July 31, 2025 • 56 mins
When Congressional hearings on UFOs feature military personnel claiming encounters with non-human technology, a profound question emerges: how would confirmation of intelligent alien life change religious beliefs? In this thought-provoking episode, a progressive Christian and a conservative atheist find surprising common ground as they explore the resilience of faith in the face of paradigm-shifting discoveries.
The journey begins with a candid confession about social media addiction, revealing how certain behaviors control us despite our conscious rejection of them—setting up the deeper question of whether we choose our beliefs or if they're somehow hardwired. Could this same dynamic apply to our fundamental worldviews?
Delving into science fiction and theological speculation, the hosts consider how different religious traditions might respond to extraterrestrial contact. While biblical literalists might struggle to reconcile Genesis with alien life, both hosts agree that religiosity itself would likely transform rather than disappear. "I think religiosity is at the core of what it means to be human," the atheist host surprisingly asserts.
Most fascinating is their exploration of beliefs so fundamental we don't even recognize them as beliefs—like our concept of "human rights." What happens when beings deserving moral consideration aren't human? This question forces us to examine assumptions about personhood and dignity that underpin modern ethical frameworks but remain largely unexamined until challenged by the truly alien.
Whether you identify as religious, spiritual-but-not-religious, or firmly secular, this conversation challenges you to examine your own unquestioned assumptions about reality. What beliefs might you hold that are so deeply embedded you don't even recognize them as beliefs? And how might those beliefs adapt when confronted with the truly unexpected?
Follow Living on Common Ground wherever you get your podcasts and join two friends from opposite ends of the belief spectrum as they demonstrate how thoughtful dialogue can bridge seemingly unbridgeable divides.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
Does it feel like every part of your life is
divided, Every scenario, everyenvironment, your church, your
school, your work, your friends,left right, conservative,
liberal, religious, secular?
It seems you always have totake a side.
This is a conversation betweena progressive Christian and a
conservative atheist who happento be great friends.
(00:23):
Welcome to Living on CommonGround.
Speaker 2 (00:28):
Do you think if we met today, we would still be
friends?
Speaker 3 (00:34):
I don't know, but we're friends now.
Speaker 4 (00:38):
A mom is known as a mom because they are with him,
man.
So what?
We won a few games and y'allfools think that's something.
Man, that ain't nothing, y'all.
And you know what else?
We ain't nothing either.
Yeah, we came together in camp,cool.
But then we're right back hereand the world tells us that they
(01:00):
don't want us to be together.
We fall apart like we ain't adamn bit of nothing, man.
Speaker 5 (01:13):
How are you?
Speaker 3 (01:14):
I'm good I'm.
Yeah, I'm doing well.
Yeah, I'm in Vegas.
Speaker 5 (01:17):
Where are you now Vegas?
Yep, yeah, and look at youtaking time to do the podcast
yeah, it's a very exciting tripto Vegas.
Well at you taking time to dothe podcast.
Speaker 3 (01:24):
Uh, yeah, it's a it's a very exciting trip to Vegas.
Well, you could be out on thestrip.
Speaker 5 (01:30):
Uh huh, sure, I don't know.
I've never been to Vegas, so Idon't know.
Speaker 3 (01:34):
Oh, you haven't.
Speaker 5 (01:36):
I have no desire.
Denise has a desire, but Idon't oh it's fun Vegas is fun
yeah.
Speaker 3 (01:43):
Yeah, not on these trips that I take, but it's
mostly where I go is sad becauseit's, you know, it's everywhere
except for the strip is justlike any kind of suburb that
you've ever been in, exceptevery single building has a slot
machine in it.
(02:03):
If it's a gas station or anoffice building, everything has
a slot machine in it.
If it's a gas station or anoffice building, everything has
a slot machine in it.
And uh, so that's a little sad,but other than that it's fine.
Speaker 5 (02:13):
Yeah, well, good, how long are you out there?
Speaker 3 (02:16):
Uh, I'm here for one night and then I am flying to
Reno for two nights, uh, andseeing people up there, and then
I'm flying home.
So if you want to get sadderthan Vegas, go to Reno.
Reno's fine, reno's fine.
I don't want anybody to get madat me, but it's not Vegas.
Speaker 5 (02:37):
I have two books I want to show you that I've got
recently.
Okay, can you see this one?
Speaker 3 (02:45):
Yes.
Yes, I can see this one, uh,yes, yes, I can read that one, I
have it and I've read umchapters of it okay, I'm gonna
read it, because you uh asked meto reach out to them and I have
, but I have not heard back.
But the them.
We should say that did you.
Are you trying to keep it asecret?
Are you trying to be coy?
No, you can say no, I nope, goahead.
(03:06):
Yeah, we reach out to brettweinstein.
I have to always have to say,like weinstein is me, brett
weinstein and heather heying whodo the uh, dark horse podcast
and and they wrote the book yeah, go ahead.
Speaker 5 (03:21):
Hunter's Guide to the 21st Century Evolution and the
Challenges of Modern Life.
Speaker 3 (03:28):
It's really good.
Speaker 5 (03:29):
It sounds really interesting to me, yeah it's
very interesting.
Speaker 3 (03:33):
They talk about hyper-novelty and essentially
the theme of the book is that weevolved as a species over at
least several hundred thousandyears.
Species over at least severalhundred thousand years.
If you want to go back to likecommon ancestors, you know, you
could go back probably a couplemillion years, something like
that, and we evolved to be athing and then in the last, you
(03:56):
know, 10 000 years, just like ablink of an eye in our, in our
evolution, uh, we completelychanged the entire structure, we
, we developed an entirestructure of, of civilization,
uh, and much of it containsthings that we just did not
evolve to be able to handle, andso, um, that's kind of the
(04:18):
theme of it trying to deal withthat.
Speaker 5 (04:20):
Anyway, I think I'm really I'm really excited about
reading it, but I've got acouple other books I have to
finish first.
One of them is this one youcan't see it.
Uh, star spangled, Jesus, starspangled.
Speaker 3 (04:35):
Jesus, yeah, okay.
Speaker 5 (04:37):
By April.
A joy, okay, and he was theother person.
That was the other personrepresenting uh, representing
persons of faith, with me thispast weekend on that panel.
Speaker 3 (04:51):
You should mention what the panel was.
Speaker 5 (04:53):
Yeah, so I had the opportunity to go to Nanacon,
which is Nashville nunsconvention, and so, basically,
you know, they told me it was anatheist convention, but it
wasn't just atheists.
Um, you know, I think nuns is abetter, uh, maybe a better way
(05:15):
of thinking about it.
So you had all kinds of peoplethere.
There were actually at theconvention, me, april and one
other christian, okay, but but Iasked um one of the uh
organizers of the event, yeah,and he estimated that about 80
of the people there probably atone time, were persons of faith
(05:37):
themselves well, that's notsurprising, I mean we live in
the west yeah, so we're allcultural Christians, can't do
anything about that.
We could talk more about thatsometime.
Okay, so a couple things.
One is I want to share thisjust because I want to let
people hear how organized we'rebecoming.
(05:58):
You shared with me.
Let's see 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7,8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13 episode
topics.
And did you see that I?
Speaker 3 (06:10):
responded no, you said that you had responded, but
I can't find it because I'm.
Speaker 5 (06:16):
I responded right on the document is what I did that
you shared with me on GoogleDrive.
I just I just made comments onit.
Speaker 3 (06:24):
Yeah, I don't.
I don't know how to get back tothat.
Speaker 5 (06:27):
I'll share it with you again.
Yeah, you shared it with me,and then you can't figure out
how to get back to it.
So the whole thing I wastalking about how organized we
are now we're actually beingjudged.
So a couple of them.
I did just say I totally agreewith you.
So.
I'm not sure that well, but Iwould still be very interested
(06:50):
in hearing what you said.
Would you have to say about it?
Because while I say Icompletely agree with you.
Speaker 3 (06:57):
I may not.
The statements intentionallyinflammatory.
They're intended to be kind ofdebate resolutions Because, if
you know, I've just beenthinking about what.
You know, we've talked aboutthis so many times.
But what we want this podcastto really be and what we want,
(07:22):
well, well, what we want thepodcast to be, and and um, you
know, my, I keep coming back tothat um, I want to model, um,
being able to, to be friendswith somebody that that you
disagree with, and also be ableto be in the same room with
people who, uh, thinkdifferently than you and still
be able to.
(07:42):
You know, if we're going tohave a group, a community that
welcomes everyone, you know,outside of what Peter Rollins
says, I've been thinking, I'vestill been thinking a lot about
that so if you're listening andyou haven't checked out the
Peter Rollins episode, I wouldhighly recommend going back.
(08:02):
I thought his point was reallywell made, but I'm going to
disregard it and just say youknow, that is what.
If that's what we're trying todo, then I want to be like I.
I want to actually model thatand kind of be a little you know
, try, try to be a little bravehere, because not just hang out
(08:27):
in the areas where I know thatwe're fine in and see if we can
have some sort of disagreementand then still be friends.
Speaker 5 (08:37):
Yeah, I would hope so .
I can be.
I guess it comes down to you.
I can be, I guess it comes downto you.
So I will say this, as I'vebeen noodling what Peter Rollins
had to say and I'm probablytwisting what he said a little
bit, good, no-transcript.
Speaker 3 (09:38):
Well.
I mean, but but I think hispoint is well made, that that,
um, the strongest communitiesare are built around a common
enemy and, uh, it's the mostbonding thing to our human brain
, I think.
And so I thought his, I thoughthis point was so made that, you
know, when he was talking aboutthe friend of his, it was like
I'm going to have a, I'm goingto have a festival where
everyone's welcome, and he waslike I could list like four
different groups of people likeright off the top of my head
(09:59):
that you're not going to be okaywith being there.
Speaker 5 (10:01):
I just started laughing inside because I felt
like he was talking about me atthat point.
Speaker 3 (10:12):
But it's a good thing to keep in mind and he might be
philosophically.
I think he's right, I don'tcare, I guess, that's where I
don't care, because I want to doit.
I want to try to do it.
Speaker 5 (10:22):
if we can, we'll have an opportunity to further
debate him especially.
I think, uh, he's going to comeback on.
Um, I communicated with him acouple times last, last week.
He's going to come back on.
Speaker 3 (10:35):
We haven't set a date yet, but and peter, if you hear
this, if you actually do listenthis, we have no interest in
debating you.
Speaker 5 (10:41):
We're just kidding well, no, I, I, I, I do.
Speaker 3 (10:44):
Okay, never mind, jeff wants to debate you.
Speaker 5 (10:47):
Not that I disagree.
Speaker 3 (10:49):
He's going to come out hard at you, Peter.
Speaker 5 (10:52):
Well, peter's smarter than I am, so I will back down
real quick.
And here's a little tip foranyone If you want me to back
down, start quoting people to me, because then I'm out of my
element, because I'm bad at that.
Speaker 3 (11:09):
So you did it in the convention, you said, you said
when you were there I was lockedin.
Speaker 5 (11:16):
I was so impressed with myself.
Yeah.
That's I'm not good, I'm notgood like that.
I I can remember things.
I just don't remember who saidit and where I read it.
Speaker 3 (11:24):
Yeah, you remember the concepts and a lot of times
you you've got the, the quotes,and if you don't remember the
name of the person who cares,honestly, like a lot of that.
I'll be honest, I think that,uh, coming from somebody who
myself, I usually can rememberthose things most of the time,
for whatever reason, if they'respoken, if I've read them with
(11:47):
my eyeballs, then I usuallycan't remember, but if they're
spoken, I've heard it.
Usually I can rememberremembering that or quoting it
and quoting the person as suchand such says in such and such
article, blah, blah it's almostgood at that it's almost all ego
, though that's just ego, youknow what I mean.
So it's not actually in reality,I think, because I think that
(12:09):
it's good.
I think that it's good becausethen I can go back and go like
who was that that said that?
And then maybe I can like, if Iwant to cross-reference
something, whatever, but that'sfor my own study.
But I think when I'm talking tosomebody and I'm like, well,
you know, like, uh, likekierkegaard says, and floating
over the fathoms and blah, blah,blah, you know like that's just
ego, that's just me trying to,you know, sound like I'm cool it
(12:33):
was you got the concept, whocares?
Speaker 5 (12:36):
yeah, well, I I know that I was describing what
richard rohr uh calls universalchrist.
I just didn't give him anycredit and didn't call it
universal christ good, so it wasyour concept, then it was, and
that's when I and that's whensomeone wanted me to explain why
I wasn't a pantheist.
Yeah, so which?
I loved that all right.
(12:56):
So there is one other topic I'mgoing to add to this list, and
we've been talking now for 12minutes.
We haven't gotten started yet,but I, I at point.
I want to talk about what theEPA is getting ready to roll
back.
Speaker 3 (13:10):
Okay.
Speaker 5 (13:11):
Yeah, I would like to talk a little bit about the-.
Speaker 3 (13:14):
We can talk about environmental stuff.
That's fine.
Speaker 5 (13:16):
Planet care yeah, and I have someone that we might be
bringing on for that one.
Oh and April of Joy has agreedto talk about our spangled jesus
a little bit, and, okay, hercome out of chris.
She was straight up a?
Um christian nationalist, okay.
So yeah, she even wrote a songand performed it, uh cool, I'll
(13:38):
try to talk her back into that.
See if I can get her back intoit, that'll be great, and then
I'll do my best to keep her out.
Speaker 3 (13:44):
So all right, hey do you want to know what I did,
want to know something that Idid this last week.
That was, yeah, that I thoughtyou would be interested in this
and it was just.
It was just terrible.
It was just terrible.
I was trying to find someinformation on on some it was
some new story.
I don't remember what it was,um, but I wanted to see what
(14:05):
people were saying about it andwhat like reporters are saying
about it and stuff.
And so I downloaded Twitteragain, Right, cause I've had it
deleted for a while, if I've had.
I've kept Facebook andInstagram, um, but I, I deleted
my, my um, x, my crack, um, mycrack, and yeah, I deleted my ex
(15:08):
.
That's pretty poignant actuallyto say it like that, and you
know instantly, just not.
I deleted and re-downloaded itand deleted it probably five or
six times in the twitter, uh,these days from certain people
because they want to hate onelon, and that's not the reason
why I have um an issue with it.
The reason I have an issue withis because I love it so much
and I love the anger and the andthe, the vitriol, and when I
say I love it, you know what Imean.
I mean I love it in the sameway that, like you know, someone
(15:28):
loves a cigarette, right Likethere's a yeah, well, there's a
chemical that you're actuallyaddicted to.
Yeah, very clearly.
And so I finally deleted itagain.
And then I told Krista lastnight.
I was like I confessed to her.
I was like I got to tell yousomething.
She was like what's going on?
(15:49):
She wasn't really interrogatingme or anything, but I could
tell she could tell I was in abad mood and I was like I really
got to tell you that.
And then I told her that Idownloaded it and then and I was
like and I'm just feeling soupset about the friendly fire
that I'm seeing coming at fullright now coming at Daryl Cooper
(16:13):
and you know, um, there'sfriendly fire happening again.
It's yeah, and it's good for hisbrand and whatever you know,
but hate it.
I hate the friendly fire andbut I keep coming back for it,
you know, and um.
So I just thought that was sointeresting that it was like I.
It was, I I kept deleting itand then like 30 minutes later
(16:39):
going I'm just gonna see againand like re-downloading it and
then deleting it andre-downloading it and then
deleting it and redownloading itand deleting it and
redownloading it.
Krista last night Krista waslike she wants to post one of
those memes.
That's like.
Other women are worried thathe's going to cheat.
I'm worried he's going todownload Twitter.
Speaker 5 (17:00):
Oh, no.
Anyway, and for full disclosure, you know Robbie created for us
an Instagram and a Facebookaccount.
Yeah, but I'm the one that'smanaging right now the Facebook
account and he's managing theInstagram.
Okay, so I'm sort of on socialmedia, but not really, and no
(17:20):
one would find me.
Give it time, no one will findme unless they look, because
Robbie made my first name LivingOn and my last name Common
Ground.
Speaker 3 (17:31):
So he made it as like a personal, he made it as a
regular.
Speaker 5 (17:34):
Yes, he did.
Okay, yeah, interesting.
So, and eventually I thinkwe'll have to change that,
because there's some things Iwant to be able to do, but I'm
not savvy enough yet.
Okay, all right.
All that being said, yeah, sotwo weeks ago we promised
katherine that we would, so I'mgoing to play the clip again
from that news um about, aboutnon-human intelligence.
(17:56):
Okay, so we're going to playthat and then we're going to.
We're going to talk about alittle more specific.
Speaker 6 (18:04):
A House Oversight and Accountability Subcommittee
held a historic hearing onunidentified anomalous phenomena
, also known as UFOs.
Lawmakers heard from threewitnesses today, including
former US military andintelligence community personnel
who claimed to have come intocontact with such objects.
Natalie Brand has more now fromthat hearing.
We have nothing close to it.
Speaker 2 (18:31):
Retired Navy Commander David Fravor testified
before Congress about anencounter he cannot explain a
strange tic-tac-shaped object hesays he saw in the sky during a
training mission in 2004.
Speaker 7 (18:37):
The technology that we faced was far superior than
anything that we had.
Speaker 2 (18:41):
Lawmakers on Capitol Hill are digging into the
national security concerns andthe mystery posed by
Unidentified Anomalous Phenomenaor UAPs, also known as UFOs.
Speaker 6 (18:53):
Do you believe that our government is in possession
of UAPs?
Speaker 7 (18:56):
Absolutely.
Based on interviewing over 40witnesses over four years, I
know the exact locations.
Speaker 2 (19:01):
A whistleblower who formerly worked on the Defense
Department's UAP task force,David Grush, claims he was
denied access to information ona government UFO crash retrieval
program, something the Pentagondisputes.
Biologics came with some ofthese recoveries Were they.
I guess human or non-humanbiologics.
Non-human, and that was theassessment of people with direct
(19:24):
knowledge on the program Italked to congress members from
both sides of the aisle aredemanding more transparency from
the us department of defense.
A recent report revealed thegovernment is investigating more
than 650 potential sightings,but ryan graves of americans for
safe aerospace says there'sstill a stigma around reporting
right now.
Speaker 7 (19:43):
We need a system where pilots can report without
fear of losing their jobs.
Speaker 2 (19:47):
The witnesses say, better data is needed to
determine what the identifiedobjects are and their origins.
Natalie Brand, cbs News,capitol Hill.
Speaker 5 (19:58):
Okay.
So her question is that if, how, if at all, would the modern
Christian paradigm change inlight of government disclosure
regarding the existence ofnon-human entities?
While she's specifically askingabout the Christian worldview
(20:21):
or the Christian paradigm, I'mcurious to know also would it
change the non-Christian or thenone perspective?
Would it open up thepossibility of there being a God
, or would it actually furthercement the fact that there's not
?
Speaker 3 (20:44):
I mean I don't see how it would change my worldview
.
I mean that's not exactly,that's not correct.
I mean it would change myworldview in the same way as,
like, if I discovered that Icould fly tomorrow.
You know like it would.
It would disrupt a lot but itwouldn't change my view of the
(21:08):
universe.
Does that make sense?
Like it wouldn't.
It wouldn't change myobjectively, it wouldn't change
my view of um, of whether thereum, you know, is it whether
there is this thing that we havebeen calling God.
That's like this, the, you knowthe, the all powerful, all
knowing, you know monotheisticGod, um, but uh, yeah, I, I like
(21:34):
this, this question, because Imean I can tell you what I don't
think it would change.
I don't think that it would endtheism, mono or polytheism at
all.
I think that is infinitelymalleable and it would just form
(21:56):
around it.
Um, one of my favorite aspectsof this this um uh book series
called the expanse I don't knowif you ever heard of that it was
.
It was uh, uh.
It was a TV show Also, they dida like a four season TV show
and it was a fan.
It's a, it's a sci-fi uh TVshow.
(22:17):
Fantastic, fantastic show.
Um, the and the.
The short plot is that it's nearfuture, but several hundred
years in the future, somethinglike that.
Um and uh, and humans areinterplanetary, we've gone to
mars and then we've gone out andwe have, um, we've uh, started
(22:43):
to mine the, the asteroid beltas well, and um, uh, and without
getting into all the details ofit, um, essentially, like
humans who have grown up on mars, civilizations that grow up on
mars are now thinking ofthemselves as a different, not a
different, species, but they'reMartians, they live, they are
(23:05):
from Mars, and the people whohave grown up and lived in the
asteroid belt with zero gravity,you know, grown up in zero
gravity, they're belters.
So this there's become this newdivision right, and essentially
, this new life form isdiscovered, and that's the whole
like long plot line or whatever.
But my favorite aspect of thisis that there's this storyline,
(23:27):
which is that the Mormon church,the LDS church, has been
building this planet, this likespaceship that's the size of a
small planet, because, with thisnew technology that all these
humans have that allows them totravel so fast and get out to
the asteroid belt, and whateverthey've now discovered that or
(23:50):
decided that, um, that they cango out beyond the solar system
and find this, and I'm not wellversed enough in the Behind this
and I'm not well-versed enoughin the LDS faith to know.
But there's some aspect of somepassages in the Book of Mormon
(24:15):
that indicate to some peoplethat there's a planet out there
that is where God lives, orwhere they're going to go for
paradise, right, right, at leastthat's in the storyline.
So they're using theirtechnology to create this
spaceship to go out to this,generations after generations
(24:38):
long, you know, mission to getto this planet.
And I just think it's such agreat kind of artistic depiction
of what I think would happen ifwe discovered definitive proof
that there's alien life and thatit's intelligent, comes.
(25:02):
It's intelligent comes to earthor whatever we have some sort
of encounter with it.
Speaker 5 (25:08):
You know, my feeling is that it would just get
integrated into, in, intopeople's faiths I, I think, um,
well, first of all, here's whatthe Church of Jesus Christ of
Latter-day Saints it comes from.
Let's see the book of Abraham,and it says that Abraham saw
(25:32):
Kolob, kolob, k-o-l-o-b and thestars.
And it says that a little notesays that it's not a planet
where God resides, but rather astar that is considered near to
God's throne and a governingstar within the cosmos.
And so it must be, yeah, and soone day on Kolob equates to a
(25:53):
thousand years on earth, whichreminds me of that song better
is one day in your courts than athousand elsewhere.
Have you ever heard that song?
Speaker 3 (26:02):
I love that song actually.
Uh, and it's the.
It's reference to the um for aday is a thousand years.
That's the whole like yeah the,the justification for um like
evolutionary creationism, rightthat that maybe god created?
Yeah, over the course ofmillions of years.
Speaker 5 (26:25):
Which I think is a good segue to where I was going
to go with this.
I think that a fundamentalist, Ithink it would be really hard
there would have to be a lot ofshuffling of their theology to
find out that, um, that there isintelligent life, um, off of
(26:51):
this planet, off of this planetright, either either equal to or
greater than human intelligence.
Because, according, if you takethe book of, if you take the
first couple chapters of Genesisliterally, then I don't think
you can anymore and I think thatwould become very problematic.
(27:14):
So for somebody like me whodoesn't take that literally and
understands it as a I got tomake sure I word that right so I
don't sound judgy understandsit as a poem.
It doesn't really do anythingfor me.
(27:34):
I would just be like well,because I can still see where
that would all be within god'spurview.
Sure, like it's, it's fine,because god, for me, is bigger
than this earth, is bigger thanum.
I heard one time somebody saythat we talk about like the
known universe and god, and godchuckles right like oh, that's
(28:00):
all you know.
So anyway.
Speaker 3 (28:02):
well, I I will say though I don't know how much
shuffling it would take, I onefor, even for a fundamentalist,
okay.
So so here, I do think thatthere are, there's a lot of
people that one might considerfundamentalists that aren't
necessarily young earthfundamentalists.
(28:24):
I think there's a lot of peoplethat you, maybe you wouldn't,
maybe somebody else who's like aprogressive Christian would
look at them and say, well,they're definitely a
fundamentalist, and I thinkthere's a lot of Christians who
would say that they take theBible literally and they're
(28:46):
still not a young earther.
I grew up in a tradition that Ithink would probably be called
fundamentalist.
I never thought of, know I, Ijust wouldn't have had those
terms, but I think that a lot ofpeople would have considered it
(29:06):
, um, fundamentalist, at leastvery conservative evangelical.
In the Christian school that Igrew up with, there were
definitely some teachers thatwere young earth creationists
(29:27):
and they were very concernedabout teaching evolution and
that kind of thing, but it wasjust like a couple of them, and
then a lot of the other oneswere just like ah, we don't.
You know, the Bible says a dayis a thousand years and a
thousand years in a day.
So we don't really know.
What we do know is that Godcreated this right, and so
there's like this whole spectrum.
(29:47):
I guess my point is that Ithink someone who considers
themselves a whatever you wantto call it a fundamentalist,
they wouldn't, because that's,that's a pejorative term, but an
evangelical, a traditionalist,whatever christian is
(30:09):
fundamentalist a pejorative termwell, it's created as a
pejorative, I think.
I think there's conservativechristians that have taken it on
as a, as a um, as a uh, uh,their own kind of identity.
Now Do you know what I mean?
Sure, it's like Puritan.
Like the Puritans never calledthemselves Puritans, the
(30:30):
Roundheads never calledthemselves Roundheads.
You know that kind of thing, butI think they kind of take it on
, so is traditionalist a betterterm, I don't know.
I think fundamentalist is finebecause it defines it.
You know what I mean.
But what I'm saying is that Ithink that many people who
consider themselves they wouldsay I'm not a progressive
(30:55):
Christian, I'm a conservativeChristian.
I believe that, however theywould say it You've heard the
terms, the phrases I'mBible-believing, I'm whatever.
It is right.
I think they who, when they runup against things that seem
overwhelming to their worldviewand the answers that they had,
they can just say well, God'sways are greater than mine,
(31:45):
God's mind is larger than mine.
I don't know all of these.
I can't say that I have all theanswers.
I just trust in God.
You know what I mean and so Ican imagine someone.
Now, I'm not saying all of them, because I definitely think
(32:05):
you're right.
There would be a lot of peoplewho would have a crisis.
It would be a crisis, for sure,but the Bible doesn't say
anything about Denisovians orNeanderthals or—.
That's because that's not real.
(32:25):
Yeah, it also doesn't sayanything about bacteria.
You know bacteria were nevercreated, right, mushrooms were
never created.
They're not, uh, they're notpart of the I'm going to get
this wrong, but they're.
They're different from theplants and the animals.
They weren't created.
You know what I mean.
So like, but you know you cansquish them in there, kind of
(32:47):
you know, and work around it.
So I don't know, I don't.
I think.
I think the vast majority ofpeople would just adapt.
Speaker 5 (32:54):
Well, and I was going to say I think the vast
majority of people wouldn't eventhink about it.
Speaker 3 (32:58):
Yeah, I think you're right because I, I really do.
Speaker 5 (33:02):
Um, I don't know, maybe I'm wrong on this right
and maybe this is just me beingjudgmental, but I do think that
the vast majority of people offaith just don't think about
their faith.
They just this is what Ibelieve and, um, I there's, I'm
(33:24):
not going to question it like,I'm not going to spend any time
thinking about it.
I'm just going to live my lifeand go right through it and
they're, and they're absolutelyokay with that.
Um, and sometimes I'm veryjealous of that, but I can't I
always have to be thinking aboutsomething, which which brings
me, um, actually to somethingelse.
I wanted to ask you yeah uh, sowe can't.
(33:44):
We might be, we might bedrifting away from our original
topic, but it relates, in mymind, to what we're talking
about here I won't tell anyone.
so, uh, when I was at um theconference yeah, the um the
moderator she was setting up aquestion that she was going to
ask about beliefs and, um, shemade the statement that beliefs
(34:08):
are not something you choose.
And so when I had myopportunity to talk, I pushed
back against that Um because I,she, could pay.
She said she made thecomparison.
And I could be wrong on this,um, but the way I remember it is
, she made the comparison tolike your eye color.
(34:30):
That, um, it's just, it's justsomething that you have and
there's nothing you do about it.
But then the example she gave Icould have punched holes in it,
but that wasn't what thequestion was about.
She said she believes ice creamis good and even if she is
given all the evidence thatthere's too much sugar in it,
(34:55):
even if she's lactose intolerant, whatever the case may be, she
still believes that ice cream isgood.
Be, she still believes that icecream is good.
So what are your thoughts?
Are beliefs something that youchoose, or is it both?
Because I'm coming along with Ithink.
(35:15):
Maybe at first you inherit them, but you can choose to jettison
them.
But then we're also gettinginto free will and I know all
that right, so just skip thatfor a moment.
By the way, I did hear backfrom Sam Harris's person and he
basically said if Sam'sinterested, I'll let you know.
Okay.
(35:37):
Which was a nice way of sayingyou need to just drop your
expectations, a little sort ofyeah, that sounds right, that
sounds right, a nice way ofsaying you need to just drop
your expectations, a little sortof yeah, yeah, that sounds.
Right, that sounds right, I'lllook for another quasi-famous
atheist and we'll bring them on.
Okay, that sounds good, yeahall right, so go ahead.
Speaker 3 (35:52):
Uh, actually there's a guy in okay, um, so I would
generally well okay, the thedebater in me is coming out and
I want the terms defined first,but I think I know what she
means and I think that generallyI would agree with her.
I think that her example's bad,but if it's the ice cream
(36:14):
example, I think that's not thebest example.
Speaker 5 (36:19):
But Because I would say ice cream is a preference,
not a belief.
Well, okay.
Speaker 3 (36:26):
So I think that I agree with her in at a, at a
baseline level.
I don't think that you can, um,that you can.
How do I say, see, this is theproblem with it.
I think the better way is tothink about, to walk through the
(36:51):
scenario where you would quoteunquote jettison a belief.
Okay, because I grew up in mychurch with pastors saying it's
not okay for you to just believein Jesus because grandma and
grandpa believed in Jesus.
Right, that's not okay, it hasto be yours, you have to choose
(37:13):
it right.
And so there was some idea that,yeah, you get taught from an
early age certain things and youjust accept it.
Children accept what they'represented with and then you kind
of put it away in the back ofyour mind.
You don't access it and in someways it's not accessible in a
(37:37):
conscious way.
There are certain things thatthere's layers that are not
accessible consciously.
They're always there butthey're not available to you to
pick apart.
But there was also thisunderstanding that you're going
to get to some age and at thatage, whether it's in junior high
(38:02):
, that was a big thing.
Junior high is the time whenyou're going to choose this for
yourself or not.
You need to make the choice foryourself.
You need to sit down and reallyit has to be up here.
You've got to think about ityourself.
And so I think there is thisunderstanding of what you're
talking about, that you can havethe beliefs that are given to
(38:22):
you and then you can jettisonthem.
But what I would say is thereason I would challenge that is
, I would go through.
What would that mean?
I sit down and I go.
I'm just going to give anexample.
My church wasn't really big onum roles of men and women.
(38:44):
You know there were.
There were like um, uh, therewere.
There were definitely uh,parishioners who um had ideas
about, you know, women beingsubmissive to their husbands and
that kind of thing.
But it wasn't really somethingthat was taught proactively,
(39:05):
right, but let's use that as anexample.
So you grow up in a churchwhere it's taught women are to
be submissive to men or to theirhusbands, right.
And then maybe you get intocollege and you haven't really
thought about it, and so nowyou're sitting down and you're
thinking about it Somebody'sbrought that up, right and
(39:27):
you're going to sit down andyou're going to think about this
.
I don't know, I don't really.
I see the verses that they'reusing, see the passages.
But then I've been told fromthese professors or these other
leaders over here that there'sthese other passages that
indicate something else.
There's this theology, I don'tknow.
Well, I really feel like theright way to view this is mutual
(39:54):
submission, and now I have kindof a framework of a theology
and these passages that I canpoint to and I have a background
(40:15):
of literature that's beenwritten on this and, yeah, that
seems right.
And so now I've jettisoned thisidea that I had about wives
being submissive to theirhusbands and now I have this
idea of mutual submission.
And I'm using this becausemutual submission, that was a
theology in the Church of God,anderson, that we grew up in.
(40:35):
But what I would ask is what wasit really that made the mutual
submission idea seem right toyou?
What was it instead of thewives submit to your husband
idea right?
What I'm saying is it seems tome like, yes, your viewpoints
(41:00):
can change to me, like, yes,your viewpoints can change.
Certainly, I have examples inmy life where I have held a view
and felt confident of it andnow I hold a different view.
But I would question whether Icould have and I'm trying really
(41:24):
hard not to get into free willbut if that was something I
could have chosen or if it wassome process by which my belief
wasn't chosen.
I didn't choose my belief tobegin with and I didn't really
choose this one over here.
It's just that this seemed this, this first belief doesn't seem
(41:47):
right to me, you know, andmaybe I come up with a new
theology or maybe I justjettison the whole thing and I
just say I don't really care, Ijust can't, I can't get beyond,
you know, I can't get behindthat concept anymore.
So that's where I would say Ithink I agree with her, because
(42:29):
I do think that everyone'sconcept of morality comes from a
priori positions that just seemright.
They, they seem rightfundamentally first, and it's
not, it's not because of like alogical progression, you know,
all right.
So that's my thoughts.
Sorry, I rambled a little bitno, so I'm okay.
Speaker 5 (42:40):
So are you suggesting that we could actually have
been talking about two differenttypes of beliefs?
Like is there okay, is therelike a um?
Are there sort of like these,uh, unacknowledged fundamental
beliefs at the core of a personand then from that secondary and
(43:07):
tertiary beliefs are shaped?
Speaker 3 (43:12):
I do think that that's a pretty good way of
modeling it.
I don't know that, those onesthat you would consider like the
primary or fundamental ones, Idon't know that those are like
set.
I think those could change also, but I don't know that I would
have that.
I don't know from where I couldstand to make myself change
(43:37):
those.
Does that make sense?
Speaker 5 (43:40):
like I don't know where I could get to outside of
right, because I'm even thinkingthat, that there's a, there's a
level of awareness that may noteven exist on that level yeah,
exactly yeah.
Speaker 3 (43:51):
Tell me, tell me, why go ahead.
Speaker 5 (43:54):
Yeah, no, I was gonna say because I'm sure, go ahead.
Yeah, no, I was going to saybecause I'm sure that there are
beliefs that I hold that I'venever even thought to question
because I'm not even like.
They're just so fundamental towho I am that like I can't even
imagine who I would be withoutthem.
Yeah and so, but I'm not evenaware of them.
(44:16):
Yeah, absolutely, if that makesany sense.
Speaker 3 (44:20):
I truly believe the less aware you are of them, the
more they control you.
And when I say control, thatsounds prejudicial.
Speaker 5 (44:26):
No, no, no.
The more they make you who youare.
Yeah, absolutely no, I get whatyou're saying.
Speaker 3 (44:31):
This is something that I think this happens in
cultures too.
In civilizations it is thethings that how do I put this?
One of the things that DarylCooper had talked about in his
(44:52):
Human Sacrifice and Cannibalismseries was that if you have to
make a rule about it in thecivilization, it's not as
fundamental as the things youdon't have to make a rule about.
The things that you don't haveto make a rule about.
They've already been acceptedeons ago and they're accepted
now in a way that nobody evenknows that they're accepted.
(45:15):
It's just obvious.
Well this is another conceptthat is built on so many other
layers of concepts that you haveto call that.
(45:42):
A civilization has to get tofirst.
You have to you, first of allyou, you have to uh, get the
idea of, um, uh.
Well, I mean, first you have toget the idea of what's a human
right.
What is that I mean?
Before you can talk, get theidea of what's a human right,
what is that I mean?
Before you can talk aboutuniversal human rights, what is
a human right?
You have to come up with aconcept of what's a human it's.
(46:06):
It's not obvious to an alien,it wouldn't necessarily be
obvious to an alien thateveryone that we say are the
same thing are the same thing.
Now, I do think that, and weall think that, we don't even
have to think about it.
We all think that that we'reall the same, right, we're all
part of the human race, allright.
(46:28):
I like what you did aboutbringing us back to the alien
thing.
Speaker 5 (46:31):
Yeah, that was good, because here's the thing.
So if, if, all of a sudden, wehad the, um, uh, close encounter
of the, uh, what was it?
close encounter of the thirdremember that movie, yeah or et,
whatever, um, is it at thatmoment that some of the
(46:56):
fundamental beliefs that maybewe're not even aware of are the
things that become challenged,and and it's so and like, and
for us to sit here and talkabout, like, well, I don't think
my beliefs would change, or itwouldn't be that much for me, um
, that we, we might not even beaware of how it would change us.
Speaker 3 (47:17):
Yeah, oh, absolutely.
I think that that I.
I that's where I, that's why Ihesitated when I said, well, it
wouldn't change my worldview.
And then I stopped and I said,well, that's absolutely not true
.
It it would.
It would shake my worldview tomy core in some ways, and I
think you're totally right, itwould be in ways that I wouldn't
be able to predict.
(47:38):
Well, here's something, okay.
So, going back to that thingthat I was just saying about, we
assume all humans are the same,okay, and we talk about
universal human rights, okay, uh, now we have an.
Now we have this other lifeform, this, this alien.
Do they deserve universal?
Oh, look, we ran into a problembecause we're talking about
(48:01):
universal human rights.
See, we have an exclusion.
We feel that we have reachedthe pinnacle of universality, if
we can say every human deservesexactly the same rights, no
matter what.
We have reached the pinnacle.
Oh, except if you now have a newlife form that comes in, let's
(48:23):
say they look exactly like us,they speak like us, they have
the same types of languages.
It's not going to be the samelanguage, but it's the same kind
of vocal inflections thatcauses the same types of
languages.
Okay, they're carbon based.
They need water.
They're more advanced intechnology, yes, but just
(48:45):
slightly Okay.
They were able to figure outsomething that allowed them to
travel across the stars to getto us.
I don't know, make it up inyour mind, but they're just like
us in that sense no-transcript.
Speaker 5 (49:39):
Can't even agree as humans what a human is and what,
what human rights are like.
Like if you ask people what,what is?
What is something that everyhuman should have the right to?
Sure we would like we disagreeon that.
(50:12):
Yeah, to someone from adifferent planet, and especially
, I mean we can't even extendrights to people from different
states and countries Like forget, forget, but I can imagine.
Speaker 3 (50:25):
I can imagine this encounter happening and then,
after unbelievable amounts ofturmoil, okay, and destruction
and death and whatever,independence day where the
president gets in a jet yeah andhe attacks, yeah, that's right
but but I mean, and I'm talkingmaybe hundreds of thousands of
(50:51):
years of this okay, betweenthese two humans and, and, uh
you know, alien humans, whateverthey are, um, that, whatever
comes on the other side of allof that, would have a concept of
(51:13):
all of them being the same the,the alien humans, the humans,
whatever you know, mixinghappens.
And you know I was gonna say,especially if you have a romeo
and juliet situation well,that's just if there's two right
don't let's.
Speaker 5 (51:33):
Yeah, all right.
So where have we landed?
What kind of common ground dowe have on this particular topic
?
Speaker 3 (51:42):
Well, you, I mean, how do you feel about my
assertion that you really can'tchoose your beliefs?
Speaker 5 (51:54):
I can accept that, if we acknowledge the fact that
there are different categoriesof belief, like I talked about,
the basic, unidentified corebelief and then also sort of a
secondary, tertiary belief,because I think that what we and
(52:19):
don't even get me into goinginto the like there's a
difference between preferenceand belief, too right, but I
think that people can change.
Or maybe there's a differencebetween belief and opinions.
I got to think more about that,because what we might be
(52:40):
calling a belief in my mind, Ican also often interpret or view
as opinion, and what I mean bythat is I have a belief that
there is a God.
I have absolutely zero evidencethat there is, and people can
argue oh, you can see it in thetrees, but you can also
(53:03):
scientifically explain all ofthat too, right.
But I, in my opinion, godexists.
So what I might be calling abelief, is it actually just an
opinion?
Or when someone says that theydon't believe that there is a
(53:27):
God, ultimately I think you gotto just acknowledge the fact
that that's really just anopinion as well, because nobody
can actually prove a lot of thethings that we claim to believe.
But I think that there issomething at the core of us that
is deeper than opinion, and Ido agree that there's probably
some things that at the core,and some of it is shared.
(53:52):
I think that you're absolutelyright that some of it is shared.
I think that you're absolutelyright that some of it is shaped
culturally, because I do thinkthat the beliefs that I might
share and I'm not talking aboutreligious beliefs either, like
I'm talking about maybe humanrights is one of those things
(54:12):
that we're just sort of dabblingaround.
A belief, do you know what Imean?
one of those things that we'rejust sort of dabbling around to
believe.
Do you know what I mean?
Because I can't.
You know like, for example, wemay all in the west, at the core
, have a belief that there is asaying like there is something
special about human life, butI'm willing to bet that there
(54:34):
are other cultures that just donot share that we can, mm-hmm
that that believes that thereare some beliefs.
Can we say?
Can we say, oh sorry, I'm sorry.
No, just say that there areprobably some beliefs that I'm
(55:01):
not even able to identify, that,um, I just inherited and I
didn't choose, and I probablywould never choose not to
believe it because I would nevereven know to think about it.
Speaker 3 (55:13):
Yeah, never even know to think about it.
Yeah, can we say that our um,our common ground could be that
we um, that we do not think thatthe discovery of alien life
would eliminate religion orchristianity, but just change it
?
Speaker 5 (55:32):
yeah, absolutely.
I think.
I think that there would besome that would change it.
I some.
They would just roll with itand just assume it already fit
within their belief structure.
Yeah.
But I don't think it would doaway with any, not just
Christianity.
But I don't think Judaismchanges, I don't think Islam
(55:52):
changes, I just think thatreligion is.
Speaker 3 (55:56):
I know that my fellow new atheists fellow they would
not consider me a fellow, thenew atheists that I really liked
the Hitchens and the Dawkins,and them especially Dawkins, he
would disagree with this.
But I do think that religion isat the core of what it means to
be a human.
I think religiosity is at thecore of what it means to be a
(56:16):
human.
I think, uh, religiosity is, isat the core of that.
So so, yeah, I don't think thatwe would cease to be human.
So I mean, I don't think thatwe would cease to be a religious
species excellent, all right,there we go.
Speaker 5 (56:30):
We've settled it perfect, perfect thanks.
Thank you for listening toliving on common ground.
Speaker 1 (56:35):
Please follow Perfect Perfect Thanks.
Thank you for listening toLiving on Common Ground.
Please follow wherever youlisten to your podcasts and
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You can also find a link to oursocial in the description.
The more people we have livingon common ground, the better the
world will be.
Does it feel like every part of your life is
divided, Every scenario, everyenvironment, your church, your
school, your work, your friends,left right, conservative,
liberal, religious, secular?
It seems you always have totake a side.
This is a conversation betweena progressive Christian and a
conservative atheist who happento be great friends.
(00:23):
Welcome to Living on CommonGround.
Speaker 2 (00:28):
Do you think if we met today, we would still be
friends?
Speaker 3 (00:34):
I don't know, but we're friends now.
Speaker 4 (00:38):
A mom is known as a mom because they are with him,
man.
So what?
We won a few games and y'allfools think that's something.
Man, that ain't nothing, y'all.
And you know what else?
We ain't nothing either.
Yeah, we came together in camp,cool.
But then we're right back hereand the world tells us that they
(01:00):
don't want us to be together.
We fall apart like we ain't adamn bit of nothing, man.
Speaker 5 (01:13):
How are you?
Speaker 3 (01:14):
I'm good I'm.
Yeah, I'm doing well.
Yeah, I'm in Vegas.
Speaker 5 (01:17):
Where are you now Vegas?
Yep, yeah, and look at youtaking time to do the podcast
yeah, it's a very exciting tripto Vegas.
Well at you taking time to dothe podcast.
Speaker 3 (01:24):
Uh, yeah, it's a it's a very exciting trip to Vegas.
Well, you could be out on thestrip.
Speaker 5 (01:30):
Uh huh, sure, I don't know.
I've never been to Vegas, so Idon't know.
Speaker 3 (01:34):
Oh, you haven't.
Speaker 5 (01:36):
I have no desire.
Denise has a desire, but Idon't oh it's fun Vegas is fun
yeah.
Speaker 3 (01:43):
Yeah, not on these trips that I take, but it's
mostly where I go is sad becauseit's, you know, it's everywhere
except for the strip is justlike any kind of suburb that
you've ever been in, exceptevery single building has a slot
machine in it.
(02:03):
If it's a gas station or anoffice building, everything has
a slot machine in it.
If it's a gas station or anoffice building, everything has
a slot machine in it.
And uh, so that's a little sad,but other than that it's fine.
Speaker 5 (02:13):
Yeah, well, good, how long are you out there?
Speaker 3 (02:16):
Uh, I'm here for one night and then I am flying to
Reno for two nights, uh, andseeing people up there, and then
I'm flying home.
So if you want to get sadderthan Vegas, go to Reno.
Reno's fine, reno's fine.
I don't want anybody to get madat me, but it's not Vegas.
Speaker 5 (02:37):
I have two books I want to show you that I've got
recently.
Okay, can you see this one?
Speaker 3 (02:45):
Yes.
Yes, I can see this one, uh,yes, yes, I can read that one, I
have it and I've read umchapters of it okay, I'm gonna
read it, because you uh asked meto reach out to them and I have
, but I have not heard back.
But the them.
We should say that did you.
Are you trying to keep it asecret?
Are you trying to be coy?
No, you can say no, I nope, goahead.
(03:06):
Yeah, we reach out to brettweinstein.
I have to always have to say,like weinstein is me, brett
weinstein and heather heying whodo the uh, dark horse podcast
and and they wrote the book yeah, go ahead.
Speaker 5 (03:21):
Hunter's Guide to the 21st Century Evolution and the
Challenges of Modern Life.
Speaker 3 (03:28):
It's really good.
Speaker 5 (03:29):
It sounds really interesting to me, yeah it's
very interesting.
Speaker 3 (03:33):
They talk about hyper-novelty and essentially
the theme of the book is that weevolved as a species over at
least several hundred thousandyears.
Species over at least severalhundred thousand years.
If you want to go back to likecommon ancestors, you know, you
could go back probably a couplemillion years, something like
that, and we evolved to be athing and then in the last, you
(03:56):
know, 10 000 years, just like ablink of an eye in our, in our
evolution, uh, we completelychanged the entire structure, we
, we developed an entirestructure of, of civilization,
uh, and much of it containsthings that we just did not
evolve to be able to handle, andso, um, that's kind of the
(04:18):
theme of it trying to deal withthat.
Speaker 5 (04:20):
Anyway, I think I'm really I'm really excited about
reading it, but I've got acouple other books I have to
finish first.
One of them is this one youcan't see it.
Uh, star spangled, Jesus, starspangled.
Speaker 3 (04:35):
Jesus, yeah, okay.
Speaker 5 (04:37):
By April.
A joy, okay, and he was theother person.
That was the other personrepresenting uh, representing
persons of faith, with me thispast weekend on that panel.
Speaker 3 (04:51):
You should mention what the panel was.
Speaker 5 (04:53):
Yeah, so I had the opportunity to go to Nanacon,
which is Nashville nunsconvention, and so, basically,
you know, they told me it was anatheist convention, but it
wasn't just atheists.
Um, you know, I think nuns is abetter, uh, maybe a better way
(05:15):
of thinking about it.
So you had all kinds of peoplethere.
There were actually at theconvention, me, april and one
other christian, okay, but but Iasked um one of the uh
organizers of the event, yeah,and he estimated that about 80
of the people there probably atone time, were persons of faith
(05:37):
themselves well, that's notsurprising, I mean we live in
the west yeah, so we're allcultural Christians, can't do
anything about that.
We could talk more about thatsometime.
Okay, so a couple things.
One is I want to share thisjust because I want to let
people hear how organized we'rebecoming.
(05:58):
You shared with me.
Let's see 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7,8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13 episode
topics.
And did you see that I?
Speaker 3 (06:10):
responded no, you said that you had responded, but
I can't find it because I'm.
Speaker 5 (06:16):
I responded right on the document is what I did that
you shared with me on GoogleDrive.
I just I just made comments onit.
Speaker 3 (06:24):
Yeah, I don't.
I don't know how to get back tothat.
Speaker 5 (06:27):
I'll share it with you again.
Yeah, you shared it with me,and then you can't figure out
how to get back to it.
So the whole thing I wastalking about how organized we
are now we're actually beingjudged.
So a couple of them.
I did just say I totally agreewith you.
So.
I'm not sure that well, but Iwould still be very interested
(06:50):
in hearing what you said.
Would you have to say about it?
Because while I say Icompletely agree with you.
Speaker 3 (06:57):
I may not.
The statements intentionallyinflammatory.
They're intended to be kind ofdebate resolutions Because, if
you know, I've just beenthinking about what.
You know, we've talked aboutthis so many times.
But what we want this podcastto really be and what we want,
(07:22):
well, well, what we want thepodcast to be, and and um, you
know, my, I keep coming back tothat um, I want to model, um,
being able to, to be friendswith somebody that that you
disagree with, and also be ableto be in the same room with
people who, uh, thinkdifferently than you and still
be able to.
(07:42):
You know, if we're going tohave a group, a community that
welcomes everyone, you know,outside of what Peter Rollins
says, I've been thinking, I'vestill been thinking a lot about
that so if you're listening andyou haven't checked out the
Peter Rollins episode, I wouldhighly recommend going back.
(08:02):
I thought his point was reallywell made, but I'm going to
disregard it and just say youknow, that is what.
If that's what we're trying todo, then I want to be like I.
I want to actually model thatand kind of be a little you know
, try, try to be a little bravehere, because not just hang out
(08:27):
in the areas where I know thatwe're fine in and see if we can
have some sort of disagreementand then still be friends.
Speaker 5 (08:37):
Yeah, I would hope so .
I can be.
I guess it comes down to you.
I can be, I guess it comes downto you.
So I will say this, as I'vebeen noodling what Peter Rollins
had to say and I'm probablytwisting what he said a little
bit, good, no-transcript.
Speaker 3 (09:38):
Well.
I mean, but but I think hispoint is well made, that that,
um, the strongest communitiesare are built around a common
enemy and, uh, it's the mostbonding thing to our human brain
, I think.
And so I thought his, I thoughthis point was so made that, you
know, when he was talking aboutthe friend of his, it was like
I'm going to have a, I'm goingto have a festival where
everyone's welcome, and he waslike I could list like four
different groups of people likeright off the top of my head
(09:59):
that you're not going to be okaywith being there.
Speaker 5 (10:01):
I just started laughing inside because I felt
like he was talking about me atthat point.
Speaker 3 (10:12):
But it's a good thing to keep in mind and he might be
philosophically.
I think he's right, I don'tcare, I guess, that's where I
don't care, because I want to doit.
I want to try to do it.
Speaker 5 (10:22):
if we can, we'll have an opportunity to further
debate him especially.
I think, uh, he's going to comeback on.
Um, I communicated with him acouple times last, last week.
He's going to come back on.
Speaker 3 (10:35):
We haven't set a date yet, but and peter, if you hear
this, if you actually do listenthis, we have no interest in
debating you.
Speaker 5 (10:41):
We're just kidding well, no, I, I, I, I do.
Speaker 3 (10:44):
Okay, never mind, jeff wants to debate you.
Speaker 5 (10:47):
Not that I disagree.
Speaker 3 (10:49):
He's going to come out hard at you, Peter.
Speaker 5 (10:52):
Well, peter's smarter than I am, so I will back down
real quick.
And here's a little tip foranyone If you want me to back
down, start quoting people to me, because then I'm out of my
element, because I'm bad at that.
Speaker 3 (11:09):
So you did it in the convention, you said, you said
when you were there I was lockedin.
Speaker 5 (11:16):
I was so impressed with myself.
Yeah.
That's I'm not good, I'm notgood like that.
I I can remember things.
I just don't remember who saidit and where I read it.
Speaker 3 (11:24):
Yeah, you remember the concepts and a lot of times
you you've got the, the quotes,and if you don't remember the
name of the person who cares,honestly, like a lot of that.
I'll be honest, I think that,uh, coming from somebody who
myself, I usually can rememberthose things most of the time,
for whatever reason, if they'respoken, if I've read them with
(11:47):
my eyeballs, then I usuallycan't remember, but if they're
spoken, I've heard it.
Usually I can rememberremembering that or quoting it
and quoting the person as suchand such says in such and such
article, blah, blah it's almostgood at that it's almost all ego
, though that's just ego, youknow what I mean.
So it's not actually in reality,I think, because I think that
(12:09):
it's good.
I think that it's good becausethen I can go back and go like
who was that that said that?
And then maybe I can like, if Iwant to cross-reference
something, whatever, but that'sfor my own study.
But I think when I'm talking tosomebody and I'm like, well,
you know, like, uh, likekierkegaard says, and floating
over the fathoms and blah, blah,blah, you know like that's just
ego, that's just me trying to,you know, sound like I'm cool it
(12:33):
was you got the concept, whocares?
Speaker 5 (12:36):
yeah, well, I I know that I was describing what
richard rohr uh calls universalchrist.
I just didn't give him anycredit and didn't call it
universal christ good, so it wasyour concept, then it was, and
that's when I and that's whensomeone wanted me to explain why
I wasn't a pantheist.
Yeah, so which?
I loved that all right.
(12:56):
So there is one other topic I'mgoing to add to this list, and
we've been talking now for 12minutes.
We haven't gotten started yet,but I, I at point.
I want to talk about what theEPA is getting ready to roll
back.
Speaker 3 (13:10):
Okay.
Speaker 5 (13:11):
Yeah, I would like to talk a little bit about the-.
Speaker 3 (13:14):
We can talk about environmental stuff.
That's fine.
Speaker 5 (13:16):
Planet care yeah, and I have someone that we might be
bringing on for that one.
Oh and April of Joy has agreedto talk about our spangled jesus
a little bit, and, okay, hercome out of chris.
She was straight up a?
Um christian nationalist, okay.
So yeah, she even wrote a songand performed it, uh cool, I'll
(13:38):
try to talk her back into that.
See if I can get her back intoit, that'll be great, and then
I'll do my best to keep her out.
Speaker 3 (13:44):
So all right, hey do you want to know what I did,
want to know something that Idid this last week.
That was, yeah, that I thoughtyou would be interested in this
and it was just.
It was just terrible.
It was just terrible.
I was trying to find someinformation on on some it was
some new story.
I don't remember what it was,um, but I wanted to see what
(14:05):
people were saying about it andwhat like reporters are saying
about it and stuff.
And so I downloaded Twitteragain, Right, cause I've had it
deleted for a while, if I've had.
I've kept Facebook andInstagram, um, but I, I deleted
my, my um, x, my crack, um, mycrack, and yeah, I deleted my ex
(15:08):
.
That's pretty poignant actuallyto say it like that, and you
know instantly, just not.
I deleted and re-downloaded itand deleted it probably five or
six times in the twitter, uh,these days from certain people
because they want to hate onelon, and that's not the reason
why I have um an issue with it.
The reason I have an issue withis because I love it so much
and I love the anger and the andthe, the vitriol, and when I
say I love it, you know what Imean.
I mean I love it in the sameway that, like you know, someone
(15:28):
loves a cigarette, right Likethere's a yeah, well, there's a
chemical that you're actuallyaddicted to.
Yeah, very clearly.
And so I finally deleted itagain.
And then I told Krista lastnight.
I was like I confessed to her.
I was like I got to tell yousomething.
She was like what's going on?
(15:49):
She wasn't really interrogatingme or anything, but I could
tell she could tell I was in abad mood and I was like I really
got to tell you that.
And then I told her that Idownloaded it and then and I was
like and I'm just feeling soupset about the friendly fire
that I'm seeing coming at fullright now coming at Daryl Cooper
(16:13):
and you know, um, there'sfriendly fire happening again.
It's yeah, and it's good for hisbrand and whatever you know,
but hate it.
I hate the friendly fire andbut I keep coming back for it,
you know, and um.
So I just thought that was sointeresting that it was like I.
It was, I I kept deleting itand then like 30 minutes later
(16:39):
going I'm just gonna see againand like re-downloading it and
then deleting it andre-downloading it and then
deleting it and redownloading itand deleting it and
redownloading it.
Krista last night Krista waslike she wants to post one of
those memes.
That's like.
Other women are worried thathe's going to cheat.
I'm worried he's going todownload Twitter.
Speaker 5 (17:00):
Oh, no.
Anyway, and for full disclosure, you know Robbie created for us
an Instagram and a Facebookaccount.
Yeah, but I'm the one that'smanaging right now the Facebook
account and he's managing theInstagram.
Okay, so I'm sort of on socialmedia, but not really, and no
(17:20):
one would find me.
Give it time, no one will findme unless they look, because
Robbie made my first name LivingOn and my last name Common
Ground.
Speaker 3 (17:31):
So he made it as like a personal, he made it as a
regular.
Speaker 5 (17:34):
Yes, he did.
Okay, yeah, interesting.
So, and eventually I thinkwe'll have to change that,
because there's some things Iwant to be able to do, but I'm
not savvy enough yet.
Okay, all right.
All that being said, yeah, sotwo weeks ago we promised
katherine that we would, so I'mgoing to play the clip again
from that news um about, aboutnon-human intelligence.
(17:56):
Okay, so we're going to playthat and then we're going to.
We're going to talk about alittle more specific.
Speaker 6 (18:04):
A House Oversight and Accountability Subcommittee
held a historic hearing onunidentified anomalous phenomena
, also known as UFOs.
Lawmakers heard from threewitnesses today, including
former US military andintelligence community personnel
who claimed to have come intocontact with such objects.
Natalie Brand has more now fromthat hearing.
We have nothing close to it.
Speaker 2 (18:31):
Retired Navy Commander David Fravor testified
before Congress about anencounter he cannot explain a
strange tic-tac-shaped object hesays he saw in the sky during a
training mission in 2004.
Speaker 7 (18:37):
The technology that we faced was far superior than
anything that we had.
Speaker 2 (18:41):
Lawmakers on Capitol Hill are digging into the
national security concerns andthe mystery posed by
Unidentified Anomalous Phenomenaor UAPs, also known as UFOs.
Speaker 6 (18:53):
Do you believe that our government is in possession
of UAPs?
Speaker 7 (18:56):
Absolutely.
Based on interviewing over 40witnesses over four years, I
know the exact locations.
Speaker 2 (19:01):
A whistleblower who formerly worked on the Defense
Department's UAP task force,David Grush, claims he was
denied access to information ona government UFO crash retrieval
program, something the Pentagondisputes.
Biologics came with some ofthese recoveries Were they.
I guess human or non-humanbiologics.
Non-human, and that was theassessment of people with direct
(19:24):
knowledge on the program Italked to congress members from
both sides of the aisle aredemanding more transparency from
the us department of defense.
A recent report revealed thegovernment is investigating more
than 650 potential sightings,but ryan graves of americans for
safe aerospace says there'sstill a stigma around reporting
right now.
Speaker 7 (19:43):
We need a system where pilots can report without
fear of losing their jobs.
Speaker 2 (19:47):
The witnesses say, better data is needed to
determine what the identifiedobjects are and their origins.
Natalie Brand, cbs News,capitol Hill.
Speaker 5 (19:58):
Okay.
So her question is that if, how, if at all, would the modern
Christian paradigm change inlight of government disclosure
regarding the existence ofnon-human entities?
While she's specifically askingabout the Christian worldview
(20:21):
or the Christian paradigm, I'mcurious to know also would it
change the non-Christian or thenone perspective?
Would it open up thepossibility of there being a God
, or would it actually furthercement the fact that there's not
?
Speaker 3 (20:44):
I mean I don't see how it would change my worldview
.
I mean that's not exactly,that's not correct.
I mean it would change myworldview in the same way as,
like, if I discovered that Icould fly tomorrow.
You know like it would.
It would disrupt a lot but itwouldn't change my view of the
(21:08):
universe.
Does that make sense?
Like it wouldn't.
It wouldn't change myobjectively, it wouldn't change
my view of um, of whether thereum, you know, is it whether
there is this thing that we havebeen calling God.
That's like this, the, you knowthe, the all powerful, all
knowing, you know monotheisticGod, um, but uh, yeah, I, I like
(21:34):
this, this question, because Imean I can tell you what I don't
think it would change.
I don't think that it would endtheism, mono or polytheism at
all.
I think that is infinitelymalleable and it would just form
(21:56):
around it.
Um, one of my favorite aspectsof this this um uh book series
called the expanse I don't knowif you ever heard of that it was
.
It was uh, uh.
It was a TV show Also, they dida like a four season TV show
and it was a fan.
It's a, it's a sci-fi uh TVshow.
(22:17):
Fantastic, fantastic show.
Um, the and the.
The short plot is that it's nearfuture, but several hundred
years in the future, somethinglike that.
Um and uh, and humans areinterplanetary, we've gone to
mars and then we've gone out andwe have, um, we've uh, started
(22:43):
to mine the, the asteroid beltas well, and um, uh, and without
getting into all the details ofit, um, essentially, like
humans who have grown up on mars, civilizations that grow up on
mars are now thinking ofthemselves as a different, not a
different, species, but they'reMartians, they live, they are
(23:05):
from Mars, and the people whohave grown up and lived in the
asteroid belt with zero gravity,you know, grown up in zero
gravity, they're belters.
So this there's become this newdivision right, and essentially
, this new life form isdiscovered, and that's the whole
like long plot line or whatever.
But my favorite aspect of thisis that there's this storyline,
(23:27):
which is that the Mormon church,the LDS church, has been
building this planet, this likespaceship that's the size of a
small planet, because, with thisnew technology that all these
humans have that allows them totravel so fast and get out to
the asteroid belt, and whateverthey've now discovered that or
(23:50):
decided that, um, that they cango out beyond the solar system
and find this, and I'm not wellversed enough in the Behind this
and I'm not well-versed enoughin the LDS faith to know.
But there's some aspect of somepassages in the Book of Mormon
(24:15):
that indicate to some peoplethat there's a planet out there
that is where God lives, orwhere they're going to go for
paradise, right, right, at leastthat's in the storyline.
So they're using theirtechnology to create this
spaceship to go out to this,generations after generations
(24:38):
long, you know, mission to getto this planet.
And I just think it's such agreat kind of artistic depiction
of what I think would happen ifwe discovered definitive proof
that there's alien life and thatit's intelligent, comes.
(25:02):
It's intelligent comes to earthor whatever we have some sort
of encounter with it.
Speaker 5 (25:08):
You know, my feeling is that it would just get
integrated into, in, intopeople's faiths I, I think, um,
well, first of all, here's whatthe Church of Jesus Christ of
Latter-day Saints it comes from.
Let's see the book of Abraham,and it says that Abraham saw
(25:32):
Kolob, kolob, k-o-l-o-b and thestars.
And it says that a little notesays that it's not a planet
where God resides, but rather astar that is considered near to
God's throne and a governingstar within the cosmos.
And so it must be, yeah, and soone day on Kolob equates to a
(25:53):
thousand years on earth, whichreminds me of that song better
is one day in your courts than athousand elsewhere.
Have you ever heard that song?
Speaker 3 (26:02):
I love that song actually.
Uh, and it's the.
It's reference to the um for aday is a thousand years.
That's the whole like yeah the,the justification for um like
evolutionary creationism, rightthat that maybe god created?
Yeah, over the course ofmillions of years.
Speaker 5 (26:25):
Which I think is a good segue to where I was going
to go with this.
I think that a fundamentalist, Ithink it would be really hard
there would have to be a lot ofshuffling of their theology to
find out that, um, that there isintelligent life, um, off of
(26:51):
this planet, off of this planetright, either either equal to or
greater than human intelligence.
Because, according, if you takethe book of, if you take the
first couple chapters of Genesisliterally, then I don't think
you can anymore and I think thatwould become very problematic.
(27:14):
So for somebody like me whodoesn't take that literally and
understands it as a I got tomake sure I word that right so I
don't sound judgy understandsit as a poem.
It doesn't really do anythingfor me.
(27:34):
I would just be like well,because I can still see where
that would all be within god'spurview.
Sure, like it's, it's fine,because god, for me, is bigger
than this earth, is bigger thanum.
I heard one time somebody saythat we talk about like the
known universe and god, and godchuckles right like oh, that's
(28:00):
all you know.
So anyway.
Speaker 3 (28:02):
well, I I will say though I don't know how much
shuffling it would take, I onefor, even for a fundamentalist,
okay.
So so here, I do think thatthere are, there's a lot of
people that one might considerfundamentalists that aren't
necessarily young earthfundamentalists.
(28:24):
I think there's a lot of peoplethat you, maybe you wouldn't,
maybe somebody else who's like aprogressive Christian would
look at them and say, well,they're definitely a
fundamentalist, and I thinkthere's a lot of Christians who
would say that they take theBible literally and they're
(28:46):
still not a young earther.
I grew up in a tradition that Ithink would probably be called
fundamentalist.
I never thought of, know I, Ijust wouldn't have had those
terms, but I think that a lot ofpeople would have considered it
(29:06):
, um, fundamentalist, at leastvery conservative evangelical.
In the Christian school that Igrew up with, there were
definitely some teachers thatwere young earth creationists
(29:27):
and they were very concernedabout teaching evolution and
that kind of thing, but it wasjust like a couple of them, and
then a lot of the other oneswere just like ah, we don't.
You know, the Bible says a dayis a thousand years and a
thousand years in a day.
So we don't really know.
What we do know is that Godcreated this right, and so
there's like this whole spectrum.
(29:47):
I guess my point is that Ithink someone who considers
themselves a whatever you wantto call it a fundamentalist,
they wouldn't, because that's,that's a pejorative term, but an
evangelical, a traditionalist,whatever christian is
(30:09):
fundamentalist a pejorative termwell, it's created as a
pejorative, I think.
I think there's conservativechristians that have taken it on
as a, as a um, as a uh, uh,their own kind of identity.
Now Do you know what I mean?
Sure, it's like Puritan.
Like the Puritans never calledthemselves Puritans, the
(30:30):
Roundheads never calledthemselves Roundheads.
You know that kind of thing, butI think they kind of take it on
, so is traditionalist a betterterm, I don't know.
I think fundamentalist is finebecause it defines it.
You know what I mean.
But what I'm saying is that Ithink that many people who
consider themselves they wouldsay I'm not a progressive
(30:55):
Christian, I'm a conservativeChristian.
I believe that, however theywould say it You've heard the
terms, the phrases I'mBible-believing, I'm whatever.
It is right.
I think they who, when they runup against things that seem
overwhelming to their worldviewand the answers that they had,
they can just say well, God'sways are greater than mine,
(31:45):
God's mind is larger than mine.
I don't know all of these.
I can't say that I have all theanswers.
I just trust in God.
You know what I mean and so Ican imagine someone.
Now, I'm not saying all of them, because I definitely think
(32:05):
you're right.
There would be a lot of peoplewho would have a crisis.
It would be a crisis, for sure,but the Bible doesn't say
anything about Denisovians orNeanderthals or—.
That's because that's not real.
(32:25):
Yeah, it also doesn't sayanything about bacteria.
You know bacteria were nevercreated, right, mushrooms were
never created.
They're not, uh, they're notpart of the I'm going to get
this wrong, but they're.
They're different from theplants and the animals.
They weren't created.
You know what I mean.
So like, but you know you cansquish them in there, kind of
(32:47):
you know, and work around it.
So I don't know, I don't.
I think.
I think the vast majority ofpeople would just adapt.
Speaker 5 (32:54):
Well, and I was going to say I think the vast
majority of people wouldn't eventhink about it.
Speaker 3 (32:58):
Yeah, I think you're right because I, I really do.
Speaker 5 (33:02):
Um, I don't know, maybe I'm wrong on this right
and maybe this is just me beingjudgmental, but I do think that
the vast majority of people offaith just don't think about
their faith.
They just this is what Ibelieve and, um, I there's, I'm
(33:24):
not going to question it like,I'm not going to spend any time
thinking about it.
I'm just going to live my lifeand go right through it and
they're, and they're absolutelyokay with that.
Um, and sometimes I'm veryjealous of that, but I can't I
always have to be thinking aboutsomething, which which brings
me, um, actually to somethingelse.
I wanted to ask you yeah uh, sowe can't.
(33:44):
We might be, we might bedrifting away from our original
topic, but it relates, in mymind, to what we're talking
about here I won't tell anyone.
so, uh, when I was at um theconference yeah, the um the
moderator she was setting up aquestion that she was going to
ask about beliefs and, um, shemade the statement that beliefs
(34:08):
are not something you choose.
And so when I had myopportunity to talk, I pushed
back against that Um because I,she, could pay.
She said she made thecomparison.
And I could be wrong on this,um, but the way I remember it is
, she made the comparison tolike your eye color.
(34:30):
That, um, it's just, it's justsomething that you have and
there's nothing you do about it.
But then the example she gave Icould have punched holes in it,
but that wasn't what thequestion was about.
She said she believes ice creamis good and even if she is
given all the evidence thatthere's too much sugar in it,
(34:55):
even if she's lactose intolerant, whatever the case may be, she
still believes that ice cream isgood.
Be, she still believes that icecream is good.
So what are your thoughts?
Are beliefs something that youchoose, or is it both?
Because I'm coming along with Ithink.
(35:15):
Maybe at first you inherit them, but you can choose to jettison
them.
But then we're also gettinginto free will and I know all
that right, so just skip thatfor a moment.
By the way, I did hear backfrom Sam Harris's person and he
basically said if Sam'sinterested, I'll let you know.
Okay.
(35:37):
Which was a nice way of sayingyou need to just drop your
expectations, a little sort ofyeah, that sounds right, that
sounds right, a nice way ofsaying you need to just drop
your expectations, a little sortof yeah, yeah, that sounds.
Right, that sounds right, I'lllook for another quasi-famous
atheist and we'll bring them on.
Okay, that sounds good, yeahall right, so go ahead.
Speaker 3 (35:52):
Uh, actually there's a guy in okay, um, so I would
generally well okay, the thedebater in me is coming out and
I want the terms defined first,but I think I know what she
means and I think that generallyI would agree with her.
I think that her example's bad,but if it's the ice cream
(36:14):
example, I think that's not thebest example.
Speaker 5 (36:19):
But Because I would say ice cream is a preference,
not a belief.
Well, okay.
Speaker 3 (36:26):
So I think that I agree with her in at a, at a
baseline level.
I don't think that you can, um,that you can.
How do I say, see, this is theproblem with it.
I think the better way is tothink about, to walk through the
(36:51):
scenario where you would quoteunquote jettison a belief.
Okay, because I grew up in mychurch with pastors saying it's
not okay for you to just believein Jesus because grandma and
grandpa believed in Jesus.
Right, that's not okay, it hasto be yours, you have to choose
(37:13):
it right.
And so there was some idea that,yeah, you get taught from an
early age certain things and youjust accept it.
Children accept what they'represented with and then you kind
of put it away in the back ofyour mind.
You don't access it and in someways it's not accessible in a
(37:37):
conscious way.
There are certain things thatthere's layers that are not
accessible consciously.
They're always there butthey're not available to you to
pick apart.
But there was also thisunderstanding that you're going
to get to some age and at thatage, whether it's in junior high
(38:02):
, that was a big thing.
Junior high is the time whenyou're going to choose this for
yourself or not.
You need to make the choice foryourself.
You need to sit down and reallyit has to be up here.
You've got to think about ityourself.
And so I think there is thisunderstanding of what you're
talking about, that you can havethe beliefs that are given to
(38:22):
you and then you can jettisonthem.
But what I would say is thereason I would challenge that is
, I would go through.
What would that mean?
I sit down and I go.
I'm just going to give anexample.
My church wasn't really big onum roles of men and women.
(38:44):
You know there were.
There were like um, uh, therewere.
There were definitely uh,parishioners who um had ideas
about, you know, women beingsubmissive to their husbands and
that kind of thing.
But it wasn't really somethingthat was taught proactively,
(39:05):
right, but let's use that as anexample.
So you grow up in a churchwhere it's taught women are to
be submissive to men or to theirhusbands, right.
And then maybe you get intocollege and you haven't really
thought about it, and so nowyou're sitting down and you're
thinking about it Somebody'sbrought that up, right and
(39:27):
you're going to sit down andyou're going to think about this
.
I don't know, I don't really.
I see the verses that they'reusing, see the passages.
But then I've been told fromthese professors or these other
leaders over here that there'sthese other passages that
indicate something else.
There's this theology, I don'tknow.
Well, I really feel like theright way to view this is mutual
(39:54):
submission, and now I have kindof a framework of a theology
and these passages that I canpoint to and I have a background
(40:15):
of literature that's beenwritten on this and, yeah, that
seems right.
And so now I've jettisoned thisidea that I had about wives
being submissive to theirhusbands and now I have this
idea of mutual submission.
And I'm using this becausemutual submission, that was a
theology in the Church of God,anderson, that we grew up in.
(40:35):
But what I would ask is what wasit really that made the mutual
submission idea seem right toyou?
What was it instead of thewives submit to your husband
idea right?
What I'm saying is it seems tome like, yes, your viewpoints
(41:00):
can change to me, like, yes,your viewpoints can change.
Certainly, I have examples inmy life where I have held a view
and felt confident of it andnow I hold a different view.
But I would question whether Icould have and I'm trying really
(41:24):
hard not to get into free willbut if that was something I
could have chosen or if it wassome process by which my belief
wasn't chosen.
I didn't choose my belief tobegin with and I didn't really
choose this one over here.
It's just that this seemed this, this first belief doesn't seem
(41:47):
right to me, you know, andmaybe I come up with a new
theology or maybe I justjettison the whole thing and I
just say I don't really care, Ijust can't, I can't get beyond,
you know, I can't get behindthat concept anymore.
So that's where I would say Ithink I agree with her, because
(42:29):
I do think that everyone'sconcept of morality comes from a
priori positions that just seemright.
They, they seem rightfundamentally first, and it's
not, it's not because of like alogical progression, you know,
all right.
So that's my thoughts.
Sorry, I rambled a little bitno, so I'm okay.
Speaker 5 (42:40):
So are you suggesting that we could actually have
been talking about two differenttypes of beliefs?
Like is there okay, is therelike a um?
Are there sort of like these,uh, unacknowledged fundamental
beliefs at the core of a personand then from that secondary and
(43:07):
tertiary beliefs are shaped?
Speaker 3 (43:12):
I do think that that's a pretty good way of
modeling it.
I don't know that, those onesthat you would consider like the
primary or fundamental ones, Idon't know that those are like
set.
I think those could change also, but I don't know that I would
have that.
I don't know from where I couldstand to make myself change
(43:37):
those.
Does that make sense?
Speaker 5 (43:40):
like I don't know where I could get to outside of
right, because I'm even thinkingthat, that there's a, there's a
level of awareness that may noteven exist on that level yeah,
exactly yeah.
Speaker 3 (43:51):
Tell me, tell me, why go ahead.
Speaker 5 (43:54):
Yeah, no, I was gonna say because I'm sure, go ahead.
Yeah, no, I was going to saybecause I'm sure that there are
beliefs that I hold that I'venever even thought to question
because I'm not even like.
They're just so fundamental towho I am that like I can't even
imagine who I would be withoutthem.
Yeah and so, but I'm not evenaware of them.
(44:16):
Yeah, absolutely, if that makesany sense.
Speaker 3 (44:20):
I truly believe the less aware you are of them, the
more they control you.
And when I say control, thatsounds prejudicial.
Speaker 5 (44:26):
No, no, no.
The more they make you who youare.
Yeah, absolutely no, I get whatyou're saying.
Speaker 3 (44:31):
This is something that I think this happens in
cultures too.
In civilizations it is thethings that how do I put this?
One of the things that DarylCooper had talked about in his
(44:52):
Human Sacrifice and Cannibalismseries was that if you have to
make a rule about it in thecivilization, it's not as
fundamental as the things youdon't have to make a rule about.
The things that you don't haveto make a rule about.
They've already been acceptedeons ago and they're accepted
now in a way that nobody evenknows that they're accepted.
(45:15):
It's just obvious.
Well this is another conceptthat is built on so many other
layers of concepts that you haveto call that.
(45:42):
A civilization has to get tofirst.
You have to you, first of allyou, you have to uh, get the
idea of, um, uh.
Well, I mean, first you have toget the idea of what's a human
right.
What is that I mean?
Before you can talk, get theidea of what's a human right,
what is that I mean?
Before you can talk aboutuniversal human rights, what is
a human right?
You have to come up with aconcept of what's a human it's.
(46:06):
It's not obvious to an alien,it wouldn't necessarily be
obvious to an alien thateveryone that we say are the
same thing are the same thing.
Now, I do think that, and weall think that, we don't even
have to think about it.
We all think that that we'reall the same, right, we're all
part of the human race, allright.
(46:28):
I like what you did aboutbringing us back to the alien
thing.
Speaker 5 (46:31):
Yeah, that was good, because here's the thing.
So if, if, all of a sudden, wehad the, um, uh, close encounter
of the, uh, what was it?
close encounter of the thirdremember that movie, yeah or et,
whatever, um, is it at thatmoment that some of the
(46:56):
fundamental beliefs that maybewe're not even aware of are the
things that become challenged,and and it's so and like, and
for us to sit here and talkabout, like, well, I don't think
my beliefs would change, or itwouldn't be that much for me, um
, that we, we might not even beaware of how it would change us.
Speaker 3 (47:17):
Yeah, oh, absolutely.
I think that that I.
I that's where I, that's why Ihesitated when I said, well, it
wouldn't change my worldview.
And then I stopped and I said,well, that's absolutely not true
.
It it would.
It would shake my worldview tomy core in some ways, and I
think you're totally right, itwould be in ways that I wouldn't
be able to predict.
(47:38):
Well, here's something, okay.
So, going back to that thingthat I was just saying about, we
assume all humans are the same,okay, and we talk about
universal human rights, okay, uh, now we have an.
Now we have this other lifeform, this, this alien.
Do they deserve universal?
Oh, look, we ran into a problembecause we're talking about
(48:01):
universal human rights.
See, we have an exclusion.
We feel that we have reachedthe pinnacle of universality, if
we can say every human deservesexactly the same rights, no
matter what.
We have reached the pinnacle.
Oh, except if you now have a newlife form that comes in, let's
(48:23):
say they look exactly like us,they speak like us, they have
the same types of languages.
It's not going to be the samelanguage, but it's the same kind
of vocal inflections thatcauses the same types of
languages.
Okay, they're carbon based.
They need water.
They're more advanced intechnology, yes, but just
(48:45):
slightly Okay.
They were able to figure outsomething that allowed them to
travel across the stars to getto us.
I don't know, make it up inyour mind, but they're just like
us in that sense no-transcript.
Speaker 5 (49:39):
Can't even agree as humans what a human is and what,
what human rights are like.
Like if you ask people what,what is?
What is something that everyhuman should have the right to?
Sure we would like we disagreeon that.
(50:12):
Yeah, to someone from adifferent planet, and especially
, I mean we can't even extendrights to people from different
states and countries Like forget, forget, but I can imagine.
Speaker 3 (50:25):
I can imagine this encounter happening and then,
after unbelievable amounts ofturmoil, okay, and destruction
and death and whatever,independence day where the
president gets in a jet yeah andhe attacks, yeah, that's right
but but I mean, and I'm talkingmaybe hundreds of thousands of
(50:51):
years of this okay, betweenthese two humans and, and, uh
you know, alien humans, whateverthey are, um, that, whatever
comes on the other side of allof that, would have a concept of
(51:13):
all of them being the same the,the alien humans, the humans,
whatever you know, mixinghappens.
And you know I was gonna say,especially if you have a romeo
and juliet situation well,that's just if there's two right
don't let's.
Speaker 5 (51:33):
Yeah, all right.
So where have we landed?
What kind of common ground dowe have on this particular topic
?
Speaker 3 (51:42):
Well, you, I mean, how do you feel about my
assertion that you really can'tchoose your beliefs?
Speaker 5 (51:54):
I can accept that, if we acknowledge the fact that
there are different categoriesof belief, like I talked about,
the basic, unidentified corebelief and then also sort of a
secondary, tertiary belief,because I think that what we and
(52:19):
don't even get me into goinginto the like there's a
difference between preferenceand belief, too right, but I
think that people can change.
Or maybe there's a differencebetween belief and opinions.
I got to think more about that,because what we might be
(52:40):
calling a belief in my mind, Ican also often interpret or view
as opinion, and what I mean bythat is I have a belief that
there is a God.
I have absolutely zero evidencethat there is, and people can
argue oh, you can see it in thetrees, but you can also
(53:03):
scientifically explain all ofthat too, right.
But I, in my opinion, godexists.
So what I might be calling abelief, is it actually just an
opinion?
Or when someone says that theydon't believe that there is a
(53:27):
God, ultimately I think you gotto just acknowledge the fact
that that's really just anopinion as well, because nobody
can actually prove a lot of thethings that we claim to believe.
But I think that there issomething at the core of us that
is deeper than opinion, and Ido agree that there's probably
some things that at the core,and some of it is shared.
(53:52):
I think that you're absolutelyright that some of it is shared.
I think that you're absolutelyright that some of it is shaped
culturally, because I do thinkthat the beliefs that I might
share and I'm not talking aboutreligious beliefs either, like
I'm talking about maybe humanrights is one of those things
(54:12):
that we're just sort of dabblingaround.
A belief, do you know what Imean?
one of those things that we'rejust sort of dabbling around to
believe.
Do you know what I mean?
Because I can't.
You know like, for example, wemay all in the west, at the core
, have a belief that there is asaying like there is something
special about human life, butI'm willing to bet that there
(54:34):
are other cultures that just donot share that we can, mm-hmm
that that believes that thereare some beliefs.
Can we say?
Can we say, oh sorry, I'm sorry.
No, just say that there areprobably some beliefs that I'm
(55:01):
not even able to identify, that,um, I just inherited and I
didn't choose, and I probablywould never choose not to
believe it because I would nevereven know to think about it.
Speaker 3 (55:13):
Yeah, never even know to think about it.
Yeah, can we say that our um,our common ground could be that
we um, that we do not think thatthe discovery of alien life
would eliminate religion orchristianity, but just change it
?
Speaker 5 (55:32):
yeah, absolutely.
I think.
I think that there would besome that would change it.
I some.
They would just roll with itand just assume it already fit
within their belief structure.
Yeah.
But I don't think it would doaway with any, not just
Christianity.
But I don't think Judaismchanges, I don't think Islam
(55:52):
changes, I just think thatreligion is.
Speaker 3 (55:56):
I know that my fellow new atheists fellow they would
not consider me a fellow, thenew atheists that I really liked
the Hitchens and the Dawkins,and them especially Dawkins, he
would disagree with this.
But I do think that religion isat the core of what it means to
be a human.
I think religiosity is at thecore of what it means to be a
(56:16):
human.
I think, uh, religiosity is, isat the core of that.
So so, yeah, I don't think thatwe would cease to be human.
So I mean, I don't think thatwe would cease to be a religious
species excellent, all right,there we go.
Speaker 5 (56:30):
We've settled it perfect, perfect thanks.
Thank you for listening toliving on common ground.
Speaker 1 (56:35):
Please follow Perfect Perfect Thanks.
Thank you for listening toLiving on Common Ground.
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