Hello, and on this first day of Pride Month, welcome to Talk ethen, the show where we value good ideas over old traditions in ancient poetry, and where beliefs are expected to have a good reason. I'm Christy Powell, and today I am desperately looking for any reasonably good reason to explain a bill on its way to Governor Abbott's desk. Senate Bill ten, recently passed by the Texas Senate, would require the Ten Commandments to be displayed prominently in every
public school classroom across the state. Not suggested required, not a well rounded history of the people of the state, not a collection of quotes from influential lawmakers and founders, but a list of rules about how to protect God's feelings and how to feel about your neighbor's possessions, including his wife. Let's not get ourselves. This is not about history. It's about control. It's about whose worldview gets to be
centered and whose gets pushed aside. Because when the government mandates one religious text in a public classroom, it's not just promoting values, it's promoting a religion. And when that happens, our Muslim neighbors, our Jewish students, our secular families, and of course everyone who believes in real religious freedom are left standing outside the circle. So let me say it plainly. The government doesn't get to pick your god or any god for you. That's not freedom, that's coercion in a
gold leaf, red letter edition. So today, I'd love to hear from you, especially if you grew up in a school where religion crept into the classroom. How did it shape you? How did it silence you? And what does it mean for a child to be told by the state which believes are worthy of a poster on the wall. This conversation matters because neutrality isn't oppression, and inclusion doesn't mean erasure. It means every student, every family has the
right to belong without an altar in their classroom. You're watching Talk Heathen. Let's think critically, let's talk honestly, and let's get into it because the show it's coming right now. Okay, welcome everyone. Today is June one, twenty twenty five. I am your host, Christy Powell, and with me today is my friend objectively Dan excited to be doing this with you.
Yes, that's right. You need a straight cis white guy token straight Cis White Guy as your co host for this first day of Pride of course, just.
Jumping into Pride. I mean, we've got big topics. You and I grew up in this area. You and I grew up around these, you know, kind of evangelical incursions into the public school system.
I think there's a lot for us to talk about. Yes, it's true. We were talking a little bit before the show because I did go to public school, but I went to public school in Waco, Texas. So I think my credibility is still there, you.
Know, like this, Yeah, the secularness of.
That, you know this, Yes, this was a little bit off, a little bit, and somehow I survived. David Oliveria has a great joke about Waco. He used to run a church there. He said that in Waco there's more Christians than people, which is a really good, a really good joke. So yeah, yeah, I definitely seen some violations in my time, as you might have as well. Although you went to a Christian school, so yeah, I did.
I did, And so that definitely shapes some of my thinking on all of this because for me, it was very normalized. It was even pushed and pressured, but not to the benefit of anybody I went to school with. If you saw the like college acceptance rate of my college preparatory religious schooling, you'd see that there are a lot of lies being told and a lot of messy
ideas being preached from the classroom. And I don't think anybody should have to go through that if they didn't choose it, And I definitely don't want our tax dollars paying for it and for the government to be pushing it in the ways that it is. So it's it's getting messy, and I think we have a lot to get into.
Yeah, definitely, definitely, especially when it comes to stuff like evolution. Like again, I went to a good public school that actually taught evolution. That was not the norm for most of my friends that went to like other schools. And even if they taught it like they still definitely was a hint of like, oh, this is actually not real, you know, just based on what I've heard from other people. Right, I mean that's just one example. There's a lot of
these kinds of issues. Nowadays, they're like, oh, we got to put the Ten Commandments in schools. I mean they've been doing that for a while, but now it's like, I don't know, it feels like it's happening again, these sorts of waves of legislation to just do anything but actually fixed the material conditions that schools.
Right. Yeah, and you know, this is at a moment where teachers have been begging for raises for a long time. We've had a number of like walkouts and protests and mess I mean, it is a messy situation and this does not feel like the right solution. Yeah, we're definitely going to spend some time on these ideas. We definitely want to hear from our audience. Of course, talk Heathen.
We are open to all of your questions about religion, secular humanism, atheistic morality, cosmology, philosophy, science, history, life, the universe, and everything. Uh. That said, Dan, is there anybody in particular you're hoping to talk to today?
Oh?
Man, you're asking me, you know, I'm always I'm always picking his calls. I feel like you should have the first go at it. There's a lot of different ones. I see, Jesse looks interesting to me. I think they're still in the screening room though. So yeah, so we've.
Got we've got some good calls on the line. We've got a few lines open, and before we jump into all of that, I just want to remind people that Talk Heathen is 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 of course,
the separation of religion and government. We are a live call in show with open lines, so get your calls in at five one two four two or from your computer at tiny dot c c slash call t H. While those calls are loading. While you guys are getting in here, let's go ahead and bring our friend Aaron in for the question of the week, our Talk Heathen to Me segment. Aaron, what you got for us this week? You are muted? My friend knew that.
Was gonna happen to you warn me. There we go, all right, uh, all right, well, today it's time for our Talk Heathen to Me segment where we get to into our question of the week. And last week we asked everybody name an inappropriate time and or place to suggest a prayer circle, and here are our top three answers. Number three from Stephen Kahn. Inappropriate time to suggest a prayer circle? Right, before the climax of a bookcocky session.
It's visceral. It's a little, honestly a little bit. Who's picking the who's picking the Yeah, got a wake you up? That'll wake you up? Okay.
Number two from Daniel Aaron, Let's form a prayer circle around this tornado and ask God to stop the storm.
Yeah, yeah, don't do we apply these beliefs I hosted to talk to either the lights reminds you not to try or attempt.
Yeah, that's gonna work about as well as rolling the dice and saying on a one the tornado will dissipate.
That's just not not going to work.
And number one from Colin Mattz in an appropriate moment for a prayer circle during a square dance.
Some fun.
Yeah wow, Yeah, so we're our answers are really all over the place today.
Really all over the place. Yeah. We went from dad jokes to very sexually explicit humor in the course of about thirty seconds. And I don't know how I feel about that, but.
It's the Christy Powell talk, you can guarantee. Yeah, it really is.
It's June, right, It's June. It's a new month. I'm not trying to yuck somebody's yum. I'm just saying that, like you said, it's a little it's a little early, it's a little literally.
All right.
Well, the prompt for next week is what would Jesus' rap name be? Damn?
What would you jan?
Yeah?
I hope you have something for this.
I feel so for some reason, what came to mind to me was MC A D you know, because it's like b C A D. Right, I don't know that that's the only thing I could think of it. It's not even.
So not good and it's like better than mine, which was just MC JD JC.
So you know, yeah, all right, we came.
Up with the same bad joke.
We gotta we gotta fix this in the future.
Get the pretres in on it.
You know what. That's okay because our convents will have better answers than we will.
So yeah, please please rescue us on this question. Give us your best this week in the comments to this episode, and uh and we'll be future will be featuring you next week. All right, thanks guys, thank you Aron. Okay, well, with all of that pre m all of that fun, let's go ahead and jump on the lines and uh yeah, you said Jesse in Michigan. Seems like a great conversation to start off with, Jesse, what's.
On your mind today? Hello, Hello, Patty, what can we do for you?
I don't know. You know, my name is Jesse, and I understand, and I wanted to talk to you. I'm especially grateful to talk to you, uh, Christy, because I know you're a mental health professional, and well, my problem is dealing with mental health.
And the atheist community.
Sure, actually kind of funny, funny, but one of the reasons why I became an atheist was sort of called my education and the arts kind of help. But also I had mental health problems as a teenager, and I started receiving cognitive behavioral therapy, which are trying to be very helpful, and uh, you know, like it sort of helped deconstruct the way that I was thinking as I grew up as a Catholic and it, you know, being Catholic kind of insinuates that you're worthless and you start to believe that.
Ever while, and yeah, I hear that.
Directly contributed to my vesic.
But the problem I'm really having now is that I identify as well. I would say that let me be clear, I am under the Latino umbrella as far as American political way of describing the census is concerned.
But yeah, let the.
Audience know that I reject that label because Latino favors Latina, favors the colonial powers of the Spanish, and also favors the Catholic Church.
So I forget that, rejects that.
So yeah, and as a person from Texas, the Texas that peppered with ancient sort of a well not really ancient, but old missions like the Alamo, which my ancestors were converted to either coerce or against their will or using force or other means.
Yeah, I hear that, and I hope that that is history that we are still willing to teach in our public high schools, which is something I definitely worry about. Like, you know, San Antonio has a missions baseball team. We're definitely aware of their existence, but how do we talk about them? What is the story that we are telling people? And how are we educating people about the oppressive nature
of those institutions. They're not just cool old buildings, they're they're places of incredible oppression.
But yeah, with all of.
That in mind, Jesse, tell me about your call for today, Tell me about your experiences of mental health and the atheism community, or what it is that you're struggling with here.
I guess I'm trying to put it into words. So it's really helpful to speak, you know, because I don't really have any other resources to talk to other people.
I mean, for example, like I said, I'm in the arts and I deal with people who are under the atheist umbrella all the time, but I don't know any other skeptic and I don't feel at home or safe within then my own arts community, because I might have someone I said, yeah, I'm idiots, but then they'll believe some like some nonset at all, alternative medicine, or I mean, in my personal encounters, I encounter a lot of people who don't understand what it's like to not be white
in the arts, and it kind of has it. It has it hacks on my mental health and it starts to feel like I don't belong And yeah.
I hear that.
I mean, we're here promoting atheism, but we also like to bring to the table critical thinking, secular humanism, like some of these other notions. Atheism absent those things can create a vacuum where a lot of completely irrational wooy type beliefs can come in fill some space.
Yeah, and it makes me feel.
Like an apple because I talk to people like, you know, like in the arts or the hard world. I had an exhibition or something, and they'll say something that I really just vehemently disagree with that might fall in line with a certain RFK. You know, that's all well and good. But it's like they can say that stuff and be accepted, but I can't. The moment you say I don't believe that, I feel like I'm an apple or like I have to sort of challenge it, and I.
Don't want to do that.
I just want to be accepted in my own space. And when I brought up to hont On my culture my identity is because I don't feel like I'm at home in Texas either, especially with all of the laws that are changing and sort of oppress I mean, what it comes down to, it's depressing me in my own country and it doesn't feel good to be the target of this administration. And I find a lot of allyship with the trans community that I have a lot of respect for because it's sort of this quest of finding
the space that you belong in. And I would say I align this that tremendously, but I guess on I guess it's really hard to put this into words. I'm trying to find a place where I belong, but the atheist community that I know of isn't sufficient. And you know, I don't fit into my own community either, because uh, you know, I'm an artist. And so if I get asked all the time to do a.
Painting of our Lady at Guadalupe, do you know that image?
Yes, yeah, I get asked to do that.
A lot, I'm like, I don't believe this and that to me, Catholicism is the sword in which was used to oppress my ancestors, and I strongly rejected. And I know that you'll receive a lot of costs from other Latino people.
I can hear it in the accent, and it breaks my.
Heart to hear people loving that oppression. These people literally killed and committed Jen Bates violence against my ancestors two hundred years ago, and it's you know, and this sort of mass deportation is a continuation of that, and it makes me feel it's like not good for my mental health.
Yeah, No, the lack of inclusion here is breathtaking, and I can absolutely appreciate why it's challenging to find a community where you feel like you fit in. You know, I did not go looking for the atheist community of Austin.
I really stumbled backwards into it. And now I'm so grateful years later to have so many wonderful friends and so many ties to this community where I'm surrounded by people who don't just reject the idea of a god, but who have a interest in skepticism, who have an interest in promoting the separation of religion and government, who are concerned about and keeping an eye on the ways that religion mixed up with government can lead to all forms of bigotry and oppression, and certainly what we are
seeing in the mass deportation movement and some of these other like very real issues. Unfortunately, I don't know exactly where to point you beyond saying building your own community is always going.
To be a part of the process.
But Dan, is there any particular organization anything that comes to mind, or any advice that you might have on how to connect with people who Jesse maybe be able to better relate to.
Well, it's really tough because not everybody views atheism the same way that we necessarily do. So, like there's this there was this idea put out. It was twenty twelve.
A person named Jay mcwright wrote this thing is called atheism plus, and it was in a response to sort of some sexual scandals that were happening in atheist conferences and stuff, and all was basically saying was, hey, we should also be like atheists and feminists, right, which is something that like, I feel like most people we talk today is like, yeah, obviously that was like a big
deal to a lot of people. Then this idea that atheism could also encompass these other values or even should have any value judgments on other issues, for some people, that's a novel thing, and some people still struggle with that. And to incorporate these other values of humanism and these other values of recognizing oppression and histories of violence and things like that and finding against that. So like that's a difficulty in itself, right one is finding atheists that
also align yourselves in those values. That's definitely different. Now I think more people are open to that, but there's still some multiple people that don't even incorporate that. So you have that, but also, you know, atheists in general organizing atheist organizations, the saying has been said many times it's like organizing a herd of cats, just because you have so many people who value themselves as free thinkers
and skeptics that they tend to fight a lot. There tends to be a lot of miscommunication, and you know, sometimes skills are misappropriated in places. So you know, when Christy is saying, yeah, you should start your own I understand that there's a huge challenge there and that's not
something that everybody can really do. But honestly, the biggest fruits of organizations I've seen have come from people who really do this stuff out of a labor of love and who really want to like see the change that they want to put out, the change that they want to see like in the world. So if you're feeling these feelings of man, I really want to talk to other people about this. I want to make stuff happen.
I'm actually with Christian saying, like, hey, starting your own group and getting stuff started is is maybe the better way than trying to find a group where you might not even fit in or want to make the things different anyway, yeah, can I one.
One to think, of course.
Yeah.
I wanted to say one thing to the audience about like what it means to be a person like in your own because I reject all a tata label. I thought more under the mestizeo category, which is, you know, the a you know, the old term for the Spanish mixing with indigenous blood and m favor of the indigenous culture more because that's frankly, you know, I've been to Spain and I don't look like a Spanish person at all. I've been to Mexico and I don't really been in
there either. I'm a Tehano, and I wanted to show this with yours, who are listeners who also might be that under that category, I say, claim your native identity, because that's what I am and my ancestors are. Will also be known as the Clilticon, which is basically all of South Texas, and that's my home and I've missed.
It, you know.
Yeah.
Yeah, it's because I wanted to sort of distill the foreignness of the Latino term, because I mean, like I said, I'm Tohano, but I haven't you know, I'm not really any I don't have anything in common with somebody from Mudawai, you know, or I don't have anything in common from somebody from Cuba. There's a difference that really.
Matters, absolutely, absolutely, especially in Texas, right. Uh, you know, Latino being the highest minority group in Texas, right, so many people having their own individual communities and cultures here that's different from the rest of the world. We're asking ourselves a lot these days, what terms like race mean to us, these sorts of social constructs that people tie
their identities to. What is the importance of that, How that representation may not reflect the individual experiences of people broadly. And yeah, of the opinion that you should take whatever label you feel comfortable for yourself and take the labels that if you think share certain particular values to you, that you try to uphold those values, I'm all for it. Yeah.
So many people in the skeptic community get very uncomfortable with the notion of like self identification, and we start hearing these references to like identifying as attack helicopters in
some of that bullshit language. And I think this is a very clear cut description of what these ideas really mean and why we have to sort of wrestle with our own identity and then connect to and identify with the aspects of our own history, the aspects of our own birth and genetics and whatever else that are important to us and that we value and not just take a oppressive label that is slapped on us by a
government census or a birth certificate or whatever else. So I don't mean to overly conflate these things here, but Jesse, I really appreciate you talking to your feelings about that Latino label and why it doesn't feel appropriate to you, and why there is so much religious oppression mixed up even in that you know, government census data.
Yeah, and the fact.
I'm in a mestizo was simply put there by the Catholic Church, and people just take it for granted because I'm like, no, the problem is is that again, Texas.
Is my home. It's our home.
It's it would be evil to be deported from my own land like that.
Yeah, you know what I mean. Yeah, I'm sort.
Of like really vehement, And I do think that the massive blocks that voted for Trump, that under the Latino umbrella, I think voted by uh it was It's a mistake. It's I think the Catholic Church is the reason for that, because there's a lot of conservativism that's inserted in the church because I used to be Catholic and I strongly reject that, and I think that's that might be why a lot of looking voted for trauma.
No question, there's a lot to be said about voting against your own self interest because of these religious affiliations and sort of a block voting that comes along with our two party system. Thank you so much for reaching
out and for sharing all of this. We definitely hope that you find a community that better suits you, and Lord, I know that Dan and I are here, at least in part to try and advocate for a government for a world that is less interested than the one we currently have in othering ostracizing, escape voting minority communities.
Definitely, yeah, I mean to me.
Also, one last thing is that I feel like the atheist community online that I can do connect with are the closest people I really find sort of a home with because I mean my community. I mean I mentioned atheism amongst the Chicano Tohano community. Man, that's a good way to get kicked out of a house Gore.
But you know what, though, you as an individual are going to be a better advocate for that in those spaces than Christy and I ever will. Right, So you know there is an advantage of your connections to those spaces that I think, you know, could be seen as
something to again like take advantage of. I'm not telling you what to do, right, but maybe there are people in those communies who are also just as isolated as you are because they don't have those kinds of connections or resources, or think of atheism as a white thing, because a lot of people think of atheism as a white thing. So you know there's something to that too, just to keep in mind.
Yeah, and I'll just point out that the incredible crew that helps Dan and I put this show on. Like Dan and I are both local to the Austin area and both grew up around here, but our crew is made up from folks all over the place. I mean, we were telling jokes about Canada earlier today, Like we are from everywhere, And if you don't have a community, maybe the atheist community of Austin can be a part
of that solution. Wherever it is that you're located. We always have volunteer opportunities, We have all kinds of different meetups and opportunities to participate in this community. We hope that you'll join us and that you can find something of value there.
Thank you very much, I super Gooper appreciate it and I hope to.
Talk to you all against so hey stame here. Thank you so much for giving us call. You have a great day.
Well.
In reference to the folks who.
Helped us put all of this together, I have once again neglected to say a big thank you to our crew. I'd love to get them up on the screen, folks who are from all over the place. Thank you so much for everything that you guys do to make us look good and to make all of this work.
Yes, yes, we can't have a show without the crew. It can't just be us two guys just talking into the void. That's what it would be. Otherwise, Yeah, that's the thing. It's like, it would just be a void.
It would just be you and I not out in front of an audience, and definitely not lit so well or sounding so smoothly.
That's true, that's true. I just I really appreciate that call because you and I are I know, are of the same mind about this. But I've talked to other skeptics who are so baffled when we talk about grace as a social construct, where it's like, yeah, of course it is, of course it is. How could it not
be right? And yeah, that's that should be treated with the same amount of skepticism as we do with all the other kinds of topics that we talk about here, with the all the nuances and things that come with that. But yeah, that kind of identity is sort of self
defined and always has been. And when people kind of realize that there's a power there, there's a liberation that comes with that that people don't realize and sometimes they feel like they have to keep up with the status quo because well, there's a lot of reasons why, but you know, just an interesting conversation.
Yeah, Well, whether you are looking to volunteer or honestly just looking to be a part of our extended digital community, or even if you're local to the Austin area, we want you to be a part of this community. Www. Dot Atheist Hyphencommunity dot org is a great place to start where you can learn more about this organization, it's policies and different ways to get involved. So with that, what do you say, we talked to Tom in Mississippi.
Yeah, that sounds good. Let's do it all.
Right, Tom, you have some thoughts about comparative religion and religion in schools. What's on your mind?
Oh? Yeah, First, I'd like to endorse share, thanks for everybody who makes possible. But as to teaching comparative religion, I think that the actual syllabus taught might be fraught with tension. Sure, I believe it should only be taught as elective, which kind of implies that it's not going to be taught at the elementary school level, only at secondary levels, possibly at the high school level, but certainly no sooner than that. And the reason I say it
should be elective is closely tied to that. For instance, if you're pursuing a major which has nothing to do in any articulable way with religion, you can go ahead and take comparative religion, but it wouldn't be really required. On the other hand, the fine point is you might have a declared major where the people in charge of that school feel that comparative religion is required for the major, in which case it's required, not only. And the Bacond issue I had was about it not. I don't. I
failed to see how this is even a debate. It seems to me that the plane reading of the constitutional laws, they are historical documents. I mean, one of the most notable being the Treaty of Tripling, if I got that name right. The government should just be ponderously unaware that such a thing is religion even exists. I think that's the only way to keep thing wee in a legal sense. So religious behavior as a special category in law should
not exist. I think all that should exist is what current the web exists as acceptable social behavior.
Yeah, no, I hear you.
And let's I suppose take those points kind of one at a time, Like the notion of teaching comparative really religion in high school. You know, I'm not a educator.
I don't necessarily know how to best break that down, but I do feel like it's important to acknowledge that it would be impossible, in my mind, to get a well rounded education at the high school level without ever having been introduced to religion and the role that it is played in our history, in the role that it has played in you know, really shaping science and philosophy
and all of these other things. So I don't feel like I would be in support of some sort of blanket band where like high schools can't even acknowledge the
existence of these belief systems. But that's not the same as singling out a particular one and raising it up to something that we have to like honor as an important part of our history, when it's certainly like the Christianity is not all of our shared history or the shared history of everybody who goes to these schools, Dan, what do you want to say on that idea before we talk about, you know, the constitutionality.
Of this law. Now I agree with you. How can you possibly talk about history and the history of ideas without talking about religion. I mean, that just seems so silly to me to be like, wow, we can't talk about this aspect of human society and human culture even though it's one of the most influential forces on the planet for what we've done, right, Like, I completely disagree it should be it should be available to be taught, Whether it should be a mandatory elective, that's another conversation.
But I'll tell you this, Christy. When I was in college, I took a course on Islamic studies taught by a Muslim professor, and I learned about Islam and its history, particularly in Arabic society, and you know what, that was invaluable to me. I have no stock in Islam. I have no stock in it. I don't think any of it's at least the core tenets of it are true in any capacity. But I have a better understanding of the history of the those ideas and have influences in
the world. And you know what, I if I ever do talk to a Muslim, I have a better context in which to approach that conversation than I ever would have without taking that course. So it's absolutely vital, I think,
and important, especially if you're in a humanities study. But honestly, anybody that has a major in school these days, in most universities, has to have some sort of humanities So even if you're doing like engineering, so like that, that's always going to be a thing people are going to take, whether they are particularly interested in themselves or not. So yeah, I mean it should be available for people to teach. I don't know. I'm in the same campus you though,
I'm not a professional in this regard. I don't know, like am I going to put a tier list as to teaching this over that. I don't know. That's a little outside of my skille. But is it valuable, should it be taught, should it be available to be taught? Absolutely?
Yeah, I think I think maybe I was a bit misunderstood.
Sure, help us out.
I did not mean to imply that at below high school level, or even at high school level, that any mention of religion was for botten. There's a difference between saying that historically the Roman Catholic Church did this and the Church of England did that, as opposed to discussing the theology of the Roman Catholic Church of the Anglican Church. That's the difference.
I still disagree with you because theology. I gotta stop you right there, Tom, because that distinction is still not good enough for me. Yes, we should talk about the history, and yes, I do think we should talk about the theology, because you know why, the theology also influenced the history.
Right.
History doesn't happen in evacue. It comes through a zeitgeist of ideas, and theology has informed philosophy, and philosophy has informed the world. I mean, I don't have to agree with it Obviously I don't write I'm on the hello, I want to talk Evean. Okay, we're on the same page there. But it's still important to know these things and have be able to be informed about it. So yeah, I still think that that's just as important.
Yeah, you can't teach world cultures, you can't teach world history without at least acknowledging what much of the world believes. And I think that there is value in diving somewhat at an age appropriate level, from a neutral point of view, into what some of those beliefs are. I mean, is that fair, Tom, Like we're whether or not there's like a dedicated course to comparative religion at the high school level is a very specific question that I don't feel
qualified to answer. But I do believe that, you know, even in the third grade, when we're learning about world history and world cultures, that we can acknowledge some of the world's varying belief systems.
Again, I don't believe that I stated that religion could not be mentioned. Yeah, I will acknowledge that this question of at what point is it appropriate to go to different depth into religion in terms of at what point many at what age or under what curriculum is a difficult question. There is not a bright line answer, I
don't think at all. However, that being said, for instance, in the third grade, it would be entirely possible to mention that, following my earlier analogy, that Henryet and his advisors decided to split off from the Roman Catholic Church without getting into theological discussions behind it, because that can be addressed. I mean, you can mention the dore theological differences, and you might even mention baldly what a couple are. But what should not happen is a debate over the merits.
On the other hand, I can have a debate over the merits of the political situation there. But I think the other important thing to say is that it's very context sensitive in terms of age and curriculum. But the reason why I hesitate at lower level is is very pragmatic. In many places, I'm not sure of all, but in many places, the curriculum at elementary or junior high school level is settled very much by a local or relatively local school board. Now when you get to a college level,
it's completely different. You're not going to your local public school or to a public school that the local area will allow you to attend. If there is a public school. Choice college now is entirely choice based pache financial considerations. Obviously, the college that you go to, given your qualified to go to, that college, is much more of a choice. Hence, I don't really care about who's setting the syllabus as
long as you observe separation of church and state. If you're a college that exists general funding or state funding, there needs to be oversight over well how balanced the syllabus.
Tom, I got great news for you, because there's no third grader in the in anywhere in this entire country that's learning about Henry the eighth and his theological inclinations or political inclinations. That's not a thing. It's it's I and I'm saying this is someone who's former careers in private education. Okay, the standards are set. Yes, you're right in that courses are selected by local school boards, but
standards of instruction are still set by the state. Right and so uh that's you know, nobody in elementary school is getting a deep cut on Thomas Aquinas and then their theology and stuff, right, I don't think, Uh, that's it's just not happening, right. I think we're talking about maybe high school electives here and how appropriate that might be. And even then, uh yeah, maybe having a you know, a deep cut theology class may not be the most
important thing when compared to other stuff. But I mean, if it's an elective, it's an elective.
Right.
They're certainly not doing that in most public schools. In fact, I don't know if any public schools, certainly not in Texas, that are requiring Christian stuff, although Oklahoma's trying to change that. But the point is, you know, it's you know.
It's understanding some of the core principles or precepts of all of this is not the same thing as debating their merit. So you know, I don't want to get too much further into the weeds of us sort of pontificating on what.
Schools should be teaching.
But I, you know, just broadly want to acknowledge that I think at any age it is appropriate to acknowledge religion exists and this is what some people believe, and this is what other people believe. But to your other point about the constitutionality of this law that is being considered here in Texas and that is very likely to be signed by the governor soon. I do worry about
the constitutionality. You know, a very similar, if not almost identical law, as I understand it was struck down in Louisiana by the Supreme Court, and that there is cause to believe that this will almost immediately be challenged. And as a non lawyer, that makes good goddamn sense, because it's hard for me to wrap my head around how this could possibly line up with the constitution.
Yep, yeah, I think we're I think we're in agreement there. I take a probably a reasonably extreme vital with it when I say the government should be ponderously unaware in the law. But yeah, And the only thing I was trying to get at is that I think that getting back to you know, what's taught. I think that at the college level is pretty clear cut that the government should be out of it. I think that in grade school is pretty clear that you don't want to dive
into the merits. And it gets funny when you talk about high school. That's all I'm saying.
Yeah, fair enough, No, I mean debating over the merits of a particular belief system. You know that can get certainly very messy. I like the idea of teenagers learning critical thinking skills. I like the idea of them being able to criticize a set of beliefs or a particular philosophy, even if they're thirteen and wrong, even if their conclusions
aren't necessarily what I would hope for from them. I think that part of any well rounded education is a willingness to question things, to challenge things, and being taught maybe how to do that in a reasonable, well reasoned,
intellectual way. So you know, we're on the same page here, and it sounds like Tom, we're all just kind of crossing our fingers that we are headed in the right direction politically, and that our governance is going to honor the rule of law and that we can actually hold strong to the Constitution.
Yep. Just one final thing I'd say is that I want to adorse your belief in the importance of the humanities or what used to be called liberal arts, even among people who are taking a strongly technical major. I'm with you there too, absolutely.
Yeah, we need to prevent stem lords from ruining our society. So yeah, I'm always going to promote demands there.
Yeah, Okay, that'll do it. Thanks a lot.
Well, Yeah, thank you, Tom. We really appreciate it talking to you. Yeah, Dan, is it?
I don't know.
I don't want to be too squeamish, like I recognize that talking than the atheist community of Boston. We've been having conversations like this for a long time. I don't necessarily know that we're a watchdog organization, but this is certainly not the first time that two hosts like you and I have sat down and wrung our hands about the erosion of the wall of separation of church and state. That being said, does this feel like just another tug
back and forth in the tug of war? Or for you, does it to feel like we are, you know, taking another meaningful step in an increasingly worrying direction.
Oh, oh, increasingly worrying direction, there, Christy, I mean.
Yeah, okay, so not just being alarmist right now, listen.
In my lifetime, this has been the greatest threat of that separation, I would say, for sure, because of the
political situation, because of our Supreme Court situation. In my personal opinion, yes, it is absolutely, absolutely the most worrying and our work as activists has never been more important in that regard, I would say, not that it hasn't been important before, but we are at a what I would consider to be a major, major, potential turning point, which is why I think we should raise the alarm bells. So you know, yeah, yeah, you know.
I have mentioned it on this show before, and I don't mean to repeat myself, and I hate thinking to myself as any kind of alarmist. But when I became a gender and sexuality therapist here in Texas, I and I started my own business, you know, I was worried about, like my expenses and how do I advertise and getting referrals, and how do I have clients coming in and how do I make money? Like all of the things that
you worry about when you're running a business. I did not have anywhere in my top ten things to be concerned about all of my clients turning into political refugees and fleeing the state because of their increasing very legitimate worries of the oppressive nature of our governance. And that is becoming like a major I hate to put it in business terms, but as that one metric, it's a major concern for like the long term viability of the work I'm trying to do here.
Absolutely in many, many, many different facets. That's true in immigration, in social and political identity, and in schools as well. I mean we're talking, we're at like Scopes monkey trial level of importance right now, Supreme Court cases in my opinion when it comes to this stuff. And it's alarming because we are both private citizens and you and I don't know any governors or you know, anything like that. Donors, yeah, our millionaire donors. Our influence only goes so far as
to the people that listen to us. But I still try my best. I don't know, and I know you try to. So we're trying.
All right, Well, let's let's keep trying. And on that note, let's talk again to d in Iowa, who has some concerns about Catholicism's role in our society. D what's on your mind?
Christ I talk to you guys. So, yeah, kind of piggybacking on Jimmy Junior's intro today, honestly, the and I want to pivot slightly to kind of support Jesse's call because he makes my point that cuts policism Tholicism as a cult, and it's actually a predatory cult because it appropriates, and then destroys certain cultural beliefs, practices, religions. It's based
on UH. It's its dogma, and its doctrines have come from appropriating pagan beliefs and celebrations and incorporating that into their into their belief and then proceeding to destroy them. And as they progressed through the world, as they progressed by by I think it wasn't it Constantine that converted and then started using the sword to spread They then turned to UH funding through different kings and queens and.
Kingdom just dragon hoarding in a lot of ways.
Yeah.
Yeah, Well, so you'll definitely find no defense of Catholicism or the Roman Catholic Church here. But when you make it a point to refer to Catholicism as a cult, I'm really curious what that word means to you. You know, I really appreciate Amanda Montell's perspective on all of this, when she writes about how the only difference between a cult and a religion is the point of view, and
how pejorative you want to be about it. You know, working in religious trauma, I don't necessarily find like the bite model or any of these other distinctions between cult and religion particularly useful. I find that cult is really just a pejorative term for religion. And I'm, you know, fine with that in the extent that I want to be like rude about somebody else's belief systems. Obviously, I'm here promoting atheism and the critical thinking that I think
would tear down religious thought. But why use that particular term? Why is that important to make that distinction here?
To me, a cult has it has many uh definitions, however, and U and characteristics. My view of what a cult is is number one, the cult has bizarre belief system based on things that are by themselves would be maybe socially unacceptable, such as cannibalism and human sacrifice. And then the degree of control that it exerts over not only its members but its environment. And I you know, I wasn't going to go into a whole thing about you know, what cults are, how you can define them, how you
can move up. But I find two definitions because I knew you would ask me that.
Sure, we find, you know, truly bizarre beliefs in other forms of Christianity, in Buddhism, in Islam, and a lot of religions that frankly don't have as many adherents as the Roman Catholic Church. Again, I am not trying to come in in defense of the Roman Catholic Church. I've spoken on this show recently about the pope election and how my concerns and feelings about that organization are definitely
already on the record. And I don't mean to pick on you for your language, but it seemed like such an important crux of what it was that you came here to share. And I'm interested in what makes you maybe want to single out the Roman Catholic Church versus railing against Islam, versus railing against Buddhism or any of these other also very popular world religions or belief system.
She might think those are cults too. I don't know. Maybe it feels that way.
I single out Catholicism because I am more knowledgeable about Catholicism than I am about Islam or Buddhism or any other, you know, established religion or belief system.
I'll tell you, you get deep enough into Buddhism and you start hearing some really weird stories, ye some things too true.
And but you know, like I said, I don't. I don't know Islam, and while I have investigated Buddhism, I found recently that I really don't know as much as I thought I did, and the Catholicism is responsible. They piggyback themselves on the age of exploration and discovery with you know, the Spanish and English colonization. As Jesse said,
his ancestors were brutally exploited, convert by force. We know that in the United States and in Canada, hundreds, if not thousands of young Native Americans and Native Canadians were flaughtered at Catholic schools, abused at Catholic schools. So I believe that the definitions of the cult that I laid out earlier are very much so fulfilled by Catholic Church.
Yeah, I guess my thing I would take with that is just because an organization abuses and exploits and colonializes does it that itself doesn't make it a cult. We would call the US a cult, although maybe the US is a call I don't know, but like a lot of colonial powers would be called under that idea, I don't think. I don't think something has to be exploitative to be a cult either, you know, I just think
you just had you know, what Catholicism really does. Though, what I do share your criticisms with is when you define fin orthodoxy, you also define heterodoxy, right. In other words, when you define what's okay and what's what's not. When when you find what's okay, you're also defining what's not okay.
And the Catholic Church has been uh, you know, sort of historical and their judgments on other cultures, other beliefs, systems, other you know, ways of life that have been antithetical to the powers that be for the Catholic Church, and therefore they've sought their destruction, which is unfortunate and obviously terrible. So I think we both take coverage with that.
I'm well aware that my language is harsh and controversial, and I appreciate you guys's counterpoints, but I am unapologetic at this time, and until such time as this pope causes a major shift in the general attitude of Catholicism, I will continue to refer to it as a culture.
No, No, that that's fairness doing that to be I'm not.
I'm not doing that too. I'm not doing that for shock value. I'm not doing it for you know, sensationalism's sake. It's it's what I truly believe based on the history. And I just wanted to do say one other thing for Jesse while he was speaking, I did some googling for Latino artists and I dropped some links in the chat for him to check out. I really appreciate his
journey in claiming his ancestry and his identity. It really touched me deeply, and I hope that he continues to find a place where he feels he belongs.
Yeah, so say we all.
I definitely want to be on the favor of creating community. It was a religious trauma therapist, Yes, of course.
I spent a lot of.
Time helping people work through the the like I guess we'll call positive traumas, or the experiences of bad things happening to you, you know, having these beliefs shove down your throats, being criticized and hurt in these very specific ways. But there's also the trauma of being removed from your community, being isolated from your community, and so many of the things that you lose when you walk away from religion.
And I think that there is remarkable value in recognizing that loss walking away from religion may be additioned by subtraction, but it's still going to hurt, because you're losing a lot of valuable aspects of your day to day life.
And I hope.
That the atheism community recognizes that, or just really recognizes how important it is to have a community, whether it's centered around atheism the way that this particular community is, or whether it's centered around you know, RuPaul's drag Race or dungeons and Dragons or whatever the hell else. You need friends in your life. Every good study on health and well being in humans says that over and over and over. So do we wish you the best? Jesse Again,
We certainly wish you the best. And we hope that everybody listening feels like they have important people in their lives that they can share the mundane and the you know, deep, heady philosophical and.
I appreciate that you're there for those of us who have lost community and friends and you know everything. It's just awesome. And hopefully the clients of yours that have felt so unsafe that they had to leave the state, I hope that they can that you can continue to counsel them, possibly through you know, online and stuff like that, because you are really providing an invaluable service. So thank you Christian. With that, I will jump off. I know it takes a lot of time, so thank you.
No, I appreciate you saying so, thank you so much for your call, and have a great Sunday afternoon. All right, Dan, I want to take a moment to thank our top five patrons. I'm going to give you a second maybe to get some of our super chats pulled up as we have more of those coming in. But first and foremost our top five patrons this week number one Oops All Singularity, number two Dingleberry Jackson, three Coleevi Helvetti for Brian Zouopke, and in the fifth spot is Ja cal
Carlton and our honorable mention this week, Diane Kerns. Thank thanks to each of you. Thanks to all of you who are part of supporting us on Patreon. If you're interested in joining, that's a tiny dot cc slash Patreon t H. And on that note, we have been recording the TALKI than Discord after shows for all level of paid patrons, and so if you're looking for even more content, even more conversations like this.
Please give that a try. Yeah, and we do have super chats that these came quite earlier. I'm glad you brought up because we should go ahead and read these. One from Miranda Ronsberger, a member of one year, gave ten dollars and said, Happy Pride Month, all you heathens. Don't let people get away with using their religion as an excuse to hate or discriminate.
That's not what religious freedom means.
That's right, that's right. I co signed on that, Miranda, and I don't know what this was in reference to, but blind Blimey, a member of two years, gave five dollars and said, Dan's right. I'm going to start my own ACA with blackjack and redacted. That's not the reacting things.
Right, Yeah, No, you know, we're talking about forming community and whatever you want to form that community around.
Right, Okay, Yeah, that makes sense. Yeah, yeah, blackjack and atheism. Yeah, I don't know. It could be a thing I guess you wanted to be.
You know, Well, we've got some other interesting callers on the line.
Who do you want to roll the dice with? Ohtally, I want to roll the dice with, uh maybe gosh, I don't know. What what do you want? Who do you want to talk to this? I know you literally just asked you that, but either one I could go with that. I see here? Okay, Nick or Michelle?
You know?
Yeah, all right, well let's do Nick in Massachusetts and see what is on his mind today, Nick, Determination, predetermination, non determination? What you got for us?
Hi?
So I kind of wanted to get your guys's sort of thoughts on what uh predetermined like a like a predetermined reality or not non determined non predetermined reality, or like the combination of the two, like what do you think we're living in? And what if like that has any bearing or if it makes any claims, like like if it is a consequence of like making a statement on whether there's a Sang sing god or not, or maybe like a prime non sen Sien intelligence Like.
I sure, well, let me just jump in and say yeah, I'll go ahead and start by saying that, you know, whether this is all just causality that is, repercussions of the Big Bang and everything is predetermined, or whether there is an actual random chance that's possible through quantum mechanics and our growing understanding of those things. I will admit it's hard for me to find any room for free will in either of those situations, and I definitely don't
see any evidence for God in either perspective. Dan, what does any of this mean to you?
I'm in the same boat as you, Chrisive. I think people get confused because I do believe we live in a deterministic universe, but that doesn't necessarily mean that everything is predetermined. I mean, if it is, then we certainly as humans don't know about it, right. We don't have all the information or variables to predict the things that we'd want to know exactly in our lives. So it's almost a point in a way. I think people kind
of overemphasize this, especially Christians who criticize our points. They're like, well, you just think everything like nothing matters because we don't have free will. And it's like, that doesn't mean that like we can't like interact with the world. It just means that there's determinists to play. It's it's a little bit more complicated.
I guess if it feels like I'm making a decision, then as far as I'm concerned at the level of experience, I'm making a decision and make some good ones.
Exactly and I and that's not me necessarily like promoting compatibilism in a way. I'm just saying it's it's a little bit more nuanced than what people give it credit for when we talk about this. But yeah, is a universe deterministic or does it? Is it made of determinist systems? Yeah? I think so. Yeah.
Like, So the reason why I asked that because like I feel like there's a comment like it's both things that are happening. Like there's a like, let's say there's one hundred percent will because that by definition just like will, like like in terms of like there's like agentic will, and then there's non agentic like predetermined just big bang
force will. So like I feel like, you know, genetics is more like there's a significant aspect of like molecular dynamics that is more on the side of like big bang force. And then you know, there's our experiential like day to day side of things where we're conscious of our experience and like having that feedback loop into our
like like continuous decision making process. And I see in the fact that like when I dream, like when I'm dreaming, maybe you guys might relate to this my sense like I feel like an objective change in my ability to control my environment and myself, so like I can't when I'm dreaming. I can observe and feel like more creative control and like environmental control, but I lose the ability to like be feeling my body and being like one
with my whole physical experience in the dream. So like there's like a change.
I think we have to acknowledge that that experience is a subjective one, that there is no objective increase in control. If anything, Dreams are just an important reminder to me that we shape our own realities. But I'm struggling with how any of this gets us closer to or further away from free will and or the existence of a god.
Okay, So I think that it's like I don't for one thing, for like on the free will side, I don't think that anything has like total will. I think we have like partial will that doesn't necessarily like control any system completely.
But uh yeah, I'd say about ten percent luck, twenty percent skill, fifteen percent concentrated power of will. Right, That's what I would say. Sorry, that's a bad joke.
If no, no, I get it. Yeah, so and then so like what that has to say about like a god or like yeah, I mean I'm not sure because I feel like if you know, like what like if we're there's like extra physical uh creator version of a god or there's like the pan theist uh just like latent energy space of like definition of a god. I mean if like I'm sort of like in the camp where you know, if I just go with with from
what I'm seeing, like that is the universe. I think that there's like some cyclical aspect and like, but I can't really explain like why anything exists besides like the necessity for like structural coherence, Like I feel like I can't really It's like it's like it's almost like the universe is.
Saying, uh, you don't.
You can't have anything without an uncontrollable uh like a completely uncontrollable force to drive the medium, like to drive continuity forward for the non deterministic, nondetermined aspects of reality like for life.
I mean, I mean, Nick, I recognize that these concepts are incredibly challenging and confusing in a lot of ways. And I don't mean to pick on you, but when you say that you don't know how to explain. I do find myself this deep into the call really unclear on what it is that you were even attempting to explain.
Can you help us a little bit, because I know one aspect of this type of philosophy is just how tempting it is to get overwhelmed by it and to maybe feel this like existential dread and then just kind of start grabbing things and shoving them together and putting the word quantum in front of it and like trying to use it to justify some sort of worldview without having wrapped our head around each of the individual concepts. Can you break it down for me a little bit,
or maybe even just bottom line it too. What does any of this mean?
Well?
So, I think that if there's anything that like is pretty like like.
If anything is going to say.
Anything about whether or not like a god exists, I think that like the fact that there's a like dead at like like non agentic aspects of reality and then agentic ones. I feel like that if anything would give up what's a clue about like the origins of the universe in life?
Yeah, if we could ever separate them out though, yea, right, Like, how how do we know that we are being agentic in any meaningful way, or how that isn't just again another sequence of predetermined things like did I take a sip of water because I wanted to or did I take a sip of water because my throat was dry? What the hell is the difference? And where does any of that Like if we could somehow separate these things
out too, am I truly making a choice? Or is the choice just predetermined by all of the other things that led up to that choice? Perhaps there could be some insight there into the choices that led to this universe existing. But I'm really struggling with like that idea that we could ever get there.
Right, So do you think that we could there's like a mechanistic way to differentiate between like an agent and a non agent, not that I.
Can understand or not that I'm aware of.
Yeah, I don't think so.
Uh.
You know, Like the thing with these is we have to ask ourselves could we have done different?
Right?
And I don't know how answerable of a question that even is. And when you bring gotten to the equation, if you ask could God have done different? If the answer to that is no, then that seems to be just as deterministic as anything else, right, So yeah, I don't know. This is this is one of the problems of our times that's even more situated with the rise of AI and whatnot. So yeah, I'm not gonna I'm not gonna be that guy that's gonna have all the answers for you.
Yeah.
Uh yeah.
I think like if we if we can, like the way that I know, we haven't like explained about a genesis yet, like we haven't like come together completely in the scientific community to like fully like mechanistically explain biogenesis. But I think, like if I go on like my hunch about like what it's gonna involve, like in the explanation, if when we get there, it's like whatever, the initial conditions are, like whatever it led up to, the initial
conditions for like the formation event is whatever. But like the formation event sort of would necessitate like like weightless a weightless environment or like a near weightless environment inside an encapsulation like an encapsulated barrier. I feel like the weightlessness is sort of like homeostatic in and for me, what that like It's like an environment that like reduces the styles uh like of scope of like of locality
for non deterministic events to happen. So it's just like, I don't know there's some power in weightlessness that I can't really fully COMPREHENDI.
I don't know if weightlessness is necessary for a biogenesis. I don't know that we know what is necessary for a biogenesis. And I definitely don't know that I am following where you get your hunch from or why that's
necessarily compelling. I think the last thing I would really say about any of this, nick is just from the perspective of the very applied philosophy of clinical counseling, is I would say that, yeah, it's probably likely true that we aren't making these choices, except that we are just following a series of choices that have already been made. Or maybe they're not even choices, maybe they are just
things that happen. And part of that still empowers us to be introspective about who we are as people and what we want out of life and what we want to do about any of it. None of it gives us the ability to forecasts or or understand things that we simply don't understand, and it doesn't make the existential void of is there a God, or why are we here or why do we exist? Any different?
Yeah?
Yeah, with regards of the like determinism thing like, for example, I can't transform into a dragon right now. I can, you know, feel like I really want to, and I can maybe try to change how much harder I feel that I want to change into a dragon, But like the mechanistic scope of like possibility isn't there, Like it's not physically possible, But then there's like physically possible, there's like the physically possible scope of things that can happen
from whatever the now is. And if we have like a coherent understanding of like those option like options, different options in that scope, and we're aware of that, I feel like that's the indicative of like will.
I'm not I.
Wouldn't say that it's like evidentiary of like like free reign type of will, but I would.
I don't know.
You're still assuming that it is impossible for you to transform into a dragon, but it is possible to do all of these other things. And I guess I'm just not there yet. I'm not convinced that just because we haven't seen something doesn't mean that it can't theoretically be possible, but I'm not sure how much further we can get in all of this, and so much of it is conjecture, Dan, or are you comfortable with leaving it there? I think I'm good leave it there.
I mean, look, at this point in the process, you want to refer to the people who have written whole books about this stuff that have way to define terms, have way better concise explanations about the things that we're going into here, because ultimately you and I are layman's on this subject, and we can give our perspectives, and I think that's about as far as we can go, you know.
Yeah, to that end, I personally enjoyed Determined by Robert Sapalski. Dan, I don't know if you co signed that one, but yeah, keep reading and Nick, we really appreciate you giving it a try with us, and give it.
Us a call all ready? Thank you have it right day? All right?
Yeah, let's sneak in one more quick call before we start to wrap up today and hear from Michelle. I know that Michelle has been waiting for a good long while. So what's on your mind today, Michelle?
Well, I was thinking throughout the calls, and I thought that I would rephrase my question. The way I had it phrased was does gepticism presuppose belief or end or faith? However, I thought that that would put me in a rock and a hard space to prove, because the way I have it understood that presupposition will argue men's work. Is that the thing like, if I would say, well, does does does skepticism pretty supposed to believe? That would mean I was saying that you start with belief, and that's
the ground that would be the ground for the skepticism. However, I want to change that around and say does skepticism? Must there be a sense of a sense of belief with our skepticism? Must we always be mixing our skepticism with the question of like, hey, does God exist?
Maybe?
Does do pixie do? Pixie?
Parting?
Universe?
Arting pixies is good?
Anything like supernatural spirit goes after life, anything of the sort, aliens, exterterrestrials. Can we say that anything of the sort exists? Should we? Should we at least dare to say maybe? Or gee?
Kind of like that?
Go I'm not sure I follow the question?
How about you? Yeah, Well, you started off with an interesting question which was does skepticism presupposed beliefs? That's a that's a very interesting question. But then you said you want to change your question, and I'm not sure what the changed question was. Can you give us, like one sentence version of what the change question is?
Yeah, tell me, Dan, maybe you could tell me?
Do I like?
Am I wrong when I say that if my question is does pre does skepticism presupposed belief? Am I wrong to say that? By saying that, I mean that we must believe first in something supernatural let's say, for example, and then we must be doubtful. Or can we just say we take a belief in skepticism at the same time and we're all the better for it, You know what I mean? You know I'm getting that now.
I think skepticism is just the degree of maybe humility with which we hold a belief.
Yeah, there's different perspectives, because philosophy is a wide ranging field, and they have different ideas and diferent perspectives on what skepticism is. Interestingly, though, there is a line of thought that says skepticism is a materialist perspective, right, And what I mean by that is the suspension of this belief right,
or the suspension of belief in particular claims. Generally, generally, the trend is it comes from some line of observation, whether it's through logical reasoning or in more recent years, through scientific observation. That's very interesting, right, because there is a trust there that's inherent to the scientific method in
understanding whether things are true or not. So in one sense, you could say there's a presupposition there, but that's only if you hold the scientific method to be a reliable arbiter of what's true. Maybe you have skepticism, but you're from a maybe you're a psychic or a believer, and you're skeptical of people who say that being psychic stuff isn't real. You know, it kind of cuts both ways
in that sense. So there's very specific context in which we use the word skeptics, or which skepticism has used in philosophy there. So I guess, like many answers, it kind of depends. But I don't think you'd necessarily be wrong in saying it could presuppose belief. It just again, really depends on how you're defining that.
I guess.
I guess right now, can we move into maybe really quickly defining belief and faith and maybe and then move it back to skepticism because for me, I can believe, for example, like for me, belief involves a certain amount of certainty about something. For me, I can believe that if I go to my refriger right now, refrigerator right now, that there might be a soda pop in there waiting for me. You know, maybe I put one in there the other day and I forgot about it, and maybe like, oh,
it's in there. Maybe it's not to someone drank it on me. Or I can have faith that it's in there. I have no evidence whatsoever. I didn't put it in there. I don't remember putting in there. Maybe I'm going on faith that maybe someone put one in there for me and it's cold, just waiting for me. But I have no evidence whatsoever. But I can hope. That's faith when you have no evidence to promote or give you any or to give you anything to bounce back to belief on,
you know what I mean. Yeah, So, and then and then we move back to skepticism and we judge our beliefs. We move back into skepticism, and then we say, well, here's here's where I'm skeptical about this phase part of the thing, and when I'm believing, and then here's my skepticism about my belief.
Yeah, yeah, I mean, there's no necessarily wrong answers here, because belief has been defined in various capacities. If you notice, when Christy and I talked to particularly theists, we are usually going to be the first ones to ask, what do you mean by faith? What do you mean by a belief right? Because that's always going to be rooted
in individual perspectives. I mean, Christian and I may have much more define, more rigorous ideas of that, but on the man on the street kind of person, maybe right, and it may take a bit to tease that out. So like belief to me is more like an attitude about something right. So I acknowledge the subjective, inherent perspectivism
that comes with a belief. I might define knowledge as a justified true belief, but even then there's problems with how you consider something to be a justified true belief, very very famously gettier problems and whatnot that come with that kind of philosophy. So I'm not going to say you're wrong on your definition there, Michelle. In fact, I think that's a pretty well thought out answer, because I don't think there is going to be one answer to this question. I think it's going to be based on
the individual. But what do you think, Christy?
Well, and it really is, like you said, more of a question of linguistics than philosophy at this stage in the game, Like how do we define belief absence of skepticism or vice versa. I, you know, I'm fine with some of the definitions that we've come up with. I don't know how functional all of this is when we act start to talk to people about what it is that.
They believe and why.
And I, you know, I'm not necessarily somebody who holds up skepticism as a incredible virtue. I know that that's a common talking point in this community. And I think that I'll stick with my sort of earlier definition of humility. You know, it's just about holding the beliefs that we hold with a certain amount of hesitation or a certain amount of humility about their certainty and their assuredness.
Yeah, if I may give an example, a brief example, I kind of like to think about it. Well, I'm certain and I am a gnostic about the fact that if I jump out of a plane at thirty thousand feet in the air without a parachute on either a I'm going to break every bone in my body and somehow contradictor to ely survive that accident, or I'm going
to die. I'm a gnostic about those facts. Those are facts, but the true fact I am, not, however, confident or have the conviction enough to say or an astic enough to say that I know that God exists, that I'm going to live internally in a sola the kingdom that I don't want to forever.
Yeah, this is.
How is that for an example?
Well, this is the this is the problem of atheist uh atheist activism as a whole. We're always going to be on the back foot when it comes to this, right because there's a million God beliefs and there's only one of us. And and the way that we even define our our atheism is contentious. There's different ideas about this. Should we define it as a positive claim or should
we define it as a lack of belief. There's there's all kinds of different conversations about this, and and I think that that nuance gets lost on a lot of people because it's it's just not it doesn't come up in carmon conversation. I certainly wasn't taught about the nuances of the atheist position when I was a Christian, Okay, So you know, there's there's always going to be different
ideas to this. But you know how I like to look at it is I have a lot of different ideas that I've encountered about God in particular, and I do reject openly some of these ideas. I'm not conclusive about some ideas, like a God that is completely outside of the known material universe. Sure, how can I know about the existence of one or not? I can be
agnostic about that. But you know, as far as the Yahweh of the Bible, of the semic tribes, you know, yeah, I don't think that that one's going to be it chief,
I don't think that one's real. So, you know, like that's my take on a lot of this, But I can only say that in so many words, right, And it's hard to sort of give that kind of nuance when talking to people about this, which is why many people are confused about the atheist position, what it actually means or what it means to most people, right right.
Dan, if I may ask really quickly before we end in the call, I think and this is a great suggestion because I one thing that I've watched a lot of the shows on this line and some others on the ACA and some other abist call and shows. ACA is the best, of course on on on TV. But I think you guys should have someone on that believes lightly at least in a creator being an interview them and take calls with them, and they actually have them answer calls with you guys.
I mean I do do that untruth wanted from time to time. Yeah, my last Christian guest was on a couple of months.
Ago, things along those lines. But yeah, yeah, So if you have somebody in mind, if there's a particular person you want to recommend, we're always taking those recommendations. I mean, shoot us an email TV at Atheist hipeencommunity dot org there's somebody who's interested in talking to us. You know, I'm not going to guarantee an interview to anybody, but I know our producers would be interested to speak to them.
Yeah. I'm proud to say that I host the only Atheist Community of Austin show that has had openly theist people on as as guests, not just as callers.
Only currently running shows, only currently running, only currently Well again, yeah, that's true, that's true.
I should Yeah, you're right, I should clarify on that. But you know it has I'll be honest. It's hard to find people, Michelle that can still vibe with us enough that we can make it an hour and a half without it turning into a ship show. Right, So there's a give and take with that, and some people don't even like it when we do it, by the way, but I think those end up being some of the most interesting content that we produce. But that's my take, Dan.
I think I could. I think I could body with you guys if you would just have beyond.
Oh come on, Michelle, you can't, you can't. You can't do this. You can't. Don't. Don't beg for the spot process. It's a thing, a show.
You appreciate your phone call.
I'm getting people in chat. You know, I'm not watching the live stream, but I know't get people in chats.
They have or on have her on, Michelle.
Well, we'll see if there's a groundswell of movement. Thank you so much for your call. And for your time, and we hope you have a great Sunday afternoon.
Yeah. On that note, any inqueries that you that go to the show should go to TV at Atheist typeencommunity dot org. Okay, we're not going to negotiate terms about potential guests live on the air. Okay, that's just not a thing, not going to happen.
So not how these interviews work. Yeah, yeah, there is a little bit of a process. Somehow Dan and I got through it. But there is a process that exists. But no, Dan, it's it's been a fun show. We've had a good time. Let's get Aeron back up and we can talk about it and wrap start the wrap things up.
Yes, today, let's do it.
Aaron, how did we do? Were we worthy of being hosts on this network? Have we gone through the process?
Have we done it?
Yeah?
Ten out of ten would recommend yes.
Yes, great, fabulous, fabulous show, great calls.
Uh, you would never see otherwise, right, Aaron? You always tell us, you always tell us the truth.
Sure, sure, yeah, you'd always tell me the truth, right right, it's mutual.
Yeah. Yeah, anyway, called, I.
Really like Tom's phrase. I'm not sure where he got it from. But ponderously unaware of religion. I kind of kind of sure that the government ship ponderously unaware of religion. I think that would help a lot.
If it was actually like that. And D's you guys talked about.
The cult of cult versus religion, and I heard that defined once as the difference between a cult and a religion is how hard it.
Is to leave.
The harder it is to leave, the more cultish it is.
Oh. I like that. Yeah.
And then as far as beliefs are concerned with Michelle's last call, I I like Steve jobs adage where you held strong opinions loosely held strong opinions, where you're you're easily convinced. You believe what you believe strongly, but you can always all your beliefs are subject to change at anytime, given new evidence, given new persuasive arguments.
Whatever. That is?
That nothing that a lack of pride, a lack of preciousness around some of these things, humbleness and willingness to you know, embrace change. I appreciate that.
Yep, so beautiful.
Well so for folks who still want to weigh in in the comments for the video, what was our our question of the week this week.
Oh, our question of the week this week was what is what would Jesus as a rapper name be?
Right?
Please? Oh my god. We did not deliver today, folks, but.
I'd probably go with King Cross or something like that.
Crosses King Cross. All right, actually place, no, that was? That was much better? Yeah, yeah, all right? Today?
Well, anybody all are sending out loverings to today are certainly our crew and everybody who helped us get this going, especially since I so often forget to bring ups up to that camera shot and to let us let us see their beautiful faces. Who else y'all got?
You're talking to me?
Yeah?
Who you talking?
Anybody else? Y'all send it out lover rings to oh oh oh gosh.
Everybody everyone out there sending it to the Happy Pride Month, say it to the Friology Et plus community.
You know, anybody who needs a community, is looking for to belong somewhere.
This is your community, right.
Absolutely, absolutely, absolutely so.
Uh.
If you don't believe this is your community, we appreciate you being here. If you do believe, we definitely don't hate you.
We're just noting, not convinced we did it. We want the truth. So watch Truth Wanted live Fridays at seven pm Central Call five one two nine nine two four two, or visit tiny dot cc forward slash call tw yeah
Can lea