and government. If you would love to get your
call in, we want to hear from you. You can call five one two nine nine one nine two four two, or you can use your computer browser at tiny dot c c slash call thh and get your halls in. Earlier on in the shows that we have enough time to address all of that conversation. But in the meantime we have our favorite segments of the week talk Heathen to me. I'm gonna bring up our good friend Richard Gilliver to take us away.
Jared Hello, Hello, Hello today I've come up unmuted. Unlike last week where I did a Jonny p Angel and came up muted, It's time for ok then to me segments where we get into the questions of the weekend. Last week we asked you what what atheists heaven look like? And here top three answers. So number three comes from Kaimore, who says, what would atheist heaven be? Free access to entire groves of the Tree of Knowledge. Yeah, maybe maybe, Gents, what do you think of that one?
So there'd be like a variety of all different kinds of knowledge and you could go to the tree. Like it's kind of like Neo and the Matrix. Right, He's like, you go to the tree and you're like, I know kung Fu?
Now, right? Is that how that works?
It'd be cool. Yeah, I think I could. I think we could live with that.
Number two comes from If I'm reading this correctly, there's probably some weirdy moticon thing going off here, but to me, it looks like it says why Sally b Unfortunately Etheist seven is mostly empty. We all end up in LDS heaven because of course humoussion is. So let's hope we don't have to wear silver suits like Joseph Smith. Joseph Smith predicted on the moon there were people living who had so looked kind of like us. We're around the
same eye of us. But I had silver suits on another great thing you got wrong.
Imagine if imagine if you tried to go to atheist heaven and you're like, oh, man, I studied so much philosophy in life. I committed so much blasphemy in life. I'm ready to go drink mountain dew and play video games for all maternity and then you just end up having a turn old spirit babies for the rest of forever, Mormon babies let down there.
And number one goes to Miranda Rensberger, who says it is heaven is unlimited doughnuts and no diabetes. I think myself and Ben have this sing way we talked about food a lot is done so today in the pre show because we want to help himself on the right fo here and again the feeling we could really really go with that one the question of the week.
Before you hold on, before you get to the new question, I noticed that the the number three entry there you said the name with a very convincing Welsh accent.
Could you say that again for us?
Yeah, we are convinced. So here's our new conspiracy, and I are convinced that Richard is actually secretly Welsh.
I think that's the.
Last year down from this.
And sorry for the interruption they're carrying just at that point.
That is actually I mean, it could be Irish gallic, but it looks very much like Scott's gallic to me. And that would be pronounced if I'm correct kai more and it doesn't look like that rich gallic and none of the words look like how they are pronounced. And I am not Welsh. Just let's just set the record straight. I love Welsh people. I've got nothing against Welsh people. Hello, all our Welsh fans. You are a little of people. Despite the joke I made last week about shinning sheep, you.
Are of people.
I am not Welsh. Let's just get that very very clear.
So the prompt of the week for next week, why is Easter on twenty four twenty this year? I'm doing it the wrong way around because we don't use it. So why it's Easter on four twenty this year? So you two, I'm going to throw it open to you. Why why is Easter on fourth on the fourth, on the twentieth of the fourth this year? This is confused?
In the hell?
How of me this premiated this way?
Why are you chased?
You on the twentieth of the fall this year?
I'm going to take a ray comfort argument today, which is something will probably be clipped out of context and sent all around the internet that I'm making a ray comfort argument. But in his you know banana argument, where if the human hand was not meant to hold the banana, or like if the banana was not designed to be the perfect shape to be held in a human hand.
You know, all of that is it's just evidence of a creator, right, And so four twenty it's like, if God did not want us to smoke pot, then why would he create it in the first place. If everything is so intelligently designed, why are these plants so wonderfully smokable? So it's on four twenty obviously, because there's an intent that you should be doing this, you should be combining these holidays into one.
We don't dr Goose on this showly, but I think we're seeing.
I think we're seeing a conversion of Doctor Ben into Rastafarianism right here in front.
Of our eyes.
But I would say that Easter's on four to twenty this year because I think somehow the universe knew that we would need a little bit extra help maintaining our chill at family get togethers in twenty twenty five. So I think that's why that Easter happens to fall on fourt I can't wait to see where Christmas is going to fall.
Yeah, it is not by chance?
Is not by chance?
Great answers, guys.
If you want answer that question without endolse and drug goose in any way, shape or form, please do so in the comments in the YouTube section and we will video once is out next week.
I have a great show, guys. I'm off scar see you Lisa. All right, thank you Richard. And with that as well, we're going to highlight some of the amazing people working behind the scenes, working on the editing, working on audio video, all of that. So let's throw it to the crew cam. Thank you so much to the mods and the side chat, all the call screeners. We greatly appreciate what you do. And an attractive bunch we
got there. Oh definitely. Yeah, all right, are you ready to take the first call of the show.
I am ready to take the first call of the show, Doctor Ben, let's hit.
It all right, let's talk to Steve pronounce him from Florida. What topic do you have for us today?
Kind of thrown in this really quick, but I have a problem with this atheism and this selfish looking at your navel and hedonism and the long term effects of society as everybody's going secular. We can see birth rates going down, and as if everybody embrace this selfishness society.
Because I have a lot of questions, Yeah, I have a lot of questions. Do you think that atheism is equivalent to hedonism? Are these like synonymous philosophies?
Well, where does atheism have any oughts not to be hedonistic?
Say that again?
Are you Are you saying that anything that doesn't explicitly say to not be hedonistic automatically promotes hedonism? Is that what you're suggesting there? It's because it seems like you're that's a really big stretch you're making there. How many atheists do you know? Just out of curiosity? How many atheists have you actually met and talked to?
I watch all these channels, a lot of these.
Channels, and you see us promoting hedonism?
Well, what is doctor ben?
Okay? Can you I don't like where this is going. If you are going to call it individual people and make targeted statements on something that's not really related, we're not going to continue this conversation. So we're gonna we're going to talk about hedonism and atheism. Can you define hedonism and how you are using the term.
Doing whatever you want to do with yourself.
So bodily autonomy is hedonism? Is that what you were.
Saying in this case? Yes? Because if everybody was to do exactly what you're doing, how long will society last? How long will we manage that?
Specifically? What are you talking? I feel like I know where you're going with this and I'm about to mute your ass.
Well, but that's my point.
You're so, how is bodily autonomy hedonistic? How is that hedonistic?
What have you done to yourself?
I do not want to engage in this conversation related to trans people. Can you stick on the topic of hedonism and atheism? What is what is hedonism other than like bodily autonomy? Because are you going to suggest that people who are religious don't have bodyly autonomy? Do you, in your every day to day life do you just let other people make decisions for your body or do you have some agency in that?
Well, let's hold on a second. I'm getting kind of a little confused on here is body of autonomy the right to kill your child in your womb?
Were are getting kind of on a tangent. We can talk about do you want to talk about abortion or do you want to talk about hedonism because you are dodging the subject right now that.
What that would call hedonism, and and just being all involved with your say.
You're calling you're defining. The way you're defining hedonism is not a way that most philosophers would define that term. So if hedonism is that drink and be merry because you're going to die at some point, if that's what we typically define as hedonism, that is a separate discussion from what you're going on with h with autonomy.
And so your claim is.
That atheism is the same as hedonism, which I will point out right now that there are many atheists that don't agree with bodily autonomy arguments. There are plenty of atheists who are transphobic, homophobic, There are plenty of atheists who do not agree with the same things that Scott and I do, and yet they're still atheists. So if you want to say that these two are the philosophy,
you can't. You can't use the arguments that you're using, right, So I'm a bit confused about what your understanding is of these philosophies and how you are asserting that they are one and the same thing.
If I could interject here for a second, real quick here, sorry, Steve, are you it says here that you're a theist or are you a particular flavor of theists. Are you a Christian or are you something else? Or what kind of okay? And so are you? Are you a Christian? Against your will? Are you being forced to worship the God of Christianity or are you choosing.
To do that?
No? I'm not being forced, okay?
So so then are you being hedonistic because you're doing what you want according to your definition of hedonism? I mean doing what you want? I mean, wasn't isn't free will? Isn't that a key part of the relationship between the Christian God and Christians?
Right?
Isn't that part of it? Isn't don't Christians do what they want?
Or?
Are you forced to do things that you don't want to do?
Well?
I've got commandments and things like that limiting what I can do.
Well, I mean that they they're limit maybe what you think you should do. But just because the commandment isn't there, Just because there's a commandment that says thou shalt not kill, doesn't mean that Christians can't kill. It means that it might motivate a Christian to choose to not kill, but they're still doing what they want, right, Isn't that?
In fact, isn't.
That a major part of committing yourself to your God is choosing to devote your life to live this lifestyle. So you're doing exactly the same thing that you were just saying is equivalent to atheism. You're doing what you want to do.
Atheism has no rules of aughts, but.
That doesn't affect whether what you do. You're still choosing.
If that's the case, if Christianity has shoulds and aughts built into it, you still choose to do that. You still want to follow those those strictures, right, those limitations you voluntarily. In fact, that's a major part of being Christianity. Being a Christian is giving yourself into that. You're choosing to do it.
Yeah, using to follow a hierarchy, which.
Okay, so as a hedonist.
Then as a hedonist, since you're doing what you want, why aren't you an atheist?
Then okay, so then we're all heathenists then, right.
According to the definition.
Yeah, because your definition of hedonism is not very consistent with the way that it's typically used, and I reject the idea that there's supposed to be a like a set of moral arts or a set of rules for every single philosophical system that you're adopting. Like so, according to you and many Christians that would say Christianity includes your beliefs in a higher power or your beliefs in like the origin of the universe, et cetera, and also includes a moral system, Atheism is not like that. It
does not encompass both sides of that. It is only it's only for your beliefs on you know, where we came from, what is the universe? Where does it come from? All that? And like is there a higher power? Is there not? Like that's really the only question that atheism addresses. There's no claim in atheism to address morality, Like none of that is encompassed within atheism itself. So I think you're making an assumption that it does cover all of
this when we're not making that claim at all. So if you're an atheist, you probably have some other moral framework that you go by. For us, it's secular humanism, which yes, kind of fits into atheism in that it is secular and does not rely on a higher power. But not all atheists are secular humanists. There are probably atheists who are hedonists, but that is separate from their atheism. Does that make sense, like they're separate categories of belief systems.
There's all different flavors. Yes, But if we look at the overall picture of the secularism in the secular West, the birth rates are going down. The selfishness is going up, the hedonism is going up.
The birth rates are going down everywhere on the globe. So you can't say that this is just related to primarily atheist areas. There's can you think of some reasons that are not religiously based why birth rates might be going down. It's a multivariate problem.
Right, Well, the biggest thing is is everybody wants to do what they want to do.
Steve, let me ask you a question, because it sounds like you do have children, Steve, yes, too, grown children. How much money have you spent on your children? First of all, like how expensive was it to even deliver children, like in a hospital setting? And along with that, how expensive is it to feed your kids, to clothe your kids, to give them education if you're not going through a
public school. But even if you are going through public school, like their school supplies, they're like sports for your kids, like activities for your kids. It's expensive to raise children, right, Steve.
But I'm not so concerned about the materialism.
But here's the thing, Like, should people bring children into the world if they cannot provide for them.
If they're a materialist?
Probably not in general. I want to know, Steve, if you had the option to have children and you had no money, you had no way to support a family, would it be a good decision. Would it be a responsible decision to have children and bring them into the world. Do you think that that is Do you think that that is ethical for you to do that?
If you kind of look at the statistics, the poorest people are having the most children.
That's not what I asked you, Steve.
Answer my question, well, I don't like the materialist argument.
You're not talking about materialism, Steve. Stop saying that it's materialism. I'm asking you if it is ethical to bring a child into the world knowing that you cannot financially support them, Like, is it okay to bring somebody into the world if they are going to have a life of suffering where they are not provided for, where they don't have access to care, access to food, access to clothing, Is that
okay to bring them into the world. And people might have different takes on this, like I'm not necessarily saying that, like I'm anti natalist, but there are plenty of reasons beyond self interest to not have children, and a lot of people, especially younger people now, are faced with an economy that cannot really support their needs. How can they support other people? Like that's that's a conundrum that a lot of people are put in, and it's a conundrum
globally as well. There are there are plenty of people around the world who cannot support children, and so it is a multivariate problem that you are limiting yourself to such a black and white lens and focusing only on whether or not it's materialistic, and you're missing some nuance here, Steve.
I'm agreeing with you. The world is very materialistic and that's what the economy's like, and it's but that.
Is not individuals. That's not individuals for the most part making that decision. That is like, do you think that individ vidual people are responsible for what their governments do?
Individual people will know because we're kind of a democracy right now. So it's all mob.
Rule like globally, Yeah, and globally too. Do you think people like in rural Iran are responsible for what their country is doing politically? Well, are they responsible for their economic situation? Well, no, no, they're not. They're not. They have no control over they have no control over the economy that they are born into. They have no control over those rules governing them for the most part. Like, it's very it's very intellectually dishonest to suggest that lower
birth rates are solely related to secularism. Right, so that points debunked. What else you got? What other evidence do you have that atheists are hedonistic?
Have we moved more towards secularism in the last fifty years than theism?
Where? Where are you talking about? Are you talking specifically America? Are you talking globally?
Basically, the secularism is taking over the whole planet.
Which I don't have specific statistics. I would think, based on trends that there is an increase in secular people and people identifying as non religious. However, I need you to bring more to the tables to suggest that this actually is a trend and that this is a problem. Right, So why is that a problem?
Well, it is a problem. For one thing, Most of these Western secular countries are importing people from the more religious countries that have children to replace the fact that they're not having any kids.
Or do you have any reason to believe that that's true. I heard the words that you said, and I understand what you're saying. Do you have any reason to think that that's actually the case?
Well, look at all the countries that are importing all the.
Religious No, I'm asking me to look at something is not what I'm looking for here. Okay, do you have any reason to think that I'm assuming that your reasoning is not based off of what doctor Ben and Scott Dickey have looked at or not looked at. Okay, So you said, Earl that the poorest are having the most children. So there that seem to imply that there's some kind of economic connection. Do you have a similar kind of Do you have any research at all that's connecting secular
or atheist perspectives to lower birth rates? In addition to that, as doctor Benn also said, is that a bad thing was our birth rate maybe even too high?
Earlier?
Is higher birth rate associated with healthier populations or healthier well being? Have you done any homework at all in any way related to any part of your question.
Well, look at it this way. If the birth rate stays the same right now as it is.
Is that a no?
Is that a no?
Have you done any research or have you done any homework at all to look into what the real world is like and to see if it's compared to the way that you think it is.
Yeah, the real world trending right now is lower and lower birth rates.
Right and what you're saying, and there are multiple reasons for that, as we mentioned, and yes, like there are some problems that you can have with lower birth ba rates. However, there's also problems with increasing the birth rates. So, yeah, you want a population that isn't super top heavy, or
you have people that can enter the workforce at younger ages. However, you have on the flip side an issue where if you run out of resources, you're going to have a falling population anyway, like you need to, like, at some point you're going to reach a cap in how many people can be alive on this planet and have access to those resources, which that cap currently you know, is kind of artificially lowered in a way because of economic
disparities like we have. Probably at the moment, we have enough resources to go around, but they are not equally distributed, and so you also have to consider the fall in population because of resource allocation. So there's multiple var variables that you're not taking into account, and you're just focusing on the ones that make your case look a little bit better.
I think we have very good resource redistribution in the US. We've got a.
Problem, absolutely not, Absolutely not. I would love for you to go to like Los Angeles or places with like higher homeless populations, because our country is really really bad at helping people get the care that they need. But yeah, there's a huge wealth disparity, and especially now we're seeing
a lot of that come to light. But I think I think you're so focused on wanting this to be related to hedonism and related to Arise and secularism and not necessarily seeing the other components of this whole question. There's also in a lot of ways we see Christianity
playing a part in the wealth disparity. Right. We see megachurches, We see people who are super rich, super rich pastors having like all of their jets that they own, having huge mansions that they are not being taxed on because it is part of their ministry and they're getting that funding from the poor people in their communities. Right, they are encouraging this wealth disparity in a lot of ways.
So when you say that this hedonism is related to arise in secularism, I want to pose to you, have you looked at the disparities within Christian communities, within religious communities, and because I think in order to make your case you have to demonstrate that secular communities have worse problems with this than religious communities, and that's not the evidence that I have seen. Have not suggested that. It's actually suggested that there's a lot of issues within more religious communities.
So what kind of what's your rebuttal to that?
Well, if you look at the most secular states, they have the most people living on the streets doing drugs and legalized drugs.
But think about this, where are the most people concentrated.
I think you need to re look at a different map that talks about drug use. Okay, I think I think maybe your your your information might be might be incorrect. But you know, I don't want to have a meme battle here, right, We're not talking about you know, sound bites taking off of a video that you saw on YouTube and using that as an argument. Okay, if you want to, I've said this before, and I'll say it until the day that I show us your work, right,
show us your your research. Back up what you're saying. Maybe think about it for a few minutes before you call us.
Don't think. Don't you Oh, I saw this great meme.
I'm going to call talk Heathen today and just talk out of my ass, you know, for fifteen minutes. Look, do a little bit, at least the bare minimum amount of research. Look up what's really happening. And don't you say, well, just look at it that this is what happened. You're just saying things. Back it up, Back up what you're saying.
Can you do that?
Very religious and seculars.
We're even listening to what I said.
Yeah, you're not listening. Do you understand population densities?
Yeah, but we're not talking densities. We're talking religion now and ethic.
We're also talk we're talking about You had mentioned that secular areas have higher amounts of people that are using substances, and I want to ask you our areas with more people let's say Seattle, Like, if I take Seattle, of course it's going to have like a higher density of people doing that than people in like rural Oklahoma because they have more people period, right, Like, if you have more people, you're going to have more people that fit
a certain demographic, right, Like I'm very confused on if you understand statistics at all, because this is very elementary level math, right, Like more people, Like, if you have more people, the more likely you're going to have any number of demographics represented and a higher concentration of them. So you'd have to compare the percentage of a population with another area's percentage of population. So you can't just take the raw number and then compare them because you're
you're dealing with entirely different populations. Right, So can you bring a citation that addresses population percentages and like prevalence?
Well, if we love all these dates with the biggest problems, they're now far less religious than they were.
Fifty or you're not addressing this, you know, I think we're going to move on because you're not listening. You're not listening and something too, like I don't know if you're familiar with Scott Dickey who we have here on the show. But he's really good at math and statistics falls underneath the subject of math, and I bet he'd be willing to like, if you'd be willing to listen to him, he could talk a bit more about how these percentages are calculated, why this isn't like a one
for one issue. But I think you need to do a little bit more homework before we have this discussion anything.
I think so too.
I think so too, you know, And even if you did find a correlation, which you know, the information that I found is.
Actually the flip of that, the reverse of that.
We can find that in many of the states that have the highest percentage of drug use per capita, taking into account population size there, the states that have the highest drug use per capita are very often the most have the highest religiosity as well. And so I'm not claiming that that means religiosity is tied to drug use specifically. I wouldn't say that because I don't have all the information.
We haven't done, you know, the proper types of controlled research and that kind of thing, and so it's clearly at least not supporting what you're saying. So look into it. Look into it, beyond the meme. Look beyond the meme. Okay, don't just stop at the at the sound bite and then you know the headlines don't necessarily have the entire story.
Okay, so please go look into it.
I would I would love to have this conversation with you, But what I don't want to have is just a well consider this and then throw up a meme on the screen. You know, let's talk. Let's have a substantive talk about what's really happening. And that's fine, and we can look into that together. But what you're given us is just it's just empty. It's just empty and vacuous. I mean, we've established that that's your opinion, and that's fine, that's your opinion.
Great, is it more than your opinion?
And if you want us to believe that it's more than your opinion, then you'll need to come with something a little more substantial.
Absolutely.
Do you agree with that, Steve, or do you think that you've got a substantial case?
Okay, I dropped him.
Okay, well that's fine, that's fine. I think we know what he would have said anyway.
Oh yeah, but like Steve, you're welcome to call back just like maybe do a little bit of homework first, and also just for people wanting to call in, we want to have a conversation with you, We want to talk, We want to have a good discussion about the issues. But we will not accept targeted calls. We will not accept calls where you call in to target a host and insult them and say that their identity is wrong or that they don't get to have like basic decency
and respect because they are of a certain demographic. Like that is unacceptable and we will not tolerate that. So do not bring those conversations. If you want to talk about you know, gender issues as a whole, like fine, but do not do not target specific individuals in your calls, please, I agree. Yeah, and now after we let our blood pressure settle a little bit, serenity. Now, this is a
great community to be a part of. We have a lot of great people you know on the show's hosting, behind the scenes, but it takes a lot of a lot of work, a lot of time and effort, and a lot of community building to put all of this into motion. And you can join us in our community. You can go to www. Dot Atheist Hyphencommunity dot org. Where you can learn about the organization as a whole. You can learn about our policies and how you can get involved if that is something that you are wanting
to do. We have other ways to support the channel as well. You can send super chats and I know you've probably seen them on the screen today and we will try to read them as they come in live on the air as long as it is appropriate and something that we are safe to read on the show. So send those in, we will read them. And I think we've had some come in.
Do we do think we do have We do have a few super chats on deck right.
Now, Scott.
Would you like to read those?
I'd be happy to. I'd be happy to.
Our first super chat of the day is from Vegan Aliens for two dollars. Thank you, Vegan Aliens for those two dollars. Watch Christ Spiracy. Watch Christ Spiracy. Is that I'm not familiar with?
That is that sounds like a movie? Maybe that could be?
That could be I'll look into it.
Christ's Spiracy all right, Neiro, we have next up for ten dollars. Hedonism means min maxing pain and pleasure. Proper hedonistic philosophy supports healthy behavior and balance in life. The misrepresentation of it as gluttony and pleasure at all costs is a scarecrow. Definitely a straw man happening there. Thank you Nero for pointing that one out. And Nero came back again with another five dollars saying, Steve, how many Christian private schools are there in the US versus secular
private schools thirty four five hundred versus fourteen thousand. That's because of wealth disparity, and we certainly can't argue with that. And please let's change the subject before I start talking about school vouchers, because I will just go on to no end there.
Yeah, thank you everyone for the supercat so far. Any others that come in we will read at the end of the show. But that is a great way to support the channel and get a little shout out on the air. Another way that you can support us is getting some talk y then merch. You can go to tiny dot cc slash merch Aca. You can get hats, tea, crop tops, pint glasses and all of this other stuff you can see on the screen. Of course you can get merch from the other shows too. I guess it's okay.
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want to talk about Jesus, evolution and Charles Darwin. What specifically is your question or argument today?
Hey?
Doing all right? How about you?
Are you in there?
Ye?
Can you hear here?
So? I've been in been on your little comment sections there for a while. I don't know if it's yours or the atheists experience. I know the atheist experience. I just listened to him on Thursday night whatever. It was the man and a woman on there, and I am the guy got a little upset about the guy saying that love doesn't exist. So what's your take on that? Does love exist? There's no such things love or love exists?
What do you What do you mean by do you mean like the emotion? Does it? What do you and what do you mean by exist?
Like?
You can't have like a bucket full of love?
Can you? So you mean exist in some other kind.
It was your host that said, oh, wait a minute, Wait a minute, wait a minute. It was your host that said, he doesn't there no such thing as love.
Well, that wasn't me, and I don't think it was doctor Ben. So you're talking to us now, Yeah, we.
Need some more context, right, I don't know what in what context that discussion was being had, So do you have any clarification on that?
But anyway, yeah, no, no, no, I just I just want to start it out that in there. But really what I want to talk about was our our our assistant pastor today because our pastor is down taking hopefully taking care of his parents. But he preached today and I was just like holy smoked. And of course they didn't tape it, but he talked about Charles Darwin. You're familiar with Charles Darwin, I'm sure so.
As much as anyone else I suppose.
Do you know before he came an atheist, what what he was was? He?
I don't know. Tell us.
Well, he was for sure a theist and his wife is definitely a theist. But he was scientific work, he was studying, he was studying to be in the ministry. Okay, well, I just think it's I think it's kind of ironic that isn't a lot of the atheists experienced people that get on here and on your show. Uh, they work for you, aren't they supposedly ex Christians? I mean, isn't that what Matt Deyla Honey is.
I'm an I'm an ex Christian. I'm an ex Christian and my family actually worked in ministry. I know several atheists who used to be pastors. It's actually pretty common. I'm curious to hear more of what your what your thoughts are of why this is particularly significant, especially for Charles Darwin. What are your thoughts on on that?
Well, you do know some of the thumb of the stuff that Charles Darwin security has been disproven, that's correct, Chris, Yes?
No?
Or am I wrong on that?
Well? There's science, that's science updates, right, because we learn things and then we Science is of course a method for investigating truth claims and learning more about the world around us, in the universe around us, and so yeah, there are some things that every scientist has gotten wrong because they're a human. They're doing the best they can with the information available at that time. And yeah, there are some things that update as we go and we
learn more and we correct ourselves. That's an advantage that science has. It's not when when we say that, you know, certain theories carry a lot of like a lot of validity. It's not saying that they're completely like flawless like ways of looking at models of our universe. But there, I'm sure you know that there's a high threshold for being called a theory, right Like it takes a lot to validate a working model and then to the extent that we're calling it a theory. But yeah, there are some
points that are outdated and that we've corrected. But that's the same with any scientist throughout history.
Cliff, do you think that that's a weakness in science if we can, if we if we compare science and religion on based off of that one thing about the ability to uh read, to correct course right to right, to make course corrections, to recognize you you did something wrong, and to change your thought process or your or your thought content so that it aligns more with what you've seen. Do you think that's a strength or a weakness of science or do you think it's an or do you think it's neither.
Correcting it, of course, would be a strength. But the problem, here's here's my problem with if you get it wrong in the beginning, if any and I'm not a house builder, Okay, I can crude, prince, I can read a little bit, but I'm pretty aware of pretty have heard work with a little bit. If you build a house and it's off square on one side and you go down fifty feet, is it the same off square fifty feet down from where you're off square on this end, or is it worse when you get there?
So what you're saying is if you don't correct that square early, if you stick with your assumptions based off of that and then continue building anyway, it gets worse,
or at least it can get worse. So what your argument is is that course corrections being able to recognize when we make mistakes in our process, we need to correct those as soon as possible and not continue on with our beliefs regardless of what our doubts might be, regardless of what our second guessing might be, regardless of what our reflection self reflection might be, and regardless of what our peers.
Might say about it.
Now, I've just described two different kind of paradigms there, I would suggest that one of those paradigms matches really well with the way science is approached, and one of those matches really well with the way religion is approached. So, based off of your example of building a house, which do you think would be the better approach to use?
The scientific approach where we can make corrections, where where we recognize that we're imperfect human beings, and we do make mistakes on occasion, and we do have biases on occasion, but then we correct those or should we stick with those? Should we set aside our worldly thoughts? We should set aside our own understanding, and we should stick with what was written two thousand to five thousand to six thousand
years ago. Which do you think, based off of your example, would be the better approach, the scientific approach or the religious approach?
Ay, man, man boy, you let me step right in that, didn't you. But yeah, here's where I'm at with that. Be honest with you. On arsent us, I am one in agreement and belief with the Bible, and I do not believe that you can prove the Bible wrong no way, shape or foreign. Well you can't, Okay. Number one but the Bible did not us. Hold on. You can laugh, that's okay, that's fine, but hold on. God did not
give us the complete knowledge of everything. He gave us enough to take him by faith, and if we will receive him by faith, he will enlighten us more and more as you go. But he's still not going to give us and we can't handle everything.
That's such a scapegoat, such a scapegoat. And based on you know what Scott just went over with you, there's a lack of humility in the way religion approaches things like to say that number one, like your your viewpoint is so spot on correct, but you just don't have all the information yet, but this God does. And and that's just how have you heard of the God of the gaps argument?
I've heard? I haven't really, I've heard of a gap theory or whatever, but I don't. There no other guy but the God of Abraham, Midge and Jacob. But go ahead.
So so that's essentially what you're doing is the God of the gaps is where you have a certain amount of information that you're pretty confident in understanding, Like we're pretty confident that you know the earth exists, we live on this earth. At some point something happened to cause this earth to come into existence. We don't know that part yet, right like, we can't super confidently say exactly
how the earth came into existence. We have thoughts, we have ideas about it, we have hypotheses, and we have some things that you know, have have reached a level of validity that we could say that's more of a theory. But no one's one hundred percent certain about any of that, right Like, there's room to be wrong, am am. I correct, there there's room to be.
Wrong, but Christians.
But that's what I'm saying. That's what I'm saying, that it's the God of the guests, because there's a room for any of us to be wrong. But what yours you're saying that God, whatever that gap is, it's just God just put God in the places where we don't know the answer to that question. And so you're so confident because that you have this answer that keeps changing. You don't actually know, but you're saying, well, God knows, I don't need to worry about this, but I can
be confident that all this is true. Whereas science isn't claiming to one hundred percent know any of those answers. We have guesses, we have some pretty educated guesses, but there's plenty of room to be wrong, and we're okay with that. I think that's a big difference that Scott was hitting on with you, is that it is within a scientific and secular framework it is okay to be wrong.
But what you're doing, you're just not thinking about it, and you're saying, well, I one hundred percent can believe this because whatever the I don't know is it's just God true.
But you're so What it sounds like to me you're trying to say is that scientists will come back and say, well, we were wrong here, we were wrong here.
And they do and they do, and it might always like so individual scientists might not specifically say that during their lifetime because science is a is a multidisciplinary like set of fields, right, Like you have people of different disciplines, you have people of different perspectives that all come together to contribute to what we understand about the universe and everything in it. Right, So one person might have gotten things wrong, but we don't learn that until after their lifetime.
And so no, that individual can't necessarily go back and correct it, but the rest of us can like it's a team effort, and that's something I think you're missing about scientific contributions as well, is the team aspect. But let's give you the benefit of the doubt here for a second, and let's say you know there is a god out there and all of the unknowns are kind of up to him. How do you demonstrate that what convinced you that that is what actually happened?
Love? Love?
All right? Please expand on that, Please expand on that.
No, you got to me, you have no explanation for love?
Are you asking us or are you telling us what we do or do not believe or do.
Or do not know?
You?
Well, yeah, okay, for instance, I do.
Well I'm saying, is so you just said that I don't have an explanation for love, and then you just I said, yes I do, and then you proceed to walk all over it and go back to your script. Are you going to engage with us because I said, yes, we do have an explanation for love? Or for go fork go for neurotransmitters. You have neurotransmitters that signal to you, hey, I like this thing or I have love for this thing like when when you have a baby, if you birth a baby, you get a huge rush of oxytocin
that allows you to bond with this other person. And so it's very easy to attribute love and other complex emotions to the human nervous system. And even beyond human nervous systems, we see this in other organisms. We see this in other primates. We can see this in like dogs and cats, Like if you have a bond with your pet, that is because of neurotransmitters. Like it's it's not super complicated to understand, even from a lower level
of science. But yeah, it's an abstract concept, but we have explanations for how it works.
Sure, So yeah, you know what, I agree with you and I've already thought that. Yes, And that's the two things that you can name. That is about the only two animals that you can name that you can say.
We can name more. What what are you denying that other animals have neurotransmitters and the ability to bond with others?
No, no, no, no, what I'm saying is besides dogs and cats. Then it starts getting a lot less. There are yes, there's always little stories of someone.
Or whatever, And now what is your what is your level of education in biology? May I ask that, what's your level of education in biology?
What?
What is your level of education in biology? How much biology have you studied?
Well? Yea, I barely got through high school.
Go ahead, okay, So do you think that your do you think that your expertise on this subject is expert level.
That Bible level?
Okay? So if I tell you, like, I have a bachelor's degree in biology and I have a medical degree, would you say that maybe you're not You're like, if if I said that your statements about other animals like not having the ability to exhibit love in the way that dogs and cats do, if I said that that does not align with the scientific consensus and the data that we currently have, would you be willing to change your mind on that or would you stay with your
own ninth grade level of education on science?
No, here's here's what I'm saying. Yes, the level of love that we understand, You're one hundred percent correct, You can find that in other animals or other whatever you want to call it, and I want to talk about is God's love. You won't find that love. You will not find a god a love anywhere else, you.
Are just you are just asserting that it's related to God. You are just asserting that.
You're also just asserting God too, by the way, I mean, that's kind of a big thing. That's a big leap right there, especially talking to a couple of atheists, and so you're not only assuming that a God exists, You're not only assuming that God is causing this kind of love, but you're assuming you're you're letting that spill over into the rest of the conversation. It's it's it's almost like you're you're not not even interested in having a conversation.
Is that? I mean, what what was your what's your what's your goal?
Here?
Are we are we discussing this? Are we are we having a back and forth?
Here?
Are you going to address the points that doctor Ben was bringing up? Or are you just going to say, oh, laugh it off and then move on to your next point and your next bullet point.
No. No, when you talk about animals having love, you can go there. Yeah, they can learn You're You're exactly right. There are some that can learn that to have some kind of a relationship with a person or with their primate whatever. Yes, I I one hundred percent agree with you. What I'm saying they don't have is a gode love, which is a.
Guy that fine, a god love.
A got thee love would be like me going up. Do you have children?
I do not?
I have children?
I do?
Okay, all right, let me ask you some If I were to take my car and deliberately run over your children in front of you, or it doesn't matter if or deliberately run over your children, would you have love for me?
Would you in some way? In some way? I would, I mean I would.
I would still love you as part of human you know I love humanity. I don't think that I would be inviting you over for drinks anytime soon. I think that I would aggressively pursue any kind of legal action.
And you know, to be honest with you, if you.
And I were in a room alone, stuff would happen after that, if you delete, if you were deliberately doing that kind of thing. And so to say that I would have no love for you is I think not correct. But I certainly wouldn't love you the same way that I love my children, or that I love my wife, or that I love my friends, or that I even love my immediate community.
Amen. But God commented his love for us, and while we were yet centers, Christ died for us.
That's it?
Did he did he actually love us unconditionally? Do you really believe that so.
He died for everything?
Where is it unconditional love? Is it unconditional love? If if you ran over Scott's children, and then Scott said, you know, I still love you, but then proceeded to lock you in his basement, set the whole thing on fire, doused it in gasoline while it's on fire, and then and then just kind of walk away, would you believe that he that he loved you? Would you believe that that he was honest when he said he loved you?
Nope? And I then why so?
Then? Why is that so? Then? How is that unconditional love from God? If God actually loved people, why would he eternally torment them? Okay, hold on, unconditional love? That sounds like love with conditions.
That sounds like love with heavy conditions.
Well hold on, hold on, give me a chance. So let's go back to let me running over his child for a for instance. Okay, Now, now he he himself says, you know what Cliff said, you going to prison for running over my kid. I'm going to pay that price for you. And not only am I going to pay that price for you, I'm going to pay it for everybody that's ever killed a kid.
Not only is that stupid, because you've now locked up somebody who was providing safety and some kind of job to society and being a contributing human, and you took that person out of society, took kids away from their math teacher all that. So you detrimented society for that, but also detrimented society by letting a murderer or like somebody who violently assaults people can and you to exist in the public around other children. So that's just irresponsible
for one, but the other thing too. But the other thing too is like earthly punishments are temporary, right, like because eventually, even if you get a life sentence, you're going to no longer be in prison, Like you're going to die and not not be paying back that sentence anymore. Right is it okay to for somebody who didn't do anything violent? You know, hats I'm not going to disagree that everybody is flawed. Everyone has done something you know,
dishonest to somebody else. People make mistakes, But do you think all of them are equally worth eternal punishment if they do not like worship a deity?
Asked, I believe? Hold on, so where you're going at? Do they all get equal punishment? And I'm going to tell you what I what I do believe? Tell me now you you know what? The Bible does say that as a matter of fact, and the Bible does point that out in the New Testament. Okay, no, not everyone is going to face the same hell or a lake of fire. They're not going to face the same effect because God said, don't be many teachers, or you will face the greater punishment. Now, are there ones that are
going to be screaming and crying and whaling in hell? Yes, there's wore is.
But yeah, and who are those people that are screaming, crying and whale in hell?
Like?
Who are those people? What things do they do in life that that warranted that type of punishment?
Well? Maybe just what I just did?
Uh?
Not did people?
So what punishment do people get if they do not believe? What? What punishment to people get if they do not believe in God?
We're kids or right?
But what punishment do people get not believing in God.
What punishment they get? They get sent to the lake of fire or not believe.
That unconditionally loving? Is that loving of your God to send people to the like of fire if they do not believe in him?
Is that unddditional load? There's that unconditional load? Well, it is when he paid the price so you don't have to go there?
How is that understand what what condition means? You can't say that.
Something is unconditioned.
You can't say it's conditional because of this condition. What you're doing, what you're you realize that that's what you're doing. You're saying that God has unconditional love for us, and then you are justifying the conditions of that love. Or are you saying that eternal torment in a lake of fire? Is this agape love that you're talking about? Is that what we're does a gape love just mean fucked up love? Is that what you're talking about? Or are we talking
about abusive? Is this like an abusive spouse or what?
No? No?
Okay?
And so if if I don't believe in God, if if I don't worship God, then you're saying God was willing to take my punishment. So then, but I'm going to to the lake of fire? Is God is not going to the lake of fire? Is that correct?
He did, Yes, he did. He went the hell.
Three days for for eternity.
He was no, no, no, no, no no. The three days that he was in that grin he went to hill that.
The same punishment, though, how is that the same punishment? Is that the same punishment as well as what an atheist would get. So he did not, So he did not take the same punishment. He did not take.
It, but he did endure it for you, he did.
For three days, maybe not three days, which is not the same? Which which? Which number is bigger? Three or infinity?
I got you?
These are not equal, right, These are not equal durations. And so one punishment is infinite and the other one is not. That is so he did not he gave up a weekend, but he did not take the full punishment. He did not endure all of that. And he's willing to subject atheists to a greater punishment under like unless they agree to certain conditions, which by definition is not unconditional love. So you cannot claim that agape is unconditioned.
And you know we're setting aside the whole fact here that all of this is based on your assumptions that this is the way it works. I mean, you don't know, and I don't mean to derail the conversation here, but I just want to at least answer, at least make sure this point has been made. You haven't given us any reason to think that there is a God in the first place. You haven't given us any reason if there is a God, that that God is the God
of the Bible. You haven't given us any reason to think that if the God is the God of the Bible, that the Bible represents God's word. And you haven't given us any reason to assume that even if it, even if we can show that God does exist and it's God of the Bible and the Bible is God's word, that we all are getting it right in our understanding it correctly. So there's multiple levels of failure happening here. And we're having a discussion on the deck of the
Titanic as it's going down. You know, we can talk about how you know, the food service was awesome on the Titanic, but we're sinking right. There's no support underneath this, There's no reason to think that any of this is real anyway, And setting aside the fact that you are totally failing on even on that discussion that we're having on the deck of the Titanic, you're not you're you're
you're saying one thing. You're saying one thing that supports what we're saying, and then acting like it's supporting what you're saying. You're saying God does have unconditional love, and then you're going into deep discussion about the conditions. Do you see that conflict there? You said before earlier that you stepped into something, right, and so I'm going to
give you a little bit of advice. If you step into something, and if you see yourself stepping into something, maybe take a step back and go a different way. Don't stop and pick it up and rub it all over your face. Okay, if you're if you find yourself going in the wrong direction, change your direction that you're going. Don't just stick with it. I mean, that's exactly what we've been talking about this whole time, about sticking with with failed approaches.
You're failing, amen, Yes, yes, I did.
You're a half percent correct. I failed in my approach, Amen, I needed.
That, and so what I want will be the next thing.
What's your Yeah, what's another reason to convince us to believe? Because that reason didn't? What else you got that that did not know?
That did not go over the world? Did it? Yeah?
It didn't. So what other reason?
Like?
Tell us what else? What else would convince you?
By the way, kudos for recognizing that. By the way, that's very difficult. Thing that you just did is recognizing when you make a mistake. And so I really want to give you an.
Applause for that.
So I do appreciate that, and and it does take a lot of courage to come on to a show and have these discussions openly with people who disagree with you.
And I do want to say, while we come from very different perspectives, I do appreciate the way that you've conducted this conversation and how honest you've been.
So I agree, I agree wholeheartedly with that.
I like you. I would like to say that I would like to say the same thing about you. I mean I would, but I here, guys, I will give it to you, try and give it to you in a nut show which you can read all my comments and then they're all the same. Okay, I want a hundred percent believe that there's a God and have loved you, love me, and he paid that.
So you say so, hold on, so you say that you are one hundred percent certain?
Yes, sir, in my heart, I want oh did you get.
To that level of certainty?
I'm not even one hundred percent certain that you just said what you said?
Yeah, how did you get to that level of certainty?
Okay? Hold on? If you seriously, if you want me to answer you, I'll tell you honestly, I believe it's because the Holy Spirit of God that is inside of me, and I cannot deny him.
If someone what convinces you, what convinces you, there's the Holy Spirit inside of you.
Hold on, and my and here's where I'm at. Unfortunately for you guys, I do not believe that any atheist was ever truly say. I don't want you. I'm not trying to make you mad. I'm not trying to piss you.
I don't want you to I don't want you to preach like. This isn't a preaching show. I just I want to know, like, because if clearly you are convinced, clearly you are convinced by a lot of this. I want you to like imagine that we have no background in Christianity. Imagine that we don't understand anything that you are like saying, walk us through. What what convinced you that the Holy Spirit is inside you at all? Explain it to me? Like I'm five? Like what?
How?
What is convinced? How? What convinced you?
What convinced me? Because number one, watching I guess probably my parents first of all, and then for me truly becoming saved because when I I made a profession of faith, just like Matt Matt did when he was a young kid, I made a profession of faith and it wasn't to tell I was a teenager that I realized, you know what, you're not saved. And then I had a choice to make either get saved or continue on pretending to be saved.
So and you think that do you think that if you are raised in a different religion, do you think that you would have had the same results and still go to Christianity or would you do you think you would have made a proclamation of faith in that other religion? Like let's say if you are raised in Saudi Arabia, do you think you would have still found Christianity at that time, or would you have made a proclamation to Islam.
No much, there's a big chance, big whether the percentage chance, that that would be Islamic rather than a Christian And that is because you're right, that's because of where I would we raised. But given the opportunity, if the Lord gives everybody I believe, an opportunity to be saved, an opportunity to know the God.
But if no one has heard, if no one has heard about Christianity, if they were raised in rural Iran or someplace where they only have access to a small amount of information related to religion, and that was it. You only heard of Islam. Like, what is supposed to convince them? In that case? How are they supposed to be saved?
Right? No, Honestly, if you want the truth, you listen to the Philippine Unich. The Eunich didn't know any better. And God told Philip, pay go join yourself for that chariot, and here comes here comes.
So what I'm getting at. So what I'm getting at, Cliff, is in the absence of these other factors, like you acknowledged that you had influence from your family. Growing up, you had influences from the culture around you. But if if that's a reason why somebody could convert to Islam or convert to Hinduism at a young age, there must be something else then that made you decide Christianity is the right one as opposed to Islam Hinduism. So what
were those other reasons that Christianity was the one? Like you said, you needed, you felt you needed to be saved. What made you think that you needed to do that?
Honestly, that's true because my dad was preaching on a message. And I can't give it exact Bible verse, but I'm pretty sure I've found it several times in Corinthians. No man called it Jesus Lord, but by the spirit, and I know my prayers it was always God, God, God. I thought, you know what, wait a minute, there's something wrong here. And you know what there is If if a guy call all he can do is pray, and when he prays it's always God, God, God or Lord God,
there's something wrong because you cannot call Jesus Lord. But I have the spirit. So that was my that was my That's what happened with me.
But as far as so you think that. Let me get this right. So if if you're praying to God, then therefore this Holy Spirit told you to do that. Is that what you're saying.
The Holy Spirit told me to do that? Yes?
How do you know? How do you know that you're being directed by the Holy Spirit to do anything? Like? What what is that feeling? Like?
Like?
Is it a is it a feeling? Is it an audible voice? Is it a touch on your shoulder?
Like?
What? How does this manifest?
Well? Can I question? Can I ask you guys a question and I'll try and answer yours? Can I ask you to a question?
I want to see a related question?
Yes, well, just didn't want didn't you say some of you guys have been supposed Christians before or whatever? Yeah?
And I know what I said at that time. I know I know that I felt I felt like I had the Holy Spirit in me. I remember having a feeling. But as I investigated more, I learned that it was just a feeling. And there are people well, and there are people who have the same feeling. There are people who have that same feeling about Islam. There are people have that same feeling even about other branches of Christianity, like there are people who are who are Mormon who
had similar feelings. There are people I know who are Jehovah's witnesses who have the same feelings, people who are Hindu, Like I went on a mission trip to India, and people who were Hindu had the same feeling. So what I learned was that I can't if all of these people can have the same feeling about their religion, I can't use that feeling as a basis for that being the correct religion, right, So there has to be another reason.
So what other reason may lets you know that this this feeling is specifically the Christian Holy Spirit?
There you go, there you go, that's good. Yeah, you cannot trust the feeling. It's not just the feeling. God is a person. Yeah so amen?
Yeah, So so what is that for you? Like, how did you how did you differentiate that this was the Christian Holy Spirit and not some other deity.
Well, I guess that's I guess that's kind of a kind of a hard thing because I don't believe there's any other other than Satan. There is no other spirit world. You have Satan, who is, by the way, a spirit, and then you have God.
But how would you know that how do you know that your feeling wasn't Satan? How do you know you weren't directed by Satan?
Let me I want to add something on top of what doctor Ben has been talking about and Cliff, I normally wouldn't ask this of a caller, but I think that you are receptive to listening to what we say, and I think that you've been conversing with us and having a good faith conversation. Here I want you to consider I'm going to make a conjecture here. Okay, I don't know you, and so I don't want to be sound like I'm judging you. I'm just making a suggestion here for you to think about. I want you to
think about what we were talking about. How people have a tendency to kind of adopt the beliefs of their parents. And to a large extent, I think that that's true. My parents happen to be religious. I don't remember believing in God myself, but it wouldn't surprise me if I did at some point. I was raised in a Christian household and so.
And even so, even though I have.
Very strong disagreements with both of my parents on the subject, I still feel a compulsion inside of me to consider what they're saying. I mean, we we are born with we've evolved to have a strong sense of accepting the things that our parents say, because you know, otherwise we're going to be sticking our hand in the fire, or we're going to be walking off the cliff, or we're going to be, you know, walking into the lions den
and all these different kinds of things. We are we're kind of pre wired to just accept what our parents say up to a point. And then of course we you know, we develop our own thinking as well, or at least many of us do. But what I would like to you to consider this, think about, at least just entertain the thought that the reason that you're believe that you're a believer, that you're Christian is because of your parents, And then think about if that were the case.
I mean, I'm not suggesting that you admit it or anything like that, but just think about if that was the case. Do you think that that would color all of your subsequent experiences. Doctor Ben was talking about how people and other religions have the same experiences, it's just they have it in a slightly different context than you are.
All of everything that we perceive, everything that we come to believe, every thought that we have is colored based off of our past experiences and things that we've believed in the past. So think about it in terms of that approach your own faith and your own belief by thinking, what if my parents had thought different, how would that
affect what I think now? Would I have thought that that was the Holy Spirit talking to me rather than something from a different religion, or would it be or would if your parents had been non religious, would you have interpreted that to be something else? Could you have interpreted that to be an emotional response or something like that? And I also want to I wanted to bring up
a book here called The Outsider Test for Faith. It's from an author by the name of John Loftis, and that's it kind of specifically addresses that point that I'm just bringing. If we can separate ourselves from if we can recognize that we're going to have bias towards things that.
We were raised to believe.
So if we can at least make an attempt to separate ourselves from that bias and then look at ourselves through an outsider's perspective, would we come to the same conclusions, And I think I think that you would agree that as human beings, we all have biases, and why we have those biases aren't necessarily relevant at this point, but you know, we could talk about that in a separate discussion. But if we recognize that we have these biases, how would your life look like to somebody else who didn't
have those biases? And I know it's it's a challenging thing to do for anybody to do, not just a religious person, But I think for as human beings, we're kind of one of our biases is that we stick with our biases. One of our biases is that we have difficulty separating ourselves from those biases, and so it takes a very conscious, deliberate effort to do so.
So what would you.
Think about giving that a try and then maybe calling us back and having a discussion about it.
No, I look, dude, I one hundred percent agree with you. I understand what I believe. I understand what you're saying, and that is the whole premise for people being raised in a Christian Just like you said, people being raised in a Christian family, you're not saved because you're raised in a Christian family. You're not born again Christian because mom and dad were. In fact, you know, my grandpa and grandma on my dad's side, at least I know,
was not a Christian, neither one of them. So my dad did not grow up in a Christian family, but he had an uncle that was a Christian, so he got introduced to Christian anybody. He didn't get saved until he was in the military. So I understand what you're saying, but that is that's what it is. You're not a Christian just because you were in that environment. And that's why I'm trying to tell you.
That wasn't That wasn't my point though, and I understand that your point might be different than my point, But do you think that, I mean, what do you think about what I said, rather than your repackaging of what I said? Do you think that would be an experiment worth trying?
Oh? No, because I know where I'm at. I mean, other people do that if they want to. But I have no reason to disagree or to not believe that God is real. I have no reason to That's.
The problem, and that is the problem because you started. You started with the assumption that your belief is true instead of what we're doing. And we're saying I'm not going to believe until I have a good enough reason to right. So we're starting from ground zero. You've already made the assumption that what you believe is true, and so now you're locked in to just assuming that this is true and waiting for somebody to prove you wrong.
But do you see why that's problematic? I said if I said that the sky is purple, and I just I believe that I've always believed that and you can't prove me wrong. Do you think that's Do you think like I'm starting from a good place with that belief? Is that a reasonable belief to have?
Ye hold on, I agree with you to be able to say that some Christians, that's what we're doing.
But let me ask you that that's what I'm not saying some Christians. I'm saying that is what you are doing. That is I don't know if you can listen back to the call after the show's done, but you you just did that. You said that you know where you're at and there isn't a reason for you to change
your view on it. So you are all you've held onto this before being provided evidence of it, because I feel like if you had that evidence that was convincing, you could just give it to us and you could answer our questions in a way that makes sense to somebody who has never been exposed to Christiana before. Right, Like, you're going into this with assumptions, and I think we're going to have to move on to the next caller.
But I want to give you I'll let Scott jump in and then I'll give you some homework for the next time.
Yeah, I just want to Cliff.
I just wanted to say that I think you do have a reason to think of that approach, and that reason is you could be wrong. You could be wrong about We started this call talking about two different perspectives. The perspective that doesn't think that they can be wrong, and we acknowledge that if you have that perspective that you can't be wrong and you are in fact wrong, then that will mean you're going to continue to be wrong.
You agreed.
In fact, I think I even got an amen out of you about this when we said that the better approach is to not assume that you can't be wrong and to consider the fact that you could be wrong and start from there, and so I think that is
a reason why you should reconsider this. And I think maybe I'm going out on a limb here, maybe I'm assuming too much here, But I think if you thought about it, you might agree with me that that's a good reason that you should consider this, that you should consider this perspective, that you should look at things from an outsider perspective. If you can't recognize that you have biases,
that's a problem. Then you're going down that dogmatic route that could lead to disaster that we agreed could lead to disaster as opposed to having the self correct you said self corrections were good. Okay, If you refuse to acknowledge that you're going in the wrong direction, then you lose all motivation to do any kind of self correct So I think you do, in fact have a reason, and I hope you think about that. I understand if you have difficulty accepting that. I, like I said, it's
our heart. Our most difficult bias is to acknowledge our own biases and to set those aside. And trust me, it's something that we all struggle with. Atheist or theist or whatever, you know, but we really can only you know, we need to address it. We need to address it unless you're unless you're satisfied leading down a path, going down a path which you agreed could lead to disaster. And so it really all boils down to doesn't matter to you whether or not what you believe is true.
If it matters to you what you believe is true, then you need to consider the fact that you could be wrong and need to think of things from a perspective that maybe you are wrong. I'm not saying I can I'm you know, I'm not saying that you should assume that you're wrong. I'm not saying that you should give up everything that you believe. But you know, we have humans have this capability of imagine hypothetical situations, and you can even say to yourself over and over again,
this is a hypothetical situation. But we can kind of imagine what things look like from other people's perspectives. And I think that kind of diversity is a is a strength in humanity as a whole. And so let's ride on that strength a little bit and allow for the fact that what we could be wrong, how can we determine that if we're wrong? Does that make sense?
It? Does it? Does, and I appreciate the conversation. I wish I could have done a little bit better. But one thing you're not going to do. And I don't mean to be mean, but it is never my mind is made up. My heart is made up. Not my mind. My heart is made up, and there is a guidance.
And that's where I want to get out with with some homework, Cliff, That's that's where I want to I want to get give you a little bit of an assignment for the next time. I would love for you to call back. I want to continue this conversation, but I'm not convinced by your personal experiences, and I want you to think about the reliability of personal experiences, like can like is it possible for personal experiences to lead
you to the wrong answer? And think about that, Think about how convinced you would be by somebody else's personal experience. And if if experience is not reliable, if I can get to wrong information through experience, what is a better way to convince us, What is going to be more reliable that can put us over the edge? And like if because if you're right, I want to also be right with you, But I need more, I need more
than this to be convinced. And some of our people in the background are asking if if you'd be willing to see if your pastor wants to call in, because that would be a great call too. Yeah.
Yeah, actually if he's.
Anything like you, Yeah, I would like some pastors to call in, some real pastors. And I have said this, I'm not Yes, my first time I sounded like an idiot, and I probably sound like an idiot. I don't think I sounded quite like an idiot this time, but my first time, yes, I sounded like any idiot. And it does bother me when so called Christians call in and
we sound like idiots. And yes, I would love for some past I've asked for some factors to call in and talk to you guys, because I, in my heart know there's a guy in heaven now you guys or and you guys are on your side, and I'm sorry for that, but I don't want other people drug down. If you, like I said, you can read my boof well you go.
Again, Like I said, your methods for how you've gotten to your your position, and the fact that you are extremely confident in a position that you've gotten through personal experience is not convincing, and it will not be enough to convince me I need something else. And so I'm going to let you go go think about it, Go talk to some more pastors, get them to call in, because I love to hear their their position on this. But I hope you have a great rest of your Sunday.
And with that, we are at a point where we're going to read the top five patrons of the week.
All right, Scott your how.
To hold up I do our top First of all, thank you all for supporting the show. Our top five patrons for this week are number one, lets say I'm I supposed to read this backwards? Or number one oops all singularity love that. Number two dingle Berry Jackson, of course a perennial favorite. Number three Coleevi Helvetti also a favorite. Number four Brian's upkey, who's been on there fairly fairly commonly recently, Number five Ja Calton, and our honorable mention
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So thank you very much.
Yeah, thank you so much. We're going to move on to our next caller. Who is d pronouns are they them from Iowa? D You are on talk he Theen. What is your topic today.
Doctor Ben Hi Scott. Yeah, So this is something that I've been working on in my life for literally more than four decades. And last year, late last year was able to embrace my uh, non binary identity and I've had congratulations.
That's a huge status.
Thank you, Thank you for that, doctor Ben. I appreciate that. But I'm kind of so, I guess I'm a little confused as to all my life on my adult lie. Well, no, I can't say that my mid in my thirties, early thirties, I came out as lesbian. I had a twenty year relationship with another woman. We got married when I will legalize same sex marriages. We've since been divorced. But and uh, and I was a cross dresser. I always I always
dressed in men's clothes. I very consciously decided not to trans although I did think about it very carefully, and one reason that I didn't was for religious reasons. I believe that God had created me as a woman, and there was a reason for that, so I decided not to change it. And now I'm definitely rethinking that now that I'm identifying as atheist and anti theists, and I've had some trans people who are well into their transition and had, you know, the surgeries and the hormone therapy.
Is telling me that I'm basing all, I'm basing my all, I'm basing my self identity on is just kind of an extended tomboy face.
Or I don't agree with that. I don't know what trans people you're talking to, but it sounds like they might be from the trans medicalist camp, which I do not accept as being valid. Essentially for people in the audience who don't know, there's a kind of there's a take from some trans people saying that you're not a real transperson unless you medically transition, and that is gatekeeping.
That is not something that I accept. The definition of being a transperson is that you identify with a gender that is not congruent with your sex assigned at birth, and so that can include the umbrella as well of non binary people, because most often these people are not assigned at birth as non binary, So that would be a gender other than their sex assigned a birth, And it doesn't matter what you do with your body related
to that. It doesn't matter any other like gender expression, It doesn't matter your sexual orientation, None of that matters. If your gender identity is different than your sex send at birth, you meet criteria for being trans in your identity is valid. So I'm not sure the specifics of where these people were going with it, but I do not agree with their position at all. If you are trands, you are trans. You do not have to prove that to anybody. And if if you want to be a tomboy,
if you identify as a tomboy, that's one thing. But if if you don't, if you identify as non binary, you are non binary. End of story.
Yeah, okay, yeah, because I I you and you and Forrest especially have given me a lot of food thought on this, and you know I'm still I'm physically attracted to women. So I mean, does a lesbian identity transit overpower the non binary?
Well, labels. Labels overly simplify everything, right, Like the purpose of a label isn't to confine you to a certain set of rules, Like a label in this case, is a way for you to communicate with the world around you, to say this is who I am, this is how I would like to be treated. And so I don't want you to think of it as like, oh, I have to meet these criteria of being a lesbian and I have to meet these criteria of being non binary.
That's not at all what this is. You can take those labels, and your specific labels, and your specific meaning of those labels might be different than somebody else's. I know non binary people who still use the term lesbian because that's the best way that they can describe their sexual orientation. And I know other non binary people who don't use that label because they don't feel as accurate
for them. And it's okay to clarify in conversation and say, you know, I'm using this label, here's what this means for me, Like I'm trans, here's what that means for me. And that's totally okay. And I think people who are going to like legislate the labels that other people can use, as long as we're being clear about it, I think that's okay. And you can just say, hey, this is these are the terms that I'm comfortable using here's what I mean by these terms, and then and then that
should be good enough. And and your identity can change over time too, and your labels can change because even though you're who you are as a person, like the core of who you are might not change throughout your lifetime. Your your awareness of your sense of self might change in certain aspects of how you uh communicate about yourself, how you present yourself in public, All of that can
change over time. It's very dynamic. So I hope you can feel a bit more reassurance that like other people can't legislate how you use your labels to describe yourself.
You know, we we we actually we got into that discussion because I've been considering saying I'm an untransitioned male. And that's when that's when things kind of blew up. Is that that's.
Not the that's not necessarily the term that I would I would use. But there's different there's different layers to transition, right, So there's like there's medical and surgical transition, of course, which are commonly accepted as forms of transition, but there's also social transition. And if you've come out and you've said, hey, my pronouns are they them? My name is this, And you've made some effort to change the way you are
seen in society. That is a form of transition. So if you've socially, if you started to socially transition, you are transitioning. And not everybody's transition is the same. Not everybody does medical transition. It's not right for everybody, and you can't legislate what is enough transition. But as long as you are making steps to you know, change the genders you are perceived like that is, that is social transition.
And you can be a transperson and not transition at all and be in the closet like but you're still a transperson and we call that a colloqual term. We call that an egg. It's like you're still in the egg and haven't hatched yet. There's still trans people, but they're just not openly trans yet and they're still valid. So yeah, and it might take you a while to get familiar with the terminology that people use.
But yeah that I definitely am in that phase, and since October I have been very seriously considering top surgery. But then you have to go through all this gender dysphoria psychological processes before most surgeons will even consider it. And I'm not sure if I'm at that place yet.
Yeah, and you have time to think about it. You have time to think about what the right things are
for you. I do recommend for everybody to have a good therapist or a good counselor who is licensed and one who is affirming, because that's something that you can just sit with them and process everything that you're going through, process your emotions, process your developed being, sense of self, and whatever direction you take, you at least have some more reassurance of what the right thing is for you.
And therapy is something that you know is super low risk if you're with an actual, licensed, accredited therapist, and it's good for people who aren't trans It's good for
pretty much everybody to have a good therapist. So that would be something that I would start doing, not necessarily with the goal of I'm doing this just so I can get access to medical procedures, but do it just so you have somebody to reflect with and someone who can like affirm you and make sure you're in in a direction that's safe mentally for you and that there isn't there are other risk factors, you know, contributing to
all of this. So I think it'd be good to look for something like that and kind of process this further before making big decisions.
So I had been out of therapy for several years because of the insurance and just gotten back in with someone I trust. So I will I will definitely take advantage of that and start talking to her about that.
Awesome love to hear that, Scott. I know this conversation is a bit more of our end, but do you have any anything to mention?
No, No, I mean this is a this is an area that I consider myself to be a learner, and so I was just like, I'm just going to shut
up and listen. And I do want to say one thing to d is that I know you've called our shows for a while now, and I really want to and I know I've said this before too, but I want to thank you for doing that, because you know, you're laying yourself out there, you're making yourself vulnerable, you're tackling issues live in real time, and I think what you're doing is really I think there's going to be a lot of viewers that can identify with that, and so I think the fact your bravery is uh is
standing up in place of other people that either can't or are are not at the at a point yet where can talk about these things openly themselves. And so I just want to thank you for for representing you know that that particular perspective, because I think it's very important.
So thank you, thank you, Thank you a lot, Scott and doctor ben I. I one of my goals is that there's somebody out there listening, either today or we'll stumble on the video later on and have some hope after listening, get some courage, because talkies and the atheist experience are directly responsible for me finding the courage to start speaking up. So if I can give back, that's great.
I love to hear that. And I know you're on the phone right now, but we gave you some lover rings just a minute ago from the crew and there here's more for you.
D go back and the chat is blowing up to and love for D too. So it's just, uh, you're get in love from all kinds of directions right now.
Yeah, And I can tell you that it's not an easy time, yeah, and where you're at is not an easy time. It's a lot of self reflection, a lot of thinking about things that kind of have been stirring for a long time, it sounds like, but almost every trans person and non binary person has been where you are, So just know that you are not alone in that There are other people in the chat here and in
the discord that also identify with your story. And I love to continue this if you have anything else to discuss in the discord afterwards as well, and I'm sure people will jump in for support there too. But that being said, we are a little bit over and I do want us to go over to the discord. But do you have anything else to bring up right now? No?
I don't. Just whoever's listening, you don't have to take sixty years to find your identity.
It's okay.
You can start whenever you really, you know, whenever you want. And thanks guys, thanks a lot.
You're here, absolutely, thank you for ay calledy talk to you next time.
All right, before we wrap up, we do got a couple more super chats in the queue here. Would you like for me to read them? Doctor Benner?
Do you want to?
Okay, go for it?
Good?
Actually we have two that are listed here now I think I've seen a couple more kind of creeping in here, so if the crew can PLoP those into the document here while we're looking at this. So the first one here is from Freak Off the Leash, which, to be honest, is really the best way to be a freak. If you're going to be a freak, then be off the leash.
Freak Off the Lease donates five dollars, and it says if I had a million dollars, I would get give half of it to the ACA, but I don't I would add yet to the end of that Freak Off the Lease. So never give up hope, right, So we'll be looking for that five hundred thousand dollars check from Freak Off the Lease, so we really appreciate it. Next one up is Miranda Rensberger. Remember one year and frequent
commenter ten dollars. Astonishing Astonishingly, today's callers have still fail to give me any reason to believe hopes dashed Again, Me too, Miranda, Maybe next time, maybe next time. Don't give up hope on that either. Neiro came in again with a two dollars donation. Trans Rule number one, never crack another egg, big no.
No, Yeah, And for people who don't know what that's referring to. It's if somebody is not openly trans or like any if this works for any number of labels in LGBTQ community. But if somebody is in the closet or not ready to come out, or somebody just doesn't know that they're trends and they're still working through that process, the only person that can make that progress is them. They're the only ones that can take that step to take on that label and to come out and be
open with themselves. So even if you have a suspicion, you do not tell somebody that they're trands. You don't make that decision for them, and you don't come out on behalf of anybody else. You leave that in their court one hundred percent. So just a little all right.
I learned something else today too. I learned what that phrase refers to now, so I appreciate that. And then our last one, our last super chat here was from Rob Tbo. Rob Tbo yep nine dollars and ninety nine cents a message.
To d D.
You will always be who you are. Labels are for the benefit of others. You don't need a change to become who you already are. And I think that's spot on right there.
Absolutely. I love that we're ending on a positive note today.
I agree to Gona. I'm gonna feel good all day from this.
Yeah, and I hope we see this amount of love in the discord as well, because we will be going to the discord after this. But just a reminder in case you missed it, the prompt for the question of the week is why is Easter on four twenty this year? So reply in the comments section and tune in next week to hear the top three answers. We also want to thank Richard Gilliver for helping out today. I know he's he does so much work for the show behind the scenes, more than a lot of you may know.
It should make him a producer.
They should, They should give him a fancy title to go.
Love yeah, right in a big corner office and all that kind of stuff.
A favorite yeah, our favorite secret welsh Man in the background. What are you? What are your comments from today's calls?
Yeah?
I want to I want to address Cliff on a couple of things. At first, I want to just want to say we love you. Don't go anywhere, stay around we Love You. There is a really really really useful book which explains love from the neurological perspective, and it is called Emotional Ignorance and it's by Dr Dean Barnett. And by the way, if you are a fan of the atheist community of Austin, a lot of this author Dr de Barnetto was a neuroscientist. Actually quotes our very own,
the ACA's very own. Dr Richard Firth god be Here was consulted in the writing of this book. So if you are an ACA fan, it would be a really useful book to read. And it does touch on emotional love from the perspective of kind of how it comes about through oxytocin and other chemicals and neural networks, and it goes into all the different kinds of what we would call love. In doing that, I noticed how when Cliff said to Dr Ben, explain love, and Dr Ben
said okay, and explained love. Cliff then said, I didn't mean that kind of love. And then the kind of love.
Gar pay love. There is no gar payl love.
God.
This is really really really really.
Really easy to disprove if there is a try omni good which if you believe in the Christian God and making the assumption that you do believe in give me a call and tell me if I'm wrong. Then the fact that he hasn't created the universe where there is no suffering is proof that a garpail of is not real. Go un soak an egg, not a trans egg, but just an actual.
Love all I'm going bye bye, all right, thank you ch And yes we will be going to the discord afterward. I believe all three of us will be going, so feel free to bring your frustrations, bring your support, bring all of that to the discord tiny dot c c slash a cd discord if you need a link to join that. And if you don't believe, of course we are your community. And that goes not just for people who are openly atheists, who are confident in their position
as an atheist. That's also for people who are just unsure, people that are on the fence, not sure what to do about their religious beliefs, people who are questioning, people who just might might have heard something today and think, you know, maybe I'm wrong about something. Need to look
into this more. This also goes for people who are in their egg stage, people who are thinking about transitioning, people who have already transitioned, people who are learning more about themselves every day and willing to willing to say I was wrong about my position before, I was wrong about how I view the world, and now I'm going to be the best person that I can be today and move forward and support others, any of those types
of people. You are part of our community, and we hope to be a safe space for you to explore that and to have people to network with, people to get support from, to talk with, to debate with. Even We appreciate you all being here and we hope that we can continue providing the space for you. And if you do believe, we don't hate you, just not convinced by everyone.
We want the truth, So watch Truth Wanted Live Friday at seven pm Central. Visit tiny dot cc, slash y t tw and call into the show at five one two nine nine two four two, or connect to the show online at tiny dot cc, slash call tw