WEBVTT 1 00:00:04.839 --> 00:00:07.400 This is Jay Dyer from Jay's Analysis. You're listening to 2 00:00:07.799 --> 00:00:11.679 Esoteric Hollywood. Esoteric Hollywood is where I deconstruct the biggest 3 00:00:11.679 --> 00:00:13.960 films in an unparalleled way, from the classics of the 4 00:00:14.000 --> 00:00:18.160 silver screen to today's blockbusters. Learned to watch film with 5 00:00:18.280 --> 00:00:35.479 new eyes. As we enter Esoteric Hollywood, Welcome, you're listening 6 00:00:35.479 --> 00:00:38.960 to Jay's analysis. And I want to do some reflections 7 00:00:39.000 --> 00:00:42.240 on the debate and discussion with Adam Kokesh, which was 8 00:00:42.240 --> 00:00:45.000 a lot of fun. I appreciate Kokash being willing to. 9 00:00:46.640 --> 00:00:50.399 Do that. I thought that was actually, you know, he 10 00:00:50.439 --> 00:00:51.200 didn't really have to. 11 00:00:51.159 --> 00:00:53.439 Do that, and he's a pretty big name guy, so 12 00:00:53.799 --> 00:00:57.240 you know, he's basically sending traffic my way, just from 13 00:00:57.320 --> 00:01:02.000 a practical standpoint, So I appreciate that, and it was 14 00:01:02.039 --> 00:01:03.880 a lot of fun, and I don't think there's no 15 00:01:04.359 --> 00:01:07.599 hostility or anything like that. We had a good conversation afterwards, 16 00:01:07.599 --> 00:01:13.799 so hopefully we can, you know, continue to have an 17 00:01:13.799 --> 00:01:17.560 open discussion on these topics, and I'm thinking I would 18 00:01:17.599 --> 00:01:20.840 like to eventually get at them on the podcast to 19 00:01:20.920 --> 00:01:27.280 discuss his experiences in war and his principle of non aggression, 20 00:01:27.319 --> 00:01:29.840 which actually I do agree with. I just think that 21 00:01:29.879 --> 00:01:35.079 it needs to be filled out in a broader philosophical 22 00:01:35.120 --> 00:01:38.799 worldview setting that it doesn't function on its own, but 23 00:01:39.079 --> 00:01:44.680 the statement itself that we shouldn't provoke or aggress others 24 00:01:45.000 --> 00:01:51.200 for the sake of stability and progress and flourishing. 25 00:01:51.480 --> 00:01:52.439 I totally agree with. 26 00:01:54.400 --> 00:01:58.000 A couple ideas that I also had that I think 27 00:01:58.040 --> 00:02:01.040 will be illustrative and instructive that I didn't actually get 28 00:02:01.040 --> 00:02:04.000 to in the debate. It didn't get to bring up 29 00:02:04.959 --> 00:02:11.840 was that there's interesting discussions even from various types of 30 00:02:11.879 --> 00:02:18.400 libertarians such as Hans Harmenhaupa. And this was actually a 31 00:02:18.400 --> 00:02:21.400 point that Tim Kelly made where he points out that 32 00:02:22.080 --> 00:02:27.319 in the book Democracy that God Has That Failed, basically 33 00:02:27.400 --> 00:02:33.400 overall government spending under monarchies was limited and it averaged 34 00:02:33.439 --> 00:02:38.599 around three to nine percent of GDP, whereas government spending 35 00:02:38.719 --> 00:02:45.280 under the Masonic republics of our day with the state's bite, 36 00:02:45.719 --> 00:02:52.240 hovers around thirty five to fifty percent of GDP on average, 37 00:02:52.479 --> 00:02:56.680 So that that's a big difference in I understand the 38 00:02:56.719 --> 00:03:00.759 ABS position, you know, is not interested in any state, 39 00:03:03.240 --> 00:03:07.000 But the problem is that the long march towards what 40 00:03:07.039 --> 00:03:12.360 we're supposed to believe is the stateless society, the coming possible, 41 00:03:12.360 --> 00:03:18.120 hopeful stateless society one day is a long march of revolutions, right, 42 00:03:18.199 --> 00:03:20.479 and Adam admitted this when he was talking about the 43 00:03:20.479 --> 00:03:25.000 phases of history. And that's sort of sort of a 44 00:03:25.599 --> 00:03:28.879 slicing up of history that both the Libertarians and the 45 00:03:28.879 --> 00:03:32.400 Anglo Saxon liberal tradition and the Marxist share. Is this 46 00:03:32.520 --> 00:03:35.840 idea that you can cut out these phases of history 47 00:03:36.639 --> 00:03:39.240 like the Dark Ages and things like this, and that's 48 00:03:39.280 --> 00:03:42.159 not really how history. I mean, I'm not opposed to 49 00:03:42.319 --> 00:03:46.280 those kinds of classifications across the board, because you know, 50 00:03:46.319 --> 00:03:48.800 we speak of the Enlightenment, which is a phase in 51 00:03:48.840 --> 00:03:52.439 the history of the West where ideas shift and change. 52 00:03:52.759 --> 00:03:57.080 I'm not opposed to that totally speaking. But at the 53 00:03:57.080 --> 00:03:59.919 same time, it's also can be used just as a 54 00:04:00.120 --> 00:04:03.719 kind of rhetorical device that doesn't really have much meaning, like, oh, 55 00:04:03.719 --> 00:04:07.000 everyone in the Dark Ages was superstitious and domb and 56 00:04:07.120 --> 00:04:09.280 that's not actually true. When you go and read them, 57 00:04:09.599 --> 00:04:12.719 many of them are much more capable philosophers than the 58 00:04:12.840 --> 00:04:18.160 average intellectual today that inhabits academia or something like this, 59 00:04:18.439 --> 00:04:21.800 you would learn. I'm a big critic of Aquinas, for example, 60 00:04:21.879 --> 00:04:24.600 but you'd learn a lot more from the feet of 61 00:04:24.600 --> 00:04:25.959 Aquinas than you would. 62 00:04:27.279 --> 00:04:28.839 Professor Richard J. 63 00:04:29.160 --> 00:04:34.639 Darwin at the local university, who's just got one mythology 64 00:04:34.720 --> 00:04:38.120 to try to teach you. That tryes to encapsulate all 65 00:04:38.199 --> 00:04:44.279 reality under one unified vision of materialism. For example, So 66 00:04:44.439 --> 00:04:48.600 other points and notes I had ambiguity on nature. We 67 00:04:48.639 --> 00:04:50.879 talk a lot about nature. I don't have a problem 68 00:04:50.920 --> 00:04:54.759 talking about nature. But for me, obviously, as you know, 69 00:04:55.319 --> 00:05:01.120 nature is confined within a specific worldview. So when Paul says, 70 00:05:01.120 --> 00:05:03.879 for example, in Romans One, that nature itself testifies to 71 00:05:03.920 --> 00:05:07.639 the existence of God, he's speaking from the advantage point 72 00:05:07.680 --> 00:05:10.399 of a person who believes in creation. You know, Paul 73 00:05:10.439 --> 00:05:14.680 talks about x neulo creation more than once in his epistles. 74 00:05:15.120 --> 00:05:18.959 So for him, reality is a created reality, and it 75 00:05:19.000 --> 00:05:24.759 has its beginning, its middle period, and its terminus or 76 00:05:26.800 --> 00:05:31.439 final state telos in God. And that's of course our 77 00:05:31.720 --> 00:05:37.959 Orthodox vision of creation and the process of history. So 78 00:05:38.040 --> 00:05:43.000 when Paul uses the term nature, it's nature understood in 79 00:05:43.000 --> 00:05:48.040 that perspective with that vantage point. Right, when a person 80 00:05:48.079 --> 00:05:52.720 with a reductionistic materialist view uses the term nature, they 81 00:05:52.759 --> 00:05:56.079 mean something totally different. So we have a lot of 82 00:05:56.079 --> 00:06:03.759 these ambiguities, oftentimes in appealing to ambiguous terms like law, freedom, nature, 83 00:06:04.480 --> 00:06:08.480 et cetera, et cetera, that are really conditioned and interpreted 84 00:06:08.519 --> 00:06:11.279 by our worldview as a whole. And this is the 85 00:06:11.319 --> 00:06:13.800 point that I continually try to stress, and what we're 86 00:06:13.839 --> 00:06:14.439 going to see in. 87 00:06:14.360 --> 00:06:15.360 This talk is. 88 00:06:16.959 --> 00:06:20.160 When we look at a couple essays, I guess, I 89 00:06:20.199 --> 00:06:22.800 guess one of them is kind of famous by the 90 00:06:22.839 --> 00:06:27.120 famous semiutitian in Berto Echo, whom I've referenced many times 91 00:06:27.120 --> 00:06:29.920 and whose books I've read many I've read many of 92 00:06:29.959 --> 00:06:34.600 his book Excuse Me of Fucoast, Pendulum and Name of 93 00:06:34.639 --> 00:06:39.759 the Rose, and even some of his philosophical and literary 94 00:06:39.759 --> 00:06:45.360 works as probably the foremost Semiutitian. Before I think he's died, 95 00:06:45.920 --> 00:06:49.519 I don't know that the Mandela effect hitting me where 96 00:06:49.519 --> 00:06:51.399 he didn't die and I thought he did. I don't know, 97 00:06:51.439 --> 00:06:54.279 but maybe I thought I saw on Drudge Report that 98 00:06:54.759 --> 00:06:56.160 Echo died a year or two ago. 99 00:06:56.240 --> 00:06:56.639 I don't know. 100 00:06:56.720 --> 00:07:01.519 But regardless of whether he did or didn't, he is 101 00:07:01.560 --> 00:07:03.720 an interesting thinker, and I guess you could say he 102 00:07:03.759 --> 00:07:12.360 represents maybe the modern progressive liberal academic. He's a good 103 00:07:13.079 --> 00:07:17.519 candidate for that role, and he's going to critique fascism. 104 00:07:17.560 --> 00:07:18.959 And this is the essay that we're going to look 105 00:07:19.000 --> 00:07:22.879 at that Daniel Spaulding sent to me. That's illustrative, and 106 00:07:22.920 --> 00:07:25.160 so what we're going to do after I finished discussing 107 00:07:25.199 --> 00:07:29.439 Adam's position in the debate and some of the points 108 00:07:29.480 --> 00:07:32.720 that I didn't ever get to in my notes reflections 109 00:07:32.720 --> 00:07:40.279 on the debate, we're going to dissect echoes essay, and 110 00:07:40.399 --> 00:07:44.839 we're going to use the apologetic methodology that I'm hoping 111 00:07:44.879 --> 00:07:49.480 to instill in people out there to give them the 112 00:07:49.480 --> 00:07:52.600 skills to do what I'm doing, as well as to 113 00:07:52.639 --> 00:07:56.360 hopefully better understand where I'm coming from, so that they 114 00:07:56.399 --> 00:07:59.120 can implement these kinds of ideas in their own life. 115 00:08:00.120 --> 00:08:02.959 Because I think they're beneficial, I think they're healthy. I 116 00:08:02.959 --> 00:08:07.959 think that they will help you to flourish, at least 117 00:08:08.000 --> 00:08:12.800 intellectually in this life and then hopefully into the life 118 00:08:13.040 --> 00:08:18.120 beyond this life. So that's what we're going to look at, 119 00:08:18.160 --> 00:08:19.959 probably in the second half of the talk. I don't 120 00:08:20.000 --> 00:08:22.519 know how much of the I don't really have it 121 00:08:23.360 --> 00:08:26.560 planned out time wise, how much you know what's going 122 00:08:26.639 --> 00:08:30.000 to take care of what, But in terms of looking 123 00:08:30.000 --> 00:08:32.559 at the debate and then looking at echoes essay. But 124 00:08:32.879 --> 00:08:35.840 a couple other points that I did want to touch 125 00:08:35.840 --> 00:08:37.600 on briefly is that I got a couple of hit 126 00:08:37.679 --> 00:08:41.080 pieces written on me this week, one from this Jason 127 00:08:41.080 --> 00:08:44.840 Calavito character that Chris at Hoasbusters has had on the show, 128 00:08:45.039 --> 00:08:49.159 and Calveto is in the I guess you could say 129 00:08:49.200 --> 00:08:54.440 the Snopes Shechrmer nexus of pathological skepticism, as the Colins 130 00:08:54.480 --> 00:08:56.600 Brothers called it, which that was a good way to 131 00:08:56.639 --> 00:09:01.039 put it. And this is just really the naive scientism 132 00:09:01.200 --> 00:09:07.759 slash empiricism perspective. And I've done countless critiques of naive empiricism. 133 00:09:08.600 --> 00:09:11.120 It's very easy to refute. It's been refuted many times. 134 00:09:11.720 --> 00:09:14.879 Of course, the people in those positions don't really get 135 00:09:14.919 --> 00:09:18.679 it and don't have the motivation, I don't think to 136 00:09:18.799 --> 00:09:25.120 want to question their presubpositions of native scientism and naive 137 00:09:25.120 --> 00:09:30.519 empiricism because it would obviously fall apart very quick, you know, 138 00:09:30.519 --> 00:09:33.200 the whole house of cards comes down. And really this 139 00:09:33.320 --> 00:09:37.000 is characteristic of all modernity. So there's a lot of 140 00:09:37.840 --> 00:09:40.720 scare tactics, straw men, false statements in. 141 00:09:40.720 --> 00:09:41.480 His hit piece. 142 00:09:42.600 --> 00:09:46.879 And since he sent a whopping four people my way, 143 00:09:47.000 --> 00:09:49.799 four hits from his hit piece. I'm not even going 144 00:09:49.879 --> 00:09:53.679 to spend that much time on it. I mean, just 145 00:09:53.799 --> 00:09:56.639 at my website, I'm getting over one hundred thousand views 146 00:09:57.279 --> 00:10:00.919 a month, and I don't think four hits from Jason 147 00:10:00.919 --> 00:10:03.120 Calvito's kind of do too much damage. 148 00:10:03.759 --> 00:10:04.440 But that's okay. 149 00:10:05.919 --> 00:10:10.919 There's a his article was more of a hip piece 150 00:10:11.200 --> 00:10:15.120 than any kind of actual argumentation. I will give him 151 00:10:15.120 --> 00:10:17.639 credit that he does seem to have listened to some 152 00:10:17.720 --> 00:10:20.799 of my talks, and so that I appreciate that he 153 00:10:20.879 --> 00:10:23.320 says that there's nothing worth listening to in my talks, 154 00:10:23.639 --> 00:10:28.639 which is interesting that he went to the trouble to 155 00:10:29.320 --> 00:10:33.200 write a hip piece, given I'm not that interesting. So 156 00:10:34.399 --> 00:10:37.000 thank you for all the liberal gatekeepers who are out 157 00:10:37.039 --> 00:10:42.919 there to protect everybody nobly in their actions, the noble 158 00:10:43.000 --> 00:10:50.240 protectors of the common men, right who You're you're stupid 159 00:10:50.320 --> 00:10:54.639 enough to fall for listening to my podcast, but you're 160 00:10:54.679 --> 00:10:58.200 smart enough to figure out if you listen to Jason 161 00:10:58.200 --> 00:11:03.600 calveto his argumentation, which is actually hit piece that's going 162 00:11:03.600 --> 00:11:07.919 to prove me wrong. So nothing but loaded questions, nothing 163 00:11:07.960 --> 00:11:12.840 but bandwagon fallacy, nothing but begging the question and nothing 164 00:11:12.919 --> 00:11:21.799 but special pleading straw men, appeals to emotion at homonyms. 165 00:11:22.519 --> 00:11:28.600 That's basically the entirety of his piece, So not even 166 00:11:28.639 --> 00:11:31.039 really worth dealing with. But of course, all of these 167 00:11:31.080 --> 00:11:37.519 positions that are really emotional based, reactionary positions, and that 168 00:11:37.559 --> 00:11:43.279 would be liberalism, leftism, progressivism, anarchism. In my view, they 169 00:11:43.919 --> 00:11:46.960 have an appearance of logic and coherence, but when you 170 00:11:47.000 --> 00:11:50.000 really boil it down to the brass tacks, you're really 171 00:11:50.039 --> 00:12:01.960 just appealing to these empty broad categories such as freedom, democracy, rights, quality, egalitarianism, 172 00:12:02.840 --> 00:12:07.679 and so Jason Calvito actually got trolled, and the humorous, 173 00:12:08.039 --> 00:12:13.799 humorless left is quite easy to troll because he actually 174 00:12:13.799 --> 00:12:16.240 believed that I think Trump is God emperor. 175 00:12:17.720 --> 00:12:20.120 He says that in this article, which of course that 176 00:12:20.240 --> 00:12:20.679 was a joke. 177 00:12:21.000 --> 00:12:28.120 Okay, that's he wasn't deft enough to figure out that 178 00:12:28.120 --> 00:12:29.080 that's a meme. 179 00:12:29.159 --> 00:12:31.879 That was used to troll the left right. 180 00:12:31.919 --> 00:12:35.000 I don't I don't know anybody that actually believes Trump 181 00:12:35.080 --> 00:12:36.000 is a god emperor. 182 00:12:36.320 --> 00:12:37.000 This is a joke. 183 00:12:37.200 --> 00:12:40.639 This is from Dune, Okay, Frank Kerbert's novels Dune, David 184 00:12:40.720 --> 00:12:44.519 Lynch movie Dune, God Emperor of Dune it's a joke, 185 00:12:44.600 --> 00:12:46.519 man lighting up. 186 00:12:50.200 --> 00:12:52.279 So I went by the way. 187 00:12:53.039 --> 00:12:59.720 Jason Calvito lost his argument with Chris Kendall at Hoaxbusters 188 00:13:00.879 --> 00:13:03.320 because it got down to the point in their debate 189 00:13:03.360 --> 00:13:12.240 where Calvito had to argue that DNA produces absolutely magical 190 00:13:12.399 --> 00:13:15.120 new information and that this is how you get the 191 00:13:15.200 --> 00:13:18.799 rise of new species from one organism to the next. 192 00:13:19.039 --> 00:13:21.879 And of course there's absolutely no evidence or proof that 193 00:13:22.919 --> 00:13:28.200 DNA produces new information. Actually, it only codes the information 194 00:13:28.519 --> 00:13:37.639 existing already within the DNA. So Chris nailed Calavito on 195 00:13:37.720 --> 00:13:41.039 that point, and Calvito had absolutely no response, and if 196 00:13:41.080 --> 00:13:45.440 I recall, he at that point left the discussion because 197 00:13:45.480 --> 00:13:49.039 he talked himself into circles. So, I mean, come on, seriously, 198 00:13:49.679 --> 00:13:56.799 naive scientism and evolutionary Darwinism. I mean, these people, I 199 00:13:56.840 --> 00:14:00.799 don't think they've ever taken a philosophy classes or logic class. 200 00:14:00.799 --> 00:14:05.399 They've had maybe pop psychology and a few maybe biologic classes, 201 00:14:05.440 --> 00:14:10.600 maybe maybe, and that's about it. But don't ever expect 202 00:14:11.519 --> 00:14:15.879 any kind of upper level analytical philosophy class, any kind 203 00:14:15.879 --> 00:14:21.399 of understanding of continental philosophy, any understanding of math theory 204 00:14:21.639 --> 00:14:25.679 or metallogic. No don't ever expect that out of these people. 205 00:14:27.159 --> 00:14:34.759 So the problem that we want to hinge the argument against, well, 206 00:14:34.840 --> 00:14:38.720 this would extend to all modern liberal positions, and that 207 00:14:38.759 --> 00:14:46.039 would include Calavito and koquesh Is Nominalism. Nominalism is the 208 00:14:46.320 --> 00:14:51.679 medieval philosophical idea that came as a response to medieval 209 00:14:52.240 --> 00:14:58.399 Augustinianism or Platonism or neoplatonism. Noominalism says that there are 210 00:14:58.440 --> 00:15:07.120 no metaphysical ideas or categories. There are only humanly constructed symbols, signs, 211 00:15:07.559 --> 00:15:10.960 or what are called tokens. So a token similar sign 212 00:15:11.159 --> 00:15:17.399 is a purely social construct. It's purely made up from 213 00:15:17.919 --> 00:15:26.639 the human creative, pragmatic, it's solely based I guess on 214 00:15:26.799 --> 00:15:32.559 use right functional. So when we talk about things like truth, 215 00:15:32.759 --> 00:15:37.720 or when we talk about any metaphysical categories like ethics 216 00:15:37.759 --> 00:15:41.600 of right and wrong or whatever, these are all constructs, right, 217 00:15:41.720 --> 00:15:47.840 They're relative. This is what nominalism ultimately has to devolve into, 218 00:15:50.000 --> 00:15:55.799 because nominalism again starts from the position of rejecting any 219 00:15:55.879 --> 00:16:04.200 of these objective, logical, ontological, ethical, metaphysical, and even mathematical categories. 220 00:16:04.360 --> 00:16:08.240 Now you say, why do they do this, Well, they 221 00:16:08.279 --> 00:16:10.840 do this. Number one because they're wrong and they're stupid. 222 00:16:10.840 --> 00:16:15.600 But number two, because they have an agenda I believe ultimately, 223 00:16:15.639 --> 00:16:19.440 which was to attack. 224 00:16:19.120 --> 00:16:20.480 The existing power structures. 225 00:16:20.759 --> 00:16:24.240 And so I don't really care about what Akham's personal 226 00:16:24.279 --> 00:16:27.919 motivations are. You know, if he wanted to I don't know, 227 00:16:28.679 --> 00:16:30.519 he wanted to be with some check or something or 228 00:16:30.639 --> 00:16:33.320 Abalard the other famous anomalists. 229 00:16:33.360 --> 00:16:35.559 I don't you know, he wanted to be. 230 00:16:35.600 --> 00:16:40.279 With some check and maybe the existing power structures, rules, 231 00:16:41.039 --> 00:16:43.399 or the papacy or something like this was in the way. 232 00:16:43.519 --> 00:16:44.480 It doesn't really matter. 233 00:16:44.519 --> 00:16:46.440 If you want to really dive deep into that, you 234 00:16:46.440 --> 00:16:54.919 can read Haiko Oberman's book on Luther, Harvest of Medieval Theology, 235 00:16:55.080 --> 00:16:57.960 where he discussed is the influence of nominalism on Luther 236 00:16:59.039 --> 00:17:01.440 in A. Gabriel by all in these other characters be 237 00:17:01.559 --> 00:17:05.000 I eal and again, that's Haiko Oberman's excellent book. I 238 00:17:05.039 --> 00:17:11.079 read that probably twelve years ago. Very technical theological, philosophical book, 239 00:17:11.119 --> 00:17:16.319 but very illustrative, very enlightening to see the rise of 240 00:17:16.319 --> 00:17:19.759 the present Reformation coming out of the nominalist tradition. So 241 00:17:19.880 --> 00:17:22.559 this is what nominalism says. It says that you don't 242 00:17:22.559 --> 00:17:28.160 really the human mind is confined to its sense data. 243 00:17:29.160 --> 00:17:34.519 And because it's confined to it, since data, it can't pretend. 244 00:17:34.960 --> 00:17:41.240 It's a pretense to speak of eternal verities, or to 245 00:17:41.519 --> 00:17:50.440 speak of metaphysical categories, to speak of objective properties of knowledge, right, 246 00:17:51.440 --> 00:17:57.599 because it's always confined to the finite. So anything that 247 00:17:57.680 --> 00:18:02.559 we might speak of as spiritual metaphysical eventually gets smushed 248 00:18:02.720 --> 00:18:06.720 into the here and the now and the immediate now. 249 00:18:07.279 --> 00:18:11.240 Maybe many of the early nominalists did not have that intention. 250 00:18:12.039 --> 00:18:15.720 They did not have the intention of smushing all of 251 00:18:15.799 --> 00:18:20.680 man's knowledge or belief in objective properties into. 252 00:18:20.480 --> 00:18:21.200 The here and the now. 253 00:18:21.880 --> 00:18:24.119 But this is eventually what happens, and this is what 254 00:18:25.319 --> 00:18:28.119 is not debatable. This is known. This is where you 255 00:18:28.160 --> 00:18:32.680 get empiricism. Empiricism rises from medieval nominalism, and empiricism is 256 00:18:33.400 --> 00:18:37.160 just nominalism right. Empiricism says we. 257 00:18:38.039 --> 00:18:38.640 Only know. 258 00:18:40.160 --> 00:18:45.319 What we can derive from sense impressions and sense data. 259 00:18:45.960 --> 00:18:49.559 And this is why for a presubsitionalist such as myself 260 00:18:49.640 --> 00:18:53.359 or anyone else who has followed this train of thought, 261 00:18:54.240 --> 00:18:58.279 Hume is very useful. David Hume is very good, not 262 00:18:58.599 --> 00:19:02.440 insofar as he's the great of a philosopher, but rather 263 00:19:02.559 --> 00:19:08.119 he is the illustrative philosopher for the empiricists because he 264 00:19:08.279 --> 00:19:13.480 took it to its consistent conclusions. You see, Hume is consistent, 265 00:19:14.119 --> 00:19:19.559 and that's why he's worthy of note. And he admits 266 00:19:19.839 --> 00:19:25.079 that the end result of this empiricism is total skepticism. 267 00:19:26.480 --> 00:19:28.640 So you don't really know, you don't really have access 268 00:19:28.640 --> 00:19:33.720 to objective truths, you don't really know that the future 269 00:19:33.720 --> 00:19:37.480 will be like the past. You don't have any rational 270 00:19:38.079 --> 00:19:45.359 logical basis for induction. It's something that you assume and 271 00:19:45.599 --> 00:19:51.799 use pragmatically, but you can't justify it. It's unjustifiable because 272 00:19:51.799 --> 00:19:57.240 it's by its very nature not provable on empirical grounds. 273 00:19:58.359 --> 00:20:04.599 So empiricism can't stand the test of empiricism. And this 274 00:20:04.680 --> 00:20:08.799 is the ultimately the question that hum Is is putting 275 00:20:08.839 --> 00:20:13.519 out there to his fellow Enlightenment skeptics and empiricists. 276 00:20:13.720 --> 00:20:16.000 And he's saying, let's not fool. 277 00:20:15.680 --> 00:20:20.079 Ourselves here, right and be dishonest and assume that we 278 00:20:20.160 --> 00:20:21.359 have objective truth. 279 00:20:22.000 --> 00:20:23.720 We don't. It's not possible. 280 00:20:23.960 --> 00:20:30.440 So really all we have is pragmatic truth, right, positivism. 281 00:20:30.599 --> 00:20:39.240 Yet how often do we hear the rationalist, scientistic empiricist 282 00:20:39.440 --> 00:20:44.359 Michael Schrmer, Dawkins, Nildigrasse, Tyson, Jason Calvito. No, no, no, 283 00:20:44.359 --> 00:20:48.960 on arguing and behaving and operating as if they have 284 00:20:49.240 --> 00:20:56.240 objective reason, logic and metaphysical truths, as they consistently deny 285 00:20:56.359 --> 00:20:59.519 and denounce metaphysical truths. And this is of course the 286 00:20:59.559 --> 00:21:03.440 great pologetic point that we're making here. Now most of 287 00:21:03.480 --> 00:21:06.960 these guys don't know this because again, well number one, 288 00:21:07.000 --> 00:21:11.319 they don't care to know it. It would under mine 289 00:21:11.359 --> 00:21:15.480 all of their thought and philosophy, pseudo philosophy, their sophistry 290 00:21:15.480 --> 00:21:19.759 really and they actually are of the descendants of the sophists. 291 00:21:20.559 --> 00:21:23.000 But they also didn't ever learn any of this stuff. 292 00:21:23.839 --> 00:21:26.759 So there's a dual problem here. It's not one of 293 00:21:26.799 --> 00:21:29.920 the others, not just ignorance. It's also probably in many 294 00:21:29.960 --> 00:21:33.720 cases bad will. If you're Richard Dawkins, do you want 295 00:21:33.759 --> 00:21:35.319 to admit you've been wronging for all these years? 296 00:21:35.319 --> 00:21:35.759 Of course not. 297 00:21:37.519 --> 00:21:41.559 So there's a career political motivation obviously in many of 298 00:21:41.599 --> 00:21:48.880 these cases. And so let's come back to Cocash, because 299 00:21:48.880 --> 00:21:53.279 we can actually group Cocush and Jason Calvito's again, as 300 00:21:53.279 --> 00:22:00.519 we said, empiricism and skepticism under one banner here, when 301 00:22:00.559 --> 00:22:05.119 we've gotten rid of in our worldview or philosophy of 302 00:22:05.160 --> 00:22:12.640 the world, the possibility of anything like metaphysical categories, truths, 303 00:22:13.200 --> 00:22:16.920 objective principles and so forth, what we've actually done is 304 00:22:17.440 --> 00:22:19.000 severely limited ourselves. 305 00:22:20.160 --> 00:22:22.160 Now you may think that they. 306 00:22:22.039 --> 00:22:25.119 Argue, of course, that this severe limitation is good, and 307 00:22:25.160 --> 00:22:27.640 it's just the fact of how things are. It is 308 00:22:27.759 --> 00:22:32.920 just how it is, and like it or not, you're 309 00:22:33.000 --> 00:22:42.160 just confined to your immediate sense datum. The question then becomes, Okay, 310 00:22:42.519 --> 00:22:47.200 if that's true, then let's be consistent with that, And 311 00:22:47.880 --> 00:22:52.240 the argument, the presubpositional argument, the transcendental argument here is 312 00:22:52.279 --> 00:22:57.000 that no one is consistent with that because it's absurd 313 00:22:57.200 --> 00:23:00.440 and it's a reductio ad absurdum. So in logic, one 314 00:23:00.440 --> 00:23:02.119 of the arguments that you can make, and it's actually, 315 00:23:02.119 --> 00:23:03.720 I believe a very strong argument. 316 00:23:03.440 --> 00:23:04.519 Is a reducty argument. 317 00:23:04.759 --> 00:23:09.720 If you reduce the opponent's position to absurdity, then it's 318 00:23:09.839 --> 00:23:15.720 obviously not a defensible rational logical position. And anytime you're 319 00:23:15.759 --> 00:23:21.640 engaging in debate, you're assuming logic, you're assuming rationality and reason. 320 00:23:21.720 --> 00:23:26.559 Otherwise no point in debating. You go home right, drop 321 00:23:26.599 --> 00:23:29.559 the mic turn off the mike from get off the stage. 322 00:23:30.319 --> 00:23:32.880 If you don't come to the table at least the 323 00:23:33.039 --> 00:23:38.119 professing belief in logic, then you don't have an argument. Right, 324 00:23:38.200 --> 00:23:43.720 argument presumes logic, but with a calaveto or with a 325 00:23:43.759 --> 00:23:50.240 co cash, we don't have any desire to question empiricism 326 00:23:50.799 --> 00:23:54.160 or the bounds of supposed skepticism. 327 00:23:54.960 --> 00:23:57.160 Rather, we just have this assumption that it's so. 328 00:23:58.519 --> 00:24:00.640 I would argue that it's not so, and I can 329 00:24:00.680 --> 00:24:02.759 prove that it's not so because it's a reduct Yet 330 00:24:02.799 --> 00:24:06.920 it reduces to absurdity. The first argument against empiricism would 331 00:24:06.960 --> 00:24:12.160 be that the as we said, the position itself cannot 332 00:24:12.160 --> 00:24:17.160 be verified empirically. Now, if you're going to argue that 333 00:24:17.279 --> 00:24:23.160 all human knowledge comes through sense data an empirical experience, 334 00:24:24.160 --> 00:24:26.680 then to be consistent, you're going to also have to 335 00:24:26.759 --> 00:24:33.039 include the maxims and presubsisitions of empiricism itself under that claim. 336 00:24:33.400 --> 00:24:37.640 You see, so we need empirical verification for the truth 337 00:24:37.759 --> 00:24:41.039 of empiricism because it's starting off of the universal claim. 338 00:24:41.079 --> 00:24:43.880 And remember Adam had no problem with universal claims. He 339 00:24:43.960 --> 00:24:47.640 admitted this several times in the debate. Liberals themselves are 340 00:24:47.759 --> 00:24:54.319 always touting these moral platitudes and all this universal claims 341 00:24:54.319 --> 00:24:57.640 of morals and ethics. Then they turn around and espouse 342 00:24:57.759 --> 00:25:04.839 total cultural epistemic moral relativism. So they're they're total fools 343 00:25:04.880 --> 00:25:07.319 from the outset. When it comes to logic, we're saying, 344 00:25:10.920 --> 00:25:15.680 excuse me, uh. When Adam argued for a person ory self, 345 00:25:17.039 --> 00:25:20.559 we are told that that there's some inherent dignity in 346 00:25:20.599 --> 00:25:25.960 this because of the development of consciousness and reason and mind. 347 00:25:26.759 --> 00:25:29.720 But the problem, as we see from that evolutionary position 348 00:25:29.759 --> 00:25:32.359 of man, is that there's no reason to believe that 349 00:25:32.400 --> 00:25:36.000 there's some inherent value to consciousness or mind. And as 350 00:25:36.000 --> 00:25:40.400 many of the present day Darwinists are now discovering, there's 351 00:25:40.480 --> 00:25:44.720 no argument for consciousness or mind on their on their presuppositions, 352 00:25:45.440 --> 00:25:48.480 and it's it's so stupid. It should be obvious that 353 00:25:48.559 --> 00:25:53.119 if you confine everything to materialism, that there's obviously no 354 00:25:53.200 --> 00:25:56.319 place for a mind because it's by definition not material 355 00:25:57.359 --> 00:25:59.759 or the soul or the self, right, the self is not. 356 00:26:00.400 --> 00:26:03.359 At what point can you tell me which collection of 357 00:26:03.400 --> 00:26:04.599 molecules is the self? 358 00:26:05.039 --> 00:26:05.279 Right? 359 00:26:05.759 --> 00:26:07.880 Well, you can't, obviously, and that none of them can, 360 00:26:07.960 --> 00:26:10.759 and they all admit that. And so since you can't, 361 00:26:11.240 --> 00:26:14.079 then the self is alusory because the self is really 362 00:26:14.160 --> 00:26:17.880 just an arbitrary collection grouping. Remember Adam had a problem 363 00:26:17.920 --> 00:26:22.279 with arbitrary collective groupings. Well, the self is an arbitrary 364 00:26:22.279 --> 00:26:25.839 collective groupings of a grouping of this group of molecules, 365 00:26:26.799 --> 00:26:30.599 this group of atoms, supposedly right, this section of the 366 00:26:30.640 --> 00:26:37.640 gray matter. Perhaps, well, no, I see, perhaps under this microscope, 367 00:26:37.799 --> 00:26:43.599 many chunks of gray matter. But you have not shown 368 00:26:43.640 --> 00:26:50.960 me that that equals a self exactly exactly, And we 369 00:26:51.400 --> 00:26:54.960 really need a person, the conception of a person, a soul, 370 00:26:55.559 --> 00:26:57.960 right in order to make sense of this idea of 371 00:26:58.920 --> 00:27:03.519 a morally responsible agent operating with a will. And we 372 00:27:03.599 --> 00:27:08.400 always hear from the libertarian perspective of the anarchic perspective 373 00:27:08.440 --> 00:27:12.000 of responsibility, moral responsibility, ethics, et cetera, et cetera. 374 00:27:12.119 --> 00:27:15.440 Well, this all assumes individually acting agents. 375 00:27:16.240 --> 00:27:19.519 But again, as many of the Darwinists have noted in 376 00:27:19.559 --> 00:27:22.759 their mechanistic view of the universe, if the universe is 377 00:27:22.799 --> 00:27:27.720 one giant machine of determined materialistic process, then the arising 378 00:27:27.880 --> 00:27:33.000 of consciousness in evolutionary process is also just another aspect 379 00:27:33.079 --> 00:27:36.559 of the determined machine. And so your belief in free 380 00:27:36.559 --> 00:27:40.319 will is really just illusory. It's a phantasm, just like 381 00:27:40.400 --> 00:27:43.920 the angels and the demons in God right according to 382 00:27:43.960 --> 00:27:49.400 your view. So this again reduces to a reductio, reduces 383 00:27:49.440 --> 00:27:54.720 to absurdity. If everything is in flux, how is it 384 00:27:54.799 --> 00:27:57.839 that we can claim to have access or knowledge of 385 00:27:58.359 --> 00:28:02.039 objective metaphysical principle and logic that are not in flux. 386 00:28:03.000 --> 00:28:06.519 This is another problem, and this is ultimately this was 387 00:28:06.559 --> 00:28:08.880 a problem for Plato as well, because Plato had a 388 00:28:08.920 --> 00:28:12.759 dialectical view of the body and the soul, the soul 389 00:28:13.440 --> 00:28:20.279 existing or subsisting, perhaps with its connection to the abstract, unchanging, 390 00:28:20.440 --> 00:28:24.039 eternal verities of the forms, yet at the same time 391 00:28:24.079 --> 00:28:27.039 being imprisoned in the body subject to perpetual flux. So 392 00:28:27.079 --> 00:28:30.279 you have a dialectical tension between two realms, one realm 393 00:28:30.279 --> 00:28:41.400 of perpetual flux, another realm of stasis and permanence and unchangeability. 394 00:28:42.160 --> 00:28:44.880 And the problem, of course is that never the twain 395 00:28:45.000 --> 00:28:49.079 shall meet. And this is a dialectical tension in the 396 00:28:49.119 --> 00:28:52.799 history of all Western philosophy. You could argue as well 397 00:28:52.880 --> 00:28:57.119 in for Eastern philosophy we reject all dialectics. 398 00:28:57.160 --> 00:28:58.559 But of course all modern. 399 00:28:58.319 --> 00:29:02.039 Philosophies, especially in the West, are built on dialectics. Be 400 00:29:02.079 --> 00:29:06.680 it libertarianism, be it anarchism, be it Marxism. They are 401 00:29:06.799 --> 00:29:12.440