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He is the author of "Sense and Goodness Without God" and also
"Not the Impossible Faith", he has a PhD in Aincent History
and here he is: Richard Carrier.
We need... we need video though
Oh! It's happening
Or is it not?
You speakers are so picky! Get us water, get us video, now we need a microphone...
Hey ??? half the fun man!
How many skeptics does it take to turn on a projector?
Well while we're waiting for that I'll tell you that my talk is going to be about
this book call "The Christian Delusion". It's edited by john Loft and has several
chapters in it. I'm going to be
talking about that book and why you should buy it. It'll be very useful to you
it's also the book that you should give to your Christian friends if you
want to introduce them to something that'll outrage them but also educate them.
Do you not have it yet?
The title of this book, "The Christian Delusion" is a riff on Richard
Dawkins' book "The God Delusion".
Richard Dawkins got criticized a bit for
being somewhat unscholarly somewhat unthorough or not responding directly to
what Christian apologists argue as if he was out of touch or whenever
so we took that critique up as a challenge and we got a bunch of experts
together who actually
are experts in all these different fields and put a bunch of chapters together
that are scholarly and well-researched
and thoroughly cited and do respond to the
criticisms and apologetics of their field. We focused on Christianity of course
because that is the main pain of our existence at present.
Islamic people don't read our books so that's kind of useless but the Christians
are kind of forced to ultimately.
(God hates you!) I'm gonna have to have more time later then
is there something wrong here? You would have a blank screen if it was...
Something's happening. Alright: everybody pray!
Which is a classic example like...
I can see it's happening, so if you all did pray,
this would be a proof of answered prayer.
(Call Rebecca Watson now to sell buttons) JT wants me to call Rebecca Watson out and sell buttons.
I'm too even keen to do that kind of thing though I think it's really 50-50 odds as to
which one of us will
gets the drunkest the quickest
JT says that depends on who buys most buttons
He's trying to plug the button which is a way for you to donate and have a little
souvenir of this event. Not only support this event but
may be give a little extra money to support Skepticon 4 next year
But in terms of the drinking game I give it
50-50 odds which of us will collapse first. However
all of you wearing Team Watson buttons its makes logical
sense that you should all be buying me drinks tonight
right?
I'm just saying. Alright. Let's begin.
The topic of my talk today is "are Christians delusional?"
Let's find out. First we have to define terms. What do we mean by delusion?
There's a colloquial sense of delusion which is a false belief or opinion
for example: 'he has delusions of grandeur' is a common phrase
I'm not talking about that. There are those from psychiatry which is a false belief
that is resistant to reason
or confrontation with actual fact. Now there's
a politically correct version of this psychiatric term
that you'll find in actual diagnostic models that makes an exception for
religion
without actually telling you that's what it's doing. This is the actual formal
definition
"a false belief based on an incorrect inference about external reality that is
firmly sustained
a) despite what almost everybody else believes (notice that insertion there)
and b) despite what constitutes incontrovertible and obvious proof of
evidence to the contrary.
Now I want you take that bit in italics and take it out, and let's just read the definition
the formal psychiatric definition;
A false belief based on an incorrect inference about external reality
that is firmly sustained despite what constitutes incontrovertible and obvious
proof or evidence to the contrary.
Obviously if you take that little section out, that little italicized part you're
still talking about a delusion.
I mean, it's quite clearly that's what we're talking about here. Just because
you have...
everybody in the room is deluded doesn't mean suddenly there's no one under delusion.
You just have...
the whole room is deluded.
So anyway... So I'm going not to use the politically correct definition. I'm gonna
talk about
just the basic definition: "a false belief that is resistant to reason or
confrontation
with actual fact." And I'll say that not all false beliefs are delusions. There's lots of
different kinds of false beliefs
and I could give a whole lecture on all the different kinds but I', going to talk
about one
delusion... one particular kind of false belief. And for a
false belief to be a delusion it has to meet these three
criteria
all three. The first a certainty it has to be held with absolute conviction.
If you're kinda wishy-washy about it it doesn't really qualify; it also has to have
incorrigiblity, that means it's not changeable by compelling
counter-argument or proof to the contrary
that's one of the key features of a delusion, and
the third criterion is impossibility or falsity of content.
In other words it has to be implausible, bizarre or patently untrue.
Now there are different kinds of delusion.
Delusion comes in many degrees. Here you've got my official dr. Carrier delusion scale.
You go from mildly delusional. Now we all are mildly delusional.
Actually psychology has proven that we all harbor a variety
different kinds of mild delusions. Guys often think they're hotter than they are,
women often think they're
less hot than they actually are, and they can actually show this with objective
tests. They can have like...
everybody in the room look at your picture and rate how attractive you are
and then have you rate how attractive you are, and you can see the difference
between the average objective measure
and your measure. These are the kind of mild delusions we have. One other common ones is
people overestimate how confident they are at a skill
and ironically the less competent you are the more you overestimate your
competence at the skill. And this is a universal thing, it's just
the way our brains work and... anyway so there are mild allusions,
then there are majorly delusional people. There's people that get
worrisome and crazy and then of course batshit insane. Now
for today I'm going to talk about the majorly delusional. I'm not talking
about the worrisome Christians or the complete batshit
insane Christians. I'm gonna talk about just ordinary majorly delusional Christians.
I'm also not gonna be talking about mildly delusional Christians
now... lets... Why do we talk about Christianity? Let's define Christianity here.
I can't take credit for this I did not
invent this quote I don't know who the author is so
props to them whoever they are, maybe someone can find out and blog it
or something, but it's... you can find it on the Internet it's
actually a completely 100% accurate description of what Christianity is.
The belief that some cosmic Jewish zombie
can make you live forever if you symbolically eat his flash and
telepathically tell him
you accept him as your master so he can remove an evil force from your soul that
is present in humanity
because a rib woman was convinced by a talking snake
to eat from a magical tree.
And there really isn't a single proposition in there that your average
Christian
can honestly deny. Yeah that's what we believe, what can I say. Now though
there are a lot of Christians now who've really taken a lot of flak for that so we
come out with a new improved Christianity of the late maybe last 50
years or so
where they... okay all that Eve stuff is baloney, rib woman, talking snake okay
maybe that's all mith
but I still have an imaginary friend who magically manipulates the world for me
and he also had magically impregnated a woman two thousand years ago
and she bore him a son who underwent an ancient ritual of blood sacrifice
in order to dispel a curse laid upon me thus ensuring I will be immortal
(although I've never seen his work for anyone else before). So that's that's what
we're dealing with. That's Christianity. That's the belief that we're gonna test:
is that a delusion?
Now there are varieties of Christians as well.
There's nominal apathetic Christians, who just say the're Christian
buit don't actually believe
any of it or don't even care whether it's true or not.
I'm not talking about those Christians today. There's also Christian who are,,, Yeah I don't
really know if it's true
it's a sort of a metaphor or something... they have different kinds of ideas, very
liberal Christians that
you can often have a really hard time trying to pin them down to what actually
they believe.
I'm not talking about those Christians either. I'm talk about the Christians that...
"it's true as told" Christians
those who say it's all true and Jesus is coming from outer
space to kill you soon.
That's actual polled
results: 40% of the American public believes that by the way. So we
can talk about maybe about 60% of
Christians are that it's true as told but aren't so sure when Jesus is gonna come and kill us.
but... you know... and there's also a split between
what I call the mildly delusional and majorly delusional Christians.
The mildly delusional ones have personal belief in God, like God exists and
Jesus was a great guy
but they'll... you know... they'll ??? the mood ??? they'll
waffle a little bit on the divine issues of Jesus and so forth
and these kinds of a happy Christians I'm not going to talk about
today. I think that's kind of a mild delusion had like so many think they
can telepathically communicate with their pets...
it doesn't really hurt anyone it's, you know it's still a delusion but... you know...
I'm talking about the "Jesus is truly the Son of God" and whatnot
and that's what I mean by majorly delusional. At least I claim
it's majorly delusional. Let's see if I'm right. Now what if someone came up to you and said
that they have an imaginary friend named Zalmoxis
who they insist is really real is not imaginary in fact and they'll never die
because this ancient demigod cleansed their soul with blood magic
which grants them the power of living forever in a magical place no one can see
Now you'd immediately take that as a delusion.
It's bizarre, implausible and patently untrue.
So much as cult in fact
is attested in Herodotus, the historian, in 425 BC five hundred years before Christianity.
Let me take you back to that. That's a description of an actual religion
practiced five hundred years before Christianity and possibly still being
practiced in the time
Christianity was invented. It looks very familiar, don't you think?
Think about that.
Another example I'm gonna give you is the heaven's gate call
I'm sure a lot of you know about this cult. They believe that
a spaceship was behind comet Hale Bob it was gonna come and rescue them
and transfer their souls from the current shells occurred bodies into new
special bodies in space ship in their lives flyway live forever in this
patient
and they're so convinced in this belief that some several dozen other
committed suicide mass suicide they're actually not all
did by the way they actually are still haven't Gators around and they still
believe this
thing it could rise up with a new near the new scientology in 50 years who
knows
I but their belief I have to point out
it was based on a diff getting your body is an alien spaceship flying by
we triggered this is patently absurd impossible and bizarre
but at least has all the elements possibility in the sense that
spaceships are only scientifically possible and the idea of being having a
body
her having your your me information your brain re imprinted on another body
that's actually better built than your current one
is not only possible in the sense that it's physically possible but will
probably actually be able to do that within a thousand years time a
technological development so
they're not really that far on the fringe and yet we all recognize
this is crazy crazy idea now this is
compare this with the Christians believe they believe that they're gonna get new
bodies in a magical
alternate universe I'll that's not as possible there's no science to support
this there are no magic alternate universes that we've
at have any evidence that it's actually it's either the same belief or at least
last possible even though with the heavens gate people believe and their
whole theory they actually had worked out as the idea quantum teleportation
and neural engineering cotton teleportation the information in there
current brains to nearly reengineer the brains have their
new bodies in the spaceship versus the christian idea that God needs blood to
fix the universe
but only his own blood had enough magical power to do it
so he gave himself a body and killed which one of these two religions makes
more sense
so if the cellmark scenes in the heavens Gators were delusional so are Christians
that's the point traffic here it so we work with nail one of the top 10 3
requirements are impossibility or falsity content implausible bizarre
patently untrue now I won't leave it at that I'm gonna point out how you can
actually make this case using
the Christian delusion Christian delusion is divided into five parts
talk about part 2 1st and that's why the Bible's not God's Word
and there's a reason we break it down like this now point up
that out later there's a chapter by Edward Burtynsky
on the cosmology the Bible it's important to know that the Old Testament
God
missus the Old Testament the voice of God in quotations himself
speaks with the assumption routinely that the earth is flat held up by four
pillars
no even God didn't know how the world was made you can be rest
be fairly certain that the Bible was not written by God or by anyone who was in
communication with him
this basic idea of water
is this giant sea up in outer space in fact outer space is an ocean
and there's this big metal firmament the got put to separate that notion from the
ocean below
and in the atmospheres in between the atmosphere this is big dome is held up
by
four pillars that's the pillars of heaven and the earth is flat held up by
four pillars
which is the pillars a bear this is the common cosmology was believe this is
structure the universe as believed by all the neighbors of israel when the Old
Testament was written
the egyptians the Babylonians and the Sumerians but instead shows its
documents extensively these the same metaphors the same terminology is the
same concept everything what worked in the same place
when you see in the Bible you know this is just a product of its cultures is not
this is not you insightful inspired text from the God of the universe
that guy who would certainly know that the earth is round and the one wasn't
you know
outer space wasn't filled with water another point and this is something I
won't go into detail because I V preaching to the choir but you know
these things
at the Bible in modern scholarship modern scholars pretty much all agree
that the Bible is ***
and they don't put it like that but
when you add up all the things they say oh well that's what you're saying
bolt MoDOT not saying when outsourcing outsourcing
and the Old Testament and the New Testament now Paul Tobin has a good
summer it's a short chapter that summarizes the
some the best examples for says hundreds of these the summer some of the best
examples that are most secured by the scholarship he cites the scholars
site the scholars and scholarship supporting each of these five points
that the Bible is inconsistent with itself
it's not supported by archaeology in fact archaeology refutes the Bible in
many points
it contains fairytales and failed prophecies
dement demonstrably failed prophecies and many forgeries both the New
Testament
I'll test retain books that we know are forged they they were not written when
or by whom they claim to be and that mainstream scholarship by the way it's
not fringe in all
so you know the book can be God's Word these things are true
and then a ton of it has a chapter on what we've got here is a failure to
communicate
doesn't even know that the movie will get the line but I won't go into that
I'm and he demonstrates an elaborate detail that one thing that God would do
if God inspired the Bible
are wrote it or whatever is that he would make sure that his message was
clear:
you make sure that you got it like this these are the moral this is what's most
what's right and wrong this is what I want from you this is what can happen
but is not massively confusing tax in fact it's so confusing it leads to
massive confusion among Christian churches we actually kill each other
over these one of the classic examples is you know can I have sex slaves are
not
I am actually the Bible is consistent on this you can
there really is no passage in the Bible it says you can frankly and there are
three passages in the Bible that
explicitly declare that you can get specific instructions on how
to manage or sex slaves
so I was not the knockouts were
part three is why the Christian God is not perfectly good says the same you say
welcome to the Bible is full of hairs and step up more
Metall metaphor or something and sorry we can't really know for sure whether
it's God's Word
but Lee Scott is perfectly good other two arguments against that the first is
that the
the goddess depicted in the Bible the character ya way is a moral monster
and Hector Avalos has a great chapter showing that that ya
way as depicted in the Old Testament is just as big a *** an ***
as all the other gods around him among the Sumerians and
babylonians and so for that means the same Jer basic
does the same thing says the same things that you would recognizes basically
you know not the kinda guy that you would respecter worship
and actor have let's call the amoral monster which is the play
there's actually a guy by the name apoco pan hu actually said
no guided all those things but they're not really monstrous got had excuses
or God can do whatever he wants and travelers take some
in on that but he shows that all the surrounding Bible codes that all the
surrounding lock codes
above the peoples around Israel writer as enlightened or more enlightened
than the clock we find in the New Testament in the Old Testament
we show that the Christian God is not perfectly good if you go by the Bible
catalyse rejected by my god you still got
this idea got left right well john Loftus has a chapter called the
Darwinian problem people were he decisively proves
that the suffering the the suffering to animals and I'm not talking about farm
animals in the same a regular animals out in the wild for
the past four billion years a that
monstrous unnecessary suffering is inexcusable and there's no possible way
God created the universe and still beat
considered perfectly good and he
addresses these responses to this letter Christian apologists are really worried
about this argument
and have been for years you might not have ever heard of it
they've developed a lot of really bizarre crazy excuses to weasel out of
it
and some are quite shocking and he he fantastically
did his research and document every single one in response to them it's a
good
good one I also recommend this bonus chapter that I wrote that in getting the
book called the will of God its 24 versus
from the Old Testament decisively show what a decade
yeah I was and you can find that on our companion site for the book
sites like Google dot com slash sites *** slash
the Christian delusion
then there's the white is not the reason Son of God part for us the other party
the christian right now right Jesus has to be the Son of God otherwise
Christianity in true in any
really metaphysical sense and Robert price as a chapter ratios that
mainstream rejection of the Gospels as not being historical events is valid
despite
a lot of recent Christian scholars attempting argue against this
I have my chapter on the resurrection right point out that
we do not have adequate historical evidence to believe that Jesus rose from
the dead
effectiveness looks the other way and
this is actually my past reputation in this argument so if you want to find
the definitive not down Christian resurrection apologetics
that's a chapter to go to and then john Loftus has at best geez was a failed
apocalyptic prophet
proving conclusively that jesus said he come back in like 20 to 40 years
the fact that he didn't decisively proves that he was wrong and it's got
camping
can't have failed to predict is our return these can't possibly even got
so what we've got here christianity is definitely implausible bizarre and pet
me and true and you all know this
but you can see that the case laid out there and has nice good short chapters
are really get down to the point and thoroughly documented
part 2 is designed to refute the Bible is God's were Christians part three is
designed refute the god is good christians part for this and Ricky
that Jesus is God christians and really it doesn't mean that there's no arguing
for them left to make that makes any reasonable sense
but just for good measure in case there were any christianity's left
we tacked part 1 in the front part 5 back and part one really get the
coherence a whole book
part 1 is the addresses the I don't mean evidence christians
and part 5 addresses that that we needed christians
when I mean by that on the part 5 last but
on a given in a general thesis here you can bring Christina down into various
different forms and no overlap so they're not
there are not distinct forms but when you add them all up you've got one whole
pizza pie
when you eat all those pieces on the Peter there's no pizza left
so want once you destroy all these in for different versions are questioning
there's no question any left
to Reebok so let me get back to that one point why society
does not West I can call that the Jesus
do this we'll pizza why society does not depend on Christian
thing I'm that's the hope that the argument is that
okay it might be false but but society would go to hell in a handbasket
if we gave up Christian believes that we should convince people to believe it
anyway because it's good for society
necessary for society and there are bright in different ways this is argued
one of course is that Christianity provides the basis for moral values in
so if Christianity would get rid of it no one will be more also we really need
to convince people that it's true
even if it's not David L A refutes this from the perspective of an
anthropologist religion is an actual anthropologist religion bro
literally the textbook on the anthropology of religion
and he argues very convincingly and thoroughly that
christianity is just one basis among many for different
moral views and it's not a very good one at that
so we don't need Christianity there lots options that we can replace Christianity
with
the other is atheism you often hear it is with the cause of the holocaust
the subtext being that's where we're gonna go to get rid of christianity is
gonna be a holocaust all over again
and I'll tell you right now this is my favorite chapter by Hector Avalos in
this book
and you can tell that takes that carry some weight it's not one of mine
and he said he'd says well eight years and was not because of the Holocaust and
he has a really excellent comparison
have the program the written declare program martin luther the founder
Lutheranism
and the Nazi program against the Jews I mean Concord I mean
point by point by point I mean their identical essentially
a whereas you don't find that and there's none of those points and art
for example is that none other than you can read all the attacks that are when
you're not gonna find
Martin with his list of things to do to the Jews
but you get for Martin Luther he shows conclusively the Nazis were bait nazism
itself was basically Christian moved it wasn't an atheistic
it was very Christian inspired by Christianity specifically German forms
and Christianity Martin
being one such and Percy also demonstrates that hit there wasn't an
atheist
I'm country popular met
another one other that but we need arguments is christianity was
responsible for modern science you think what what the hell
I have a chapter in this is right in my field
I studying ancient science I'm an expert at so when is Christian say these things
I know of which I know what I speak definitely as I have this chapter called
Christianity was not responsible for modern science right layout the argument
that they've actually made
and show whites complete *** not only
both in terms of being completely illogical but also in terms being
factually wrong in almost every single point
but you might wonder like who mixes are you serious
yes there are several popular conservative text books that say miss
I could be one of them quote from one of them as a new generation
historians sociologists and philosophers of science has proven
biblical religion was not the enemy of science but rather the intellectual
matrix that made it possible in the first place
without the key insights that Christianity found celebrated in the
Bible
spread throughout europe science would never have happened
the evidence is incontrovertible it was the rational theology have both the
catholic Middle Ages and the Protestant Reformation
inspired by the explicit and implicit truth revealed in the Jewish Bible
that led to the discovery that modern signs as one-quarter have others and and
my chapter in this book
and the entire paragraph is *** every single I
I'm there's also one that didn't get the book book that you think might be
missing
obvious one that Christianity gave us democracy in your Christianity we get
rid of democracy
I have that chapter written its online is an update in all article above mine
called Christianity was not responsible for american democracy
it's also available at the Christian religion companion site I'll
give you a spoiler on that these a thing those dirty little pagans invented
and is not a jot about democracy in the Bible as totally paying an institution
so that brings us back to last one part 1
which is the I don't need evidence christians and
this is one of the best sections in the book has 1i think you can read me
you should really should be because it's not only applicable to religion
it's applicable to all your decision making in your life
can educate you on how your brains evolved to make mistakes
your brain is inherently built by natural selection to screw up
and you have to compensate for those errors if you're gonna think rationally
an actor
and there these chapters in the only thing in several ways
David our talks about how Christian evangelists in foreign countries
actually
use established anthropological psychological science
against people in order to spread the faith they use what's what has been
learned by anthropologists and have
several textbooks explaining how to manipulate people in different cultures
to adopt
Christian belief and it's a very interesting thing but it also educate
you on how
how much of your mind is basically permeated with cultural assumptions
that you take for granted and how much culture affects how you see things and
understand things
and hit by showing how that is manipulated control you
you can understand how to resist that manipulation and avoid that pitfall
and then Valley Terrico and Jason long have Christian belief through the lens
of cognitive science and the malleability of the human mind
both cover all the psychology these kind of natural areas not talk about that a
bit more
and john Loftus rounded out by revisiting his outsider test for faith
which is one thing he's
famous for his action a protege expert is a William Lane Craig
so he knows what I mean creates tricks he was once an evangelical intellectual
under him now he's a avid hardcore atheist
and what is the outsider test for free it's very simple and
common sense really you must ask your own religious claims
and texts by the same standards you apply to other religions
that said that's all the test your religion has to pass if you're religions
claims and text
fare no better our any religion is just as false as there's
this seems like an obvious thing to say and yet there are many Christians who
you blown their top over this and insisted he's wrong with this test
doesn't apply and we can ignore this test and so forth
which is astonishing
but their reasons why we need to test are religiously for any worldview
against it by the same standards we test the ones we reject so if we reject the
religion
for XY I'm XY and z. reasons and those reasons also hold for
this other major looking at we gotta rejected two otherwise are being
inconsistent
why do we have to do this we have to do this because religion
the religion we assume that it wouldn't political views anything else based on
your geography everywhere
other police can have this exact same background one other reasons to get a
clear on this is the choice of religious belief
is positively correlated with cultural and geographic familiarity and access
mostly Christians in America mostly Muslims in the Middle East
mostly Buddhist in Asia that generally is not what you see
when one of these is a true religion generally you see this pattern when
religion is basically a cultural assumption rather than something is true
contrast this with science there's no American science Muslim science
who decides sciences the same everywhere physics the same everywhere
there's a reason why that is because science gets to the truth I think people
see it as to the truth of things
religion doesn't really so people pick their religion based on the 1s
immediately available to them the one they're indoctrinated in and then they
go on throughout her life assuming that that's the norm against which they
should measure everything else
so if you were born in the Middle East you probably be a muscle a Christian
that sort of thing you can ask a question like mom and then would you be
just as convinced that is on mister
another reason to get a clue about this is that religious belief is negatively
correlated negatively correlated with intelligence
education and self-esteem and in the Christian delusion
Terrico alongside the studies that confirm all of these things
basically the smarter you are the less likely you are to blame
the more you know the less likely you are to believe
and the more self respect you have the less likely you are to believe
now the cat the relationships aren't strong with a strong enough
to be a warning to someone that you should actually
strive to educate yourself to know more
to be smarter and you can make yourself smarter by the way intelligence as
is learnable you should strive to do these things and strive to have more
self respect so that you can evaluate religion objectively
and not pursue religion as some sort of modification for things that you find
lacking in your cell
in addition to all that
our intuition is totally *** up
and we confirm this it was mentioned the other day hyperactive agency detection
it's actually built into our brains
we over attribute agency to things that happen in the world
I'm and i cant as a great quote in there I probably won't have time to read it I
i wish i did. I miss get over it
if you wanna learn know about this this brain module that over and over again if
I
agency the Christian delusions a great section on
talking about a lot of actual experts and cognitive science and history
religion have studied this and and it's been confirmed
but this is the way the brain normally works as we've evolved to work
so that you're you're actually prone to recognize or assume
that the conscious purpose behind things that happen so you might catch yourself
arguing with your car for example that that's the same kind of
thing that you you've grown beyond the point where you can immediately correct
that information
you can argue with your car you know there isn't really a sole operating your
***
but people who don't make that connection don't start to realize
over there isn't really a soul in my car that's basically religion
acceptance into the cards in the universe or whatever
their various other examples like this on one is that
fear-based message messages suppressed critical reflection and this has been
confirmed by psychologists
if I scare you if I say you're gonna go to hell you're gonna lose a million
dollars ur
you lose your house or something the moment I've scared you
your you're awesome actually evaluating what I say next
in terms of critical evaluation go down substantially and they've actually done
control tests really give information to someone to make an argument is someone
who hasn't scared and they make an argument to someone
with this with the fear-based message in front of it and the people in the
fear-based section believe
believe what was told them to a higher percentage in the people in control
so your brain is actually hard-wired say oh oh this is scary this is important
information it's important that I believe it
and it's the same basic problem with hyperactive agency detection
as cavemen it made more sense to Aaron
in the the direction caution if you over believe things that are
dangerous you're gonna catch all the dangerous things and you might do a few
mistakes that are dangers
or not as dangerous raise a few under detect danger
then some something dangerous gonna get so the odds of you being killed by under
detecting danger
are higher than are getting killed if you over detect dangerous so we were
designed over detect danger which means we're extremely manageable
by fear and that's actually how we've all to be the basic error that our
brains make
and you should be on the watch out for that's not just religion that can be
used
they can use this factor to manipulate you politics media
corporations everybody can do it another one as time increases confidence faster
than evidence this is a weird one
you can give you can take a control group and give them more evidence
and and start with the claim and give them increasingly not evidence and see
how how more there but their belief increases we can give someone know no
new evidence and just let them wait
amount of time and sin the longer they believe something
you may do rates and how certain there it's true the rates and how certain are
through go up
overtime even though no new evidence has been true and this is we all behave this
way our brains are still to do this that the amount of time that you believe
something is
misperceived as increasing evidence that it's true and there's no increase that
whereas increasing evidence has actually a lesser fact it hasn't affected
increases
percent certainty but its increased certainty is actually less impressive
than the time
that's completely irrational and yet that's the way the brain works you have
got to be on your
on your guard against it and others that rationalization is an autonomous
instant as I'm missus pointed out earlier
yesterday really good example that your brain makes a decision for emotional
reasons first and then
comes up with intellectual reasons to believe it now if your emotions are
well-trained
that works reasonably well and if you're reason is trained enough to be
self-critical well I better a better check that sure
then you can correct the errors that this process makes that you have to
learn to do that if you don't learn to do that your brain automatically
rationalize anything but that you want to believe so that
people who aren't train critical thinkers don't take the father
living a self-exam in life and teaching them how to question themselves and not
be sure that the instinct worked all the time
those people are gonna be highly prone to being certain that their true it
would I have always be intellectual reasons but none of those reasons for
that reason that they came to the belief and maintainable
mother's instinct a false generalization this is one thing that surprised me when
I actually read the chapters for this book
is that if you present someone with Lexie three arguments for position
and one of them is weak and the other two are strong and they can
refute the weak argument people automatically assume that they can
refute the strong arguments
so that actually adding a weak argument too strong arguments actually
worsens your case intellectually convince them that you're wrong
so it's actually counterproductive to add a week argument in
usually only meet with strong arguments and not give them a week 1
to do in our brains actually designed to do this that if we can catch a problem
with the week I can we assume that the whole through a bargain at the hospital
Vargas thrown at us
are the same type and then we can dismiss them also and it's a way of
saving time in a sense the
you don't have to turn evaluate every single piece of evidence if
one or two don't work out for you you can base with her
using easy heuristic and just reject all of them and then move on to something
else
it's irrational it but it's the way our brains evolved to work and psychologists
approver that is how our brains work
22 act against that and guard against a grim against that
another common one is confirmation bias is an eight were actually designed to
have confirmation bias to look for evidence
for things that for claims and for believes we don't look for evidence
against
quite simply even though that's the scientific method way what makes the
scientific method
contrary to common sense is that instead of looking for evidence
formally we actually design a test for something that's designed
to find evidence against her belief if there is any and that's why science
actually works so well because it works against the way we were all
to thank and it's important tour to realize that and that's another part of
skepticism in science and
effect everything we we do like I for our polymer political decisions and
everything
it's not just religion but the fact that all these things are inherent
is a very strong reason that any Christian or any
religious person has to really be extremely skeptical of their religion
and make sure that it passes test the same tests
that they apply to all other religions because they're all these different easy
reasons and it could be misled
into their world view now there's some bad news
after my love this am that psychology doesn't trump reason most of the time
knees art at the studies also discussed in the Christian delusion
face to face argument is more persuasive than in direct communications
so people come knocking on your door trying to sell the gospel to you
are more effective even if they have weaker arguments than
a book or the Internet and this has been proven it's just that the way people
work
it makes no sense but there it is miss work pointing this out
people they're very susceptible to this and
you should be aware that your settled and avoidance behavior is natural
if you have this comforting belief that you need or you think you've been
convinced that
challenging this plea for questioning as believers dangers
you engage in avoidance behavior and that means swallowing lousy arguments
rather rattling
any argument that you can you can escape with bill
and avoiding exposure top positions that means not reading our books
not going to eat this conference is not going on the Internet avoiding forums
even ones who get challenging and actually going interact with this
often run away and that's avoidance behavior it's irrational
but it's how people behave and another is
the fallacy of poisoning the well actually works it's a proven
psychological principle that if you
try target someone is immoral or the something wrong with them they're bad
person
then all their arguments can be ignored even if there they have a really solid
evidence in the Arctic point this out
so if you ever wonder why atheists have to be vilify constantly
by Christians their poisoning the well they're trying to tell people
it's a bad people there for their arguments have to be mad as well
it's a fast irrational but its psychologically
in a these are problems
nevertheless we have this out outsider tester fate we can prove it's a rational
way to go
must test your own religious claims by and text by the same standards
so I don't think the response that john Loftus is gone and he actually presented
this argument at a conference event
event evangelical philosophers and they all
responses in his chapter in this book is a response to their responses
and basically can't divide the responses and the two things to
different ways of responding one is we don't have to test our faith by the same
standards we test others
full stop hypocrisy rocks
that's one as patently a rash so that's that's like delusion rearing its ugly
head
full-on I mean you my list tattoo delusional right on your forehead if
your gonna say that
act that that's the mantra delusional person the second one is that our
religion passes the outsider test because we have all those awesome
evidence
and then of course that's what the rest in the book shows is not the case
so we've got the second leg here in court ability is not changeable by
compelling counter are
argument or proof to the contrary they claim they have a was awesome evidence
even when they they've been shown plainly that they don't or they
retreat into irrational rejections professional top
evokes talk about the last one sam Harris just came out with a book called
the moral landscape
not forthcoming when I wrote the slides it was forthcoming it's actually out now
I'll I got an advance look at this book it's pretty good book
especially if you're a fan of sam Harris I recommend it's not fully
philosophically rigorous but it's got a lot of great science at
and site you recommended and I'm of course
tough loss for who argues for his position
an hour get it II target for before he even knew I was I going for it
but I R you for using on a philosophical terminology so I'm kind of like it
I told my mind I'm how clean is Darwin or the other way around
out but one thing you point out this booking and this is what his
dissertation
as a speech thing on cognitive sciences the he talks about his dissertation work
on the study other believe as an emotion and one thing that he and other
psychologists and cognitive science
27 established so what we call police this
certainty that something is true is actually a motion it's like
you know like Mike lover Joe iran is that it's actually emotional state and
emotional valuator in the brain
we've actually located in the brain me know where physically in the brain
certainty is generated
and we know it can misfire just like all other motions can you can fall in love
with someone you really are
really isn't same person you thought they were you can be joyous for the
wrong reasons and so on
another classic example a mess at its thats a parallel to delusion
is a phobia
now phobia is an intense emotion in this case fear
triggered by an inappropriate stimulus like flying an airplane
spiders or sour things does anybody know what
fierce our things is it an actual condition
alright up by a drink for someone who comes up later
actually have a clinical name I yet so if there's people who actually deathly
afraid of sour things
it they're they're terrified now
that what makes a phobia is that there's no rational connection between emotion
or its intensity and the stimulus flying an airplane spiders and sour things
simply aren't that scary I mean really objectively nor that dangerous
so intensely fearing is a rash
and we recognize this who recognize a phobia is not irrational belief in it
something
you can say it's kinda perform a delusion and people walking easily
recognize that the problem that the if they have a phobia that they need to be
cured a
and there are ways to cure it delusion
is basically just like that delusion is an intense emotion
in this case certainty triggered by an appropriate stimulus
bizarre claims made an old book that for example there is no rational connection
between emotion or its intensity
and the stimulus the gospel simply isn't that convincing really
that's being intensely certain it's true is a rational this book intense be
believing it is a rash
so that gives us the last like a delusion consists have certainty
hell with absolute conviction
types established all three the book gives you all you need to know to
establish every single one of them
christianity is a delusion
I do some good news psychology has shown some things that we can make you sir
one is that the Morse the more that someone is forced to defend BB
over long experience time especially even in San
in short term settings the more you're forced to defend a belief the more you
have to think about it
and that that process itself can actually to us to a certain percentage
measurable percentage
counteract all the other irrational things that I was talking about earlier
so the more you can't force them to think about the weirdness of their
religion or or the lack of evidence on the challenges to it
the hot the more percentage of Christians are gonna start walking away
second for everybody but can increase the number who do walk away
and cognitive dissonance is at this disturb another disturbingly
an emotional state that's uncomfortable when you
are entertaining to believes that you really want to believe in but they
contradict each other
or there are two options that you can't you have to choose one or the other you
can't use them both
and the really important options and it makes it difficult to choose between
them
the state a cognitive dissonance feels extremely uncomfortable because
its obvious that your brain needs to make a decision and so this this
emotional discomfort is there to push you did go one way or the other
now when you're when the purpose of course make decisions kept the kind I
think Kate many did
for but now believe when belief becomes a decision whether to believe something
or not
at cognitive dissonance can actually affect can create problems for you
because you might end up with contradictory beliefs
and now you're only solution is to give up one or the other belief
accomplish some rationalization that eliminates the contradiction
know if you combined and sustain both of these you force people into cognitive
dissonance
and one thing is shown is that this darker the contradictions
the strong bigger the contradictions are the more impressive her emotionally
effective there or the start for the options
the more the cognitive dissonance works so if you can buy and sustain bow
strong cognitive dissonance creating arguments
regarding internal contradictions and their particular beliefs
and forcing and costly to defend their belief
if you combine to sustain both it's an effective d converter up
significant enough pop percentage in any population
say it's even for 10 percent per generation that gives us the win
over like a hundred years so these are the kinds of things that psychology can
help us understand
and the purpose of this book is to help you do that you can't it's a whole
talking with a lot of information you can use going out there and it also
educate you
and how to construct your world view and be aware the way your brain makes
mistakes have overcome them
has got a lot of great fun stuff in it as well
there are things that Christians and their well Christians and maybe even
Christian most Christians think you're crazy
someone that's in there but it's a good read
I would really please encourage you to buy it because it's my only source of
income right now is selling my books
so a if you if you want to support my work please buy my books
I might have to buy them back and I'll be out of money at that
making a profit or something that met my wife certainly want me to make money so
please help me up I've also written two books that are also help with this
and the address to things that you need to know when you go out armed
in amongst the Christian holes as it is
once lost many others in history and so I've written two books that are related
to this
my book on philosophy sense and goodness without God which is a complete
worldview
you don't agree with that begins United example of how to construct a complete
worldview
based on science evidence some reason rather than
years picking piecemeal or dropping some existing product
I cover epistemology morality aesthetics politics
I'm and metaphysics everything and I'm sure how it's all connected and why you
need to have a worldview to
and it's also built in this got the %ah griffey's the whole deal
so it's an extremely useful tool for going on and drink a lot of questions
and addressing
and also for building your own world in coming up with a a
well evidence coherent will you have your own even if assuming you don't
agree with that one
I P L and not the impossible faith is basically shows give you the whole
background of the origins of Christianity in terms that
by addressing these arguments that Christianity was so impossible
it could only have succeeded yes if teases really resurrected from the dead
there's a particular evangelist by the name a GP holdings to make this argument
my book is a point by point reputation and his crazy in
illogical false claims about it but in the process
you get a lot of fun yes seeing this guy get trashed but you also get educated
about
ancient sociology action religion the context thanks to Christianity and
Judaism lot of things you might not have known
an armed with that information you can you find that very useful and
dealing with Christian argument so both of these books will help you evangelize
previous
that's what you want to do do it online for example the easiest way for you to
do it
or going out personally in some way or another doing it and
or if you're not going to do it yourself it would be helpful if you could
financially support those of us who do
so that we can do the work for you either way enables them to be great
but I'd especially like to see lots of people going out and spending the mean
as it were but when you're up there trying to evangelize for atheism
don't do this but don't do that
I'm not asking you go do that I'm asking to do some more like this
and I know who this guy is probably column or her
they've got to be at least a little crazy and have a lot of time on their
hands but a
now imagine if we have people who are paid to just drive this car around an
answer the phone
yeah
so thats a my talk about the christian delusion
if we have time of we do I can take questions
where are we on our time
I snow and even paying attention to help
okay journalists do typed in the Caribbean on time
it so you mentioned on
how christians of ideas and such
in the natural other speakers say that he's being at the bottom the political
total
so obviously there's an image issue that needs to be changed or worked on
on how could someone you know help improve that image
now I'm I'm not the one to ask really there are a lot of people who are
more expert at that kind of thing and there's a there's a good talk in person
I didn't get
on video by Terry Koshan he does the religion survey that the giant when it
does not serve 800,000 random americans every 10 years
and it's a survey that showed that we double our numbers in the last twenty
years
and where he points out that a lot of things that you can do
based on what psychologists have learned but I would go online find what experts
are saying
real experts are saying about that and in general
I don't think the image problem is really the issue it's like
it's not is it gay people had to go out and convince christians that they were
nice people per se
it's just they had to be more out to the point that Christians actually we get to
know them and realize that their
they're not these horrible crazy perverted people and in fact that's what
what has been most effective apart from ridiculing the Christian Right which has
been very active
and and I have a lot to say about that I know people are
criticize the idea ridiculing religion but I think it has its uses one is used
properly
but the others just the more the Christians got to know gay people
realize that they're gay people in the family that created cognitive dissonance
you love your son
and you have this conflict here love your son and your understanding how
great his character is and the fact that he's gay
and then you have your religion saying that thats evil now
you have a lot of Christians who then shun their son reject them
but you have a percentage always a percentage that resolve the
contradiction
by rejecting the religious view and once the rejected one religious dogma there
on the road Jack
so eventually it might take a few years looking up the region legend eventually
am so that's the kind that's one kind of thing you can do
just be more hours don't don't be and I something if I think your place and
don't be a ***
an only to prom with being a *** IMEI it's more a question
don't be I mean don't encourage criminality
for example just basically demonstrate that you're good citizen
whose non-violent I'm quite frankly if you're demonstrate your good neighbor
doesn't matter how cantankerous you are
that's the key that that's the key thing that's going to change her thing
but the other thing is simply confronting the lies him even look at
how well you might ask what
how would you improve their image in Nazi Germany it with an even be a
rational
question right asa that that's the thing
it's really have to respect to confront the lies that that things are being the
Jews are subhuman
your dues aren't even remember the human species and things like that just
blatantly false
and this hitler's an atheist think this blatantly false and the more you spread
the word in the actual evidence backed other the more people see that this
claim it there's any
is actually under challenge the more percentage people have been told that
he's an atheist
are going to actually start looking into it and for when you look into it they're
gonna find out that they've been lied to
that Hitler was really a believer and Nazism was really Christian program and
so that's how you win and it's
its bite get picking off small percentages over time
have recounts the true believers and but you say to fight the lies
in public you have to get out there and prove that atheists are you know good
citizens and work for working all these things
and so yeah that would be my recommendation but there are other
specific things that could be done
experts and talk all one of things that
religious do is they recognize phone herbal populations are vulnerable people
are fine people in there too vulnerable time
their lot of people who've had an illness or injury or something like that
and the when they come through that
on they have this narrative that God wanted me to learn something from this
it's great for you to talk about up you know having a discussion at pub
and I was actual annoyed that we talked about having a discussion that pub
I heard Randy say that you know people might commit suicide if they didn't have
the religion
and I think that's cuz we're not offering them a good alternative I'm a
surgeon who does lots of cancer surgeries and frequently I have to tell
people
you have cancer we can cure it you're going to die and
there are standing by our hospital lots other
'em religious people religious pamphlets
giving people a way to deal with them message falsely
and I challenge a challenge
a challenge you guys to come up with give us some help yeah give us in
helping out when I have to talk to family and say
this person's you know you're gonna go to some bad times how can I help them
through that
give us give us a bill subsist a good example and I'm gonna answer those
questions I know what you mean
and this is for you and for anyone out there who is interested in pursuing this
or has faced the same problem works in the medical industry for example
this is exactly the kind of thing that people should be writing to Tom Flynn
the Council for secular humanism and other leaders
have major national organizations that have the resources and the networks
around the country
to implement something like Pampling like Center pamphlets that
could be made available or actual people who are
ages to counselors who could be make themselves available as volunteers is
County art tons a pastoral care people hired by the hospital's
yet and your YouTube a tough fight yeah it's a tough fight but
you could do something and and in fact once you start doing something
you might start generating enough revenue from donations are 30
turkey might over top I suggest to be a topic for the next
yes kept academia at
but one one thing one thing that's relevant to that is
a I totally agree that they need a worldview to replace can basically there
clinging to a rock and a crazy see and you have the option
telling the Lego the rockin just float freely or you can point out that there's
another rock that they can quickly jumped you
and about 10 people do that on their own the jump from one region to another one
sec to another
but we can do that as well as my books and goodness without God is designed to
do that is like this is another rocky can jump is another complete worldview
it answers questions about the meaning of life about half a step and all these
other things
and it gives advice for for the literature to read on topics as well
so at talk and talk about morality and other things a concern people so
that's why I wrote the book so that's one use for it
and seek a point that out and hopefully other
genius philosophers work grew up among UN and right other exxon books like that
disc which is actually for the
audience out here how many you actually picked up their pocketbook
for Richard here at skeptical on I would encourage
olive you to get all three of those books out there
especially those who are big fan of nailed I could literally
not have written nailed without Richard Carrier he was there from the beginning
the put be on the right track keep be of the wrong tracks
and he was the I literally could not have that book
without Richard and everything he's ever written has been
brilliant even the books it's only a part of I would read those books
you your you won't regret it at all thanks
have time for another i think is the last one a sense a good missus awesome
as you all read it
spank you if you don't I yeah other sis
argument their apologists camp because we saw always say I love you born here
you'll likely be Christian
born in rate your very likely be Muslim
and as a podcast been around said well
you wouldn't even be having that thought if you were born in a Muslim country
you have that because spar the culture here is have access the idea that
people think it's not on the list usually
yeah on what we're all kinda response would you have to that yeah
that's exactly what the response is that were raised against law office at the
evangelical Philosophical Society
he responds to it very ably and thoroughly and Christian religion
in his chapter on this so by the book yeah so by the *** yeah
my gun as a case that has been said enough by the books