God is I Am & Playing with Words | Uber - Florida | Atheist Experience 21.14

well we've got goober in Florida hello hello that can't that's not your real name you know it's a drive it's a nickname cool well we'll find we'll go ahead and give you the benefit of the doubt and say that you are in fact uber until it's been demonstrated that it's impossible for you to be Hoover yeah that'd probably be the wise thing to do uh all right so um I guess I was having a little trouble wording it into a question but I figured it out um so my question is I'm sure you're familiar with the story of you know of Moses and the burning bush Moses talking to God about what you should say to the Israelites and God responding back to Moses I am that I am is your life I am sent you yeah in fact I was made reference with that this past week that's an interesting thing that you just brought that up but good oh that is interesting um oh I just wanted to ask what would you say if I guess somebody came up to you and uh said that uh God is I am okay there's a lot of when I was religious there was a whole lot of mysteriousness around this phrase and then I read a book by Karen Armstrong called the history of God where she looked at the history of all the Abrahamic religions and how they came together and she explained it as a phrase which is like let's say I'm telling you a story and I'm saying like three men were on their way somewhere and blah blah blah and you say well where were they going and I say well I don't they went where they went she says that this is common phrasing and that when somebody says tell them I am Who I am sent you it's it's like almost in a relevancy that it's not thing isn't isn't about it's not the story is not about this it's about something else it's about freeing these people or about going there and getting these people that get the important thing isn't who sent you it's your mission now whether or not that's correct I don't know but it was certainly an interesting way of looking at it that I hadn't heard or considered before even though I was very familiar with the phrasing of they went where they went or what they had for dinner they ate what they ate you know and yeah I definitely am familiar with that kind of a phrase or a statement and she's saying that it's like a common folkloric commentary in the Abrahamic religious tradition I have no idea like I did not even if it's incorrect that statement tells me nothing it really doesn't have a lot of it my goodness I was going to interject afterwards I guess and say I'm not gonna necessarily I'm not using the Bible as proof or anything it was just um the story kind of uh it was a story I learned when I was younger I thought about it for a while I had a different interpretation of it but that's the Bible you know well I can tell you what they taught me when I was in you know Sunday school which was that the idea of I am was supposed to have represented the context of eternal exist and only eternal though blah blah blah they made a very big thing out of it whereas now I'm like I wonder if it was a big thing or and it was just a small thing and if gnosis comes to me and says I am Sydney or you always at me or JimBob sent me my response is going to be the same why do I care you know I don't you know it'd be interesting I guess to find out all but when you say the Lord of the universe sent me okay I not even convinced there is a Lord of the universe why the hell did he need to send you why can't he come tell me what he wants to tell me himself yeah so I guess the reason I took it as a significant story I guess is because it was a point in the Bible where I guess God was defining himself in a sense but did it define anything anymore than saying they went where they went defines where they went I wanted to be pity myself but well my interpretation of it was a god is is if that makes any sense to you know it doesn't all right so all daughters of tomorrow we're talking about it in a I mean I learned you're Gimbels yes they are and is is would be well we don't want to get into the Bill Clinton speak of what depends on what is but you know you can look at that and it we can seem this is why I said it's a Dipity it can seem very profound oh god is like thee is existence is the eternal is and it can seem very insignificant but only if you're already buying into this in truth it has provided you absolutely nothing of substance about what God is and it have divided you with nothing to confirm that in fact God is which is the question that I want answered it's what would it take to convince me that God exists or that a God is real or that a God is let alone is is and telling you God is doesn't do that well alright so here's why I took it on as significant because uh alright so the reason why yet I guess you didn't want to delve into is is is is because it gets a little wordy and confusing but uh not because it's weird and confusing it's short words is what uh here's what I care about you believe in God exists right right why why why do you believe that's the only thing I care about no I care about other things I don't care about this in context of this this situation no yeah why I believe personally because of experience proof I guess that worked for me um I guess I I wasn't always a Christian I was raised Christian um I was atheist for a while and then I guess I started just looking into a bit of everything different philosophies religions and came across some answers I guess that works for me I mean I I don't expect you know my understanding or my what I know to apply or work for everyone and I could be wrong so um so so you believe for a reason but you don't think I should believe for that same reason no I think you should believe for the exact same reason and I would even Haven are that I would like to know if it's in fact true and you have a good reason I'd like to know what that reason is so that I could in fact believe so what's the reason well hey all right so like you all's race Christian and um I didn't necessarily like the Bible or Church at first I mean I was forced to go I didn't understand anything nothing makes sense I asked a lot of questions nobody liked that um but being that I was raised around it I always ended up I guess carrying extra information about God that I didn't necessarily care to know at the time like uh you know is a sin to make a image or an idol of God um that's one of the ten commandments arm or and I always I've always wondered why that was I never really understood it I don't think why don't you wonder if it was not why it was if it because I don't accept that there's first of all I don't accept this notion of sin I certainly don't accept the notion that it is somehow sinful to make a graven image of something you seem to be skipping a couple steps to go to why is that the case when when the question is if it is that the case uh well see I've asked a lot of those questions that's one of the reasons I became atheist and cool places because wrong answers all can't prove somebody to something they shouldn't believe it at the end of the day it comes down to that cut-and-dry oh my gosh why why we knew that why do we need to go in in this little tap dance around you became convinced what convinced you and should it convince other people what convinced me was that I'm an artist um I make art for fun and uh I started studying words and I I write and I guess um it helps me put things into perspective what convinced me specifically less I guess it was it was that it was um it was that hearing about sorry I'm trying to I'm trying to figure out exactly how to put it into the best words because I don't wanna I I'm not trying to mince this up here but um what convinced me was hey what is over what convinced you what convinced you that the Earth spins on its axis I'm not sure the earth even those that I can't prove it to myself I mean I haven't I'm not saying I can't I just I haven't so like I don't really care about that I mean there's a bunch of stuff you could do to try to improve that and I mean you could read books about it that at all the earth is tilted 23.5 degrees this was like I don't know I haven't proved it to myself so it doesn't it's not relevant to me well I was trying to be as helpful as I could just awesome or this round that's one that was do you believe the earth is round it seems more probable and likely but I don't I can't say I know I don't know there's like I'm saying you're convinced of that you've become convinced of for good reason something you actually gave a crap about because you don't care about the earth or it's been or but yet you'll you'll say I'm an artist and I've studied words and that's what convinced me of God you know isn't the idea that the earth spins on its axis not only something that we can trivially demonstrate now we have much better information evidence to support this isn't that a much more trivial claim than that there is an all-knowing all-powerful extant agent that exists independent of space and time and cares who you sleep with and doesn't want you to make graven images and yet you became convinced of that one and you don't seem to give a rat's ass about the earth spinning what it's not that I don't give a rat's ass about their spinning it's just that at the end of the day unless I observe something from myself I can't prove it myself oh wow and you've observed it tell us about when you observed God well no that's the thing you can't you can't directly observe or you just is that you said that over you just said you just said that if you can't you can't believe it and yet you believe God and believe in the gut God exists so and now you're saying when I ask you when you observe God now you're saying you can't so do you not see that you just place yourself in direct contradiction with yourself and you're very hesitant to express belief in things like the earth spins on its axis and the earth is round but you're very okay expressing a belief in God and when asked about these questions of physical earth sciences the response is since I can't observe it I feel uncomfortable saying you know I'm committed to believing it and yet you're saying you can't observe God that you seem to feel comfortable saying that you're committed to believing it do you understand the problem that we're seeing I understand but what I mean is you can't observe God with the with your senses you can experience God but you can't observe guy okay we're done your political senses when you experience God what is that for you like it like explain that experience to us uh well uh alright one of the times I guess I had the experience uh this probably won't be too shocking I tried shrooms and I felt um mom's room so let me know let me ask you this do you think that a brain that is chemically altered by a psychedelic substance is more likely to get you to an accurate understanding of reality or an inaccurate understanding of reality I think we're made out of chemicals so how do you not understanding we have is going to be based on the chemical reactions going on in our body anyway so do you observe those chemicals you just told me we're made of chemicals have you observed that I mean I can like pour chemicals on myself and they'll react with my body I'm made out of atoms and molecules I'm made out of not how do you know that have you observed an atom oh I mean you can do things to water and water is made out of that it there's ways how do you know the water is made of atoms have you have you observed and we're back to this thing you said you couldn't believe something if you haven't observed it and yet when we start pushing you on things you make all sorts of declarations that you can't have observed you've never observed an atom I just want to I can think I can cut this a little bit short though I mean we asked over here for the reasons why he believes and he said that it was personal experience and one of those examples was an experience while he's on shrooms now what I would like to say first of all over is I want to personally give you snaps for your honesty okay because a lot of people call up here and they want to argue about apologetics that have zero to do with why they actually believe a God exists they want to talk about other things that have nothing to do with why they believe and that is such a waste of time and so for you to call up and and be honest and put yourself out there and say I had experiences when I was on drugs and that I felt like I felt God and that's why I believe now whether or not we would agree that that's reasonable we probably would not because we've had other colors where we've had this conversation but I do appreciate the fact that at least you are telling us the truth about what convinces you that God exists because many people call the show who are not as honest as you I think my issue here is that I'm not convinced based on what you said and based on what I understand a reasonable I don't even think you think that's a good reason which is why it took you 15 minutes of hemming and hawing about artists and words to finally get to I had an experience on shrooms well it's not just an experienced notion that was you asked for an example that was one of mine no I didn't ask for the reason I asked for a reason I said that you know I understood a little bit about what you were describing with the mushrooms so that I do agree with Matt that you're talking about it you're talking about basically brain states and physical and mental sensations and emotional feedback is what I'm understanding how did you determine that that was God because they have to do with equilibrium connectivity oneness um I'm trying to find the right words it's a little hard the reason I brought up words in the first place was because like I said I'm an artist I write so the way I think about things like everything around us is a noun nouns verbs describe nouns and verbs using art types okay no we're not we're not going down this road how did you determine the point okay well how did on is a noun no and we describe God God is a now right God God is a noun and sometimes with a pronoun and if we try to describe God using adjectives which are adverbs and work types which are adjectives and adverbs um if if adjectives and adverbs are based on our perception our five senses colors shapes feelings but at the half-day when you write it on paper is all you need is really simple you had an experience that you are saying was God how did you determine that that experience was in fact God how did you - how did you conclude that you weren't that it wasn't something else or you believed in something else if I can cruise and have an experience and tell you that now I believe in a different God from you how do we tell which one of us is right or if either of us are I don't know you're really breaking my brain at this point and do you care do you care if what you believe is accurate or not of course I think well you say of course I think most people will say that but if you actually care wouldn't you then take steps to ensure that you do have the most accurate understanding right like wouldn't you write the best tools to figure out whether or not you're more likely correct or not correct do you think that this nonsensical talk about nouns and adjectives is a as an actual tool that can lead you to the conclusion that an experience was caused by God well I mean you think language we're using language right now to discuss God it I think it does help to understand the language in language is a tool that conveys a concept from one mind to another language is malleable it changes all the time we make up new words we change words it is nothing but a way for us to communicate an idea the idea is separate and whether or not the idea points to anything true is also separate from the language why would you think that this noun adjective thing is a is a reliable pathway to determining that you are correct in your interpretation of an experience as having been from God I'm what I'm saying is it helped me I guess what I'm saying is it helped me comprehend or understand things better I'm not saying that okay I've founders you know you know what you know what helps me comprehend and understand things better an understanding of skepticism and critical thinking and logic and science but the fact that something helps you understand doesn't mean that what you understand is correct and if you care about whether or not it's true then what you want is a method to determine whether or not what you believe is true or likely to be true so what you're saying is you care whether or not things are true or untrue correct yeah right all right so that and for something to be true that would mean that it would have to be what is correct or incorrect truth is that which conforms to reality that's the definition of truth that I'm good with all right so true it conforms with reality so comport with what is yeah yeah for is is not know if I have a I don't know that this is easy if I say unicorns is does that mean unicorns exist well no because it's enough for most reality right and so if you say jehovah is or seenu is does that mean that either of those actually conform to reality or comport it would depend on what those things are what are you here yeah yeah how do you find out what they are own alright so again today goes back to what I guess my definition of God is no I guess I am curious because you were talking in terms of the 10 commandments and carving images and things so I think the assumption was that you were going with a biblical God is that not correct um I mean what is there's a large government religions and Bibles but they all they do is a lewd I guess to God date I mean even if they make an image of God is usually like like for instance and into ISM there's a creator the preserver and the destroyer we're not going to not going to play multiple religions what do you believe God is and if you say is I hang out I believe God is a power in a sense I don't I don't believe somebody would worship God if God had nothing to do with power i I have a power companies and our people wouldn't it wouldn't make sense to people you haven't given a sufficient definition or description of God come on is that power there's a little bit like a guy who called when I was on last time and said timelessness was an attribute it's like no that's not an attribute because we're if I have something in this and that's timelessness something in this and that's not how do we know like which one can we identify as timeless apart from God is a power which doesn't tell me a thing what what is God logic God is okay we're moving on I appreciate it thanks so much god is love God is an ephemeral feeling nothing ever got got everything and that is that you don't have a concrete you're basically you are so fond of playing with words but now you're playing with the god word I can pretty much guarantee you that logic and power didn't tell you not to carve an image but hey that's not the claim logic and power all right I

Channel: The Atheist Experience

Views: 267,450

Rating: 4.8147926 out of 5

Keywords: atheist experience, the atheist experience, theatheistexperience, atheist, atheism, atheist vs christian, atheist debate, religion debate, atheism debate, Matt Dillahunty (Broadcast Artist), belief, faith, reason, rational, proof, evidence, logic, fallacy, religion, religious, science, secular, Skepticism, skeptic, questioning god, doubt, is god real, agnostic, agnosticism, evidence for god, Christianity, Islam, morality, evidence for jesus, Jesus, Jesus Christ, debate, Bible, Bible contradictions

Id: 9v_7FfN3mQU

Length: 21min 59sec (1319 seconds)

Published: Thu Jul 27 2017