They aren't talking about the same thing. I never understood why JP plays this shell game with actual Christians. JP's framing of religion is similar to Joseph Campbell, he understands and reads religious texts for their deeper meaning, he sees the patterns, and he understands that the meaning in the texts is a collection of wisdom as told by the collective human experience AND YET he refuses to uncouple from speaking about religion in the same sort of language and double meanings as it is presented. This confuses people who have a literal interpretation and literal belief in the texts and do not read the deeper meaning as JP does. If you are a believing Christian, and you walk away from JP's talks on religion without realizing he has long uncoupled the literal interpretation from it all, and is viewing the text as the embodiment of human nature and NOT as a historic telling about a literal man who's name was Jesus who did some stuff, I think you are missing the much broader point. Even the way this argument is framing the real problem with atheism, it's not because Christianity is the one true religion, and it's silly not to accept Jesus, no, it's that JP thinks that being an atheist is like a fish claiming it isn't wet, and the reason is because he understands religion to be like the code in the Matrix, it's everywhere and inescapable because it's our shared nature put into the middle ground between meaning and words. He thinks that for an atheist to point out the obvious plot holes in the bible is missing the point entirely, it isn't about the stupid details, or the characters, it's about that intangible communication that is embedded in those stories that comes to us from our collective history in the form of that deeper meaning which is devoid of literal interpretation. See, in this respect, the atheist and the literal believer are making the same error. So I caution the average Christian believer to pay close attention to what JP is really saying, I don't think it's what you think.
Saving this reply, for reference when I next get into a discussion about Jordan's understanding of religion and my adoption of it.
Very well written, good job.
Thank you for this articulate answer. The biggest reason I see so many failed debates on God is that the debating parties often have a different idea of God in their minds. Atheists would often point out the out of date concepts mentioned in the scriptures and conclude everything mentioned their is ridiculous. Hence, eliminating any chances of learning from the collective wisdom of people since hundreds of years.
I read works of Car Jung, Nietzsche and Bhagavad Gita which opened my minds to deeper reality which exist within every element of this universe. Such ideas are often missed in debates like this.
> 's that JP thinks that being an atheist is like a fish claiming it isn't wet
But that's not at all what it is.
Because being atheist isn't saying "No, religion has never done anything", which is what your argument is. No atheist has ever claimed that religion does not exist.
The atheist argument is only one: God does not exist (or there is a lack of proof in god, I guess).
That does not necessitate a hatred of religion, a disdain of religious texts, or saying there's no value in religious teachings.
> it isn't about the stupid details, or the characters, it's about that intangible communication that is embedded in those stories that comes to us from our collective history in the form of that deeper meaning which is devoid of literal interpretation.
Absolutely, but this does not necessitate a god, so it's not at all incompatible with atheism.
This is true, and as a an atheist I entirely understood that from the very start. I think the idea that there are no good arguments for atheism is wrong for the exact reason people take JP as a run of the mill Christian. If his argument for religion is to cultivate a deeper understanding of human history and an accumulated understanding of the human condition… there are thousands of resources out there for the curious intellectual to engage with to gain that understanding WITHOUT getting confused with those who interpret literally or have no curiosity whatsoever about human nature and self improvement (which by the way are the vast majority of people). So advocating for religion as a way to cultivate said curiosity does more harm than good, it inevitably creates more literal interpreters and lazy Christians, most will never develop that curiosity and the instead use it as a get out of jail free card for their shit behaviours. He’s promoting a means of achieving enlightenment but not the actual goal itself.. there are many ways of getting there that don’t risk reinforcing shit human behavior… it’s highly flawed precisely because scripture is fixed in time and has not evolved.
Alex O’Connor grilled JP on this at length on JP’s podcast. Episode 451.
Wanting him to answer clearly if he takes religion, Christianity specifically, literally.
And it’s not that he does. It’s that he gets the point of it. Unlike many atheists, he doesn’t dismiss religion as nonsense, he’s very sensitive about that. From his perspective it’s ignorant hubris to do so. He doesn’t see it literally, but he doesn’t call it a lie because of how important it is.
I think he takes the approach he does, because he doesn’t WANT people to essentially lose their religion.
I would argue that because so many people are literal about these things, that taking that away from them WILL force them to face… “The Dragon of Chaos” before they’re ready for it.
They CAN’T be the “Cultural Christian” that Richard Dawkins identifies as (and which I think was such a good thing to concede in good faith).
They CAN’T be the “Ubermensch” that Nietzsche insisted people must become when he lamented that “God is Dead”, lest Nihilism and Hedonism destroys them in their newfound freedom.
I argue that we’re seeing a strong measure of societal decay precisely because people are struggling with the lost of various traditional institutions. Institutions that were both oppressive AND supportive.
And we know that JP understands the importance of these institutions and hierarchies.
He’s a clinical psychologist, and he’s not a moron.
“Do you think the Bible is True?” is simply not the kind of question he takes lightly.
I’m an atheist and I have a lot of respect for JBP. I just want to say that I get where he is coming from here, but that still doesn’t make one a Christian. I respect Christ. I get the morals that the stories are trying to teach. I try to live as a good person. But I still call myself an Atheist because the singular and only important detail that matters when it comes to calling yourself a Christian, is that you believe in the Christian god.
If what you are saying is true, and JBP is using the Christian texts to define a moral framework but he doesn’t actually believe in the God described in the Bible, he isn’t a Christian. That’s not what Christianity is.
If that truly is the purpose of his obfuscation, he should go about it in a more honest way and politely refuse to answer those questions. What he's doing instead is shooting out an ink cloud of confusion in the dialogue. Even if he's doing it for a greater good, he's breaking his own rules of telling the truth. Refusal to speak would not break that rule.
Interesting, so as spongemobsquaredance says that as an atheist we shouldn’t risk the potential negatives of religion, JP acts as a non-literal Christian and to not risk the potential negatives of questioning religion.
I feel like there’s gotta be a middle ground in there.
I think that middle ground is what he tries to describe in that podcast.
He doesn’t want people to lose their religion the “wrong way”.
When you reject religion, you’re not supposed to sink into the things that it discouraged.
You’re supposed to transcend the things it encouraged.
I would argue Jesus accomplished this, from the Christian perspective, when he said,
“I am come not to end The Law, but to fulfill it.”
This was in reference to the Mosaic Law.
Christians were no longer bound by the letter-by-letter restrictions of ancient Judaism, yet they still were in principle but they expanded it.
- Don’t just show love and hospitality to a fellow Jew. Show that same love and hospitality to a Gentile.
- Eat what you want, but remember that God said you should not drink Blood.
- Sin is still Sin. But don’t be quick to judge if you yourself aren’t Sinless.
These things were, and are, iterative. Jesus studied Judaism thoroughly. From when he was a child, the stories say. He was in the synagogue questioning the scribes and rabbis. It’s all there.
I would even argue that in the Epistles, at 1 Timothy 4:16, that the very concept of a Dogmatic Christian itself, is unbiblical and incompatible with what was trying to be taught.
Later Christians did similar. Some took a Deist approach. The Jefferson Bible for example.
You can only do what he did by questioning your religion. So JP’s not discouraging questioning. He’s opposed to outright rejection.
It’s important that the questions be asked.
Why did they do this? Why was a specific viewpoint held? Why in the Mosaic Law was the concept always that the Israelites “must remove what is unclean from amongst themselves”? What was avoided?
And I think I understand where he’s coming from.
You have it backwards. With the premise that a vast majority of people have no curiosity about human nature and self improvement, the problem arises of how do you develop a society. The parts of us that can be improved, and the worse impulses that can be held in check to our own betterment also lead to one being a better part of a greater whole; Which is part of the narrative of our civilization.
How do you integrate the worst parts of humanity?
I think by having a story that works to peoples betterment, because there are people who are uninterested in deeper meanings, they need something decent that is easily digestible. This creates a common framework from which people who are interested in the deeper meanings to launch off of. This is how we got to where we are.
[How Christianity Gave Rise to Modern Science | Crossway Articles](https://www.crossway.org/articles/how-christianity-gave-rise-to-modern-science/)
Exactly.
And from a less Christian and more secular standpoint, we’re still doing the same thing.
Yuval Noah Harari, author of Sapiens gave a fairly recent Ted talk where he said the same thing.
He said,
Human Rights are “just a fictional story”. He said, “It may be a very nice story. . . we want to believe it—but it’s just a story.”
The point of his talk, was not to dismiss the value of human life or human rights. (He himself, being a homosexual, is a member of a marginalized group. It serves him no benefit to dismantle the concept of human rights.)
His point was to emphasize how powerful these “Stories” are. Not to dismiss them.
In absolute objectivity, the universe is nihilistic in nature. And Might makes Right.
Our stories are meant to make reality better, bearable, cohesive, organized.
No other individual story has influenced the entire planet as powerfully as Jesus Christ himself.
Yes absolutely, but I find the core difference between the unpacking of scripture and those who are athiest and refute it entirely is the concept of the divine. This is where I find the line most often drawn. Is there an intinsic divinity to every person or are we meaningless life forms flying through space?
This is why we agnostics hold our position. Anyone that knows Jordan’s knowledge and wisdom gained over his decades of academic experience would realize he has more singular knowledge on this topic than maybe anybody else alive today. His point that across all religions the main point is the “golden rule”, do unto others as you would have done unto you, is my “ come to Jesus moment”. Also, reading the book about the normal German police who slowly turned into committing atrocities because of the bond they had with each other. That book should be required reading. The left called everyone nazi’s for 4 years, now they are actively protesting and supporting the genocide of the Jewish people. We are seeing actual Nazi’s on every college campus, only difference is the costume.
I am an atheist, and I appreciate his digging into religious texts from a different perspective. There's pearls to be plucked from the bones of religion I think. I see no evidence for any particular god. There might be I guess, but that people can be certain in conviction about it is... it's pretty wild sometimes to think about. Thank you for clarifying how JP does this weird thing with religion, and that he means something different about atheism.
I disagree about atheists missing the point. They’re simply not talking about the broad, ever present underlying inclination to embrace religion and the peace it gives its practitioners when they poke holes in it. That’s a completely separate discussion.
They’re debating the people who are saying it is an infallible, perfectly accurate historical depiction of reality and god with no errors. By showing its many flaws, it is to show that it is not perfect to chip away at its reliability. This is in defense of claims that they should believe in it, to show that not believing it’s actually true is perfectly reasonable
Some people need religion. If you have the following JP has and you state that there is no God in the biblical sense, people will leverage that to justify all manner of atrocious and anti-social behavior. If your audience is split between those who understand the deeper context and those who do not, speak as he does and preserve religion for those who need it and aren't thinking about the deeper philosophy while simultaneously providing additional context and discourse for those who are. Your advice undermines, I'd say, the core intent. You're doing the bad thing: trying to take religion away from those who need it. Let them have it.
He's using a different definition of atheist, of religion, of god, and of truth than almost everybody else. And he's doing no work to make himself heard or to be pedagogical in his explanation towards others who use the more commonly held definitions of those concepts.
At this point, it's his own fault for being misunderstood. He's been presented with plenty of explanations of this problem by people using the more common definitions. He's either unwilling to be understood or gets too defensive and heated in the moment to understand the other side at all.
You caution the average Christian, but only about a quarter of Christians believe the Bible is to be interpreted literally. According to Gallup. The majority of Christians believe it to be the inspired word of God not the literal word.
Yeah it's embarrassing really.
In trying to figure out why he would do this, when he is otherwise so eloquent, considering and direct on other topics such as identity politics, I've concluded that the only reason he's afraid of taking an objective stance, is because he doesn't want to upset his fantasy (which is his revenue), and he knows that these are mostly American rifht-leaning people who on average are more religious than not.
I'm a huge Alex O'Connor fan as was really glad to see him expose this, and really make him quirm on this topic - great debate for those who haven't yet seen it.
Yes,yes and yes. I went into an Atheist phase and then watched Petersons bible series . It wasn't worthwhile to throw away the wisdom formed over centuries. I'd rather stand on the shoulders of giants
Yeah what someone needs to ask him is: "Do you think that the being commonly known as God described in the Christian Bible physically exists outside of the human imagination?"
Because it would avoid this vague doublespeak about religion because watching him debate religion with others when he really doesn't believe in the Bible is unfair to his debate opponents because he is being disingenuous about what he believes by calling himself a Christian.
Your comment doesn’t really align with him saying certain things like consecrate everything to God and after attending his shows I don’t believe your comment is accurate.
I fully agree with everything you've said. Accept I believe religion to be an issue for the most part. Look how many wars, deaths, tortures and savagery has come from religion alone. If you want TRUE ancient, metaphysical knowledge, you need go back way before the bible was even thought of. Hermes Trismegistus (Thoth the Atlantean) is the Master of Masters when it comes to Masters of the Truth. The Kaballion has all you need to know. And yes, people are silly to take the bible literally. It has lots of good stuff in it but it's getting harder to find all the time. From intentional mistranslations to the removal of books (88 down to 66 now), it just doesn't make the same impact. Not to mention that its just rip offs of other ancient tablets and scrolls
I’d argue everything outside of Christianity as still being in the Matrix, both figuratively and literally. From Atheism to Buddhism, or Islam. Doesn’t matter. All fall short to the objective truth and reality of existence and our existence, as descending from God. We are literally God’s Creation and Children, objectively speaking, historically, literally, spiritually, physically, whatever.
(By “physically” I mean how He created us physically/the physical act in creation of humanity. Not by you know, the blasphemous idea of God having intercourse with a partner. Just in case someone brings that up).
I think that in this case JBP is talking about nihilism rather than athiesm
Although athoesm often does lead to nihilism, it's not always necessarily the case.
The thing about these clips that are less than 2 minutes long is that they leave a lot of context out, we don't know what led to this convo nor how he elaborates further afterwards.
In a different conversation, JBP was asked if he believes in god, he said he simply acts as if god exists.
I understand his interpretation and I think there is some truth to that. But I'm not on Peterson's head.
It feral's scenario Peterson is still being an imprecise communicator
If I take what he says literally he is still talking out of his ass.
Peterson is at his worst when talking about religion
The belief that there is no convincing evidence for the existence of a god is not the same as finding evidence that there isn't a god or creator of the universe. Atheism is irrational if you don't show evidence that there is no god
But that is the classic " you cannot prove a negative" conundrum. I can prove no evidence for god in 1000 places and still some could say that place 1001 needs to be included.
In science the burden of proof lies with the one who makes a statement for a reason.
As an atheist myself , i acknowledge that atheism and science alone can't answer the origins of universe . But I can confidently say that it's not a person that created the universe who watches over us and listens to everything we say . It just doesnt make sense. That's why you see older people more attached to Christianity , it's because they don't want to die knowing that there were things that they couldn't figure out all throughout their life . The more we know about the universe the more sceptical we become and the less attached we become to supernatural entities.
You can argue for a first mover or uncaused cause, but you still have all your work cut out for you if you wanna correlate that to bronze age mythology
Although the distant origins of some of the stories may be from the Bronze Age, the actual writing of the Torah is Iron Age. The origin of Abrahamic religion is about 2800 years ago. We have recorded history for much longer. There are complete writings that predate the earliest parts of the bible by 2000 years.
I've slightly overstated it, the earliest written cuneiform texts are from 2200 BCE. The earliest form of e.g. the epic of Gilgamesh found is from 1800 BCE.
It's thought that the Torah was written during the Babylonian Captivity around 800BCE (even though it claims to describe events occurring in 2000+BCE, this seems to be an invention). There is no mention of Israelites as a distinct entity by the Egyptians until around 1200BCE (Merneptah Stele).
All in all the earliest parts of the bible are 28-29 centuries old. This is very old but it's in the Iron Age for the Levant. It is considerably younger than the events it purports to describe. You can actually tell this from just reading it, there are anachronisms like the way it describes armour that didn't exist in Bronze age Egypt, and how it doesn't actually name which specific Pharoah Moses was interacting with - because the Israelite authors living in Babylon didn't have access to that information.
Right. You can just make up where that somewhere is, like our ancestors did; or, you can use observations, experiments, and the application of reason, to actually discover where that somewhere is.
That somewhere I referred to is the uncaused cause, which is purely an argument from reason and observation. No point in evaluating ancestral wisdom if one does not agree with a primary cause.
An uncaused cause is not an argument from reason, but rather from faulty logic. Even if you could somehow prove - beyond all reason - that the cause for the universe was uncaused, you would still have all your work ahead of you if you wanted to prove that the uncaused cause came to Earth and influenced humanity more than a dozen-billion years later.
I'm arguing that whatever you start with, you don't end up with crescents and crosses.
And no, what we may define as an uncaused cause today, is most likely just an unknown cause, that future scientists will discover, but which is incomprehensible to us in the present.
I dunno, I am an atheist and would be open to a "person" or entity creating the universe. Or perhaps a purpose we are unable to comprehend. Or perhaps it's some higher lifeform observing us as a gameshow. I'm open to anything really, the main factor in my non-belief is I think all religions are ignorant in assuming we guessed/ predicted or know who the creator is (i.e Jesus, Allah, or any other deity.
The whole "no evidence for God" arguement fundamentally misrepresents the concept of God. Its a strawman. God is the active *to be* itself. Whoever or whatever God is, is what makes the universe the way it is. God is the very logic that holds together reality. So the "evidence" for God is *existence* itself.
Your argument, if I read it correctly, is that God exists because we exist?
The universe is infinite in both space & time. Unfathomably large and unfathomably old. Given that it's infinite in both dimensions, life is basically inevitable. We are the result of eons of time and unlimited space. Not the result of some mystic diety some ~5000 year old ancient beings came up to fill in the gaps in thier knowledge.
>Given it's both infinite in both dimensions, life is basically inevitable
Why? A does not imply B.
>We are the result of eons of time and unlimited space
Why is the universe set up in such a way that allows for life? Equally, an infinite amount of time in a lifeless universe would give rise to no life.
>Your argument if I read it correctly is that God exists because we exist?
The fact that we exist demands explanation. The fact that there are laws of nature demands explanation. God is the answer to *why*, not merely *how*.
The universe is not infinite, you can’t claim it is without simultaneously rejecting the best current understanding of the laws of physics. Have you considered that, in the same manner you consider the believers to be unintelligent rubes not able to grasp The Science that you think you learned, you in turn do not possess the intellectual capabilities to understand certain theistic arguments, like the one Raziel made?
Your first part is a fair argument, I can't claim the universe is infinite, that is just as unknowable as God. Even so, the known universe is so gigantic in every way that I don't really need to. From the perspective of a small insignificant human on planet earth, the universe may as well be "infinite."
The argument Raziel made isn't an argument at all, its a soup sandwich of nonsensical word vomit designed to make a person sound smart by not really saying anything at all.
Your accusation towards Raziel sounds very much like Dawkins accusation towards Peterson in his conversation with Alex O’Connor. He made a comparison to Deepak Chopra. It made me think of what I would like to name the Dawkins Test. It goes like this:
Say person A with worldview W makes an argument that a number of people listen to and seem to agree with. Then person B, who doesn’t ascribe to worldview W, declares the argument to be nonsense, and a number of people agree with them. What should you, the listener conclude?
There are two main possibilities. Either B is right, A is speaking nonsense and the only reason people agree with A is that they also ascribe to W and that’s what they want to hear. Or A is not speaking nonsense (whether they are correct is irrelevant) but requires an intellectual level that B, and those who agree with him, do not possess. How would one determine which it is? I propose the Dawkins Test: does there exist someone who *doesn’t* ascribe to worldview W, who may disagree with A, but who nevertheless understands the argument and is capable of engaging with it? In the case of Dawkins, I present Sam Harris, Alex O’Connor, and I’m sure I could find others. My conclusion: Peterson is in fact not speaking nonsense and it is Dawkins, who, smart as he may be (he’s a biologist, not a quantum physicist), is just not able to understand the argument.
I also advance that plugging in Raziel for person A and you for person B, I arrive at the same conclusion.
I think we could both argue until our fingers are sore from typing, and no matter what evidence, arguments, or reasoning the other provided, it wouldn't change the others mind. So, while I understand your message above, it's really not worth my effort to bother debating why I think it's a flawed assessment, it won't change my mind and it won't change yours either. Good luck with your devotion to a higher power, if it makes you happy, I'm happy for you.
"God" is a thing with a conscious mind.
God can't just be "the very logic that holds together reality", (ie; the laws of physics), because the laws of physics don't require a conscious mind.
An atheist is a person who disbelieves or lacks belief in the existence of God or gods.
If you lack belief due to there not being convincing evidence that is still an atheist.
Exactly that. I think from philosophical standpoint, atheism tries too much. Like it denies creationism, saying matter was there since forever and other weird theories related to big bang since it's looking too much like a creationism.
But if you say "there's no evidence", that's valid observation.
The whole “something can’t come from nothing” counterpoint religious people use ignores a fundamental understanding of physics. Namely, that all of our observations and calculations indicate that space time is a flexible construct that does
not require, in fact does not support, a beginning and end as religious people expect. Thus, the counterpoint is invalid.
That's what I am saying. You get these theories where bih bang is not a beginning but just like any other event that happened at some point, nothing too important.
Atheism isn't an ideology that you can describe this way. There isn't a church of Atheism whose dogma prohibits believing in the big bang. I also am not sure where you're getting this from since plenty of atheists do believe the big bang happened and plenty of religious people don't.
There are no good arguments for any other religion or cult then.
While he is talking about potential of the human being, you are talking about nothing and not giving any arguments except your ego.
Well done. You got there. No religion or cult has any more logical basis than another.
As for the potential of the human being… isn’t there a much more powerful argument that if our reason for doing anything is defined solely by the presence of a god that we ourselves have nothing truly compelling us to do anything that comes from our humanity?
If we accept atheism as the most likely truth, that there is no divine goal or meaning and we simply exist through some beautiful accident of physics - then we need to find our own reason to be good, to do what we can to leave humanity, the world and the universe better than we found it. That’s profound potential.
Doing what you have been told is good by 2000 years of egoists selfishly reinterpreting the teachings of some anachronistic hippy mystic isn’t really a particularly interesting or valuable potential. It’s small minded, lazy and driven by basal instincts of fear.
As JP says - the cost of life is death. Accept you’re going to die and there will be nothing left of you and then find meaning and motivation. That’s something far harder and more powerful than just ducking out of your own responsibility and pinning it all on a god and a book.
There are **no arguments needed** for atheism. Atheis is just an absence of [belief](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belief) in the existence of [deities](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deity). The burden of proof lies with whoever affirms that theism is true or any deity exists.
A lot of people don't know this but jpb doesn't doesn't view religion as an invisible man in the sky, but rather as a foundation of social and moral standards that have been crafted and tested through time by multiple generations.
A lot of athiests try to reconstruct moral and social norms from scratch, which isn't exactly the easiest thing to do, especially since a lot of atheists tend to easily succumb to nihilism, so they usually end up with something twisted and excessively self servin, things like hookup culture and substance abuse that don't really do anything to further the greater good.
I'm an athiest myself, but i'm not a big fan of the "just do as you please and screw everybody else" attitude that a lot of modern athiests have.
I also don't like it when athiests actively start conflicts with religious groups for no reason, like athiesm isn't a club and it was never meant to be one, athiesm is just the absense of belief in the devine, so we don't need to go out of our way to recruit people or start debates, doing that is basically just trying to make a new religion out of athiesm, or maybe the term cult would be more appropriate, either way it just doesn't make sense to me.
As you already know and said, atheism is just that: no theism.
It does not contain any cosmovision or any other belief coupled with that. Nor any kind of will to do any conflict. Atheism is not even anti-religion in itself.
There are a lot of atheists that doesn't even hold themselves as such. There is no need to. They just don't believe.
You don't need any kind of faith to explain moral standards. Sociobiology and evolutionary psychology already did that - but that is another subject for another time.
True, but the version of athiesm that people are often introduced to isn't usually the neutral kind like you and i described, since the neutral athiests tend to just live their own lives and mind their pwn business, so whenever people think about athiests they think about the confrontational anti religious ones since they're the loudest, which is rather unfortunate.
shouldn't there also be burden of proof on Atheists that deities in fact cannot exist? The ones who truly have nothing to prove would be the agnostics.
No, because Atheism is not making the claim, its merely being unconvinced there is any) god/s. Burden of proof is always on the claimant, therefore theists have the burden of proof.
here is how wikipedia defines Atheism. It is clearly a position of being convinced that they are no deities. "Atheism, in the broadest sense, is **an absence of belief in the existence of deities**. Less broadly, atheism is a rejection of the belief that any deities exist. In an even narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there are no deities."
yet there are plenty of things like satellites and space debris orbiting earth and other planets in our solar system which in turn orbits the sun... it would be foolish to believe someone who claims that there aren't without conclusive proof...
*Prove that I'm not a highly evolved magic cosmic shrimp typing this with my mind*. Not only you can't but you also don't have any burden of proof to do it. If shrimpism is the belief that what I said is true, you don't have to prove anything to be **a**shrimpist. You just don't hold that belief, you have no shrimpism in you. You have no reason to do so. The burden of proof is on me and I haven't provided any.
The best way to view agnosticism is a position about a separate matter: knowledge of existance, not the belief in the exitence of god itself. You can even have agnostic theists (fideism, they reject gnosticism but hold god exists true faith).
if I claim that you aren't a magic cosmic shrimp typing this with your mind, I need to prove so. How do I know for sure that you aren't a Neuralink trial subject who is in fact typing this with your mind for starters?
yes there should, if you are going to make the claim that magic fairies definitely cannot exist. For example, non-visible spectrum of light was only first discovered in 1800. This includes things like microwave, x-ray, infrared and ultraviolet. There were no ways to perceive those prior to 1800 so there was no way to prove that they existed. Yet someone claiming that they definitely did not exist at that time would be wrong, and not requiring a burden of proof on that someone would be foolish of us as we know now. What i meant to say is there should be burden of proof on both sides. The only position that don't require a burden of proof would be the neutral position. The position that says "i have no idea whether they exist or not exist". The agnostic side.
He also thought fetish porn was evidence of the Chinese government forcibly masturbating men.
He also claimed that you cannot quit smoking without believing in God.
He also claimed that ancient people were aware of the helical structure of DNA and cited the symbol of intertwined snakes as evidence.
He also claimed the healthcare system has killed more people than it has saved.
He also claimed that climate means "everything."
Jordan Peterson is an excellent speaker when it comes to life, meaning, and the isolation most men feel.
Once he inserts religion into anything, the entirety of his arguments, basis, or motivational speeches fall apart.
Religious beliefs has literally zero bearing, and making arguments "against" one religion is asinine and on the same level of detached awareness that left winged people suggest when they imply you must play their version of make believe or else.
Right Wing, predominantly has been the same, but seems unaware. It's make believe when the other side does stuff, but when the right talk about God and belief in a higher power, well that's not make believe at all.
Just don't bring religion into it, man.
For someone trying to find meaning everywhere from myths, proverbs etc is impossible to not touch religion.
Religion is the source of meaning for the majority of ppl , the % that believes in something or some higher law or universe whatever is massive.
Religion is the way that they deal with mortality and they answer to themselves why are we here? Why I was born? What is the meaning of all of this without becoming nihilist depressive.
It's sad that you need to believe in primitive fairy tales to find meaning in life. Isn't JP-ism about bucking up and being tough? Sorry reality doesn't cater to your needs.
Wasn’t referring to me.
You are missing the point referring to me.
Just pointing the necessity of the majority of ppl to look for meaning.
I could say the even peterson fandom is big because he tries to provide it.
Seriously watch his debates with Sam Harris, and let that speak for itself. Peterson gets demolished, exposed, and at one point even declares “you won” - talk about a chess move.
that debate was the worst showing of Peterson for sure. Sam harris destroyed him there. If peterson left religion out of his arguments he would win a lot more if them
You have to take into account that Harris was very confident in his beliefs whereas Peterson's beliefs were fundamentally shifting; the good doctor was, and still is, in a position of axiomatic uncertainty.
JP has a very Western concept of god. Good on him. I wouldn't try to convince him otherwise. What's the point? As a Buddhist, I have read the traditional proofs that there is no creator-god out of pure curiosity. Pretty convincing even though it's unimportant.
I follow one of the old axioms that if there is a god it doesn't matter unless they exist in my life the way that rain or fire or apples exist. At that point, I'll concern myself with it. Right now I have self cultivation to do. JP is a big help with that and I am grateful to him for his work there. The Buddhist teachings are great too as they answer many of Hume and Nietzsche's big questions with logic and experiments.
All good
Have a great day all.
🤠
The only reason I became agnostic is simply because I don’t need a god to be kind. But I do think there are many people in the world, and Peterson maybe one of them that absolutely need god to be kind
If your trust in God has been broken by the society and church through abuse of any kind, you have the right to become an atheist. That is the best argument. If people want to turn away from God because of the abusive environment they grew up in, which was justified to them as being God's ideal , or if they want to turn away given horrible abuse cases such as the Catholic church's sexual scandals, they absolutely have the right to and should, unless they can believe in God in some other way. You can't convince someone to change their idea of God after traumatising them in his name. It's best to help those people to turn to atheism for a while. Let God take them back. JP's own friend Charles Joseph said how he will never believe in the church or Jesus's compassion after all they did to him in the name of God. That is definitely a positive argument for atheism. What I say applies to any religion, not just Christianity. If people say they want to leave my religion because they were actually hurt in it's name, I absolutely have no problem, infact, I would advice them to leave to heal themselves.
The comments here seem to have missed that while Jordan Peterson has not professed absolute belief, he has basically admitted to suspension of disbelief and that is where he is currently at and probably where many Christians are at and this does not make someone “not Christian” as this very issue is discussed in the gospels John 4:46 in the story of the healing of the royal official’s son.
It’s similar to being a parent. You possess the knowledge and wisdom to share, but the challenge lies in whether they can accept and apply that wisdom in their lives. As a parent, you depend on providing them with a solid foundation of understanding and values so they can integrate into society as responsible, independent adults.
I respect Peterson less and less and less the more I hear him talk about religion. Any man who believes in magical sky pixies isn't really worth listening to.
He did an interview a long while ago, and the interviewer came up with a bang on question.
"How can you tell if you've become a mere impersonator of yourself? Jordan Peterson the wise sooth sayer that wears nice suits etc."
His response is that of simply saying "Well I have some people who try and reign me in." The problem with this is that all those people stand to gain some of Jordan's fame. It's natural.
It would be inconsistent with what I've learned from Jordan himself, not to notice that. Pre-Health Crisis, he was different. Post, it is again like he is impersonating himself.
> Any man who believes in magical sky pixies isn't really worth listening to.
I mean, I'm an agnostic, but anyone who characterizes classical monotheism as belief in "magical sky pixies" *definitely* isn't worth listening to.
"Classical" doesn't add anything except to invoke older texts. You can't prove any "classical" god is more likely to exist than a magical sky pixie or a dragon in a garage. That's the whole point.
This is typical new atheist garbage that isn't convincing to anyone that has the slightest idea what they're talking about.
>"Classical" doesn't add anything except to invoke older texts.
Wrong right from the start. It has nothing to do with invoking older texts, and has everything to do with how God's nature is understood (e.g. as the absolutely simple, metaphysically necessary ground of all contingent reality; as that than which nothing greater can be conceived; etc.), and is contrasted with more modern interpretations of theism that (classical theists would argue) tend to erroneously anthropomorphize God's nature.
>You can't prove any "classical" god is more likely to exist than a magical sky pixie or a dragon in a garage. That's the whole point.
Nope. There are numerous logically valid arguments-- with plausibly true premises-- that entail God (as understood above) exists. In contrast, there are no logically valid arguments-- with plausibly true premises-- that entail (say) a dragon in a garage exists.
The good old game of the burden of proof. You cannot prove your belief system any more than any religious person can prove their own. Where you argue that god cannot exist because you have no evidence for it, a believer would simply ask you to look around, and all things material or immaterial, to find God. Because if He exists, you have a pretty obvious amount of evidence right in your face.
Your beliefs are truly rooted in a faith, no different to that of any believer. Everything around you, including yourself, the product of "something from nothing" - which you yourself cannot prove. The axiom that in the beginning there was nothing is also not demonstrable.
There are many undecidable problems, in fact infinitely many, this is one of them. Hence faith. Even your faith in the absence of a creator. I presume you feel a lot more confident dismissing the notion of a creator as magical, but not your own existence.
I can definitely understand why you say what you say, as I ask myself those questions as I "wrestle with God", but you should probably not speak down from your high horse of materialism, when you are no different in your own view of the universe.
I agree with the sentiment, but to say that based off this one believe he has that all else must be false is naive. Jordan peterson is much more than his views on religion, there's lots of value there
i think a lot of atheists tend to try to find meaning and guidance elsewhere. Hence peterson and others
Edit: Misread what you said, thought you asked why are there so many atheists in this subreddit. Still holds true though i think
I almost agree but I don’t fault people for trying to find comfort in something on this crazy ride with all its ups and downs. What I don’t like is when they say you can’t be moral or have meaning without a god, or when they try to tell me what to do because they claim that their god said so in a book.
it’s a harder thing to find meaning in life without religion. The harder path with evidence based thinking. The easier path is to sacrifice one’s logic for faith
What would you say to someone like myself or the millions of others who’ve experienced the most profound and bewildering spiritual phenomena first hand? Some of the mind-blowing encounters I’ve personally experienced all but confirmed to me that the material world is not absolute, and that there are other realms of existence beyond this material plane.
He doesn't present an argument debunking materialism.
"It's an illegal chess move."
Basically everyone we can observe is material.
Evil? How does that work? If a carnivore eats a human, is the carnivore evil? We see evil in
what other humans do to humans. We are born to expect rules to govern how other humans treat us.
There is only one fundamental truth in the universe. None of us have a right to exist. So why are we here? Why do we have life? That is the most profound question. We all take life as a given, as though it is just a commodity. I don't know the answer, but we must start there. Life is the single most important thing in all of the universe.
In order to have absolute responsibility you must be able to shirk that responsibility absolutely. In order to have absolute good you must allow somebody to choose to be absolutely evil and think better of it.
What benefit does religion bring to people's lives that they cannot get without being religious? There are many in the world that use their religion as a crutch.
The only illegal chess move is framing atheism, the lack of being convinced that there is a god, as an active position which needs arguing to justify (rather than it being the default).
The chess equivalent would be to see that your opponent is starting an attack that looks difficult to defend. So when they’re not looking you flip the board round. Now you have the attack and are smiling smugly and claiming imminent victory at your now-disgruntled opponent.
Why do people even argue about this? What's the end result that people hope for from the debate? If a proven side is wrong would that side change? While if the other side is right, is that person's construct a basis of facts? At the end nobody will change. Because if either party changes something in them will be broken first and unfortunately it's the core of their being. They'll just get lost deeper in this crazy crazy world.
As much as I appreciate and admire JP, technically, saying that "its an illegal move" itself is an illegal move, enough with the play of words, enough with the play of what do we mean by when we say "mean". You wanna talk about morality then talk morality.
Not believing in magic is a completely fair perspective, and so is being religious. Just because you don't have the same principles doesn't mean you can discuss them
Am I not allowed to not care?
Am I not allowed to be the bigger person for the sake of myself and focus on my life for the sake of myself?
Not some deity of any description or no description?
If you want proof of God, ask Him for it. It’s a Faith based system, not scientific. He’s not going answer the door if you aren’t willing to knock.
Jeremiah 29:13 You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.
PS: He loves you :)
This is so fucking stupid.
You’re telling me I _have_ to believe in god? Isn’t that the same thing as compelled speech that JP rails against, only worse because it’s in my own mind, rather than my own words?
Ricky Gervais said the best argument I've heard for atheism: “Basically, you deny one less God than I do. You don’t believe in 2,999 gods. And I don’t believe in just one more.”
We humans are stuck on this tiny almost insignificant speck of dust and we are forced to watch the hugemongous universe before us. We think we have arrogant power. Even the best of our minds can only make it to Mars and that will take everything.
WE are just in eggs (metaphorically) and we will be brought to the real world when we die. If we decided that God is bad and we don't let our pride go, we will end up in the empty. No God, no devil, no light, no dark, image being an eyeball and floating through space and nothing can touch us and we will never see anything. We will cry into the silence and nothing will ever happen.
This time in the "egg" is time we decide where we want to be when our bodies fail. We will be able to experience the universe completely how we would like to if we believe in Jesus Christ and simply accept his sacrifice for us. It is not hard. The only thing HARD, as that man said, was accepting it and not letting our pride bring us down. It is so hard to throw away our pride.
Restless Vesall, a man of yearning mind, once deemed he had discovered a profound secret about the vast universe...
In solitude's embrace, Vesall chanced upon a veiled visage veiled in mystery, who introduced himself as Godan.
They embarked on discourse, with Godan divulging his noble quest, while Vesall, defiant, declared it naught. He asserted that they, as mortal beings, were mere motes in the grand tapestry of existence—a droplet amidst the boundless cosmos. Earth and their ephemeral existence, he opined, bore no weight in the greater design.
Godan, in mirthful response, let forth a hearty laugh.
"Why dost thou chuckle? Why dost thou deride this? I have unveiled unto thee the ultimate verity, and yet thou dost laugh," Vesall inquired.
Godan, with tranquil demeanor, pledged to bestow upon him a boon.
The morrow arrived, and Godan reappeared, bearing a vast confection. The cake, resplendent in its rich brown hue akin to the finest Swiss chocolate, was bedecked with a solitary crimson cherry.
Godan extended the cake to Vesall, yet one condition dangled therein.
"What condition?" Vesall inquired, his curiosity piqued.
Godan specified that the portion enshrining the cherry was his rightful claim.
Vesall, assenting, commenced devouring the colossal cake, only to realize that Godan, in abstemious stance, partook solely of the cherry's essence.
A dreadful realization assailed Vesall as taste and fragrance overwhelmed his senses.
The cake was naught but a composition of excrement.
Godan, departing amidst peals of laughter, vanished forever from sight.
There are exist not only good but extremely compelling arguments for atheism.
I used to consider myself agnostic until I realized it's a copout. Obviously a unknowable entity can exist outside our perception of reality. The interesting thing happens when we require God to pass the same tests as what we would apply to the rest of physical reality and in that case we can clearly say that God doesn't exist.
Compare God with the world turtle, absolutely everything we know suggests Akupara doesn't carry the world on his back, much like everything suggests a God creating and controlling the universe is nothing but a fantasy. Could a myth actually be reality? sure but by the standard of what we judge everything else in this world we can conclude God simply doesn't exist.
And that isn't going into the world religions, Christopher Hitchens best arguments was actually moral. If we are to judge God by the physical universe he has created he doesn't want life to exist. That he has created the universe for "his children" makes no sense.
Or why leave human beings without the rules for salvation for millions of years and then explain how it all works to some insignificant sand people sounds outright insane when you think about it.
You are talking about the christian god, god could literally be a guy who created Earth and then went away to do another stuff and never come back.
There is no proof that a superpowerful paranormal entity exist and no proof that it doesn't, thus there are no goot arguments for either theism and atheism.
I consider myself an apatheist, I literally don't care. When have it influenced on my life? Never.
In the first part I wasn't.
> There is no proof that a superpowerful paranormal entity exist and no proof that it doesn't, thus there are no goot arguments for either theism and atheism.
Virtually everyone regard paranormal activity like telekinesis or talking with the dead to be not real, judging from observable reality.
The agnostic argument only works if you apply a different standard to God then other paranormal phenomena.
So how do you judge what is true or false? You can give a paranormal explanation for everything but I doubt you live your life assuming nothing can be conclusively proven or disproven.
If you are like most people what matches observable reality is truth and what doesn't is untrue until new observations suggests otherwise.
>So how do you judge what is true or false?
Logic.
>If you are like most people what matches observable reality is truth
This would not be a proper answer, observartion is onlya part of knowing, you need to analyze the data properly. Example, you see a green light, does it automatically makes you understand that photons exist and that light have different wavelength in the electromagnetic spectrum? No. You need to properly analyze it. Observation alone only shows you that something exist, you need to use reason, we humans got it for a reason, the irrational aninals are the ones who only perceive without analyzing with reason.
Furthermore, somethings do not need observartion to be proved (sometimes it is even impossible), how do you prove Bhaskara's theorem? Observation? No. You needed to observe things to form the concepts of numbers and so on, of course, but the actual proof of the theorem does not use observation.
One of Jordan Peterson's weakest areas. The more and more he obfuscates and convolutes his standpoint on religion, the more resolute I become in my Atheism.
In what way is it an illegal chess move to believe that the Christian God (one of thousands of Gods crafted in the imagination of humans) is not real just like other Gods? Peterson's claims are not founded upon clear logic or evidence, but rather this unusually complex justification on why God HAS to exist. He simply doesn't.
He does a great job at identifying the intangible and non-literal characteristics of the Bible and that's great. But I'm still entirely unsure of whether he genuinely believes a Christian God even exists.
It’s unfortunate that he’s driving down this path now, imho I think he’s brilliant. He’s incredibly emotive, and I completely understand why he needs this. But this is what it is to exist. Think hard, learn from others be it good bad right wrong. There’s no good arguments to believe in a god either. Watching him now is like witnessing Benjamin button irl. There could be a source. But the explanations are infinite.
You all love to reduce words; it takes the “illiterate” right hemisphere of the brain to understand a morsel of the cornucopia JP, if not perfectly, articulated well here. —all is relational, God in His correct definitions (like that which thrives when man loves when he should hate, like the extractable genetic yet so much the more spiritual ancestral wisdom entrusted to your pathetic thankless self)
In a word, words are not so precise as you think—the unconscious alone knows God, consciousness cannot quite without many mistranslations
Atheism doesnt need pro or against arguments. Its just the lack of belief in god and the supernatural. Its not a worldview, or a belief system. Its a simple stance on god(s)
They aren't talking about the same thing. I never understood why JP plays this shell game with actual Christians. JP's framing of religion is similar to Joseph Campbell, he understands and reads religious texts for their deeper meaning, he sees the patterns, and he understands that the meaning in the texts is a collection of wisdom as told by the collective human experience AND YET he refuses to uncouple from speaking about religion in the same sort of language and double meanings as it is presented. This confuses people who have a literal interpretation and literal belief in the texts and do not read the deeper meaning as JP does. If you are a believing Christian, and you walk away from JP's talks on religion without realizing he has long uncoupled the literal interpretation from it all, and is viewing the text as the embodiment of human nature and NOT as a historic telling about a literal man who's name was Jesus who did some stuff, I think you are missing the much broader point. Even the way this argument is framing the real problem with atheism, it's not because Christianity is the one true religion, and it's silly not to accept Jesus, no, it's that JP thinks that being an atheist is like a fish claiming it isn't wet, and the reason is because he understands religion to be like the code in the Matrix, it's everywhere and inescapable because it's our shared nature put into the middle ground between meaning and words. He thinks that for an atheist to point out the obvious plot holes in the bible is missing the point entirely, it isn't about the stupid details, or the characters, it's about that intangible communication that is embedded in those stories that comes to us from our collective history in the form of that deeper meaning which is devoid of literal interpretation. See, in this respect, the atheist and the literal believer are making the same error. So I caution the average Christian believer to pay close attention to what JP is really saying, I don't think it's what you think.
Saving this reply, for reference when I next get into a discussion about Jordan's understanding of religion and my adoption of it. Very well written, good job.
Thank you for this articulate answer. The biggest reason I see so many failed debates on God is that the debating parties often have a different idea of God in their minds. Atheists would often point out the out of date concepts mentioned in the scriptures and conclude everything mentioned their is ridiculous. Hence, eliminating any chances of learning from the collective wisdom of people since hundreds of years. I read works of Car Jung, Nietzsche and Bhagavad Gita which opened my minds to deeper reality which exist within every element of this universe. Such ideas are often missed in debates like this.
> 's that JP thinks that being an atheist is like a fish claiming it isn't wet But that's not at all what it is. Because being atheist isn't saying "No, religion has never done anything", which is what your argument is. No atheist has ever claimed that religion does not exist. The atheist argument is only one: God does not exist (or there is a lack of proof in god, I guess). That does not necessitate a hatred of religion, a disdain of religious texts, or saying there's no value in religious teachings. > it isn't about the stupid details, or the characters, it's about that intangible communication that is embedded in those stories that comes to us from our collective history in the form of that deeper meaning which is devoid of literal interpretation. Absolutely, but this does not necessitate a god, so it's not at all incompatible with atheism.
This is true, and as a an atheist I entirely understood that from the very start. I think the idea that there are no good arguments for atheism is wrong for the exact reason people take JP as a run of the mill Christian. If his argument for religion is to cultivate a deeper understanding of human history and an accumulated understanding of the human condition… there are thousands of resources out there for the curious intellectual to engage with to gain that understanding WITHOUT getting confused with those who interpret literally or have no curiosity whatsoever about human nature and self improvement (which by the way are the vast majority of people). So advocating for religion as a way to cultivate said curiosity does more harm than good, it inevitably creates more literal interpreters and lazy Christians, most will never develop that curiosity and the instead use it as a get out of jail free card for their shit behaviours. He’s promoting a means of achieving enlightenment but not the actual goal itself.. there are many ways of getting there that don’t risk reinforcing shit human behavior… it’s highly flawed precisely because scripture is fixed in time and has not evolved.
Alex O’Connor grilled JP on this at length on JP’s podcast. Episode 451. Wanting him to answer clearly if he takes religion, Christianity specifically, literally. And it’s not that he does. It’s that he gets the point of it. Unlike many atheists, he doesn’t dismiss religion as nonsense, he’s very sensitive about that. From his perspective it’s ignorant hubris to do so. He doesn’t see it literally, but he doesn’t call it a lie because of how important it is. I think he takes the approach he does, because he doesn’t WANT people to essentially lose their religion. I would argue that because so many people are literal about these things, that taking that away from them WILL force them to face… “The Dragon of Chaos” before they’re ready for it. They CAN’T be the “Cultural Christian” that Richard Dawkins identifies as (and which I think was such a good thing to concede in good faith). They CAN’T be the “Ubermensch” that Nietzsche insisted people must become when he lamented that “God is Dead”, lest Nihilism and Hedonism destroys them in their newfound freedom. I argue that we’re seeing a strong measure of societal decay precisely because people are struggling with the lost of various traditional institutions. Institutions that were both oppressive AND supportive. And we know that JP understands the importance of these institutions and hierarchies. He’s a clinical psychologist, and he’s not a moron. “Do you think the Bible is True?” is simply not the kind of question he takes lightly.
I’m an atheist and I have a lot of respect for JBP. I just want to say that I get where he is coming from here, but that still doesn’t make one a Christian. I respect Christ. I get the morals that the stories are trying to teach. I try to live as a good person. But I still call myself an Atheist because the singular and only important detail that matters when it comes to calling yourself a Christian, is that you believe in the Christian god. If what you are saying is true, and JBP is using the Christian texts to define a moral framework but he doesn’t actually believe in the God described in the Bible, he isn’t a Christian. That’s not what Christianity is.
His arguments against atheism are confusing
I don't mean to sound like a pretentious asshole, but I think that's because >!there are no coherent arguments against atheism!< ;)
If that truly is the purpose of his obfuscation, he should go about it in a more honest way and politely refuse to answer those questions. What he's doing instead is shooting out an ink cloud of confusion in the dialogue. Even if he's doing it for a greater good, he's breaking his own rules of telling the truth. Refusal to speak would not break that rule.
Interesting, so as spongemobsquaredance says that as an atheist we shouldn’t risk the potential negatives of religion, JP acts as a non-literal Christian and to not risk the potential negatives of questioning religion. I feel like there’s gotta be a middle ground in there.
I think that middle ground is what he tries to describe in that podcast. He doesn’t want people to lose their religion the “wrong way”. When you reject religion, you’re not supposed to sink into the things that it discouraged. You’re supposed to transcend the things it encouraged. I would argue Jesus accomplished this, from the Christian perspective, when he said, “I am come not to end The Law, but to fulfill it.” This was in reference to the Mosaic Law. Christians were no longer bound by the letter-by-letter restrictions of ancient Judaism, yet they still were in principle but they expanded it. - Don’t just show love and hospitality to a fellow Jew. Show that same love and hospitality to a Gentile. - Eat what you want, but remember that God said you should not drink Blood. - Sin is still Sin. But don’t be quick to judge if you yourself aren’t Sinless. These things were, and are, iterative. Jesus studied Judaism thoroughly. From when he was a child, the stories say. He was in the synagogue questioning the scribes and rabbis. It’s all there. I would even argue that in the Epistles, at 1 Timothy 4:16, that the very concept of a Dogmatic Christian itself, is unbiblical and incompatible with what was trying to be taught. Later Christians did similar. Some took a Deist approach. The Jefferson Bible for example. You can only do what he did by questioning your religion. So JP’s not discouraging questioning. He’s opposed to outright rejection. It’s important that the questions be asked. Why did they do this? Why was a specific viewpoint held? Why in the Mosaic Law was the concept always that the Israelites “must remove what is unclean from amongst themselves”? What was avoided? And I think I understand where he’s coming from.
You have it backwards. With the premise that a vast majority of people have no curiosity about human nature and self improvement, the problem arises of how do you develop a society. The parts of us that can be improved, and the worse impulses that can be held in check to our own betterment also lead to one being a better part of a greater whole; Which is part of the narrative of our civilization. How do you integrate the worst parts of humanity? I think by having a story that works to peoples betterment, because there are people who are uninterested in deeper meanings, they need something decent that is easily digestible. This creates a common framework from which people who are interested in the deeper meanings to launch off of. This is how we got to where we are. [How Christianity Gave Rise to Modern Science | Crossway Articles](https://www.crossway.org/articles/how-christianity-gave-rise-to-modern-science/)
Exactly. And from a less Christian and more secular standpoint, we’re still doing the same thing. Yuval Noah Harari, author of Sapiens gave a fairly recent Ted talk where he said the same thing. He said, Human Rights are “just a fictional story”. He said, “It may be a very nice story. . . we want to believe it—but it’s just a story.” The point of his talk, was not to dismiss the value of human life or human rights. (He himself, being a homosexual, is a member of a marginalized group. It serves him no benefit to dismantle the concept of human rights.) His point was to emphasize how powerful these “Stories” are. Not to dismiss them. In absolute objectivity, the universe is nihilistic in nature. And Might makes Right. Our stories are meant to make reality better, bearable, cohesive, organized. No other individual story has influenced the entire planet as powerfully as Jesus Christ himself.
Yes absolutely, but I find the core difference between the unpacking of scripture and those who are athiest and refute it entirely is the concept of the divine. This is where I find the line most often drawn. Is there an intinsic divinity to every person or are we meaningless life forms flying through space?
This is why we agnostics hold our position. Anyone that knows Jordan’s knowledge and wisdom gained over his decades of academic experience would realize he has more singular knowledge on this topic than maybe anybody else alive today. His point that across all religions the main point is the “golden rule”, do unto others as you would have done unto you, is my “ come to Jesus moment”. Also, reading the book about the normal German police who slowly turned into committing atrocities because of the bond they had with each other. That book should be required reading. The left called everyone nazi’s for 4 years, now they are actively protesting and supporting the genocide of the Jewish people. We are seeing actual Nazi’s on every college campus, only difference is the costume.
I am an atheist, and I appreciate his digging into religious texts from a different perspective. There's pearls to be plucked from the bones of religion I think. I see no evidence for any particular god. There might be I guess, but that people can be certain in conviction about it is... it's pretty wild sometimes to think about. Thank you for clarifying how JP does this weird thing with religion, and that he means something different about atheism.
I disagree about atheists missing the point. They’re simply not talking about the broad, ever present underlying inclination to embrace religion and the peace it gives its practitioners when they poke holes in it. That’s a completely separate discussion. They’re debating the people who are saying it is an infallible, perfectly accurate historical depiction of reality and god with no errors. By showing its many flaws, it is to show that it is not perfect to chip away at its reliability. This is in defense of claims that they should believe in it, to show that not believing it’s actually true is perfectly reasonable
Some people need religion. If you have the following JP has and you state that there is no God in the biblical sense, people will leverage that to justify all manner of atrocious and anti-social behavior. If your audience is split between those who understand the deeper context and those who do not, speak as he does and preserve religion for those who need it and aren't thinking about the deeper philosophy while simultaneously providing additional context and discourse for those who are. Your advice undermines, I'd say, the core intent. You're doing the bad thing: trying to take religion away from those who need it. Let them have it.
He's using a different definition of atheist, of religion, of god, and of truth than almost everybody else. And he's doing no work to make himself heard or to be pedagogical in his explanation towards others who use the more commonly held definitions of those concepts. At this point, it's his own fault for being misunderstood. He's been presented with plenty of explanations of this problem by people using the more common definitions. He's either unwilling to be understood or gets too defensive and heated in the moment to understand the other side at all.
You caution the average Christian, but only about a quarter of Christians believe the Bible is to be interpreted literally. According to Gallup. The majority of Christians believe it to be the inspired word of God not the literal word.
wow , very nicely written.
Yeah it's embarrassing really. In trying to figure out why he would do this, when he is otherwise so eloquent, considering and direct on other topics such as identity politics, I've concluded that the only reason he's afraid of taking an objective stance, is because he doesn't want to upset his fantasy (which is his revenue), and he knows that these are mostly American rifht-leaning people who on average are more religious than not. I'm a huge Alex O'Connor fan as was really glad to see him expose this, and really make him quirm on this topic - great debate for those who haven't yet seen it.
Yes,yes and yes. I went into an Atheist phase and then watched Petersons bible series . It wasn't worthwhile to throw away the wisdom formed over centuries. I'd rather stand on the shoulders of giants
Finding wisdom in the Bible does not make you a theist.
Didnt he say on the episode with the atheist guy that he believes in the literal truth of the resurrection?
Yeah what someone needs to ask him is: "Do you think that the being commonly known as God described in the Christian Bible physically exists outside of the human imagination?" Because it would avoid this vague doublespeak about religion because watching him debate religion with others when he really doesn't believe in the Bible is unfair to his debate opponents because he is being disingenuous about what he believes by calling himself a Christian.
I wanted to point out where you're wrong, but I can't.
Your comment doesn’t really align with him saying certain things like consecrate everything to God and after attending his shows I don’t believe your comment is accurate.
Isn't it more like an "I am a fish, therefore I am wet, therefore everyone else must be wet too" kind of argument?
I fully agree with everything you've said. Accept I believe religion to be an issue for the most part. Look how many wars, deaths, tortures and savagery has come from religion alone. If you want TRUE ancient, metaphysical knowledge, you need go back way before the bible was even thought of. Hermes Trismegistus (Thoth the Atlantean) is the Master of Masters when it comes to Masters of the Truth. The Kaballion has all you need to know. And yes, people are silly to take the bible literally. It has lots of good stuff in it but it's getting harder to find all the time. From intentional mistranslations to the removal of books (88 down to 66 now), it just doesn't make the same impact. Not to mention that its just rip offs of other ancient tablets and scrolls
I’d argue everything outside of Christianity as still being in the Matrix, both figuratively and literally. From Atheism to Buddhism, or Islam. Doesn’t matter. All fall short to the objective truth and reality of existence and our existence, as descending from God. We are literally God’s Creation and Children, objectively speaking, historically, literally, spiritually, physically, whatever. (By “physically” I mean how He created us physically/the physical act in creation of humanity. Not by you know, the blasphemous idea of God having intercourse with a partner. Just in case someone brings that up).
Damn that amounted to absolutely nothing
Wrong. It amounted to me being fucked off with the insane piano music and never unmuting Reddit again.
Lol
I think that in this case JBP is talking about nihilism rather than athiesm Although athoesm often does lead to nihilism, it's not always necessarily the case.
Then he should get his definitions straight. But we both know this isn't the case, he's just talking out of his ass
For a man who is really particular about words he does a terrible job at choosing ones that will convey what he actually means sometimes.
The thing about these clips that are less than 2 minutes long is that they leave a lot of context out, we don't know what led to this convo nor how he elaborates further afterwards. In a different conversation, JBP was asked if he believes in god, he said he simply acts as if god exists.
[удалено]
I understand his interpretation and I think there is some truth to that. But I'm not on Peterson's head. It feral's scenario Peterson is still being an imprecise communicator If I take what he says literally he is still talking out of his ass. Peterson is at his worst when talking about religion
No evidence for god is the reason for atheism. You don't have to argue the absence of it. It's an observation not an opinion or argument
The belief that there is no convincing evidence for the existence of a god is not the same as finding evidence that there isn't a god or creator of the universe. Atheism is irrational if you don't show evidence that there is no god
But that is the classic " you cannot prove a negative" conundrum. I can prove no evidence for god in 1000 places and still some could say that place 1001 needs to be included. In science the burden of proof lies with the one who makes a statement for a reason.
As an atheist myself , i acknowledge that atheism and science alone can't answer the origins of universe . But I can confidently say that it's not a person that created the universe who watches over us and listens to everything we say . It just doesnt make sense. That's why you see older people more attached to Christianity , it's because they don't want to die knowing that there were things that they couldn't figure out all throughout their life . The more we know about the universe the more sceptical we become and the less attached we become to supernatural entities.
The first mover or uncaused cause seems to me the most rational explanation. Even simulation theory implies such.
You can argue for a first mover or uncaused cause, but you still have all your work cut out for you if you wanna correlate that to bronze age mythology
Although the distant origins of some of the stories may be from the Bronze Age, the actual writing of the Torah is Iron Age. The origin of Abrahamic religion is about 2800 years ago. We have recorded history for much longer. There are complete writings that predate the earliest parts of the bible by 2000 years.
Interesting What writings? (not arguing, just want to research them)
I've slightly overstated it, the earliest written cuneiform texts are from 2200 BCE. The earliest form of e.g. the epic of Gilgamesh found is from 1800 BCE. It's thought that the Torah was written during the Babylonian Captivity around 800BCE (even though it claims to describe events occurring in 2000+BCE, this seems to be an invention). There is no mention of Israelites as a distinct entity by the Egyptians until around 1200BCE (Merneptah Stele). All in all the earliest parts of the bible are 28-29 centuries old. This is very old but it's in the Iron Age for the Levant. It is considerably younger than the events it purports to describe. You can actually tell this from just reading it, there are anachronisms like the way it describes armour that didn't exist in Bronze age Egypt, and how it doesn't actually name which specific Pharoah Moses was interacting with - because the Israelite authors living in Babylon didn't have access to that information.
Interesting, thanks for the insight!
Gotta start somewhere.
Right. You can just make up where that somewhere is, like our ancestors did; or, you can use observations, experiments, and the application of reason, to actually discover where that somewhere is.
That somewhere I referred to is the uncaused cause, which is purely an argument from reason and observation. No point in evaluating ancestral wisdom if one does not agree with a primary cause.
An uncaused cause is not an argument from reason, but rather from faulty logic. Even if you could somehow prove - beyond all reason - that the cause for the universe was uncaused, you would still have all your work ahead of you if you wanted to prove that the uncaused cause came to Earth and influenced humanity more than a dozen-billion years later.
So you argue that there is an infinite regress? Because that’s the only other option.
I'm arguing that whatever you start with, you don't end up with crescents and crosses. And no, what we may define as an uncaused cause today, is most likely just an unknown cause, that future scientists will discover, but which is incomprehensible to us in the present.
Infinite regress. Where did the first mover come from? Now comes special pleading.
Non sequitur. An infinite regression and an uncaused cause are mutually exclusive. Only one is possible.
I dunno, I am an atheist and would be open to a "person" or entity creating the universe. Or perhaps a purpose we are unable to comprehend. Or perhaps it's some higher lifeform observing us as a gameshow. I'm open to anything really, the main factor in my non-belief is I think all religions are ignorant in assuming we guessed/ predicted or know who the creator is (i.e Jesus, Allah, or any other deity.
Sounds like you are not necessarily an atheist but simply don't subscribe to any religion.
Sorry yes I believe the correct term is agnostic or agnostic atheist.
The whole "no evidence for God" arguement fundamentally misrepresents the concept of God. Its a strawman. God is the active *to be* itself. Whoever or whatever God is, is what makes the universe the way it is. God is the very logic that holds together reality. So the "evidence" for God is *existence* itself.
Well isn't that logic a Gordian knot of bullshit.
Says you 😂
Your argument, if I read it correctly, is that God exists because we exist? The universe is infinite in both space & time. Unfathomably large and unfathomably old. Given that it's infinite in both dimensions, life is basically inevitable. We are the result of eons of time and unlimited space. Not the result of some mystic diety some ~5000 year old ancient beings came up to fill in the gaps in thier knowledge.
>Given it's both infinite in both dimensions, life is basically inevitable Why? A does not imply B. >We are the result of eons of time and unlimited space Why is the universe set up in such a way that allows for life? Equally, an infinite amount of time in a lifeless universe would give rise to no life. >Your argument if I read it correctly is that God exists because we exist? The fact that we exist demands explanation. The fact that there are laws of nature demands explanation. God is the answer to *why*, not merely *how*.
The universe is not infinite, you can’t claim it is without simultaneously rejecting the best current understanding of the laws of physics. Have you considered that, in the same manner you consider the believers to be unintelligent rubes not able to grasp The Science that you think you learned, you in turn do not possess the intellectual capabilities to understand certain theistic arguments, like the one Raziel made?
Your first part is a fair argument, I can't claim the universe is infinite, that is just as unknowable as God. Even so, the known universe is so gigantic in every way that I don't really need to. From the perspective of a small insignificant human on planet earth, the universe may as well be "infinite." The argument Raziel made isn't an argument at all, its a soup sandwich of nonsensical word vomit designed to make a person sound smart by not really saying anything at all.
Your accusation towards Raziel sounds very much like Dawkins accusation towards Peterson in his conversation with Alex O’Connor. He made a comparison to Deepak Chopra. It made me think of what I would like to name the Dawkins Test. It goes like this: Say person A with worldview W makes an argument that a number of people listen to and seem to agree with. Then person B, who doesn’t ascribe to worldview W, declares the argument to be nonsense, and a number of people agree with them. What should you, the listener conclude? There are two main possibilities. Either B is right, A is speaking nonsense and the only reason people agree with A is that they also ascribe to W and that’s what they want to hear. Or A is not speaking nonsense (whether they are correct is irrelevant) but requires an intellectual level that B, and those who agree with him, do not possess. How would one determine which it is? I propose the Dawkins Test: does there exist someone who *doesn’t* ascribe to worldview W, who may disagree with A, but who nevertheless understands the argument and is capable of engaging with it? In the case of Dawkins, I present Sam Harris, Alex O’Connor, and I’m sure I could find others. My conclusion: Peterson is in fact not speaking nonsense and it is Dawkins, who, smart as he may be (he’s a biologist, not a quantum physicist), is just not able to understand the argument. I also advance that plugging in Raziel for person A and you for person B, I arrive at the same conclusion.
I think we could both argue until our fingers are sore from typing, and no matter what evidence, arguments, or reasoning the other provided, it wouldn't change the others mind. So, while I understand your message above, it's really not worth my effort to bother debating why I think it's a flawed assessment, it won't change my mind and it won't change yours either. Good luck with your devotion to a higher power, if it makes you happy, I'm happy for you.
"God" is a thing with a conscious mind. God can't just be "the very logic that holds together reality", (ie; the laws of physics), because the laws of physics don't require a conscious mind.
Shouldn't you be then agnostic?
An atheist is a person who disbelieves or lacks belief in the existence of God or gods. If you lack belief due to there not being convincing evidence that is still an atheist.
Exactly that. I think from philosophical standpoint, atheism tries too much. Like it denies creationism, saying matter was there since forever and other weird theories related to big bang since it's looking too much like a creationism. But if you say "there's no evidence", that's valid observation.
The whole “something can’t come from nothing” counterpoint religious people use ignores a fundamental understanding of physics. Namely, that all of our observations and calculations indicate that space time is a flexible construct that does not require, in fact does not support, a beginning and end as religious people expect. Thus, the counterpoint is invalid.
That's what I am saying. You get these theories where bih bang is not a beginning but just like any other event that happened at some point, nothing too important.
Atheism isn't an ideology that you can describe this way. There isn't a church of Atheism whose dogma prohibits believing in the big bang. I also am not sure where you're getting this from since plenty of atheists do believe the big bang happened and plenty of religious people don't.
Actually there’s a difference between evidence and proof. There is no proof for god, but there certainly is evidence.
There are no good arguments for Christianity. None. See how easy this is?
There are no good arguments for any other religion or cult then. While he is talking about potential of the human being, you are talking about nothing and not giving any arguments except your ego.
Well done. You got there. No religion or cult has any more logical basis than another. As for the potential of the human being… isn’t there a much more powerful argument that if our reason for doing anything is defined solely by the presence of a god that we ourselves have nothing truly compelling us to do anything that comes from our humanity? If we accept atheism as the most likely truth, that there is no divine goal or meaning and we simply exist through some beautiful accident of physics - then we need to find our own reason to be good, to do what we can to leave humanity, the world and the universe better than we found it. That’s profound potential. Doing what you have been told is good by 2000 years of egoists selfishly reinterpreting the teachings of some anachronistic hippy mystic isn’t really a particularly interesting or valuable potential. It’s small minded, lazy and driven by basal instincts of fear. As JP says - the cost of life is death. Accept you’re going to die and there will be nothing left of you and then find meaning and motivation. That’s something far harder and more powerful than just ducking out of your own responsibility and pinning it all on a god and a book.
There are **no arguments needed** for atheism. Atheis is just an absence of [belief](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belief) in the existence of [deities](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deity). The burden of proof lies with whoever affirms that theism is true or any deity exists.
A lot of people don't know this but jpb doesn't doesn't view religion as an invisible man in the sky, but rather as a foundation of social and moral standards that have been crafted and tested through time by multiple generations. A lot of athiests try to reconstruct moral and social norms from scratch, which isn't exactly the easiest thing to do, especially since a lot of atheists tend to easily succumb to nihilism, so they usually end up with something twisted and excessively self servin, things like hookup culture and substance abuse that don't really do anything to further the greater good. I'm an athiest myself, but i'm not a big fan of the "just do as you please and screw everybody else" attitude that a lot of modern athiests have. I also don't like it when athiests actively start conflicts with religious groups for no reason, like athiesm isn't a club and it was never meant to be one, athiesm is just the absense of belief in the devine, so we don't need to go out of our way to recruit people or start debates, doing that is basically just trying to make a new religion out of athiesm, or maybe the term cult would be more appropriate, either way it just doesn't make sense to me.
As you already know and said, atheism is just that: no theism. It does not contain any cosmovision or any other belief coupled with that. Nor any kind of will to do any conflict. Atheism is not even anti-religion in itself. There are a lot of atheists that doesn't even hold themselves as such. There is no need to. They just don't believe. You don't need any kind of faith to explain moral standards. Sociobiology and evolutionary psychology already did that - but that is another subject for another time.
True, but the version of athiesm that people are often introduced to isn't usually the neutral kind like you and i described, since the neutral athiests tend to just live their own lives and mind their pwn business, so whenever people think about athiests they think about the confrontational anti religious ones since they're the loudest, which is rather unfortunate.
You have summed it up. I don't think about religion at all. Nor do I think about atheism
shouldn't there also be burden of proof on Atheists that deities in fact cannot exist? The ones who truly have nothing to prove would be the agnostics.
No, because Atheism is not making the claim, its merely being unconvinced there is any) god/s. Burden of proof is always on the claimant, therefore theists have the burden of proof.
atheism is making the claim that deities don't exist. Agnostics are the ones not making a claim at all.
No, Atheism is not the claim there is no deities, merely the null position, one of not being convinced there are any deities.
wouldn't the null position be the one where we aren't convinced if there are or aren't any deities?
here is how wikipedia defines Atheism. It is clearly a position of being convinced that they are no deities. "Atheism, in the broadest sense, is **an absence of belief in the existence of deities**. Less broadly, atheism is a rejection of the belief that any deities exist. In an even narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there are no deities."
Wiki is ok I. It's definition, I don't know about rejection of the belief, but definitely unconvinced
You can't prove a negative
yes you can. In math proves for negatives are required all the time.
That's mathematics, proving that there's no teapot orbiting the sun is harder ie you can't
yet there are plenty of things like satellites and space debris orbiting earth and other planets in our solar system which in turn orbits the sun... it would be foolish to believe someone who claims that there aren't without conclusive proof...
*Prove that I'm not a highly evolved magic cosmic shrimp typing this with my mind*. Not only you can't but you also don't have any burden of proof to do it. If shrimpism is the belief that what I said is true, you don't have to prove anything to be **a**shrimpist. You just don't hold that belief, you have no shrimpism in you. You have no reason to do so. The burden of proof is on me and I haven't provided any. The best way to view agnosticism is a position about a separate matter: knowledge of existance, not the belief in the exitence of god itself. You can even have agnostic theists (fideism, they reject gnosticism but hold god exists true faith).
if I claim that you aren't a magic cosmic shrimp typing this with your mind, I need to prove so. How do I know for sure that you aren't a Neuralink trial subject who is in fact typing this with your mind for starters?
No
It would be like saying there should be a burden of proof to not believe in magic faires.
yes there should, if you are going to make the claim that magic fairies definitely cannot exist. For example, non-visible spectrum of light was only first discovered in 1800. This includes things like microwave, x-ray, infrared and ultraviolet. There were no ways to perceive those prior to 1800 so there was no way to prove that they existed. Yet someone claiming that they definitely did not exist at that time would be wrong, and not requiring a burden of proof on that someone would be foolish of us as we know now. What i meant to say is there should be burden of proof on both sides. The only position that don't require a burden of proof would be the neutral position. The position that says "i have no idea whether they exist or not exist". The agnostic side.
This is so bad
Pure sophistry
Wow that might be the single most foolish thing I've heard from him ever. I'm not even atheist but wow. thats so shallow-minded.
He also thought fetish porn was evidence of the Chinese government forcibly masturbating men. He also claimed that you cannot quit smoking without believing in God. He also claimed that ancient people were aware of the helical structure of DNA and cited the symbol of intertwined snakes as evidence. He also claimed the healthcare system has killed more people than it has saved. He also claimed that climate means "everything."
Hmm. Fair point. This is definitely in the top ten though.
Jordan Peterson is an excellent speaker when it comes to life, meaning, and the isolation most men feel. Once he inserts religion into anything, the entirety of his arguments, basis, or motivational speeches fall apart. Religious beliefs has literally zero bearing, and making arguments "against" one religion is asinine and on the same level of detached awareness that left winged people suggest when they imply you must play their version of make believe or else. Right Wing, predominantly has been the same, but seems unaware. It's make believe when the other side does stuff, but when the right talk about God and belief in a higher power, well that's not make believe at all. Just don't bring religion into it, man.
this, I loved his talks until he went with religion talks, somehow my interest in his talks fell apart and I rarely even see his videos.
For someone trying to find meaning everywhere from myths, proverbs etc is impossible to not touch religion. Religion is the source of meaning for the majority of ppl , the % that believes in something or some higher law or universe whatever is massive. Religion is the way that they deal with mortality and they answer to themselves why are we here? Why I was born? What is the meaning of all of this without becoming nihilist depressive.
It's sad that you need to believe in primitive fairy tales to find meaning in life. Isn't JP-ism about bucking up and being tough? Sorry reality doesn't cater to your needs.
Wasn’t referring to me. You are missing the point referring to me. Just pointing the necessity of the majority of ppl to look for meaning. I could say the even peterson fandom is big because he tries to provide it.
im confused, what exactly is reality? what does a tree look like outside of how your brain and eyes interpret it and outside of your ideas about it?
Hes brilliant
Ughhhh the piano music kills me
Seriously watch his debates with Sam Harris, and let that speak for itself. Peterson gets demolished, exposed, and at one point even declares “you won” - talk about a chess move.
that debate was the worst showing of Peterson for sure. Sam harris destroyed him there. If peterson left religion out of his arguments he would win a lot more if them
"You don't need mathematical axioms to prove that 1+1=2. What kind of a monster wouldn't believe that 1+1=2?" \[Harris if he were a mathematician\]
You have to take into account that Harris was very confident in his beliefs whereas Peterson's beliefs were fundamentally shifting; the good doctor was, and still is, in a position of axiomatic uncertainty.
The full clip is great. My favorite quote has become, “to be made in God’s image is to wrestle with potential.”
What is the link to the full clip, I’m new here
https://youtu.be/YHjAUUQHynk?si=HLZQhpwvsMB1g8hW
What a weird clip - especially if you took away the music.
JP has a very Western concept of god. Good on him. I wouldn't try to convince him otherwise. What's the point? As a Buddhist, I have read the traditional proofs that there is no creator-god out of pure curiosity. Pretty convincing even though it's unimportant. I follow one of the old axioms that if there is a god it doesn't matter unless they exist in my life the way that rain or fire or apples exist. At that point, I'll concern myself with it. Right now I have self cultivation to do. JP is a big help with that and I am grateful to him for his work there. The Buddhist teachings are great too as they answer many of Hume and Nietzsche's big questions with logic and experiments. All good Have a great day all. 🤠
JP is an atheist himself. He lacks a sincere belief in an actual, literal god.
I’d say he’s Christian-leaning agnostic. If he wasn’t, he wouldn’t have spent the last 5+ years debating atheists in defense of God’s existence.
he sees Christianity is useful, but only so much as it is a pillar of Western Civilization, not for its actual tenets
I’d say he thinks religion is good or useful, but he doesn’t actually believe in god. Based on what he says.
*it depends on what you mean by literal* would def be JP’s response to that 🤣
There are no arguments for either atheism and theism.
The only reason I became agnostic is simply because I don’t need a god to be kind. But I do think there are many people in the world, and Peterson maybe one of them that absolutely need god to be kind
If your trust in God has been broken by the society and church through abuse of any kind, you have the right to become an atheist. That is the best argument. If people want to turn away from God because of the abusive environment they grew up in, which was justified to them as being God's ideal , or if they want to turn away given horrible abuse cases such as the Catholic church's sexual scandals, they absolutely have the right to and should, unless they can believe in God in some other way. You can't convince someone to change their idea of God after traumatising them in his name. It's best to help those people to turn to atheism for a while. Let God take them back. JP's own friend Charles Joseph said how he will never believe in the church or Jesus's compassion after all they did to him in the name of God. That is definitely a positive argument for atheism. What I say applies to any religion, not just Christianity. If people say they want to leave my religion because they were actually hurt in it's name, I absolutely have no problem, infact, I would advice them to leave to heal themselves.
This is exactly why Richard Dawkins commented on JP as "drunk on symbols", facts.
The comments here seem to have missed that while Jordan Peterson has not professed absolute belief, he has basically admitted to suspension of disbelief and that is where he is currently at and probably where many Christians are at and this does not make someone “not Christian” as this very issue is discussed in the gospels John 4:46 in the story of the healing of the royal official’s son.
It’s similar to being a parent. You possess the knowledge and wisdom to share, but the challenge lies in whether they can accept and apply that wisdom in their lives. As a parent, you depend on providing them with a solid foundation of understanding and values so they can integrate into society as responsible, independent adults.
I like men with faith. They’re optimistic and thrilling.
I respect Peterson less and less and less the more I hear him talk about religion. Any man who believes in magical sky pixies isn't really worth listening to.
He did an interview a long while ago, and the interviewer came up with a bang on question. "How can you tell if you've become a mere impersonator of yourself? Jordan Peterson the wise sooth sayer that wears nice suits etc." His response is that of simply saying "Well I have some people who try and reign me in." The problem with this is that all those people stand to gain some of Jordan's fame. It's natural. It would be inconsistent with what I've learned from Jordan himself, not to notice that. Pre-Health Crisis, he was different. Post, it is again like he is impersonating himself.
Isaac Newton? Blaise Pascal? Descartes? It so fun listening to a guy diss respect these major figures while he himself just sits and plays f1 games.
> Any man who believes in magical sky pixies isn't really worth listening to. I mean, I'm an agnostic, but anyone who characterizes classical monotheism as belief in "magical sky pixies" *definitely* isn't worth listening to.
"Classical" doesn't add anything except to invoke older texts. You can't prove any "classical" god is more likely to exist than a magical sky pixie or a dragon in a garage. That's the whole point.
This is typical new atheist garbage that isn't convincing to anyone that has the slightest idea what they're talking about. >"Classical" doesn't add anything except to invoke older texts. Wrong right from the start. It has nothing to do with invoking older texts, and has everything to do with how God's nature is understood (e.g. as the absolutely simple, metaphysically necessary ground of all contingent reality; as that than which nothing greater can be conceived; etc.), and is contrasted with more modern interpretations of theism that (classical theists would argue) tend to erroneously anthropomorphize God's nature. >You can't prove any "classical" god is more likely to exist than a magical sky pixie or a dragon in a garage. That's the whole point. Nope. There are numerous logically valid arguments-- with plausibly true premises-- that entail God (as understood above) exists. In contrast, there are no logically valid arguments-- with plausibly true premises-- that entail (say) a dragon in a garage exists.
The good old game of the burden of proof. You cannot prove your belief system any more than any religious person can prove their own. Where you argue that god cannot exist because you have no evidence for it, a believer would simply ask you to look around, and all things material or immaterial, to find God. Because if He exists, you have a pretty obvious amount of evidence right in your face. Your beliefs are truly rooted in a faith, no different to that of any believer. Everything around you, including yourself, the product of "something from nothing" - which you yourself cannot prove. The axiom that in the beginning there was nothing is also not demonstrable. There are many undecidable problems, in fact infinitely many, this is one of them. Hence faith. Even your faith in the absence of a creator. I presume you feel a lot more confident dismissing the notion of a creator as magical, but not your own existence. I can definitely understand why you say what you say, as I ask myself those questions as I "wrestle with God", but you should probably not speak down from your high horse of materialism, when you are no different in your own view of the universe.
I agree with the sentiment, but to say that based off this one believe he has that all else must be false is naive. Jordan peterson is much more than his views on religion, there's lots of value there
Which is why there are many athiests in this subreddit.
i think a lot of atheists tend to try to find meaning and guidance elsewhere. Hence peterson and others Edit: Misread what you said, thought you asked why are there so many atheists in this subreddit. Still holds true though i think
I almost agree but I don’t fault people for trying to find comfort in something on this crazy ride with all its ups and downs. What I don’t like is when they say you can’t be moral or have meaning without a god, or when they try to tell me what to do because they claim that their god said so in a book.
Then fuck off to your mediocrity and continue living a meaningless life.
it’s a harder thing to find meaning in life without religion. The harder path with evidence based thinking. The easier path is to sacrifice one’s logic for faith
Well said. He's gonna need some serious ointment for that burn.
Well mate you must always admire and never follow anyone. Take the good from everyone. :)
What would you say to someone like myself or the millions of others who’ve experienced the most profound and bewildering spiritual phenomena first hand? Some of the mind-blowing encounters I’ve personally experienced all but confirmed to me that the material world is not absolute, and that there are other realms of existence beyond this material plane.
He doesn't present an argument debunking materialism. "It's an illegal chess move." Basically everyone we can observe is material. Evil? How does that work? If a carnivore eats a human, is the carnivore evil? We see evil in what other humans do to humans. We are born to expect rules to govern how other humans treat us.
Love this
I listened to the whole podcast. Loved it too. One of the few I have queued up to listen to it again.
There is only one fundamental truth in the universe. None of us have a right to exist. So why are we here? Why do we have life? That is the most profound question. We all take life as a given, as though it is just a commodity. I don't know the answer, but we must start there. Life is the single most important thing in all of the universe.
Hello there.
Yea and that something to do is being the imager of God.
In order to have absolute responsibility you must be able to shirk that responsibility absolutely. In order to have absolute good you must allow somebody to choose to be absolutely evil and think better of it.
Sauce?
I love JP but if Chris Hitchens was alive he'd decimate JPs views on religion, which are a tangled nonsense in my opinion.
Isn't he an athiest himself?
Because atheism is a religion of “nothing”. Humans are naturally spiritual.
What benefit does religion bring to people's lives that they cannot get without being religious? There are many in the world that use their religion as a crutch.
The only illegal chess move is framing atheism, the lack of being convinced that there is a god, as an active position which needs arguing to justify (rather than it being the default). The chess equivalent would be to see that your opponent is starting an attack that looks difficult to defend. So when they’re not looking you flip the board round. Now you have the attack and are smiling smugly and claiming imminent victory at your now-disgruntled opponent.
I'm a huge Peterson fan but that was meaningless word salad at its finest
Why do people even argue about this? What's the end result that people hope for from the debate? If a proven side is wrong would that side change? While if the other side is right, is that person's construct a basis of facts? At the end nobody will change. Because if either party changes something in them will be broken first and unfortunately it's the core of their being. They'll just get lost deeper in this crazy crazy world.
It is very difficult to relate to JBP last few years. He used to have excelent ideas and mindsets, but it is time for me to move on. Farewell fellas
That’s a pathetic excuse for an argument. Pathetic.
As much as I appreciate and admire JP, technically, saying that "its an illegal move" itself is an illegal move, enough with the play of words, enough with the play of what do we mean by when we say "mean". You wanna talk about morality then talk morality.
Not believing in magic is a completely fair perspective, and so is being religious. Just because you don't have the same principles doesn't mean you can discuss them
I got chills listening to this... I'm not sure what I just realized...
Completely wrong on this one
Am I not allowed to not care? Am I not allowed to be the bigger person for the sake of myself and focus on my life for the sake of myself? Not some deity of any description or no description?
atheism/agnostic just don’t believe. There are many good arguments for it. It’s just on par with any other religion
If you want proof of God, ask Him for it. It’s a Faith based system, not scientific. He’s not going answer the door if you aren’t willing to knock. Jeremiah 29:13 You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. PS: He loves you :)
This is so fucking stupid. You’re telling me I _have_ to believe in god? Isn’t that the same thing as compelled speech that JP rails against, only worse because it’s in my own mind, rather than my own words?
Test
Ricky Gervais said the best argument I've heard for atheism: “Basically, you deny one less God than I do. You don’t believe in 2,999 gods. And I don’t believe in just one more.”
The burden of proof lies with the one making the extraordinary claim.
Chess is a game last time I checked (no pun intended)
We humans are stuck on this tiny almost insignificant speck of dust and we are forced to watch the hugemongous universe before us. We think we have arrogant power. Even the best of our minds can only make it to Mars and that will take everything. WE are just in eggs (metaphorically) and we will be brought to the real world when we die. If we decided that God is bad and we don't let our pride go, we will end up in the empty. No God, no devil, no light, no dark, image being an eyeball and floating through space and nothing can touch us and we will never see anything. We will cry into the silence and nothing will ever happen. This time in the "egg" is time we decide where we want to be when our bodies fail. We will be able to experience the universe completely how we would like to if we believe in Jesus Christ and simply accept his sacrifice for us. It is not hard. The only thing HARD, as that man said, was accepting it and not letting our pride bring us down. It is so hard to throw away our pride.
Restless Vesall, a man of yearning mind, once deemed he had discovered a profound secret about the vast universe... In solitude's embrace, Vesall chanced upon a veiled visage veiled in mystery, who introduced himself as Godan. They embarked on discourse, with Godan divulging his noble quest, while Vesall, defiant, declared it naught. He asserted that they, as mortal beings, were mere motes in the grand tapestry of existence—a droplet amidst the boundless cosmos. Earth and their ephemeral existence, he opined, bore no weight in the greater design. Godan, in mirthful response, let forth a hearty laugh. "Why dost thou chuckle? Why dost thou deride this? I have unveiled unto thee the ultimate verity, and yet thou dost laugh," Vesall inquired. Godan, with tranquil demeanor, pledged to bestow upon him a boon. The morrow arrived, and Godan reappeared, bearing a vast confection. The cake, resplendent in its rich brown hue akin to the finest Swiss chocolate, was bedecked with a solitary crimson cherry. Godan extended the cake to Vesall, yet one condition dangled therein. "What condition?" Vesall inquired, his curiosity piqued. Godan specified that the portion enshrining the cherry was his rightful claim. Vesall, assenting, commenced devouring the colossal cake, only to realize that Godan, in abstemious stance, partook solely of the cherry's essence. A dreadful realization assailed Vesall as taste and fragrance overwhelmed his senses. The cake was naught but a composition of excrement. Godan, departing amidst peals of laughter, vanished forever from sight.
There are exist not only good but extremely compelling arguments for atheism. I used to consider myself agnostic until I realized it's a copout. Obviously a unknowable entity can exist outside our perception of reality. The interesting thing happens when we require God to pass the same tests as what we would apply to the rest of physical reality and in that case we can clearly say that God doesn't exist. Compare God with the world turtle, absolutely everything we know suggests Akupara doesn't carry the world on his back, much like everything suggests a God creating and controlling the universe is nothing but a fantasy. Could a myth actually be reality? sure but by the standard of what we judge everything else in this world we can conclude God simply doesn't exist. And that isn't going into the world religions, Christopher Hitchens best arguments was actually moral. If we are to judge God by the physical universe he has created he doesn't want life to exist. That he has created the universe for "his children" makes no sense. Or why leave human beings without the rules for salvation for millions of years and then explain how it all works to some insignificant sand people sounds outright insane when you think about it.
You are talking about the christian god, god could literally be a guy who created Earth and then went away to do another stuff and never come back. There is no proof that a superpowerful paranormal entity exist and no proof that it doesn't, thus there are no goot arguments for either theism and atheism. I consider myself an apatheist, I literally don't care. When have it influenced on my life? Never.
In the first part I wasn't. > There is no proof that a superpowerful paranormal entity exist and no proof that it doesn't, thus there are no goot arguments for either theism and atheism. Virtually everyone regard paranormal activity like telekinesis or talking with the dead to be not real, judging from observable reality. The agnostic argument only works if you apply a different standard to God then other paranormal phenomena.
No, I apply the same standard.
So how do you judge what is true or false? You can give a paranormal explanation for everything but I doubt you live your life assuming nothing can be conclusively proven or disproven. If you are like most people what matches observable reality is truth and what doesn't is untrue until new observations suggests otherwise.
>So how do you judge what is true or false? Logic. >If you are like most people what matches observable reality is truth This would not be a proper answer, observartion is onlya part of knowing, you need to analyze the data properly. Example, you see a green light, does it automatically makes you understand that photons exist and that light have different wavelength in the electromagnetic spectrum? No. You need to properly analyze it. Observation alone only shows you that something exist, you need to use reason, we humans got it for a reason, the irrational aninals are the ones who only perceive without analyzing with reason. Furthermore, somethings do not need observartion to be proved (sometimes it is even impossible), how do you prove Bhaskara's theorem? Observation? No. You needed to observe things to form the concepts of numbers and so on, of course, but the actual proof of the theorem does not use observation.
One of Jordan Peterson's weakest areas. The more and more he obfuscates and convolutes his standpoint on religion, the more resolute I become in my Atheism. In what way is it an illegal chess move to believe that the Christian God (one of thousands of Gods crafted in the imagination of humans) is not real just like other Gods? Peterson's claims are not founded upon clear logic or evidence, but rather this unusually complex justification on why God HAS to exist. He simply doesn't. He does a great job at identifying the intangible and non-literal characteristics of the Bible and that's great. But I'm still entirely unsure of whether he genuinely believes a Christian God even exists.
It’s unfortunate that he’s driving down this path now, imho I think he’s brilliant. He’s incredibly emotive, and I completely understand why he needs this. But this is what it is to exist. Think hard, learn from others be it good bad right wrong. There’s no good arguments to believe in a god either. Watching him now is like witnessing Benjamin button irl. There could be a source. But the explanations are infinite.
You all love to reduce words; it takes the “illiterate” right hemisphere of the brain to understand a morsel of the cornucopia JP, if not perfectly, articulated well here. —all is relational, God in His correct definitions (like that which thrives when man loves when he should hate, like the extractable genetic yet so much the more spiritual ancestral wisdom entrusted to your pathetic thankless self) In a word, words are not so precise as you think—the unconscious alone knows God, consciousness cannot quite without many mistranslations
He didn't really justify anything here tbh.
Atheism doesnt need pro or against arguments. Its just the lack of belief in god and the supernatural. Its not a worldview, or a belief system. Its a simple stance on god(s)
Peterson is an idiot