Sam Harris On Whether Religion Really Does Make Everything Worse | The Good Fight with Yascha Mounk
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- čas přidán 12. 05. 2024
- Sam Harris is a neuroscientist, philosopher, author, and the host of the Making Sense podcast. He rose to prominence as a member of the “Four Horsemen” of New Atheism, which also included Daniel Dennett, Richard Dawkins, and Christopher Hitchens.
In this week’s conversation, Yascha Mounk and Sam Harris discuss the intellectual case for atheism; why both left and right have become more extreme in recent years; and the prospects of a more rational politics in the near future.
TIMESTAMPS
0:00 The main conceit of New Atheism
29:14 Has religion provided society with substantial good?
50:31 Living an examined life, and the effects of untethering religion from society
1:11:20 The problem on the left
Please do listen and spread the word about The Good Fight.
Email: podcast@persuasion.community
Website: www.persuasion.community
Spotify: open.spotify.com/show/3nhfO2X...
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Twitter: @Yascha_Mounk & @joinpersuasion
LinkedIn: Persuasion Community
"In this very day, women in iran are protesting, fighting and in many cases dying to carve out some space of equality for themselves, politically." So proud to be one of those women Sam mentioned. From Tehran, Iran.
... I can not imagine how difficult that fight is and how long you have to persevere with it ... best of luck to you and all like-minded women ...
You women give others hope everywhere. You are wonderful and brave. ❤ from California.
@@oldskeptic1513❤
😂😂
Good luck and I'm sorry. From new york
I just watched Nathan Lents talking on William Lane Craig podcast on how he sees no contradiction in "reconciling" science and religion.
Hard to repeat but I agree with Aaron Ra that hard as it may be to believe it's only without God that we can have both Reason and Morality:
In general Christianity supresses scientific and rational thinking, but when it comes to moral things that it's supposed to defend from ethic blind science it fails and gets out of "sciences" way trying to reconcile its doctrines and not caring about anything else than consolidating its community in its outdated believes.
Catholicism banned Darwin until 1950s and Protestants still ban, but Christianity in Germany (and in Japan)backed Hitler!
Religious People screamed in horror when Noble He Jiankui did perfect Germ Line Crispr to protect two pretty babies from HIV.
czcams.com/video/jXYH9xdrhGU/video.html
At the same time religious people who scoufled He Jiankuis chance of Humanity progress have nothing to say against unlimited stem cell technologies like brain organoids which are already conscious!
Religion just fails both scientifically and ethically caring instead about "Reconciling Doctrines with Science"
Ridiculous!
I tried for many years to find my place with God and religion. I studied world religions at a university and took courses on Christianity. What I read didn't make sense to me. I found myself being critical and saying out loud "this is bullshit". I later found Sam's book "The End of Faith". Read it twice. Sam does make sense to me and I love to hear what he has to say. Nice interview.
Try to make a place in your heart for God, God is a Spirit who needs a body and a mind to express itself.
@@denniscanales4780 Really? You know that god exists, what he is, and what he needs? How? You are doing what all religious people are doing: assert things without providing a hint of proof. Because you don't have any, of course. If a god existed, he could make everyone believe in him instantly. He wouldn't need people to convince other people that he exists. That idea alone is laughable.
.. me, I was raised a Muslim, living in a Muslim community; but I had trouble since I was 5 years old in making sense of the claims made in Islam, the claims which I was supposed to believe in as the truth wholeheartedly .. how can I wholeheartedly believe in something that doesn't even make sense? I first thought that the elders must have misunderstood the teachings .. but no, they haven't. Islam couldn't be true .. one has to be irrational to believe in irrational ideas.
Basically the same thing for me. In the process of trying to be a better Christian, I finally found out this is a whole pile of nonsense.
Really? Look, I have been an atheist all of my 55 years but I never found Harris to be all that convincing of anything, and 'The End of Faith' is a cluster f#ck of caricature after caricature of what religious people actually do believe and practice.
Sam Harris is articulate, eloquent and most of all uses reason and common sense! Love him!
For sure! Like the time he said having dead babies in the basement is better than anything Trump related. His hatred of Trump is almost like a religion to him. Sam is a true source of reason and wisdom
"In an interview with John Wood Jr Sam Harris claims that "in some sense, we were unlucky" that COVID-19 didn't kill children rather than the elderly because that would have reduced the prevalence of vaccine skepticism."
@@notanemoprog He's a pig
Trump has the near magical ability to conjure pure hatred and moments of aggravation,.. even from people that have the ability to think.Tends to happen when someone constantly and consistently insults the core of basic humanity and intelligence. And you witness the masses following it.Hatred is justified.
Except for vaccine critique or when it comes to Trump or critiqing Judaism😂
I’m only 20 minutes in and this is already one of the best interviews of Harris I’ve heard in years. It’s great when an interviewer can get him to dig a little bit deeper and go beyond the neatly chunked and pre-articulated arguments that he has laid out so many times before. Those arguments strike me as completely correct and rhetorically effective, but I’ve heard them so many times so it’s awesome to hear Harris closer to the edge of what he is completely certain about and able to articulate.
I agree that Mounk was able to ask Harris questions that go beyond his "neatly chunked and pre-articulated arguments", but I felt that Harris was not willing or able to go to those destinations, like when Mounk asked if it was genuinely possible that humanity rises to the secular moment and does not simply get deluded by non-theistic dogmatic faiths (like wokeism on the Left or Q-Anonism on the Right) and Harris spen the next 5 minutes talking about how the moral coding of "homosexual = bad" was wrong. It surprised me just how unwilling to escape his typical prism Harris was here.
@@oremfrienit’s like he rises and rises and rises and then *bam* reverts to New Atheism soundbite Sam at the worst times.
For example, the problem of how to have meaningful social interaction is a true problem. He could’ve said “right diagnosis, wrong solution” to go back to religious modes of existence. Instead he made a silly argument about Santa Claus.
Sam says the stuff I’m thinking but can’t express. I like that he’s never rude and speaks calmly. It’s like the sound of gentle breeze rustling leaves in a forest. So natural and real.
He wants to nuke Iran lmao
@Norse Mythology wow. Send me a link. I’ve watched him stay pretty calm. For example when debating Depak Chopra
Sam usually stays reasonably calm, even many years ago. He might be a little too quick to interpret people who disagree with him as bad faith actors but he deals with a lot of criticism and a lot of it is unfair accusations, so I think overall he handles it well.
Sam Harris: “The Hunter Biden laptop story was correctly sweeped under the rug by Democrats. Trump is so dangerous that I could care less if Hunter Biden or Joe Biden had the bodies of dead children in their basement.” Incredibly moral comments from an atheist. Atheists always end up grasping at dangerous dogma because they could care less about anything but themselves and appearing virtuous.
@@Lorenzo1972. Please provide a source for this. When I’ve heard Sam say this or I’ve seen it quoted he made a point to separate Hunter from Joe, so I’m surprised to see the “or Joe Biden” in this quote. Also the saying is “I couldn’t care less” and Sam is pretty careful with words so this makes me think that whoever transcribed the quote either wasn’t careful or perhaps was willfully inaccurate, so your source may have misled you. Or maybe I’ll be surprised. Anyway, please provide the source…I couldn’t find this exact quote. Thanks.
Epic clarity with deep and full answers! Sam Harris is a vital antidote to the poison of our human frailty! Very clear and well formed questions! More please !
Yascha unfortunately falls into the what if fallacy. That is not an argument you can use to dismiss the actual misery visited upon the earth by religious zeal that did happen. Conjecturing what if religion had not existed is a pointless exercise.
Harris is brilliant. I've been impressed with his analysis of religion since starting to read his books so many years ago. He would be my number one if not for Christopher Hitchens.
Stupid people like stupidity. Good for you. Just laugh!
Same.
Richard Dawkins is Great and brilliant too. I read all his books long time ago.
I love his choice of words, it has been years since I got to know Sam and haven't had anything that I disagree with.
Religion says”pay no attention to the man behind the curtain “ while science pulls the curtain back.
care explaining?
I have always loved the Wizard Of Oz analogy. Probably because at the age of 6, I saw the movie and was fascinated by the story. A few years later, I could see the same confusions, manipulations and "make-believe" magic in the churches and intuitively knew that it all did not make any sense. I was about 8 years old. Once I decided that I was interested in knowing the truth of everything and actively studied everything I could, I knew I was an atheist.
@@lunarlight3131 It's not all that complicated mon ami. The first 15min of this interview deals with that aspect of religion e.g. miracles and a benevolent god. As time goes on and our understanding of how the universe works (aka science) those things that were once attributed to divine intervention can be explained by science. For instance, diseases that were once considered as punishment from a god, e.g. the bubonic plague and small pox, turned out to be caused by viruses or bacterial infections and poor hygiene.
Reading about quantum physics puts some of the "magic" back I think.
@@UserName_no1 in other words now we know how the God's punishment work🤣 nothing really changed
Sam Harris is the voice of reason.
How can we trust the left if they're so willing to lie about these things? What else are they lying about??
He used to be. SH is as unhinged as the people he feels rage towards. What a fall he has taken.
@@bassandtrebleclef It is one of the most extraordinary and shocking falls I have witnessed. I never worshipped him but I certainly thought very high of his words.
@@bassandtrebleclef Haha! Trying to imagine Harris in a state of rage. A hastily launched false equivalence there, should rightly be seen as a lack of an argument by those familiar with Sam's body of work.
@@bassandtrebleclef what about him is unhinged?
Can't get enough of good logic and good sense.
I hope you know by now that the answer to end covid is for the thieving ministers to return the money.
Anybody collecting money for ministering in any way and anybody saying that same sex marriage is a sin when it is not is now blacked out from the holy Spirit and will be until they repent and return the money and accept truth or they wait too late and die with the wicked. The Great Tribulation begins September 1st. I am Elijah of Malachi 4:5-6.
Sadly a rare thing
Sam Harris went on the Triggernomenty podcast and said it's rational to overthrow a democratically held election to keep Donald Trump from being President again. Reason and Rationality is how you get every secular dictator in the last 120 years. SO REASONABLE
Aka can't get enough of feeling superior (no shade tho bc I also love this kinda content)
We need more lockdowns and mandated vaccinations to make logic for academics great again.
Nice.
I can’t imagine how human civilization would have done without religion but man, I’d sure loved to find out.
Look at the Soviet union, genocidal maniacs thats what you would have gotten
Or shitholes in backwater Africa there is another example
I grew up in a mostly secular household with an undercurrent of Catholicism. So i was exposed to both the option not to be religious and the opportunity to see Christian religion up close. There was always the possibility, in my mind, that i could go either way. The selection against religion wasn't because i was aware of atheism so much as it was because i rejected religious mythology and the way that religious people conducted themselves.
Relying on how people conduct themselves to inform your analysis of whether what they are saying is true is a logical fallacy.
@Krzysztof Grabka - the OP doesn't say that they concluded what religious people were saying "wasn't true". They're not presenting a structured logical argument, therefore there's no fallacy.
I was adopted.
The emotional, mental, physical and verbal abuse started on the first day.
I was forced/ required to participate in their religion.
I wasn't allowed to object or opt out.
@@grabka1984
How do you figure?
Harris is the goat
Really? You're easily impressed.
@@grosbeak6130 Sam Harris is good at reconstructing an argument and looking at it from a different viewpoint. He's also genuinely funny when he's being candid
He's quick with it and good at coming up with funny retorts on the spot
@@kevincloar2443 you sound like a true fan boy.
@@grosbeak6130 well people are allowed to like stuff. You seem butt hurt
Why are you giving Kevin crap? S.H. has his share of blind spots, but generally has good content on most topics.
To claim to 'Believe' in any religion can take barely a second of thought. To study nature, science, tto think critically and rationally fills up a whole lifetime.
I love Sam’s generosity of time . His clarity of thought ability to articulate it but also reference it to common sense and relatable other analogies ! He is always so refreshing !!!
It is so sad seeing the lack of views or interest to an intelligent person lik Sam Harris. He is probably one of the smartest people living today on Earth, yet you see woke channels on one hand gaining millions of views, and people like Andrew tate on the other side all over the internet. I was surprised to see that Sam appeared on a podcast but it’s barely visible and suddenly popped onto my feed. Nonetheless it’s refreshing to see him talks about religion .. a subject he got famous for but shifted away from.
Hahaha....ask the trigger nometry guys....he is pathetic
@@oncho1960 even though I don’t agree with him on that point.. he is a person who is levels ahead intellectually.. than conservatives could ever produce
@Ahuramazda I used to be a fan too.... no more....he revealed himself to be a tyrant
@@oncho1960 bruh, you don’t to need to agree on everything, that would be boring actually. I’m a big lefty liberal and I sometimes enjoy watching people like ben shapiro, corwder, and stuff..
HAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAH
I grew up in Fundamentalist Christianity slathered mentally in dogma and hellfire and damnation. I left that faith but family members still cling to that religious environment. One thing I have discovered is that in the case of my childhood family I believe staying in that faith is a sort of Tribal Identity. And due to tribalism religion is simply a side effect that serves to support and reinforce tribalism. My family members view Heaven almost like a private club where everyone feels safe leaning back in their chairs and discussing detailed Bible scripture while Christ often sweeps through the rooms clasping their believing and faithful shoulders.
I agree, some people just need that crutch, hopefully in the future many more won’t.
I never understood what community people get from religion. I was brought up in a very religious family - church weekly, bible school, summer camps etc but had a greater sense of community through my family, school friends and parents, scouts, sports teams etc where I developed much stronger meaningful relationships. I'm sure other people have had diffetent stronger supportive religious upbringing, but I don't that's a common experience in the UK - maybe more of a US experience? Surely there is a wider issue of dissolution of all social community opportunities that are beneficial for our wellbeing?
Reading The Delusions of Crowds. We have the highest percentage of believers in the more developed nations.
What a beautiful, considerate, honest examination of incredibly topical points. So happy the algorithm lead me here, thank you for your work!
It can be incredibly difficult to be standing in front of a person who appears to be an intelligent and rational person and then find out they are a god-fearing bible thumper. These folks hold important positions in our community such as police chief, mayor, doctor, lawyer, teacher etc. This is terrifying to me.
What's the issue with that?
@@bundo1591 Beliefs inform actions. If my doctor's judgment about my own or my family's medical condition was influenced in any way by any religious conviction or doctrine I would be concerned.
@@bundo1591 because if you can believe ridiculous claims without evidence and think that the immoral things that ideology supports is acceptable because god said so and you hold position of power it is concerning.
Whereas if you use reason, evidence, free inquiry and skepticism in arriving at the things you accept we are in a better position.
Wakey wakey
@@colinross3755 ohhh I thought for a second you were arguing in favor of religion, no I agree with you
On being an atheist in today’s world:
“You witness to your horror, that we’re living in a world that is shattered over competing claims of literature”…
This realization was awful for me too. It’s the puzzle of my remaining years…how to spread the truth of critical thinking and the scientific method to as many people as I can, before some frenzied evangelical dotard runs me down with his Ford F350…
Don't worry about the F350 hillbilly straw man caricature in your mind. Worry about the very real people in the WEF co-opting.your government and making you a serf, or killing you for depopulation purposes. Oh, they're atheists and transhumanists by the way. You've got a lot to learn.
My baby drives a Chevy Duramax dually and she is an Agnostic. They don't all fit into a mold. :)
Ok, in my experience as an atheist, i have met both "good" and "bad" atheists. So atheism isn't a guarantee of a good life or benign intent. I have seen, for instance, racist atheists. The loss of religion wouldn't end things like tribalism, intolerance, greed or bad intent (evil). Religion wasn't holding those at bey to begin with. But the end of religion (were it possible) would provide one less system for the people who practice those negative attributes to weaponize.
It’s funny evangelical magas have no concern whether their stance is co-opted by WS to do evil. Until their complicity is owned by them, the weaker minded will be used for murder of vulnerable minority groups.
Incorrect. Secular/atheistic materialism forms its own religions. Marxism/critical theory is the scripture of of such religious movements, for example. The woke are zealots with their own creed; heresy hunting and looking for witches to burn. We will never be rid of it because the urge to believe in something greater than ourselves that we can give ourselves over to is inherent to humanity, and there will always be those that give in to whatever construct in an all encompassing, uncompromising, unfalsifiable/ends justify the means manner. Whether it's YHVH and the Holy Scriptures, or The Party, The Leader and the Theory, there will always be something else.
The host brings up a good point, Humans will Human, Violence is not a religious problem it is a human one. The last 100 years proves that you don't need religion to murder 300 million people.
The idea that you can get a group of humans to passively become more peaceful is just strange. It requires effort and not just right think to be a good person and to overcome the base human condition.
When the statement "Religion causes all wars" was popular, my reply was always: Name 10 religious wars.
We evolved a need for social belief systems, and for narritives these have both positive and negative effects.
I would like to know how we remove something we evolved to need?
Love Sam Harris! Thank You !!!
He is a special kind of person....don't be deceived....he is a tyrant
I hope Sam lives many many more healthy years. Hitchens was thrilling on contemporary topics but gone too soon. Meditation is the next venture I've only just dipped my toes into. I believe Sam when he says there's a "there" there when it comes to meditation because the opposite of it is a picture that is vividly painted by him and experienced by myself daily. That, and I've experienced glimpses of what he teaches, if only for fleeting moments.
Meditation is your brain on home made drugs. Nothing to see there. It's much easier and far more effective to take some magic mushroom or amphetamines.
I am a 56 year old Atheist. With that said I read, study the Bible because it’s so foundational to Western Literature.
Sam Harris is soooo right !!! I love to listen to him. I remember how frightened I was when I was a child thinking about the end of the world that (according to my parents), the sky will open up and god will appear to judge every human being, sending a lot of people to hell and the good ones were supposed to go to heaven. But when I was about 12 y/o, I started to doubt all that nonsense and have my own criteria, although I never told my parents that I did not believe all those stories. (that would be a blasphemy, according to them, but I could not wait to leave my house and I never, ever, asked any questions about it.
I wish I could live long enough to see society once religious people are no longer the majority. It may be a long way off, but it is coming (assuming we don't blow ourselves up or something first, which is definitely on the cards)
Very interesting and worthwhile video. A must see video for everyone.
At least anyone with an open mind.
I think when we make decisions our brain "computes", "weighs", "examines" and "analyzes" data in a way that includes unconscious processes. That is why I put it in quotation marks. Certain things we do is unconscious, often because we have unexamined prejudices, we have past experiences that are outdated, we sign meaning to things more than the current situation calls for etc. (This is the part of thinking when we kind of let things drive us and we lose "free will"). When we "dial down" our brain waves, more components will have their place in our decision making. Dialing down ones that we unconsciously signed more importance too is important. (Sorry if I am being painfully obvious, and there is nothing new)
An illustration: You have a map. The capitol city is your decision, your destination. From every city, town and village you can get to the capitol. If you have a speed limit of 80 mile/hour, at 4pm you will have only people arriving (information you are collecting) from the big cities closer to the center and to the highways. You will never meet the one from off the main track or farther from the capitol. But it doesn't mean that that information/person has no value. It maybe actually would change your decision in a meaningful way. When you dial down the speed limit to 30 mile/hour and you have the meeting at 5pm, you have more info in. I used to choose a question I was considering or I wanted to make sure that my decisions were based on enough information. When I set down to meditate, I thought about it, just a little. Then I didn't think at all about that particular question. Only did the "calming down my body, mind, thoughts". The question was nowhere in my thinking. When the time was up, "I"/ my mind/ my own thoughts were coming back to their "regular" "speed". Often I had some kind of answer or understanding to that question that I had before I set down.
I don't think living in an "existence of 30 mile/hour" is the answer. There are reasons why we have different speeds through out the day. But it is helpful to visit, useful as a tool and free will have a chance to partially be present. Partially. How much hiding is there, that is a psychological gym that our ego has to be committed too.
Unfortunately I don't meditate as I use to. My map is bombed by Russians and certain cities and towns are obliterated. My ego lost her limbs and I am not sure if she is salvageable. You need a healthy ego to be able to have sound, healthy, reasonable decisions.
(I am spiritual. It doesn't matter for me how we call it, but I favor not to use names others push on me. It can be God, Allah, Universe, Gaia etc. If there is this power that people attached different names too, one thing is for sure s/he will not care which one you are using. But s/he will definitely care if you used the name or book to hurt, abuse, kill others. I think there is a reason what religion, where and while emerged. But for sure: hate, abuse of power or ignorance were not part of "devine will")
Also, I think the right hemisphere weights in the decision more if we slow down.
Murdering over 150,000 native American Children because they refused to become christians was free will instigated bye the racist doctrine of christianity,
Or how about this , make up an excuse for religion over this,
My peoples first contact with christianity after 65,000 years with any middle eastern type god, religion had no place in the day to day business of Australian aboriginals until this day.
In 1788 when white genocidal christians landed in Australia, They where horrified that woman in Aboriginal society had equal standing with men, they where included in all civil matters including law, These white christians then started killing whole Aboriginal communities, Men woman children new born`s because my people refused to deny the rights of woman who had had those rights for over 65,000 years.
Belief in god is a disease and should be treated just like the black plague.
One problem with the argument "religion makes everything worse" is that it makes no distinctions between religions and no distinctions between religious sects.
But nearly everyone agrees that suicide cults are bad. And you'd have to work extremely hard to find any harm that comes from Shinto.
So the problem doesn't come from religion in general. I think it's a number of factors which can be present in different ways and at different levels in religions.
How much is it a "high control group" (read:cult or cult-like).
How much does it proselytize?
Is it an organized religion and do the organizations have any history of seeking political power?
Is it a religion that primarily emphasuzes ritual and/or community belonging or does it emphasize dogmatic beliefs?
Do the rituals invoice harm to oneself or others?
Does the community belonging aspect involve demonization of out-groups?
Are the beliefs incompatible with a rational-scientific worldview?
I hate it when a person is interviewed after a tragedy that they alone survived and they say thank God He was looking out for me! Makes me cringe! How about the others who didnt make it? God didnt give a shit about them?🤔
Yes, this is one of those fallacies that helped me early on to question belief in a personal God that intervened in our lives to help. It is so arrogant. I remember hearing Tammie (the wife of that nut Jim Baker who served time) said the lord had punished her dog for pissing on her drapes! lol That was an eye opener that I brought forward into all scenarios where we/I wanted to think that God had intervened personally. I still want to believe this, but I know better than to really believe it.
Its a phrase people say, when you sneeze people say bless yiu
If that stirs hatred inside of you it kinda nullifies the fact that hate comes from religion right?
Finally, someone asking SH the proper questions - I mean really fundamental ones - but almost never posed to Sam. Liked and Subscribed.
Is it possible to get a transcript of this?
Great discussion, thank you both!
Great discussion appreciate Sam going onto others platforms to discuss his views
I can see why they confuse Sam with Ben Stiller, he does have a comedic sense.
I say that admiringly.
Stiller is gonna play Harris one day. Denis Leary is also gonna play Jon Gruden.
Confucianism is an example of an ancient ideology that helped to build and maintain social harmony,
without having to appeal to the "supernatural".
In fact, Confucius himself advised:
"the sage will not discuss weird powers or random spirits" (子不语怪力乱神）
"respect the ghosts and spirits but stay distant from them" (敬鬼神而远之)
In other words, humans can and should take care of themselves
and not rely on unseen powers.
A later Confucian sage, Mencius, pointed out the natural basis of human morality:
The fact that you feel bad when a fellow creature suffers, is the reason why you can be a moral human being.
(I forgot the exact quote for this)
Mencius lived 3400 years ago.
So for millennia, there are already influential people who know, teach, and make happen,
the kind of "better alternative to religion" being discussed in the initial part of the video.
Mounk's remark that he finds it hard to imagine that alternative in the earlier history of mankind
is perhaps due to his limited knowledge of world history,
i.e. he's only familiar with the history of the West, in which it seems that every social development has been entangled with religion until modern times.
Wish Sam would have talked about what he said in his "The Paradox Of Death" episode. Definitely something that would be cool to hear a more in-depth conversation about.
As long as there are people willing to believe in Magical Thinking, we will have to put up with religious zealots in this country! 😢
If you think religious people are the problem, you've totally lost the plot. Unless of course people like Klaus Schwab worship something other than themselves and power.
Pilots who fly dangerously by choice because they believe God will keep them safe... That's a strawman example of the true believers.
By the time I understood that it was okay to accept myself as a homosexual man, it was too late, I had already spent too long learning to despise homosexuality, learning that hating it and hating myself for being gay was the correct christian thing to do.
I now rationally know it was child abuse that Catholic Curch made me believe I was destined to burn in hell for eternity. But, unlearning that self-hatred isn't an easy thing to do after two decades of religious indoctrination. I've been going to therapy for over 10 years, battling clinic depression and anxiety disorder, learning how to observe my suicidality tendencies from a distance, as just one more symptom, reminding myself everyday that I don't deserve to end my life.
I want to give a hug to my past self and tell him he is allowed to live and to love himself, that I love him, that he did his best, that he is my hero.
A form of “grooming” did this. “It is easier to build strong children than repair broken men.” Frederick Douglas
Intellectual topics require knowledge, interest and often courage to present. These YouTuble presentations can be very interesting to take in and important to digest.
Some of this discussion seems based on the assumption that America is a viable empire that is at a turning point. Which, I would guess, was a debate that went on right up to the day Odovacar became king of the Roman Empire. America was founded as a Republic, not a democracy. It has never been a democracy and, more importantly, can not be a democracy under the constraints imposed by the Constitution. That is one reason why our political policies do not reflect the opinions of the majority. The majority does not matter. The anti-democratic structure of the Senate, gerrymandering in the House, the Electoral College (which gave us both Bush II and Trump) and a Supreme Court appointed for life by those same anti-democracy institutions, are all that matter. Democracy is not salvageable in America because we have never been a democracy. Nor will we ever be. Moreover, any political system so flawed as to allow a Trump like character into the highest office in the land is a system already too flawed to salvage. What we should be debating is how to live and evolve as honest and honorable human beings while living in a failing empire on the edge of being tossed into the dustbin of history. That would be an interesting debate. (Though I have to admit I enjoyed this one as well. Mr. Harris is one of my favorite commenters.)
Define republic without the description of democracy
Democracy is just using a vote determine majority decision whether that majority occurs through elected representatives or from direct vote of the whole population is inconsequential to your point.
I love it when he talks on this subject.
As for diminishing conflicts, there will always be resources in third-world countries that first-world countries deem to belong to them.
This whole issue about "belief" strikes me as a generally overlooked concept.
A person can literally think they believe something for an entire lifetime, but have they ever really considered their actual knowledge of the subject?
When I was a kid, i thought i believed the things that I said I believed, but as i got older i realized that I have no use for belief.
Aside from what I know.
Of course i believe what I know, but that's kinda redundant really.
I also see what I look at, but there's no point in articulating the seeing with the looking.
I don't think i am even capable of believing something that I don't know, to the best approximation of course.
I might have hallucinated my entire life, but I have no reason to make such an assumption.
As far as I can tell, i actually exist, and if i could "choose" a belief, i would simply choose to believe that everything is perfect forever.
It really seems like people are confident in their ability to choose a belif.
I just don't have that kind of skill.
I've thought about this quite a bit, being raised in a baptist family with Christian schooling and all that. I tried my ass off to get hold of the whole "faith" idea, it just wouldn't take.
I asked myself if i believed everything that these vicious adults were insisting on, and
It occurred to me that I should be honest with myself, so I had to face the fact that I didn't believe any of it.
It was very liberating.
There were some genuinely mean people who were pushing fear and guilt at me with a very excessive approach.
I knew i didn't want to grow up like they were. There was plenty of obviously terrible behavior coming from a good portion of the people who took intrest in my soul.
I don't need to believe anything that I don't know. As far as I can tell.
Why do "believers" even say "i believe!"?
I mean, do you know or not?
If you don't know, how even do you believe?
It's a mystery to me.
Just learn about things. Then you know things. That's more than adequate to grow as an individual in the world.
Right?
The process of either situation: Coming to believe/coming to no longer believe, is so mystical to me. I have found with most of us we can't put a finger on any one moment when this changed happened in real time.
The first sentence out of his mouth,….”the intellectual case for atheism..” like atheism is something WE have to prove.
Some atheists like to imagine they are on a balcony watching an arena full of clowns arguing over which worldview is true. In reality, they're just another clown in the arena.
I love Sam Harris' logic and way of seeing things.
Not sure if I feel the same way about the interviewer (sorry)
What you think is a result of how you think. We need to teach intellectual honesty and integrity. This is such a powerful discussion. When does a parent tell their children that there is no Santa? I think we are in a similar human growth moment. When will humanity be ready to emotionally move beyond this need to believe in a benevolent savior? Kick the crutches away from dependent people and many will not have the self determined strength to stand alone.
I think that people are predisposed in the brain whether one believes or not..just a personal hypothesis
Thank you, Sam, for EXPLAINING this topic and not expressing it in a way that was NOT condescending, arrogant, and disrespectful of those who may disagree and those who are trying to learn and understand the subject!
"Do we get a 60 or 70 year post-doc on becoming a mensch?" -- my new favorite Sam Harris moment.
Thank you for inviting Sam Harris.
“Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools”
Thanks very much!
I feel like even if you changed the book, they would still make shit up based on emotional reasoning
Why do you think people have emotions? are they useless? Maybe they are more important then rational thinking, maybe not, but we have them and they play important role in making decisions, that's what it is.
Sam has so extraordinarily and articulately demonstrated the feelings I've had on religion for a long time. He has such a way with putting things into words.
Hearing Sam talk about meditation turned out to be the most enlightening part of the conversation. That sincerely surprised me. Really enlightening. 😮
"...An autistic god who spins a roulette wheel...". I so love Harris for his ability to take the piss out of religious nonsense, the aforementioned nugget a priceless reward coming after me rolling my eyes when the host pressed Harris after he had already given a thoroughly satisfying answer to the question of whether atheism rules out the possibility of any sort of divine force in the world. Just because it's worth repeating, the answer was basically that though one cannot rule out that possibility, there is no evidence that any of our supposedly sacred books is an authentic and valid representation of said force, nor that said force is particularly moral or benevolent.
No religion? We would probably 1000-years more advanced. LOL. Christianity, like the Standard American Diet (SAD), anything is better. 😊
Sam makes so much sense when he talks about religion.
If only he would maintain this same attitude toward politics, freedom, and choice like in other areas!!
@@mitchpeter5718 He does.
@@TheAlibabatree no he doesn’t!! He’s got a serious case of TDS!! When you’re based, you don’t compromise your philosophical standing because of politics or because you hate Trump or whoever!! Sam has shown that he is lacking….!!
@@mitchpeter5718 No offense, but I’m almost certain it is you who are obsessed and “deranged” about former president Donald Trump. Look at all those exclamation marks.
Calm down, stop pointing fingers at others, and look inwards.
No he doesnt @@TheAlibabatree
Thanks for having Sam on!
I dont think ‘happy’ is the correct word. I believe ‘content’ should b our expected middle or neutral place on the line graph. From there, from being content (which is not happy or unhappy, its just being present) then we can have stimulation that makes us happy or unhappy. If a person is unhappy or sad or worried or nervous all of the time in place of being content, then they would b depressed or in need of mental health help/guidance. At the same time being happy all of the time should b seen as an unrealistic expectation that can cause real harm. Content can also b described as being at peace. U r not worried or nervous or projecting or fearful or regretful, u r content. THAT is a very realistic expectation & then of course we should all see having momentary spikes into different degrees of happiness & momentary dips into varying levels of unhappiness as a normal part of our human experience. Doing so can give us a healthy acceptance of problems & their effect on the human mind/body/mood as well as seeing happiness as a limited experience, something to only expect in moments, as to not b constantly seeking it.
About 37 minutes in Yascha presents Sam with an argument being made that says because the world has become more secular it has created new problems that otherwise wouldn't have happened. Respected people actually make this argument? The example given was that increased secularism has made some percent of people, who otherwise would not have been depressed, depressed. So changes/advances/innovations that create unforeseen problems make the changes themselves bad and therefore must be reversed? Well there goes the automobile, globalization, most technology. Fluoride put alot of dentists out of work, so fluoride must be banned? Apparently the baby does need to get thrown out with the bath water.
Keep up the fight Sam. God knows you're doing a great job!
Please move the camera further away next time. It is very disconcerting to see your slight head movements greatly exaggerated.
Lol... this comment is actually funny
It bothered me too. Also he has difficulty expressing himself and therefore talks too much.
This definitely comes from someone who is only concerned with appearances and not substance.
@@altosack Actually, while I found Harris to be thoughtful and interesting, the other guy was a plonker. The head movement made it worse.
"Atheist" (noun). A made up label given to someone for not believing in something that doesn't exist. Let that sink in.
The last question and the answer was great! Why didn't the interviewer have a comment? nothing at all.. it felt awkward and abrupt to end the way he did, especially as he made it personal by saying he was never interested in meditation.
power to all women fighting for equality
Here's a suggestion; when inviting a highly regarded guest to share their opinions, let them speak more than you speak.
I'm sorry but i'm going to have to see a citation for the premise that believers in Q are less religious than non Q believers. From my perspective here in the USA, Q-ism and Evangelism go hand in hand, just as a casual assessment of the people involved. But i'd be glad to consider otherwise if there's documented evidence.
Religion, in general, tends to call for a suspension of skepticism and an increase in credulity. By it's nature it encourages people to believe without proof, just as would be required for a belief in Q. So the religious are primed to add Q-ism to their already dubious religious beliefs. It's not a substitution, one for the other, it's an addition of yet more unlikely perceptions by people already predisposed to take them on.
Right. You pile on what reinforces.. will the fanatical right OWN their complicity in inspiring mass killers like Aldrich, Rittenhouse, Gendron, et. al.?
Human intention and agency applied to natural phenomena...then organized by complex hierarchical societies for control and cohesion, circa the Neolithic age.
Someone put a bunch of Christmas pamphlets in front of my secretary, but I got her laughing when I pretended it claimed that virgins now have babies 😄
this ploy has been used for time immemorial to avoid being an outcast from society.
I don't meditate. It seems like a waste of consciousness to me. If i'm feeling in that gray area of dissatisfaction or lack of achievement, what lifts me is to make someone else happy. The feeling is contagious. Next time you feel the need to meditate, find someone and make them smile. It works every time.
I think the point is your ability to make people smile is enhanced by meditating.
@@TheJamie1965 Nah, i can do it without that.
Phil, meditation is to know yourself and how we function as people. It's not necessarily a medicine you take to feel good about yourself, although that can be an effect also.
Um. You CAN do both.
Phil is astute. Love is an action verb for him.
It’s a fascinating position for Sam to hold, given his adoption modern “leftism” and his comments/view of the world. Fascinating in the sense that he has been on record (listen to triggenometry interview for one of the more glaring incidents) making statements typically espoused by only religious zealots. The concept of traditional religion shifting into a different more political context has been discussed but does not seem to be main stream yet. The tenants are eerily similar though of its followers - blind faith, with normalization of Machiavellian tactics to achieve the church’s (or political movements) goals. So I just find it interesting that a sort of modern religious zealot is arguing the case against religion but failing to see the possible connection to the two in his own life.
I know Sam as a critic of "Modern Leftism"...when you say he has adopted it, what are you meaning by "modern leftism"? I know he considers himself a liberal, but he's not in agreement with what would be labeled "woke".
@Knowledge and Pleasure he is anything but a liberal.....he is a tyrant....
Rubbish. Give us some examples to back up your assertions.
I think this is a huge misrepresentation of Sam's views, which are really critical of woke, but also unrelenting on republican rabies. It is hard to see anything but red with Trump. The man, as hilarious and charming to some and insufferable and inflammable to others he might me, is a capricious buffon who's very dangerous to put into power. He is riding into battle of culture wars a mish-mash army of people just tired of dishonest pandering and corruption from establishment normies and then regal lunatics of all sorts and sizes. To an outsider Trump is more evident for what he is. Extravagant charismatic showman, sweet and nice on personal level with people he socializes in circles (remember the fondness and compliments he gives to royal family and, francly, anyone he hangs around, even after being harsh in rhetoric towards them), but lacking cunning and understanding that politics is not all huge gestures and personal rapport, but a lot of deception (he got fooled by Pootin weasel), false niceties and cold calculating contracts. If I understand correctly, Trump's leadership is intellectually offensive to people like Sam. And it can be dangerously disruptive
@@LoliLikesPedobear Sam’s biggest problem with Trump (apart from his incompetence and lack of care for democracy) is his relentless, shameless and obvious lying.
Thank God for Sam Harris. 😊
Seriously, he’s the voice of sanity. How do you talk to people who don’t see what he’s saying?
Sanity😂
Ever seen his stance on the vaccine or Trump?
Dude is borderline unhinged
Sam was correct in pointing out that the Supreme Court would look at affirmative action in college admissions and rule that it is reverse racism.
Sam is such a calm, articulate speaker of the truth! What a great show!
"We should be allergic to dogmatism" Well said Harris.
13:21 “An autistic God with a roulette wheel… what are we praying too here.” Lmao Sam delivers again with the comedy.
That line had me crying at work 😂 replayed it a few times
@35:30 (maga = identity religion). I agree with that. I went through a phase of that in the early 90s when Clinton was president, and there was the "Republican Revolution." (Gingrich's "Contract With America"). That period was very similar to the maga. (I personally knew "constitutional militia" members who went to prison. It's funny how history repeats itself.). I considered myself "devout" fundamentalist, origalist, highly-principled Christian, but wasn't part of any denomination, church building. I was "above" that.
I think the consistent theme here is "hubris." An excessive confidence in "I know what's going on, and who's wrong, and who needs to be scapegoated. How could I be wrong? (when I talk the talk of righteousness)?" I think the left does it too, social-justice warring. (Not that there isn't a problem. Just that "identities" can be formed upon the problem. Same hubris. The left's is more practical. The right's more traditional? Flip sides of the same coin (of "profoundly correct").
The left... the right... you clearly have not been able to shed your tribal origins. ;-)
@@schmetterling4477 FWIW: I went through a phase of rabid libertarianism (Ayn Rand perectionism, absolutism, everything's consensual -- coercion is bad). Then, reality set in. I think of it as buddhism's "middle way." Extreme good is as bad as extreme bad ("the road to ---- is paved with good intentiones."). Extremes tend to be the flip side of the same coin. I think our two-party charade of choice lends itself to mad extremes like that. Or, going to the "opt-out" unrealistic extreme I did for awhile. The system is a prisoner's dilemma. (The prisoner's often can't see their own desperation. They really feel like this is real, and they're making a substantial impact by voting for the lessor of two choices which they wouldn't choose under any other condition, with more choices, etc.
So, I think I'm about as far from tribalism as one could be. But, I often surprise myself by how wrong I am too. (I don't know.). I support so-called "instant-runoff" (ranked-choice) ballots which would let us specify our 1st to Nth choices (vote our conscience _and_ "hold our nose."). Allows us to vote _for_ someone (ideals), not _against_ someone by default (the main driver in the two-party monopoly). It's a very logical & simple system that can be easily demonstrated with simple spreadsheet math: 1) The winner needs over 50% of the vote. 2) Discard the lowest vote-getter, count the next choice of anyone who voted for them. 3) Go to #1.
There would be tremendous metrics arising from that kind of plebiscite. We might know that the winner was everyone's _last_ choice (not much of a mandate). Or, the runner up would have been the winner if just 10% of the winner's voters (who voted next choice for the runner up) had voted for the runner up. It would give a multi-dimensional view of what the public wants (more or less). Not this hostage-taking vote we typically do, "winner takes all" and we mostly know what people _DON'T_ want.
I don't think I'm tribal.
entirely a matter of perspective and what you value
I value tolerance, equality and peace. Religion is, by its very nature, intolerant, tribal and violent.
The Bible says that you should love your neighbor like you love yourself, directly translated from Danish. So if people don´t treat me nicely, then I would not have to love those people, or be good to those people, cause I love myself like I love others, which means I should not hate myself either, or put up with cruelty from other people?
We need to find better ways to help the people that come out of religion. It can be very traumatizing to realize there is no heaven. If we were to have a global "awakening" of religious people we will very well be in a global anarchic scenario. One key concept could flip the belief switch on a monumental scale. That would be just as scary to me. The amount of damage caused by this nihilistic realization could very well cause a world of devastation.
I was eight years old when my bullshit detector kicked in. I didn't find the experience traumatizing at all. I simply gave up on Adult Santa two or three years after I had given up on Santa Santa. ;-)
I believe the longer we have entertained this illusion the longer our period of recovery likely will be. Mine was quite long and involved drugs and dealing drugs. I wish I could have magically recovered and become more functional on short order, but I suspect that I needed a time to act out.
Knowledge is based on evidence.
Faith is based on choice.
Discussion with a person who confuses these two motions would have been a waste of time, had the religionists not been so numerous and influential. Democracy give equal votes to all.
Yes , in metaphorical terms religions are in the catagory of remaining among the last of our wishful thinking epistimologies ! If we really want our world and people to progress and work together it would be necessary to living in the reality of what is and evidential and not in the delusion of what is'nt based on our delusional hopes and wishes !
Great questions. And great answers.
The fields of conflict and peace studies and political psychology and likley others are searching for peace between groups.
The "what if religion actually did good things for civilization" argument, while avoiding the question of whether any religion is actually true or not, really boils down to an ends-justify-the-means argument: if humanity is united by a lie, it is better than humanity not being united at all.
That's not even a useful question because Judaism was never a religion that was designed to unite people. Neither was Islam. One can have a discussion about Christianity. I don't think it qualifies, either and neither do most people in the world.
@@schmetterling4477- It's true that uniting people and improving people are two different things; civilization could theoretically be improved by religion without everyone believing the same thing.
Given that all three are supposed to be worshipping the same God, the problematic question in terms of logic is "designed by who?" - if by God, then which religion is correct and, if by people, then is there really a God?
@@Malt454 Judaism was simply a tribal religion. Yahweh was there exclusively for the Jewish people. Jesus exists exclusively for Christians. One can not come to the father other than through Christ. The NT is very clear about that. Allah is even more exclusive. It's either Allah or the highway... which is a literal death threat by Islam.
Other than that all of them are just Nigerian Prince scams, of course. Can somebody get better by being scammed out of money? I don't think so.
I think we might be making the assumption that had the Abrahamian religions not come along that something else wouldn't have taken their place. It seems to me these are the products of human nature. Tribalism and the apparent need to be led by some alpha entity coupled with the desire for personal immortality make something like them appear to be inevitable.
Daniel Dennett - the great Christopher Hitchens - Sam Harris - Richard Dawkins !! What a great era ! I miss the Hitch abd their conversations !! Could we use Hitch now !!
The thing with religion is that it always constructs an enemy as to provide an illusion to followers of superiority. Therefore changing the "books" to promote good things won't work.
I love this intelligent discussion
Take A Moment
The world needs to listen. Revolution is in the air.
I was one of many atheists in our foxholes gods were not needed, it's what we do best.
We were all on the lawn mower.
I won't be here.
I am a 28yrs RAF veteran At 64 I live in a care home and will continue to make the world a better place until I'm dead.
We all die. Don't want to upset anyone...
Stay together, it's all we have
Stay Safe
Stay Free 🌐
So when did you lose your mind? ;-)
This was a good interview in that the host allowed Sam to give a full answer to the questions. Some of the questions were cringe-worthy. Any question that involves an unfalsifiable counterfactual should not see the light of day. There were several of those in this interview.
It is a waste of time to go down that road in my opinion. That might be the best interviewer has going for him. Sam was very patient. More patient than I would have been.
The first 14min of this discussion kinda reveals the underpinning of religion. As the thinking homo sapien evolved the things that couldn't be explained by rudimentary science were attributed to some unexplained force. Thus the birth of religion. Take for instance this scenario. The first homo sapiens have no explanations for events that occur in Nature such as volcanoes, lightning, comets, etc, etc, etc. Some members of the population attribute it to another Neanderthal that has mystical powers that may or may not live amongst them. (Let's face it, most of the earliest god's of mythology were created in their image and had, or were depicted, with physical characteristics similar to their own.) Word spreads, religion is born. A neanderthal, or Egyptian, witnesses lightning from the sky striking a tree and causing a fire. An act of their god. Some time later another neanderthal is sitting on his bedding made of straw and smacking a rock against another rock (aka flint), producing a spark, that in turn, ignites his bedding. He started out attempting to create a spearhead or arrow point but instead accidentally harnessed arguably one of the most consequential energy sources of mankind. That neanderthal then becomes either a shaman or the first scientist, or both. Some would not fully accept the explanations offered by shaman and begin to explore causation. These would later become our religious leaders and their followers and members of the scientific community( or Scientologist 😆). Later to be broken down into subgroups of conservative thinkers and progressive thinkers. The history of mankind in a nutshell.
The World according to _____ .
Thank youuuuu
It's a supreme pleasure to listen to REASON and a critical, assiduous thinker like Sam Harris!
Great discussion thanks
If evidence is the measure, what about more real unitive states of consciousness where the mind and body are known as One, the world known in its primary unity beyond the bifurcation of language, to which the ancients could only describe through the limits of their own language where evidence is as foreign a concept as the supernatural is to reasoning?
No one here, understands, truly the code that needs to be known,
Which enables you to comprehend the reality behind the Façade