Is it rational to believe in God? Stephen Woodford VS. Simon Edwards
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- čas přidán 5. 09. 2023
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“We cannot understand the mind of god and he works in mysterious ways… but let me tell you exactly what he wants you to do”
There is a philosophical twist one could make out of this. You might grasp the contents of God's requirements prima facie but not necessarily the goal of his requirement.
Abraham is an example. "Leave your home to a place I would show you...". At face value, it is easy to understand what God wants you to do but the motive is not one you have mentally handy. Why should I leave my home because you're asking me to? What would I achieve with that?
God wants you to gimme money!!
@@theweirddeveloper360 "There is a philosophical twist one could make out of this. " - Right, and thats why there are multiple versions of what god wants, as in, multiple religions, multiple sub-sets of those religions, countless holy books, countless versions of god/gods.... Then you gotta ask yourself, which belief do i follow, how well am I gonna interpret it, etc...
This is one way to know, that priests, imams, rabbis and others like this are professional liars.
That makes a lot of sense!!! Not
_"A god that does not manifest in reality is indistinguishable from a god that does not exist."_ [Matt Dillahunty]
He does manifest in reality
@@colepriceguitar1153 really? I've never seen him.
@@colepriceguitar1153 If he does, we would love to have you demonstrate the god to us. It shouldn't be that difficult, if the god manifests in reality.
@@colepriceguitar1153Be as detailed as possible. What elements on the periodic table make up this entity? What is the exact location of this entity? Give me GPS coordinates. Weight and height.
“A penis that manifests itself in reality is indistinguishable from a penis that does not exist.” [also Matt Dillahunty]
This theists credentials are quite Impressive. Imagine how hard I laughed when he opens with the watchmaker analogy. Apologetics really hasn’t changed in 200 years huh.
Well, a few hundred years ago, the watchmaker argument was originally the sun dial argument!
Kant is smiling in heaven.
Or, he no longer exists.
"It just doesn't matter!" (Bill Murray in meatballs
I always love the suggestion that what whenever there's something contradicting our interpretation, we can't possibly understand everything that God meant, but anything that fits our interpretation, we know exactly what was meant and we understand it fully.
Great point. That's another CHECKMATE.
From, we can continue the interrogation and checkmate with techniques like:
"A god of supposd unlimited power that has limitations on what it can teach or make people understand, doesn't exist, because now we have identified limitations.
Coincidentally, what God wants...is also what I want.
This one stumps them , they refuse to answer. Did god the intelligent designer design us to crap out dirty stinking filthy turds? to have stinking farts, and the possibility of having stinking wet farts in public?
@@DrMontague Also many humans bleeding monthly and the bible refers to all bodily functions as "filth." So its a god of filth, because it couldn't think of a single better way to do things
Stephen: 'Here's my rational argument.' Simon: 'Imagine the leaves in your garden.'
When he started with that I thought he was going to use the “god sends us signs” argument
@@Power_to_the_people567well he did head almost instantly in to the puddle argument
@@Power_to_the_people567it was practically the watch on the beach argument. He makes more assumptions and claims than actual arguments.
@@Nathouuuutheonethe leaves on the ground example is just a rehashing of frank turek’s refrigerator note from “i don’t have enough faith to be an atheist” back in 2003 (and i’m sure that was just an evolution of something else). it tries to conflate the raw data of reality with a message with clear intent, purpose, and origin. i’m glad stephen didn’t spend too much time on it because it’s a silly conflation of terms.
Yup abrahamic style
_"Gods & magic are the simplest & most childish excuses men have ever invented to explain things they didn't & still don't even want to understand."_ [AronRa]
Great debate! I was dizzy with just how many of Simon’s arguments were just flat assertions 😂
I mean, what do you expect? They are literally pulled from his ass. 😉
But that is a given, that is exactly what blind faith is, blind.
He is an apologist. Assertions and antiquated arguments is all they have.
Idk why I was hoping to not hear the same old shtick. Recycled Trash arguements that have been completely and thoroughly dismantled a thousand times.... 🤮
@@JayCubsGaming same
As an Aussie I'm going to apologize, but before you ask, the answer is no. You took the smeghead, we don't want him back. Well done Steve, you hit that one for six.
I would imagine you wouldn't like Ken Ham back either🤣
@@Goodboy-ip7ue he's America's problem now and even most of them don't want him. It's just like tRump said, we ain't sending the world our best people, you're getting our rejects. Australia, what John West is to tuna, we are to exports. BTW, we don't want Mel Gibson back either...
I’m an Aussie too. I was looking at Simon before he started talking and I thought to myself “is this guy one of those Australian Christians that leave Australia to spread their weird ideas overseas?”…. And he was! At least we are able to get rid of them.
It's sad because he seems like a nice kind person, yet so misguided by saying things like the bible is what took civilisation forward from slavery and sexism and racism etc... completely forgetting the dark ages lol
If this is the best god can do in terms of it's people defending his existence... He shouldn't be surprised so many don't believe he's real at all...
To be fair, we have no idea what their god feels on the subject. Could be really embarrassed
@@GameTimeWhygood one 😂
@@GameTimeWhy If we are talking about 'their' god then we do have an idea as that's what their holy book is. If there is a god and that god has nothing to do with their religion then it's not 'their god' to begin with.
@@GameTimeWhy it is possible god uses religion to sort out the sycophants and suck ups and in fact he prefers atheists, i know that's the game i'd play.
but.
really an actual god wouldn't just be hidden, an actual god who wanted to see how we act sincerely wouldn't let us have any notion he existed at all.
@@zacharyshort384 except the bible has many descriptions and interpretations of what their god is like and they are not at all coherent.
A masterclass from Simon in avoiding questions and redefining language to suit an agenda. Truly inspiring, I don't know why I came searching for something as lowly as rational debate.
I am only 18 min in, and was thinking the same.
first time watching a religious debate? LOL
Thanks you steven for not permitting the word "accident" to stand. Listening to this was worth it just to hear this epic takedown at 48:11
"If you define accident as anything not designed"
- rationality rules
Weird, I scrolled to this comment at the exact time this happened! Must be god! ;)
Exactly. Theists hold a false dichotomy at the outset. "X" is either designed or a completely random mistake, then tell the story of a 747 made by a tornado. They do not admit the laws of physics playing out reliably and predictably over and over again. Water does not flow "randomly". It follows the path of least resistance downhill, very reliably and predictably. Biology follows the same laws of physics as everything else, it just happens to be more complex. And complexity does not necessarily prove, suggest or imply the existence of a magic deity. "God has always hidden in the shadows of the unknown, but when the bright light of discovery shines into the recesses of the unknown, Gods are never there to be found." ND Tyson.
It's hilarious how Simon cites racism and sexism as universally objectionable ideas when I'm pretty sure the Bible is the main reason why people still justify those beliefs today
No, racist people today are not racist because the bible says so.
Or at least A major reason for their racism lol
99999 needles 😮
But evolution would tell you that holding your own tribe in higher esteem than others is a good thing.
All of this "objectively bad" like racism, sexism, anti-homosexuality, etc are only considered bad in modern, western societies of extreme decadence.
None of those beliefs are natural or organic. They only become bad when a moral framework, discrete from reality, is applied. Maybe that framework is from God, maybe it's from somewhere else, either way it should be acknowledged.
The basic premise of Christianity is that the irrational person blindly follows evolutionary drives, still drivers of present behaviors, the rational person is guided by enlightened self-interest, and the transformed person has transcended the drives of "self" under a new guiding law: love even those who do not value the highest ideals, accord humans a value/ worth/ dignity not assigned by race, class, circumstances of birth, and govern not by pragmatism or human power structures, but by a Higher Law.
Humanism holds humans to the human standards of social behavior.
Transcendent Law holds people to impossibly high standards of ethical behavior.
That some are liars and claim they are following these Higher Laws does not make those standards wrong.
When it comes to building aircraft, nuclear power stations, etc, "Good enough," is not good enough. Only excellence can be the standards.
I didn’t think Simon’s arguments would be so bad. That’s probably my fault.
Stephen crushed Simon on the moral question.
no theist has a good argument for god. we gotta stop acting as if theists are intellectuals
If you refute their argument, they pause as if to reconsider, then come back with exactly the same argument 5 minutes later.
Yes, surprising how bad they were. Eg conflating atheism with naturalism shows impressive ignorance.
Evolutionary success does not rely upon truth, but that it relies on the FACT that we, as humans, can know logic. We can know that 1 Apple and another, similar, apple means two apples. Are they the same apple? Probably not. But this is the nature of this particular debate. Apples to oranges.
@@godinflt555 No ideea what your point is, but many animals aree able to count too.
What this debate clearly showed is that Simon is a really nice guy, but irrational. :)
You are just assuming the "really" part though 😉 as theists assume "God" goes by neurotypical male pronouns.
"I kind of predicted that you might pick a few *_obscure Bible passages..."_*
"Totally valid that you would pick some *_really tricky verses..."_*
Obscure Bible passages?! My guy... Stephen is referring to the sixth commandment (from the second draft), which is literally one of the most quoted parts of the entire collection of books, then referring to an ENTIRE CHAPTER, not "some really tricky verses," where that very same character does exactly the opposite of that commandment specifically because Yahweh directly spoke to him. This isn't obscure. This is from the story of the guy who is credited with one of the most well-known parts of the whole Bible.
----
"Then *_the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, 'Take vengeance on the Midianites_* for the sons of Israel; afterward you will be gathered to your people.'"
"So they made war against Midian, just *_as the Lord had commanded Moses,_* and _they killed every male. They killed the kings of Midian along with the rest of those killed: Evi, Rekem, Zur, Hur, and Reba, the five kings of Midian. They also killed Balaam the son of Beor with the sword."_
"But Moses was angry with the officers of the army, the commanders of thousands and the commanders of hundreds, who had come from service in the war. And Moses said to them, 'Have you spared all the women?'"
"Now therefore, _kill every male among the little ones, and kill every woman who has known a man intimately._ However, all the girls who have not known a man intimately, keep alive for yourselves."
----
Simon completely deflects from that chapter by saying not only that you can't hold it against a modern moral standard, but that it makes sense when you look back at the same book a few chapters earlier in Numbers 25... But rather than justifying anything, that section raises even MORE questionable killing!
----
"While Israel was staying in Shittim, the men began to indulge in sexual immorality with Moabite women, who invited them to the sacrifices to their gods. The people ate the sacrificial meal and bowed down before these gods. So Israel yoked themselves to the Baal of Peor. And the Lord’s anger burned against them.
*_The Lord said to Moses, 'Take all the leaders of these people, kill them and expose them in broad daylight before the Lord, so that the Lord’s fierce anger may turn away from Israel.'_*
So _Moses said to Israel’s judges, 'Each of you must put to death those of your people who have yoked themselves to the Baal of Peor.'_
Then an Israelite man brought into the camp a Midianite woman right before the eyes of Moses and the whole assembly of Israel while they were weeping at the entrance to the tent of meeting. When Phinehas son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron, the priest, saw this, he left the assembly, took a spear in his hand and followed the Israelite into the tent. _He drove the spear into both of them, right through the Israelite man and into the woman’s stomach._ Then the plague against the Israelites was stopped; but those who died in the plague numbered 24,000.
*_The Lord said to Moses, 'Phinehas son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron, the priest, has turned my anger away from the Israelites.'"_*
----
So people were sleeping with women from another culture and participating in their rituals, therefore not only genocide, but also culling your own people? Yeah, that's NOT better.
*tl;dr: Moses being told by Yahweh to kill every male and every female who has slept with a male after being given the commandment not to kill is NOT an obscure tricky verse, and his deflection to holding the Bible to a certain moral standard falls flat when it fails to uphold its OWN moral standard.*
Rationality Rules does a great job explaining difficult subjects in an easy to understand way.
Rationality really does rule.
As a lawyer I wouldn't want to be defended by somebody who doesn't believe in evidence. What a shame to the profession. So much false reasoning, so much false argument.
If you were guilty, that may be the best kind of lawyer. 😂
Then why do you believe atheism and all the atheist horse manure you are fed without evidence?
That's my view of Philosophy as a whole... Philosophy doesn't care about truth... it just cares about making arguments not whether they are sound or valid.
@@aralornwolf3140 Truth is a philosophical concept. Your philosophy is that philosophy doesn't care about truth...
Unreal.
@@JimCastleberry,
Truth is what is best supported by all available evidence. This means, _every argument for god_ is not true since they are all fallacious and they ignore evidence counter to their point and yet, you have no problems with those falsehoods.
Ergo, Philosophy doesn't care about Truth.
It’s unfortunate this was so short. I feel like both sides barely had time to get their thoughts across. That said, this was less a debate and more of a discussion between cordial adults and that’s always a pleasure to listen to.
God iz realz..
vs.
Doubt ya brah..
Agreed. Too rushed to meet the already too short deadline.
It was fine to listen tho. Rare treat. 😁
@@Tyrannimarja the religist had nothing to add, i've heard this bull over and over. religion is boring if nothing else. plantinga for goodness sake, letters in the leaves. god.
@@HarryNicNicholas It's funny how true your words are. Religion is boring. Magic (in principle and specifically 'miracles') isn't.
Meaning: If religion and thereby magic is real...why are their arguments and evidences so boring, old and wrong?
I'd propose: if any religion were real, their arguments would be as fascinating as a magic system. (If you're into that kind of thing)
I'm only 11 minutes in, but I wanted to share a problem that I've been having. I guess it's a good thing more than a problem but when the believer started his opener, my heart dropped because he seems like a really sweet and kind man who is arguing for things that aren't real. I don't know. It's just a little sad sometimes.
Like watching a mentally handicapped child at a party play with their imaginary friend
It is very sad really. Fancy crippling your capacity to enjoy life and think rationally to such a ridiculous notion as a god, no matter what its flavour.
I agree, but I have always made a distinction between “god” and religion. I believe that all religion is 100% man made. If there is a god, there is no religion on earth that accurately describes it. BUT I am willing to admit that I just don’t know if there are forces in the universe that we don’t understand that some people would call a deistic god. For that I’m willing to admit ignorance.
I understand the sentiment but I think what you reserve judgment for and admit ignorance of, would not fit the standard definition of God. God as a word has a particularly limiting scope and is a good example of why it's important in a debate to first agree on a definition lest you be arguing two completely separate points@@blaster-zy7xx
@@blaster-zy7xxwe don’t know if there's a flying tea pot in space either. There might be, but we don’t know.
Man Steven is so good at this stuff. The inescapable logic is well...inescapable.
By far the cringiest argument was essentially "I can't actually defend how theism supports moral objectivity due to the accurate dichotomy you've raised. So instead I'll ignore that and you'll just have to trust me that 'he is the good' despite not being able to define what that means"
i’ve started to realize that as many times as i’ve heard “god is good”, it’s just an unfalsifiable claim. the best response to “god is good” is to simply ask “how would you know if he wasn’t?” when you define your character, everything they do, and their very existence as “good”, it’s impossible to evaluate. it’s pretty much begging the question.
In terms of human psychological and social development, however, it makes sense for people over the millennia to devise an embodiment of their concept of "good". That's true of Greek religious mythology too.
So, from that perspective, i.e. we intrinsically recognise things that are good and attribute a symbol/representation of that good, then God=Good makes total sense.
@@TaeyxBlack I'll do you one better; specific religious belief is entirely begging the question
@@TaeyxBlack"and what do the turkeys call the farmer in November."
@@konstantinlozev2272 _"...we intrinsically recognise things that are good and attribute a symbol/representation of that good, then God=Good makes total sense."_
And you named the Greek mythology just before that, with many gods that aren't good but fallible and not a symbol for good. In many similar societies it made a lot more sense for people to make people symbol for good and then ascribe godlike attributes to them that would make them stronger or immortal.
Ironically a common theme in many polytheistic mythologies is that the person who is special, like a half god, would be the good person, as opposed to petty gods and dumb peasants and leaders and everything in between. What I'm saying is that it seemed that people recognized that the status quo and people in general are pretty dumb and that it would take an abnormal person to inspire people and change it for the better.
Christianity took that to the extreme and was like, yeah, but then we'd still have to put in effort, we can just make a super god and a half god son that will do everything for us and we can just hang back in our status quo. All we have to do is beleive and worship and no one can tell us to put in effort. So yeah, then it makes sense that the god also needs to be good, otherwise you're evil by worshiping it and you'll get a lot of noise from people and you might think you should rebel and put in effort again if you care about humans at all. The Greek half gods needed the people to rise up, but the gods weren't good or inspiring to do good at all. They were just as likely to be corrupt or good as humans are.
What people generally don't do is think about what the concept of good is, so it does make a lot of sense to just make intuitive examples/symbols to tell stories instead of explaining it. If the story doesn't give a correct answer, it can still serve as inspiration and make the reader think about the topic, assuming that people aren't so arrogant as to assume the story gives the right answers but can be as fallible as the reader. The Greeks understood this. The characters didn't and don't need to be good or perfect. Christians are a special and supremacist breed, along with muslims.
I could've listened to another hour. You explain things so well!
This was a good debate and wish it was another hour! Thank you, Steven.
His arguements are soooo bad. I loved watching you smile whenever you saw where he was going well ahead of time, Stephen. It'd be hilarious if it wasn't so frustrating.
I wish theists would do some homework before showing up and actual respond to the atheist speaker rather than just speaking from a script.
The night before, we were discussing what arguments we thought he'd bring up... we guessed correctly on all counts 😄 so when you say Steve was smiling as if he saw where he was going ahead of time... Steve did!
@@castlesandcuriosities you just proved magic is real.
@@GameTimeWhy awesome! Has it got any practical use? 🤔
@castlesandcuriosities That's amazing! I'm glad you guys are still close. I must admit I'm suffering from withdrawals from your lowfruit series! I understand though if health gets in the way or if you're burnt out. Take care!
We were treating each other "morally" (mutually cooperatively / constructively) for hundreds of thousands or even millions of years before we ever invented the word "morality" to describe it. It's no coincidence that all religious moral codes just happen to be about behavior -- stealing, killing, lying -- that undermines the sense of security of the group.
Problem is that we had those morals long before we left the trees and most social animals share them
@@stixinst5791
Heck ... I don't see that as a problem, but rather as a feature -- a feature that, as you say, we can observe in real-time just by looking at the social animals around us. The point is that the behavior came first, the religious moral codes came long after the fact. Many theists think the moral codes are prescriptive, but they're actually descriptive.
@@dougsmith6793 I'm pretty sure most religions just encode the accepted morals of the place they were formed in as well. They take what's there and pretend they created it. They poach a lot that's not theirs and it makes conversation very hard. Theists don't seem to understand you need grounded situations and goals to really discuss useful morality and not abstract garbage.
I think the main issue is everything is bottom up and higher level behavior is emergent. Theists generally think top down and don't understand emergent phenomenon. We literally found an invisible world under us and they're still looking up to explain everything. I hate that people act like all religion didn't see disease as from above. It's actually from below. They weren't entirely wrong to think that way, but once we found the small world, suddenly we can explain it. Religious thought is literally backwards. Always looking for the flow of action down. Always looking for someone pulling strings at the top, when what we see is explained by all the people on the bottom.
The theist will simply rebut by saying, god wrote that morality onto everyone's heart from the beginning
@@Theomatikalli Like it actually has time to do that for every human birth.
Very refreshing watching such a respectful debate where people listen and talk to understand and not talk over each other in order to win.
Dammmmmn Stephen!!!! That opening was outstanding. Everything I've Ever wanted to say on this topic. And exactly the reasoning and rationality that will make someone come to the realization of truth. And finally leave make believe behind.
Thanks so much!
Your public speaking skills have gone off the charts my man.
That was icredibly entertaining. Amazing job, Stephen!
What did I just witnessed? A civil debate? That's so rare! Good job Stephen and Simon! I can even concede that Simon put forward an interesting argument with the "rationality vs fitness spawning from evolution". Never heard that before!
Thanks host for the opening false equivalence between rationality and theism.
Really setup the tone of the general debate.
people think brierly is loverly, but i see him as one of the worst two faced liars in the circles of two faced apologists.
Can anyone drop a timestamp of when this pops up? I'd like to go back and re-analyse.
@@eamontdmas exactly. how many times did Simon lose his way, only for the moderator to step in and redirect him and/or the conversation as a whole.
Well, the host is a true believer. It is no surprise.
14:57 Stephen you are so on the money here. That little smile was everything. I smirked at the same time you did when he said, "our universe is finely tuned for life... because our universe has at least 30 or more scientific properties like gravity, electromagnetism, dark energy, like precise dials on a radio..."
...tsunamis, cancer, parasites, meteorites, volcanoes, salt oceans, eh... yeah. Perfect.
Yes. Why do they consider it magical that humans exist in conditions that are conducive to human existence?
@@riffhammeron Of course all the other planets in our solar system seem so mammal friendly. not.
"so... you're telling me that God all powerful had to adhere to this very fined tuned things, and he couldn't do it otherwise?"
So finely tuned...13.8 billion years of effort to create a universe 46 billion light-years across, for the sole purpose of bringing about a bunch of talking monkeys who can only exist on one ten-quintillionth of it (and even that part has so many interesting ways to maim and kill them), and can only see maybe 4% of it...yep, makes perfect sense.
Great job on a great conversation
Hard to believe that people are still using the "fine tuning" argument.
Thats why never let Christians debate philosophy. Make THEM defend the bible and love their supposed god. So many atheists don't understand that they ate HELPING Christianity by allowing the debate to be philosophical.
NOPE. Debate me on your book and religion's claims.
Actually the "fine tuning" argument is much more powerful an argument today, than it EVER was before, because of what physicists have learned in the past 30 years. In 1150 or 1950, for example, it was a MUCH weaker argument. But now it is so much more powerful that you have thousands of MAINSTREAM scientists grabbing at "speculative ideas" (not science) to refute it. Of course the most popular of these ideas is that of an INFINITE number of entire universes in order to explain away this ONE "finely tuned" universe. So science has actually STRENGTHENED the "finely tuned" argument and made it hundreds of times more powerful than it originally was. That was one piece that Simon was much more on the money on, compared to Stephen.
I love that when Simon was talking, Steve was just smirking at how ridiculous the things he was saying were 😂
Smirking is the sign of a good person... And loving the smirk? Well, hats off to you sir.
Simon was doing a lot of smirking as well
@@7EiamJ7 Simons smirk was the smirk of a person not listening.
@@crusatyr1452 nervous smirking. lol. i haven't heard those lines of argumentation for so long, did simon not get the memo that they had all already been argued into an empty tomb? embarrassing, no wonder religion is dying (pew and gallup).
@@monkeibusiness the smirk of someone thinking "ground swallow me up, i'm out of my depth, with a hippie"
They need to give Stephen a better challenge.
There is nothing better, the problem is that theistic arguments have not changed since the belief in gods was invented.
Assumes a challenge is available to be found.
There is nothing better. I have never seen even a decent argument for god. If you have it please present it to me? It is all god of the gaps at the end of the day and it is all bad.
One thing I noticed right away is Stephen's opening statement was, "here's the problem of evil, here are common creationist rebuttals, and here's why I think these responses are insufficient." Simon's opening statement was, "here are 3 common creationist arguments." Stephen playing chess, Simon playing checkers.
Great conversation. You will get better on the points. It's hard to focus if opponent plan is to mislead.
Stephen, you did great in this debate. Although the nerves were getting in your way, you still managed to explain your arguments well enough.
Great and lowly are RELATIVE. 😉
Incidentally, Slave, are you VEGAN? 🌱
@@SpiritualPsychotherapyServices What point are you trying to make with that Non Sequitur fallacy?
@@Power_to_the_people567, I am patiently awaiting your response to my question, SLAVE. ☝🏼
13:30 - 14:02 I propose that the human species is so successful because evolution by natural selection has provided us the advantage of being able to come to scrutinise reality and come to true beliefs.
What, are you saying that the ability to recognise truth might be a survival advantage? Please, that can't be right, can it?
@@eamontdmas We wouldn’t have been as evolutionarily successful if we we're unable to decipher how reality works- aka have true beliefs.
@@BMTroubleU I really shouldn't try to sarcasm on the internet. It's impossible. I agree with you whole heartedly.
@@eamontdmas ah, I see. No worries mate 👍
Great stuff, I think Stephen's debate style has greatly improved. I was also pretty excited when he whipped out the Problem of Evil _and_ the Euthyphro dillemma later on. Definitely a great 1-2 punch.
My question shuts them up. Did god the intelligent designer design us
to crap out dirty stinking filthy turds? to have stinking farts, and the
possibility of having stinking wet farts in public?
That opening statement was amazing. Well done.
Yes hello fellow apes must mean that his faith is in evolution
the human mind trying so desperately to rationalise irrational biblical morality, is truly something to behold. Excellent work Stephen!
Excellent and ordinary are RELATIVE. 😉
Incidentally, Slave, are you VEGAN? 🌱
Ironically, atheists hold to no objective morality and thus have no footing in claiming something as immoral.
Objective, as in foundational laws in the universe. Atheistic morality is based on humanist ethics.
Some species of ape rape their children. Is that immoral? Or natural?
An honest atheist would admit its neither moral or immoral.
If rape is neither wrong nor right. Then how can you claim anything is immoral in the Bible.
Rationality Rules, and wow did it! Stephen, I don't know that I've seen you in a public debate like this! Excellent job! I hope it pays well and you keep at it! Most impressive, my young dude!👍💙💖🥰✌
Simon lost the argument on the Euthyphro Dilemma and was conveniently cut short. Stephen's questions would have had the theist grasping for rational answers with none coming.
Yeah, I kinda agree.....the 'moderator' had to step in a few times to save Simon's bacon.
Euthyphro is a false dilemma easy to defeat. You and Stephen will lose on this too.
Atheism is sub-rational and fatal to any coherent morality.
@@JimCastleberry Please, show us the way then! Defeat it!
@@jordanh865 Easy! God's moral NATURE (an objective unchanging feature of God) is neither apart from God or decided by God).
Euthyphro defeated. Split the horns of the false dilemma.
@@JimCastleberry,
ROFL... That's fallacious. "God is Moral because it's his Nature to be Moral"... Circular Logic... useless.
The more Simon went on, the more I was saying "This is easy pickings for Stephen, he's gonna wipe the floor with his nonsense."
I really appreciate that these two were respectful of each other
Having been through this exploration of the _rationality_ of faith many times, I could not help but be moved by the fact that *Stephen only got to drink one bottle of water and at least three bottles of air.*
17.30 "It goes counter to some of our deepest intuitions" - and those intuitions have evolved over a million and more years of living in cooperative groups
It's way more humbling that we're here simply by chance. And it's also super cool to realise that we are the universe looking back on itself.
Breaking out the watch makers argument was the cringiest possible opening. I would have accepted him just standing up and going "come on." Really emphatically over that.
Man this was good. Thank you Stephen. The only defence Simon seemed to put up was to drag out hes vague answers.
Good and bad are RELATIVE. 😉
Incidentally, it’s called “Spell-Check”. ✅
Look into it. 👨🏻🎓
12:27 I groaned when he mentioned design and morality because I know those two arguments have been debunked on this channel but maybe he got something in his bag
I had to cut some family members off because they liked to wax on about goodness and morality while affirming I deserve to burn forever in hell for not believing. Believing hell is eternal torture and calling it just is the sickest thing I've heard otherwise good people say. No one deserves that. I mean no one. Pure evil. The morality argument is already lost there. At least I know some are just scared. They know better and I got it out of them like pulling teeth. God damn euphemisms. They don't call it what it really is because they know it's wrong but they are scared. The ones that affirm it and aren't scared really disturb me. Being on board with that fully and not just because you feel there is no choice is a true sickness.
Imagine going to Oxford University, and then parroting Frank Turek's arguments.
I always enjoy a good debate. 2 different views and yet we can talk. Bravo to both speakers and thank you Stephen for your post.
It was a polite debate, but I wouldn't call it good.
In my opinion, nothing Simon said was even remotely challenging to Steven in any way.
It was just the same old irrational assertions and grasping at straws. It wasn't thought provoking or insightful.
It ended up being more of a unintended lecture by Steven and I think Simon needs to look at his beliefs for a good while longer before trying to debate this question.
Simon’s arguments were absolute shite. To be fair, they we’re arguing two different things. But I don’t know if Simon could have argued anything less or more. His naturalistic argument was weak; others have argued better. This was a amateur boxer vs a Tyson in the prime.
"Evolution didn't intend Steven."
Something we can ALL agree on.
Someone needs to gift a copy of Dawkins 'The Blind Watchmaker' to Simon.
My question shuts them up. Did god the intelligent designer design us
to crap out dirty stinking filthy turds? to have stinking farts, and the
possibility of having stinking wet farts in public?
Thank you for this conversation and the good faith you both practiced throughout. It was a pleasure to listen to, shame you ran out of time
dear mr. woodford, i have to admire your patience to explain those things again and again.
Keep up the good work Stephen, huge fan from Uruguay!
Absolutely crushed him imo. Annoyed me that Simon kept referring to an atheistic view as the atheistic belief. One thing to note: you kept forgetting the water bottle was empty 😅
Instead of we watchers of "Sir" Woodford simply taking a sip of some beverage each time an a$$hole says "atheistic belief", we should, instead, comment to Stephen to stop the conversation with his interlocutor and ask "how is a lack of a belief a belief" ???
Yeah Simon did not care about actually having an honest conversation. He did zero homework beforehand.
It wasn't empty, it was filled to the brim with the holy spirit. Though that's probably the same thing,
Atheism is a belief. A weak, unjustified, intellectually lazy belief held without evidence.
My question shuts them up. Did god the intelligent designer design us
to crap out dirty stinking filthy turds? to have stinking farts, and the
possibility of having stinking wet farts in public?
Simon's refusal to engage the morality question in good faith is very telling; it's clear he either hasn't given it much thought or is quite uncomfortable with the (obvious) answer.
Well done Steven! First debate of yours that I've seen and for what it's worth I thought you presented your arguments well and responded to counter arguments equally well. Also, I learnt about the counter to objective morality claims. Before, I didn't even understand why it matters or what the point being made is. Now my understanding is that the objective biblical morality is equally shaky. Unless one presupposes a god that is omnibenevolent. But then of course whence cometh suffering and evil...
Like number 500 thank you for sharing this. Think you totally tore his arguments apart. Don't think he had enough experience with Atheists to really deal with what you were saying to him in most contexts.
"There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so"
Got so excited when you brought up the Euthyphro dilemma and especially when he gave the classic answer "well God is good'. Legitimately haven't heard any apologist answer the follow up question of that. Still haven't of course, but that's ok I guess.
Actually his answer added the definite article. Rather than good being objective and apart from God or good being what God says, Simon said that God is "THE good".
He tries to make God the embodiment or definition of good therefore trying to remove the contradiction.
It doesn't work for me, but it seems to for him.
@@psibert And that was his answer to the first question. Like I said, "God is good" pretty much. What I did not hear, and have never heard, an answer to was the follow up question of "So is God good because he aligns some "good" that was already present or is he good because he defines what good is by his very existence?"
He does say something afterword, but I don't even want to call it response, as it seems to me that he just repeated what was saying earlier.
Great debate 💯
Frankly right now is like arguing with toddlers: they have absoluterly nothing. 2 minutes into the apologist introduction and i've already groaned 3 times for how childish were his arguments.
it's embarrassing. still, one more nail in the coffin of god.
Simon Edwards could be synonymous with word salad.
That's all apologists. Tons of words that add up to zero demonstrable reality.
I think you did really good in this discussion.
42:19
That was so well played. You literally allow him to run his scripted answer to the dilemma just to strangle him with his own words.
It is only more obvious when his ONLY response is to abandon rationality and appeal to intuition and emotion.
I don't know, to me Steve's intro already destroyed ANY possible argument the other side oculd have given.
Just finished hearing the openings but, gosh, it feels like virtually anything can be constructed to be proof of God if you really want it.
If God exists in the way commonly understood, why wouldn't it? It's very obvious reading these comments that it's been swarmed by biased fanboys [edit] Oh I just realized this was posted by RR. I thought it was just suggested to me based on subscriptions.
@@jcalle2biased fan boys? While the comments tend to skew one direction, I haven't seen anything fallacious, or improperly reasoned.
Could you point to some or be more specific?
@@HowBoutDemBoyzz Nearly every single comment I read till my post was about how theologists have no arguments and that Stephen (edit, sry mixed up their names) was too good for him. Not to mention the comment I just responded to.
@@jcalle2Many theologists have decent arguments. It's apologists who have no good arguments
@@jcalle2 that's likely because the arguments used here (fine tuning, objective morality etc) are very tired and have been conclusively responded to time and time again.
I think maybe the sentiment of most of the comments is they have heard both sides of these discussions a ton and when a theist brings them out, you know exactly what they're going to say.
That isn't in itself a bad thing, but I suspect most here see nothing new, and after so long of examining these arguments, have not found anything close to convincing them of a god, or even if it's rational to believe in a god given the evidence we have.
Straight into the watchmaker. Fell at the first hurdle, hit his face on the floor and smashed out his teeth.
Yes, we had a variation on the watch on the beach argument quickly followed by the tornado in a junkyard creating a jumbo jet argument. I was really disappointed, I was expecting something a little better than this, I don't know why I even thought that might be possible.
@@andystokes8702Yeah I expected more as well, especially considering the apologetic came from Oxford and the atheist from CZcams 😂
This is just painful. How Stephen isn’t laughing out loud is credit to him.🤦♂️
Love the vids buddy
Stephen, you really excel in this format.
Short answer: no.
Long answer: fuck no.
👏🙂
Great video.
The debate was unfortunately too short for Stephen and Simon to really get into the arguments.
Circular argument that rejects science
Conflating atheism with naturalism
Another circular argument
And a third circular argument that rejects science
Great work Simon.
NOT
"I love you brian". Oh how often that emotional appeal worked for me. Sitting in a car, a 5 lb trigger weight from oblivion, Christian music telling me that someone does love me. I suspect he went for that specific message in this hypothetical rather than "there is a god" because often the emotional attachment to God kept many of us in longer than it should have. But of course we now understand the processes of how many aspects of our world as complex and seemingly unexplainable as words in leaves do come about without intervention and as for the processes that we can't yet explain we have no particular reason to believe a deity was involved.
Impressive performance Stephen. The first condescending remark came at 39:08 when Simon said "I kind of predicted that you would pick a few obscure bible passages...". I love how you matched his energy in your next response at 42:17 with "in the literature this is the most common rejoinder you'll get to the objection that i raised...". And you kept up with the perfect amount of grit from there as to not allow him to resort to mockery as his arguments failed.
That opening was top notch!!! Nioce!!!
Nice guy. He seems to be a version of the average believer…who’s never pondered (or pretended to ponder) the veracity of his beliefs.
They seem like outdated poorly programmed robots.
" Ca n not pon der new
I I I id ideas ..."
Excellent argument from Stephen with "God ask us to do things because they are good or what God ask us is good because he ask it?" that proved in a sense that morality is independent of God, even in Simon logic and argument, because we can see (even Simon) that some things that God asked Moses (to kill genocide etc) are objectively from a moral perspective wrong. Even if God ask it, which it did. And we still think it's wrong right now. So...if we are able too see a wrong thing that God ask, we don't need God to have morality.
Many theist still cannot accept that morality is independent of the existence of god. So to them, god asking Moses those things would mean that god works in mysterious ways…
@@Power_to_the_people567or they will vilify and dehumanise the victims in the most convoluted ways to make it seem as if it was some form of divine justice. They are primitive, tribal, irrational people with phones.
"To get away from that uncomfortable dilemma, you'd just have to become a believer! And then you'll believe! Job done!"
Christianity becomes more absurd the more you think about it!
Smoked him, Stevo :) I hope to see you doing more debates in the future
Simon is surprisingly open about his child harem.
My thought exactly. 😅
What? I'm sorry...I missed it. Can you point to that point in the debate? Was it during his opening statement or under cross-examination?
@@davidofoakland2363 About 40 sec in. -"I'm married with three kids."
@@kratozsweden5593that's really funny. Didn't realize he was Muslim.
It took me a few seconds, but I got it. LMAO! @@kratozsweden5593
Only 20 minutes in so keep that in mind... but, why can't relgious people at least come up with new/different arguments?
These beLIEvers all use the same arguments over and over and over again because a) it allows them to self affirm what they think in front of others b) it can often convince the other hard of thinking folks to join them, adding to their affirmation of bullsh-t. Hence - nothing new to offer.
Else they would have to admit they have been fooled and per that quote "It is harder to fool someone than convince them they have been fooled."
Cos they get all their answers from really old, and often barbaric, texts.
Because there is no more to say for them. They have nothing. Even if we grant that there is a creator, it will still be an empty bag they hold. It does not lead to Christianity or any of the other beliefs. It could just as well be the Evil God, that Stephen suggested or a big ass that farted the Universe out.
If they could think they wouldn't be religious.
Because that would require critical thinking, and you know where that would lead...
Hats off to both for keeping it civil.
"I want what's true, not what makes me feel good" He said exactly what I wrote months ago!
Nice work, Stephen! I especially like how you “flipped the script” after 7:12
It's not irrational to believe what your parents and community tell you to believe. That has no bearing on whether it's true or not. You can "believe" anything that suits you but "facts" require evidence. Without evidence or data, there is no logical reason to believe something is real.
Logical in this argument is synonymous with rational. It's illogical and irrational to live you entire life on claims without evidence to support those claims.
@@aralornwolf3140 : One can be mistaken without being irrational
@@lrvogt1257,
"Without evidence"
@@aralornwolf3140 : not everyone delves into the scientific basis of the globally accepted beliefs they were raised with. A syllogism can be true and therefore logical without being valid. I’m not going to be so hard on them for their socialization.
Good discusions. Very well done Steven👍
I latetly have come acros two books that enabled me to see reality and the supernatural from another perspective as I think.
These books are "A Thousand brains" by Jeff Hawkins which esentialy states that our brain constantly comes up with, compares and improves models to predict reality.
And the second book is "The big picture" by Sean Carroll which esentially states that everything there is, is bound in a context and nothing can be purely isolated. Which means that if you think about and interact with reality you are part of a context that needs to be taken into considerations if you want to make correct assumptions.
I hope whoever might read this comment may take my view on reality as food for thought.
Cheers.
My question shuts them up. Did god the intelligent designer design us
to crap out dirty stinking filthy turds? to have stinking farts, and the
possibility of having stinking wet farts in public?
Enjoyed the debate Stephen! I would be interested in hearing your thoughts on how it went, what you think went well and what things you would like to do differently if you were in a debate with this same topic again.
My question shuts them up. Did god the intelligent designer design us
to crap out dirty stinking filthy turds? to have stinking farts, and the
possibility of having
stinking wet farts in public?
Stephen really ought to offer his game of Debunked after this "debate". Simon would have ended up with all the cards.
If you think that your mind has some kind of access to recognition of truth, you're living in a fantasy world. We very obviously do not have the ability to tell truth from untruth. We can only use our meager physiological tools to attempt to discern what is more or less likely about the world around us, which is why this argument is about which assumption is more or less rational. If there were some access to absolute truth, this debate would not exist.
Well done, Stephen! You've gotten much better at live debates. I'd like to tackle one topic Simon brought up that you didn't have time to cover in depth...
Simon says, "In a godless universe where everything that exists, including our minds, is but the product of mindless, unplanned, unguided processes, then on what rational basis can I trust that anything my mind tells me is true, including the arguments that lead me to atheism?" [13:00]
Mind, thought, logic, etc., are the processes of what a naturally evolved brain like ours does (as well as other animals, to some extent). Atoms aren't chemistry, but can lead to the emergence of chemistry. Chemistry is not biology, but can lead to the emergence of biology. And multicellular biology forms the physiology of complex organs, like human brains, which process sensory inputs, distinguishing between hot vs. cold, light vs. dark, sound vs. silence, and in some cases, fact vs. fiction (though some of us are better at this than others). You don't need a god to tell you the truth value that the light in a room is either on or off. Even the most basic light-sensitive single celled organisms, like the Erythropsidinium, can detect the truth of light. Truth starts with our senses. (Though senses too can be fooled, like optical illusions, but work well enough for most species to rely upon to aid in their survival).
One would expect that the only way creatures could possibly survive in a mindless, unplanned, unguided process like natural selection in a physical universe, is if those creatures could distinguish basic sensory truths. The rational basis for believing our minds when they tell us some things are true, is the fact that our species has survived the harsh and often cruel trials of evolution. But that doesn't mean we can automatically detect every truth value as easily as we can detect light from dark. Some senses, some processes of logic, etc., are stronger than others. Humans survived for a very, very long time without the ability to smell like a wolf, see like a hawk, or use the advanced math, logic, and reason we take for granted today. Nomadic hunter-gatherers didn’t have time to contemplate the possible ways string theory or loop quantum gravity may or may not affect our universe. But all this is to be expected with slow evolution under naturalism. However, in many theists’ worldview, god is the architect of our minds. But this would imply that humans should ALWAYS discern fact from fiction, because an all powerful, all knowing god wouldn't design an inferior, faulty mind (unless he was not all loving and just playing a cruel joke). Yet, the evidence demonstrates that not only atheists, but the vast majority of people on the planet, disagree with Simon's version of a god in ways both minor and major, and thus clearly cannot rely on his god's design of mind to determine what is actually true.
Nailed it. And if we live in a world were god chooses to remain hidden in order to test faith and people's true moral values and there's a deceiving evil force roaming around, you have yet more reasons to strongly doubt everything, including your own beliefs. I mean, it's not atheists who claim that dinosaur bones were put there by satan to deceive us, or that the old testament god is the demiurge, or that Christianism is idolatry.
I like that there is no cover on the table so you can see Stephen's leg twitching every time when Simon misrepresents what Stephen is saying, but he stays patient and polite :)
Am at Simon exposition of the moral argument... He is not done but let me do this prophecy : he's gonna be steamrolled.