Atheist Experience 23.08 with Tracie Harris & Jen Peeples

so you think the you tell us how to live our lives never questioning the thoughts from which your Mar der think that suffering is part of some great plan that's been divid I wonder I wonder I wonder I wonder what will it take for you to start opening your eyes I wonder I wonder I wonder we got a crowd today so hello and welcome to the Atheist Experience today is Sunday February 24th 2019 I'm your host Tracy Harris and with me today is co-host Jen peoples hey hey glad to have you on thanks H what a week so The Atheist Experience is a production of the atheist community of Austin a Texas nonprofit educational organization dedicated to the separation of religion and government and promotion of positive atheist culture you can come down today after the show is over and you can join us for dinner where we will be having barbecue and potatoes and sausage and I believe they told me it was been smoking all day yeah 12 hours so far yeah there's some stuff ready so we're down on kanig that's the uh free thought Library if you want to Google that address and uh it's also where our ACA studio is where we obviously have a pretty big crowd today turned out to watch the show I don't know if they're here for us or the barbecue I wouldn't presume I'm not going to flatter I I'm I'm good but I don't compare to barbecue so the notes today for the association are that we have our February newsletter out and you can download it from the website there should be a link available for that and there you go looks like they're showing something there there's the newsletter blurb that our production team has all right graciously supplied and our production team has also put together a video for atheist day which is going to be happening at the Austin capital in March so that's coming up next month and everybody's invited to come out if you're local and we have a production team video that's been produced so let's go ahead and roll atheist around the world secular groups are gathering this march to celebrate the first International atheist day while we encourage atheist groups to come together and celebrate we invite you to join us because lacking religion does not constitute hate because in many parts of the world World disbelief can have tragic consequences because it's time to create an International Community because where we can be counted we should stand up this March 23rd and join us as we demand to be [Music] counted [Music] and that's our blur so you know you might want to check and see if you're not in Austin if there's anything happening locally with any of your local groups um there might be some things going on I think there are some concurrent events that are happening sounds like it and again for us we're going to be down at the capital and um be looking for more information on that and with that that's the end of my announcements and you have topics yeah so um first off on Friday late Friday a federal judge in Texas ruled that the current Selective Service registration law that requires males only to register for the draft is unconstitutional um this is the first ruling on that since the 1981 Ross V Goldberg case I believe it was that said it was that male only registration was constitutional because at that time women were prohibited from combat right combat roles which was not exactly true true enough right it was a technical truth right yeah yeah um but since then of course women have been fully integrated into combat roles in the military and now the judge has ruled it's unconstitutional so we um await further um action on that and expect um a longer discussion about that on the next Godless [ __ ] episode yeah because I mean we have talked about this before on GB and I know this is not GV so I'm not going to like spend too much time on this you know people that want to follow up can follow up there but one of the things that we do discuss is the idea that you know when people point out the disparity in things like registration for the draft one of the things we like to note is that it is actually women in the military who are who were struggling to get themselves integrated into combat roles which would be required to undo this disparity right so it was that sort of discrimination against women in combat roles that kept the disparity in the draft registration and so by by engaging in pushing equality for women in the armed services in another role they're able to now push forward to try and end that gender disparity in in the um registration for the draft which is one of the things we like to talk about is the idea of how uh like discrimination and sex sexism feeds into harm for everyone right and when you end that in one place here you can see how it's interconnected and how it now makes things better for people in another area and I'm I'm not necessarily even saying that I support a draft right I'm just saying that if you're going to have one it should be um treated with equality if you're going to have combat roles we should treat them with equality I mean this this is you know it's about giving people what they need in order to succeed and making sure that everybody is treated um with equity right all right that was a that's a good piece of news yes I think so um so my other topic that I wanted to talk about today I should say it's a mixed piece of news because like I said it depends I guess on it's a good piece of news for equality and Equity it's a it's a kind of might be disturbing if you're the person that wanted to eliminate it allog together then you might be like oh now there's even more people that are you know but I I'm not like I said I'm not taking a position on whether or not people should or should not support a draft or registration yeah um I'm just saying that you know well and and I don't want to like talk about this too much because I actually want people to tune into to the next Godless [ __ ] and we'll talk about this some more because I have thoughts on this having been in the military for in the Years 26 years yeah so um my next thing is I I um was suffering from a cold two weeks ago when I was supposed to be on the show and I got over that one and yesterday I started coming down with another one you can't get another cold if you've already had a cold because your immune system gets fixed that's right except you know the rhinovirus mutates readily and so you can get multiple colds some diseases you can't get more than once except for under certain circumstances and one of the things that's happening right now you all probably heard about the measles outbreak up in Washington state so as of today there have been a total in um I believe it's um Clark County a total of 65 cases confirmed um they're currently investigating one suspect case um in nearby King County there's one additional case uh but the the epicenter of this seems to be Clark County and of the 65 cases that they've had so far 57 are unimmunized they never had the MMR vaccine which by the way if you get one of those it's 93% effective at preventing disease if you get two that goes up to 97% so these are unimmunized people 57 cases they have um six cases that are unverified so that means they can't verify their immunization status so it could be that they're unimmunized or maybe they had one or maybe even two um of and sometimes people yeah sometimes people are not able like literally not able it's not just a choice like someone can't get the vaccine or you have situations where you know someone is imuno compromised you know regardless of what they can or can't do where they just have you know other issues going on like a child that might be in you know cancer treatment or something like that exactly yeah and there are there are situations like I said especially with MMR because it's a live um it's it's a live virus vaccine so it's a weakened attenuated virus that can't live outside you know a a very narrow range but it's really good at producing immunity good news is all these kids now have natural immunity right exactly yeah because that's you know all the antivaxers are always saying hey it's so much better to get natural immunity um to these diseases that's what they told us in school right yeah when they were H handing out when they were giving us the vaccines handing out these vaccines for these diseases that kids have been dying from okay um yeah so um I have in my hands a paper from Science magazine it was published in n in uh 2015 oh yeah 2015 okay um and it's it's uh the title of It kind of long it says long-term measles induced immunomodulation increases overall childhood infectious disease mortality which basically means that if you get the measles infection with the measles makes your body forget how to fight other diseases that you may already be immune to so if you had chickenpox last year and you get the measles this year you're now susceptible to getting chickenpox again and all these other diseases they didn't teach me that yeah so much for natural immunity right yeah and so much for like basic single sentence understanding of the whole immune system yeah well you just need to like eat healthy fruits and vegetables and boost your immune system and you'll be fine right there you go yeah so that's scary that is some frightening work yes and so they they had noticed that when some researchers had noticed notice that when measles vaccine was introduced to countries like shortly thereafter the childhood um mortality rate plummeted for not only measles but all childhood illnesses and they thought oh that's very interesting um and they had actually done some studies with macak monkeys that demonstrated sort of the same thing that you know this sort of um sort of immune system Amnesia happens in other primates so they did some long-term studies where they looked at um infection um infectious disease rates for other things and sure enough um infection with measles causes a spike in childhood deaths from other diseases so it's not just measles not just measles complications it's all kinds of other stuff and when the measles vaccine was introduced you don't see those spikes in fact you see these things just plummet and I know you can't see this but you could see what's happening here this thing is tailing off dramatically yeah and I want to just say I mean these are what we would consider generally developed Nations right so this is not like a a study that was done in somewhere where the Health Care system is you know horrible right this is like England and Wales this is Denmark the US I mean this is areas where you would expect that people would have access to vaccinations into a decent standard of healthare right yeah and when they looked at um what's happening in less developed Nations same thing's happening where you know the lack of probably worse I mean I would guess that the numbers are even you know more horrendous in an area where you have even less access to any sort of vaccination or any sort of um you know care well and one of the really interesting things that happens too is that uh one of the things that they kind of noticed in this is that it actually the effect is more dramatic with female children that's weird it is very strange but yeah it was particularly dramatic with female children um it's really odd but they thought okay maybe it's not the measles maybe it's some some way we're torturing the numbers here uh because of you know immunizations maybe any immunization would show the same effect so they tried it with uh the protestas vaccine and they manipulated the numbers the same way did the same kind of statistical anal is and everything it did not have the same effect so it actually is the measles that's causing this increased mortality um and it goes away when you immunize so get your measles vaccine wow G that's just disturbing yeah disturbing but I guess good to know the more you know well that and and um I think one of the things that's not really widely acknowledged and and I know the antivaxers say it's just fearmongering but there's a specific kind of incph itis that um is caused by the measles vaccine okay and the kids that get this specific kind of En sephtis they usually die within 3 years of Contracting it okay um it's not as rare as it was previously thought to be and the risk of it extends for 6 to eight years following measles infection so it's this is not a trivial risk that um that kids face when they get the measles so about getting the measles or getting the vaccine getting the measles okay so maybe I might have heard that wrong but just to clarify so if you get them if you get the vaccine you don't have to worry about I was like wait a minute if you get the measles too if you get the measles you're at risk for this type of intis for 6 to8 years following infection with the measles if you get the vaccine you don't have to worry about that wow you won't be at risk so there I've been seeing stories of um kids turning 18 and going and getting their own vaccines which Go Go kids or even yeah there's a Reddit um uh subad for kids of antivaxers who have gone on the internet and have realized holy crap I need to get my shots and they are actually uh going on this place to find out where they can get their shots and as long as they're of legal age to consent to medical treatment in whatever state they live in they can get their shots without their parents permission what was interesting was I I saw that you had posted something about reactions like parental reactions to it which to me I think speaks volumes and I think um you were making the point that the reactions make a point as well um some of the kids I read about like their their parents really didn't care like maybe it was their mom that was really into antiva and Dad wasn't just sort of went along and so later when they did it Dad didn't care was just like yeah whatever if you want to do it do it um but the people that were freaking out like the people whose parents freaked out I that reaction I don't understand right like it's I even if I put myself in that mindset where I'm just like I think this is a dangerous thing right like I think it's a dangerous procedure and so as a parent I'm not going to allow this and so I that's what I do but when the kid turns 18 it's not on you anymore right you know and and it's like if this is what the kid wants to do the kid the kid is now an adult and now wants to and now understands the risk and is now going to do this and it has really nothing to do anymore you're not coupable anymore so chill but yeah there was one mother who was taking her son's decision to get vaccinated as a personal insult like he was personally rejecting everything she had done for him yeah and it's like she wants her right to make these decisions about her kid respected but she doesn't want to respect another adult's right to make those same decisions for themselves right she wants her right to make that decision for somebody else to be respected but she doesn't want to extend respect to another adult who says I'm going to do this and only put myself at the risk right right it's like you know I that I did not get I mean I I wonder what her reaction would be if he gets a tattoo or a bodypiercing I mean I guess it depends on her position on you know it's like because it's not her child's life you know clearly this is her extended life right this is a vicarious existence this thing is an extension of her not her it's not a separate human I mean you know if my 13-year-old son came to me and said Mom I want to get a tattoo I'd be like no you can't get that tattoo right now but you know when he's 18 and he's old enough to cons plan your tattoo start working on your tattoo plan and when get old enough as much ink as you want when you're 18 but you're not getting a tattoo at 13 you know yeah and I wouldn't I mean I wouldn't consider that you know a rejection of my parenting or anything if he chooses to do that there's even things that I think are risky that if you know if I had a kid and the kid engaged in that I would be concerned like I would just be like oh my God I'm going to have a hard I can't watch you do this cuz this is too scary for me to watch it yeah but I'm not going to As Long As I think you know unless I thought somehow that the kid didn't under right you know like but even then you still have to say well you know I I've told you what I think about it and you still have to make your own decisions I mean people have to live their own lives and answer for their own choices right let people take risks I agree spread your wings yes all right do you have anything else I think that's it all right so let's go ahead and skip over to callers and we have got Alex in California who says belief in God is rational and rationality and belief in God can coexist you're on with Tracy and Jen hey Tracy and Jen can you hear me okay yeah yep how are you guys good thank you hope you're well as well what's on your mind today yeah so um first of all I just want to say set up the discussion I really like your guys' show um and I'm against dogma and preaching and all this kind of stuff and a little bit about me is I'm a former Christian and now I'm a theist so I did reneg from Christianity and so I kind of wanted to call because I know Tracy from hearing your past uh uh podcast I guess you were in a similar situation to me where you kind of stopped being a Christian and became kind of a theist and was looking around for Faith yeah yeah right yeah yeah cool yeah so so that's kind of where I in my life right now okay um and so I really like your guys' show I was watching it and then I heard and it wasn't you guys so I'm going to pait the question to you about what I heard but I heard on The Atheist Experience uh I think it was Matt but I'm not sure but I heard that essentially uh there was this argument against personal religion and the argument was that personal religion is not a good thing because it was compared to being a poison in small quantities because the idea I think was that religion goes against rationality and so so even if you're kind of you have a personal religion and you're not harming anyone uh because you're like personally practicing this irrational uh you personally have this irrational practice that it may bleed into other aspects of your life and then uh purport more irrationality that will spread to other people and then everyone will be irrational and horrible things will happen um I I would say that like for me there's two there's two prongs of the of the religious belief where it's somebody that like you're saying that doesn't preach right like I'm not going out and preaching I'm not trying to convert anybody I just have my beliefs and that's that um for me there's two things number one is it buffers and this is not necessarily the person's responsibility but I just think it's an observation that it buffers more extreme views but again I can't say that they are necessarily responsible for someone else taking it to a greater extreme I'm not saying that what I am saying is that a person who is Extreme looks at the person who believes and thinks well they understand that I'm fundamentally correct and they just don't understand that they need to be more extreme yet right so that's kind of how they view it now that whether or not I'm G you know I'm not saying again that that's that would be the the person who has the less extreme view is necessarily you know responsible for somebody being more extreme but I will say that the person who is Extreme takes comfort in knowing that that other people you know kind of quote agree with them um and they just are kind of separated only by what God expects from them and the other concern that I have is kind of what you mentioned right it's not like there's a guarantee that if I have an I mean I'm pretty sure that in my if we could do like a a viral scan to detect all the irrational beliefs in my head I'm pretty sure things would come up and so I probably am carrying on with some things that could be corrected should be corrected that I might not I'm clearly not aware of because I think if I was aware that it was irrational and and sometimes we believe irrational things and have irrational fears for example and even though we're aware they're irrational we still have them so even knowing that it's irrational doesn't isn't always a guarantee that you're going to somehow just you know magically get over it so part of reality is that I think we're all kind of walking around with some irrational thoughts and so the question becomes do we think that it's a good goal to reduce that irrationality in ourselves when we can right like that that the world would be somewhat better if we did care whether or not what we believe is true and we did take steps to confirm that what we believe is true and that we that it would impact you know how we live our lives and what we think about things and how it in integrates with other beliefs I mean do you think that's fair yeah definitely I think I think reducing rationality is a very good idea but I guess guess maybe another like another way of phrasing or maybe a kind of what I'm getting at in my question is uh do you necessarily think that um like in general a belief in some sort of uh God I'll say God some sort of God is uh necessarily irrational and is is always going to cond be conducive to that kind of irrational part of you that we all have and I totally agree that everyone has an irrational part of them that you can't necessarily rationalize um for like change rity well and some things don't some things don't even lend themselves to rationality right like visceral reactions for example aren't aren't like like I taste something and I hate it that's not something that is like it could be really good for me it's not going to make me like it right right um so there's some things that that that visceral reaction has nothing to do with rationality and everything to do with this is just how I react to that thing um and you can you can work on adjusting things like that cuz there's certain things that maybe freak you out and then later in life you like them or things you know like ah you know other people kissing gibbes cooties and I'm not kissing anyone and then later kissing becomes a really good idea right so I mean we all have changes like that um but I I'm sorry I'm losing my train of thought I got off on that joke maybe do do you mind if I bring maybe bring us back to go for it yeah bring bring me back I guess cool yeah so I guess my question was that do you would you lump a belief in God with these kinds of necessary necessarily irrational things like phobia okay that was the question okay I do think um that there's all all the the gods that I've had put to me do tend to fall into the well they fall into the irrational category then you have something like pantheism where they're relabeling the universe and that is just one where I sort of am like it's a useless unnecessary relabeling and repackaging of something that is the same thing so it's not it's like a a kind of useless belief I don't know that i' would call it irrational I would say that it's just simply strange to me and unnecessary um but as far as like the any kind of deistic or the theistic gods that I've heard put forward I have not seen like a a a really good reason to believe them yeah that that makes sense so do you mind if I if I try to propose one definition to you and then try to reduce that definition to maybe something more intuitive and then you can maybe tell me your thoughts on it and you can go from there yeah why not go for it cool so um and I have this written down so I'm kind of cheating here but no no it's good to let me just say I I'm okay with people writing their thoughts down sometimes that's a good thing yeah in general it's better than rambling on trying to remember what you wanted to say so yeah great so let me let me go ahead and and say it so by Def a definition of God that I came up with is uh a personal interpretation and personification or personifications of our experience of the material world combined with the ideal example of our best attempt at an objective morality I know it's a mouthful no I I'm trying to just process no I I think what you're saying um when I'm when you talk about a personification of the experience right um it's kind of like you tell me if I'm missing interpreting it I think immediately of like the Greek gods and how Zeus is a personification of lightning right um and also C I mean I can also say Christ but you're absolutely right that I actually had that down as one of my examples is Ze I think I'm following you and now as far as the objective morality that gets hairier um you get into the concepts of of which aspects of morality can reasonably be considered object jective or reasonably labeled subjective obviously there's like a couple of things in play um do you mind if I maybe give an example yeah go for it that might help so so with Zeus for example we can just take that sure so he was the personification of lightning right so I think that um when the Greeks imagined this personification of lightning because of course they didn't understand lightning in its fullest they kind of had him act out uh the like take the actions of some someone who was the embodiment of this natural disaster Force right and it's the same with Christ I believe like at that time the ideal of Mercy was was um such and such ideal and and it was an embody it was embodied in Christ and it's the same with Guan uh in in eastern Buddhism the personification personification of Mercy you get all of these Legends and fables about Guan uh doing all these crazy things um but they're all essentially super mer super merciful things that are supposed to take this ideal to its extreme I I'm going to accept that for the sake of continuing the discussion I think I would take issue with say because I think that there are so for example just to give you one quick example of of why I would take issue is that the story of the adulterous woman where Jesus lets a woman off the hook for what should be the death penalty under the law of God right yeah that story was added later and some of the thinking about why it was added later was to soften the image of Jesus and make Jesus less hard ass so yeah I mean there it's not like this Jesus was invented as a personification of Mercy he had to actually be made more merciful and yeah I agree with that and so but when we're talking about this a personification of something is okay like for example wisdom is personified in the Bible right wisdom has a a song I guess with I think it's in Proverbs where wisdom speaks right and um but I I would be concerned if someone took these artistic personifications and believed that they were real entities that were dictating morality to us that would concern me yeah so an argument from Authority essentially well or from whatever they're doing right because it's like the moment they start saying that this thing that they believe is there that seems to me to be a personification of something else they're saying is instead of being a useful tool to help us Envision a thing is now becoming a thing that governs us instead the people that have invented it that gets a little scary it's almost like the thing is taking on a life of its own now and has the potential to be distorted into something dangerous yeah and I think I would agree with that and I think I think that it's been been proven or like shown just from history that ideas of God can can make can make people do very dangerous and and negative things yeah but I think that in and of itself if you take if you take the the idea of God as what I've mentioned as just a personification of of um an interpretation and of the morality of the time or what you believe in then it does have this ability to evolve with your own understanding of morality and your own interpretation sure and it does I mean it can also be yeah maybe I can I don't I don't disagree so from an anthropological perspective part of the function of religion is that it helps us carry our cultural paradigms with us right so it it embodies the the the the story of us in a way that allows us to take those stories um and remember them almost like making the Stars into your your you know your gods and heroes so that you can say well there's Achilles and there's you know um Taurus and there's because it it helps you map the stars um and so for this the the religion helps us kind of map who we are it takes the the things it's it's like our cultural mythology and I'm not against it in that level those stories are you know sitting around the campfire drinking your beers and telling your stories about our you know like our little moral tales and our esops fables and whatever it is that sort of reflects what our culture values I'm okay with that and like you say there's this sort of religion creates life life creates religion where they're influencing each other and then it sort of evolves forward in a certain way and like I say I'm I'm actually not opposed to to to an artistic interpretation of social mores what scares me is when they become authoritative and rigid and dictatorial yeah no I I definitely agree with you I definitely agree with you there so I think we're on the same page there so maybe I'll I'll CH I'll segue a little further down with down my my little document here since we're on the same page here and um and I'll just go to maybe one of the one of the reasons why because you may ask like and and you're not asking this but if I were s on your side I'd probably ask this of myself so I'll just I'll just ask it anyways um you may ask uh well why like if you just treat these things as as stories uh can't you have uh you know stories of morality from an atheist atheistic perspective as well well we do have them seems yeah we have those yeah there are little secular like esa's fables are secular and they're all little morality I think the question if I understand where you're going with this is you know the question I would have is what is kind of bootstrapping a deity on top of this do for you yeah yeah yeah that's that's a great question um that's a really good that's like that's a good core question yeah yeah I think I think my answer to that is prayer um and so maybe let me talk about that uh so if if we consider this definition of God and we consider what can this definition of God actually do uh one of my claims would be that this God that I've defined um that's made by man and and man is reinforced by this God in turn this God can actually change your attitudes this is my claim uh and the reason and one of the big reasons I say that is because of prayer so if you if you associate a deity to a set of moral values and to an interpretation of the world then through prayer you can actually reinforce your SEC secular ideals and and your your um morality it's like having a role model when you were a child well okay actually I was just thinking of that right like like there are people there are certain books for example that that have really resonated with me books that I've read that resonate that I think about in certain times in fact I make connections all the time with different things that people are just like wow that's a weird connection to make um I guess my thing is I don't have a problem with anything that you're describing and I even don't have a problem saying that it could be a useful tool the problem is when people forget that it is a tool for people and then they start making that the tool that they're using like you say not just not just personifying it for effect but personifying it because they actually believe that there is a person in there that is dictating these things because that is a whole other level yeah I agree with you and I think I think that it's definitely I'm as against uh theism in that regard as you guys are um but but I do think that well that's pretty much the only theism think we would be opposed to I think a theism where somebody says I just visualize God as like the good stuff in the world and it's a personification of that that I use as a tool and I don't think that it's like a real entity with a personality that tells me what to do I think if everybody saw God that way we wouldn't have this show because I think I think I think we would look at them and say you're an atheist okay okay that's great I mean as if if we have no uh yeah I mean that's that's great okay I hope that help clarify I mean I hope that offers some clarification of the positions that you had questions about yeah yeah definitely okay well cool yeah I guess that's the end of the call yeah thank you much it was great talking to you thank you I appreciate the call all right bye yeah all right and so let's see that was a that was a nice mellow call let's go check out who do we got here that that call reminded me of uh this is a a paper we've we've okay cited many times on the show it was published in the proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences in December of 2009 and the title of the paper is believer's estimates of God's beliefs are more egocentric egocentric than estimates of other people's beliefs so basically your God always hates all the same people you do right and they they documented this in an fmri values all the things you value right yeah yeah and and so I mean I think and and that's the interesting thing right so some people do set this up to reinforce their own ideas but then you have authoritarian religions which of which I was participant that that go beyond that right so they literally tell you your instinct to think somebody's all right if they're gay um needs to be checked because God's not okay with gay people yep and yes you love them but they're living in sin and they're doing wrong and this is harmful and God God doesn't like what they're doing he he does not love the sin and so you get this idea where you're sitting there kind of saying huh like in my own personal estimation this person seems fine to me yeah but I guess I got to think of what they're doing is wrong cuz it's wrong and if I start liking it or thinking it's okay then I'm in danger because now I'm on that slippery slope where I'm not actually you know hating sin like I need to um I need to love them but enough to change them and make them not gay anymore um so there are these authoritarian religions where it it does the thing I'm warning against which is you take that step where the tool you is you yeah and that's when it's not okay and that's the danger of it and that's just on a small level then you get to a large level where with 3,000 people are dead MH so you know this is this and I'm not making the slippery slope I'm not saying that if there's a person that believes in God that goes and works in the food pantry that you know next week they're going to be flying a plane into a building right yeah I'm just saying that you know this is a it reminds me I think there was a time Jeff D had a good example one time where he said it's almost like a gun where it fires toy pellets and then real bullets and you never know what you're G to get you know what I mean and that's kind of what it is it's like you you've got this this toy that can do these harmless things or these helpful things and these really horrendous things and it's not unique I guess in that aspect no and and it's influential right and sometimes with these um authoritarian religions they actually do some good but all the good they do doesn't make up for the bad stuff yeah so yeah the thing can't should not be dictating to the person the tool should not be dictating to you right um so let's go ahead and talk now to this is Kim in the UK um you want to prove the existence of God and you're certain you can do it and you're on with Tracy and Jen hi Tracy hi Jen hello how are you okay what's on your mind well I believe I can prove the existence of God um but I also want to talk about other things well we only have a limited time here we're not the talk Heathen show so we have limited time so pick pick your topic okay well first I'd like to to establish a definition of Consciousness between us that'd be amazing because I don't know that there is this established definition of Consciousness but lay it on me um well I guess I I believe Consciousness is the state of being aware and it's also a neurological pattern with inside our mind right I think that awareness in the brain as far as as far as I know and I am like the the ultimate lay person as far as I know conscious awareness in the brain can be mapped so if we want to call that like a pattern in the brain I'm okay with it because we can tell when a person when something in your head has reached a conscious aware level on at least in some some areas cuz I've read that so and then the other thing you said I think is just awareness which I think yeah that that's I'm I'm okay with that I mean I think that awareness is is fair enough to for you know good enough for government work so yeah let's proceed okay um well I believe God is a state of consciousness why because I think it's linked to the lindic system of the brain why um to do with Evolution and no I mean I mean why do you believe that God is linked to any of this because um the concept of God manifests inside the human mind well so does the concept of lots of things right the concept of Infinity but I don't know that there's such a thing and concepts of all kinds of monstrous things and wonderful things and I mean we just had talked to a guy that that reminded us that a concept of God can be just a personification of lightning so I mean but that doesn't mean that Zeus exists it's linked to the lyic system of the brain though because trly when they saw lightning they um labeled it as something because they were scared of it or they okay okay so are we saying then that are you basically saying that you define you're re you're going to relabel God as the concept of God that people hold in their head cuz I don't take issue with that I would probably agree I wouldn't say it's just that though I would say it's it's a pattern of thought that is like a a state of consciousness yeah no I'm not no I'm not I'm not on the yeah train so well if it's if it's a state of consciousness how come we don't have that Consciousness well no I think he's saying that we do he's just calling it God oh okay I'm like I don't know but I don't understand why um I don't think I don't think we quite got clear there well the existence of God manifests inside the human mind right as a concept or a pattern in our brain is that state of thought as a state of thought as a what a as a state of thought a state of force of thought position of thought oh a state of thought a state of thought I I mean I guess I'm just wondering why we'd call it God well it's just a label isn't it yeah but why use that label why not use whatever it's actually labeled um well it is labeled God I mean sometimes people use the label I wait a minute I I've read I I'm not I I admit I admit I'm a lay person person but I have read some papers written by neurologists and neuroscientists and I have not yet seen them say that there's some sort of part of the brain that they label God or some sort of thought or Consciousness that they're labeling God I have not yet seen that I'm not saying that that's not correct I'm just saying I I've seen a lot of stuff referred to and I haven't heard that label yet that's why I'm highlighting the lyic system of the brain for you to think about right because it's a specific area of the Mind Right but it's a lyic system yeah yeah why would I call it God when someone uses the label God is my point uhuh right when someone uses that label um is the definition is linked to the lyic system of the brain to do with breath is this like when they do the scans the brain scans where the people like think about go because Jen was just talking about when they were mapping like concepts of God to other to like people's brains when they think about what God thinks about right right and and their brains map pretty much their own ideas onto the concept of God whereas when they think about what other people think about it's different than what they think right so if are we saying that this is just that that people who believe in God are just mapping a concept of a person in a way that reflects their views and that it shows up in the mind that way like shows up in brain mapping that way I'm not specifically talking about the Western God I'm talking about the universal concept of God I don't think there is a univers sure there's not a universal concept of God I mean we just talked to a guy that has a totally different view of what mean what God means I'm trying to I'm trying to reach um I've got a lot to say and if you if you cut me up then it's difficult for me to explain what I mean right so I guess what I'm saying is that um the lyic system of the brain right controls basic emotions like fear pleasure anger right okay and dominance yeah now that that also is the area where I I think God manifests okay and based on what like is they mapped this cuz there is some mapping of the brain that corresponds to people's thoughts about God I don't deny that I'm just I'm not sure it's in the lyic system but if we're talking about proving the existence God to you aren't I no you're proving that people think about God well yeah I mean I could think about having a dog and you could map that too but I don't really have a dog right but I could be thinking about the dog I'm going to get next year when I you know I get a bigger yard or but but I mean the dog that I'm going to get doesn't exist and I might not ever get a dog but I could still think about it and we could map where in my brain my fantasy dog is living right yeah no I I totally agree with you okay but the the concept of God is is like the concept of dog not the concept of a specific dog right okay you know what I mean sure okay and dogs exist well dogs exist but the dog I'm going to get next year doesn't and I'm just saying that I can think about okay I'm not talking about AIC God I mean right but what you're what you seems like you're saying what it sounded like you said was that if I Can Dream It it exists and and I don't think I agree with that I don't think that's what I mean okay then I've misunderstood and I'm glad that we can clarify this so if the dogs that exist are irrelevant to my concept of the dog like if I Can Dream up a concept of an animal that doesn't exist and that can be mapped in my brain maybe dog was not a good example if I dream up Bigfoot you can still map where I'm thinking about Bigfoot doesn't mean there's a Bigfoot bigfoots as far as I'm aware don't exist I don't think you can map someone's concept of Bigfoot sure you would I have to think of it somehow right I mean it's got to show up in my brain this is this is basically what they did with this study that I quoted after the previous caller they put people in an fmri machine and they asked them questions about what they thought about certain social issues what other people thought about certain social issues and what their God thought about those issues and it turns out that what they think and what their God thinks uh those those light up the same part of the brain yeah but it wasn't Bigfoot was it no but if I did start thinking about what does Bigfoot think that would be a part of the brain because they also asked these people what did other people think and they and it was different okay it didn't map to the same things they thought and so if I started thinking like what would a Bigfoot think like a Bigfoot would be a big animal and it would probably be hunting like a you know like a gorilla and then almost like a bear too like I would have my own concept of what a Bigfoot is and how it might think and when I start thinking about and the moment I start thinking my brain is going to start activating and it's going to be mappable so my concept of the Bigfoot or the Bigfoot would think would actually map it would show up somewhere and it's irrelevant whether or not a Bigfoot exists just like aliens like things that don't live on the earth I don't know what they are but some people have a concept of them right of of uh yeah of a aliens and if they thought about aliens they would have that concept showing up somewhere and it's possible that there's like some people that share the same concept of an alien like people that go to the UFO conferences and stuff right would have probably a far more um Collective view of it and I'm sure that they would probably have similar brain mapping much more so than somebody like me that doesn't have like a really solid state thought about it um and and there's just all kinds of different types of gods but I but they don't I mean it's one thing to say that we have that concept and that it it resonates with part of the brain it's another thing to say that this is evidence of an existence outside of concept and I I I hm good point right but I don't think that I'm I'm trying to prove existence outside of concept except for the fact it's linked to a Physical Realm inside the human mind but to say that it's linked to say that it's linked to that and not that that's where it exists I guess is where we're having a disagreement or at least some sort of Disconnect I'm saying that the fact that it's in your head as a concept demonstrates the fact that it's in your head as a concept I don't think it can be read as more than that or at least I'm unaware of evidence that it should be read as more of that as more than that okay let let's def let's define existence then because I think that would help as well well I believe Concepts can exist but I don't think that having a concept means that something inhabits um has its own manifestation in some way if the lyic system part of the brain exists I'm saying it's specifically linked there if you're saying that it manifests as mapping in that area I would say fine and I don't I guess if that's all God would be then I would say a person who holds that concept of God I would probably Embrace as an atheist right well I identify as an atheist who could explain the the lyic system of the brain and how and how got oh see they they they tagged you with a t yeah and so I'm I'm gonna say I love our production group because they're awesome and they do all the screening and I could not love them more for that um but yeah I I think I was coming at this from you doing more than just saying it's a concept in someone's head because you were tagged as a theist so I was like waiting for how does this get to theism and what you're saying is communication that's miscommunication on that part it's okay no no no I'm not yeah I'm not saying that like you lied to get you know priority calling that is definitely not I don't mean to imply that I imply I'm implying no uh guys they asked me if I'm a theist or an atheist and I said I'm a non-conformist right well this is why we ask though okay this is this is why we ask because we we do give priority to theist callers so um people should be clear even if you're even if you don't like the labels try to give us some indication because we we do say on the air and we do promote for the show that we take priority for theist callers what I usually do is all the first callers that come in as theists I will take those calls first and then I take the atheists who were have been waiting fair enough no I'm just explaining that for the audience like people that are watching not it's not necessarily for your benefit because we're already on the call I'm in the UK this obviously you guys are in America and there's a different audience sure sure I'm a longtime viewer okay well I don't think we disagree that God exists as a concept in your brain that can be mapped is is that fair and yeah that's fair okay I think I think it's specifically linked to the lyic system of the brain right and it may be I'm curious I'm curious why you think that well I think he's saying that that would be where the mapping would occur and I don't know but yeah I mean based on on what like has there been a study where they mapped God in that area I think is what Jen is asking yeah maybe you guys could can have a look at it and and and I don't know maybe I can call in again and we can talk about the Olympic system but can I move on to something else um uh we' got a bunch of calls yeah we usually don't do like more than than a topic and you know we've we're on the second call and we're like at almost 5:30 here I'll tell you what though very curious if anyone has ever read any Wikileaks in the studio at all has anyone ever read any Wikileaks head why would that be yeah why is it why are you asking this question because last week yeah Matt just hung up on someone and claimed they were a conspiracy theorist but none of you have verified anything and you call yourself Skeptics I don't know what this is about I whoa whoa whoa when have I ever called myself a skeptic yeah I've watched the show for a long time okay okay I have never called myself a skeptic okay fair enough fair enough but I I'm curious to as to whether anyone has actually looked at Wikileaks and just just to let people know that was not because I'm like hey man I'm no skeptic those Skeptics are no it's that I don't I'm not sure that I'm really that good at debunking stuff that I would label myself a skeptic so I don't I I I consider Skeptics to be people that are far more skeptical than me and more capable of assessing claims than I am so just FYI well I didn't want people to think I was like distancing myself for some negative reason it's like I just don't consider myself on that level so I just sort of am like I'm here I'm talking I'm having conversations I'm thinking things through ref fleshing stuff out that's what's going on if you you know if somebody else calls it skeptical then that's what they call it but I don't I don't think that I'm on that level fair enough okay I don't want to label you like like I would have to fit into one of your labels when I called in the show right it's not nice to be sure well I mean we have to prioritize the calls so yeah yeah I get that I get that maybe you need a third option someone who's a nonconformance or you just need to answer the question because it's a binary question you're either an atheist or a theist no because I'm Pro today I've proved the existence of God within the lyic system of brain you're proving mean proving the concept people think about it no atheist is going to say that there does not exist a concept of God in some people's heads I mean I I don't know I've never met that atheist I've heard atheists who say that that concept is irrational or that it doesn't make any sense and that they it's illd defined but I have never heard somebody say that there is no such thing as a concept of God it might make sense if you were tortured and you needed something to to what might make sense no no no no there they say that the concept doesn't make sense in the in the when people try to explain what their gods are that they're like irrational and self-contradicting and I get that okay I'm I'm I'm curious about Wikileaks because you know you got don't know we don't give a [ __ ] about wikileak what is wik what is the thing with Wikileaks because guys yeah I don't even know so that's the end of that call we're going to move on cuz we have other calls you know whatever if people want to read Wikileaks go read wikileak it's like I'm not telling you you can't this is I don't know what that has to do with anything yeah I don't either so we're going to go with um Roy in Washington state who experience has experiences as an alter boy and wants to talk a little bit about finding Jesus and you're on with Jen and Tracy hey hey man it's it's snowing like crazy here which has been unusual for three and a half weeks now it's crazy it's never well anyway that's needless subject okay um uh when I was going blind they put me in as a altered boy to maybe strengthen my religious beliefs and uh I was a teenager and I'd had some experience and uh one day I told my friend Bob that I was going to uh go to confession and Bob says why do you want to do that says you'll find out so you're going to find out too anyway so the confessional was empty I went in and the father comes in and I said to him forgive me Father for I have sinned I was with a loose girl and right away he says is that you Roy our new altar boy I said yes Father well well who was it Roy says well father I promis not to give her name so I wouldn't hurt her reputation so right off he starts off well boy was that Susie I said no father I I'm really hoping this isn't a joke yeah seriously cuz this is starting to sound like a joke you don't want that no this isn't a joke show yeah oh darn okay well I can tell you I found Jesus yeah and you actually got on the show from telling us that you were a theist so have fun okay so this is going on now to the people who've been waiting who have been um atheists online let's take Jessica in Orlando you have a spouse who is a theist and she's and you're an atheist and your spouse's kid is going through sobriety and going to live with them and they cut off at that point so this is a long question and you're on with Tracy and Jen so what can we do for you hey guys so I'm um yeah like you guys said I've been an Atheist for a while and my girlfriend has been a theist on and off I guess it's intensified over the last three or four years since her son went through the heroin addiction and she attributes him coming out of it to God and I mean I can kind of understand where she's coming from but at the same time I don't agree with her and it's difficult because we're bringing him into the household and I don't know how to approach a situation so so yeah I'm just calling him for some advice yeah is is the you said that um the kid is also a theist or is that yeah well I shouldn't say a kid so um I'm in my 30s she's in her 50s and he's about my age okay he's a grown man he has a couple of kids he has a girlfriend that lives down that they've been with for a long time and I just we go back and forth we have debates we talk about you know what she believes what she doesn't believe but it's a whole different playing field when it comes to her kid I don't want to interfere with you know what she's trying to teach him but at the same time I don't agree with it I mean she puts Joyce Meer tracks oh my God and yeah yeah like it it's it's that I mean I don't how how are you how are you in this relationship if she's that far into it okay so when we first met I was 19 she was 39 um I I was pretty much clear that I didn't believe but I I went through some things myself too and I wasn't judgmental and we've gone through our relationship for the most part she hasn't really been like a practicing Christian and now within the last three or four years since he's fallen into his heroin addiction she's picked it back up you know yeah it wasn't something that we really dealt with throughout the entirety of our relationship it's kind of been like a say you know you don't say anything I don't say anything and we just kind of Let Live and Let Live and now it's come back up to the point where she's attributed his sobriety to Jesus he was he he messed up he he did some things and he was supposed to go to prison and you know I I told her I go look don't worry about it and and the system down here if he's supposed to get five years he might get a year and he'll be out and when he got six months she completely attributed that to God it wasn't like the justice system is overflooded here and they can't suain it was just it was completely attributed to God there was no association with hey look you know this is how the justice is it's just there's no logic that goes into the reasoning you know it's just yeah it is what it is and it's frustrating I I talk to her all the time you know she had this experience about 10 years ago with shadows and figures and I'm like honey look you know there's sleep paralysis you have hallucinations things happen and it this it's not like she has a Biblical understanding of God it's not like she has this logical understanding of God it's just like this I feel it and you know my indoctrination tells me it's true and it's Fuster I don't know how to approach it and that emotional connection is hard to break especially when you're dealing with something like addiction which is scary it is I know and that's what I don't want to interfere with I don't agree with it I don't think she's right I don't think that God is healed him but when he comes to live with us and she tells me well wait till he tells you his testimony you'll see you'll see and I I've heard so many testimony my my parents are fundamentalist Christians you know and I've just come to the point in my life now where okay I'm honest with everybody I don't try to pretend like yeah hang on hang on a minute because I mean I I honestly feel like this call is like 98% in Jen's wheelhouse like for so many reasons but I do want to point out that just kind of an inserted observation it's yeah it's one thing thing to say my son is coming to stay and we have these beliefs and we're going to work within this Paradigm of belief because this is what we both believe and you know and you saying that's fine I'm hands off you guys do handle it how you want to hand it's another thing to be like and then you have to hear his testimony when you know it's like hey leave me out of this yeah right because yeah yeah and and that's that's one of the things I was going to get to is that it's possible for you to support his sobriety without engaging in any of this religious nonsense because if he's if he's sober it's because he did the work okay yes yes thank you yes that's where I was getting why credit to something else right and you can help him take credit for the work he did every day without you know feeding this need to like you know credit Jesus or whatever yeah and I mean as somebody that's recovering he's going to have to live in a world where not everybody believes in God and and if if if everybody else has to believe in God in order for him to feel supported then it's going to be a rough ride for him yeah yeah and he needs to know that you know he got sober because he made decisions that got him incrementally closer to sobriety every day and he can make those decisions every single day and he'll have to you know that's the only way he's going to stay sober is if he makes those decisions for himself yeah and I agree because I've dealt with substance AB substance abuse myself and I've always found that the AA never resonated for me this higher power you know trying to attribute your sobriety to something else outside of yourself it just never seemed like anything that made sense to me and that's my fear he's coming into the household and he's attributing those things I've already been through that I I've SE through it and it's hard for me to just sit back and say okay all right I'm going to accept that and there's nobody else around me that's an atheist I mean I live completely surrounded by the so it's hard for me to say okay what am I gonna do am i g to take a stand am I just gonna just sit back and let it go yeah it's I mean I don't know it's hard for me yeah yeah it's I mean it's hard when you've you know invested a long time in a relationship and even though their beliefs have changed or at least your understanding of their beliefs has changed you know it's it's hard for um you know that's I think that's a separate decision um but as far as supporting his sobriety without supporting belief in a God one of the things that all of these um 12ep type things the religious-based um sobriety programs rely on is that any success you have in the program is attributable to God right cuz you're helpless um and any failings are yours alone because you're a sinner and so it's head ey wind tails you lose all the time and so I think the best thing you can do for him is make sure he understands that um the success he had is actually because of his work and that addiction is a difficult thing and that if he if he slips um that that's not Not Unusual and it's not a moral failing on his part he didn't let anybody down it's not cuz he's a sinner or he's worthless or anything he just gets up the next day and he starts over again yeah that's life right I mean and that's all you can do exactly it's like it's almost I mean it's not nearly as consequential I don't think but as an example if you have a workout routine and you just bail on it one day that doesn't mean oh that's it I can no longer work out it's like you just go back to the gym I mean yeah oh I missed the workout so that's it I can't I can't work out anymore um yeah if you if you slip up and you you know you start using you can stop again yeah just you you can actually only other thing I want to slip in here before you guys let me go because I know you have a lot of calls waiting is I think I she doesn't have like a a tiing connection to the Bible or like a fundamentalist view I think for her it's a visceral feeling of I had an experience when I was younger and I don't know how to explain it so we've been through this a few times she had um I guess when she was younger her mom and her had some M come up from the floor and they didn't know how to explain it and you know more consequentially um closer maybe um when her son was about uh 15 or so he was in bed and she woke up and she had these shadowy figures and they were pressing her down and her son was foaming at the mouth and I'm trying to explain to her look I God as a theist I I used to be I'm terrified I just sleep sometimes with the lights on because these people terrified me to the point where I have anxiety issues at this point in my life but yeah no guys like I get it I I can understand it I process it but for her these things are so visceral she doesn't understand that you can have these experiences and they're produced by the brain and they're biochemical reactions I mean if we had a trophy for like tolerance yeah I think you would get like the tolerance trophy today for the show I mean that's unbelievable I so appreciate that but I through it every day I because I love her she's the love of my life and and I just want got to be love there's no other explanation that's yeah wow no just want to make her understand that there's things outside of what she understands there's like I like to take different what I call them lenses through view life right so I view my life through lens of psychology it's one of my favorite lenses I live life through biology lenses and different things and I just want to pull her out of this theistic view of VI the world and say hey honey there's other ways to see the world and I think are start St to work with it but now that the kid is coming in I just feel her putting up the walls and I don't want her to put up the walls to the point where she won't see the world for what it is and I don't know guys I'm having a hard time I just think it's about taking a step back on this one I mean it's going to be one of those things where it's like best to best to just let it ride and just stay out of it and um and and if it comes and gets dropped in your lap I wouldn't even I still wouldn't go there I'd still just be like you know what don't drop this in my lap I I'm I I love you enough to stay out of it and let you guys work it out in your own you know religious framework um but don't be bringing this to me because I'm already doing I'm bending over backwards as it is just to keep my mouth shut so you're welcome I appreciate that that well I won't take up any more of your time but that was I really appreciate you doing awesome work out there yeah I appreciate everything best of luck and feel free to you know call back with an update if there's like an update yeah oh definitely if we end up breaking up in my little fall we'll have to start a pool what will the next call be oh no thank you very much Jessica okay bye bye wow wow that's a tough one yeah man that's rough yeah I mean there's the whole you know the theist in the relationship who suddenly decides to like go full on Joyce Meyers onor and everything but then um you know add the sobriety Challenge on top of that it's pretty rough wow yeah I wow I just that whole Joyce Meers thing just blew me away though I was like who is Joyce Meer I saw you yeah she's a televangelist one of these Prosperity Gospel types that you know she wants you to send her your last $5 and she lives mlion that part about women being silent in the church not not her all right so let's go on to Dean in Washington who wants to know how to debate morality with someone who believes in an afterlife you're on with Tracy and Jen hi hey Dean can you hear me fine you sound great okay this is my first time calling so uh little little nervous but I really like your show and uh uh well I really appreciate it because uh I was a Christian for the first 20 years of my life and because of your show that I was able to I say deconvert and kind of look at the world with my eyes open so I just wanted to start by saying thanks okay so you you have a little bit then of perspective around what it means to believe in an afterlife yeah but that doesn't necessarily make arguing around it easier um for of context I um well I been thinking a lot about I mean obviously I just DEC confirmed been thinking this stuff lot so I wrote an essay on kind of the problems I had with the Christian idea of Purity oh yeah the Christian idea of Purity is kind of like one of the most like controversial things it's like the it's the biggest thing Christianity pushes that's kind of contrary to the culture right right it's absolutely toxic yeah and it's just weird it's like a weird arbitrary well I mean it's not weirdly arbitrary because you can get like where they get into it and like the benefits that people get from it from a from a imbalanced society yeah um but it's but it's it's almost just like saying you know there's some uh some sort of virtue to never eating broccoli right and then just and then just promoting never eating broccoli is like the best thing someone can and if you eat broccoli you're somehow soiled yourself and yeah you know it's like just the weirdest thing yeah I I I grew up in that and I did and now looking at like yeah I I think it is kind of messed up in but so after writing time I've gotten a lot of discussion from a lot I get I mean mostly I mean online but the thing it's really difficult to debate many people because what they what the end up saying like um oh like it doesn't matter if it's harmful like I it's harmful it's unhealthy that it because it lays on a burden too heavy to bear I say oh well it doesn't matter because hey it's worth it this harm is worth it because if you're following God or God doesn't Define harm the same way because what matter is eternal harm like say um as long as God exists God will like work it all out in the end it's like dude it's like it's frustrating because I most of people like I'm trying to debate with or trying to argue with like yeah you can't really well wait a minute wait a minute you can't have a debate about morality where one person is basically allowed to say I believe God has this particular morality moral plan and that's my morality and I'm going to argue from that position and then you're arguing from a completely different position right because she's just going to keep coming back and saying cuz God I mean that she has to be called on that it's you don't just get to make up a God and then say that's where your Mor morals come from and then start dictating what morals are I mean for me I mean for the perspective I have it's kind of arbitrary to me whether God or does or does not exist I I can't know for certain but it doesn't matter to me in the context of this moral in this moral context because to me like if these beliefs harm people it doesn't matter if God said them right but you're gonna I mean you're to find a to find any activity that comes with no risk is going to be almost I mean I'm gonna say impossible you know maybe somebody's going to come up with one and be like this has no RIS you know and I'll be wrong but I'm going to say like broadly and generally speaking you can find risks associated with anything right the question isn't whether somebody's taking a risk or whether harm can come from a I mean harm can come from me driving to my office during the week the question though is you know how how I value that why I value that what this adds to my life what this you know gives for me and how this benefits me versus what those risks are which is up to me right I can't take risks for other people but I can take I can agree to risk for myself and I guess what I'm saying is if if they're just going to point to something and say there's a risk but there's risks that come with you know I think having an unfulfilled sex life right right I think that that's damaging when I was referring to harm I was more referring to my belief the belief does harm um I I I don't really feel like um I've had that many people argue from risks I I don't think that'd be a strong argument but um it it bugs me because it's like um I mean I I don't have to follow these rul World myself I don't care but it hurts me to see I mean I know I stopped so many Christian friends I know they're living in a a Christian culture with all these rules right and I think these rules do so much harm like I don't care if you're a Christian and you believe it if these rules are harming you if these rules if these ideas um because I mean I mean in response i' got lots of teson people like yeah these rules did mess me up they did make sex life harder and it's like so they do mess people up and it's like so it's like right but they're but they're seeing this I mean you were there right you you believed this so you understand that they see this as like a temporary inconvenience before you hit eternity so for them anything that you have to sacrifice or suffer in this life is completely tolerable and completely temporary compared to the eternity that you're going to have with God in Bliss right I mean that's the argument so if if we're telling if if we allow them to basically have that platform to start with I don't think there's anything you're going to be able to say that's going to make a dent right because the other thing is you know you know that in their worldview if they don't pass this test they don't get the afterlife yeah they're going to burn in hell forever if they have sex outside their marriage and don't get you know forgiveness or whatever I don't think I believe that a Christian but a lot of Christians do yeah a lot of them do I I think there's so much I mean I mean I didn't believe that but I felt there was even just whether you believe know afterlife or not is reliant on sex I think is this is a matter of guilt um I think I feel for me I I I didn't have I didn't follow any of these rules because I was afraid I was going to go to hell I didn't think that but it was the debilitating guilt of I mean these are words I couldn't follow I mean I'm a human being and I feel like um I don't know no that I mean that's the cycle though right you can't follow the rules because you're a human being and these rules are inherently not like not human right they're they're made for some ideal that doesn't exist and even the Christians admit that they will admit that oh this is Fallen World and and this is why you know you can't you can't be perfect right so literally they put these rules down that do not reflect the human condition they they interpret the condition of humans to be non what do you call like like not to be optimal right so they're saying that we are suboptimal now and and that we should be able to live up to these rules we can't because we're suboptimal and that's what salvation is for it makes up that difference right between the the Fallen human and what it should be and when you deal with human beings and you're saying that we human beings don't get to Define what is human that something else is what defines what's human and not people and what people actually do what people actually need and what you know the real psychology of people and the real physiology of people when you just simply say none of that matters that's all messed up now and we have to go by this map that is the perfect person right you're not even on the same page with uh they're they're busy dehumanizing everything that's that's going to make people happy and fulfilled and you're basically saying these rules will make you unhappy and unfulfilled and they're saying it doesn't matter because there's this afterlife and this is the the the goal anyway even though you're not perfect you can't live up to it you just keep on doing it just like that workout thing we were doing with the guy with the addiction you f you know you make this mistake you ask God to forgive you and then you go on and you try to be perfect some more yeah but it's not a perfect human yeah it just seems really hard to find any any common common ground regarding morality well I I have a question why are you having these debates I mean what's your goal in this um I I'd like to convince people I mean honestly I if if I could convince people that hey this is this is wrong this is bad that's I would like that because I think so how are you g to let's say let's say that I am back the way I was I'm the fundamentalist Christian you want to convince me about morality and I believe that Bible is the word of God God said it that's it um how you going to convince me if you're going to allow me to argue from the position of God um that is tough um that is tough yeah um because I just I I think you you you have to care about yourself um I do I want to go to heaven and be with Jesus I want to live forever in Bliss with God and you know be that person that you know makes God happy because God created me and loves me I I don't think God's going to it's always seems clear to me that God doesn't really care about you while you're on Earth so are you kidding he died for me he died for me he was tortured for you know like a day and then and then he hung on a cross and you know I mean this is this is a a guy who came to Earth and was rejected and willing to suffer and die for me for crimes that you know I was going to commit as a human being this is how is that not love that someone would lay down their life for you yeah but I just I just don't I don't see how any of that's relevant to our life now because I've been redeemed right I was destined for hell I was destined for an eternity of damnation and Jesus stepped up and you know he died for me to be that sacrifice so that I could then you know be acceptable to God because as I am I'm just nowhere near acceptable because you know fall of Man and all that I I really think morality should be defined by what we do here on Earth and I I still I just I mean I've heard all these testimonies and stuff but yeah I just I don't think that that most of those kinds of ideas are relevant to life on Earth and well that's because life on Earth is is not what it's supposed to be I mean it's all evil and horrible because the fall and who better to help me navigate this kind of horror than the God who loves me and has the perfect path he knows what's perfect I'm imperfect I don't know what's perfect so it's better for me to follow what God says and if it doesn't make sense to you it's because you just don't understand the mind of God which is perfect yeah um I I really don't think I came into this ready to uh debate on these I'm trying to show you something which is that when you give these people God when you don't challenge their God the foundation you're going to get into this weird cycle of of wildness that goes down the rabbit hole and you cannot win against accepting their God as a premise it's it's just frustrating because it seems like I I I can't get to morality I wouldn't be able to argue morality until I can disprove God and it seems like like awful steps to take I don't think you have to disprove God but you have to explain to them that you don't you don't accept the God as the explanation for Morality and they're going to have to demonstrate why you should that's the point if yeah I I kind of get it's like saying if I were to say to them you know if I were to explain it to them and say look if I said that I have like a magic tennis ball at home that ows me with like moral answers I go and I focus on it and then I get the moral answer um if you don't believe the magic tennis ball is giving me those those moral answers then you're not going to really care what is expressed morally by me you know via that tennis ball and I think that if a theist understands that you just do not accept that like why why should I accept that your God exists and is dictating this morality is the first question you're saying that your God is the basis of morality so can you explain to me that how you even know that Foundation is there I think that's a fair question yeah yeah I one person who said to me like okayy I I can't argue if God doesn't exist I can't argue Christian morality well there you go I like then then we can't have a discussion because Christian morality is kind of useless if you can't argue without God and I was like like I understand that but it's like I I don't know is this guy even willing to look at the world through a lens that maybe God wouldn't exist it's like he can only argue Christian morality from that perspective but he's not willing to accept an alternative perspective and no but he has to demonstrate his okay because the world that you see he sees too or she or whoever right the the world that you're looking at when you say that you see a desk they see a desk too they're adding a God and you're saying I don't see that like that's something you're saying is there but I'm not seeing that and so if they're going to make this addition of something that is really integral to the rest of their argument that premise has to be acceptable to you you have to be able to say okay I Now understand your why you believe in this God and so we can proceed but they have to explain that it's it's only fair that if they if they want to argue with you about morality via God they have got to be able to explain that this found you know what this Foundation even is where it comes from like what is this thing they've got to explain that to you so that you guys can have some common ground to proceed with yeah but but if you give them if you just say okay yeah you can argue this from God in the Bible and you just argue it from your own perspective and I'll argue it from my perspective never the twin are going to meet that's true that's definitely true and I've definitely seen that they really don't in intersect at all you could literally be showing me the genocides in the Old Testament I would just be like because God knows better yeah because God knows better this is the best of all possible worlds so um I I I realize we're getting close to the top of the hour here so um I don't want to take up a lot of time but when you put them put it out there that they need to justify why they're basing morality on God okay don't expect that you're going to get to the actual morality conversation probably not okay because they're gonna I guess that's true but but that's okay because that might be a very interesting conversation well it's okay because you can't have the morality conversation when you're you're both coming at this from two different realities I mean this isn't even like two different perspectives this is like a different reality a totally different what what is what they think a human being is isn't what you think a human being is you know and what they think is like the real underlying foundation of the universe is not what you accept as the real underlying foundation of the universe the entire entirety of reality is different to them I definitely see that yeah yeah I definit I definitely see that in AR I saw that my understanding of reality was different when I was there though I'd like to think I wasn't as unreasonable as some these people are but I as clearly I was because I was able to still argue this it's like yeah that's where it come you know it's it's just a kill it's a it's a kill all right because God knows better yeah but how do you explain this horrible thing God knows better fall of Man God knows better you just keep you know rinse for repeat just keep saying that that's all it's all you need to say I I think if if that was satisfying to me I don't think I think I would have stayed a Christian well there's a lot of other things that can mess you up you know that messed up my Christianity for me but um yeah I mean there's like all kinds of stuff that's but but you can't have a a debate about morality when both of you think that the source of morality is like completely different you're basically saying that morality is something that you know belongs to humanity as far as like human morality is morality among humans and we Define that morality um based on what we are and they're basically saying no what you are is completely hosed up and there's this other thing that we accept as what you should be um that's you know drawn up in this book or whatever that this and this God knows what it is and he's trying to tell you and so you need to listen to that God um they they're just not even what's what you were describing like what is good for somebody they see good for somebody is totally different it's better for you to like die have a millstone tied around your neck and be thrown into a you know body of water uh than to cause somebody else to stop believing in God and you would be like what what um because they're just seeing a whole different you know value system that's that's Topsy Turvy compared to where where you're at yeah well thanks I really appreciate it yeah and I mean good luck just kind of think about it basically you have to start asking them to to demonstrate their foundations before you start accepting them and allowing them to just like run rough shod yeah okay I think most most of the friends I still have are Christians so I'm wor I don't I want wonder if I'm going to have to do this a lot well maybe not I mean uh you might join some forums are you a member in any atheist forms or groups where you can communicate and chat and balance ideas not really I mean most most of all this discussion is going out to like Reddit yeah yeah but I don't really the only the only atheist well the only atheist I really know well in person is my brother and my cousin who live with me so yeah um that's definitely something I've been thinking about it's trying to broaden my uh Community yeah yeah do I I would say like you know go and read read some atheist blogs just and I mean I'm not saying that to say like oh they'll tell you what to think or say because frankly you could read atheist blogs that disagree with each other so what I'm basically saying is at least it'll give you something to think about like you can look at points counterpoints even within the atheist community and kind of say you know does this make sense to me or is this too easy to like even I could come up with a you know debunking this thing like I don't think this is a good argument this person is putting forward I mean you you need to still judge it don't get me wrong like use your brain and judge this stuff yeah but um at the the same time expose yourself to some other ideas and see how other people handle it and what you think is is good and sound and what you think isn't well and the other thing I would suggest is also read some religious blogs because there's a lot of uh religious blogs that try to debunk The Atheist position yeah and sometimes there is an atheist position you read it and you just think to yourself that's not what I think what if they talk about but you know that you can take that and kind of think about whatever points they bring up and um you know come up with your own responses because I promise you somebody will pull that out in a conversation so you can be prepared for stuff all right okay well thank you Dean we're gonna go ahead and let you go um and we have like a couple of all right well thank you thank you okay um I do want to say just real quickly because I had made that comment about somebody identified as a theist on our call list and um they were like oh no that's you know that's an error and I just want to in the interest of fairness Express that the people in the control room vly disagreed with that statement uh and basically said no we did not make an error we what we were told now not having been involved I can only say that our control room does a really good job of identifying people and they do this all the time does not mean that they cannot make a mistake so I'm not going to call this guy a liar even though maybe they might have used words that strong yeah um but I do want to in our control room defense because they do such a great job for us want to mention that you know I don't I don't want to just throw them under the bus too quickly because a caller says hey was an error they don't um misrepresent people yeah I mean I'm willing to admit that we can make an error or be unclear about something and sure you know but but they are pretty careful and and when they tag people I think they're they're doing their best to uh accurate represent what they are told or how it's expressed yeah with that in mind we have one other call that was been waiting since the beginning of the show so we're going to go ahead and take Charles in Arkansas and this is on how to deal with family who's religious um you're an atheist and you're on with Tracy and Jen hey guys how's it going really good um I'm glad you can inter my call i' U like I said I've got a problem with my mother and it's she's been a the her whole life you know Church camp every year and all my life she's just not ever wanted to just kind of let go of being you know a mother like her son's growing up she's always wanted to kind of tell me how to do things what I believe especially and whenever I started questioning that it was all I got was oh you know that's that's taboo and you know you you should really go to church you know it wasn't never it was never a thing of like oh okay well you know your own per you're your own person I respect that and yeah to this day like I'm I'm 27 years old and uh she moved back in with me after she got cancer again oh man this the third time and U but I don't know how to get her to understand that I'm grown and and it's like she she will not listen to any kind of rational argument that I tell her like hey this this does not go with what's real and they just say you don't need to give up on God and I just don't know what to do is she prizz to you like um I'm sorry I'm I'm not entirely sure what that word means is she is she bringing up the subject is she the one that's broaching this the ideas of the god ideas and the religious discussion um yes some sometimes she is um it'll she'll kind of you know bounce it off of a thing like you know God's doing you know good work you know and you know the cancer is going away because of him and you know obviously I'm thinking no it's because of the the medicine that they have Mom do you say that or are you just thinking that uh sometimes I start to say it that's harsh dude harsh I mean I'm just going to say I I you know farbe it for me to tell people how to you know deal with their interpersonal relationships but man that's got you got more brass than I do because if somebody were dealing with cancer treatment and they were like God is really helping me I think I would probably be like that's nice for you you know I'm not sure I'd be like I think it's the medicine I mean I'm not trying to just you know to her bubble but I'm it's just that I've heard this for so long from her her parents and stuff and I was like y'all are not even giving it the thought that this may not be you know a God look like this might be the the medicine that they've been working on for years yeah but God has God has cured her twice now right I mean I I shouldn't I mean I I say that as somebody who has you know went through um cancer in my own life with my husband so I'm like you know making that joke as one of not um from the outside but it's like you know yeah God has inflicted cancer on you the third time now like what boy he sure wants to prove his you know his power here on his healing powers I've I've said that a couple times I was like well why does he not cure you why does he just keep dragging this on and she's always given the answer like well you know he just wants he just wants us to make sure that we look to him and and stuff like that like if that's what's happening I don't want to look to him yeah he's not doing it yeah no I hear you man but it's like I just I my my heart would would fail me when it comes to something like I don't I don't think I could go there with a cancer patient yeah it's like people people with some kind of you know serious illness like that they tend to be pretty umem yeah emotionally vulnerable and I don't really think it's a productive conversation to try to like disabuse them of I mean I understand I mean I don't let me don't get me wrong like I'm not saying give Mom card blanch to keep throwing her God around if she's using this as like her leverage right that would be horrible for somebody to say now that I have cancer they won't say anything to me and I can keep pushing God at them um but I mean if she really is just owning these comments and you don't think that there's a passive aggressive bent to it if she's just kind of expressing like I'm so so glad that God is helping me um maybe just kind of pick up a newspaper at that point and you know I don't know I mean I know what you're saying it's your call it's your mom and you guys have your own relationship and and maybe I just don't understand it you know I just think about my own relationships and that might not be the way to approach it um but it's just like I just dude you got that's some brass like really and I it's not that I just want to like hurt her feelings or just you know tear down her you know God wall I I don't want her to just have hope in something that really is highly unlikely I don't want her to just to have well you know clinging to something I want her to be able like hey this is working the medicine is working you know instead of thinking is she continuing with her medical treatment yes um her doctors have said that she'll have to do it the rest of her life that's what's keeping her alive okay well as long as she's continuing with the medical treatment then you could think of the god stuff as her extra thing that she's got going on that doesn't really help anything but you know that's fine a comfort thing yeah because I mean the only time I would get concerned about this and maybe come at her a little harder is if she decided she was going to discontinue treatment because she God's going to cure me or God's going to call me that'd be completely irrational especially if it wasn't something that was terminal unless she discontinued the treatment I mean if somebody's terminal fully support their decision to discontinue treatment if they feel like it's time yeah um yes yeah but you know if if if someone has the ability to you know continue treatment and you know it it would offer a reasonable chance at a good quality of life and they decide to discontinue because of prayer then I'd probably come at them pretty hard over that but and I I just want to ask because I don't want to be unfair to you um so is are the comments and is the exchange like pretty much along the lines of the example you gave her is there more going on like is mom maybe pushing harder like I just want to understand a little bit U like I I was going to get to this um that she doesn't she doesn't acknowledge that I can have my own beliefs and that you know she doesn't acknowledge that I'm just trying to explain things to her and I don't know if it's a a thing like a power thing I don't know if it's a security thing can you give me an example give me an example the type of things she says that reflects what you just described it's like um like like she was talking to my dad they've been divorced a while but she was talking to him like you know you need to talk to Charlie you know he need you need to tell him he needs to go to church she is she having this conversation in front of you like you're privy to this and she knows it no they they don't but I've you know been talked to by my dad and okay so your dad told told you this okay mom's been talking to me okay and I just don't it's it's like it's like they think that they have any kind of bearing on what I believe in personally and it's like like like y'all I'm an adult I can think so what does your dad do like does does your dad just call you and say your mom called and said I need to pressure you some more about Jesus or like how does that conversation didn't go no um usually it's face to face well okay so you T you're in the same area as your dad and he comes over and says I need to pressure you about Jesus because your mom called me and asked me to like it it'll go along the lines of like hey your mom said you're mad at God and this is completely wrong I'm not mad at God you know but he'll say you know hey your your mom doesn't have cancer because of okay this is this is where they're getting out of line all right now now I'm understanding a little bit more yeah you can shut that down sometimes I have a hard time articulating myself sometimes no just just tell them look I'm not going to church I don't have the same beliefs yeah you can go to church if you want to it won't be with me right and um and you can insist that they stop pressuring you to go to church right and if they if they continue to do that you can explain to them that this is going to impact your relationship with them because that crosses into um abusive uh behavior on their part and you don't have to put up with that [ __ ] yeah I I definitely think that you can tell them that that's a conversation you're not willing to have and that you know if they want to come and visit you're fine with it you love your mom love your dad glad the cancer treatments are going well glad you got your religious supports or whatever but I don't need them and if we're going to have a relationship and we're going to have conversations maybe you're not at the level where you want to say if we have a relationship but if if we're going to have these conversations um I want to have conversations that we enjoy and I don't enjoy it when you're when you're like you know doing your your Jesus stuff with me so just leave it alone and you know if God wants me call me you know to come back I'm sure he knows where I am so yeah feel free to pray all you want yeah pray for me and God will let God make that decision whether or not I need to believe again and I think a little bit of it is like a power thing I'm not entirely sure but it seems that way a little bit yeah it's control it's definitely controlling it's very controlling my family's my family's very hostile and uh like you know especially if you're Muslim or gay or black to some extent um that hate me to some extent not not like extreme like you know you know shooting people thankfully no no but they're just they're that way and like you know they're the they have the old you know the old typical South mentality to some degree of some people and it's hard to get past that like hey you know you got to you got to think this way you got to go to church you got to not like black people you gota cuz Jesus loves bigest yeah and it's it's like it's hard to get to them like hey not I don't have to think like that and I don't like why can't y'all accept that yeah and but but uh who knows they might see this and I might be in more trouble but I doubt they're watching I would say though I doubt it all you have to do is just say we're not having this conversation what else would you like to talk about and if they push it then just be like don't have time for it um see you know got a roll talk to you later dad and it sounds like mom is kind of using dad as a conduit so you're probably not having the same issues with Mom but I think after after um after I just keep you know dropping in the issue that eventually they're going to start wanting to you know walk on me and then eventually I'd have to defend myself like hey this is the reason do you want do you want to listen I will tell you or do you not want to listen yeah and that's a I mean that's a that's a fair approach too to say you know if I'm going to listen to your you know preach session then you're going to sit and listen to me okay I mean if you want to go that route you can who knows I mean maybe maybe dad's more reasonable I don't know it's kind of hard to Envision this um yeah I know what you're saying but U I'd be like hey didn't I divorce you he's over 18 why are we having this conversation yeah it's it's it's it's a mess um but anyway I appreciate it I'll let y'all go all right thanks Charles thank you all right bye I mean hey even though he's got his mom moving back in at least Charles isn't under 18 and living at home which is the case for some oh yeah atheist Youth and yeah you know hang in there you'll be 18 eventually be making your exit plan yeah and that's it for our calls so I just want to thank Jen for coming in today and sitting with me for the hour and a half plus and thanks to the audience and thank you so much to the control room and to our very honest call screener yes thank you so much um and we have dinner again at kanig Lane here at the studio free thought Library we're serving up barbecue potatoes and sausage that was the other thing all right so and that stuff been on the pit for going 14 hours so we're going to eat some barbecue that's right so you think that you

Channel: The Atheist Experience

Views: 71,240

Keywords: TheAtheistExperience, Atheist Experience, atheist, experience, atheism, religion, religious, faith, belief, secular, science, reason, rational, proof, evidence, logic, fallacy, Tracie Harris, Jen Peeples, argument, God

Id: M8RRT1iKQIg

Length: 108min 7sec (6487 seconds)

Published: Mon Feb 25 2019