# Cults, Conspiracy Theories, and the Christmas Penis

An episode of [TheThinkingAtheist](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/412308695), 13 Dec 2024, 1 h 00 min.

Audio: https://dts.podtrac.com/redirect.mp3/mgln.ai/e/711/api.spreaker.com/download/episode/63285733/podcast776_christmaspenis.mp3

This show is a weird, wild, wonderful holiday ride. Enjoy some great calls. Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/thethinkingatheist--3270347/support.

## Transcript

[0:01] Speaker 1: Understand the thinking atheist. It's not a person, it's a symbol,
[0:09] Speaker 1: an idea.
[0:10] Speaker 2: The population of atheists this country is going through the.
[0:13] Speaker 1: Rule, rejecting faith, pursuing knowledge, challenging the sacred. If I
[0:19] Speaker 1: tell the truth, it's because I tell the truth, not
[0:22] Speaker 1: because I put my hand on a book and made
[0:24] Speaker 1: a wish and working together for a more rational world.
[0:29] Speaker 2: Take the risk of thinking. Feel so much more happiness.
[0:32] Speaker 2: Truth Fusian wisdom will come to you that way.
[0:35] Speaker 1: Assume nothing, question everything, and start thinking. This is the
[0:43] Speaker 1: Thinking Atheist podcast hosted by Seth Andrews.
[0:56] Speaker 2: There are headlines about people who have been distracting themselves
[1:01] Speaker 2: from the events of the day finding other things to
[1:04] Speaker 2: think about. I, for the first time in a couple
[1:07] Speaker 2: of years, got back into gaming. I am one of
[1:10] Speaker 2: the worst gamers in the world. I'm terrible. I have
[1:13] Speaker 2: no reflexes. I was weaned on the Atari twenty six
[1:17] Speaker 2: hundred for God's sake, which is still a classic console.
[1:21] Speaker 2: But I mean, this is my mindset. We had one
[1:23] Speaker 2: big red button and the joysticker that was it. So
[1:26] Speaker 2: now when I'm with Natalie's grandkid and we're sitting on
[1:30] Speaker 2: the couch and he's got the PlayStation controller and he
[1:33] Speaker 2: looks like he's programming a rock at launch for NASA's
[1:36] Speaker 2: fingers and moving it. That kid plays Fortnite so fast
[1:40] Speaker 2: I can't even tell what's going on. That is not
[1:43] Speaker 2: my bag. So it's rare that we can find a
[1:44] Speaker 2: game that I can really get into. But it's been
[1:46] Speaker 2: fun to distract myself. And thanks to the recommendation of
[1:51] Speaker 2: a friend named Kristen on Twitch, I started playing something
[1:56] Speaker 2: called Bramble the Mountain King. This is a magical fairy
[2:02] Speaker 2: tale of a game that is also really dark. This
[2:08] Speaker 2: cherub faced child character. I'm tiny, and I'm walking through
[2:13] Speaker 2: the lilies and the dandelions and the blades of grass,
[2:17] Speaker 2: and the music plays, you know, Swiss folks songs in
[2:20] Speaker 2: the background, and I can hear the bubbling brook behind me,
[2:23] Speaker 2: and there are lovely trees, and the sun is rising,
[2:27] Speaker 2: and all of a sudden, out of the blue, a
[2:31] Speaker 2: hideous creature shows up and bites the head off of
[2:35] Speaker 2: my body. I mean, there is a sense of real danger.
[2:43] Speaker 2: It is like Guillermo del Toro's Pans Labyrinth mixed with Tolkien,
[2:48] Speaker 2: and that's a compliment. It is one of the most
[2:51] Speaker 2: beautiful games I've ever played. I'm not great at it,
[2:54] Speaker 2: but apparently it's fun to watch me sort of amble
[2:58] Speaker 2: about and die horribly. You know, you can all off
[3:00] Speaker 2: of rocks down into pits, you can get eaten by creatures,
[3:03] Speaker 2: you can get poisoned, all of these ways that the
[3:05] Speaker 2: little child character can die. Apparently I'm a source of
[3:09] Speaker 2: great amusement. So if you are seeking that kind of amusement,
[3:13] Speaker 2: you can subscribe to my Twitch channel. Just keep your
[3:17] Speaker 2: expectations low. Twitch dot tv slash Seth Andrews tt A
[3:26] Speaker 2: And the only reason I stuck TTA for the Thinking
[3:28] Speaker 2: Atheist is because Seth Andrews was apparently already taken, but
[3:33] Speaker 2: so Twitch dot tv slash Seth Andrews TTA. The holiday
[3:39] Speaker 2: season almost wrapping up. Our Christmas decorations are out. They're
[3:43] Speaker 2: kind of generic winter decorations. I have a challenge because
[3:47] Speaker 2: every time I walk by my neighbor's decoration, I can't.
[3:54] Speaker 2: I'd my neighbor lovely person put up a gingerbread man
[4:01] Speaker 2: and he is kind of lean, one of those inflatable
[4:04] Speaker 2: things that has the electric fan that makes it blow
[4:07] Speaker 2: up and stand about eight feet tall. So he's a
[4:10] Speaker 2: gingerbread man with these kind of narrow arms, and he
[4:12] Speaker 2: has this Santa cap, a red santic cap on him.
[4:16] Speaker 2: The problem is is that the little inflator blower mechanism
[4:20] Speaker 2: is not keeping him in a standing position, and so
[4:24] Speaker 2: he falls over. When he falls over, his arms collapse
[4:28] Speaker 2: into his side and he lays there with the cap
[4:30] Speaker 2: on his head, and he looks like a big brown penis.
[4:37] Speaker 2: It's a penie. He's a penis. I'm telling you. We
[4:41] Speaker 2: shoot pictures and send him to each other. Natalie, look
[4:44] Speaker 2: at it. Look at it. It totally looked. It looks
[4:47] Speaker 2: even more like a penis tonight with a little red condom.
[4:50] Speaker 2: I'm not being base. This is how it looks. I
[4:53] Speaker 2: would put it online, but I don't want to embarrass
[4:55] Speaker 2: my neighbor. I know, wanted to get back to her air.
[4:58] Speaker 2: I can talk about it and get away with it
[4:59] Speaker 2: on the podcas. So I've got my Christmas deer. Everybody
[5:03] Speaker 2: else has Santas, and there's snow men and they've got
[5:06] Speaker 2: their own little deer. One has some deer with turning
[5:10] Speaker 2: heads and they're looking around at you. And then you
[5:12] Speaker 2: go around the corner and there's the big gingerbread flacid
[5:15] Speaker 2: penis laying on the ground. It's terrifying. It is terrifying.
[5:20] Speaker 2: So anyway, Mary penis do you and yours? I never
[5:28] Speaker 2: liked that word much. Is there another name for beyond
[5:32] Speaker 2: the slang names? You know, the Howard Johnson, the blooney pony,
[5:38] Speaker 2: that kind of those things are funny. But couldn't science
[5:41] Speaker 2: have come up with a better name than penis? It's
[5:44] Speaker 2: just something creepy about it. Help me out in the
[5:47] Speaker 2: comments section, like what would be a good new scientific name?
[5:50] Speaker 2: And then when I tell you the story about the
[5:52] Speaker 2: gingerbread thing whatever we call it, then I wouldn't have
[5:55] Speaker 2: to say the P word. Okay, that's just that's a task.
[5:59] Speaker 2: That is your miss f y. I am slowly phasing
[6:04] Speaker 2: off of Twitter slash X. Still use it from time
[6:08] Speaker 2: to time because we've got so many viewers and listeners
[6:11] Speaker 2: and I'm trying to get the content out, but I
[6:12] Speaker 2: am dialing it down. I am on Blue Sky. You
[6:16] Speaker 2: can just search me as the websites are the names
[6:20] Speaker 2: of the channel, Seth Andrews dot com, the Thinkingatheist dot com.
[6:24] Speaker 2: Blue Sky is exploding twenty some million users. It already
[6:29] Speaker 2: feels more like Twitter than Twitter. I am highly optimistic
[6:34] Speaker 2: that it might be a great resource for the rest
[6:36] Speaker 2: of us. And Blue Sky seems to have lower tolerance
[6:40] Speaker 2: for bullshit patrols, fake accounts, that type of thing. It's
[6:44] Speaker 2: not about being an echo chamber, but it is more
[6:46] Speaker 2: about not just being a sewer. And so far Blue
[6:51] Speaker 2: Sky has, I think, managed to accomplish that warts and
[6:55] Speaker 2: all flaws and all. There are growing pains. But if
[6:57] Speaker 2: you want to find me, go and subscrib or follow
[7:01] Speaker 2: or whatever. I've got a switchboard full of callers already.
[7:07] Speaker 2: Let's start with Nick at five zero nine. Nick, can
[7:10] Speaker 2: you hear me? Yes, welcome, What do you want to
[7:13] Speaker 2: talk about?
[7:14] Speaker 3: Thanks for having me on. So I'm a PhD student
[7:19] Speaker 3: and I'm researching immune show, so there's a lot of
[7:22] Speaker 3: work I do in immunology, and I just think how
[7:26] Speaker 3: insane it is that we have a guy like RK.
[7:29] Speaker 3: Junior so publicly accepted for making these anti vax claims
[7:33] Speaker 3: that are so easily and blatantly proven wrong.
[7:38] Speaker 2: The vaccines cause autism thing. He is on record. I
[7:41] Speaker 2: think he was on CNN making the statement that no
[7:45] Speaker 2: vaccine has ever been proven effective and he said, well,
[7:49] Speaker 2: I never said that, and the reporter went to the videotape,
[7:53] Speaker 2: as they say, and played his own words back to him,
[7:56] Speaker 2: and then he denied that he had said that or
[7:59] Speaker 2: it was out of context. I'm horrified.
[8:02] Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, absolutely, it's I really wish that more reporters
[8:06] Speaker 3: would kind of push him on subjects like this, because
[8:10] Speaker 3: you know, I have a lot of family members that
[8:11] Speaker 3: are you know, they're not. I wouldn't say I'm an expert,
[8:14] Speaker 3: but they don't know nearly as much as I do,
[8:16] Speaker 3: so they're very easily susceptible to these kinds of claims,
[8:20] Speaker 3: and it's spreading like wildfire. So one thing is my lab.
[8:24] Speaker 3: We're in the midst of having to reapply for funding,
[8:28] Speaker 3: and it's going to probably line up that we're going
[8:30] Speaker 3: to be applying for funding this spring, and already kind
[8:34] Speaker 3: of having a conservative administration can limit how much funding.
[8:38] Speaker 3: We primarily get funding through NIH which is kind of
[8:41] Speaker 3: overseen by public Health, So it's concerning are we going
[8:45] Speaker 3: to get funded for the next few years. These are
[8:48] Speaker 3: actual issues that most Americans don't consider that most sciences
[8:53] Speaker 3: could take a huge hit from having a guy like
[8:55] Speaker 3: him in charge.
[8:57] Speaker 2: Wasn't it the vaccines cause autism? Conspiracy? Theory was started first,
[9:04] Speaker 2: or at least promoted on a large scale, first by
[9:07] Speaker 2: Jenny McCarthy. She was the model and actress.
[9:11] Speaker 3: I'm not too familiar with the entire history of it,
[9:14] Speaker 3: but I do know there was a paper that was
[9:16] Speaker 3: published that made this claim. But that paper has since
[9:20] Speaker 3: been proven wrong countless times, but kind of the narrative
[9:23] Speaker 3: from the initial publication still remains as a talking point
[9:28] Speaker 3: by anti vaxxers. It is concerning, but even as someone
[9:33] Speaker 3: I'm a researcher, but even as a father, I have
[9:36] Speaker 3: a five month old baby and where I live, like
[9:40] Speaker 3: whooping cough is going around, and the reason it's going
[9:43] Speaker 3: around is because people aren't getting vaccinated. So it's like
[9:46] Speaker 3: this COVID nineteen anti vaxx rhetoric is extending into all
[9:50] Speaker 3: forms of vaccines. It's twenty twenty four. We shouldn't be
[9:53] Speaker 3: having booking cost outbreaks. We should be past this. And
[9:58] Speaker 3: I don't know what it's going to take for people
[10:00] Speaker 3: to realize how dangerous these diseases are and why we
[10:03] Speaker 3: vaccinate other than people are going to get sick, and unfortunately,
[10:07] Speaker 3: some people might may die before it finally hits home.
[10:10] Speaker 2: And even then, I've sort of given up hope they
[10:13] Speaker 2: died from something else, or maybe the government killed them
[10:16] Speaker 2: to cover up their vaccine propaganda. It is amazing how
[10:19] Speaker 2: resistant people can be to data, to science, to good sense.
[10:24] Speaker 2: I am sorry to see where we are. I would
[10:27] Speaker 2: have never predicted it. All we can do, I guess,
[10:30] Speaker 2: is be pro science in this anti science country.
[10:33] Speaker 3: And I wanted to say one more thing please. As
[10:36] Speaker 3: a scientist during COVID nineteen stuff, I was almost on
[10:40] Speaker 3: the impression that, well, maybe it's the researchers that aren't
[10:42] Speaker 3: communicating this effectively, But I've come to realize that it
[10:46] Speaker 3: really wasn't the scientists. It's the podcasters and these kind
[10:51] Speaker 3: of sort of echo chambers where you get someone on
[10:53] Speaker 3: Joe Rogan that says do your own research, but they
[10:57] Speaker 3: don't actually know what that means. They google something, skim
[11:01] Speaker 3: past all the things that disprove what they think, and
[11:04] Speaker 3: find the one guy on a blog post that says
[11:07] Speaker 3: it has microchips in it, and they claim that's doing
[11:09] Speaker 3: their own research. So I'm I'm a bit of a loss.
[11:13] Speaker 3: Just how do we how do we get back trust
[11:16] Speaker 3: in institutions when it's not really the institution's fault. It's
[11:20] Speaker 3: kind of these fringe and some really large podcasts that
[11:23] Speaker 3: are pushing these narratives.
[11:25] Speaker 2: It's not just the Joe Rogans though. If we see
[11:29] Speaker 2: the Rupert Murdochs and his massive media empire, Fox News
[11:33] Speaker 2: and beyond, they've weaponized these major networks as propaganda machines.
[11:40] Speaker 2: You see Elon Musk who was weaponized x to spread
[11:44] Speaker 2: all kinds of crazy conspiracy theories or at least doubt
[11:48] Speaker 2: about the science of vaccines, etc. So you know, we've
[11:51] Speaker 2: got major, major, major players with huge billions of dollars
[11:56] Speaker 2: and they're able to go and create an alternate reality.
[12:00] Speaker 2: Your frustrations, I know we're shared by this audience, but
[12:03] Speaker 2: I'm thankful to meet someone who is an agent of
[12:06] Speaker 2: real science in the real world. Keep doing science, Okay.
[12:10] Speaker 3: Nick, thank you, Yeah, thank you. I know I can't
[12:14] Speaker 3: really do a whole lot on a large scale, but
[12:16] Speaker 3: I have come to realize that even the people that
[12:19] Speaker 3: I have completely different political views with, at the end
[12:22] Speaker 3: of the day, we generally want the same thing for people,
[12:26] Speaker 3: and they've just been misled on how to go about that.
[12:29] Speaker 3: So if you do find yourself up against someone who's
[12:32] Speaker 3: anti vax or is claiming that chemicals in the water
[12:35] Speaker 3: are turning kids gay or something completely ridiculous. I think
[12:40] Speaker 3: they're not a bad person in their heart, and we
[12:41] Speaker 3: have to try and find common ground to convince them,
[12:44] Speaker 3: or at least get them to consider that they may
[12:47] Speaker 3: be wrong.
[12:48] Speaker 2: It sounds like a speech I just did in Knoxville,
[12:51] Speaker 2: Tennessee called the Brick Wall Brain, which I would encourage
[12:55] Speaker 2: everybody to look up. Nick, You're much appreciated. Happy New Year. Okay,
[13:00] Speaker 2: thanks for having me on so you bet you nice
[13:01] Speaker 2: talking to you. We'll see you later out of curiosity.
[13:06] Speaker 2: The vaccines cause autism myth has been around for years.
[13:11] Speaker 2: I want to say it originated with Jenny McCarthy, the
[13:17] Speaker 2: model actress who had a child with autism, and she
[13:20] Speaker 2: just made a connection and she, being a semi famous person,
[13:24] Speaker 2: went public with it, and then everything else sort of
[13:28] Speaker 2: exploded from there. But I don't trust my memory, so
[13:31] Speaker 2: I pulled up a Time magazine article on the beginning
[13:35] Speaker 2: of this. So let's take a second and get into it.
[13:38] Speaker 2: I'm going to read it cold. The vaccine autism myth
[13:41] Speaker 2: started twenty years ago. This was published in twenty eighteen,
[13:44] Speaker 2: so that's twenty seven years ago. Here's why it still
[13:47] Speaker 2: endures today. Anti vaccination headlines like HPV vaccine leaves another
[13:54] Speaker 2: seventeen year old girl paralyzed, populate the Internet that and
[14:00] Speaker 2: researches vaccines, discovers vaccination horrors, goes vaccine free. Are just
[14:06] Speaker 2: a few examples of the fake science news stories shared
[14:09] Speaker 2: this month on Facebook. If you're a parent on social media,
[14:13] Speaker 2: you've likely seen many posts just like these. Maybe you've
[14:17] Speaker 2: even clicked on one, curious what's the harm? Right. As
[14:21] Speaker 2: a family physician with four decades of experience fighting preventable
[14:25] Speaker 2: disease around the globe and a professor of anthropology, risk
[14:30] Speaker 2: and decision science studying global vaccine confidence, we have seen
[14:35] Speaker 2: the deadly harm that fraudulent science and unfounded claims can cause.
[14:40] Speaker 2: And this takes me to the author of the article,
[14:43] Speaker 2: doctor Jonathan Quick, MD. Doctor Quick says the vaccine autism
[14:49] Speaker 2: myth is one chilling example of fraudulent science. February twenty eighth,
[14:54] Speaker 2: twenty eighteen, marks the twentieth anniversary of an infamous article
[14:58] Speaker 2: published in the Pristine Pigius medical journal The Lenset, in
[15:03] Speaker 2: which Andrew Wakefield, a former British doctor, falsely linked the
[15:08] Speaker 2: MMR measles mom send Rubella vaccine to autism. The paper
[15:14] Speaker 2: eventually was retracted by the co authors and the journal.
[15:18] Speaker 2: Wakefield was delicensed by medical authorities for his deceit and
[15:23] Speaker 2: quote callous disregard for children in his care. It took
[15:28] Speaker 2: nearly two decades for the UK immunization rates to recover.
[15:33] Speaker 2: By the end, UK families had experienced more than twelve
[15:36] Speaker 2: thousand cases of measles, hundreds of hospitalizations, many with serious complications,
[15:42] Speaker 2: and at least three deaths. Stunningly, the vaccine autism myth
[15:47] Speaker 2: still persists. It was amplified by the British media during
[15:51] Speaker 2: its early years, later by celebrity endorsement, and more recently
[15:55] Speaker 2: worldwide by social media. Wakefield has continued his own relentless
[16:01] Speaker 2: personal campaigning, moving well beyond the initial MMR vaccine scare
[16:06] Speaker 2: mongering to attacking the CDC and is controversial film Vaxed.
[16:12] Speaker 2: The film was pulled before screening at the Tribeca Film Festival,
[16:16] Speaker 2: but found its way into independent theaters in the US
[16:19] Speaker 2: and Europe. Europe's fourfold increase in measles cases and thirty
[16:24] Speaker 2: five measles related deaths in twenty seventeen due largely to
[16:28] Speaker 2: people not getting vaccinated. Also reflects how Wakefield's vaccine autism
[16:34] Speaker 2: scare can spark vaccine refusals that lead to debilitating and
[16:39] Speaker 2: fatal cases of measles. In the US, measles was declared
[16:44] Speaker 2: eliminated in two thousand. Since two thousand, however, there has
[16:49] Speaker 2: been a resurgence of measles, with more than twenty two
[16:52] Speaker 2: hundred and sixteen reported cases. Wakefield's anti vaccine fanaticism contributed
[16:59] Speaker 2: to the twenty fifteen outbreak in Disneyland, California, which eventually
[17:04] Speaker 2: infected more than one hundred thirty people, and to the
[17:07] Speaker 2: twenty seventeen measles outbreaks in Minnesota, where his message persuaded
[17:12] Speaker 2: many parents not to vaccinate their children. The vaccine autism
[17:17] Speaker 2: myth has also prompted an alarming number of Millennials, the
[17:22] Speaker 2: generation that came of age in the era of Wakefield's
[17:25] Speaker 2: misinformation in the US, not to vaccinate their children. Vaccine
[17:32] Speaker 2: reluctance does not apply just a Measle's flu kills one
[17:35] Speaker 2: hundred to three hundred children under the age of five
[17:39] Speaker 2: each year end up to eighty five percent of them
[17:43] Speaker 2: were not vaccinated when they died. The article goes on,
[17:49] Speaker 2: but we get the point. Wakefield and his work continuing
[17:52] Speaker 2: to be embraced by the anti vax crowd and those
[17:56] Speaker 2: who just don't know the difference after all of these decades.
[18:00] Speaker 2: It hurts the heart. Many say it's the most wonderful
[18:05] Speaker 2: time of the year. I don't know, but we're gonna
[18:08] Speaker 2: take more of your wonderful calls next. Don't forget to
[18:23] Speaker 2: subscribe to my second podcast, True Stories. Podcast dot com
[18:28] Speaker 2: is the website, or you can just search for True
[18:31] Speaker 2: Stories with Seth Andrews on all major podcast apps. I've
[18:37] Speaker 2: got John from upstate New York area code six oh seven.
[18:42] Speaker 2: Are you there?
[18:43] Speaker 4: He s?
[18:44] Speaker 2: What's going on? John?
[18:46] Speaker 5: I wonder is there a term in the English language.
[18:49] Speaker 5: I've tried to find it where like, you're professionally and
[18:52] Speaker 5: personally in one of the best spots you've been, but
[18:56] Speaker 5: the rest of the world feels like it's going insane.
[19:00] Speaker 5: Word in the English language for that, because that's where
[19:02] Speaker 5: it feels like I'm at right about now.
[19:04] Speaker 2: Lucky, I'm a cis white hetero guy in the United States.
[19:12] Speaker 2: I am not in the crosshairs as much as so
[19:15] Speaker 2: many marginalized groups. So when I talk about the harms
[19:19] Speaker 2: that are coming down the pipe. I've already been vaccinated.
[19:23] Speaker 2: I'm not going to be beat up because I'm a
[19:25] Speaker 2: trans person. I don't feel physically in danger. I've got
[19:29] Speaker 2: at this point anyway healthcare, you know. So I'm not
[19:33] Speaker 2: in a point where I worry as much. And so
[19:36] Speaker 2: I realize I'm in a position of luck or privileged
[19:39] Speaker 2: chance circumstance. But at the same time, I do look
[19:42] Speaker 2: because I'm a member of the human race, and because
[19:45] Speaker 2: I feel like we all need to be advocates for
[19:48] Speaker 2: each other, understand that those who are not in that
[19:51] Speaker 2: privileged position are really in the crosshairs and they need advocacy,
[19:54] Speaker 2: and they are in real danger. And so I feel despair.
[19:57] Speaker 2: My heart kind of dies inside. Is that what you're
[19:59] Speaker 2: talking about?
[20:00] Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, And I don't know. Maybe it's because I'm
[20:03] Speaker 5: seeing this through the lens of a teacher. There's a
[20:07] Speaker 5: lot of memes out there that talk about how the
[20:11] Speaker 5: first impulse when a child is failing their class is
[20:15] Speaker 5: to blame the teacher. Not to say that we have
[20:18] Speaker 5: no responsibility. It's absolutely true we do, but there is
[20:23] Speaker 5: so much more blaming upon educators for when students don't
[20:28] Speaker 5: do well instead of putting the responsibility on the students
[20:33] Speaker 5: to actually complete their work. We're dealing with a situation
[20:38] Speaker 5: where the teacher trying to motivate the student who is
[20:42] Speaker 5: just so unmotivated and doesn't do the work, and they
[20:46] Speaker 5: fail because they don't put forth the effort, they don't
[20:50] Speaker 5: do the work. And I feel like the electorate, too
[20:54] Speaker 5: many of the electorate are like that.
[20:56] Speaker 2: First of all, let me make sure that I'm understanding.
[20:59] Speaker 2: Are you saying that? But we live in a culture
[21:01] Speaker 2: where we have taken healthy reaction into over reaction. We
[21:06] Speaker 2: are over analyzing to the point where we are externalizing
[21:09] Speaker 2: blame instead of understanding that some of the problems are
[21:14] Speaker 2: because we aren't prepared, we haven't done the work, we
[21:17] Speaker 2: aren't engaged, we aren't effective. We need to take personal
[21:21] Speaker 2: responsibility to a larger degree. Is that what I'm hearing?
[21:24] Speaker 5: I think that democrats are running the risk of putting
[21:27] Speaker 5: too much responsibility on themselves and not putting enough responsibility
[21:33] Speaker 5: on the voter and not putting enough responsibility on the
[21:36] Speaker 5: people to be able to do the work. And the
[21:41] Speaker 5: reason why I said it reminds me of being a
[21:44] Speaker 5: teacher because one of the earliest staging of my teacher
[21:48] Speaker 5: training that I ever received. The best piece of advice,
[21:51] Speaker 5: or one of the best pieces of advice that I
[21:53] Speaker 5: ever got, was, if you take every kid's failing grade personally,
[21:59] Speaker 5: you'll never or survive because you could do the absolute
[22:03] Speaker 5: perfect lesson plan, give the students all of the resources
[22:08] Speaker 5: that they could need to do the test. You could
[22:10] Speaker 5: go as far as taking the dang thing for them,
[22:14] Speaker 5: and they will still fail. That's on them because they
[22:18] Speaker 5: didn't put forth the effort, either because they wouldn't, or
[22:21] Speaker 5: they couldn't because they have other things going on, or
[22:24] Speaker 5: just because they don't care. And obviously the only flaw
[22:28] Speaker 5: in that analogy is that it would be one thing if,
[22:32] Speaker 5: like the students that I mentioned, where they're the only
[22:35] Speaker 5: ones suffering the consequences of the failing grade, we're all
[22:39] Speaker 5: suffering the consequences of their civic illiteracy sticking their fork
[22:45] Speaker 5: in the electrical socket. We're all connected to them, and
[22:49] Speaker 5: we're all going to feel the pain.
[22:51] Speaker 2: What's that line, you know, how you're dead and you
[22:54] Speaker 2: don't feel anything, but it hurts the people around you.
[22:57] Speaker 2: It's the same when you're stupid. You may not feel it,
[23:01] Speaker 2: but you're doing harm. Everybody around you is feeling pain
[23:04] Speaker 2: kind of thing, So I don't know if that's an
[23:07] Speaker 2: accurate statement or not. People who have been misled, yeah,
[23:11] Speaker 2: they're victims, but they also do have a responsibility to
[23:15] Speaker 2: do some homework and to crawl out of the mire.
[23:18] Speaker 2: How you can lead the horse to water. We'll do
[23:21] Speaker 2: our best to inform them, but they're going to have
[23:23] Speaker 2: to make the escape. So that's a good point, John,
[23:25] Speaker 2: and I appreciate you making it.
[23:27] Speaker 5: I'm about seven or eight months removed from starting my
[23:31] Speaker 5: dissertation in the PhD field, and just keep a heart
[23:35] Speaker 5: out for teachers everywhere because it's going to get rough
[23:37] Speaker 5: with missus Vince McMahon leading what's left of the Department
[23:41] Speaker 5: of Education.
[23:42] Speaker 2: Boy, oh yeah, she's going to body slam the Department
[23:46] Speaker 2: of Education. She's gonna choke slam. That's what they call it,
[23:50] Speaker 2: the Apartment of Education. John, thanks for calling. I have
[23:53] Speaker 2: a great one. We'll see you later.
[23:55] Speaker 3: Good to hear from you, Set Yeah, you.
[23:57] Speaker 2: Too, I think he called me, so it's good to
[23:59] Speaker 2: hear from you.
[24:00] Speaker 5: John.
[24:01] Speaker 2: I think anytime there's a healthy reaction, there is an
[24:05] Speaker 2: overreaction possible. Anytime we see something happen that's necessary. You
[24:11] Speaker 2: will see a group of people, a percentage of faction,
[24:14] Speaker 2: a group, a shade of that movement. Then go and
[24:18] Speaker 2: overdo and overthink and overcompensate and over work. And it
[24:24] Speaker 2: happens everywhere we go. I think it happens in every
[24:27] Speaker 2: group and every tribe. It's a very human thing. I
[24:31] Speaker 2: don't overthink the twenty twenty four election. I know what happened.
[24:38] Speaker 2: The medium moguls and the oligarchs and the agents of
[24:41] Speaker 2: disinformation created an alternate reality. Freaked out, an entire culture
[24:46] Speaker 2: of people said trust us will save you, and a
[24:50] Speaker 2: very often incurious, terrified, sometimes bigoted group of people took
[24:55] Speaker 2: debate and got us where we are. So I can
[24:58] Speaker 2: see them as victims. But I can all also say
[25:00] Speaker 2: that you're failing the test. That's not my fault. I
[25:05] Speaker 2: think that's a fair point. I've got Faye at eight
[25:10] Speaker 2: one seven. Thanks for waiting on me. Are you there?
[25:13] Speaker 2: I am here, Seth, welcome. What's on your mind?
[25:18] Speaker 6: I had a couple of words that something. Here's what happened.
[25:23] Speaker 6: I was on the atheist of sub reddit I Reddit,
[25:27] Speaker 6: and I apparently use a forbidden word in the course
[25:30] Speaker 6: of trying to encourage our community to be better about
[25:35] Speaker 6: our use of language. You know how vernacular use of
[25:39] Speaker 6: words causes their meaning to drift if you're not using
[25:42] Speaker 6: them properly. Like the term gas lighting. It got so
[25:47] Speaker 6: popular now people just use it to me lying, when
[25:49] Speaker 6: in fact, it means lying and encouraging one to believe
[25:53] Speaker 6: that they're crazy. That's the whole point of gas lighting.
[25:56] Speaker 6: They're trying to think you're crazy. You're not in touch
[25:58] Speaker 6: with reality if I'm just lying. So the terms that
[26:02] Speaker 6: I was wanted to encourage us to take a stronger
[26:05] Speaker 6: look at, or a couple that come up in atheist conversations,
[26:09] Speaker 6: and those words. Anything surrounding cults and the idea of
[26:16] Speaker 6: religion as a mental disease or mental illness.
[26:21] Speaker 2: Pop psychology is frustrating, isn't it. People are counseling this
[26:25] Speaker 2: unqualified people are counseling other people using memes, and I'm
[26:31] Speaker 2: sure trained mental health professionals look at that stuff and go, no,
[26:34] Speaker 2: that's reductive. No, that's the wrong term. No, that's just
[26:38] Speaker 2: a wrong claim, and you're doing more harm than good.
[26:41] Speaker 2: And yet that stuff is everywhere. What do you mean
[26:45] Speaker 2: about cults? What do you see that's being gotten wrong
[26:48] Speaker 2: in that regard.
[26:50] Speaker 6: Well, the idea that all religions are cults. To me
[26:55] Speaker 6: by using that term, like the whole topic that I
[26:59] Speaker 6: was desponding to when I got banned was that the
[27:03] Speaker 6: question from someone who's obvious expeditions in trauma. Religious trauma
[27:07] Speaker 6: is a real thing, But the question was is Catholicism
[27:12] Speaker 6: a cult? And if you look at the bite model
[27:16] Speaker 6: that is available to anyone who knows how to use Google,
[27:19] Speaker 6: there's a way of categorizing a true cult from you know,
[27:24] Speaker 6: religion maybe start out as a cult and they end
[27:26] Speaker 6: up getting powerful, and then they become an institution and
[27:29] Speaker 6: is no longer a cult because you can come or
[27:30] Speaker 6: go at your pleasure.
[27:32] Speaker 4: Well I'm talking, you're.
[27:34] Speaker 6: Manipulated and it's hard to leave, and there you're being separated.
[27:38] Speaker 6: There's a whole spectrum of behavior in terms of like
[27:42] Speaker 6: cults that are actually really dangerous for people. And I
[27:45] Speaker 6: think that by use a blanket in term of cult
[27:47] Speaker 6: to describe all religion, I think it's inaccurate and it
[27:50] Speaker 6: does a disservice to people who actually suffer from being
[27:53] Speaker 6: in cults.
[27:54] Speaker 2: I resist the idea that cult is just one thing
[27:57] Speaker 2: because I do think the Catholic Church is a I
[28:01] Speaker 2: think the byte model applies behavior control, information control, thought control,
[28:06] Speaker 2: emotion control. Even though people can leave, those engaged are
[28:12] Speaker 2: being controlled. Here's who you can marry, Here's who is
[28:15] Speaker 2: qualified to be clergy, here's your reproductive model. Contraception is banned,
[28:20] Speaker 2: here's the model for achieving heaven or avoiding hell. Even
[28:24] Speaker 2: though it's massive and massively wealthy, it still qualifies as
[28:28] Speaker 2: a cult. And it's a type of cult, because I
[28:31] Speaker 2: don't think cults are any one thing. I do take
[28:34] Speaker 2: your point that using the word religion as a blanket
[28:37] Speaker 2: statement is wildly nebulous and means so many different things.
[28:42] Speaker 2: Is it a spiritual religion where no control is in
[28:45] Speaker 2: play and people are just you know, they get together
[28:47] Speaker 2: and they get to be who they are, and they
[28:49] Speaker 2: call it spiritual. Is it something else where they're more
[28:51] Speaker 2: of a deist. Is it something else where it's a
[28:53] Speaker 2: secular religion, pagan religion. To say, the word religion cheats
[28:58] Speaker 2: the larger, much more common plex conversation. Right, I agree.
[29:03] Speaker 6: I think everything is this on a spectrums. I look
[29:05] Speaker 6: at a life. I think everything is on a spectrum.
[29:08] Speaker 6: And one of the comments that I read in that
[29:11] Speaker 6: little subreddit was someone said, you know, religion is a
[29:14] Speaker 6: cult with an army.
[29:16] Speaker 2: It's popular, it's still a cult. I did a speech
[29:21] Speaker 2: last year at the American Atheist Convention. It's online. It's
[29:24] Speaker 2: called Blood Cult, and it's about Christianity, right, It's about
[29:30] Speaker 2: Christianity because at its fundamental core, if you're talking about
[29:34] Speaker 2: Bible based, Bible literalist Christianity and not this sort of
[29:38] Speaker 2: pie in the sky, moderate, progressive, watered down, cherry picked
[29:43] Speaker 2: thing that doesn't have much to do with scripture. If
[29:46] Speaker 2: you are living scriptural Christianity, you are in a cult.
[29:50] Speaker 6: Okay, I appreciate that. I was calling to look to
[29:54] Speaker 6: you for wisdom on this. Oh God, ban me for
[30:00] Speaker 6: using apparently a forbidden word. No, trying to say, hey,
[30:06] Speaker 6: can't we be more careful in our use of language.
[30:08] Speaker 6: I appreciate that different framing. I appreciate that very much.
[30:11] Speaker 2: I know I'm sorry that you were banned. I think
[30:14] Speaker 2: we should be able to talk about these things in
[30:16] Speaker 2: good faith as adults in the room without hitting the
[30:20] Speaker 2: ban hammer. So you're not banned here. Your perspective is welcome,
[30:24] Speaker 2: and let's talk again. You know, and if you come
[30:26] Speaker 2: across any new and better information, I would want to
[30:29] Speaker 2: know that so I can change my mind. All right.
[30:32] Speaker 6: Well, the other one was the whole thing about mental illness,
[30:34] Speaker 6: like referring to people with who have been in doctrinates,
[30:38] Speaker 6: who are victims themselves as victims of mental illness. I
[30:41] Speaker 6: think it doesn't disservice people who actually suffer from real
[30:44] Speaker 6: mental illness.
[30:45] Speaker 2: Absolutely, religion is not a mental illness. And even if
[30:54] Speaker 2: there are people who do suffer from mental illness who
[30:57] Speaker 2: become religious, or maybe they are more prone in some
[31:00] Speaker 2: ways more susceptible to those types of ideas, it doesn't
[31:04] Speaker 2: mean that religion itself. People who practice religion though that Christians, Muslims, Catholics, Jews, whoever,
[31:11] Speaker 2: these are not mentally ill people. My IQ, my brain capacity,
[31:16] Speaker 2: the machine of my mind did not change one way
[31:19] Speaker 2: or the other. When I was a Christian and then
[31:22] Speaker 2: segued into non religious life. I was not mentally ill.
[31:26] Speaker 2: And this is one of the worst arguments that I
[31:28] Speaker 2: have heard atheists used out there. I stand against it
[31:31] Speaker 2: everywhere I go, and I'm astounded at the pushback that
[31:34] Speaker 2: I've gotten. FAE.
[31:36] Speaker 6: It's sad that we tend to live in this polarized,
[31:39] Speaker 6: you know, memified universe, everything's just reduced to bumper stickers
[31:43] Speaker 6: and sound bites and memes and stuff. And I like
[31:47] Speaker 6: conversation that's a little more nuanced.
[31:49] Speaker 2: Well, you and I have had a conversation which was
[31:53] Speaker 2: nuanced and nobody was banned. So I consider these last
[31:57] Speaker 2: few minutes a success. Fae, we did.
[31:59] Speaker 3: It, and you happy for everything you do.
[32:02] Speaker 2: So it's lovely talking to you. Happy New Year, We'll
[32:05] Speaker 2: see you later.
[32:05] Speaker 5: Happy hear your take care.
[32:06] Speaker 2: I see them by already in the comments mental illness,
[32:11] Speaker 2: mental breakdown, lack of mental capacity. This is reductive and
[32:16] Speaker 2: it cheats real mental illness conversations. And honestly, it's a
[32:21] Speaker 2: shitty way to approach people who have a God belief.
[32:24] Speaker 2: Your mentally ill is not how we fix it. It's
[32:28] Speaker 2: not just that it's not accurate, it's superior, it's snotty,
[32:31] Speaker 2: it's unhelpful. Why in the world would we walk in
[32:34] Speaker 2: and say, oh, you must be damaged, your brain must
[32:38] Speaker 2: not be functioning correctly, you're mentally ill. I remember when
[32:43] Speaker 2: I first became an activist, people used to use this term.
[32:46] Speaker 2: I don't see it much anymore, but it was a
[32:49] Speaker 2: horrifying term. They would call them christ tards or religitard.
[32:54] Speaker 2: I'm sorry, what is it you want to accomplish with
[32:56] Speaker 2: that term? I just want to feel superior about yourself.
[33:00] Speaker 2: You want to knock other people down, You want to
[33:02] Speaker 2: treat him like a one dimensional subhuman. In some ways,
[33:06] Speaker 2: you're going to be shitting me. It's a tremendously wrongheaded
[33:10] Speaker 2: and damaging way to approach people. I will die on
[33:13] Speaker 2: this hill. I've got a web call zombie Reusshue. Do
[33:20] Speaker 2: you want me to call you this? Zombie or z R?
[33:22] Speaker 2: What do you want?
[33:23] Speaker 7: Just call me? Zombie? Is zombie a pseudonym that I use?
[33:27] Speaker 2: That's fine with me.
[33:28] Speaker 7: It's not my real name, of course, of course it's well.
[33:33] Speaker 2: I've never once to write a recollection conversed with the undead.
[33:37] Speaker 2: This is an honor for me, Zombie. So what's on
[33:39] Speaker 2: your mind? What do you want to speak about?
[33:41] Speaker 7: Consider it just to be my first name?
[33:43] Speaker 2: Okay?
[33:43] Speaker 7: Right, So you said that you're into gaming. I am too,
[33:47] Speaker 7: and I have a gaming series that I think, or
[33:50] Speaker 7: at least a narrative gaming series that I think. Considering
[33:53] Speaker 7: your skill level, once you get accustomed to it, I
[33:55] Speaker 7: think you can enjoy that intersects with your interest in
[33:58] Speaker 7: religion and atheists and attempting to get into video game culture.
[34:03] Speaker 7: It's called shin Magami tense.
[34:06] Speaker 2: How do I even spell that?
[34:09] Speaker 7: S hi in space okay n eg ami space te
[34:17] Speaker 7: n sei okay.
[34:20] Speaker 2: I just pulled it up on wiki. A Japanese media
[34:25] Speaker 2: franchise role playing video game genre tactical action massively multiplayer.
[34:31] Speaker 2: Does that sound familiar?
[34:32] Speaker 3: Is?
[34:32] Speaker 2: That's the one.
[34:33] Speaker 7: It's not massively multiplayer in most cases, most of these
[34:36] Speaker 7: games are single player, at least the mainline series. The
[34:40] Speaker 7: one that I'm actually going to steer you toward is
[34:42] Speaker 7: Shin Magami Tense four and it's CQL shin MCGAMMI Tense
[34:47] Speaker 7: four Apocalypse. I think you would really enjoy the narrative
[34:52] Speaker 7: and the story quality involved.
[34:55] Speaker 2: I'm more of a like mission guy. If you put
[34:57] Speaker 2: me in an open world, I tend to get lost
[35:01] Speaker 2: and frustrated. I like more of a linear story. Give
[35:04] Speaker 2: me a task to achieve, a mission, to accomplish, a
[35:07] Speaker 2: foe to defeat.
[35:08] Speaker 7: That's exactly what happens. That's exactly what happens in these games.
[35:12] Speaker 7: You start in an area as a given protagonist. These
[35:15] Speaker 7: games are not MMOs, at least not in most of them.
[35:18] Speaker 7: There's a sub series of them called the Persona series
[35:21] Speaker 7: that is kind of an MMO, but it has different
[35:24] Speaker 7: mechanics than the what's referred to as the mainline series.
[35:28] Speaker 7: If that makes any sense.
[35:29] Speaker 2: If my reflexes are barely good enough to play Candy Crush,
[35:34] Speaker 2: then how hosed am I? I mean, do I have
[35:37] Speaker 2: to be able to You're.
[35:38] Speaker 7: Not, because this is entirely turn based. Like a game
[35:41] Speaker 7: of Dungeons and Dragons, you are given a series of
[35:44] Speaker 7: press turns. The enemy cannot take a turn until you
[35:48] Speaker 7: take a turn. You cannot take a turn until the
[35:50] Speaker 7: enemy has had their turn. Nothing is reflex oriented.
[35:54] Speaker 2: Oh yeah, that's my speed because I have the reflexes
[35:58] Speaker 2: of a three toed sloth. You know. I game at
[36:01] Speaker 2: the speed of litigation, at least in the fight scenes.
[36:03] Speaker 2: Everybody else is moving quickly and I'm like, which button
[36:06] Speaker 2: do I press? And then I panic and die horribly.
[36:09] Speaker 2: I guess again, which is part of the appeal of
[36:11] Speaker 2: my channel. I will do a check on that. Shin
[36:14] Speaker 2: mgami tense. That sounds intriguing. Thank you for that, zombie.
[36:18] Speaker 7: The final boss is usually YHVH jehovah.
[36:23] Speaker 2: Yeahweh I get to fight God. That sounds like a party.
[36:26] Speaker 2: I'll definitely check it out now. Thanks for the heads up.
[36:29] Speaker 2: Appreciate you all right, Gratu later Shin mcgami tense. I'll
[36:35] Speaker 2: hand that to my wish list and give it a shot.
[36:40] Speaker 2: I've got Kelsey at four zero five. That sounds like Oklahoma, Kelsey,
[36:45] Speaker 2: are you there?
[36:46] Speaker 8: I am here, I've been noble welcome.
[36:49] Speaker 2: What's on your mind?
[36:51] Speaker 8: Well, so, I have been with my boyfriend for over
[36:55] Speaker 8: two years now and he is a flat earther.
[37:00] Speaker 2: How's that working for you?
[37:02] Speaker 8: It actually really hasn't been that big of a problem.
[37:05] Speaker 8: We've had a couple of little arguments over the subject.
[37:10] Speaker 8: I'm obviously an atheist. I love science, I love space
[37:14] Speaker 8: related stuff, and so I would like to be able
[37:18] Speaker 8: to talk to him about that stuff at some point,
[37:22] Speaker 8: and I was hoping for some advice on how to
[37:25] Speaker 8: be more confident about bringing up stuff.
[37:28] Speaker 2: That I'm not an expert. We're just talking over coffee
[37:31] Speaker 2: as friends. Are there any other conspiracy theories that your
[37:35] Speaker 2: boyfriend brings to the table or is flatter It seemed
[37:37] Speaker 2: to be the.
[37:37] Speaker 8: One he does believe in a lot of other conspiracies,
[37:42] Speaker 8: and he is very Christian.
[37:45] Speaker 2: So it sounds to me like you disagree on a
[37:48] Speaker 2: lot of data type stuff, But overall, are your values
[37:54] Speaker 2: the same. You want to treat people well, you want
[37:57] Speaker 2: to build the better world. You have the same end,
[38:00] Speaker 2: you have the same sense of humor kind of thing.
[38:02] Speaker 2: I mean, what is it that attracts you to him
[38:04] Speaker 2: and vice versa.
[38:05] Speaker 8: Well, me and him are pretty much touched at the hip.
[38:08] Speaker 8: We get along right. Ever since first time we met
[38:11] Speaker 8: each other, We've just gone along really good, and I
[38:14] Speaker 8: can't see myself being with anybody else.
[38:17] Speaker 2: This is a remarkable example of two people who have
[38:21] Speaker 2: disagreements on some facts but seem to align in terms
[38:25] Speaker 2: of values. When you both enter a situation and you
[38:30] Speaker 2: see right and wrong present itself, you would line up
[38:32] Speaker 2: on what the right and wrong thing to do would
[38:34] Speaker 2: be right?
[38:35] Speaker 5: Oh yeah, yeah, But.
[38:36] Speaker 2: You're frustrated that when it comes to conspiracy theories that
[38:40] Speaker 2: don't necessarily impact your everyday lives. The earth is flat
[38:45] Speaker 2: doesn't really affect your you know, the comings and goings
[38:48] Speaker 2: of the day, doesn't affect your job, your family, any
[38:50] Speaker 2: of those types of things. It's more in the abstract,
[38:52] Speaker 2: but it still frustrates you. All I would know to
[38:56] Speaker 2: do is to lead with questions.
[38:59] Speaker 5: You know.
[38:59] Speaker 2: I think my favorite flat Earth question is if the
[39:03] Speaker 2: Earth was flat, why haven't cats pushed everything off the
[39:06] Speaker 2: edge by now? I don't know. That's always made me
[39:08] Speaker 2: laugh just a little bit. But if you were to
[39:11] Speaker 2: walk in any direction, would at some point you reach
[39:14] Speaker 2: the edge? Where does your concept for flat Earth come from?
[39:20] Speaker 2: Does it come out of the Bible? Is it something else?
[39:22] Speaker 2: Did you watch some sort of a YouTube video? Is
[39:25] Speaker 2: there recovering over the Earth? How would you explain the
[39:28] Speaker 2: fact that the global nature of the planet is, how
[39:32] Speaker 2: everything from the airline industry to meteorology function. If the
[39:37] Speaker 2: Earth was flat, all of that would not be working correctly.
[39:40] Speaker 2: I think you just asked some questions in good faith.
[39:43] Speaker 2: I think for me, the big challenge is not to
[39:45] Speaker 2: get myself worked up or I get frustrated and I
[39:48] Speaker 2: hear an answer that's just stupid. I'm like, that's just ridiculous.
[39:52] Speaker 2: My first instinct is to raise my voice and to
[39:55] Speaker 2: tighten my spine and to be like, you got to
[39:57] Speaker 2: be shipped me. Do you really believe that's true? That's emptying,
[40:01] Speaker 2: But I've had to work. Yeah, you just think, how
[40:05] Speaker 2: could you believe something so dumb? And then your voice
[40:09] Speaker 2: raise and then they start shouting at you, and nothing
[40:11] Speaker 2: gets accomplished, everybody gets mad, and you don't speak for
[40:15] Speaker 2: a few hours. Does that sound familiar, Kelsey?
[40:18] Speaker 8: It has happened a couple of times.
[40:20] Speaker 2: It's hard, but I think when we're speaking to people,
[40:25] Speaker 2: if we want them to open their minds, we have
[40:27] Speaker 2: to do our best to make sure that they and
[40:29] Speaker 2: the one on ones don't feel like we're attacking them personally.
[40:33] Speaker 2: And I think questions, the Socratic method, the street epistemology
[40:37] Speaker 2: approach has a lot of merit. I don't make these
[40:40] Speaker 2: long conversations. I start with just a few questions and
[40:42] Speaker 2: then I leave it. You know, so, hey, tell me
[40:46] Speaker 2: how you came to this position. I'm interested, Well, how
[40:49] Speaker 2: would you answer this? Because I'm curious? And then I
[40:52] Speaker 2: would just change the subject. And then maybe the next
[40:56] Speaker 2: time that four minute conversation turns into a seven conversation,
[41:01] Speaker 2: and then maybe the next time we can sit down
[41:02] Speaker 2: and have a longer conversation. We're dipping our toe into
[41:05] Speaker 2: the water and then our ankle, and then we're up
[41:07] Speaker 2: to our waist. We're not trying to throw them in
[41:10] Speaker 2: headfirst right off the bats, and this allows them to
[41:14] Speaker 2: feel like we're not attacking them personally. We just are
[41:17] Speaker 2: trying to understand and then we want to be understood.
[41:21] Speaker 2: But there is no magic bullet, or else we would
[41:23] Speaker 2: have already fixed the world. Kelsey, And if you find
[41:27] Speaker 2: a tactic that would change the minds of all flat earthers,
[41:30] Speaker 2: please call back, because this is a major problem. We
[41:34] Speaker 2: got people, They got people in the year twenty twenty
[41:37] Speaker 2: four to twenty twenty five, and they think the Earth
[41:40] Speaker 2: is a disc Someone explained this to me. It's maddening,
[41:44] Speaker 2: but I'm glad you have each other, and I'm glad
[41:46] Speaker 2: you seem to have each other's backs overall, and you've
[41:48] Speaker 2: got someone to share life with despite your differences. That's
[41:52] Speaker 2: I think that's worth talking about just as much as
[41:54] Speaker 2: anything else. You know, you have a person and that's lovely.
[41:58] Speaker 7: Yeah.
[41:58] Speaker 8: Like I said, it's over two years now, and I've
[42:01] Speaker 8: asked a lot of other people for advice over the years,
[42:05] Speaker 8: and nobody has given me the answer that he just
[42:09] Speaker 8: saves me.
[42:10] Speaker 2: I don't know that it's even a good answer now.
[42:12] Speaker 2: When your boyfriend gets into things that may affect health
[42:15] Speaker 2: and safety, if he gets into conspiracy theories that may
[42:19] Speaker 2: affect whether or not people embrace vaccine science, or whether
[42:24] Speaker 2: they are going to be discriminatory against marginalized groups, whether
[42:28] Speaker 2: it's race or gender. Those speak more to values, and
[42:32] Speaker 2: I think if you get into those waters, that's those
[42:35] Speaker 2: are more difficult conversations. But flat Earth, Yeah, you know,
[42:39] Speaker 2: I get your frustration, but it's not like it's going
[42:42] Speaker 2: to change your everyday lives right right, Just next time
[42:46] Speaker 2: you look up into the sky, you can look at
[42:48] Speaker 2: the atmosphere, and your boyfriend can look at the atmos flat,
[42:52] Speaker 2: and then you can get on with the rest of
[42:54] Speaker 2: your day.
[42:55] Speaker 8: Okay, Kelsey, Okay, Well, with I ever get to the
[42:59] Speaker 8: mom of this in a few years, I will definitely
[43:01] Speaker 8: let you know.
[43:02] Speaker 2: I am insanely curious. If this is going to play
[43:05] Speaker 2: out in any way, you must let me know.
[43:07] Speaker 8: Okay, Okay, thank you, take care, see you later.
[43:10] Speaker 2: My favorite is the earth is flat because it says
[43:13] Speaker 2: so in the Bible. I mean, that's just the most
[43:15] Speaker 2: weak ass reasoning. It says so in the Bible. We
[43:22] Speaker 2: have many more listeners to speak with. What happens next
[43:26] Speaker 2: only the callers know, hang on ding toward the Christmas holiday?
[43:36] Speaker 2: Has this year just flown? It's just flown by. I
[43:41] Speaker 2: cannot believe it's almost twenty twenty five. Not sure what
[43:44] Speaker 2: the future holes. I'm buckled up. How about you? We
[43:48] Speaker 2: are talking today to our listeners and whatever is on
[43:52] Speaker 2: the caller's mind. I've got Daniel at two six seven.
[43:58] Speaker 2: Thanks for waiting.
[44:00] Speaker 4: Hey, how you doing? First of all, I wanted to
[44:01] Speaker 4: make a quick apology to speaking harshly on YouTube.
[44:03] Speaker 2: Section, apology for what Daniel.
[44:08] Speaker 4: I was making the critique of one video you had
[44:10] Speaker 4: and you jumped in at the end, and I said,
[44:13] Speaker 4: why didn't you address my other points? But to make
[44:14] Speaker 4: a long story short, I was speaking harshly because I
[44:17] Speaker 4: thought you wouldn't debate me on the issues.
[44:19] Speaker 2: What video was it? And what was your critique? Now
[44:22] Speaker 2: I'm all curious, jeez, I forget the title.
[44:26] Speaker 4: It looked like a Ted talk And essentially I was
[44:28] Speaker 4: finding a lot of what you said interesting, but where
[44:31] Speaker 4: you got into the vaccine stance. I myself had a
[44:33] Speaker 4: lot of questions and I was asking him in the
[44:35] Speaker 4: comments section, and none of them were getting addressed. And
[44:39] Speaker 4: maybe the last critique I've made you jumped against and
[44:42] Speaker 4: you did answer that one. But I pointed out that
[44:45] Speaker 4: that was a minor critique and you wouldn't even debate
[44:49] Speaker 4: me on that. I felt, But do.
[44:50] Speaker 2: You have any idea how many comments, how many people
[44:53] Speaker 2: approach my pages? Do you have any idea how many
[44:56] Speaker 2: thousands of people say, debate me, respond to me? Notice me,
[45:00] Speaker 2: If I didn't respond, or I only did once, it
[45:04] Speaker 2: likely wasn't anything personal. It was more a matter of
[45:07] Speaker 2: bandwidth until cloning technology is, you know, is a thing.
[45:11] Speaker 2: I'm just one guy doing my best, So if I
[45:15] Speaker 2: didn't adequately engage, please understand, it's likely because I'm just human.
[45:20] Speaker 2: Fair enough, Daniel, fair.
[45:21] Speaker 4: Enough, of course. And on the other side, I just
[45:23] Speaker 4: like to say, I don't think it's enough that we
[45:26] Speaker 4: have free speech or even equal speech. If there's not
[45:28] Speaker 4: equal listening going along, then they'll probably always people that
[45:31] Speaker 4: are going to get a little harsh like I did.
[45:34] Speaker 4: And I've heard this saying, maybe Churchill said something, speak
[45:36] Speaker 4: softly and carry a big stick. Well, if you're the
[45:39] Speaker 4: head of a state, and I'm told that that's a
[45:42] Speaker 4: poetic metaphor for like a big weapon, the big stick,
[45:45] Speaker 4: there us common people. All we have is our mouths,
[45:47] Speaker 4: So sometimes we mouth off, and I apologize if I
[45:50] Speaker 4: went too far.
[45:51] Speaker 2: There's nothing to apologize for. I'm I'm I'm good. Anything
[45:55] Speaker 2: else on your mind?
[45:56] Speaker 4: One critique, yeah, basic critique was your your how do
[45:59] Speaker 4: you trust these government until numbers on vaccines or just
[46:03] Speaker 4: anything in general? And not to say that some of
[46:05] Speaker 4: them can't be true either, but it seems like it's
[46:07] Speaker 4: a general premise. You did go on the narrative of
[46:10] Speaker 4: the government numbers regarding COVID, and I'm wondering how you
[46:14] Speaker 4: get that type of trust. It does remind me of
[46:16] Speaker 4: certain religious people appealing to a book or something, But
[46:20] Speaker 4: I'm wondering how you approach it with that much validating
[46:24] Speaker 4: the government line that much.
[46:26] Speaker 2: When it comes to science and scientists, the perfect is
[46:29] Speaker 2: the enemy of the good. I understand it's imperfect, But
[46:32] Speaker 2: the beautiful thing about science is that scientists aren't out
[46:36] Speaker 2: to prove each other right. Scientists are out to prove
[46:40] Speaker 2: each other wrong or themselves wrong. These are constant systems
[46:44] Speaker 2: of testing and re testing and improving. Some people say
[46:48] Speaker 2: that the fact that science has been wrong about some
[46:50] Speaker 2: things is a bug. I think improving on their ideas
[46:54] Speaker 2: and updating textbooks and the data that they have. I
[46:58] Speaker 2: think that's not a bug, it is a fear. And
[47:00] Speaker 2: we have people who have spent their lives, they have degrees,
[47:04] Speaker 2: they have a tremendous amount of education. They are experts
[47:08] Speaker 2: in their field interacting with other experts in those same
[47:12] Speaker 2: fields who are constantly sharpening each other's knives. They are
[47:15] Speaker 2: constantly challenging and debunking or reaffirming or retesting each other.
[47:20] Speaker 2: And so while science is imperfect, I would rather take
[47:24] Speaker 2: the data that is provided by scientific communities like the
[47:28] Speaker 2: Centers for Disease Control, etc. Than an anti vax crank
[47:33] Speaker 2: who has been cast off and de licensed as a doctor,
[47:37] Speaker 2: somebody like Andrew Wakefield. I throw my lot in with
[47:42] Speaker 2: the larger community of vetted scientists who are always on
[47:45] Speaker 2: the hunt for a better idea or a better model,
[47:49] Speaker 2: and their model says vaccines have saved millions and millions
[47:54] Speaker 2: and millions of lives and are arguably the single greatest
[47:58] Speaker 2: invention in human history. I believe that I hold with
[48:03] Speaker 2: those experts.
[48:04] Speaker 4: Well, you know, you didn't answer my question about the government,
[48:07] Speaker 4: but you did make a bunch of things about the
[48:09] Speaker 4: scientific community.
[48:10] Speaker 2: The CDC, though we're talking about the CDC is a
[48:14] Speaker 2: governmental arm and so when I say the government and
[48:17] Speaker 2: the centers for disease control, I can lump those in
[48:20] Speaker 2: two together, and in this holds for the EPA and
[48:23] Speaker 2: climate scientists. So many of them are private, they are professors,
[48:27] Speaker 2: they are working in fields of research, but many also
[48:29] Speaker 2: do work for and involve themselves with the government. They
[48:33] Speaker 2: are experts in their field. Flawed. Yes, are there examples
[48:37] Speaker 2: of grift and corruption and problems, yes, but overall the
[48:42] Speaker 2: processes remain sound.
[48:44] Speaker 4: Well first of all, yeah, I'll go back to that
[48:46] Speaker 4: because I still don't think you address it. But what
[48:48] Speaker 4: I'm claiming here is you just made a statement that scientists,
[48:51] Speaker 4: you know, go back off of each other and sharpen
[48:53] Speaker 4: each other's tools, off of each other's improvements. But in actuality,
[48:56] Speaker 4: what I see happen all the time is too infrequently
[48:59] Speaker 4: to these scientists or scholars or anybody in the head
[49:01] Speaker 4: of their field go back and revaluate what's already been
[49:04] Speaker 4: done and do it again. You know what, It's a
[49:07] Speaker 4: tedious work and nobody wants to do it.
[49:09] Speaker 2: How do you know that?
[49:10] Speaker 8: A lot of times?
[49:10] Speaker 2: Where do you get that information? Daniel.
[49:12] Speaker 4: I myself in my field of study, my field of research,
[49:16] Speaker 4: I've found that in many different instances, sometimes what has
[49:20] Speaker 4: been done before needs to be challenged again. I myself
[49:23] Speaker 4: critique Christianity, and I find numerous instances that top scholars today,
[49:28] Speaker 4: mostly atheists, that they don't even bring up against Christianity.
[49:32] Speaker 4: And guess what, Because I'm not an authority, I don't
[49:35] Speaker 4: have the equal speech, or to say the least, equal
[49:37] Speaker 4: listening from them. One example I bring up all the
[49:41] Speaker 4: time these scholars like bart Arman, who bring up the
[49:43] Speaker 4: virgin birth parallels with Jesus, and then they neglect the
[49:47] Speaker 4: testimony of early church fathers about a certain man right
[49:50] Speaker 4: in front of the apostles who claimed he was born
[49:52] Speaker 4: by a virgin. They said he had a book called
[49:54] Speaker 4: an Evangelion, which is our word gospel. A lot of
[49:57] Speaker 4: things that are relevant that scholars who you know, are
[50:00] Speaker 4: atheists professorly, you think they would want to bring up.
[50:03] Speaker 4: But you know what, they're too stuck in their ways.
[50:05] Speaker 4: They're not opening to listening. And I cite there standing
[50:09] Speaker 4: the documents themselves.
[50:10] Speaker 2: I need you to take a breath. All right, let's
[50:12] Speaker 2: have a conversation. I don't want a monologue. Bart Erman
[50:16] Speaker 2: is one guy, and you know what's interesting about Ermin.
[50:18] Speaker 2: He's a great example of how these people who have
[50:21] Speaker 2: PhDs in their fields a respected study are sharpening each
[50:26] Speaker 2: other or challenging each other. Because there are other scholars
[50:29] Speaker 2: who have publicly come forward and challenged Erman on any
[50:32] Speaker 2: number of his claims. He believes Jesus was a real guy.
[50:35] Speaker 2: There are mythsist PhDs who say that no, he likely
[50:39] Speaker 2: was not a real guy. There are other people who
[50:41] Speaker 2: would disagree on any number of Erman's claims from Josephus
[50:45] Speaker 2: or anything else. And that's the process. That's the process.
[50:50] Speaker 4: You're leaving that as usual, you're leaving something essential out,
[50:53] Speaker 4: and we talk so long I can't adjust the point. No, he,
[50:56] Speaker 4: like you said, he addresses other scholars or somebody who's
[51:00] Speaker 4: accredited by the academia, and there's a bias there, just
[51:04] Speaker 4: like your dependence on government numbers. Now you admit that
[51:07] Speaker 4: CDCs mixed with government numbers, but you can't point to
[51:10] Speaker 4: one government that's never had total transparency or honesty understandably, right,
[51:15] Speaker 4: I'm not saying it's not understandable, but you don't equate
[51:18] Speaker 4: this into your equation.
[51:20] Speaker 2: I don't think I believe I said the perfect is
[51:22] Speaker 2: the enemy of the good. There are examples of human error,
[51:25] Speaker 2: even corruption and grift, But overall, do I think that
[51:29] Speaker 2: the CDC, which is a massive organization with so many gears,
[51:34] Speaker 2: they have all worked together in sync and to defraud
[51:39] Speaker 2: people into believing fake information about vaccines, I do not.
[51:44] Speaker 2: You know, ninety eight percent of the planet's climate scientists,
[51:50] Speaker 2: ninety eight percent of the planet's climate scientists agree that
[51:54] Speaker 2: climate change is human caut We are seeing a human
[51:58] Speaker 2: based impact on the climate. Now. These people who are experts,
[52:03] Speaker 2: degreed professionals in their field, who are all the time
[52:06] Speaker 2: improving each other's work, challenging each other. They are doing
[52:10] Speaker 2: their research, they are testing and retesting, they are analyzing
[52:14] Speaker 2: the atmosphere and beyond.
[52:15] Speaker 4: What, I take their word and I can't challenge would
[52:18] Speaker 4: I take their words climate change? You do recognize that
[52:22] Speaker 4: humans weren't on this planet, climate would change too, So
[52:25] Speaker 4: it kind of renders the whole phrasing meaningless.
[52:27] Speaker 2: The point is not you know whether or not the
[52:30] Speaker 2: climate is changing. We're talking now about a gradual warming,
[52:35] Speaker 2: a measurable warming of the planet because of the carbon
[52:39] Speaker 2: dioxide that human beings are putting into the air. Okay,
[52:44] Speaker 2: and we are saying now.
[52:46] Speaker 4: That, But what I'm saying is the phrasing seems meaningless.
[52:48] Speaker 4: And if you don't change the phrasing human right, even
[52:51] Speaker 4: without us, maybe the planet would get warm and maybe
[52:54] Speaker 4: the answer the poop would take over.
[52:55] Speaker 2: And who knows, Daniel, I wonder, then where do you
[52:59] Speaker 2: get your information? If you are not relying on people
[53:04] Speaker 2: who have dedicated their lives to education and educating others,
[53:08] Speaker 2: to analysis, research, scientific testing, the people who do what
[53:11] Speaker 2: they do at the highest levels. If you don't hold
[53:15] Speaker 2: to the scientific consensus says out there, where do you
[53:18] Speaker 2: get your information? Who do you trust?
[53:20] Speaker 4: Right? And it's sort of what you say reminds me
[53:22] Speaker 4: of appealed to authority, just because now I'm not saying
[53:24] Speaker 4: throw it out because it's not an appeal to authority.
[53:28] Speaker 2: It's not an appeal to authority.
[53:30] Speaker 4: Who said it? But what was said? And that will
[53:33] Speaker 4: answer your question. Sure it shouldn't be about it all.
[53:35] Speaker 2: Right, Hang on, Daniel, It's not an appeal to authority
[53:38] Speaker 2: to receive and accept overwhelming evidence presented to you by
[53:43] Speaker 2: experts in their fields. There's a difference between that and
[53:47] Speaker 2: just accepting an authority who says it, and therefore I
[53:51] Speaker 2: accept it. There's a difference there.
[53:53] Speaker 4: You did leave out things and you go on, I
[53:56] Speaker 4: can't address them because there's so many mistakes. It's hard
[53:58] Speaker 4: to pull all of them and remember them. First of all,
[54:01] Speaker 4: you did admit I think that the governments, none of them,
[54:03] Speaker 4: are totally transparent, and they have secret agendas for what
[54:06] Speaker 4: it's worth not saying with this but COVID or not.
[54:09] Speaker 4: But you do admit the interaction between the CDC the
[54:11] Speaker 4: so called scientists, and you keep leaving out that merger
[54:15] Speaker 4: with government. You do it all the time, and it's hard,
[54:18] Speaker 4: among other things you do. So it's the basic elements
[54:21] Speaker 4: of your speech. I'm trying to just forget about your
[54:23] Speaker 4: deeper points. Hey, your whole manner of speech seems partially.
[54:26] Speaker 2: Take a breath. Where do you get your your science
[54:30] Speaker 2: if not from scientists?
[54:32] Speaker 4: Okay, well, then you have to play the philosopher's game
[54:34] Speaker 4: where you define science. Of course, define science from it.
[54:37] Speaker 4: Because what you said earlier that scientists go out to
[54:39] Speaker 4: prove each other wrong, I got news for you. Other
[54:41] Speaker 4: people do that too, and so do they use intuition.
[54:45] Speaker 4: Not a lot of people do those people are kind
[54:47] Speaker 4: of pseudo? I think maybe, But a lot of people
[54:49] Speaker 4: use the quote unquote scientific method who are not term scientists.
[54:54] Speaker 2: Well, we can all participate in the processes of science,
[54:59] Speaker 2: but there's a difference.
[54:59] Speaker 4: But between me going out and listen to me, the
[55:02] Speaker 4: scientists don't listen to me. You agreed with that.
[55:05] Speaker 2: Again, Okay, I'm done with Daniel. Thank you for the call.
[55:09] Speaker 2: I appreciate your verve and enthusiasm, but I don't think
[55:12] Speaker 2: anything productive was taking place. I think in retrospect, what
[55:16] Speaker 2: I was hearing in Daniel's frustration was you know, he
[55:20] Speaker 2: was upset that the bart Ermans of the world were
[55:24] Speaker 2: not hearing his protests or counter arguments, and so he
[55:28] Speaker 2: felt locked out of these discussions. You know, why aren't
[55:32] Speaker 2: they Why aren't skeptics listening to this argument? Why aren't
[55:36] Speaker 2: atheists appreciating this or that angle and then altering their positions?
[55:42] Speaker 2: And he feels frustrated about that. But there is a
[55:45] Speaker 2: big difference between an argument from authority and acceptance of
[55:50] Speaker 2: a scientific consensus. We can talk about things academic things
[55:55] Speaker 2: like was Jesus a real guy? Et cetera, But there
[55:59] Speaker 2: is a scientific consensus on evolutionary science, on human caused
[56:05] Speaker 2: climate change, on virology and the efficacy and necessity of vaccines.
[56:12] Speaker 2: Thinking his power has a great way of saying it.
[56:15] Speaker 2: Science denialists believe they are the true skeptics who are
[56:19] Speaker 2: embracing sciences rigor. They claim they want evidence, but failure
[56:25] Speaker 2: to accept well supported conclusions and the light of overwhelming
[56:29] Speaker 2: evidence isn't skepticism, it's denial. Now, what makes all this
[56:36] Speaker 2: really sticky is that anybody anywhere, including me, we can
[56:41] Speaker 2: find instances where scientists came to a conclusion that was
[56:45] Speaker 2: either imperfect or outright wrong and then had to be corrected,
[56:50] Speaker 2: which is why scientists don't speak in terms of truth
[56:53] Speaker 2: with a capital T. Right, we have come to a
[56:56] Speaker 2: conclusion based on a preponderance of evidence. Who's that philosopher
[57:01] Speaker 2: or author who said something like open minds are meant
[57:04] Speaker 2: to close on something, but we shouldn't weld our minds
[57:08] Speaker 2: totally shut. So if you and I look at our
[57:11] Speaker 2: planet and the reality that we live in, and we're
[57:14] Speaker 2: able to see evidence of how it's made, what the
[57:18] Speaker 2: physics of the universe are, etc. We accept the overwhelming
[57:22] Speaker 2: scientific consensus tomorrow if it has brought to our attention
[57:27] Speaker 2: that we actually live in a simulation, or the Earth
[57:30] Speaker 2: is inside a huge snow globe which is sitting on
[57:34] Speaker 2: the fireplace mantle of a giant purple octopus from an
[57:38] Speaker 2: alternate universe. We have to be prepared to unseal our
[57:42] Speaker 2: brains and expand our thinking, to change our minds. This
[57:46] Speaker 2: is the beauty of science, but its imperfection is frustrating,
[57:50] Speaker 2: and it does open the door to all kinds of
[57:52] Speaker 2: discussions about how much trust do we put in the PhDs,
[57:57] Speaker 2: what about the history of humanity when we've gotten things wrong.
[58:01] Speaker 2: The point is not that we're closed minded. The point
[58:04] Speaker 2: is that we have to at some point, as lay people,
[58:07] Speaker 2: we're going to have to rely on the expertise of
[58:12] Speaker 2: experts who are all thousands and thousands of gears and
[58:16] Speaker 2: the larger machine of expertise on important subjects. They're not
[58:23] Speaker 2: standing on the high mountains saying this is absolute truth.
[58:26] Speaker 2: That's authority, but they can be in many ways authorities
[58:32] Speaker 2: in their subjects, delivering for us peer reviewed and vetted
[58:36] Speaker 2: information by which we can determine our positions about the world.
[58:42] Speaker 2: It's sticky, it's complicated, but I don't think it's that complicated,
[58:47] Speaker 2: is it? You tell me did I get this one wrong?
[58:51] Speaker 2: Just tell me in the comments section. You know, all right, fine,
[58:54] Speaker 2: take a number. I am right here. I submit myself
[58:58] Speaker 2: as a target for or your potential derision and ridicule. Hey,
[59:04] Speaker 2: you know I'm a giver. Let's call it, shall we.
[59:07] Speaker 2: It's always good hanging out and spending time with you,
[59:12] Speaker 2: and I'm so glad for our callers and of course
[59:15] Speaker 2: or your participation in the community. Be safe out there.
[59:18] Speaker 2: I'll see in a few days. Take care.
[59:20] Speaker 1: Follow The Thinking Atheist on Facebook and Twitter for a
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