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Speaker 2: Hello and welcome to my channel Vice Rhino. Here today
Speaker 2: we're looking at a video that I became aware of
Speaker 2: when TMM and Professor Plink made their responses to it,
Speaker 2: and the premise sounded interesting enough that I decided I
Speaker 2: wanted to have a go. I have avoided watching more
Speaker 2: than the introductory sections from either of the other videos
Speaker 2: in order to avoid just copying their homework, but given
Speaker 2: how unoriginal most apologetic stuff is, I imagine there will
Speaker 2: be a fair amount of overlap. So this video is
Speaker 2: called Dear Atheist, ten Things you should Stop saying. This
Speaker 2: has a chance to actually be a good and thoughtful video,
Speaker 2: because there are things that I have seen atheists say
Speaker 2: that I think hurt the atheist cause more than help it.
Speaker 2: So let's see if that's where he goes with it.
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Speaker 3: So thank you, dear atheists.
Speaker 4: As a theist, as a Christian, I want to ask
Speaker 4: you to stop doing ten things. Okay, ten things is
Speaker 4: what I'm imploring you to stop doing when talking to
Speaker 4: or debating with a Christian someone like me.
Speaker 2: Well, I'll start my video by offering you a couple
Speaker 2: suggestions for yours. First, if you're dead set on the
Speaker 2: typical apologist, look at all the books I want you
Speaker 2: to think I read background. You need to be farther
Speaker 2: away from the book so that the camera's auto focus
Speaker 2: can figure out that there's a person there that should
Speaker 2: be in focus. If space is an issue, get someone
Speaker 2: to manually focus it for you. Second, you don't need
Speaker 2: to have hand gestures for everything you say. If you're
Speaker 2: just naturally a gestury guy. That is fine, but don't
Speaker 2: squish yourself to make sure the gestures are visible on camera.
Speaker 2: It makes it look rather awkward. I am not pointing
Speaker 2: these out to be like, oh, look at me, I'm
Speaker 2: so much better at tubing the US than you. I'm
Speaker 2: doing it because these are things that I have also
Speaker 2: had issues with in the past. Though this is probably
Speaker 2: pointless now. This channel's more recent videos are mostly just
Speaker 2: recordings of him getting sermons in a church, so I
Speaker 2: don't know I'll do with this what you will.
Speaker 4: First off, stop claiming that Theists or Christians have the
Speaker 4: burden of proof for proving God's existence.
Speaker 2: Why to read the paragraph that you've got on screen quote,
Speaker 2: the burden of proof is on the person who makes
Speaker 2: the claim, not on the person who denies or questions
Speaker 2: the claim. The fallacy of the burden of proof occurs
Speaker 2: when someone who is making a claim puts the burden
Speaker 2: of proof on another party to disprove what they are claiming.
Speaker 2: You are claiming that there is a God. I question
Speaker 2: that claim. At what point in this transaction do you
Speaker 2: not have the burden of proof?
Speaker 4: How burden of proof works? Is anybody making a claim
Speaker 4: has to back that claim up.
Speaker 2: You claim there's a God, I am asking you to
Speaker 2: back that claim up, easy peasy.
Speaker 4: So if I were to say God does exist, I
Speaker 4: do have the burden of proof. I will have to
Speaker 4: try to prove that.
Speaker 2: Yes. So I am still confused as to why you
Speaker 2: think I should stop pointing out that it's a reversal
Speaker 2: of the burden of proof for you to then turn
Speaker 2: around and say prove God doesn't exist when I ask
Speaker 2: you for evidence.
Speaker 3: If you say God does not exist, you.
Speaker 4: Are making a claim and you have to prove that
Speaker 4: argument right there.
Speaker 2: Sure, I'd agree that if an atheist is claiming that
Speaker 2: there are no gods, then that would place the burden
Speaker 2: of proof on the atheists. You know what, I'm actually
Speaker 2: going to agree with this. Atheists should stop telling apologists
Speaker 2: that they have the burden of proof. But not because
Speaker 2: the apologists don't have the burden of proof, rather because
Speaker 2: burden of proof isn't really useful concept in normal conversations.
Speaker 2: If you are in a formal debate, then sure it
Speaker 2: is good to establish at the beginning who has the
Speaker 2: burden of proof, and that will depend on the phrasing
Speaker 2: of the proposition being debated, But in normal conversation, the
Speaker 2: burden of proof doesn't necessarily lie with the person making
Speaker 2: the claim. Rather, it lies with the person who is
Speaker 2: actually trying to convince the other person that they are right.
Speaker 2: If you are trying to convince me that there is
Speaker 2: a God, I ask for evidence and your response is
Speaker 2: to tell me to prove that there is not a God,
Speaker 2: then I'm probably going to write you off as someone
Speaker 2: who isn't worth engaging with. Likewise, if an atheist is
Speaker 2: trying to convince a Christian that there is no God,
Speaker 2: falling back to telling the Christian that they have the
Speaker 2: burden of proof so they need to prove atheism wrong
Speaker 2: is not likely to be taken seriously. And this is
Speaker 2: true regardless of whether the atheist formulates their position as
Speaker 2: there are no gods or I am not convinced of
Speaker 2: your claim that there is a God. Arguing over the
Speaker 2: burden of proof will at best and in a technical
Speaker 2: gatcha that will change the way someone states their position,
Speaker 2: but changes no minds. So arguing over the burden of
Speaker 2: proof is largely pointless in most scenarios. Functionally speaking, the
Speaker 2: burden lies with the person who cares about convincing the
Speaker 2: other person irrespective of how their position is stated. Such
Speaker 2: a person would be better served by actually arguing for
Speaker 2: their position rather than trying to convince their interlocutor that
Speaker 2: they don't have to because of some philosophical technicality.
Speaker 4: Second thing, please stop saying that Christians have a blind faith.
Speaker 2: That's not something I've been a fan of saying. But
Speaker 2: the Bible does define faith as the conviction of things
Speaker 2: not seen. So if you're not happy with faith being blind,
Speaker 2: maybe take that up with God.
Speaker 4: There is nothing about Christianity that requires or even that God.
Speaker 3: Asks for a blind faith.
Speaker 4: I don't know.
Speaker 2: I feel like asking people to believe that a guy
Speaker 2: came back from the dead based on nothing but accounts
Speaker 2: found in ancient books kind of fits that description. There
Speaker 2: are all sorts of miraculous claims found in all sorts
Speaker 2: of ancient books, Christian or otherwise, many of which, including
Speaker 2: a lot of the Christian ones, Christians themselves do not accept.
Speaker 2: Read some of the apocryphal Gospel. Sometime asking us to
Speaker 2: believe one specific magic claim from one specific ancient book
Speaker 2: with nothing aside from the claims of that book, as
Speaker 2: the evidence is essentially blind.
Speaker 3: Faith.
Speaker 2: So, while this is not something that I typically say,
Speaker 2: it is an unfortunate fact for you that your book
Speaker 2: defines faith as blind, and your evidence isn't any better
Speaker 2: than the evidence for, say, Apollonius of Tyana, a first
Speaker 2: century Neo pytheagre and miracle worker who healed the sick
Speaker 2: and was executed by the Romans before his ascension to heaven.
Speaker 2: The evidence for Apollonius is actually better than for Jesus,
Speaker 2: because we potentially have fragments of works that were actually
Speaker 2: authored by him, whereas I'm not aware of anyone even
Speaker 2: claiming that Jesus ever wrote anything himself.
Speaker 4: We're told in the Book of Romans, we're told in
Speaker 4: Psalm nineteen creation bears witness to the Creator.
Speaker 2: And it does so with enough specificity to get you
Speaker 2: to Christianity. Weird then, that no culture has ever developed
Speaker 2: Christianity prior to their contact with Christian missionaries, unless you're
Speaker 2: pivoting to arguing for a deistic God, in which case
Speaker 2: the argument boils down to So I have a hard
Speaker 2: time with the concept that the cause of the universe
Speaker 2: wasn't directed by a thinking being of some kind. Therefore,
Speaker 2: there was a thinking being of some kind. If that's
Speaker 2: the route you want to take, then fine, But look
Speaker 2: at the Trees doesn't prove Christianity. And given that, scientifically speaking,
Speaker 2: cosmologists don't seem to be arguing on the pro God side,
Speaker 2: I'm gonna say that look at the Trees is at
Speaker 2: best inconclusive.
Speaker 4: We're told that the conscience and the law is written
Speaker 4: onto our hearts.
Speaker 2: And yet when we examine hearts under a microscope, it
Speaker 2: seems to be just muscle and connective tissue. Okay, I
Speaker 2: guess that was maybe a touch too literal, although having
Speaker 2: it literally written there would be some pretty neat evidence
Speaker 2: for God and definitely would have been within his ability
Speaker 2: to do. But what that typically means is that we
Speaker 2: all agree on morality. Therefore God is the source of
Speaker 2: our morality, except for when we don't agree on morality,
Speaker 2: in which case that's because of the fall. Now can
Speaker 2: you see how it might not be entirely convincing to
Speaker 2: a non believer if the argument is everyone agrees except
Speaker 2: when they don't, and both are proof of my thing.
Speaker 4: And again those provide evidences of a creator.
Speaker 3: Eh.
Speaker 2: But it's not good evidence though, is it?
Speaker 3: At best?
Speaker 2: It's ambiguous? If it weren't ambiguous, you wouldn't need faith.
Speaker 2: Hence blind faith the convictions of things not seen.
Speaker 4: How blind faith works is non existence. You put faith
Speaker 4: in something that you can't see, you don't have evidence for,
Speaker 4: and I don't believe that's the God of Christian Scripture.
Speaker 2: Okay, let me repeat what he just said so that
Speaker 2: we can all make sure that we heard it right.
Speaker 2: How blind faith works is non existence. You put faith
Speaker 2: in something that you can't see, you don't have evidence for,
Speaker 2: and I don't believe that's the God of Christian Scripture. Guys,
Speaker 2: I must admit I'm at a loss here. I don't
Speaker 2: even know what he's trying to say. Is he saying
Speaker 2: that belief in the non existence of God is what
Speaker 2: actually takes blind faith? If so, then I get why
Speaker 2: he has atheist telling him he's got the burden of
Speaker 2: proof backward. I don't have blind faith in the non
Speaker 2: existence of the God of Christian Scripture. I just don't
Speaker 2: have faith that the God of Christian Scripture is a
Speaker 2: real thing that exists. So that comes back around to
Speaker 2: you wanting to convince me that you are right, and
Speaker 2: me not really caring one way or the other. But
Speaker 2: that was also just me trying to understand an apparently
Speaker 2: nonsensical statement. So I could be wrong here. If you
Speaker 2: think you know what he was talking about, feel free
Speaker 2: to translate it for me down in the comments. Engagement
Speaker 2: bait achieved, lampshading achieved.
Speaker 4: Matter of fact, with evidence, we have the same evidence.
Speaker 3: We have creation, We have the conscience.
Speaker 4: The abstract concepts of thought and love and things like that.
Speaker 2: All of those things have scientific explanations that do not
Speaker 2: require a God. Sure, having a scientific explanation for something
Speaker 2: does not prove that there is no God, but the
Speaker 2: fact that they can be explained without God suggest to
Speaker 2: me that they aren't actually evidence for God.
Speaker 4: So we take these evidences it's called circumstantial evidence indirect evidence,
Speaker 4: and we find out through abductive reasoning which is most
Speaker 4: reasonable to attribute this to a God or to material
Speaker 4: or naturalistic explanations.
Speaker 2: Abductive reasoning is when you reach a conclusion based on
Speaker 2: premisses that are deemed to be more probable than not.
Speaker 2: The way you solve a wordle puzzle is with abductive reasoning.
Speaker 2: The thing about abductive reasoning, though, is that it can
Speaker 2: be true that a premise is more likely than not,
Speaker 2: but still wrong. So, to use the word example, you
Speaker 2: could start out with a word that has an E
Speaker 2: in it on the grounds that E is the most
Speaker 2: common letter in the English language and so you are
Speaker 2: more likely to at least get one green or yellow
Speaker 2: letter on the first try. But if the word that
Speaker 2: day is trail and you guessed evoke, then you'd be
Speaker 2: left with entirely wrong letters despite you getting two ease
Speaker 2: in there for good measure. Using abductive reasoning, one of
Speaker 2: the key tools is Aukham's raiser, the idea that the
Speaker 2: hypothesis that requires the fuse assumptions or entities is the
Speaker 2: most likely, all else being equal. Now, when using nature
Speaker 2: as evidence for God, we both have the same evidence.
Speaker 2: So which explanation requires the fuse assumptions or entities the
Speaker 2: one that doesn't have a God? Does this automatically mean
Speaker 2: it is correct? No, but it does mean that abductive
Speaker 2: reasoning can get you to either conclusion, and in my opinion,
Speaker 2: the version of it that you use to get to
Speaker 2: atheism seems more plausible than the one that leads to God.
Speaker 4: At the end of the day, you got to answer
Speaker 4: yourself one question, did mind come from? Matter or did
Speaker 4: matter come from mind?
Speaker 3: What is mind? No matter? What is matter? Never mind?
Speaker 2: Mind came from matter. Brains exist and are made of matter.
Speaker 2: Changes to the brain result in predictable changes to the mind,
Speaker 2: indicating that the mind is dependent on the matter of
Speaker 2: the brain rather than the other way around. There is
Speaker 2: nothing that I've seen that indicates a mind without a
Speaker 2: brain is even possible, So I find it incredibly hard
Speaker 2: to believe that the most complicated mind in the cosmos
Speaker 2: exists independently of any matter.
Speaker 4: The third thing, please stop denying the fact that you
Speaker 4: have a worldview.
Speaker 2: Okay, I know of zero atheists who think that they
Speaker 2: do not have a worldview. What we will deny is
Speaker 2: that atheism is that worldview. Atheism can certainly inform your worldview,
Speaker 2: but atheism is merely an answer to the question do
Speaker 2: you believe in God? Now? Because people who believe in
Speaker 2: God also have beliefs about things this God wants us
Speaker 2: to do or not do. Being an atheist means that
Speaker 2: we don't have to spend any mental energy wondering if
Speaker 2: our invisible friend is upset at us for failing to
Speaker 2: follow one of their arbitrary rules. So when forming our
Speaker 2: worldview that will likely have an impact. But apologists will
Speaker 2: treat atheists as a monolith and then talk about how
Speaker 2: harmful the atheist worldview is when atheism is not in
Speaker 2: and of itself a worldview.
Speaker 4: If you were an atheist, you may not have what's
Speaker 4: called an atheist worldview, and I understand that. But you
Speaker 4: do hold to a secular worldview, one that is not
Speaker 4: of God and does not have God in it at all.
Speaker 2: So you're asking atheists to stop saying a thing that
Speaker 2: atheists don't say, and that you acknowledge that atheists don't say.
Speaker 2: As to the secular worldview, all secular really means is
Speaker 2: not religious. Now, sure, that would include the I don't
Speaker 2: feel obligated to follow all the arbitrary religious rules thing,
Speaker 2: but that also includes everything you do in your life
Speaker 2: that has nothing to do with religion. Most of a
Speaker 2: religious person's life is secular. It doesn't matter how devout
Speaker 2: you are. You aren't having a prayer session about every
Speaker 2: product you buy at the grocery store. You don't ask
Speaker 2: God which direction to turn to every intersection when you
Speaker 2: know where you're going. You don't sing worship songs as
Speaker 2: you wipe your ass. Well, I mean, maybe you do,
Speaker 2: and that's okay, I won't judge. The point is, secular
Speaker 2: isn't really a worldview either. It's just everything you do
Speaker 2: that's not religious. Again, though being an atheist can certainly
Speaker 2: inform your worldview, an atheist is less likely to think
Speaker 2: that sex outside of me is bad, for instance, but
Speaker 2: that is not the whole of the worldview.
Speaker 4: With this worldview, it is not tenable. It is not
Speaker 4: liveable in society because it breeds subjectivity in relativism.
Speaker 2: See, and that's where you lose us. It's not just hey,
Speaker 2: you guys have a different worldview and I think that
Speaker 2: might be bad. It's you guys have a different worldview,
Speaker 2: and you having a different worldview will end civilization as
Speaker 2: we know it. I actually think this one should be flipped.
Speaker 2: It's not the atheists that should stop saying they don't
Speaker 2: have a worldview. It's that Christians should stop using the
Speaker 2: supposed consequences of the atheist worldview as an argument for Christianity.
Speaker 2: I mean, right from the gate, it's an argument from consequences.
Speaker 2: I don't like what an atheist world looks like. Therefore God,
Speaker 2: but also the supposed consequences of a secular society are
Speaker 2: just wrong. It turns out highly secular countries tend to
Speaker 2: also be much happier ones. Now, does this mean that
Speaker 2: being secular causes society to be happier. No, this is
Speaker 2: a correlation. There isn't enough information to make a causal
Speaker 2: link at the time. But you say that being secular
Speaker 2: leads to all of these horrible outcomes when reality shows
Speaker 2: that to be false. At the very least, we have
Speaker 2: enough information to say that being secular will not cause
Speaker 2: society to descend into chaos. What it really looks like
Speaker 2: is that countries with high levels of individual freedom combined
Speaker 2: with a strong social safety net are the ones that
Speaker 2: wind up being happier. So China, highly secular, is also
Speaker 2: kind of mid when it comes to happiness and is
Speaker 2: pretty low when it comes to freedom. Finland, though, gets
Speaker 2: the number one spot for both freedom and happiness, and
Speaker 2: is also a very secular country, with only thirty three
Speaker 2: percent of fin stating that they believe there is a God,
Speaker 2: forty two percent say that there's some sort of spirit
Speaker 2: or life force, and twenty two percent say that they
Speaker 2: don't believe in any of that. So it looks like
Speaker 2: the combination of freedom and a social safety net are
Speaker 2: the main things that lead to a happy society. It
Speaker 2: just so happens that a secular society is more likely
Speaker 2: to allow for freedom and a social safety net than
Speaker 2: a religious one. Now, if I were at a hazard
Speaker 2: to guess, I would suggest that there is a causal
Speaker 2: link between a highly religious country and one that is
Speaker 2: likely to restrict personal freedoms. God says you can't be gay,
Speaker 2: so we can't allow gay marriage. God says, no sex
Speaker 2: outside of marriage, so there's no need for sex said,
Speaker 2: and contraceptives encourage fornication, so we'd best restrict those while
Speaker 2: we're at it. And the Bible says that anyone who
Speaker 2: looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery
Speaker 2: in their heart, and that we shouldn't place a stumbling
Speaker 2: block before a fellow believer. So I guess all the
Speaker 2: women have to be completely covered up. Religion, with its
Speaker 2: arbitrary rules, leads to a less free society. A less
Speaker 2: free society is a less happy society. Air go, A
Speaker 2: secular society is more likely to be a happy one.
Speaker 4: It doesn't show sacredness of human life.
Speaker 2: I know that's a dog whistle for abortion. Which ties
Speaker 2: back to the freedom thing. If a woman is forced
Speaker 2: to have an unplanned kid, that will drastically reshape her life,
Speaker 2: so taking that choice away from them necessarily restricts their freedom.
Speaker 2: But if we actually want to look at the sanctity
Speaker 2: of life, how about we look at what happens to prisoners.
Speaker 2: The United States has the fifth highest incarceration rate in
Speaker 2: the world, will Finland is chilling down at number one ninety,
Speaker 2: the twenty seventh lowest in the world. The prison system
Speaker 2: in Finland focuses on rehabilitation, figure out what went wrong
Speaker 2: in a person's life that led them to crime and
Speaker 2: fix it. The prison system in the United States focuses
Speaker 2: on retribution. This person did a bad thing, so they
Speaker 2: must be punished for it. As a result, the United
Speaker 2: States forces people, many of whom are guilty of non
Speaker 2: violent crimes that were committed out of desperation, to give
Speaker 2: up large portions of their life, being locked away forced
Speaker 2: into slave labor in many cases, while in Finland they
Speaker 2: are treated as people who need help and just by
Speaker 2: virtue of being living human beings, they are entitled to
Speaker 2: a certain amount of dignity. I feel like helping prisoners
Speaker 2: escape a life of crime in order that they might
Speaker 2: live normal lives. Respects the sanctity of life more than
Speaker 2: they did bad thing once got to lock them up.
Speaker 4: Does like the Christian worldview? Does that God created us,
Speaker 4: me and you in his image. There's a sacredness, there's
Speaker 4: a sanctity of life.
Speaker 2: There's a sanctity of life exclusively for fetuses. Once it's
Speaker 2: an actual living person, they have to fend for themselves.
Speaker 2: How dare you suggest we give kids free lunches at school,
Speaker 2: or provide resources for single parents, or hell, even just
Speaker 2: providing basic health care for people. Finland has socialized health care,
Speaker 2: but you know, forget about that for a moment. I
Speaker 2: live in Canada. We also have socialized health care. Recently,
Speaker 2: one of my kids was that a summer camp and
Speaker 2: the counselor thought that they had a seizure. An ambulance
Speaker 2: was called, a day was spent at the hospital and
Speaker 2: a follow up appointment with pediatrician was arranged. The kid
Speaker 2: is okay. We're not sure exactly what happened that made
Speaker 2: the counselor think it was a seizure, but all the
Speaker 2: medical people are convinced that there wasn't actually a seizure.
Speaker 2: I had a stressful couple of days because of that,
Speaker 2: But do you know what didn't even enter my mind
Speaker 2: the question of how I was gonna pay for it.
Speaker 2: I am happy that the staff at the camp were
Speaker 2: comfortable calling an ambulance rather than worrying that they were
Speaker 2: overreacting and that they'd have to worry about a parent
Speaker 2: suing them for medical expenses. I am happy that they
Speaker 2: just ran the appropriate test without having to argue with
Speaker 2: insurance companies because some grumpy person in a call center
Speaker 2: thinks they might not have been necessary. Canada is more
Speaker 2: secular than the United States, and I would argue that
Speaker 2: the fact that we have socialized health care means that
Speaker 2: we value the sanctity of life more than the United States.
Speaker 3: Four.
Speaker 4: Please stop saying, Please stop saying evil disproves God.
Speaker 2: It's not that evil disproves God per se. It's that
Speaker 2: evil disproves the concept of a benevolent and all powerful God,
Speaker 2: which last I checked, was the God that Christians believed in.
Speaker 2: So evil disproves the Christian God at least.
Speaker 4: Because at best, the presence of evil would maybe discredit
Speaker 4: his character. It may show that he's a malevolent god.
Speaker 4: It may show that he's not loving and caring, but
Speaker 4: at very best that is only disproving or discrediting his character.
Speaker 2: Right, if you're willing to acknowledge that the God you
Speaker 2: believe in is an immoral, malevolent monster, then the problem
Speaker 2: of evil isn't a problem for you. But if you
Speaker 2: want him to be all loving and all powerful, then
Speaker 2: it is.
Speaker 4: Which again, I could flip that right around on you
Speaker 4: and show how evil does point to a loving God.
Speaker 2: I mean, I've seen the apologetic attempt to do this.
Speaker 2: It basically always boils down to one.
Speaker 3: Of two things.
Speaker 2: First, the idea that free will is a greater good
Speaker 2: than evil is evil. Therefore, on balance, allowing free will
Speaker 2: with the evil is better than not allowing free will
Speaker 2: and creating a perfect world, which I'm not sure I
Speaker 2: agree with, and also doesn't account for natural evils like hurricanes, earthquakes,
Speaker 2: and baby cancer. And second is the idea that we
Speaker 2: are incapable of not liking unpleasant things without God as
Speaker 2: a standard of absolute good by which we can compare
Speaker 2: the unpleasant thing and thus determine that it is in
Speaker 2: fact unpleasant. This one just doesn't make any sense to me,
Speaker 2: as I am perfectly capable of not liking things without
Speaker 2: there being an absolute basis for the thing that I
Speaker 2: don't like. I don't want to die, so I don't
Speaker 2: like being murdered. Doesn't matter if a magical sky wizard
Speaker 2: says murder is wrong. I don't want it to happen
Speaker 2: to me, so I can say murder bad.
Speaker 3: Five.
Speaker 4: Stop saying science disproves.
Speaker 2: God, I don't. But science does disprove certain interpretiations of God,
Speaker 2: such as the one that Younger's creationists believe in science
Speaker 2: shows the Earth to not be young or go the
Speaker 2: God of the young Earth creationists can't exist.
Speaker 4: Like I said previously, you gotta either have mind from
Speaker 4: matter or matter from mind. Creation explains the concept of
Speaker 4: consciousness in abstract thought.
Speaker 3: What is love?
Speaker 4: How can two people look at one abstract painting or art,
Speaker 4: one love it and one hate it? Mathematics All these
Speaker 4: things naturalism cannot explain.
Speaker 2: So, setting aside the part of that I already dealt
Speaker 2: with in a previous point, I am interested to know
Speaker 2: why you think the subjectivity of beauty is proof of God.
Speaker 2: The argument from beauty usually relies on the fact that
Speaker 2: many of us have largely similar opinions about aesthetics, but
Speaker 2: you just trot it out an example that shows that
Speaker 2: not to be the case. As to mathematics, that is
Speaker 2: a system that we came up with that described certain
Speaker 2: aspects of the universe. If the universe were different, math
Speaker 2: would also be different.
Speaker 3: Science cannot explain.
Speaker 4: Science may be able to explain how we use the
Speaker 4: atomic bomb, but science can't explain if we should, why
Speaker 4: should it be used or not used?
Speaker 2: Oh, Christianity isn't so great at that either, Given its
Speaker 2: track record, the answer would be nuke everyone who's not
Speaker 2: a Christian. Thank God for secularism.
Speaker 3: Am I right?
Speaker 4: Science only deals with the natural world, not the supernatural,
Speaker 4: which I propose you and I both have to believe
Speaker 4: in a supernatural, beyond natural world.
Speaker 2: Well, then you would just be wrong because I do
Speaker 2: not believe in such a world.
Speaker 4: Six Again, please stop saying there's no historical evidence of Jesus,
Speaker 4: which Joseph is, Pliny the Younger, Tacitus, Lucius of Samasoda.
Speaker 4: You have the Talmud, you have all these authors and writers,
Speaker 4: plus you have the early church fathers.
Speaker 2: Okay, I'm not a mytheicist, but can you at least
Speaker 2: acknowledge that the majority of those are not actually historical
Speaker 2: references to the guy Jesus himself, but rather are references
Speaker 2: to things that Christians believe. But this also isn't a
Speaker 2: straightforward question. What do you mean when you say that
Speaker 2: Jesus existed? If you mean the Gospels are accurate depictions
Speaker 2: of the life of a guy named Jesus, then no,
Speaker 2: even many Christian scholars will disagree with you there.
Speaker 3: Now.
Speaker 2: If you mean the character of Jesus was based on
Speaker 2: a real guy who was probably teaching something similar to
Speaker 2: what we find in the Gospels, then sure, a guy
Speaker 2: with a common name was teaching a fairly common thing
Speaker 2: for the time and was executed in a fairly common
Speaker 2: method by a government that executed people at the drop
Speaker 2: of a hat. I have no problem believing that on
Speaker 2: what winds up being fairly scant evidence. The real question
Speaker 2: comes when we try to figure out what parts of
Speaker 2: the Gospel are based on truth and what parts are legend.
Speaker 2: There is much scholarly debate on this subject. Again, even
Speaker 2: among Christian scholars. It is very much not a matter
Speaker 2: of it must be true. It's in the Bible, and
Speaker 2: as it turns out, it's nearly impossible to suss out
Speaker 2: what parts, if any, are true and what parts are
Speaker 2: later embellishments. So while I would agree that the character
Speaker 2: of Jesus was probably based on a real guy, or
Speaker 2: possibly an amalgamation of multiple real guys, the Jesus that
Speaker 2: is portrayed in the Gospels almost certain did not exist.
Speaker 4: Please stop saying the historicity of Jesus is inaccurate. Even
Speaker 4: your notable atheists recognize that, yes, he was a historical person.
Speaker 3: Please stop using that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, many notable atheists think he was an historical person,
Speaker 2: but many also do not, or at least don't treat
Speaker 2: his existence as an incontrovertible fact. As of twenty fourteen,
Speaker 2: doctor Richard Carrier's list of scholars who were still alive
Speaker 2: at the time and question the historicity of Jesus contained
Speaker 2: forty eight names. Sure, many of them were taking soft
Speaker 2: positions like what I have here, where it's acknowledged that
Speaker 2: the evidence is sparse, but the claim is so mundane
Speaker 2: that sparse evidence is good enough, so they wouldn't necessarily
Speaker 2: call themselves mithsists. But to say that no scholars take
Speaker 2: mythicism seriously is just flat out wrong.
Speaker 4: Seven, stop arguing that religion does not provide any sort
Speaker 4: of scientific advancement.
Speaker 2: It doesn't. Though, best you can claim is that some
Speaker 2: people who happen to be religious also made scientific advancements.
Speaker 2: There are none that I am aware of that actually
Speaker 2: resulted from their religion beliefs.
Speaker 3: Let me read you off some names.
Speaker 4: You probably already heard of.
Speaker 3: Isaac Newton.
Speaker 2: I have heard of Isaac Newton, and you obviously haven't
Speaker 2: heard about his heretical religious beliefs. He was a nontrinitarian
Speaker 2: arian Christian who spent much of his time dabbling in
Speaker 2: the occult.
Speaker 4: Johann Kepler, You got Louis Pasteur, Ernest Walton, Raymond Damadian.
Speaker 4: They are numerous people of religious faith that provide scientific advancements,
Speaker 4: medical advancements, and things like that. Please stop saying religion
Speaker 4: doesn't provide scientific achievements because it dies.
Speaker 2: Did they provide those scientific advancements because of their faith,
Speaker 2: or did they make those advancements and just so happened
Speaker 2: to also be Christian. Because the thing is, most of
Speaker 2: the people you mentioned lived in a time when it
Speaker 2: would have been social suicide to not be Christian. I
Speaker 2: don't think you can really say that their Christian faith
Speaker 2: is what caused their scientific advancements when they likely wouldn't
Speaker 2: have been allowed to do their work if they did
Speaker 2: not first pay homage to the dominant religion. Also shout
Speaker 2: out to the Muslims for inventing algebra. Should we all
Speaker 2: worship a lot? Since Newton wouldn't have been able to
Speaker 2: do much of his work without the foundation laid by
Speaker 2: Muslim mathematicians. Help the Islamic Golden Age basically laid the
Speaker 2: foundation of all of modern science. So I guess we
Speaker 2: should all be Muslim if we're going by the importance
Speaker 2: of scientific advancement, though that probably ignores the contributions of
Speaker 2: the ancient Greeks and Chinese. So huh. Turns out science
Speaker 2: works regardless of your religion. So yeah, Christians have made
Speaker 2: scientific advancements, but Christianity is not responsible for them.
Speaker 3: Number eight.
Speaker 4: Stop saying and asking the question who created God when
Speaker 4: you have the same problem yourself. We both have to
Speaker 4: explain the beginning. We both have to explain the origins.
Speaker 2: Okay, well, let's go back to abductive reasoning and ow
Speaker 2: comes razor. Then we both have a universe that has
Speaker 2: a beginning, and we all want an explanation for that.
Speaker 2: The scientific explanations all involve a bunch of math and
Speaker 2: physics that accurately model how things happen in the real
Speaker 2: world and extrapolate back to the beginning. The Christian explanation
Speaker 2: has the same math and physics to contend with, but
Speaker 2: adds the additional complexity of an omnipotent being that has
Speaker 2: to exist prior to the universe on top of it.
Speaker 2: Auckham's razor would have us discard this extra entity, but
Speaker 2: also like, I don't know is a valid answer when
Speaker 2: it comes to this sort of thing. The theoretical physicists
Speaker 2: are working on it, and they don't seem to think
Speaker 2: that God is a necessary part of any of their equations.
Speaker 2: This actually ties into his last point. The reason we
Speaker 2: say that Christianity stifle scientific progress is because the scientists
Speaker 2: are here saying, hey, we don't know how the universe began,
Speaker 2: but we're working on figuring it out. Well. The Christian
Speaker 2: apologists are saying, they don't know, so it must have
Speaker 2: been God. If we accept that as an answer, we
Speaker 2: potentially miss out on a lot of scientific knowledge that
Speaker 2: could be discovered if we don't just assume that the
Speaker 2: answer was God.
Speaker 4: But our Christian worldview provides a better clarity of the
Speaker 4: first cause than the secular worldview does.
Speaker 2: Is that clarity worth anything if it is wrong? What
Speaker 2: is the point in having a clear answer if the
Speaker 2: answer is not the correct answer?
Speaker 4: Nine, please stop claiming that only stupid people are atheists
Speaker 4: or I'm sorry, well, please stop saying only stupid people
Speaker 4: or brainwashed people or indoctrinated people turn out to be theists.
Speaker 2: So this is one that I would agree with, but
Speaker 2: the way he handled his mispeak there makes me less
Speaker 2: inclined to be charitable. Here, most atheists are formerly religious.
Speaker 2: They aren't indoctrinated into atheism. They started out indoctrinated into
Speaker 2: religion and then at some point found themselves unable to
Speaker 2: believe it. And your attitude here suggests that you think
Speaker 2: that only stupid people are atheists while you are in
Speaker 2: the process of begging atheists not to say that only
Speaker 2: stupid people are Christians. Now, I wouldn't say that only
Speaker 2: stupid people are Christians. There have been some very intelligent
Speaker 2: Christians throughout history. But the fact that you didn't see
Speaker 2: a problem with your little chuckle at the idea of
Speaker 2: all atheists being stupid and decided that it was okay
Speaker 2: to leave that in the video speaks to the fact
Speaker 2: that I am not currently dealing with one of the
Speaker 2: intelligent Christians.
Speaker 4: Theism has nothing to do with intellect. Ok You have
Speaker 4: Andrew Kamal, you have Christopher Hirata, you have Rick Rosner,
Speaker 4: three people with some of the highest IQ scores we.
Speaker 3: Know of, and they are each theis.
Speaker 4: Okay, So please stop saying that Theism is only a
Speaker 4: faith for dumb people.
Speaker 2: I have never heard of any of those people, and
Speaker 2: I don't care about their IQs. For those listening without watching,
Speaker 2: he listed all of their IQs as you was saying
Speaker 2: their names. IQ is a thing that unintelligent people think
Speaker 2: is the primary measurement of intelligence, when in reality, IQ
Speaker 2: is a subjective measurement that requires interpretation based on what
Speaker 2: type of test was taking, the goals of the test,
Speaker 2: socioeconomic factors, and more in order to be useful for anything.
Speaker 2: I have taken multiple IQ tests in my life. Sometimes
Speaker 2: it's registered me as a genius level, other times I've
Speaker 2: only been slightly above average, and each time the test
Speaker 2: was of my ability to solve certain types of puzzles,
Speaker 2: which are not necessarily indicative of general intelligence. At any
Speaker 2: rate I can list three smart people who are Christian
Speaker 2: does not mean that Christianity specifically or religion in general,
Speaker 2: actually correlate with greater intelligence. It just means you found
Speaker 2: three smart people who are Christian. Also, most people seem
Speaker 2: to be convinced that after about the one sixty or
Speaker 2: one eighty mark, IQ scores become unreliable, meaning that someone
Speaker 2: with an IQ of two twenty can't necessarily be said
Speaker 2: to be meaningfully smarter than someone with an IQ of
Speaker 2: two hundred. So after one eighty, who cares? But also
Speaker 2: I did google the three examples that he provided. Andrew
Speaker 2: Kamal is indeed a Christian Christopher, herata is inconclusive. I
Speaker 2: can't find anything either way, so clearly it's not of
Speaker 2: the utmost importance to him. And my personal favorite was
Speaker 2: Rick Rosner, who, in an interview from August of last year,
Speaker 2: can be quoted as saying, theology. You know what, let's
Speaker 2: read a bit more of that quote. When asked about
Speaker 2: the potential of using theology to deal with modern issues
Speaker 2: like artificial intelligence, he said, quote right off the top
Speaker 2: of my head, I have to say theology. I reject
Speaker 2: theology at this point here in America, Christian nationalism has
Speaker 2: hijacked much of Christianity. Millions call themselves Christian while supporting
Speaker 2: a cruel anti humanist racist agenda. On the other hand,
Speaker 2: science works, So yeah, good choice of intelligent theists there.
Speaker 2: One out of three is not bad.
Speaker 4: I guess back your arguments up with stats, with rational
Speaker 4: explanations and proofs I do.
Speaker 2: One of my ongoing frustrations is that I will need
Speaker 2: to do a ton of research in order to counter
Speaker 2: the things that apologists will just say offhand without a citation.
Speaker 2: Very rarely do I find anyone with a sourceless to
Speaker 2: respond to, and when I do, they almost always either
Speaker 2: misquote their sources or quote mind them answers in Genesis
Speaker 2: is probably the worst defender for that. Every time I
Speaker 2: respond to them, the majority of my time is spent
Speaker 2: reading the sentences around the quotes that they choose to
Speaker 2: support their position, because the surrounding context proves their position wrong.
Speaker 4: Finally, number ten, please stop regurgitating. Okay, Now, I understand
Speaker 4: Christians on the other side, sometimes we regurgitate.
Speaker 3: Regurgitate too.
Speaker 2: If by Regardsgate, he means copying points that you have
Speaker 2: heard other people make without really putting much thought into
Speaker 2: it yourself, then I'm sad to say that that appears
Speaker 2: to be what he has been doing for most of
Speaker 2: this video here.
Speaker 4: But please do your own research, okay.
Speaker 2: As always, the phrase do your own research is accompanied
Speaker 2: by the best of takes.
Speaker 4: If Jesus Christ was a real person, If Jesus Christ
Speaker 4: was crucified by ponscious pilot during the first first century AD,
Speaker 4: then that is the most important event in the history
Speaker 4: of mankind.
Speaker 3: Nope.
Speaker 2: If his claims about being the son of God who
Speaker 2: is being crucified to a tone for your sins but
Speaker 2: only if you accept the sacrifice, are true, then maybe.
Speaker 2: But with what you listed there, he was just one
Speaker 2: of many guys who was executed by the Romans. That's
Speaker 2: it for this one. Turns out this video is mostly
Speaker 2: just I wish atheist would stop pointing out problems with
Speaker 2: my religion. Today's common to the day comes to us
Speaker 2: from the results of the poll that I ran a
Speaker 2: couple weeks ago. Seef y'all thought I shoul redo the
Speaker 2: audio For the questions for atheist video, fifty nine percent
Speaker 2: said no, forty one percent said yes. So the nose
Speaker 2: have it, But I did already fix it. For patrons
Speaker 2: and podcast listeners because Patreon and spreaker both allow you
Speaker 2: to replace media files on published post, So if it
Speaker 2: bothered you at the time and you are a patron
Speaker 2: or you listen to the podcast version of the show,
Speaker 2: you can just go back to the original post and
Speaker 2: it will be fixed. And since I already have the
Speaker 2: file ready, I am just going to upload it as
Speaker 2: an unlisted video and I'll put up a pin comment
Speaker 2: on the original with a link to the fixed audio version.
Speaker 2: That way, I'm not clogging up notifications with that you've
Speaker 2: seen already, but if you want it, it is there
Speaker 2: for you. Also pop a card up here so you
Speaker 2: can go straight to the fixed one if you like.
Speaker 2: Thanks for watching. Don't forget to go to surf shark
Speaker 2: dot com slash rhino for an extra four months for free.
Speaker 2: I'll be back next Friday with more, but if you
Speaker 2: need to get your Rhino fixed in before then. I
Speaker 2: live stream of service every Wednesday eight thirty Eastern on
Speaker 2: my other channel, The Watering Hole. Thanks to Piper for
Speaker 2: being my editor, and special thanks is always do my patrons,
Speaker 2: Andrew Eslik and all the rest who are the thing
Speaker 2: that apologist should stop saying to the atheists that are
Speaker 2: my channel. If you'd like to look at the trees,
Speaker 2: you can join us on Patreon for as little as
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Speaker 2: which is also where you'll find links in my other projects.
Speaker 2: If for whatever reason you want to send me stuff,
Speaker 2: my pepbox addresses in the description. See you next time.