Of people say blasphemy has been termed the unforgivable sin. So according to Mark,
chapter three, verse twenty nine, but whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit
will never be forgiven, but it's guilty of an internal sin. So like
I can think of like a dozen worse things than blasphemy, and I bet
you can too. And apparently God can forgive abusers, murderers, slave owners,
thieves, and anyone else, but he draws the line at blasphemers.
So I think that's stupid. Maybe you do too. But if this makes
sense to you, please call into the show because it is starting right now.
Hello, everybody, welcome to TALKI that it is Sunday, August twenty
two, twenty three. I am your host today objectively Dan, and joining
me in the co pilot's seat this time is Richard. Richard, what's happening?
Very good. I'm very excited it's to do this again with you done
after last week. We had a great great last week. I thought last
week was pretty fun, and I'm excited for round two. So bear with
us, folks, because I'm going to tell you about what this show is
all about. It's talk either, it's a product of the Atheist Community of
Austin, a five O one C three nonprofit organization dedicated to the promotion of
atheism, critical thinking, secular humanism, and the separation of religion and government.
And if this is your first time watching, you should know Talk Even
is a live call in show. It happens every week and we have live
lines, so you can get your calls in right now at five one two
nine nine one nine two four two, or you can call it through your
computer at tiny don cc slash call t H and we have open lines right
now, so you should definitely get your calls in so we can actually,
you know, make this a real call in show, because otherwise it's just
going to be me and Richard talking for like an hour and a half,
which I guess we could do, but like kind of, I don't know,
that's not what people people expect from this, So get your calls in
before we do get to any calls. So we have our talk Heathen to
Me segment Richard. Last week we ask you you are in hell and who
is your roommate. I was excited to see what the answers of this one
would be, and I think there's some pretty good ones here. So let's
read our top three answers from last week. Number three is from mister Colby
the Second, who says, my roommate is Eddie van Halen and turn it
up to eleven would be ten times better than listening to hymns all day and
night and have it, which is true. I mean like it seems like
all the cool people do go to Hell. I don't know you agree with
that, Richard? Do you think that's? Yeah? I think more interested
in having Steve VII though, because he didn't think it's our work for the
filmed Crossroad, which was all about the devil someone selling the soul to the
devil to become a great guitar player. So I'd personally choose Steve over Eddie
van Halen. But great, yes, you know you always make deals with
the devil. Can we make deals with God? Is that a thing too?
I don't know. Is there some sort of exchange that could be made?
I don't know. That's for theologians to decide. But number two comes
from Diana Bender, who says I am in Hell and my roommate is Mother
Terisa. Oh, that would be really bad to have Mother Teresa as a
room she'd probably be very like, she'd probably just like a curse you out
if you did anything that she didn't like, you know, she'd probably be
really mad at stuff. I don't know. It probably wouldn't be a fun
time. Yeah, especially if you will ill should just encourage it to embraration.
So for involved with than giving you a medicine, that's a good point.
If she saw you burning, she's like, oh, you just need
to embrace it. It's like a good thing. And I would be like,
no, that's not true. I need a taile at all. At
least if I'm burning, probably do more, but at least That Number one
comment though, comes from rc Blazer, who says, nobody tell God,
but I am definitely afraid of Audrey hepburn my roommate. And now it's like
really great, Like, oh no, not Audrey Hepper and anybody but her,
Like, yeah, that's that's pretty funny. Uh yeah, but yeah,
those are some great answers. Thank you guys so much for commenting on
our segment. This week's prompt is going to be headline a Bible story using
Florida. Man, I'm gonna be honest, this may be like one of
the top five best prompts we've done. We need really good answers from you
guys. Okay, so headline a story using Florida Man in your comment this
week, and we might read it out for next week and pick the top
three answers. Do you have a good headline for this prompt? Florida in
Exodus would be I just had this image of God and Moses doing all the
hard work freeing everybody from slavery, getting them out of Egypt, getting to
the border of Egypt, and Florida man just say no, We're going to
build a wall, like you can't come in. You've got to stay Egypt
and remain slaves. Well, yeah, I think, yeah, it's something
I was thinking, like maybe the story of Samson or something like Florida Man
breaks down local buildings after after hair growth or something something like that. But
yeah, I want to hear your guys comments on that, so let us
know what you think. And hey, Richard, guess what, Well,
go on, I have a new toy I've been playing with here. I
got a little men listen listen, listen, listen listen. I don't know
how much I'm gonna be able to use it today, but I have been
playing with this little voice modifier thing and it is pretty funny. I'm not
gonna do the sound effects because it sound effects I'm not sure about, like
how the copyright stuff works here, but I may pull out some of these
other voice things, like peck this out here? What's this book? If
I'm follow the narrator? What if I did the whole builment a little little
little choppie there? Maybe it's it's work in progress. I gotta I gotta
fix on this thing. But in the future you may see more of this.
I'm experimenting with some of these. Maybe maybe this one will work.
It's like a helium one. Oo. There we go. This is what
I could do, like the whole stuff, not really though that'd be really
annoying anyway. So yeah, I got some voice stuff. If you guys
have ideas for voices I could do, maybe I'll I'll invest in using this
in the future. But hey, it's time to get to some calls,
Richard. You're ready to talk to some people always, all right, let's
let's do it. We have our first call here coming from Cass who's calling
in from Canada Cast. You are live on Talk Heathen what's going on?
Hey, nothing much. How are you guys doing? How could we help
you? Yeah, I guess I just kind of wanted to talk about the
topic of like death and the idea of afterlife, just because I mean,
this is something I've been thinking about my whole life, growing up very religious,
and especially the past few months since my mom passed away, and it's
just it's just like it's a great idea to think about an afterlife, you
know, but it's also just not something I have enough evidence to believe in.
But yeah, I'm just kind of curious about what you guys think about
it, and like kind of where you guys come from from an atheist standpoint.
Yeah, Richard, do you want to take this one first? Yeah?
Kind of. First of all, I'm sorry for your loss. I
myself have lost both of my pavans and all of my grandparents, So yeah,
I've been been through the kind of the death thing a little bit myself
as well. I've never been religious, so I never had that kind of
perspective of coming out of religion or kind of having that that difference of opinion
between being a religious person and believing in an afterlife and not being a religious
person and not been believing in it, but still having those kind of remnants
of belief to it. So it's it's interesting for me the kind of the
perspective from that angle from me personally, I've never believed in an afterlife.
I've I've studied religion from lots of different cultures. There are lots of different
lots of different beliefs about the afterlife, and lots of different ways of dealing
with both and afterlife and the kind of death itself depends, and some of
them are entire climate related, which I think is really really interesting. You
know, you know, how you dispose of bodies in the him a layer
where you're high upen and everything's frozen, you can't bury bodies up there is
entirely different to how you would do it in a kind of temperate climate,
and that all plays in to kind of belief about the afterlife as well.
There's lots of there's lots of ways of looking at it. I would For
me personally, it's it's it's interesting to look at it kind of academically,
but there's an emotional aspect to it as well, And I'm interested in your
kind of uh. When you said you don't have evidence for it. Because
this kind of suggested to me that this this internal struggle going on where you've
got a remnant of belief and although you're kind of understand from the kind of
from the logical point of view that there's no good reason to believe it,
that you might still be clinging to a little bit of your former belief about
an afterlife. Is that correct? Absolutely? I feel like you really like
nail nail whatever they're termite nail on the head, And I think in such
situations it's, you know, we could we could talk about we could talk
about, well, there's no good reason to believe it till the cows come
home, and it will make no difference. You know. It's you know,
you're you're still going to be in a process of grieving and you've got
to kind of work through that, and it's going to be a personal thing.
I think, you know, the reason I suggested these different cultures and
things is for me, the kind of the best kind of suggestion I've got
for you, because you're still clinging to a particular view, from a particular
tradition on an afterlife, is go and kind of have a look at all
the different afterlives. So rather than trying to tell yourself, you know,
well it makes no sense to believe in an afterlife because there's no evidence stright,
just go and look at how many different kinds of beliefs there are about
afterlives, and I think that will kind of that will internally give you an
understanding rather than trying to reason your way out of it, which doesn't always
work, especially when you've got a huge emotional kind of baggage to go with
that. Rather than trying to reason your way out of it, just kind
of look at all the different ideas there are about it across the board,
and I think that will be more helpful than somebody's saying to you, well,
you've just got to think your way out of it, because you know
it doesn't make sense to believe in it. Dan, No, I think
what you're saying is true. So I was a former Christian. I've been
a nonbeliever for over half a decade now, I don't know how long.
It's been a little over half a decade. So I think, Cass,
if most of us were honest with ourselves, especially those of us who were
former Christians, we recognize that a lot of people. One of the reasons
why they believe is because they think some philosophical proposition is true, or they
think, oh, this historical evidence or the scientific evidence is really great and
pointing towards a cod belief. They want to believe in an afterlife, Like
I think an afterlife is a core part of it. And that's not just
for Christians, by the way, that's for most of human history, right,
Like how many religions talk about what happens after death, right, I
think it's most of them, not all of them, certainly, but there's
a lot of them that do. And that's because there is something about the
human psychology that wants to keep going right and wants to be able to see
our loved ones after they pass. It says, oh, well they're they're
okay, they're just in a different place than they are now. But the
truth is, as of course you recognize, is that our consciousness is probably
toward like tied towards our physical beings, right, and so when our physical
self expires, so does everything else about us. And that's a really hard
pill to swallow. It's a pill that most people don't want to swallow.
So we kind of suppressed that a little bit, and the fact that you're
having this sort of dissonance even though like you don't believe in a bunch of
other stuff, points to how hard it is to dissuade yourself of this kind
of belief. It really is sort of a psychological phenomenon. But it's also
a thing that you just have to deal with like everybody else, right,
Like we all kind of have to grieve, We all kind of have to
go through with this. In my opinion, though, it's more honest to
be able to say, well, this person was with us now and now
isn't and we can move on with our lives and recognize the impact that they've
had in our lives. It makes our relationships with people, in my opinion,
even more meaningful, because if I say, oh, well, i
know my grandmother's sick right now, but I'm not going to visit her.
I'm just gonna wait till the afterlife comes and maybe I'll see her then.
I mean, that's a very extreme example, but we do kind of not
take as much stock into human life in that regard. I mean, there's
a lot of people that do really think, well, there's the bad things
happening now, but people are going to a better place. It is,
how like awful things like war are justified in some people's minds. So in
one sense it's terrible because we don't get to see the people that we love
anymore. But in another sense, it does give us a sense of beauty
because it lets us know that the relationships and impacts that people had in our
lives, we're real and we're lost, and I think it's that loss that
sometimes gives us the value that they had in the first place. I don't
know, just a perspective, but there's a million answers to this question,
and the only one that's going to work for you is the one that works
for you, and that's something you got to figure out for yourself. But
hopefully that's helpful. Cast what do you think, Yeah, yeah, for
sure, for sure. I think it's just it's kind of like the hard
part for me is that it's almost like I'm still kind of holding on too
like a little bit of hope that there's an afterlife, Like I'm okay with
like the idea that like, you die and that's it, like there's nothing
else. I'm okay with that idea, but there's still that just like that
little piece of me that's just like, well, I guess it would be
a nice thing if there was something after, like something that we cannot imagine
or we don't know, you know, it's just kind of like the idea
of it. It's still kind of like nice to think about. And it's
just it's it's hard because it's like is that helpful for me? Or is
that making it worse? Like is it easier for me to just throw out
every hope and just move on as if you know, there's nothing that's going
to happen after or is it helpful for me to at least hold on to
some hope because maybe that'll give me some motivation or happiness. Like, I
don't know where to kind of like draw that line, because obviously, like
how you guys said too, like some people who are really religious, they
kind of like they believe so much in an afterlife that they don't, you
know, live this life to the fullest because they just think, Okay,
I'll see you in the next life and whatever. So it's like I don't
want to live that way, but I also kind of it's almost like I
like the hope that, you know, maybe there is something more to the
life that we're living now. But I'll yeah, I also just don't want
to completely not live the life I have now at the same time, So
it's kind of just like drawing a ballet. Ye. The fact that you're
cognizant of that, I think is a good sign, right, because it's
like you under stand that, Yeah, that's an excuse people use not to
like take care of their own health, right. I've definitely heard that from
people. They just say, well, it doesn't matter, this life is
temporary, right, you understand that. That's bs. You understand that said
something people say to make themselves feel better. That's that's good. I think
that's that's the healthiest place you can be. If if if they thought that
an afterlife at least gives you some kind of peace or at least maybe the
fact that I mean, because like we don't know honestly, right, Like
we don't know they're they're very much could be. I think it's very unlikely.
But that's one of those questions where it's like, yeah, I just
don't think it's true, but I can never possibly one hundred percent know for
sure. I just wouldn't know what that would mean. I guess where I'm
getting at here is a loose kind of belief like that is going to be
way less problematic than one that's sort of stitched into a hierarchy of other beliefs.
And what I'm really talking about here is Christianity, right, because I'm
assuming you come from a Christian background, right, that Christians sort of yeah,
yeah, yeah, right, yeah, kind of costal. Yeah,
there's a whole lot of implications that come with like that Christian sort of understanding
of the afterlife. And I don't think that's where your brain is at,
right. And I'm just anticipating the comment section here because I don't want them
to be like, oh, you shouldn't tell people to believe in delusions.
I'm not. It's natural to think that there could be an afterlife. I
say it's natural because billions of people believe it, Like there's that's just the
thing that's part of humanity. Whether or not we can control that, or
whether or not we find it convincing, that's going to be up to people's
psychology, people's understanding of evidence, people's understanding of philosophy, people's understanding of
life. So I say, if it's helpful for you, and it's not
going to be a bother in any other sense of your life. Yeah,
I have hope, but I also strongly suggest what you already do understanding and
have it being cognizant of the fact that this probably is the only life we
have, and so the relationships you have with people and the things for yourself,
like you should be building and investing it for yourself in right, Like,
you shouldn't just be like, oh, well, I'm just going to
donate all of my life to doing this thing for other people because I can't.
You know that I'll get treasures in heaven if I do this, right,
Like, that's that's not going to be helpful for you. But if
you say, hey, I'm gonna give my time for people because I want
to help other people out, it makes me feel good. And also I
think that's one of the best things a human being can do. I mean,
that's just that's doing the same thing but with a different perspective. Right.
It really is about that perspective, Like how healthy of a perspective that
is. And I think what you're describing sounds natural and totally fine. Honestly,
I don't know what do you think, Richard? Yeah, yeah,
I agree, And I think I just want to say a couple of things
on the kind of hope thing. First of all, I would I would
absolutely love there to be a place where I could be really united with,
you know, my loved one so paston. I think it would be a
brilliant you know, I kind of hope that's the case as well, without
having any I've never been really justus, I've ever never held that belief,
but it's it is a nice idea, and you know, if, if,
if you can use that as a and I think that as well,
even though I've never believed in it, I still, you know, I
can think about it and say to myself, that would be a really really
great thing. Without having any belief that it is true or that it will
happen whatsoever, you can still use it as a tool to kind of help
you, you know, face this emotional stress you're going through. I still
think about that. You know, my father died eleven years ago, and
I still think about that. My mom's died at the start of last year,
and I still think, wouldn't it be nice if there was a place
where we could be together again with the full kind of acceptance that there isn't,
and I think it's as Dan said, it's a perfectly natural thing to
do. I think it's also worth kind of noting that religions have and do
exploit this hope tremendously. And you know, I think there's not our con
speak for all of them. I'm not saying that they're all like utterly dishonest,
because I don't think they are all utterly dishonest. But there are certain
some religions and certainly some kind of schools of religion, certain churches, certain
preachers, certain pastors that will exploit this and use this to take advantage of
people. And being aware that, you know, this is a natural thing
that people go through, and be aware that people do use this as an
exploitative tool, and I think that's very important just to keep in the back
of your mind as well. But yeah, man, on the same absolutely,
on the same page as done with this. You know, it's it's
it's a natural part of the grieving process, and there is no harm in
it. There is no harm in having those thoughts. Wouldn't it be nice
if I could be with my loved ones again? Yeah? Yeah, I
think I think that's all we have to say on this case. Hopefully that
was helpful. Any other comments before we let you go? No, No,
that was very helpful. It's it's helpful to you know, talk about
it with like mind people. I just I've had this fear that, you
know, if I think this way, like, can I am I like
progressing in like logical thinking? Or am I like being held back by like
this fundamental belief that like I've been taught my whole life. So it's it's
helpful to know that like you guys too, as atheists and logical thinkers like
also you know, have a hope because it would be nice, you know,
Cass, you have my permission to be irrational on this belief. Okay,
here I have granted you high authority from the atheist atheist community of Austin
on high and I've said, yes, you're allowed to have this because you're
a human being and you deserve dignity and respect and to be able to grieve
for your loved ones. Yea, So if that's what you're looking for,
I'll give that to you. Thank you, Thank you, thanks guys.
Yeah, of course, very helpful. Of course, of course, thank
you for calling in, Cass. What a nice call I'm, of course
circumstances not being nice, but just like I like this perspective of, hey,
I am. I think of myself as a logical thinker and I want
to think logically about this. Is it okay that I'm not thinking logically about
this? Like, I think it's brilliant. I think I think there's so
many people kind of in our community who try and try and kind of make
vulcans out of themselves and disassociate themselves from emotion, and you can't do that.
We are emotional creatures and we can understand logic and we can understand kind
of skepticism in practice, but we are still emotional and we've still got that
aspect of ourselves to deal with. And it's great to keep aside on ourselves.
As well as talking to other people about skepticism, we need to view
it internally as well. This is a problem that the atheist community faces at
large. They really do think of a lot of people as like vulcans,
and this idea of like, oh am, I allowed to be irrational about
this, Like it's almost like there's going to be consequences if you aren't.
And beliefs are important, right, I'm not saying like, beliefs don't have
consequences. They certainly do. But there's nothing about at least from what cast
is describing about their situation and saying, oh, this is going to lead
to something that's problematic. Right, They're not saying, Oh, I think
there might be hope for heaven, so I'm going to donate all my money
to this psychic who can tell me about talking to me talking to my mother
through psychic phenomenon and stuffing. Yeah, it's it's nothing like that. It's
more just like, I hope I get to see this person again. And
if that's the extent of it, Yeah, why why would I take that
away from somebody? Why? Because I think I'm better than them, and
I think, oh no, actually, you're never going to see this person
again. I mean, how shitty is that? Right? That's there's no
reason for that, So I don't think it in itself. It's an illogical
viewpoint anyway. Having the whole you're not saying you think it's actually going to
happen. Yeah, You've just you just want to see someone you love and
know's had a great amount of importance in your life again. That I think
that's absolutely acceptable. Yeah, yeah, that's true. Let's go ahead and
take some other calls. But before we do, just a reminder, this
Saturday, Next Saturday, this Saturday. I've had a debate with people about
whether you can say next Saturday if it's the upcoming Saturday or if it's the
Saturday after, and it's stupid. But anyway, August twenty six, specifically,
what I mean this year is the back cruise. If you guys are
tired of hearing us announce announce it, don't worry. It's gonna happen really
soon. So tickets have sold out, but there is a chance you can
still join us if you join the waitlist, So sign up for that in
case there are cancelations, and join the latelist at TI dot cc slashbackers,
And hey, if you bought tickets and you can't come, please go ahead
and cancel so that somebody else can come, because there's a lot of people
on the list already and we want to make sure as many people can come
as they can. So if you know, hey, I got these tickets
and I can't actually go, please go ahead and cancel. There's a lot
of people that don't do that. And then they end up. You know,
there's now as many people that can come, So if you do have
your tickets, look forward to going on the boat and also enjoying conversations with
all the other folks that are gonna be there, Forest Valkai, j,
Mike, Christy Powell and lots of other hosts from other shows. So check
it out. One more thing as well, just as we're talking about supporting
the ACA, Hey, we've got a shirt this month. It is a
Satan the lesser of two evils on there, which is you know, very
edgy. If you're into that, you can get that and of course all
the other Talk Heathen merch at tiny dot cc slash merch aca right now,
I of course have to remind you please like, subscribe and enable notifications if
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If you send a super chat today you can have it be read out
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And we will read all super chat that gets sent to us, as long
as their YouTube appropriate. And that's it. That's all I got. Let's
go ahead and move on to our next caller. Let's see, let's talk
to Tim. Tim who's calling in from Washington. Tim, you're live on
talk Ethan. What's up, hey, Dave? And how are you?
I'm doing great? Tim, How are you doing? I'm doing very well.
Hey. You know it's the weekend. Well it's the end of the
weekend for me. But anyway, Yeah, so I wanted to talk about
nihilism a little bit, if that's okay, and it's sort of related,
I guess to the last call. Everybody's asking permission today? Yeah, live
your life, state, folks. Yeah, absolutely talk about nihilism. My
boyfriend and I were out yesterday and we were talking and this subject came up,
and and I thought, I was I have been thinking about this for
several months. Nihilism isn't necessarily a negative philosophy. It's not about, oh
my god, there's nothing, there's nothing to this whole thing and we're all
just kind of we're all just kind of existing or anything like that. You
know, it's it's sort of it's sort of all about you get to live
your life, period, and it really goes to show the type of person
you are if if you're a good person and you believe that after death there
is nothing, and you really believe that there is no heaven nor hell,
or you really believe that that we aren't put here for a specific reason because
God, Odin raw any of these gods have just placed us here. We
are simply here because we happen to exist on a planet that was perfect for
us to evolve into what we are. And it really shows what kind of
a person you are if you believe that there is nothing in the future,
nothing after death, and you're still a good person and you're not being forced
to be a good person because the tank commandments are telling you to be sure.
Sure. Yeah, Nihilism is complicated because it's been interpreted by different people
to mean different things. Right, So like nihilism. First of all,
there's different kinds of nihilism you can talk about, like metaphysical nihilism or like
myriological nihilism. But most people when they're talking about nihilism, they're talking about
what's been described by philosopher Freed Nietzschi, who says, who talks about nihilism
in several of his books, But it's not a prescriptive sort of ideology really,
it's more a description of the times Nietzchi was was worried. He was
worried about the post Christian world. Basically, he's the one you've you ever
heard like God is dead and we have killed him. That's that's Friedrich Nietzi.
He said that, And basically he's like, look, what are we
going to do about living in this world that has no sense of objective values?
Right where everybody is kidding coming up with zoe meaning and he is actually
very power positive in his affirmation. He says, look, we have to
make meaning for ourselves. I mean, there's a lot of people that misinterpret
his work because they just heard about it and they're like, oh, he's
saying everything is all meaningless. He's like, yes, but he's not saying
that's it. He's saying and so because of that, human beings have to
kind of do things right. And of course other writers have talked about this
too. Niche's like the guy that people talk about with this and yeah,
like like people who are very serious about the concept of existential nihilism, this
idea that nothing matters, they're they're the first ones to say, yeah,
we have to like kind of come up with our own stuff here. And
that's been interpreted in different ways. Albert Kamu talks about, you know,
the myth of Sisyphus coming up with absurdism, and then and Jack Garrett and
all these other folks and the rest of the twentieth century like kind of talk
about this. But anybody who's never actually read any of that stuff is just
like, oh, yeah, all these atheists they say that, you know,
there's just no meaning to life and we just gotta all die. What's
the point of live in Like, that's just really not what any of them
have to say about it. And it's a little more complicated, but you're
right, there are more positive interpretations of it that are out there. Richard,
what you got, Yeah, I'm not really looked into nihilism nehilism,
however you want to say it very much. I think I wrote an essay
about it on Nietzsche and is kind of is the way that in Buddhism influenced
his philosophy, and now people misunderstood Buddhism at the time that he was around
and kind of saw that as a nihilistic philosophy, which it isn't. And
you know, I kind of did an essay about that a while ago.
But you know, it's not other than that, it's not actually something I've
looked much into. I think we get in this community, we get it
thrown as a lot by Christians and other religious people who kind of say,
well, if you don't have something to believe in, you're obviously believing nothing,
therefore you're nehilist. And I don't. I just simply don't think that's
the case. And I don't think there's a there's a definite difference from me
between skepticism and nihilism. And you know, yeah, that's important to point
out. Well, other than that, I've really not much to contribute with.
Yeah, but what you're saying is important because even if there isn't an
objective reason for living, an objective value, an objective ray. I mean,
so what right, that's not stopping people from living? I don't.
I don't live. I didn't like like the things that I liked when I
was five because they were objectively good. I liked them because I just thought
they were cool, right, And it's the same thing for everything I like
today. I'm just more grown about it and I like to have more complicated
reasons. But I don't know. It's like, you like what you like,
and most of us are pretty pragmatic about it. So a lot of
the things we like are pragmatic and happy to help us. But that doesn't
mean that they're objective. Just because they're they appear to be universal, it's
a guarantee a lot of people what a lot of people thinking universal values really
aren't right. But anyway, Tim, what you had sound like yet more
to say, Well, I was. I was also telling him yesterday when
we were talking that when when I was a Mormon and a fundamentalist Penteconstal Christian
and all of that, I was so afraid of death. I was so
afraid of fucking my life up somehow doing something wrong. That God is going
to send me to hell because I would miss step. And with nihilism or
the nihilistic thinking of not really having to look toward an actual afterlife just no
longer existing after this body fails, I'm no longer really afraid of death.
I'm no longer really afraid to live my life and make mistakes along the way.
And and you know, and yet I can also be such an incredible
person because I'm not told I have to be an incredible person. I can
be this incredible person just because that's the humane thing to do. It's you
know, it's not it's not it's not, I guess, a superior thing.
It is just a humane thing to be a good person. And and
that's what I love about kind of thinking about That's what I love about nihilism,
or at least my idea of what nihilism is, because it's I don't
have to live by any set standard. I just have to live by decent
human thought and you know, making sure that I am being the best person
I can. However that may look. Yeah, you know, hundred percent
to totally agree with you. Yeah, it's again, it's one of those
things where some people they look at that and they don't find empowerment at all,
and they think it's defeating. I definitely thought that when I was a
Christian, and then I realized, well, Christianity and also be interpreted in
extremely nihlest ways if you just have the right language for it, if you
have the right mindset for it. Look at what God wants for us.
We are master. God is our master, and we're essentially his puppets,
uh, And we just have to follow the will of God. And if
we refuse to follow the will of God, we are rejected and we are
sent to Hell, and we are to burn for eternity for expressing the free
will that He gave us. What exactly is positive about that message in that
light? You know, there's there's there's lots of ways that yeah. Yeah,
So so if we're talking purely in terms of positive and negative worldviews,
right, you can easily construe the Christian worldview to be extremely negative. And
yeah, can nihilism be interpreted in a negative way and still be legitimate to
it? Like fundamental sort of interpretations? Like, yeah, I think you
can, But you can also be interpreted in a positive way. I mean,
really, that's kind of the whole point it's like it's it's really up
to what philosophers have made of it and what and how to solve the human
condition, right, I mean, that's that's really what it comes down to,
especially in a world that is probably going to be slowly rejecting Christianity over
time, or at least reinterpreting it to fit more modern secular reventions. So
anyway, Yeah, that's all I got, Richard anything. Actually, Now,
the other thing, we just need to get rid of this kind of
idea that nihilism is people walking around going whoa is mee? Everything is worthless
because it's just simply not the case. It's a very navel of every marginal
last view of what days. Yeah, i'derstand tell me anything else before we
let you go. No, I think that's all. I want to die.
Just like I said, I was talking with my boyfriend yesterday and was
thinking, oh crap, I want to talk about this to somebody who actually
will understand what I'm saying. And you not only understood it, but you
actually explained a couple of things to me that I didn't know. So that's
cool. Oh yeah, well yeah, yeah, I mean I think if
you want to read the books. I can't remember if it's the Gay Science
where he talks about it, or if it's thus spoke zare through stuff,
but he talks about it, and honestly, Arthur Schopenharer and stuff talks about
it before. But like Nietzsche's kind of the guy if you want to talk
about this stuff in depth, he's he's, he's, he's very interesting on
that. But Tim thinks again for calling in and always appreciate it. When
you do call in, it is always lovely talking to you and a good
conversation. And nihilism is probably one of the most most misunderstood and misinterpreted ideas
and philosophy. Uh, maybe more than anything else. I really can't think
of anything else that's more misinterpreted, can you. I mean, it's it's
really just don't know. Yeah, everybody that's yeah, I guess that's that's
fair. Everybody just has their own ideas of what nihilism is. And it's
complicated like it's one thing. Like many things of philosophy, it doesn't have
just one definition, but it's also like going to have various, much more
thought out ideas than what you might imagine if you actually take the time to
read stuff, but most people don't know. Yeah, it is what it
is. But hey, well philosophy people is impotant. Yeah, and I'm
by the way, I don't have a philosophy degree or anything. I'm just
I'm just a late person. So I could be one hundred percent wrong,
and some philosophy PhD is gonna be like, hey, my degree is in
philosophy, and you explained it far better than I could have said. Well,
there you go. I just I just you know, you can figure
this stuff out by Google searches. Honestly, I mean, it doesn't take
it's not that hard, but it is for some people. But hey,
I have to move on here and talk about the Patreon as we have kind
of mentioned some ideas on supporting us to Patreon is one of them, and
we will be reading those top five patrons at the turn of the hour.
We also have a channel that houses all of the shows of the ACA in
audio podcast form. I almost had audio podcast form, which sounds kind of
cool. That sounds like a rap album that I would buy audio podcast form.
You can visit tight out, cc slash ae N podcasts for that.
You can also become a part of the talk Heath and community in our fan
run facebook page at that tying at cc slash fbt HG and if you do
join that, please don't be a dick. There's a lot of people that
join and post nasty things, and all the hosts are kind of looking.
We're always seeing what you got to say. All right, you guys said
some some some funny things on there. Sometimes I will say that. And
lastly here before I move on, if you didn't know, Park Heathen does
have a TikTok and does go live before the show's on Sunday, Richard just
went live today, so go subscribe and joined the pre show on the Tonk
Heathen TikTok. Richard, how was that today? It was great. We
had a we had we had what we sometimes get and it's not always a
case. We sometimes get people who will put them money where their mouth is.
But today we had a lot of people who were making a lot of
claims and when asked to call in, was it not not going to do
that? No, it's one thing to write something, to make a statement
in a comment section. It's an entirely different thing to have a conversation about
it. And so I've said this many many times if you were if you're
going to just make a statement and you're not willing to have a conversation,
this tells me that you're not convinced that the statement you're making you actually have
evidence fall you know, Come meet me in the ring, boy, come
come in, come at me. Richard's starting fights on ticktock over here,
and keep that energy, Richard. That's good. No, no, no,
I know what you mean. Though. It's like pople you can say
whatever you want in a common section anywhere. It's just like, yeah,
but why not have a conversation about it? If you truly believe that's something,
you think it's true, right, right? Why not defend that?
I don't know. That's what I think is interesting about some people. But
hey, remember last week whenever we had a conversation about vegans, remember that,
Richard. Okay, Well, we have another caller who wants to talk
in the in the same loop here, So maybe this will be a sequel
to our conversation last week, maybe part two, maybe not. Though.
This is Julie who's calling in from New Mexico. Julie, what did you
want to talk to us about today? I wanted to talk about and how
veganism can actually like reduce overall violence in the world. M okay, yeah,
tell me more. And well, just like you know, if people
people accept the violence against animals in order to eat them, and I just
think that if we stop normalizing the killing of animals, then it would eventually
lead to less violence within humans. Yeah, I mean I like that.
And first of all, as you know, I am, I'm a vegan.
I'm sympathetic to the being well viewed. Right, So I'm I'm pro
what you say in the sense that human's tendencies towards animals, right, how
they view animals can be reflective of how they view other people. Right.
Mohammed Gond talked about like this concept. Right, He was like, look,
if you want to see if a nation is civilized, see how they
treat their animals. Right, I'm paraphrasing. He didn't exactly stand right that,
but this was the same idea, right, It's this idea of like,
look, we know that animals are quote unquote lesser beings than us in
some way, right, maybe they don't have the same rational capacities, maybe
they don't have the same intellectual or abilities. Otherwise, so how we treat
them. How we treat the lesser of animals can be reflective of how we
treat the lessers of people, or what we consider lessers within human populations.
Right. Obviously the idea of like seeing somebody, Yeah, yeah, and
the idea of seeing somebody as a lesser is of course problematic with it itself.
But how many times has that happened in human history? Right? How
many times have people had this concept and and has done terrible things. So
so, in principle, I think you're right. Now. That being said,
I have met other vegans and seeing other vegans who are just as violent
in other ways, maybe just verbally. Maybe they're not killing animals, but
you know what I mean, it's it can vary a little bit, So
I think, you know, I think the idea is nice. I think
I like it in principle. Does it work in practice? I'm not sure,
but yeah, I do. I do agree though, right, I
mean, as a as a whole, If the world was more vegan,
ostensibly we would be a less violent world because animals would not be on the
receiving end of violence, or at least it would be scaled down to a
significant degree. Right, there would still occur obviously, exactly. Yeah,
yeah, it just kind of reduced the thought of violence then sure, sure,
yeah, And we do have very violent tendencies for ex animals. Yeah,
yeah, there are violent cultural tendencies. I do agree with that,
Richard, What do you think? Yeah, I think this is an interesting
one. I overall agree that, you know, you know, reducing violence
across the board is a good idea. I'm not sure how. I think
it's a nice idea that if we if everyone became vegan, it would reduce
violence between human to human violence. I'm not sure it works in practicality.
Yeah, yeah, if a look at I mean, the the idea that
that touched on from Mahatma Gandhi, who who was a vegan is and the
kind of the thing that that that non violence in that tradition is called a
him and it's also held in Tibetan Buddhism. Now, in Tibetan Buddhism,
it could be argued that there is less violence than in the tradition that Mahatma
Gandhi comes from. However, because of where they live and the practical aspects
of that, a lot of Tibetan Buddhists do eat meat. Yeah, so
it's I think I think if we're taking kind of a case study, look
at it with people who followed the same kind of idea of hymns of non
violence, and both come from traditions which are at least promote vegetarianism. I
don't think that bears out with there is a lot of violence in some Hindu
cultures where the practice especially it's a more vegetarianism is a phenomenon you could,
Sorry to interrupt you, Richard, Yeah, this is a phenomenon ostensible you
should be able to measure in some capacity. Right, Are the most vegan
societies so less violent? Can you track that in a metro kind of way
like I would think of, Okay, well there's no one vegan vegetarian societies,
but there's certainly more than others. I'm thinking maybe India, you know,
maybe other Southeastern Asian nations probably do that more. Are they more or
less violent? It also depends on how you define violence as well. The
only thing I know for certain that can level out structural violence is the alleviation
of poverty. From from my understanding, I'm not sure if a veganism has
that same effect that would be interesting to study, though probably really hard to
do. I don't know, but yeah, a lot of a lot of
interesting thoughts here. Sorry I interrupted you there, Rich, But no,
no, I think I don't agree, and I agree with you entirely on
the poverty front as well. Yeah, I just for me, because I
don't know if one's being done. I'll have to look into it. But
I would love to see a study on hymns as a concept and the different
cultures and places that practice it. Look, you know, whether they are
largely vegetarian or egan, whether they are largely meet eaters, and look at
corresponding kind of crime figures. I suppose is the only way you could do
it. Yeah, I don't know. You know, it's a very hard
thing to do. It's a very hard thing to collert that data and to
decide where outside factors are coming in and where they're not. Certainly an interesting
concept, Yeah, and I think it's definitely a watch this Space idea.
It's a very good idea. I think to kind of look into that further.
Really, any other thoughts, Yeah, no, No, that's a
he made a really good point about data and stuff like that. I didn't
even think about that I was just thinking about the violence in general exist people.
So yeah, I know that's a good idea. Yeah, yeah,
I mean I again, I agree with you from a philosophical perspective, right,
Juliet, which is like, yeah, I want to alleviate violence against
animals and right, so I think that if you're going to be vegan,
you're going to be less violent, but like you may be less violent in
that one category, it may mean that you struggle with violence in other ways,
you know what I mean, Like, I don't know, I also
other other vegans. Yeah. Another think to point out, too, Julie,
is that I assume you're the same in my position where you're a vegan
for philosophical reasons, but not everybody who's vegan is vegan for philosophical reasons.
Some of them are vegan because for health reasons. Some of them are vegan
for you know, other kinds of things, and so they may still have
this kind of maybe problematic view towards animals, are problematic view towards other people
that doesn't get solved because that they're vegan. It's just because oh I'm vegan
because I want to look fit and have this nutritional thing also I think people
of other races are inferior to me or something right like that could still happen
that there's nothing that says that that's not coherent or inconsistent unfortunately. So yeah,
something to think about there. But I like your call, Julie.
It was it was a good call. Good call, Richard or Julie,
any of the thoughts. No, I agree. I think it was a
good call. It was a great, great question and certainly one I think
I think if this was a scientific paper, it would have a section that
they and set called discussion where you kind of talk about how you can take
it further and take the idea further and look at it into more detail.
Definitely a good call. Definitely an interesting subject to kind of that needs further
development and looking at I like it. I like it. We do have
some other calls psychology of people, you know what I mean, just their
mindset. Yeah, thank you for taking my call. I appreciate it very
much. Thank you so much, Julie. Have a great rest of your
day. And now we have more calls in the queue that I want to
talk about veganism. So I knew, you know, we started the firestorm
here today great cord and yeah, it's happening. So we will talk more
about it in just a second, but before we do, there's a super
chat we gotta read. It's from Ben nine, which is a great name.
I don't know if it's a Ben ten reference and you're just Ben nine
or of just Ben nine is like a different thing, or like G nine,
maybe like Be nine. I just like it Ben nine, who gave
ten dollars, He says a twelve step programs are definitely our Christian movement,
and it can be difficult to get off merry go round, but it's possible
to experience sobriety without a h key. And I think you know, I
don't have any personal experience with those kinds of programs. I only know from
people who have talked about this kinds of stuff, and I know that there
are twelve step programs in general are problematic because they're motivated by religious institutions a
lot of times and don't maybe maybe don't display the same efficacy as other kinds
of programs. Maybe you could speak to this more, Richard, but I
can only know what I've been told about it. Yeah, I've not experienced
them personally from what I know about them. They are very much you know,
higher power motivated, and certain ones, the famous ones, let's not
advertise them that the famous ones are very much Christian higher power motivated. Yeah,
you know, it's it's a shame that we have to go down that
route of having some kind of deity or supernatural element in it, because you
could called you know, you could call motivation a higher power in that context
and have different things to motivate you that in that aspect. Yeah, and
I think you know, whether that's well whatever. Lots of examples, if
you've got children, you know, seeing your children and providing a good life
for your children again could be considered a higher power. So I don't know
why we have to elevate it to some kind of supernatural element. You know.
Motivation comes in many, many different forms. Yeah. Daryl Ray spoke
to me about this actually on Truth Wanted a few weeks back. Who and
he makes the case that a lot of twelve step programs just kind of offer
themselves to local communities as sometimes even just for free, in order to sort
of be in compliance with some regulatory laws in the United States about you know,
offers and programs offered to people in prison populations and and other sorts of
things like that. So there is a case to be made that a lot
of these programs exist and the reason why they're so popular isn't because they're good.
It's just because it's like a cheap option basically for people to take uh
and doesn't actually have to do with their efficacy. Unfortunately. This is the
case that Dye rams and who knows much more about the subec and I do.
So you should check out that episode of Yeah where he talks about it
more if you're interested. But hey, there's some more folks who want to
talk to us now, Richard, and let's go ahead and talk to them
now. I'll talk to about more announcement stuff later, since we've just gotten
to a super cat there. Yeah, let's let's let's keep going on the
let's keep going on this I just because there's a couple of people that want
to talk to us about it, we are going to keep talking about.
Brandon's calling in from Florida. They have a question for you, Richard,
Brandon, you're live on talk Ethan. What's up? Tell you how you
doing? Thanks for having me, guys, I really appreciate you having me
in a show any time for us. You're you're here to question Richard,
Right, what do you got? Yeah? So, I actually run the
official veganism channel of YouTube and tom athis just like you guys. And as
I've been exploring this path of trying to convert people to veganism, I've noticed
definitely a parallel between believers and meat eaters. Whereas people kind of they have
like an excuse as to, let's say, why they eat animals, and
as soon as I disassemble that excuse, then they're kind of trying to come
up with their next excuse. As soon as I dismantle that excuse, they're
trying to come up with their next excuse. Because I'm finding like it's somebody
that, for whatever reason, they want to do it, if they want
to harm cute, defenseless little creatures, even though like you could get all
the same case pleasure from plants. They're it's health here and nobody has to
die. So now that I've kind of noticed that parallel kind of brings me
to everybody that I was an atheist. I'm really puzzled because I feel like
there's a certain level of hypocrisy there where it's somebody's an atheist and they want
somebody else to question their beliefs and their reality and look at what's the you
know, the morally correct thing to do and Whatnot's a question how could somebody
understand all of this and still shooes to harm animals unnecessarily? Basically, my
course, between atheism and skepticism another difference between two. That's just saying,
yeah, do you know the difference between atheism and skepticism. I mean I
talked to one of the same, I say, I mean atheists, they're
out of the same there there isn't a God. No atheism is as an
answer to a single question, and it's about the belief in God. That's
a skepticism is about. I don't know about that, Richard. I mean
there's people who call themselves skeptics about lots of things. I don't know if
they has just got not atheism, I said, not skepticism. Oh sorry,
I thought you said skepticism. No atheism is an answer to a single
question. Skepticism is applying kind of skepticism to across the board, not just
to the God question. I noticed in your introduction there, so when you
were talking about trying to convenient to kind of convince people that they should be
vegan. You did a lot of things I wouldn't call skeptical. You're poisoned
the wealth a little bit by calling animals you argued from emotion by calling animals
cute. You're poisoned the well a little bit by forgot what you did.
But you did poison the world. Got the specific example. Now if you
did it, if you want to kind of repeat the argument, and I'll
try and pick it up again, okay, because I's just wondering why you're
not vegans. Yeah, hey, Brandon, if you are on speaker,
we need you to go ahead and change that. I'm gonna mute you real
quick while you fix that, because I think your audio just just pooped out
there. Sorry, I was interrupting there and also playing. I feel like
I have to play Devil's Advocate with you, Richard when we when we have
these cars last week, I think while we're waiting for Brandon to fix that,
I'll tell you this. I think you can make You can make comparisons
to meat eaters and religious people, but you can also make comparisons to vegans
and religious people. You can make comparisons religious people like anything. I understand
why that is an analogy that could be used. And and I and I
have had frustrating conversations with people who are advocately anti vegan, like who are
are adamantly anti vegan? Right? Who? Who? Really? Uh reject
that? And yeah, I could definitely make some comparisons there. But in
this context, it can be a little it can be a little slippery,
can be a little I don't know, Richard, I don't know why,
why, fully what? What? What stances you have? I do know
that you at least, hello, you're talking to me about it, but
also you're willing to talk to always about it. So I will grant you
that, Okay, Like that's that's that's the thing most people will not do.
But I am. I am curious to see, uh if we could
get to the heart of that a little bit more. Let's see if Brandon's
audio is a little bit better. Brandon, I'm unuting you now, if
you could talk for a second, Let's see if we can hear you better.
Hey, sorry about that? How are you there? Got you?
Now? Go ahead? Where did you guys lose me? What was the
last thing you heard me say? Pretty much? Lost yet everything honestly,
if you want to start over, okay, Okay, So I was saying
that for me, if I see, like a wasp, what I would
consider a not cute living being precally a wasp on my porch, I would
go out there and save its life because as an atheist, I'm under the
you know, understanding that everybody, whether you're an aunt, a wasp,
or cow, pig or chicken, everyone only gets one life as far as
we know. So how can I rob that being of its one and only
life for my own selfish reasons? Like even if you told me, being
a shadow of a doubt, that I would live a shorter life being vegan,
I would still choose to do this just because I feel it's some moratally
correct thing to do. How can I, you know, for all the
things that would arrive somebody to be atheists, they have to be humble,
they have to you know, really look at themselves and be brave and say
they may not know everything, or them have to accept certain things that are
uncomfortable. So I feel like if somebody is willing to go through all all
of those mental barriers and arrive at that conclusion that those same same level of
reasoning would draw them to be vegan as well. So I'm curious, Richard,
like, why why aren't you vegan? I'm not vegan because I don't
see any moral imperative too being vegan. Regarding the example of harming wasps,
I would also go and save the life of a wasping you know what,
I'd also go and save the life of if I saw it in distress and
peril. Is a cow or a pig or a chicken, I would if
I saw a cow wrapped up in barbed wire, I wouldn't say I am
a meat eater. I eat meat, I eat beef especially, So I
am going to go and I'm going to let that die because I don't care
about the well being of that individual creature. I wouldn't do that. I
would do the best I could to try and save that particular animals life in
that circumstance. You know, we have questions like this. We had one
on the call last week where someone said, you know, why wouldn't just
go and punch a dog. It's not comparable. I don't walk round punching
things intentionally, causing physical harm to things for no reason whatsoever. You know
I disagree with a lot of the farming processes, and know a lot of
vegans don't lie that they think that's an excuse. I think we would be
We had an extensive after show and the ACD discord last week, only we
went to I think almost to the time where the next show began, and
aren't talking on this issue. And you know my stances that we would call
we would have a much much better kind of overall well being for animals if
vegans and meat eaters worked together to change farming methods, to change the way
with farm, to change the way we treat animals while they're being formed.
I think it would cause I think it would it would make the price of
meat go up. It would make the consumption of meat to go down.
I'll just finish my thought and then I'll let jump in. I think it
would make the price of meat go up. I think it would make the
cost of meat come down. I think it would make the health of people
eating meat better overall. And I think all of those things are good things.
But that doesn't to me say that we must therefore all become vegan.
Well, I think, well, it's my first point I would say is
if you replace any of those words cow, pig, chicken, fish,
wash, if you replace it with human, I'm going I would probably installate.
Why well, I'm saying, like, why would we change the word
to human? Well, because it's just a show. I want to see
if you're consistent, Like, because I'm thinking you would change everything. You
just say, why is it inconsistent? Why is it inconsistent? But what's
kind of like if somebody said a black life is worth less than a white
life, right, if you're saying an animal life is worth lives? It's
not like that, because black, black people and white people are human beings,
and I appreciate human beings, and I can communicate with them, and
for the most part of our exceptions, but I can communicate with human beings
on the same level that I myself communicate. I can't do that with other
animals. That doesn't mean I don't care about the welfare or well being of
animals while they are alive. I don't want to see undue suffering, And
that to me is because you have a problem with them suffering. I think
the reason you have a problem with them suffering is because you recognize that any
level of suffering is wrong and you want to minimize it. So if we
can minimize it altogether and just cause no suffering at all, why not pick
that up? Why would be cause no suffering at all? What would happen
to the animals? And I'm not talking about kind of just I'm not just
kind of throw in the short term, you know, let's get rid of
all the farm animal What would we do if we all became vegan tomorrow argument,
I'm not going down that kind of rule, although that is a valid
argument in itself, I think. But let's say that if we're talking about
reduction of suffering, let's take pigs as an example. If if the vegan
argument is that we should reduce suffering, and we can, you know,
we've got wild pigs, We've got farmed pigs. Now, let's say if
we stop farming pigs, the number of wild pigs would go up, because
those you know, unless we are just advocating killing all of those animals off.
Now, what's got which has better less suffering? If let's say we
have a kind of ideal form which reduces minimize us suffering or as much as
we can possibly and I know we don't have that, and that's why I
think we should work together to kind of achieve those things. But let's say
that we do have that, and then we have a pig in the wild,
which one of those two things has less suffering? Do you think one
with shelter, one with access to medicine before before it's killed for food,
one that's had had access to medicine, one that's got shelter, one that's
you know, is cared for, or the one that's left in the wild,
and even at the point of death, where if it's one in the
wild and it's it's getting ripped apart by a predator, or the one that
is, you know, quickly killed for meat consumption. If we're using suffering
as an argument, which one of those has less suffering? Okay, I
have several things to say to your point. Well, first, why you
know said if it was wild versus kept in captivity. For me, I
think if everybody kind of treated it with the same outlook that I have,
I mean, we could still keep things in captivity and protect them without killing
them is one option. I think, Well that would that would be ideal,
But I think if we're talking realistically, that's not going to happen when
if we're going to keep the amount of the kind of creatures alive, it
still takes the land that they fed on, it still takes the kind of
the care. It costs money, and unless it's an industry which is willing
to do that for profit at the end of the day, then it's that's
going to fall down onto charitable organizations. And that I think is an unrealistic
standards to say, well, all these animals, well we can just care
for them all. Well we can just care for them without killing them.
Well, I don't think that would be a little bit of thing. I
caught a little bit of the previous call, and it sounded like, I
believe Danny were saying that, you know, there are vegans that are violent
and those that are not. I would argue that that is more plant based
people who donate animals for health reasons and whatnot. Because vegans, the whole,
the whole philosophy behind veganism is causing the least amount of harm possible.
So whatever the answer ends up being, if everyone tomorrow stopped eating animals,
you're saying, what would we do with all these animals? You know,
are they going to be killed? I said, I said, that was
one. That was one argument you could use, but that's not the argument
I was using. I was giving you a specific example of a creature in
the world, and I've noticed how you've actually avoided answering this to go onto
something else, because my specific question, well, if we had a creature
in the wild and one that was on a on a humane farm up until
the point of death, which one suffers less? Was this specific question I
asked you, And I notice how you've strategically avoided answering that question to give
a different scenario. Well, let me answer your question. I think up
until the point that they're killed, obviously, the one kept in captivity would
have a potentially maybe a better life. However, why potentially maybe, and
why only up until the point of death? Well let me answer, Let
me please, you know, let me answer out. So for example,
if I ever capture like a spider, I caught one the other day that
was in the airports for sure going to die. So I was like,
Okay, I'm going to capture this and then I'm gonna take it home and
release it. So when I got home, I was at the woods,
I was like, I could keep this spider, and it would probably live
a longer, safer life. Rather it might get eaten in five minutes after
I release it. But then I put myself in the shoes of the spider,
and I want to be free. I wanted to I'd say, let
the spider take its chances that you know, like whether it gets eating or
not. Maybe that's more nature versus if it's just kept as a slav or
kept you know, and a plastic bottle for the rest of his life.
That's why absolutely imagined and absolutely as absolutely nothing to do with the specific question
I asked you, which would suffer less? Because the argument you gave initially
was one off suffering. So I'm asking you a question about suffering, well,
which would suffer less? So let me get the answer out and I'm
trying to, but you keep changing the trying to change the question. I'm
asking you to relate to something else. If we're talking about suffering, which
is what you were talking about, which one stuff is less? I think
that me personally, I don't know if I have that answer. But whoever
decides that if they came in it with the philosophy of you know what I
think, sir, I think I think it's difficult for you to answer because
it demonstrates that the argument is giving is a flawed argument. And at the
start of this you were talking about how our meat eaters akin to religious people
with some of the arguments to give, and I know it's this is exactly
you're doing. You're doing the theist thing yourself. You're not answering a specific
question given to you because it appears to be difficult for the thing that you
want to try and demonstrate. I'm not sure, Richard, I think he
said he wasn't sure of the answer here. I want to make sure that
Brandon gets his point across here too. Brandon, go ahead, Yeah,
so thank you. I fact uninterrupted for just I don't know a minute or
so please. I think that the first point I would make is there's nothing
we get from an animal that we don't get from a plant. Nutrition wise,
it's just filtered through the animal. All the protein, all the nutrition
comes from plants. So knowing that there's really no reason to eat animals,
So maybe you might say taste pleasure. But if I could convince you with
some delicious vegan food that you could get all the taste pleasure you want from
plants and the whole thing is completely unnecessary, then I think we would both
be in the same place of why would we do this? We don't need
it for taste or for a nutrition. So, having said that, the
whole philosophy behind veganism is just showing love, treating everyone as an equal,
whether you're an ant or a human or whatever. So to your specific question,
well, I probably don't have the answer to that, But whoever comes
up with the answer, I think if they approached it from the position of
the most loving answer possible, that you know, as we replaced the word
pig was human, I think it's very easy to see where I'm coming from
if I said, if it was a human, would you want to be
farmed and killed? No matter what life you've got, at some point you
say I don't want to be killed, I'd better take my chance. And
I've already answered this question. And did you catch last week's show or Brandon
when we when we kind of had the Vega conversation on that, Well,
I haven't, and I'm sure you probably have answered it. I was just
thinking, as I said earlier, that I run the official vegans and channel,
and I said all my followers to you guys a channel, so I
just wanted to hear them say what I say to you guys. I want
you guys say back. I think would be interesting for my audience. And
I'll definitely check up on that previous video after this phone call. Yeah,
I think we should, because just just quickly before you go, I think
I touched on the point on that last channel when you said, you know,
you want to cause you know, as little harm as possible to things,
you know, I touch. And this is one of the this is
one of the major things which stops me thinking that veganism is a model imperative.
I have no problem with people being vegan. I'm not one of those
people. I'm not one of those people who say you shouldn't be vegan.
I'm not I'm not like, I have no problem whatsoever with people who are
vegan. I think this issue it's almost more. I feel like this is
more important than the almost as somebody a believer or an atheist, because that's
kind of like all in your mind. But this is these are the actions
that come as a result of what somebody believes, and it's literally a matter
of life and depth. If somebody believes that the Bible told them it's okay
to have a little animal holocaust, then that's what they're going to do.
So I think that their actions are more important than their beliefs. Since so
I you know, I know you're already talking. I think Brandon, action
beliefs in form actions, and you know, you know this is why I
advocate for you know, I don't believe that we should unduly go out causing
harm to things for no reason. This is why I think vegans and non
vegans should work together to get I think I think the bigger question is not
whether someone is vegan or non vegan. But I think the bigger question is
why the folk do we allow current farming methods the way they are? And
I think we'd have far more impacts if we work together. I think we'd
have far more impact if we worked together as vegans and non vegans to try
and change that. Then if we if we spend time on doing about whether
they should be vegan or not. I think the moment you say that one
life is more valuable than another in any context, that leads to factory farming.
So the first don't do this whole system Brandon Brandon. Brandon, do
you have children, sir, I don't. I do, and I can
tell you absolutely that I view one life more important than another, because if
anybody attempted to harm my children, that person would be in a far worse
condition because of my actions than an advocation. I see that, I see,
and I believe you'll do too. I think if I think, if
you are family, I have. I have a dog who lives in our
house and it is safe everybody, and all last week we're talking about dog
meet. He is safe. I value that dog's life more than I value
someone else's dog's life because he's part of my close circle. And I think
we all have that, whether we're vegan or well. Hang out. We'll
wait a minute. We do need to end this because we're fifteen minutes in.
But I want to ask one question for you, Richard. You said
that you would eat dog meat, but you also said that you wouldn't let
anybody harm your dog. So is there any inconsistency there? What have we
found a dog on the street? Why does the dog on the street.
Why is it okay for me to eat that dog but not the dog that
I don't think in the society in which we live, it's okay to do
that. Said. You said you would eat dog meat though, Yeah,
if we had, if we had a society where we eat that, we
eat dogs, and we you know they were they were formed to a standard
where they were you know, because in society is where they do eat.
Dogs are not particularly cared for. In principle, I have no problem with
the in dog meat. This was saying it only matters if it's right or
wrong to eat a dog if society says it's okay. I'm saying that.
I was going to say, I'm saying it matters to eat it because we
don't. We can't just simply go against the laws of our land for what
we consider is acceptable to do. Yeah, we can. We do it
all the time. You know what I would? I would? I would
if it was a lot of the land for me to report Jewish people to
the Nazi government, I wouldn't do it. What do you mean, Richard?
The law of the land doesn't determine what's right or wrong. Come on,
now, than what if? What if? What if it was state
mandated Christianity we have to go to church every sudday. If we don't do
it, but we could still fight against it without having to right, kind
of at the point peel to it straight away. But right, But the
point is social norms, right, don't determine necessarily what's right or wrong.
Right, just because it's the law of the land. No, I agree,
Yeah, I agree, but I don't on the issue of but that's
not what we're talking about. The issue of eating meat. And the kind
of conversation last week was about colnism. And you know, the reason that
came up was because the kind of definition of colnism is that they would treat
some creatures differently to others depending on the status. And the reason I said
that was because I don't actually, in principle, I have no problem with
the things that we would classify as pects would not not unless because of with
I've already answered this question. I don't know why we have to go back
there, because humans I can relate to on a different level. They are
parts of my own species. Yeah, I think this is an ongoing conversation.
We're over fifteen minutes on this call. We have to let it go.
Brandon. I appreciate your calling in absolutely, Thank you so much,
No problem, Brandon, thank you for having me on. Yeah, absolutely,
have a good one. Uh. This is an ongoing topic here,
Richard. You know, we're whittling you away. We're slowly converting you to
the high Church of Veganism. Uh. And that is the agenda, it's
written out. Yeah, I don't care. I'm not really tied into the
vegan community. Actually, it's very funny. I didn't realize that there are
other channels sending people to the show. That's really funny. Yeah. I
just want to say before we move on to further announcements and things, that
I'm going to repeat what I said at the l end of last week's show.
There were lots of people complain about the vegan calls coming in, or
even the philosophy calls that come in. If you don't want to hear them,
get you religious friends to phone in, because we're going to field those
calls if the come in. If you want to hear questions about God and
questions about religion, get the people you know who are religious and all believe
us to believe is in God to call in. You know, don't just
sit there complaining that we take vegan calls, because it's not going to stop
us taking vegan calls. Even though I'm on the other side of it,
I know it's not going to stop the other thing too. It's entertaining for
me one because the very unique position I sit in, but also because it's
different from the other kind of stuff we're usually talking about on here, and
I like I like seeing it. I like it even if it's messy,
it's pretty funny for me. I'm not gonna lie it is. It is
for my personal satisfaction a little bit, and I will take advantage of that
while I'm posts anyway, Richard, Thanks, thanks, thanks for being a
good sport. And moving on, Let's get some a couple announcements out of
the way and we might have some theist calls here in just a second,
real quick though. The ACA does want you to know what is happening in
the community, and for that there is an updated website. It's www dot
Atheist hyphen Community dot org. We're you can learn about the organization itself,
it's policies, and what you can do to get involved. And we also
want to hear from you. We want to know what you liked, what
your thought was effective, and more importantly, what you thought we could do
better. Specifically what Richard can do better now that he's host, not host,
start producer of Talk Keathan. So go complain to Richard now and you
can do that if you email TV at Atheist typhon community dot org and let
us know or let me know how much I suck as a host, or
if I'm good, whatever you want to tell us there, that's the email
address to do it. And we're past the hour here, so we need
to get to some of those top five patron announcements. So Richard, if
you want to get that list set up, But while you're getting that up,
I'm gonna say if you happen to be in the Austin area. Next
week, on the twenty seventh, the bat Cruise weekend, we are also
doing a live broadcast of Talk Keithan and The Atheist Experience. It's going to
be a three host show for Talk Keithan and a three host show for the
Experience. We got Forest val Kai, J Mike, and Jamie Forbes next
week, A k A. Blind Limy and also Johnny p Angel, Forrest
Valkaye and J Mike on Eighthies Experience. It is a free event, of
course, doors open at noon, so check it out. You got that
list of top five patrons rich Absolutely. Number one is Dinglebridge Jackson. Number
two is Beyond Lashi, who is incidentally a new patron, so it's great
to see you. Two new page jump to five Absolutely, number three is
one of my favorite oops all Singularity, Number four Devaux Valjean, and number
five the old favorite call Helvette. And then honorable mention this week to JP
Young. So thank you all for your patronage. We really really do appreciate
it. And while we're on the subject souper chats, you can send super
chats. We do have a super chat from Tinkles Twinkle to us for ten
pounds, which suggests to me that they are in my neck of the woods.
And they ask, I'm reading this out because they ask done what we
all believes? And what is your story on how you became an atheist?
Thanks? Yeah, I feel like I've told this story a million times,
so I will give you a truncated version and tell you where you can find
out more. But in short, I was most often known for having a
conversation of myself as a Christian with Anthony mcdabosco in the street Epistemology community,
and so that was kind of a thing for while. There's a thirty minute
conversation of me as a Christian if you want to see that, it's it's
on YouTube. But you know, that wasn't the reason why I became an
atheist. It was I call it a stepping started in my path. I
mean, I grew up as a Christian and I and I talked about this
more in the sequel video to that, which is also on Anthony's channel,
but basically, the short version is I grew up as a Christian, was
very much involved in the Christian community, and eventually, when I found that
I couldn't actually demonstrate how my beliefs could be true, or at least I
couldn't demonstrate them to be true more so than really any other it just claims,
I realized it wasn't right for me to hold on to them because I've
just wanted to believe things that were true. So I eventually discarded those beliefs
and got more involved in the atheist community. And hey, eventually I showed
up here one day, so that's pretty cool. But yeah, it's a
story. You can check out again on Anthony mcnabosco's channel. There's a first
video there, and there's a second video there where I go in depth more
about my story. And I've been interviewed on a couple of different channels as
well. Sidney Davis Jr. Junior, who was on the show recently,
also interviewed me on her podcast, So check that out as well if you
want a more recent coverage. I guess from like a few weeks ago,
a few months ago, I think is when I did that, So yeah,
check that out. Also, we just got another super chat here,
so I'll go ahead and read. It's from Robin Webster, who gave five
dollars, who says, what would a vegan diet mean in regards to our
development of bigger brains by eating and cooking meat? Good job with callers,
and it's a great point. So it's been often speculated by the anthropologists that
one of the reasons why we have bigger brains is because of our ability to
eat cooked foods. Now, this isn't a definitive answer as to why we
have larger brains. It is one of many competing theories. However, it
has a lot of traction. Truth is, we don't know for sure.
The thing is, if you know, if we can synthesize proteins in the
same level that we can get from like cooked meat and cooked products. I
really don't see this being like a huge problem. And also we're talking about
in evolutionary terms, which matter for like, you know, millions of years,
uh sometimes, So it really just kind of depends to me. This
is like a very sci fi hypothetical space rustion, which maybe that's that's what
you're getting at, Robin. I don't know, but it's not a big
concern for me. If that's what you're interested in. I mean, it
could have an effect, but really, how can we really know. I
mean, we don't even know what our current diets due to us we have
a very limited understanding of nutritional science as it is. I don't know if
we can make far flung predictions like that in the future. Maybe some people
think we can, but I'm not aware of a science that robust that can
that can do that. I don't know if you had any thoughts on Richard,
but yeah, that's my take. You're muted right now, Richard.
Just f yi. Yeah, thanks Dan, Yeah, I tind to I
actually agree with Dan on that. I think, you know, if that's
the case that you know, our bigger brain development came from me in me.
That has no, no, nothing at all to do with whether we
choose to be vegan now or not. You know that we've already got those
bigger brains. What what would it have an effects going forward? We don't
know. You know, we'd have to do the we'd have to do the
research. Don't think it's neither of us are capable of doing. But let's
let's try to get at least one more caller. We'll see if we can
take any more. For today, we're talking to Herbert, who is calling
in from Arkansas, Herbert who says, we are being deceived by the devil.
Herbert, you're a live on talk ethen, what's up all right?
Yeah, we definitely are being deceived by the devil, and of course all
religions will tell you about that. But the deception is very simple, and
it's right in our faces, and no one seems to see it. The
big lie is about the nature of our reality and the nature of our realm
and our planet in the Solar System, and of who created what. And
basically that's that's being perpetuated by NASA and by all of the space programs that
are absolutely lying to us. How well, I'll there now. I take
it you have definitive evidence that this is the case. Then I don't know,
I guess how you define definitive evidence. Well, do you think I'm
quite sure about it? So, yeah, what's your reason you're saying that
this is absolutely the case? I'm sure you've got something that is it?
Is it just a hunch you've got? They have documents demonstrating that NA NASA
are lying to us. What kind of what level of evidence is it that
persuades you that this is true? Well, we all live on a creator
in a creator on the moon. Okay. That has absolutely nothing to do
with the question I've just asked you, sir. I feel like I've been
avoid people who avoiding my questions tonight and then strollly frustrating. What level of
evidence, sir, do you have that NASA are lying to us? Is
it a hunch you have got? Do you have do you have some undisclosed
some documents that have been disclosed to yourself by NASA personnel? Have you seen
documents? Have you spoken to people from NASA who've told you that this is
the case. No, I have a logical mind that they can see the
truth. So I have Wait, I have a largical mining the truth too,
and I think NASA's being totally honest. So now what well we have?
I mean, first of all, you're asking me for proof of something
that I haven't even really explained. What's going on here? Different evidence of
the king that you made, which was that NASA was lying to us.
I want to deal with that specific. You see the moon, Yes,
you see the moon. What has that got to do with NASA lying to
us? Wait? Wait, wait, let them cook, let them cook,
Richard, Yeah, I can see the moon. What's up? Have
you ever looked at the moon through a telescope or footage of a moon through
the telescope? Yeah, I've done both. Yeah, and you notice how
everything looks wavy and all the stars look wavy. Everything looks like it's watery.
No, because it's only reflections. It's reflections off of them. I
think it looks watery. And but don't said no, don't said to naughty
Ansa. And then you said, well that's because well, when I don't
agree with you, when I go outside and I look at the moon,
and I turned into a werewolf, they're in the full moon. I don't
see any water on the mirror. I don't see. I don't think it's
watery. It doesn't look watery to me. See, you're not even listening.
I am listening. You said it looks watery. I say, I
don't think it looks watery. You say it's wavy election off of water.
Yeah, wavy, it doesn't. Why do you say that you've never seen
close up some stars how they look like water flowing? No, I don't
think they do. I mean I don't think they look like water. I
think they look like gases. You know, yeah, they are gases.
Okay, gases aren't water. I mean they're not like liquid water anyway.
I mean they could be water in liquid and gas form. But well,
why don't you guys let me tell you what I'm trying to say before you
start asking me for proof of what I'm trying to say, because I actually
don't agree. We don't just let people come on here and just talk and
talk and talk and talk. This is about having conversations about beliefs and white
people belief it's not it's not simply about someone coming out with multiple things.
You made a claim, you made a claim about NASA lying, I still
want to it seems like your establishment of that it's simple, It's simply,
sir, is simply that it feels that way to you. Now, I
would because if you demonstrated absolutely that NASA was lying, then I would be
very interested in what NASA was lying about. See this. I once did
a comparison between people who believe in conspiracy theories about NASA's kind of similar to
you, that have no evidence behind them, and actual conspiracies within NASA that
have been demonstrated, and one of them was when the Challenger. Then an
actual, an actual conspiracy that happened with NASA was when the Challenger spacecraft exploded
and there was an investigation into it, and it turned out that NASA knew
about the fault that was present in the OWE rings during that launch, that
they weren't stable a certain when it got to a certain low temperature. They
knew about this, and it was kind of swept under the carpet during the
investigation. That is a genuine conspiracy. We have evidence of it, we
have paper trail of it, we have a witness testimony about it, and
it was demonstrated to be the case That is how you demonstrate that a conspiracy
is taking place. Just simply saying where it kind of doesn't really feel right
to me is not evidence that conspiracy is taking place. You're just making the
statement that a conspiracy is taking place. Now, if you could demonstrate that
a conspiracy was actually taking place, I myself and I'm absolutely sure that Dan
would also be very, very very interested in what that conspiracy was. But
at first we need to know that a conspiracy is actually taking place, because
otherwise it's just a statement. You have no idea what I'm trying to tell
you, because you're asking for proof before I even can explain what I'm trying
to say. You said the moon isn't real. You said it's a reflection.
No, I did not. I did not say the moon is not
real. Okay. The way is the moon the giant planet, the reflection
of the giant planet that all other planet starts exist on, and we are
seeing reflections off of our atmosphere and off of other atmospheres that are outside of
it. There's several plasma layers scientifically proven that go around our Solar system,
the Sun, the planets. We're seeing luminaries that are just reflections of reflection
of the disagree with activity. He's right. Wait no, Richard, he's
right. No, he's right, he's right. I'm an agreeance. I
think it's all okay, okay, Herbert, why do you think that's infections?
The deception, the deception by of the devil, is that we are
made to believe that we are floating out in some space all crazy like and
you know, millions of miles an hour, whatever however you want to call
it. But who is the devil? And why I would what would be
his advantage in deceiving is over such a thing. There's a giant planet out
there, full of resources, and who is the places? Wait? Wait,
wait, hold on, wait, I want to we gotta we gotta
go deeper, Richard. I gotta know this. So there's a plant that
is the hope of truth wants a call in case you don't know he talks
about this stuff. This is my bread and butter, all right, I
gotta know. So there's a planet and it's reflection is what we see on
the moon. That right, Our image of the moon is a reflection,
no image of your cosmic reflection of the entire planet, and on that planet
everything all the other planets and stars exist, satellites and all that crap.
So the moon, the moon is a reflection. It doesn't it's not there
in in a material flight. It's a reflection. Okay, So what's reflecting
it? It's underneath this, we're on top of it, we're standing on
it, we live on the moon. It is a reflection of the planet
that we are on. Oh okay, okay, okay. So the moon
is a reflection of our planet. But our planet is eleven hundred times bigger
than what we're told Earth is sea, Richard. This is some deep info
that you just gotta we gotta, I gotta learn from this. Okay.
Wait, so so we're on a planet and it's big, really big,
and the moon is a reflection of that. So like, what is the
Is the moon just like a giant mirror in the sky? How does that
work? You know? The plasma of the the our atmosphere, which is
made of gases which are compressed into liquid, is reflective, just like water,
and so some of the light goes through and some end goes to the
next layers and reflects off of that too. It's like having two two way
mirrors or two you know, translucent, kind of halfway reflective, you know,
surfaces bouncing the same light back and forth to each other. Some light
goes through, some light comes back, and the stuff that goes through makes
it look like that there's a whole bunch of these things out there. But
what we're actually seeing is Earth has its atmosphere. We're seeing other realms,
other places on the Moon that have their atmospheres too. And we see that
shining and we think that's a star, but that's actually just another realm,
another planet, plant, you know, plant, you know, like a
get it the word, you know, it's a small part of the plane.
Okay, okay, so wait, but the moon in the sky at
least, right, same thing with the stars. Stars aren't in the same
location every time, but because oscillating, but they but they do stay in
the same position relatively, you know, you know, because of We know
that, because of astronomy, astrology, all that stuff. It doesn't change.
It's because it's right. Yeah, no, I hear you. I'm
listening. Okay, now see see now we have a fuller picture of your
worldview here, Herbert. I appreciate you sharing that with us. Let's get
to the nitty gritty here. Okay, Richard wants to know a couple of
things. He wants to know about the devil. He wants to know about
the deception. So we start with that, Richard, or you want to
go a different one. What are you thinking? Yeah? Who is the
devil? I'm still well, I'm still interested in what this evidence is.
Yeah, the God of the Bible, of the Bible, because God of
the Bible is deceiving us through NASA and presumably other space faring agency everywhere,
Yes, yes, all of them. What should why should we care what
the Bible says? Just like anything else that has some truth in it.
Well, there are certain things that have some truth in it that aren't all
true, right, definitely not all true. It's it's absolutely misleading. So
why should we have about what he has to say? Yeah? How do
we know this part is a true part? What if it's a fake part?
What part are you talking about? Just any part of the Bible?
Right? How do we know the true parts from the Bible from the not
true parts of the Bible? I wouldn't know. Well, you do think
some of it's true, right, so you you must have a method.
Well, I mean some of the historical accounts are true. I think they're
just misinterpreted, you know, just like mythology is true, okay, and
it's being incredible and not real. There's some historical accounts of the Bible tell
you, yeah, there could be some exaggeration and stuff right in like mythology.
Right, yeah, I'm following you there. How do we decide which
is the right interpretation? Right? In other words, what if what you're
saying right now the entire cosmology, Like you're not using the Bible for answer.
I don't know. I'm not looking through the Bible for answers. No,
I'm looking around at the world. But what do you mean looking around
at the world? Because when I look around at the world, I do
not see that the that we that the moon is a reflection of our planet
alongside all the other stars. Like I'm looking around the world and I don't
see that. So how are you seeing that? What method are you using
to come to that conclusion? Because it makes everything else makes sense. To
be honest, it makes things make less sense. I don't think it makes
more sense, Like like like you're telling me that everybody within every single space
sparing every single aerospace engineering firm, every single one, the ones that don't
even go to space, the ones that just work around control as they do
not know. Everybody does not know. Everybody does not know. The elites.
Elon Musk knows, Jeff Bezos knows. They are shipping products out through
the people and other entities outside of our crater. Those giants satellites that we
see during the daytime, those are just man made realm that are just outside
of our crater. Perfect you you're saying Amazon's Wait, Amazon's doing space deliveries.
That's crazy. Wait they can't. They're late on my overnight. You're
telling me they can go, they can go to space. That's crazy,
dude, that's wild. Have canisters that well, why else would they have
fuel cells that don't get returned because they're just cargo and those space ships are
just full of helium. There's no way. If if we could, if
we if if if the cosmology, if the stars were like they said they
were in the moon was that far away, we'd never be able to get
there. Ever, what are they delivering? What do they got like?
What what do people there's this? I mean, there's people out there.
I don't know. Those phone tables what is it? Yeah, why do
you? Yeah, exactly, why do Why does Elon Musk think that he
can make a phone that works on Mars? Because Mars isn't that far away
and I've seen no. I just think Elk thinks very highly of himself.
I think that's why he thinks that. I think he thinks he could do
it. I don't know if that's because Mars is that far away he can
do it because Mars is a giant volcano, and there's a Soviet scientist that
even said that that Mars is the is the biggest volcano on the planet.
Her. Are you trolling? You're trolling, dude? Are you trolling her?
Knowing at all? I'm not trolling at all, not one bit.
If we live on the moon, if we live on the moon, why
don't we all? Why don't will wear silver costumes? Is predicted by the
moment. Religion. I think that's a very important question that needs answer.
And if we're going to talk about people living on them, yeah yeah,
yeah, yeah yeah. The Mormons, yeah yeah yeah, yeah. Man,
the Mormons, uh yeah, they're the weird ones Worman's really I don't
know about it. I don't really know exactly what they believe. Okay,
So so I have to do with costumes. That's just weird. So you
guys are deflecting. Where do we go from here? Like, how do
we know that any of this is true? Like, can you give us
one thing that we can look at that tells us. Oh yeah, Okay,
this makes sense because I'm hearing a speculation. Right, It's easy to
speculate. I can come up with my own cosmology. I can say the
moon is literally made of cheese, and the fact that people say it's made
of cheese as a joke is the government trying to dissuade us from the idea
that the moon is actually made of cheese. Right? I could say that,
what's going to make that true? Right? We have that. You
could say anything, but it doesn't make any logical sense. I'll be honest,
Herbert. I don't think what you're saying makes logical sense. I think
where we go from there, Herbert, to kind of get what you're saying
to make logical sense. I mean, even if we just apply the principles
of Welcom's rich ra is the kind of idea with the least amount of assumptions
is more likely to be correct. There were so many assumptions and what you're
saying because that you could build the largest mountain in the universe out of that.
I'm not assuming there's plasma bubbles surrounding the planets in the Solar System,
that's scientific fact. I'm assuming that they would be compressed gases which are reflective,
similar to how water is. But that's a logical assumption that makes sense.
Why is that logical assumption that makes sense? Water can be dash can
to be compressed into liquid, and liquid that are that are not dark are
usually reflective or even if they are dark, Yeah, partially, but also
like planets could be a thing. See what I mean. We have different
ideas, right, So you hear the word plane at a small part of
the plane. Yeah, that's not what that the animology of that I think.
But but but but here's here's my greater point, right, Herbert,
we have different ideas. We can rank these ideas on what's more likely to
be true versus what's less likely to be true. Right. We can take
a list of a million ideas of what the universe is, and by and
large, there's going to be some that are just there's just no reason for
us to think it could be true. But we don't really have any other
reason. Besides, it could be to think it because some that are going
to be more likely to be true than others because of evidence, right,
because of the things we can observe. They tell you, They tell you
right in your face all day long. Why do you think, uh elon
muff internet company is called star Link because he is linking the stars that are
outside of our planet, that are on the same planet, outside of our
craters. How or it could just be he's a he's a sci fi nerd
and he thinks it sounds cool. You see what I mean. We have
different ideas about what one could be true. Yeah, we can. You
can play it all off like that, but when you really start to look
at it as how it makes sense. Why would he send his tesla out
there if he actually couldn't drive the stupid thing out there? Wait? Wait,
we can't. Nobody can drive cars out into space. Makes differ.
I've seen fast and furious. I disagree with you, don completely. Well,
that is also a lie perpetuated by the government to make you think otherwise.
We look like I think he put a rocket out in the space with
a Tesla car on it because he wanted to show off. That's why.
No, right, he needs his car out there. He needs a car
out there so it cruise around. You think he literally needs a car,
Herbert, you're strolling. I am. I do not believe for a second
you're being serious, Herbert. I am on dud. I have taken the
executive decision to drop Herbert because I think about last Remolte. It's ridiculous.
Come on, all right, even if oh, that's first of all very
unique cosmology, I'll give you points for creativity. Uh but look, I
could say a million ideas and none of them can be true because there's no
reason for us to believe it. I have yet to see a single thing
that you said today where I should think it's true if you're being genuine,
which I'm suspicious of. But if there is a good chance you're being genuine,
I really want you to think, like, Okay, how would you
convince a guy like me? Right? What's the best strategy to convince a
guy like me? Is it does keep saying stuff because it makes sense to
you? Or do you want to make appeals to my world view, my
understanding of science, my understanding of history, my understanding of politics, in
order to make something to be true. Because your worldview is so different from
mine, I have no idea how I could connect there. I have no
idea how I could incorporate any of your ideas into what I already believe.
So good luck to you question. You have to demonstrate things, and this
is you often see this in conspiracy and Dan, you know a lot about
conspiracy theories. Being the producer and the host I people want to do deal
with it a little bit more than we do over here. But you know,
the thing about conspiracy theories is you start with something like and that's a
popular one, NASA is lying to us, And rather than demonstrating that that's
the case, because there is no reason in claims like that one that we've
just heard, there is no way to demonstrate that's the case because it's not
the case. So instead of simply demonstrating it is the case, which is
what we should be doing if we're trying to convince someone it's a case,
we have to start layering up and layering up, and what we get is
a runaway train effect of more elaborate story always to try and justify the one
before it, and that's how these kind of deep conspiracy theories start. And
it's why that's so difficult to kind of the people who were kind of call
up in them. It's why it's so difficult to get them out of them,
because it's not just a case of saying, well, look at this
one thing. There were les built upon les upon les, each trying to
justify the one before it. Yep, I agree with that. And folks,
we are getting to the end of the show. But if you like
what you see and you want to keep watching, Richard and I are going
to go on the after show for the Atheists metivaunst to discord. You should
go to that tie dot cc slash a CD discords, a fan run discord
server, and both of us are going to be hanging out today. You
get it to first, so check that out, and of course check out
the Nonprofits which is going to be streaming right after this show is completed.
Let me see if there's anything else I need to say here. Of course
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Richard not to talk shit, but kind of a diva. I mean
he's like, he's like lighting has to be perfect. He's like, I
need the ACA to order one hundred cans of mountain dew just so I can
get through a show. I mean, ever since he became producer, he
just thinks I will not eat blue smarts. You can take you won't smarties.
That's the whole thing. Any any crewcamp, crewcamp today, for the
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the viewers, because you are the ones who make the show happen.
We couldn't have a show without you. Let's get some love ring out there
for that, if we can activating love ring lasers. See, this is
actually how you know that we aren't real? Did you know that we're a
reflection? Because look at these love rings? They come out in a circle
right, kind of like if you threw a stone in a lake. So
maybe we're actually the reflection Richard? Do you ever think of that? I'm
convinced that's it. We have got more. I got more of where that
comes from. But we're out of time. We got to end the show
today. Whether or not you believe, if you're an essential worker, we
want to thank you. If you don't believe, this is your community.
If you do believe, we don't hate you. We all just melts convinced.
Thanks a lot, everybody. We'll see you next time, see you,
next time. We want the truth. So watch True one at five
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