Speaker 1: Hello, and on this first day of Pride Month, welcome
Speaker 1: to Talk ethen, the show where we value good ideas
Speaker 1: over old traditions in ancient poetry, and where beliefs are
Speaker 1: expected to have a good reason. I'm Christy Powell, and
Speaker 1: today I am desperately looking for any reasonably good reason
Speaker 1: to explain a bill on its way to Governor Abbott's desk.
Speaker 1: Senate Bill ten, recently passed by the Texas Senate, would
Speaker 1: require the Ten Commandments to be displayed prominently in every
Speaker 1: public school classroom across the state. Not suggested required, not
Speaker 1: a well rounded history of the people of the state,
Speaker 1: not a collection of quotes from influential lawmakers and founders,
Speaker 1: but a list of rules about how to protect God's
Speaker 1: feelings and how to feel about your neighbor's possessions, including
Speaker 1: his wife. Let's not get ourselves. This is not about history.
Speaker 1: It's about control. It's about whose worldview gets to be
Speaker 1: centered and whose gets pushed aside. Because when the government
Speaker 1: mandates one religious text in a public classroom, it's not
Speaker 1: just promoting values, it's promoting a religion. And when that happens,
Speaker 1: our Muslim neighbors, our Jewish students, our secular families, and
Speaker 1: of course everyone who believes in real religious freedom are
Speaker 1: left standing outside the circle. So let me say it plainly.
Speaker 1: The government doesn't get to pick your god or any
Speaker 1: god for you. That's not freedom, that's coercion in a
Speaker 1: gold leaf, red letter edition. So today, I'd love to
Speaker 1: hear from you, especially if you grew up in a
Speaker 1: school where religion crept into the classroom. How did it
Speaker 1: shape you? How did it silence you? And what does
Speaker 1: it mean for a child to be told by the
Speaker 1: state which believes are worthy of a poster on the wall.
Speaker 1: This conversation matters because neutrality isn't oppression, and inclusion doesn't
Speaker 1: mean erasure. It means every student, every family has the
Speaker 1: right to belong without an altar in their classroom. You're
Speaker 1: watching Talk Heathen. Let's think critically, let's talk honestly, and
Speaker 1: let's get into it because the show it's coming right now. Okay,
Speaker 1: welcome everyone. Today is June one, twenty twenty five. I
Speaker 1: am your host, Christy Powell, and with me today is
Speaker 1: my friend objectively Dan excited to be doing this with you.
Speaker 2: Yes, that's right. You need a straight cis white guy
Speaker 2: token straight Cis White Guy as your co host for
Speaker 2: this first day of Pride of course, just.
Speaker 1: Jumping into Pride. I mean, we've got big topics. You
Speaker 1: and I grew up in this area. You and I
Speaker 1: grew up around these, you know, kind of evangelical incursions
Speaker 1: into the public school system.
Speaker 2: I think there's a lot for us to talk about. Yes,
Speaker 2: it's true. We were talking a little bit before the
Speaker 2: show because I did go to public school, but I
Speaker 2: went to public school in Waco, Texas. So I think
Speaker 2: my credibility is still there, you.
Speaker 1: Know, like this, Yeah, the secularness of.
Speaker 2: That, you know this, Yes, this was a little bit off,
Speaker 2: a little bit, and somehow I survived. David Oliveria has
Speaker 2: a great joke about Waco. He used to run a
Speaker 2: church there. He said that in Waco there's more Christians
Speaker 2: than people, which is a really good, a really good joke.
Speaker 2: So yeah, yeah, I definitely seen some violations in my time,
Speaker 2: as you might have as well. Although you went to
Speaker 2: a Christian school, so yeah, I did.
Speaker 1: I did, And so that definitely shapes some of my
Speaker 1: thinking on all of this because for me, it was
Speaker 1: very normalized. It was even pushed and pressured, but not
Speaker 1: to the benefit of anybody I went to school with.
Speaker 1: If you saw the like college acceptance rate of my
Speaker 1: college preparatory religious schooling, you'd see that there are a
Speaker 1: lot of lies being told and a lot of messy
Speaker 1: ideas being preached from the classroom. And I don't think
Speaker 1: anybody should have to go through that if they didn't
Speaker 1: choose it, And I definitely don't want our tax dollars
Speaker 1: paying for it and for the government to be pushing
Speaker 1: it in the ways that it is. So it's it's
Speaker 1: getting messy, and I think we have a lot to
Speaker 1: get into.
Speaker 2: Yeah, definitely, definitely, especially when it comes to stuff like evolution.
Speaker 2: Like again, I went to a good public school that
Speaker 2: actually taught evolution. That was not the norm for most
Speaker 2: of my friends that went to like other schools. And
Speaker 2: even if they taught it like they still definitely was
Speaker 2: a hint of like, oh, this is actually not real,
Speaker 2: you know, just based on what I've heard from other people. Right,
Speaker 2: I mean that's just one example. There's a lot of
Speaker 2: these kinds of issues. Nowadays, they're like, oh, we got
Speaker 2: to put the Ten Commandments in schools. I mean they've
Speaker 2: been doing that for a while, but now it's like,
Speaker 2: I don't know, it feels like it's happening again, these
Speaker 2: sorts of waves of legislation to just do anything but
Speaker 2: actually fixed the material conditions that schools.
Speaker 1: Right. Yeah, and you know, this is at a moment
Speaker 1: where teachers have been begging for raises for a long time.
Speaker 1: We've had a number of like walkouts and protests and
Speaker 1: mess I mean, it is a messy situation and this
Speaker 1: does not feel like the right solution. Yeah, we're definitely
Speaker 1: going to spend some time on these ideas. We definitely
Speaker 1: want to hear from our audience. Of course, talk Heathen.
Speaker 1: We are open to all of your questions about religion,
Speaker 1: secular humanism, atheistic morality, cosmology, philosophy, science, history, life, the universe,
Speaker 1: and everything. Uh. That said, Dan, is there anybody in
Speaker 1: particular you're hoping to talk to today?
Speaker 3: Oh?
Speaker 2: Man, you're asking me, you know, I'm always I'm always
Speaker 2: picking his calls. I feel like you should have the
Speaker 2: first go at it. There's a lot of different ones.
Speaker 2: I see, Jesse looks interesting to me. I think they're
Speaker 2: still in the screening room though. So yeah, so we've.
Speaker 1: Got we've got some good calls on the line. We've
Speaker 1: got a few lines open, and before we jump into
Speaker 1: all of that, I just want to remind people that
Speaker 1: Talk Heathen is a production of the Atheist Community of Austin,
Speaker 1: a five oh one C three nonprofit organization dedicated to
Speaker 1: the promotion of atheism, critical thinking, secular humanism, and of course,
Speaker 1: the separation of religion and government. We are a live
Speaker 1: call in show with open lines, so get your calls
Speaker 1: in at five one two four two or from your
Speaker 1: computer at tiny dot c c slash call t H.
Speaker 1: While those calls are loading. While you guys are getting
Speaker 1: in here, let's go ahead and bring our friend Aaron
Speaker 1: in for the question of the week, our Talk Heathen
Speaker 1: to Me segment. Aaron, what you got for us this week?
Speaker 1: You are muted? My friend knew that.
Speaker 4: Was gonna happen to you warn me. There we go,
Speaker 4: all right, uh, all right, well, today it's time for
Speaker 4: our Talk Heathen to Me segment where we get to
Speaker 4: into our question of the week. And last week we
Speaker 4: asked everybody name an inappropriate time and or place to
Speaker 4: suggest a prayer circle, and here are our top three answers.
Speaker 4: Number three from Stephen Kahn. Inappropriate time to suggest a
Speaker 4: prayer circle? Right, before the climax of a bookcocky session.
Speaker 2: It's visceral. It's a little, honestly a little bit. Who's
Speaker 2: picking the who's picking the Yeah, got a wake you up?
Speaker 2: That'll wake you up? Okay.
Speaker 4: Number two from Daniel Aaron, Let's form a prayer circle
Speaker 4: around this tornado and ask God to stop the storm.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, don't do we apply these beliefs I hosted
Speaker 2: to talk to either the lights reminds you not to
Speaker 2: try or attempt.
Speaker 4: Yeah, that's gonna work about as well as rolling the
Speaker 4: dice and saying on a one the tornado will dissipate.
Speaker 2: That's just not not going to work.
Speaker 4: And number one from Colin Mattz in an appropriate moment
Speaker 4: for a prayer circle during a square dance.
Speaker 3: Some fun.
Speaker 1: Yeah wow, Yeah, so we're our answers are really all
Speaker 1: over the place today.
Speaker 2: Really all over the place. Yeah. We went from dad
Speaker 2: jokes to very sexually explicit humor in the course of
Speaker 2: about thirty seconds. And I don't know how I feel
Speaker 2: about that, but.
Speaker 1: It's the Christy Powell talk, you can guarantee. Yeah, it
Speaker 1: really is.
Speaker 2: It's June, right, It's June. It's a new month. I'm
Speaker 2: not trying to yuck somebody's yum. I'm just saying that,
Speaker 2: like you said, it's a little it's a little early,
Speaker 2: it's a little literally.
Speaker 3: All right.
Speaker 4: Well, the prompt for next week is what would Jesus'
Speaker 4: rap name be? Damn?
Speaker 1: What would you jan?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 1: I hope you have something for this.
Speaker 2: I feel so for some reason, what came to mind
Speaker 2: to me was MC A D you know, because it's
Speaker 2: like b C A D. Right, I don't know that
Speaker 2: that's the only thing I could think of it. It's
Speaker 2: not even.
Speaker 1: So not good and it's like better than mine, which
Speaker 1: was just MC JD JC.
Speaker 2: So you know, yeah, all right, we came.
Speaker 1: Up with the same bad joke.
Speaker 2: We gotta we gotta fix this in the future.
Speaker 1: Get the pretres in on it.
Speaker 2: You know what. That's okay because our convents will have
Speaker 2: better answers than we will.
Speaker 1: So yeah, please please rescue us on this question. Give
Speaker 1: us your best this week in the comments to this episode,
Speaker 1: and uh and we'll be future will be featuring you
Speaker 1: next week. All right, thanks guys, thank you Aron. Okay, well,
Speaker 1: with all of that pre m all of that fun,
Speaker 1: let's go ahead and jump on the lines and uh yeah,
Speaker 1: you said Jesse in Michigan. Seems like a great conversation
Speaker 1: to start off with, Jesse, what's.
Speaker 2: On your mind today? Hello, Hello, Patty, what can we
Speaker 2: do for you?
Speaker 5: I don't know. You know, my name is Jesse, and
Speaker 5: I understand, and I wanted to talk to you. I'm
Speaker 5: especially grateful to talk to you, uh, Christy, because I
Speaker 5: know you're a mental health professional, and well, my problem
Speaker 5: is dealing with mental health.
Speaker 3: And the atheist community.
Speaker 5: Sure, actually kind of funny, funny, but one of the
Speaker 5: reasons why I became an atheist was sort of called
Speaker 5: my education and the arts kind of help. But also
Speaker 5: I had mental health problems as a teenager, and I
Speaker 5: started receiving cognitive behavioral therapy, which are trying to be
Speaker 5: very helpful, and uh, you know, like it sort of
Speaker 5: helped deconstruct the way that I was thinking as I
Speaker 5: grew up as a Catholic and it, you know, being
Speaker 5: Catholic kind of insinuates that you're worthless and you start
Speaker 5: to believe that.
Speaker 2: Ever while, and yeah, I hear that.
Speaker 3: Directly contributed to my vesic.
Speaker 5: But the problem I'm really having now is that I
Speaker 5: identify as well. I would say that let me be clear,
Speaker 5: I am under the Latino umbrella as far as American
Speaker 5: political way of describing the census is concerned.
Speaker 3: But yeah, let the.
Speaker 5: Audience know that I reject that label because Latino favors Latina,
Speaker 5: favors the colonial powers of the Spanish, and also favors
Speaker 5: the Catholic Church.
Speaker 3: So I forget that, rejects that.
Speaker 5: So yeah, and as a person from Texas, the Texas
Speaker 5: that peppered with ancient sort of a well not really ancient,
Speaker 5: but old missions like the Alamo, which my ancestors were
Speaker 5: converted to either coerce or against their will or using
Speaker 5: force or other means.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I hear that, and I hope that that is
Speaker 1: history that we are still willing to teach in our
Speaker 1: public high schools, which is something I definitely worry about. Like,
Speaker 1: you know, San Antonio has a missions baseball team. We're
Speaker 1: definitely aware of their existence, but how do we talk
Speaker 1: about them? What is the story that we are telling people?
Speaker 1: And how are we educating people about the oppressive nature
Speaker 1: of those institutions. They're not just cool old buildings, they're
Speaker 1: they're places of incredible oppression.
Speaker 2: But yeah, with all of.
Speaker 1: That in mind, Jesse, tell me about your call for today,
Speaker 1: Tell me about your experiences of mental health and the
Speaker 1: atheism community, or what it is that you're struggling with here.
Speaker 5: I guess I'm trying to put it into words. So
Speaker 5: it's really helpful to speak, you know, because I don't
Speaker 5: really have any other resources to talk to other people.
Speaker 5: I mean, for example, like I said, I'm in the
Speaker 5: arts and I deal with people who are under the
Speaker 5: atheist umbrella all the time, but I don't know any
Speaker 5: other skeptic and I don't feel at home or safe
Speaker 5: within then my own arts community, because I might have
Speaker 5: someone I said, yeah, I'm idiots, but then they'll believe
Speaker 5: some like some nonset at all, alternative medicine, or I mean,
Speaker 5: in my personal encounters, I encounter a lot of people
Speaker 5: who don't understand what it's like to not be white
Speaker 5: in the arts, and it kind of has it. It
Speaker 5: has it hacks on my mental health and it starts
Speaker 5: to feel like I don't belong And yeah.
Speaker 2: I hear that.
Speaker 1: I mean, we're here promoting atheism, but we also like
Speaker 1: to bring to the table critical thinking, secular humanism, like
Speaker 1: some of these other notions. Atheism absent those things can
Speaker 1: create a vacuum where a lot of completely irrational wooy
Speaker 1: type beliefs can come in fill some space.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and it makes me feel.
Speaker 5: Like an apple because I talk to people like, you know,
Speaker 5: like in the arts or the hard world. I had
Speaker 5: an exhibition or something, and they'll say something that I
Speaker 5: really just vehemently disagree with that might fall in line
Speaker 5: with a certain RFK. You know, that's all well and good.
Speaker 5: But it's like they can say that stuff and be accepted,
Speaker 5: but I can't. The moment you say I don't believe that,
Speaker 5: I feel like I'm an apple or like I have
Speaker 5: to sort of challenge it, and I.
Speaker 3: Don't want to do that.
Speaker 5: I just want to be accepted in my own space.
Speaker 5: And when I brought up to hont On my culture
Speaker 5: my identity is because I don't feel like I'm at
Speaker 5: home in Texas either, especially with all of the laws
Speaker 5: that are changing and sort of oppress I mean, what
Speaker 5: it comes down to, it's depressing me in my own
Speaker 5: country and it doesn't feel good to be the target
Speaker 5: of this administration. And I find a lot of allyship
Speaker 5: with the trans community that I have a lot of
Speaker 5: respect for because it's sort of this quest of finding
Speaker 5: the space that you belong in. And I would say
Speaker 5: I align this that tremendously, but I guess on I
Speaker 5: guess it's really hard to put this into words. I'm
Speaker 5: trying to find a place where I belong, but the
Speaker 5: atheist community that I know of isn't sufficient. And you know,
Speaker 5: I don't fit into my own community either, because uh,
Speaker 5: you know, I'm an artist. And so if I get
Speaker 5: asked all the time to do a.
Speaker 3: Painting of our Lady at Guadalupe, do you know that image?
Speaker 2: Yes, yeah, I get asked to do that.
Speaker 5: A lot, I'm like, I don't believe this and that
Speaker 5: to me, Catholicism is the sword in which was used
Speaker 5: to oppress my ancestors, and I strongly rejected. And I
Speaker 5: know that you'll receive a lot of costs from other
Speaker 5: Latino people.
Speaker 3: I can hear it in the accent, and it breaks my.
Speaker 5: Heart to hear people loving that oppression. These people literally
Speaker 5: killed and committed Jen Bates violence against my ancestors two
Speaker 5: hundred years ago, and it's you know, and this sort
Speaker 5: of mass deportation is a continuation of that, and it
Speaker 5: makes me feel it's like not good for my mental health.
Speaker 1: Yeah, No, the lack of inclusion here is breathtaking, and
Speaker 1: I can absolutely appreciate why it's challenging to find a
Speaker 1: community where you feel like you fit in. You know,
Speaker 1: I did not go looking for the atheist community of Austin.
Speaker 1: I really stumbled backwards into it. And now I'm so
Speaker 1: grateful years later to have so many wonderful friends and
Speaker 1: so many ties to this community where I'm surrounded by
Speaker 1: people who don't just reject the idea of a god,
Speaker 1: but who have a interest in skepticism, who have an
Speaker 1: interest in promoting the separation of religion and government, who
Speaker 1: are concerned about and keeping an eye on the ways
Speaker 1: that religion mixed up with government can lead to all
Speaker 1: forms of bigotry and oppression, and certainly what we are
Speaker 1: seeing in the mass deportation movement and some of these
Speaker 1: other like very real issues. Unfortunately, I don't know exactly
Speaker 1: where to point you beyond saying building your own community
Speaker 1: is always going.
Speaker 2: To be a part of the process.
Speaker 1: But Dan, is there any particular organization anything that comes
Speaker 1: to mind, or any advice that you might have on
Speaker 1: how to connect with people who Jesse maybe be able
Speaker 1: to better relate to.
Speaker 2: Well, it's really tough because not everybody views atheism the
Speaker 2: same way that we necessarily do. So, like there's this
Speaker 2: there was this idea put out. It was twenty twelve.
Speaker 2: A person named Jay mcwright wrote this thing is called
Speaker 2: atheism plus, and it was in a response to sort
Speaker 2: of some sexual scandals that were happening in atheist conferences
Speaker 2: and stuff, and all was basically saying was, hey, we
Speaker 2: should also be like atheists and feminists, right, which is
Speaker 2: something that like, I feel like most people we talk
Speaker 2: today is like, yeah, obviously that was like a big
Speaker 2: deal to a lot of people. Then this idea that
Speaker 2: atheism could also encompass these other values or even should
Speaker 2: have any value judgments on other issues, for some people,
Speaker 2: that's a novel thing, and some people still struggle with that.
Speaker 2: And to incorporate these other values of humanism and these
Speaker 2: other values of recognizing oppression and histories of violence and
Speaker 2: things like that and finding against that. So like that's
Speaker 2: a difficulty in itself, right one is finding atheists that
Speaker 2: also align yourselves in those values. That's definitely different. Now
Speaker 2: I think more people are open to that, but there's
Speaker 2: still some multiple people that don't even incorporate that. So
Speaker 2: you have that, but also, you know, atheists in general
Speaker 2: organizing atheist organizations, the saying has been said many times
Speaker 2: it's like organizing a herd of cats, just because you
Speaker 2: have so many people who value themselves as free thinkers
Speaker 2: and skeptics that they tend to fight a lot. There
Speaker 2: tends to be a lot of miscommunication, and you know,
Speaker 2: sometimes skills are misappropriated in places. So you know, when
Speaker 2: Christy is saying, yeah, you should start your own I
Speaker 2: understand that there's a huge challenge there and that's not
Speaker 2: something that everybody can really do. But honestly, the biggest
Speaker 2: fruits of organizations I've seen have come from people who
Speaker 2: really do this stuff out of a labor of love
Speaker 2: and who really want to like see the change that
Speaker 2: they want to put out, the change that they want
Speaker 2: to see like in the world. So if you're feeling
Speaker 2: these feelings of man, I really want to talk to
Speaker 2: other people about this. I want to make stuff happen.
Speaker 2: I'm actually with Christian saying, like, hey, starting your own
Speaker 2: group and getting stuff started is is maybe the better
Speaker 2: way than trying to find a group where you might
Speaker 2: not even fit in or want to make the things
Speaker 2: different anyway, yeah, can I one.
Speaker 5: One to think, of course.
Speaker 6: Yeah.
Speaker 5: I wanted to say one thing to the audience about
Speaker 5: like what it means to be a person like in
Speaker 5: your own because I reject all a tata label. I
Speaker 5: thought more under the mestizeo category, which is, you know,
Speaker 5: the a you know, the old term for the Spanish
Speaker 5: mixing with indigenous blood and m favor of the indigenous
Speaker 5: culture more because that's frankly, you know, I've been to
Speaker 5: Spain and I don't look like a Spanish person at all.
Speaker 5: I've been to Mexico and I don't really been in
Speaker 5: there either. I'm a Tehano, and I wanted to show
Speaker 5: this with yours, who are listeners who also might be
Speaker 5: that under that category, I say, claim your native identity,
Speaker 5: because that's what I am and my ancestors are. Will
Speaker 5: also be known as the Clilticon, which is basically all
Speaker 5: of South Texas, and that's my home and I've missed.
Speaker 3: It, you know.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 5: Yeah, it's because I wanted to sort of distill the
Speaker 5: foreignness of the Latino term, because I mean, like I said,
Speaker 5: I'm Tohano, but I haven't you know, I'm not really
Speaker 5: any I don't have anything in common with somebody from Mudawai,
Speaker 5: you know, or I don't have anything in common from
Speaker 5: somebody from Cuba. There's a difference that really.
Speaker 2: Matters, absolutely, absolutely, especially in Texas, right. Uh, you know,
Speaker 2: Latino being the highest minority group in Texas, right, so
Speaker 2: many people having their own individual communities and cultures here
Speaker 2: that's different from the rest of the world. We're asking
Speaker 2: ourselves a lot these days, what terms like race mean
Speaker 2: to us, these sorts of social constructs that people tie
Speaker 2: their identities to. What is the importance of that, How
Speaker 2: that representation may not reflect the individual experiences of people broadly.
Speaker 2: And yeah, of the opinion that you should take whatever
Speaker 2: label you feel comfortable for yourself and take the labels
Speaker 2: that if you think share certain particular values to you,
Speaker 2: that you try to uphold those values, I'm all for it. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So many people in the skeptic community get very uncomfortable
Speaker 1: with the notion of like self identification, and we start
Speaker 1: hearing these references to like identifying as attack helicopters in
Speaker 1: some of that bullshit language. And I think this is
Speaker 1: a very clear cut description of what these ideas really
Speaker 1: mean and why we have to sort of wrestle with
Speaker 1: our own identity and then connect to and identify with
Speaker 1: the aspects of our own history, the aspects of our
Speaker 1: own birth and genetics and whatever else that are important
Speaker 1: to us and that we value and not just take
Speaker 1: a oppressive label that is slapped on us by a
Speaker 1: government census or a birth certificate or whatever else. So
Speaker 1: I don't mean to overly conflate these things here, but Jesse,
Speaker 1: I really appreciate you talking to your feelings about that
Speaker 1: Latino label and why it doesn't feel appropriate to you,
Speaker 1: and why there is so much religious oppression mixed up
Speaker 1: even in that you know, government census data.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and the fact.
Speaker 5: I'm in a mestizo was simply put there by the
Speaker 5: Catholic Church, and people just take it for granted because
Speaker 5: I'm like, no, the problem is is that again, Texas.
Speaker 3: Is my home. It's our home.
Speaker 5: It's it would be evil to be deported from my
Speaker 5: own land like that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know what I mean. Yeah, I'm sort.
Speaker 5: Of like really vehement, And I do think that the
Speaker 5: massive blocks that voted for Trump, that under the Latino umbrella,
Speaker 5: I think voted by uh it was It's a mistake.
Speaker 5: It's I think the Catholic Church is the reason for that,
Speaker 5: because there's a lot of conservativism that's inserted in the
Speaker 5: church because I used to be Catholic and I strongly
Speaker 5: reject that, and I think that's that might be why
Speaker 5: a lot of looking voted for trauma.
Speaker 1: No question, there's a lot to be said about voting
Speaker 1: against your own self interest because of these religious affiliations
Speaker 1: and sort of a block voting that comes along with
Speaker 1: our two party system. Thank you so much for reaching
Speaker 1: out and for sharing all of this. We definitely hope
Speaker 1: that you find a community that better suits you, and Lord,
Speaker 1: I know that Dan and I are here, at least
Speaker 1: in part to try and advocate for a government for
Speaker 1: a world that is less interested than the one we
Speaker 1: currently have in othering ostracizing, escape voting minority communities.
Speaker 2: Definitely, yeah, I mean to me.
Speaker 5: Also, one last thing is that I feel like the
Speaker 5: atheist community online that I can do connect with are
Speaker 5: the closest people I really find sort of a home
Speaker 5: with because I mean my community. I mean I mentioned
Speaker 5: atheism amongst the Chicano Tohano community. Man, that's a good
Speaker 5: way to get kicked out of a house Gore.
Speaker 2: But you know what, though, you as an individual are
Speaker 2: going to be a better advocate for that in those
Speaker 2: spaces than Christy and I ever will. Right, So you
Speaker 2: know there is an advantage of your connections to those
Speaker 2: spaces that I think, you know, could be seen as
Speaker 2: something to again like take advantage of. I'm not telling
Speaker 2: you what to do, right, but maybe there are people
Speaker 2: in those communies who are also just as isolated as
Speaker 2: you are because they don't have those kinds of connections
Speaker 2: or resources, or think of atheism as a white thing,
Speaker 2: because a lot of people think of atheism as a
Speaker 2: white thing. So you know there's something to that too,
Speaker 2: just to keep in mind.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and I'll just point out that the incredible crew
Speaker 1: that helps Dan and I put this show on. Like
Speaker 1: Dan and I are both local to the Austin area
Speaker 1: and both grew up around here, but our crew is
Speaker 1: made up from folks all over the place. I mean,
Speaker 1: we were telling jokes about Canada earlier today, Like we
Speaker 1: are from everywhere, And if you don't have a community,
Speaker 1: maybe the atheist community of Austin can be a part
Speaker 1: of that solution. Wherever it is that you're located. We
Speaker 1: always have volunteer opportunities, We have all kinds of different
Speaker 1: meetups and opportunities to participate in this community. We hope
Speaker 1: that you'll join us and that you can find something
Speaker 1: of value there.
Speaker 5: Thank you very much, I super Gooper appreciate it and
Speaker 5: I hope to.
Speaker 1: Talk to you all against so hey stame here. Thank
Speaker 1: you so much for giving us call. You have a
Speaker 1: great day.
Speaker 6: Well.
Speaker 2: In reference to the folks who.
Speaker 1: Helped us put all of this together, I have once
Speaker 1: again neglected to say a big thank you to our crew.
Speaker 1: I'd love to get them up on the screen, folks
Speaker 1: who are from all over the place. Thank you so
Speaker 1: much for everything that you guys do to make us
Speaker 1: look good and to make all of this work.
Speaker 2: Yes, yes, we can't have a show without the crew.
Speaker 2: It can't just be us two guys just talking into
Speaker 2: the void. That's what it would be. Otherwise, Yeah, that's
Speaker 2: the thing. It's like, it would just be a void.
Speaker 1: It would just be you and I not out in
Speaker 1: front of an audience, and definitely not lit so well
Speaker 1: or sounding so smoothly.
Speaker 2: That's true, that's true. I just I really appreciate that
Speaker 2: call because you and I are I know, are of
Speaker 2: the same mind about this. But I've talked to other
Speaker 2: skeptics who are so baffled when we talk about grace
Speaker 2: as a social construct, where it's like, yeah, of course
Speaker 2: it is, of course it is. How could it not
Speaker 2: be right? And yeah, that's that should be treated with
Speaker 2: the same amount of skepticism as we do with all
Speaker 2: the other kinds of topics that we talk about here,
Speaker 2: with the all the nuances and things that come with that.
Speaker 2: But yeah, that kind of identity is sort of self
Speaker 2: defined and always has been. And when people kind of
Speaker 2: realize that there's a power there, there's a liberation that
Speaker 2: comes with that that people don't realize and sometimes they
Speaker 2: feel like they have to keep up with the status
Speaker 2: quo because well, there's a lot of reasons why, but
Speaker 2: you know, just an interesting conversation.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Well, whether you are looking to volunteer or honestly
Speaker 1: just looking to be a part of our extended digital community,
Speaker 1: or even if you're local to the Austin area, we
Speaker 1: want you to be a part of this community. Www.
Speaker 1: Dot Atheist Hyphencommunity dot org is a great place to
Speaker 1: start where you can learn more about this organization, it's
Speaker 1: policies and different ways to get involved. So with that,
Speaker 1: what do you say, we talked to Tom in Mississippi.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that sounds good. Let's do it all.
Speaker 1: Right, Tom, you have some thoughts about comparative religion and
Speaker 1: religion in schools. What's on your mind?
Speaker 7: Oh? Yeah, First, I'd like to endorse share, thanks for
Speaker 7: everybody who makes possible. But as to teaching comparative religion,
Speaker 7: I think that the actual syllabus taught might be fraught
Speaker 7: with tension. Sure, I believe it should only be taught
Speaker 7: as elective, which kind of implies that it's not going
Speaker 7: to be taught at the elementary school level, only at
Speaker 7: secondary levels, possibly at the high school level, but certainly
Speaker 7: no sooner than that. And the reason I say it
Speaker 7: should be elective is closely tied to that. For instance,
Speaker 7: if you're pursuing a major which has nothing to do
Speaker 7: in any articulable way with religion, you can go ahead
Speaker 7: and take comparative religion, but it wouldn't be really required.
Speaker 7: On the other hand, the fine point is you might
Speaker 7: have a declared major where the people in charge of
Speaker 7: that school feel that comparative religion is required for the major,
Speaker 7: in which case it's required, not only. And the Bacond
Speaker 7: issue I had was about it not. I don't. I
Speaker 7: failed to see how this is even a debate. It
Speaker 7: seems to me that the plane reading of the constitutional laws,
Speaker 7: they are historical documents. I mean, one of the most
Speaker 7: notable being the Treaty of Tripling, if I got that
Speaker 7: name right. The government should just be ponderously unaware that
Speaker 7: such a thing is religion even exists. I think that's
Speaker 7: the only way to keep thing wee in a legal sense.
Speaker 7: So religious behavior as a special category in law should
Speaker 7: not exist. I think all that should exist is what
Speaker 7: current the web exists as acceptable social behavior.
Speaker 2: Yeah, no, I hear you.
Speaker 1: And let's I suppose take those points kind of one
Speaker 1: at a time, Like the notion of teaching comparative really
Speaker 1: religion in high school. You know, I'm not a educator.
Speaker 1: I don't necessarily know how to best break that down,
Speaker 1: but I do feel like it's important to acknowledge that
Speaker 1: it would be impossible, in my mind, to get a
Speaker 1: well rounded education at the high school level without ever
Speaker 1: having been introduced to religion and the role that it
Speaker 1: is played in our history, in the role that it
Speaker 1: has played in you know, really shaping science and philosophy
Speaker 1: and all of these other things. So I don't feel
Speaker 1: like I would be in support of some sort of
Speaker 1: blanket band where like high schools can't even acknowledge the
Speaker 1: existence of these belief systems. But that's not the same
Speaker 1: as singling out a particular one and raising it up
Speaker 1: to something that we have to like honor as an
Speaker 1: important part of our history, when it's certainly like the
Speaker 1: Christianity is not all of our shared history or the
Speaker 1: shared history of everybody who goes to these schools, Dan,
Speaker 1: what do you want to say on that idea before
Speaker 1: we talk about, you know, the constitutionality.
Speaker 2: Of this law. Now I agree with you. How can
Speaker 2: you possibly talk about history and the history of ideas
Speaker 2: without talking about religion. I mean, that just seems so
Speaker 2: silly to me to be like, wow, we can't talk
Speaker 2: about this aspect of human society and human culture even
Speaker 2: though it's one of the most influential forces on the
Speaker 2: planet for what we've done, right, Like, I completely disagree
Speaker 2: it should be it should be available to be taught,
Speaker 2: Whether it should be a mandatory elective, that's another conversation.
Speaker 2: But I'll tell you this, Christy. When I was in college,
Speaker 2: I took a course on Islamic studies taught by a
Speaker 2: Muslim professor, and I learned about Islam and its history,
Speaker 2: particularly in Arabic society, and you know what, that was
Speaker 2: invaluable to me. I have no stock in Islam. I
Speaker 2: have no stock in it. I don't think any of
Speaker 2: it's at least the core tenets of it are true
Speaker 2: in any capacity. But I have a better understanding of
Speaker 2: the history of the those ideas and have influences in
Speaker 2: the world. And you know what, I if I ever
Speaker 2: do talk to a Muslim, I have a better context
Speaker 2: in which to approach that conversation than I ever would
Speaker 2: have without taking that course. So it's absolutely vital, I think,
Speaker 2: and important, especially if you're in a humanities study. But honestly,
Speaker 2: anybody that has a major in school these days, in
Speaker 2: most universities, has to have some sort of humanities So
Speaker 2: even if you're doing like engineering, so like that, that's
Speaker 2: always going to be a thing people are going to take,
Speaker 2: whether they are particularly interested in themselves or not. So yeah,
Speaker 2: I mean it should be available for people to teach.
Speaker 2: I don't know. I'm in the same campus you though,
Speaker 2: I'm not a professional in this regard. I don't know,
Speaker 2: like am I going to put a tier list as
Speaker 2: to teaching this over that. I don't know. That's a
Speaker 2: little outside of my skille. But is it valuable, should
Speaker 2: it be taught, should it be available to be taught? Absolutely?
Speaker 7: Yeah, I think I think maybe I was a bit misunderstood.
Speaker 2: Sure, help us out.
Speaker 7: I did not mean to imply that at below high
Speaker 7: school level, or even at high school level, that any
Speaker 7: mention of religion was for botten. There's a difference between
Speaker 7: saying that historically the Roman Catholic Church did this and
Speaker 7: the Church of England did that, as opposed to discussing
Speaker 7: the theology of the Roman Catholic Church of the Anglican Church.
Speaker 7: That's the difference.
Speaker 2: I still disagree with you because theology. I gotta stop
Speaker 2: you right there, Tom, because that distinction is still not
Speaker 2: good enough for me. Yes, we should talk about the history,
Speaker 2: and yes, I do think we should talk about the theology,
Speaker 2: because you know why, the theology also influenced the history.
Speaker 6: Right.
Speaker 2: History doesn't happen in evacue. It comes through a zeitgeist
Speaker 2: of ideas, and theology has informed philosophy, and philosophy has
Speaker 2: informed the world. I mean, I don't have to agree
Speaker 2: with it Obviously I don't write I'm on the hello,
Speaker 2: I want to talk Evean. Okay, we're on the same
Speaker 2: page there. But it's still important to know these things
Speaker 2: and have be able to be informed about it. So yeah,
Speaker 2: I still think that that's just as important.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you can't teach world cultures, you can't teach world
Speaker 1: history without at least acknowledging what much of the world believes.
Speaker 1: And I think that there is value in diving somewhat
Speaker 1: at an age appropriate level, from a neutral point of view,
Speaker 1: into what some of those beliefs are. I mean, is
Speaker 1: that fair, Tom, Like we're whether or not there's like
Speaker 1: a dedicated course to comparative religion at the high school
Speaker 1: level is a very specific question that I don't feel
Speaker 1: qualified to answer. But I do believe that, you know,
Speaker 1: even in the third grade, when we're learning about world
Speaker 1: history and world cultures, that we can acknowledge some of
Speaker 1: the world's varying belief systems.
Speaker 7: Again, I don't believe that I stated that religion could
Speaker 7: not be mentioned. Yeah, I will acknowledge that this question
Speaker 7: of at what point is it appropriate to go to
Speaker 7: different depth into religion in terms of at what point
Speaker 7: many at what age or under what curriculum is a
Speaker 7: difficult question. There is not a bright line answer, I
Speaker 7: don't think at all. However, that being said, for instance,
Speaker 7: in the third grade, it would be entirely possible to
Speaker 7: mention that, following my earlier analogy, that Henryet and his
Speaker 7: advisors decided to split off from the Roman Catholic Church
Speaker 7: without getting into theological discussions behind it, because that can
Speaker 7: be addressed. I mean, you can mention the dore theological differences,
Speaker 7: and you might even mention baldly what a couple are.
Speaker 7: But what should not happen is a debate over the merits.
Speaker 7: On the other hand, I can have a debate over
Speaker 7: the merits of the political situation there. But I think
Speaker 7: the other important thing to say is that it's very
Speaker 7: context sensitive in terms of age and curriculum. But the
Speaker 7: reason why I hesitate at lower level is is very pragmatic.
Speaker 7: In many places, I'm not sure of all, but in
Speaker 7: many places, the curriculum at elementary or junior high school
Speaker 7: level is settled very much by a local or relatively
Speaker 7: local school board. Now when you get to a college level,
Speaker 7: it's completely different. You're not going to your local public
Speaker 7: school or to a public school that the local area
Speaker 7: will allow you to attend. If there is a public school.
Speaker 7: Choice college now is entirely choice based pache financial considerations. Obviously,
Speaker 7: the college that you go to, given your qualified to
Speaker 7: go to, that college, is much more of a choice. Hence,
Speaker 7: I don't really care about who's setting the syllabus as
Speaker 7: long as you observe separation of church and state. If
Speaker 7: you're a college that exists general funding or state funding,
Speaker 7: there needs to be oversight over well how balanced the syllabus.
Speaker 2: Tom, I got great news for you, because there's no
Speaker 2: third grader in the in anywhere in this entire country
Speaker 2: that's learning about Henry the eighth and his theological inclinations
Speaker 2: or political inclinations. That's not a thing. It's it's I
Speaker 2: and I'm saying this is someone who's former careers in
Speaker 2: private education. Okay, the standards are set. Yes, you're right
Speaker 2: in that courses are selected by local school boards, but
Speaker 2: standards of instruction are still set by the state. Right
Speaker 2: and so uh that's you know, nobody in elementary school
Speaker 2: is getting a deep cut on Thomas Aquinas and then
Speaker 2: their theology and stuff, right, I don't think, Uh, that's
Speaker 2: it's just not happening, right. I think we're talking about
Speaker 2: maybe high school electives here and how appropriate that might be.
Speaker 2: And even then, uh yeah, maybe having a you know,
Speaker 2: a deep cut theology class may not be the most
Speaker 2: important thing when compared to other stuff. But I mean,
Speaker 2: if it's an elective, it's an elective.
Speaker 3: Right.
Speaker 2: They're certainly not doing that in most public schools. In fact,
Speaker 2: I don't know if any public schools, certainly not in Texas,
Speaker 2: that are requiring Christian stuff, although Oklahoma's trying to change that.
Speaker 2: But the point is, you know, it's you know.
Speaker 1: It's understanding some of the core principles or precepts of
Speaker 1: all of this is not the same thing as debating
Speaker 1: their merit. So you know, I don't want to get
Speaker 1: too much further into the weeds of us sort of
Speaker 1: pontificating on what.
Speaker 2: Schools should be teaching.
Speaker 1: But I, you know, just broadly want to acknowledge that
Speaker 1: I think at any age it is appropriate to acknowledge
Speaker 1: religion exists and this is what some people believe, and
Speaker 1: this is what other people believe. But to your other
Speaker 1: point about the constitutionality of this law that is being
Speaker 1: considered here in Texas and that is very likely to
Speaker 1: be signed by the governor soon. I do worry about
Speaker 1: the constitutionality. You know, a very similar, if not almost
Speaker 1: identical law, as I understand it was struck down in
Speaker 1: Louisiana by the Supreme Court, and that there is cause
Speaker 1: to believe that this will almost immediately be challenged. And
Speaker 1: as a non lawyer, that makes good goddamn sense, because
Speaker 1: it's hard for me to wrap my head around how
Speaker 1: this could possibly line up with the constitution.
Speaker 7: Yep, yeah, I think we're I think we're in agreement there.
Speaker 7: I take a probably a reasonably extreme vital with it
Speaker 7: when I say the government should be ponderously unaware in
Speaker 7: the law. But yeah, And the only thing I was
Speaker 7: trying to get at is that I think that getting
Speaker 7: back to you know, what's taught. I think that at
Speaker 7: the college level is pretty clear cut that the government
Speaker 7: should be out of it. I think that in grade
Speaker 7: school is pretty clear that you don't want to dive
Speaker 7: into the merits. And it gets funny when you talk
Speaker 7: about high school. That's all I'm saying.
Speaker 1: Yeah, fair enough, No, I mean debating over the merits
Speaker 1: of a particular belief system. You know that can get
Speaker 1: certainly very messy. I like the idea of teenagers learning
Speaker 1: critical thinking skills. I like the idea of them being
Speaker 1: able to criticize a set of beliefs or a particular philosophy,
Speaker 1: even if they're thirteen and wrong, even if their conclusions
Speaker 1: aren't necessarily what I would hope for from them. I
Speaker 1: think that part of any well rounded education is a
Speaker 1: willingness to question things, to challenge things, and being taught
Speaker 1: maybe how to do that in a reasonable, well reasoned,
Speaker 1: intellectual way. So you know, we're on the same page here,
Speaker 1: and it sounds like Tom, we're all just kind of
Speaker 1: crossing our fingers that we are headed in the right
Speaker 1: direction politically, and that our governance is going to honor
Speaker 1: the rule of law and that we can actually hold
Speaker 1: strong to the Constitution.
Speaker 7: Yep. Just one final thing I'd say is that I
Speaker 7: want to adorse your belief in the importance of the
Speaker 7: humanities or what used to be called liberal arts, even
Speaker 7: among people who are taking a strongly technical major. I'm
Speaker 7: with you there too, absolutely.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we need to prevent stem lords from ruining our society.
Speaker 2: So yeah, I'm always going to promote demands there.
Speaker 7: Yeah, Okay, that'll do it. Thanks a lot.
Speaker 1: Well, Yeah, thank you, Tom. We really appreciate it talking
Speaker 1: to you. Yeah, Dan, is it?
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 1: I don't want to be too squeamish, like I recognize
Speaker 1: that talking than the atheist community of Boston. We've been
Speaker 1: having conversations like this for a long time. I don't
Speaker 1: necessarily know that we're a watchdog organization, but this is
Speaker 1: certainly not the first time that two hosts like you
Speaker 1: and I have sat down and wrung our hands about
Speaker 1: the erosion of the wall of separation of church and state.
Speaker 1: That being said, does this feel like just another tug
Speaker 1: back and forth in the tug of war? Or for you,
Speaker 1: does it to feel like we are, you know, taking
Speaker 1: another meaningful step in an increasingly worrying direction.
Speaker 2: Oh, oh, increasingly worrying direction, there, Christy, I mean.
Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, so not just being alarmist right now, listen.
Speaker 2: In my lifetime, this has been the greatest threat of
Speaker 2: that separation, I would say, for sure, because of the
Speaker 2: political situation, because of our Supreme Court situation. In my
Speaker 2: personal opinion, yes, it is absolutely, absolutely the most worrying
Speaker 2: and our work as activists has never been more important
Speaker 2: in that regard, I would say, not that it hasn't
Speaker 2: been important before, but we are at a what I
Speaker 2: would consider to be a major, major, potential turning point,
Speaker 2: which is why I think we should raise the alarm bells.
Speaker 2: So you know, yeah, yeah, you know.
Speaker 1: I have mentioned it on this show before, and I
Speaker 1: don't mean to repeat myself, and I hate thinking to
Speaker 1: myself as any kind of alarmist. But when I became
Speaker 1: a gender and sexuality therapist here in Texas, I and
Speaker 1: I started my own business, you know, I was worried about,
Speaker 1: like my expenses and how do I advertise and getting referrals,
Speaker 1: and how do I have clients coming in and how
Speaker 1: do I make money? Like all of the things that
Speaker 1: you worry about when you're running a business. I did
Speaker 1: not have anywhere in my top ten things to be
Speaker 1: concerned about all of my clients turning into political refugees
Speaker 1: and fleeing the state because of their increasing very legitimate
Speaker 1: worries of the oppressive nature of our governance. And that
Speaker 1: is becoming like a major I hate to put it
Speaker 1: in business terms, but as that one metric, it's a
Speaker 1: major concern for like the long term viability of the
Speaker 1: work I'm trying to do here.
Speaker 2: Absolutely in many, many, many different facets. That's true in immigration,
Speaker 2: in social and political identity, and in schools as well.
Speaker 2: I mean we're talking, we're at like Scopes monkey trial
Speaker 2: level of importance right now, Supreme Court cases in my
Speaker 2: opinion when it comes to this stuff. And it's alarming
Speaker 2: because we are both private citizens and you and I
Speaker 2: don't know any governors or you know, anything like that. Donors, yeah,
Speaker 2: our millionaire donors. Our influence only goes so far as
Speaker 2: to the people that listen to us. But I still
Speaker 2: try my best. I don't know, and I know you
Speaker 2: try to. So we're trying.
Speaker 1: All right, Well, let's let's keep trying. And on that note,
Speaker 1: let's talk again to d in Iowa, who has some
Speaker 1: concerns about Catholicism's role in our society. D what's on
Speaker 1: your mind?
Speaker 8: Christ I talk to you guys. So, yeah, kind of
Speaker 8: piggybacking on Jimmy Junior's intro today, honestly, the and I
Speaker 8: want to pivot slightly to kind of support Jesse's call
Speaker 8: because he makes my point that cuts policism Tholicism as
Speaker 8: a cult, and it's actually a predatory cult because it appropriates,
Speaker 8: and then destroys certain cultural beliefs, practices, religions. It's based
Speaker 8: on UH. It's its dogma, and its doctrines have come
Speaker 8: from appropriating pagan beliefs and celebrations and incorporating that into
Speaker 8: their into their belief and then proceeding to destroy them.
Speaker 8: And as they progressed through the world, as they progressed
Speaker 8: by by I think it wasn't it Constantine that converted
Speaker 8: and then started using the sword to spread They then
Speaker 8: turned to UH funding through different kings and queens and.
Speaker 1: Kingdom just dragon hoarding in a lot of ways.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Well, so you'll definitely find no defense of Catholicism
Speaker 1: or the Roman Catholic Church here. But when you make
Speaker 1: it a point to refer to Catholicism as a cult,
Speaker 1: I'm really curious what that word means to you. You know,
Speaker 1: I really appreciate Amanda Montell's perspective on all of this,
Speaker 1: when she writes about how the only difference between a
Speaker 1: cult and a religion is the point of view, and
Speaker 1: how pejorative you want to be about it. You know,
Speaker 1: working in religious trauma, I don't necessarily find like the
Speaker 1: bite model or any of these other distinctions between cult
Speaker 1: and religion particularly useful. I find that cult is really
Speaker 1: just a pejorative term for religion. And I'm, you know,
Speaker 1: fine with that in the extent that I want to
Speaker 1: be like rude about somebody else's belief systems. Obviously, I'm
Speaker 1: here promoting atheism and the critical thinking that I think
Speaker 1: would tear down religious thought. But why use that particular term?
Speaker 1: Why is that important to make that distinction here?
Speaker 8: To me, a cult has it has many uh definitions, however,
Speaker 8: and U and characteristics. My view of what a cult
Speaker 8: is is number one, the cult has bizarre belief system
Speaker 8: based on things that are by themselves would be maybe
Speaker 8: socially unacceptable, such as cannibalism and human sacrifice. And then
Speaker 8: the degree of control that it exerts over not only
Speaker 8: its members but its environment. And I you know, I
Speaker 8: wasn't going to go into a whole thing about you know,
Speaker 8: what cults are, how you can define them, how you
Speaker 8: can move up. But I find two definitions because I
Speaker 8: knew you would ask me that.
Speaker 1: Sure, we find, you know, truly bizarre beliefs in other
Speaker 1: forms of Christianity, in Buddhism, in Islam, and a lot
Speaker 1: of religions that frankly don't have as many adherents as
Speaker 1: the Roman Catholic Church. Again, I am not trying to
Speaker 1: come in in defense of the Roman Catholic Church. I've
Speaker 1: spoken on this show recently about the pope election and
Speaker 1: how my concerns and feelings about that organization are definitely
Speaker 1: already on the record. And I don't mean to pick
Speaker 1: on you for your language, but it seemed like such
Speaker 1: an important crux of what it was that you came
Speaker 1: here to share. And I'm interested in what makes you
Speaker 1: maybe want to single out the Roman Catholic Church versus
Speaker 1: railing against Islam, versus railing against Buddhism or any of
Speaker 1: these other also very popular world religions or belief system.
Speaker 2: She might think those are cults too. I don't know.
Speaker 2: Maybe it feels that way.
Speaker 8: I single out Catholicism because I am more knowledgeable about
Speaker 8: Catholicism than I am about Islam or Buddhism or any other,
Speaker 8: you know, established religion or belief system.
Speaker 1: I'll tell you, you get deep enough into Buddhism and
Speaker 1: you start hearing some really weird stories, ye some things
Speaker 1: too true.
Speaker 8: And but you know, like I said, I don't. I
Speaker 8: don't know Islam, and while I have investigated Buddhism, I
Speaker 8: found recently that I really don't know as much as
Speaker 8: I thought I did, and the Catholicism is responsible. They
Speaker 8: piggyback themselves on the age of exploration and discovery with
Speaker 8: you know, the Spanish and English colonization. As Jesse said,
Speaker 8: his ancestors were brutally exploited, convert by force. We know
Speaker 8: that in the United States and in Canada, hundreds, if
Speaker 8: not thousands of young Native Americans and Native Canadians were
Speaker 8: flaughtered at Catholic schools, abused at Catholic schools. So I
Speaker 8: believe that the definitions of the cult that I laid
Speaker 8: out earlier are very much so fulfilled by Catholic Church.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I guess my thing I would take with that
Speaker 2: is just because an organization abuses and exploits and colonializes
Speaker 2: does it that itself doesn't make it a cult. We
Speaker 2: would call the US a cult, although maybe the US
Speaker 2: is a call I don't know, but like a lot
Speaker 2: of colonial powers would be called under that idea, I
Speaker 2: don't think. I don't think something has to be exploitative
Speaker 2: to be a cult either, you know, I just think
Speaker 2: you just had you know, what Catholicism really does. Though,
Speaker 2: what I do share your criticisms with is when you
Speaker 2: define fin orthodoxy, you also define heterodoxy, right. In other words,
Speaker 2: when you define what's okay and what's what's not. When
Speaker 2: when you find what's okay, you're also defining what's not okay.
Speaker 2: And the Catholic Church has been uh, you know, sort
Speaker 2: of historical and their judgments on other cultures, other beliefs, systems,
Speaker 2: other you know, ways of life that have been antithetical
Speaker 2: to the powers that be for the Catholic Church, and
Speaker 2: therefore they've sought their destruction, which is unfortunate and obviously terrible.
Speaker 2: So I think we both take coverage with that.
Speaker 8: I'm well aware that my language is harsh and controversial,
Speaker 8: and I appreciate you guys's counterpoints, but I am unapologetic
Speaker 8: at this time, and until such time as this pope
Speaker 8: causes a major shift in the general attitude of Catholicism,
Speaker 8: I will continue to refer to it as a culture.
Speaker 1: No, No, that that's fairness doing that to be I'm not.
Speaker 8: I'm not doing that too. I'm not doing that for
Speaker 8: shock value. I'm not doing it for you know, sensationalism's sake.
Speaker 8: It's it's what I truly believe based on the history.
Speaker 8: And I just wanted to do say one other thing
Speaker 8: for Jesse while he was speaking, I did some googling
Speaker 8: for Latino artists and I dropped some links in the
Speaker 8: chat for him to check out. I really appreciate his
Speaker 8: journey in claiming his ancestry and his identity. It really
Speaker 8: touched me deeply, and I hope that he continues to
Speaker 8: find a place where he feels he belongs.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so say we all.
Speaker 1: I definitely want to be on the favor of creating community.
Speaker 1: It was a religious trauma therapist, Yes, of course.
Speaker 2: I spent a lot of.
Speaker 1: Time helping people work through the the like I guess
Speaker 1: we'll call positive traumas, or the experiences of bad things
Speaker 1: happening to you, you know, having these beliefs shove down
Speaker 1: your throats, being criticized and hurt in these very specific ways.
Speaker 1: But there's also the trauma of being removed from your community,
Speaker 1: being isolated from your community, and so many of the
Speaker 1: things that you lose when you walk away from religion.
Speaker 1: And I think that there is remarkable value in recognizing
Speaker 1: that loss walking away from religion may be additioned by subtraction,
Speaker 1: but it's still going to hurt, because you're losing a
Speaker 1: lot of valuable aspects of your day to day life.
Speaker 2: And I hope.
Speaker 1: That the atheism community recognizes that, or just really recognizes
Speaker 1: how important it is to have a community, whether it's
Speaker 1: centered around atheism the way that this particular community is,
Speaker 1: or whether it's centered around you know, RuPaul's drag Race
Speaker 1: or dungeons and Dragons or whatever the hell else. You
Speaker 1: need friends in your life. Every good study on health
Speaker 1: and well being in humans says that over and over
Speaker 1: and over. So do we wish you the best? Jesse Again,
Speaker 1: We certainly wish you the best. And we hope that
Speaker 1: everybody listening feels like they have important people in their
Speaker 1: lives that they can share the mundane and the you know, deep,
Speaker 1: heady philosophical and.
Speaker 8: I appreciate that you're there for those of us who
Speaker 8: have lost community and friends and you know everything. It's
Speaker 8: just awesome. And hopefully the clients of yours that have
Speaker 8: felt so unsafe that they had to leave the state,
Speaker 8: I hope that they can that you can continue to
Speaker 8: counsel them, possibly through you know, online and stuff like that,
Speaker 8: because you are really providing an invaluable service. So thank
Speaker 8: you Christian. With that, I will jump off. I know
Speaker 8: it takes a lot of time, so thank you.
Speaker 1: No, I appreciate you saying so, thank you so much
Speaker 1: for your call, and have a great Sunday afternoon. All right, Dan,
Speaker 1: I want to take a moment to thank our top
Speaker 1: five patrons. I'm going to give you a second maybe
Speaker 1: to get some of our super chats pulled up as
Speaker 1: we have more of those coming in. But first and
Speaker 1: foremost our top five patrons this week number one Oops
Speaker 1: All Singularity, number two Dingleberry Jackson, three Coleevi Helvetti for
Speaker 1: Brian Zouopke, and in the fifth spot is Ja cal
Speaker 1: Carlton and our honorable mention this week, Diane Kerns. Thank
Speaker 1: thanks to each of you. Thanks to all of you
Speaker 1: who are part of supporting us on Patreon. If you're
Speaker 1: interested in joining, that's a tiny dot cc slash Patreon
Speaker 1: t H. And on that note, we have been recording
Speaker 1: the TALKI than Discord after shows for all level of
Speaker 1: paid patrons, and so if you're looking for even more content,
Speaker 1: even more conversations like this.
Speaker 2: Please give that a try. Yeah, and we do have
Speaker 2: super chats that these came quite earlier. I'm glad you
Speaker 2: brought up because we should go ahead and read these.
Speaker 2: One from Miranda Ronsberger, a member of one year, gave
Speaker 2: ten dollars and said, Happy Pride Month, all you heathens.
Speaker 2: Don't let people get away with using their religion as
Speaker 2: an excuse to hate or discriminate.
Speaker 1: That's not what religious freedom means.
Speaker 2: That's right, that's right. I co signed on that, Miranda,
Speaker 2: and I don't know what this was in reference to,
Speaker 2: but blind Blimey, a member of two years, gave five
Speaker 2: dollars and said, Dan's right. I'm going to start my
Speaker 2: own ACA with blackjack and redacted. That's not the reacting things.
Speaker 1: Right, Yeah, No, you know, we're talking about forming community
Speaker 1: and whatever you want to form that community around.
Speaker 2: Right, Okay, Yeah, that makes sense. Yeah, yeah, blackjack and atheism. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I don't know. It could be a thing I guess
Speaker 2: you wanted to be.
Speaker 1: You know, Well, we've got some other interesting callers on
Speaker 1: the line.
Speaker 2: Who do you want to roll the dice with? Ohtally,
Speaker 2: I want to roll the dice with, uh maybe gosh,
Speaker 2: I don't know. What what do you want? Who do
Speaker 2: you want to talk to this? I know you literally
Speaker 2: just asked you that, but either one I could go
Speaker 2: with that. I see here? Okay, Nick or Michelle?
Speaker 6: You know?
Speaker 1: Yeah, all right, well let's do Nick in Massachusetts and
Speaker 1: see what is on his mind today, Nick, Determination, predetermination,
Speaker 1: non determination? What you got for us?
Speaker 6: Hi?
Speaker 9: So I kind of wanted to get your guys's sort
Speaker 9: of thoughts on what uh predetermined like a like a
Speaker 9: predetermined reality or not non determined non predetermined reality, or
Speaker 9: like the combination of the two, like what do you
Speaker 9: think we're living in? And what if like that has
Speaker 9: any bearing or if it makes any claims, like like
Speaker 9: if it is a consequence of like making a statement
Speaker 9: on whether there's a Sang sing god or not, or
Speaker 9: maybe like a prime non sen Sien intelligence Like.
Speaker 1: I sure, well, let me just jump in and say yeah,
Speaker 1: I'll go ahead and start by saying that, you know,
Speaker 1: whether this is all just causality that is, repercussions of
Speaker 1: the Big Bang and everything is predetermined, or whether there
Speaker 1: is an actual random chance that's possible through quantum mechanics
Speaker 1: and our growing understanding of those things. I will admit
Speaker 1: it's hard for me to find any room for free
Speaker 1: will in either of those situations, and I definitely don't
Speaker 1: see any evidence for God in either perspective. Dan, what
Speaker 1: does any of this mean to you?
Speaker 2: I'm in the same boat as you, Chrisive. I think
Speaker 2: people get confused because I do believe we live in
Speaker 2: a deterministic universe, but that doesn't necessarily mean that everything
Speaker 2: is predetermined. I mean, if it is, then we certainly
Speaker 2: as humans don't know about it, right. We don't have
Speaker 2: all the information or variables to predict the things that
Speaker 2: we'd want to know exactly in our lives. So it's
Speaker 2: almost a point in a way. I think people kind
Speaker 2: of overemphasize this, especially Christians who criticize our points. They're like, well,
Speaker 2: you just think everything like nothing matters because we don't
Speaker 2: have free will. And it's like, that doesn't mean that
Speaker 2: like we can't like interact with the world. It just
Speaker 2: means that there's determinists to play. It's it's a little
Speaker 2: bit more complicated.
Speaker 1: I guess if it feels like I'm making a decision,
Speaker 1: then as far as I'm concerned at the level of experience,
Speaker 1: I'm making a decision and make some good ones.
Speaker 2: Exactly and I and that's not me necessarily like promoting
Speaker 2: compatibilism in a way. I'm just saying it's it's a
Speaker 2: little bit more nuanced than what people give it credit
Speaker 2: for when we talk about this. But yeah, is a
Speaker 2: universe deterministic or does it? Is it made of determinist systems? Yeah?
Speaker 2: I think so. Yeah.
Speaker 9: Like, So the reason why I asked that because like
Speaker 9: I feel like there's a comment like it's both things
Speaker 9: that are happening. Like there's a like, let's say there's
Speaker 9: one hundred percent will because that by definition just like will,
Speaker 9: like like in terms of like there's like agentic will,
Speaker 9: and then there's non agentic like predetermined just big bang
Speaker 9: force will. So like I feel like, you know, genetics
Speaker 9: is more like there's a significant aspect of like molecular
Speaker 9: dynamics that is more on the side of like big
Speaker 9: bang force. And then you know, there's our experiential like
Speaker 9: day to day side of things where we're conscious of
Speaker 9: our experience and like having that feedback loop into our
Speaker 9: like like continuous decision making process. And I see in
Speaker 9: the fact that like when I dream, like when I'm dreaming,
Speaker 9: maybe you guys might relate to this my sense like
Speaker 9: I feel like an objective change in my ability to
Speaker 9: control my environment and myself, so like I can't when
Speaker 9: I'm dreaming. I can observe and feel like more creative
Speaker 9: control and like environmental control, but I lose the ability
Speaker 9: to like be feeling my body and being like one
Speaker 9: with my whole physical experience in the dream. So like
Speaker 9: there's like a change.
Speaker 1: I think we have to acknowledge that that experience is
Speaker 1: a subjective one, that there is no objective increase in control.
Speaker 1: If anything, Dreams are just an important reminder to me
Speaker 1: that we shape our own realities. But I'm struggling with
Speaker 1: how any of this gets us closer to or further
Speaker 1: away from free will and or the existence of a god.
Speaker 9: Okay, So I think that it's like I don't for
Speaker 9: one thing, for like on the free will side, I
Speaker 9: don't think that anything has like total will. I think
Speaker 9: we have like partial will that doesn't necessarily like control
Speaker 9: any system completely.
Speaker 2: But uh yeah, I'd say about ten percent luck, twenty
Speaker 2: percent skill, fifteen percent concentrated power of will. Right, That's
Speaker 2: what I would say. Sorry, that's a bad joke.
Speaker 9: If no, no, I get it. Yeah, so and then
Speaker 9: so like what that has to say about like a
Speaker 9: god or like yeah, I mean I'm not sure because
Speaker 9: I feel like if you know, like what like if
Speaker 9: we're there's like extra physical uh creator version of a
Speaker 9: god or there's like the pan theist uh just like
Speaker 9: latent energy space of like definition of a god. I
Speaker 9: mean if like I'm sort of like in the camp
Speaker 9: where you know, if I just go with with from
Speaker 9: what I'm seeing, like that is the universe. I think
Speaker 9: that there's like some cyclical aspect and like, but I
Speaker 9: can't really explain like why anything exists besides like the
Speaker 9: necessity for like structural coherence, Like I feel like I
Speaker 9: can't really It's like it's like it's almost like the
Speaker 9: universe is.
Speaker 2: Saying, uh, you don't.
Speaker 9: You can't have anything without an uncontrollable uh like a
Speaker 9: completely uncontrollable force to drive the medium, like to drive
Speaker 9: continuity forward for the non deterministic, nondetermined aspects of reality
Speaker 9: like for life.
Speaker 1: I mean, I mean, Nick, I recognize that these concepts
Speaker 1: are incredibly challenging and confusing in a lot of ways.
Speaker 1: And I don't mean to pick on you, but when
Speaker 1: you say that you don't know how to explain. I
Speaker 1: do find myself this deep into the call really unclear
Speaker 1: on what it is that you were even attempting to explain.
Speaker 1: Can you help us a little bit, because I know
Speaker 1: one aspect of this type of philosophy is just how
Speaker 1: tempting it is to get overwhelmed by it and to
Speaker 1: maybe feel this like existential dread and then just kind
Speaker 1: of start grabbing things and shoving them together and putting
Speaker 1: the word quantum in front of it and like trying
Speaker 1: to use it to justify some sort of worldview without
Speaker 1: having wrapped our head around each of the individual concepts.
Speaker 1: Can you break it down for me a little bit,
Speaker 1: or maybe even just bottom line it too. What does
Speaker 1: any of this mean?
Speaker 6: Well?
Speaker 9: So, I think that if there's anything that like is
Speaker 9: pretty like like.
Speaker 3: If anything is going to say.
Speaker 9: Anything about whether or not like a god exists, I
Speaker 9: think that like the fact that there's a like dead
Speaker 9: at like like non agentic aspects of reality and then
Speaker 9: agentic ones. I feel like that if anything would give
Speaker 9: up what's a clue about like the origins of the
Speaker 9: universe in life?
Speaker 1: Yeah, if we could ever separate them out though, yea, right, Like,
Speaker 1: how how do we know that we are being agentic
Speaker 1: in any meaningful way, or how that isn't just again
Speaker 1: another sequence of predetermined things like did I take a
Speaker 1: sip of water because I wanted to or did I
Speaker 1: take a sip of water because my throat was dry?
Speaker 1: What the hell is the difference? And where does any
Speaker 1: of that Like if we could somehow separate these things
Speaker 1: out too, am I truly making a choice? Or is
Speaker 1: the choice just predetermined by all of the other things
Speaker 1: that led up to that choice? Perhaps there could be
Speaker 1: some insight there into the choices that led to this
Speaker 1: universe existing. But I'm really struggling with like that idea
Speaker 1: that we could ever get there.
Speaker 9: Right, So do you think that we could there's like
Speaker 9: a mechanistic way to differentiate between like an agent and
Speaker 9: a non agent, not that I.
Speaker 1: Can understand or not that I'm aware of.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I don't think so.
Speaker 3: Uh.
Speaker 2: You know, Like the thing with these is we have
Speaker 2: to ask ourselves could we have done different?
Speaker 3: Right?
Speaker 2: And I don't know how answerable of a question that
Speaker 2: even is. And when you bring gotten to the equation,
Speaker 2: if you ask could God have done different? If the
Speaker 2: answer to that is no, then that seems to be
Speaker 2: just as deterministic as anything else, right, So yeah, I
Speaker 2: don't know. This is this is one of the problems
Speaker 2: of our times that's even more situated with the rise
Speaker 2: of AI and whatnot. So yeah, I'm not gonna I'm
Speaker 2: not gonna be that guy that's gonna have all the
Speaker 2: answers for you.
Speaker 7: Yeah.
Speaker 6: Uh yeah.
Speaker 9: I think like if we if we can, like the
Speaker 9: way that I know, we haven't like explained about a
Speaker 9: genesis yet, like we haven't like come together completely in
Speaker 9: the scientific community to like fully like mechanistically explain biogenesis.
Speaker 9: But I think, like if I go on like my
Speaker 9: hunch about like what it's gonna involve, like in the explanation,
Speaker 9: if when we get there, it's like whatever, the initial
Speaker 9: conditions are, like whatever it led up to, the initial
Speaker 9: conditions for like the formation event is whatever. But like
Speaker 9: the formation event sort of would necessitate like like weightless
Speaker 9: a weightless environment or like a near weightless environment inside
Speaker 9: an encapsulation like an encapsulated barrier. I feel like the
Speaker 9: weightlessness is sort of like homeostatic in and for me,
Speaker 9: what that like It's like an environment that like reduces
Speaker 9: the styles uh like of scope of like of locality
Speaker 9: for non deterministic events to happen. So it's just like,
Speaker 9: I don't know there's some power in weightlessness that I
Speaker 9: can't really fully COMPREHENDI.
Speaker 1: I don't know if weightlessness is necessary for a biogenesis.
Speaker 1: I don't know that we know what is necessary for
Speaker 1: a biogenesis. And I definitely don't know that I am
Speaker 1: following where you get your hunch from or why that's
Speaker 1: necessarily compelling. I think the last thing I would really
Speaker 1: say about any of this, nick is just from the
Speaker 1: perspective of the very applied philosophy of clinical counseling, is
Speaker 1: I would say that, yeah, it's probably likely true that
Speaker 1: we aren't making these choices, except that we are just
Speaker 1: following a series of choices that have already been made.
Speaker 1: Or maybe they're not even choices, maybe they are just
Speaker 1: things that happen. And part of that still empowers us
Speaker 1: to be introspective about who we are as people and
Speaker 1: what we want out of life and what we want
Speaker 1: to do about any of it. None of it gives
Speaker 1: us the ability to forecasts or or understand things that
Speaker 1: we simply don't understand, and it doesn't make the existential
Speaker 1: void of is there a God, or why are we
Speaker 1: here or why do we exist? Any different?
Speaker 8: Yeah?
Speaker 9: Yeah, with regards of the like determinism thing like, for example,
Speaker 9: I can't transform into a dragon right now. I can,
Speaker 9: you know, feel like I really want to, and I
Speaker 9: can maybe try to change how much harder I feel
Speaker 9: that I want to change into a dragon, But like
Speaker 9: the mechanistic scope of like possibility isn't there, Like it's
Speaker 9: not physically possible, But then there's like physically possible, there's
Speaker 9: like the physically possible scope of things that can happen
Speaker 9: from whatever the now is. And if we have like
Speaker 9: a coherent understanding of like those option like options, different
Speaker 9: options in that scope, and we're aware of that, I
Speaker 9: feel like that's the indicative of like will.
Speaker 1: I'm not I.
Speaker 9: Wouldn't say that it's like evidentiary of like like free
Speaker 9: reign type of will, but I would.
Speaker 6: I don't know.
Speaker 1: You're still assuming that it is impossible for you to
Speaker 1: transform into a dragon, but it is possible to do
Speaker 1: all of these other things. And I guess I'm just
Speaker 1: not there yet. I'm not convinced that just because we
Speaker 1: haven't seen something doesn't mean that it can't theoretically be possible,
Speaker 1: but I'm not sure how much further we can get
Speaker 1: in all of this, and so much of it is conjecture, Dan,
Speaker 1: or are you comfortable with leaving it there? I think
Speaker 1: I'm good leave it there.
Speaker 2: I mean, look, at this point in the process, you
Speaker 2: want to refer to the people who have written whole
Speaker 2: books about this stuff that have way to define terms,
Speaker 2: have way better concise explanations about the things that we're
Speaker 2: going into here, because ultimately you and I are layman's
Speaker 2: on this subject, and we can give our perspectives, and
Speaker 2: I think that's about as far as we can go,
Speaker 2: you know.
Speaker 1: Yeah, to that end, I personally enjoyed Determined by Robert Sapalski. Dan,
Speaker 1: I don't know if you co signed that one, but yeah,
Speaker 1: keep reading and Nick, we really appreciate you giving it
Speaker 1: a try with us, and give it.
Speaker 2: Us a call all ready? Thank you have it right day?
Speaker 2: All right?
Speaker 1: Yeah, let's sneak in one more quick call before we
Speaker 1: start to wrap up today and hear from Michelle. I
Speaker 1: know that Michelle has been waiting for a good long while.
Speaker 1: So what's on your mind today, Michelle?
Speaker 6: Well, I was thinking throughout the calls, and I thought
Speaker 6: that I would rephrase my question. The way I had
Speaker 6: it phrased was does gepticism presuppose belief or end or faith? However,
Speaker 6: I thought that that would put me in a rock
Speaker 6: and a hard space to prove, because the way I
Speaker 6: have it understood that presupposition will argue men's work. Is
Speaker 6: that the thing like, if I would say, well, does
Speaker 6: does does skepticism pretty supposed to believe? That would mean
Speaker 6: I was saying that you start with belief, and that's
Speaker 6: the ground that would be the ground for the skepticism. However,
Speaker 6: I want to change that around and say does skepticism?
Speaker 6: Must there be a sense of a sense of belief
Speaker 6: with our skepticism? Must we always be mixing our skepticism
Speaker 6: with the question of like, hey, does God exist?
Speaker 7: Maybe?
Speaker 6: Does do pixie do? Pixie?
Speaker 2: Parting?
Speaker 6: Universe?
Speaker 3: Arting pixies is good?
Speaker 6: Anything like supernatural spirit goes after life, anything of the sort, aliens, exterterrestrials.
Speaker 6: Can we say that anything of the sort exists? Should we?
Speaker 6: Should we at least dare to say maybe? Or gee?
Speaker 2: Kind of like that?
Speaker 1: Go I'm not sure I follow the question?
Speaker 2: How about you? Yeah, Well, you started off with an
Speaker 2: interesting question which was does skepticism presupposed beliefs? That's a
Speaker 2: that's a very interesting question. But then you said you
Speaker 2: want to change your question, and I'm not sure what
Speaker 2: the changed question was. Can you give us, like one
Speaker 2: sentence version of what the change question is?
Speaker 6: Yeah, tell me, Dan, maybe you could tell me?
Speaker 2: Do I like?
Speaker 6: Am I wrong when I say that if my question
Speaker 6: is does pre does skepticism presupposed belief? Am I wrong
Speaker 6: to say that? By saying that, I mean that we
Speaker 6: must believe first in something supernatural let's say, for example,
Speaker 6: and then we must be doubtful. Or can we just
Speaker 6: say we take a belief in skepticism at the same
Speaker 6: time and we're all the better for it, You know
Speaker 6: what I mean? You know I'm getting that now.
Speaker 1: I think skepticism is just the degree of maybe humility
Speaker 1: with which we hold a belief.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's different perspectives, because philosophy is a wide ranging field,
Speaker 2: and they have different ideas and diferent perspectives on what
Speaker 2: skepticism is. Interestingly, though, there is a line of thought
Speaker 2: that says skepticism is a materialist perspective, right, And what
Speaker 2: I mean by that is the suspension of this belief right,
Speaker 2: or the suspension of belief in particular claims. Generally, generally,
Speaker 2: the trend is it comes from some line of observation,
Speaker 2: whether it's through logical reasoning or in more recent years,
Speaker 2: through scientific observation. That's very interesting, right, because there is
Speaker 2: a trust there that's inherent to the scientific method in
Speaker 2: understanding whether things are true or not. So in one sense,
Speaker 2: you could say there's a presupposition there, but that's only
Speaker 2: if you hold the scientific method to be a reliable
Speaker 2: arbiter of what's true. Maybe you have skepticism, but you're
Speaker 2: from a maybe you're a psychic or a believer, and
Speaker 2: you're skeptical of people who say that being psychic stuff
Speaker 2: isn't real. You know, it kind of cuts both ways
Speaker 2: in that sense. So there's very specific context in which
Speaker 2: we use the word skeptics, or which skepticism has used
Speaker 2: in philosophy there. So I guess, like many answers, it
Speaker 2: kind of depends. But I don't think you'd necessarily be
Speaker 2: wrong in saying it could presuppose belief. It just again,
Speaker 2: really depends on how you're defining that.
Speaker 1: I guess.
Speaker 6: I guess right now, can we move into maybe really
Speaker 6: quickly defining belief and faith and maybe and then move
Speaker 6: it back to skepticism because for me, I can believe,
Speaker 6: for example, like for me, belief involves a certain amount
Speaker 6: of certainty about something. For me, I can believe that
Speaker 6: if I go to my refriger right now, refrigerator right now,
Speaker 6: that there might be a soda pop in there waiting
Speaker 6: for me. You know, maybe I put one in there
Speaker 6: the other day and I forgot about it, and maybe like, oh,
Speaker 6: it's in there. Maybe it's not to someone drank it
Speaker 6: on me. Or I can have faith that it's in there.
Speaker 6: I have no evidence whatsoever. I didn't put it in there.
Speaker 6: I don't remember putting in there. Maybe I'm going on
Speaker 6: faith that maybe someone put one in there for me
Speaker 6: and it's cold, just waiting for me. But I have
Speaker 6: no evidence whatsoever. But I can hope. That's faith when
Speaker 6: you have no evidence to promote or give you any
Speaker 6: or to give you anything to bounce back to belief on,
Speaker 6: you know what I mean. Yeah, So, and then and
Speaker 6: then we move back to skepticism and we judge our beliefs.
Speaker 6: We move back into skepticism, and then we say, well,
Speaker 6: here's here's where I'm skeptical about this phase part of
Speaker 6: the thing, and when I'm believing, and then here's my
Speaker 6: skepticism about my belief.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I mean, there's no necessarily wrong answers here,
Speaker 2: because belief has been defined in various capacities. If you notice,
Speaker 2: when Christy and I talked to particularly theists, we are
Speaker 2: usually going to be the first ones to ask, what
Speaker 2: do you mean by faith? What do you mean by
Speaker 2: a belief right? Because that's always going to be rooted
Speaker 2: in individual perspectives. I mean, Christian and I may have
Speaker 2: much more define, more rigorous ideas of that, but on
Speaker 2: the man on the street kind of person, maybe right,
Speaker 2: and it may take a bit to tease that out.
Speaker 2: So like belief to me is more like an attitude
Speaker 2: about something right. So I acknowledge the subjective, inherent perspectivism
Speaker 2: that comes with a belief. I might define knowledge as
Speaker 2: a justified true belief, but even then there's problems with
Speaker 2: how you consider something to be a justified true belief,
Speaker 2: very very famously gettier problems and whatnot that come with
Speaker 2: that kind of philosophy. So I'm not going to say
Speaker 2: you're wrong on your definition there, Michelle. In fact, I
Speaker 2: think that's a pretty well thought out answer, because I
Speaker 2: don't think there is going to be one answer to
Speaker 2: this question. I think it's going to be based on
Speaker 2: the individual. But what do you think, Christy?
Speaker 1: Well, and it really is, like you said, more of
Speaker 1: a question of linguistics than philosophy at this stage in
Speaker 1: the game, Like how do we define belief absence of
Speaker 1: skepticism or vice versa. I, you know, I'm fine with
Speaker 1: some of the definitions that we've come up with. I
Speaker 1: don't know how functional all of this is when we
Speaker 1: act start to talk to people about what it is that.
Speaker 2: They believe and why.
Speaker 1: And I, you know, I'm not necessarily somebody who holds
Speaker 1: up skepticism as a incredible virtue. I know that that's
Speaker 1: a common talking point in this community. And I think
Speaker 1: that I'll stick with my sort of earlier definition of humility.
Speaker 1: You know, it's just about holding the beliefs that we
Speaker 1: hold with a certain amount of hesitation or a certain
Speaker 1: amount of humility about their certainty and their assuredness.
Speaker 6: Yeah, if I may give an example, a brief example,
Speaker 6: I kind of like to think about it. Well, I'm
Speaker 6: certain and I am a gnostic about the fact that
Speaker 6: if I jump out of a plane at thirty thousand
Speaker 6: feet in the air without a parachute on either a
Speaker 6: I'm going to break every bone in my body and
Speaker 6: somehow contradictor to ely survive that accident, or I'm going
Speaker 6: to die. I'm a gnostic about those facts. Those are facts,
Speaker 6: but the true fact I am, not, however, confident or
Speaker 6: have the conviction enough to say or an astic enough
Speaker 6: to say that I know that God exists, that I'm
Speaker 6: going to live internally in a sola the kingdom that
Speaker 6: I don't want to forever.
Speaker 2: Yeah, this is.
Speaker 6: How is that for an example?
Speaker 2: Well, this is the this is the problem of atheist
Speaker 2: uh atheist activism as a whole. We're always going to
Speaker 2: be on the back foot when it comes to this,
Speaker 2: right because there's a million God beliefs and there's only
Speaker 2: one of us. And and the way that we even
Speaker 2: define our our atheism is contentious. There's different ideas about this.
Speaker 2: Should we define it as a positive claim or should
Speaker 2: we define it as a lack of belief. There's there's
Speaker 2: all kinds of different conversations about this, and and I
Speaker 2: think that that nuance gets lost on a lot of
Speaker 2: people because it's it's just not it doesn't come up
Speaker 2: in carmon conversation. I certainly wasn't taught about the nuances
Speaker 2: of the atheist position when I was a Christian, Okay,
Speaker 2: So you know, there's there's always going to be different
Speaker 2: ideas to this. But you know how I like to
Speaker 2: look at it is I have a lot of different
Speaker 2: ideas that I've encountered about God in particular, and I
Speaker 2: do reject openly some of these ideas. I'm not conclusive
Speaker 2: about some ideas, like a God that is completely outside
Speaker 2: of the known material universe. Sure, how can I know
Speaker 2: about the existence of one or not? I can be
Speaker 2: agnostic about that. But you know, as far as the
Speaker 2: Yahweh of the Bible, of the semic tribes, you know, yeah,
Speaker 2: I don't think that that one's going to be it chief,
Speaker 2: I don't think that one's real. So, you know, like
Speaker 2: that's my take on a lot of this, But I
Speaker 2: can only say that in so many words, right, And
Speaker 2: it's hard to sort of give that kind of nuance
Speaker 2: when talking to people about this, which is why many
Speaker 2: people are confused about the atheist position, what it actually
Speaker 2: means or what it means to most people, right right.
Speaker 6: Dan, if I may ask really quickly before we end
Speaker 6: in the call, I think and this is a great
Speaker 6: suggestion because I one thing that I've watched a lot
Speaker 6: of the shows on this line and some others on
Speaker 6: the ACA and some other abist call and shows. ACA
Speaker 6: is the best, of course on on on TV. But
Speaker 6: I think you guys should have someone on that believes
Speaker 6: lightly at least in a creator being an interview them
Speaker 6: and take calls with them, and they actually have them
Speaker 6: answer calls with you guys.
Speaker 2: I mean I do do that untruth wanted from time
Speaker 2: to time. Yeah, my last Christian guest was on a
Speaker 2: couple of months.
Speaker 1: Ago, things along those lines. But yeah, yeah, So if
Speaker 1: you have somebody in mind, if there's a particular person
Speaker 1: you want to recommend, we're always taking those recommendations. I mean,
Speaker 1: shoot us an email TV at Atheist hipeencommunity dot org
Speaker 1: there's somebody who's interested in talking to us. You know,
Speaker 1: I'm not going to guarantee an interview to anybody, but
Speaker 1: I know our producers would be interested to speak to them.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I'm proud to say that I host the only
Speaker 2: Atheist Community of Austin show that has had openly theist
Speaker 2: people on as as guests, not just as callers.
Speaker 1: Only currently running shows, only currently running, only currently Well again, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's true, that's true.
Speaker 2: I should Yeah, you're right, I should clarify on that.
Speaker 2: But you know it has I'll be honest. It's hard
Speaker 2: to find people, Michelle that can still vibe with us
Speaker 2: enough that we can make it an hour and a
Speaker 2: half without it turning into a ship show. Right, So
Speaker 2: there's a give and take with that, and some people
Speaker 2: don't even like it when we do it, by the way,
Speaker 2: but I think those end up being some of the
Speaker 2: most interesting content that we produce. But that's my take, Dan.
Speaker 6: I think I could. I think I could body with
Speaker 6: you guys if you would just have beyond.
Speaker 2: Oh come on, Michelle, you can't, you can't. You can't
Speaker 2: do this. You can't. Don't. Don't beg for the spot process.
Speaker 2: It's a thing, a show.
Speaker 1: You appreciate your phone call.
Speaker 6: I'm getting people in chat. You know, I'm not watching
Speaker 6: the live stream, but I know't get people in chats.
Speaker 2: They have or on have her on, Michelle.
Speaker 1: Well, we'll see if there's a groundswell of movement. Thank
Speaker 1: you so much for your call. And for your time,
Speaker 1: and we hope you have a great Sunday afternoon.
Speaker 2: Yeah. On that note, any inqueries that you that go
Speaker 2: to the show should go to TV at Atheist typeencommunity
Speaker 2: dot org. Okay, we're not going to negotiate terms about
Speaker 2: potential guests live on the air. Okay, that's just not
Speaker 2: a thing, not going to happen.
Speaker 1: So not how these interviews work. Yeah, yeah, there is
Speaker 1: a little bit of a process. Somehow Dan and I
Speaker 1: got through it. But there is a process that exists.
Speaker 1: But no, Dan, it's it's been a fun show. We've
Speaker 1: had a good time. Let's get Aeron back up and
Speaker 1: we can talk about it and wrap start the wrap
Speaker 1: things up.
Speaker 2: Yes, today, let's do it.
Speaker 1: Aaron, how did we do? Were we worthy of being
Speaker 1: hosts on this network? Have we gone through the process?
Speaker 2: Have we done it?
Speaker 4: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Ten out of ten would recommend yes.
Speaker 4: Yes, great, fabulous, fabulous show, great calls.
Speaker 2: Uh, you would never see otherwise, right, Aaron? You always
Speaker 2: tell us, you always tell us the truth.
Speaker 4: Sure, sure, yeah, you'd always tell me the truth, right right,
Speaker 4: it's mutual.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, anyway, called, I.
Speaker 4: Really like Tom's phrase. I'm not sure where he got
Speaker 4: it from. But ponderously unaware of religion. I kind of
Speaker 4: kind of sure that the government ship ponderously unaware of religion.
Speaker 4: I think that would help a lot.
Speaker 2: If it was actually like that. And D's you guys
Speaker 2: talked about.
Speaker 4: The cult of cult versus religion, and I heard that
Speaker 4: defined once as the difference between a cult and a
Speaker 4: religion is how hard it.
Speaker 6: Is to leave.
Speaker 4: The harder it is to leave, the more cultish it is.
Speaker 2: Oh. I like that. Yeah.
Speaker 4: And then as far as beliefs are concerned with Michelle's
Speaker 4: last call, I I like Steve jobs adage where you
Speaker 4: held strong opinions loosely held strong opinions, where you're you're
Speaker 4: easily convinced. You believe what you believe strongly, but you
Speaker 4: can always all your beliefs are subject to change at anytime,
Speaker 4: given new evidence, given new persuasive arguments.
Speaker 2: Whatever. That is?
Speaker 1: That nothing that a lack of pride, a lack of
Speaker 1: preciousness around some of these things, humbleness and willingness to
Speaker 1: you know, embrace change. I appreciate that.
Speaker 2: Yep, so beautiful.
Speaker 1: Well so for folks who still want to weigh in
Speaker 1: in the comments for the video, what was our our
Speaker 1: question of the week this week.
Speaker 4: Oh, our question of the week this week was what
Speaker 4: is what would Jesus as a rapper name be?
Speaker 3: Right?
Speaker 2: Please? Oh my god. We did not deliver today, folks, but.
Speaker 4: I'd probably go with King Cross or something like that.
Speaker 2: Crosses King Cross. All right, actually place, no, that was?
Speaker 2: That was much better? Yeah, yeah, all right? Today?
Speaker 1: Well, anybody all are sending out loverings to today are
Speaker 1: certainly our crew and everybody who helped us get this going,
Speaker 1: especially since I so often forget to bring ups up
Speaker 1: to that camera shot and to let us let us
Speaker 1: see their beautiful faces. Who else y'all got?
Speaker 4: You're talking to me?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 5: Who you talking?
Speaker 1: Anybody else? Y'all send it out lover rings to oh
Speaker 1: oh oh gosh.
Speaker 2: Everybody everyone out there sending it to the Happy Pride Month,
Speaker 2: say it to the Friology Et plus community.
Speaker 4: You know, anybody who needs a community, is looking for
Speaker 4: to belong somewhere.
Speaker 2: This is your community, right.
Speaker 1: Absolutely, absolutely, absolutely so.
Speaker 2: Uh.
Speaker 1: If you don't believe this is your community, we appreciate
Speaker 1: you being here. If you do believe, we definitely don't
Speaker 1: hate you.
Speaker 2: We're just noting, not convinced we did it. We want
Speaker 2: the truth. So watch Truth Wanted live Fridays at seven
Speaker 2: pm Central Call five one two nine nine two four two,
Speaker 2: or visit tiny dot cc forward slash call tw yeah
Speaker 5: Can lea