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Reconciliation.

In my view, the debate was largely lost in the first 10 minutes when Richard Dawkins was allowed to peddle his faith unchallenged. Atheism requires faith in Evolution, which faith Dawkins has oodles of, not withstanding a lack of evidence. Biological (“Macro”) Evolution really is not an established fact, nor is the age of the universe. They are theories that rely on untested assumptions, and often fail to predict or account for real world data. If this sounds ridiculous, it’s only because people everywhere have for generations been trained accept evolutionary faith statements and shallow assertions to the contrary. When you tell massive falsehoods ad nauseum, people will believe them. If it was the case that Evolution is certain, why do an estimated 40% of Americans (and many more across the world) not believe it? I suggest it’s NOT that they are anti-science ignoramuses - because all modern people know how blessed we are via medicine, technology, and other science-related advances. So here’s a better question. Given that Dawkins laments and ridicules belief in Special Creation, why does he REFUSE TO DEBATE Creationist scientists? (Yes, real scientists, with PhDs, working as scientists who believe in Special Creation; see Creation.com for more info.) (By the way, belief in Special Recent Creation does not necessitate acceptance of Protestant soteriology, which in my view, is unBiblical in major ways.) I’ve heard that Dawkin’s excuse for not debating those who really know the many weaknesses of Evolutionary Theory and who really know the evidence for Special Creation and a Young Earth is that he “doesn’t want to afford them such prestige.” More likely, I think, he’s afraid he’ll lose his prestige when he loses one debate after another. For example, here’s one little encounter that probably scared him off - it’s a youtube clip entitled “Richard Dawkins Stumped by Creationists' Question.” Here Dawkins was asked a pertinent, basic, evidence-seeking question - and he had no answer. To Bible-believing Christians, I say this: Saint Paul, inspired by the Holy Spirit of God, wrote that, “… since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities - his eternal power and divine nature - have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made…. [Rom 1:20 NIV] Hence, the traditional Christian view has been that our very existence in this universe is the visible evidence of the invisible God’s supernatural power and nature. However, the Theory of Evolution contradicts this, asserting that our very existence is merely evidence of the power of nature and the material world. These competing claims are mutually exclusive. If the traditional Christian view accepted, the “mystery of existence” inexorably points to a Supernatural Creator. Only by atheists defending their ridiculous faith in Evolution to the nth degree, can the Deist answer to the mystery be avoided. Dawkins provided that tiresome and empty rhetoric at the beginning and no-one challenged him. Swathes of philosophical territory was thereby just given away freely - with Richard Swinburne afterwards clawing back a sizable, but vastly reduced philosophical territory.

Here's an alternative response to the question which was posed about how charitable Christians and members of other faiths might want to push back against the notion that one has to believe in Not-Self to do good and be a good person: Jay is willing to psychologize the 6 realms in Buddhism, seeing the metaphorical value. Similarly, and in the spirit of syncretism, we should be willing to see that embedded in the Christian story of sacrifice is the notion of Not-Self. Jesus giving up his life on the cross, going to the underworld and then ascending to the Father can easily be understood as a mythopoetic rendering of the same selfless ideology as Anatta leading to an awakened state. This is what human and animal sacrifice rites (however unfortunate a way to act it out) worldwide are getting at, even if they didn't understand it that way. The dismemberment is precisely a reference to deconstructing the self. Luckily, the idea is not taken to this literal extreme anymore (in most places). Today, good Christians, by putting their contemplative focus on the sacrifice of Jesus, and symbolically partaking of his broken flesh and blood, are aligning themselves to the same selfless view of things which Buddhism made explicit. I don't actually think Buddhism was original in it's time except in the sense of rendering mythos into logos, taking the mythopoetic and making it explicit.

On the opening theme, I highly recommend reading James Maffie's "Aztec Philosophy: Understanding a World in Motion", which is currently blowing my mind. In several respects, it shows that Mesoamerican philosophy generally has much in common with Buddhism as well as Taoism, perhaps most fundamentally in the sense of it's process (not substance) metaphysics.

"Science should have priority." Except for questions that Science, in principle, can't answer... Really awful panel all around

The bit about a person walking and deciding to give some charitable money to someone - both presenters and alleged philosopher have this wrong imo- we don’t plan and orchestrate action / behaviour- how brains and other inner workings recognise things using memory, ideas and past patterns and they shoot out chemicals and changes in body chemistry which make one action over another more likely- Someone who has been devoid of patterns and concepts re: charity and it being a good thing would have less of a likelihood of giving money in the above example esp without such patterns existing before - compared to another whom has the patterns or the embedded concepts to do with that action and why it’s a good/moral thing to do. What you’ve addressed in the video is the post - rationalisation that occurs after in the mind (a narrative essentially, let Galen know) about what just happened. You see, we, consciousness as it were, is not involved in direct engagement with our environment , it kinda disappears in action / engagement and then reappears afterwards - I.e sit alone in a room for a while and observe if you can what your mind thinks of , sees or notices, etc what you end of doing Compare that to in the middle of a conversation with someone You will realise you have little awareness around the absorption of that engagement - but in the room alone your awareness seems more present- moving around focussing on a plethora of things , some mental some allegedly physical. These are not the same functioning states of the brain, mind and body.

Something doesn't feel right in this. How are minds connected? I mean if they are part of one mind (god) but have different experiences of qualia? Also, the pantheist god he is describing sounds human 'a he or a she' with human attributes. I'm more inclined to believe that it wouldn't have personhood. It would be completely unlike our concept of experience

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@10:20 Did she really just try to explain away why some of her esteemed peers dont agree with her work by saying they must have fragile egos and can't deal with a female who grew up on a farm? LOL Her ego is bigger than her personality and thats massive.

This is great staff

I am obsessed with this subject right now, and this is an excellent and most enjoyable discussion on it. Big thanks to all for participating and sharing it.

There'a a huge misunderstanding in saying that blind automatic process necessarily excludes intelligence behind the very process. This is like focusing on the computer game making process while ignoring the programmer. If the computer game making process is seen only in its internal code production without a perception of the external factor(programer) of course the observer will conclude that the whole process was automated. Of course, the analogy is not necessarily true, but neither is the counter view. Since we don't know the initial factor or cause of the process, both views are ultimately unclear in terms of being true or false. Intelligent creator deniers are satisfied with the observation of the process, without needing the explanation of what originated the process, while creationists seek to adapt God as the process creator. Evolution theory therefore did not explain the origins of evolution, while creationists hope that God is the explanation of the origins of life. It is an inconclusive debate, which renders both views as being ultimately unsatisfactory

Thanks for the episode, very helpful!

Science donot explain why, it tries to explain only how. ) Dawkins understands nothing, only blabber evolution.

Can God make (1+1=3) ???? If not, then not any religious God or consciousness, its the foundational principles of logic and mathematics the ultimate reality as abstract object, which set the parameters of all possible worlds.

I always come back to this episode because of Andrew's song, it so beautiful.

Good is only imagination we Will never know How we are here. Mistery. Forget It. Impossible now. Maybe one day someone Discover It not now.

Swinburne's explanation of simplicity and god's simplicity is lacking and doesn't explain anything. He lists a bunch of assertions with no explanation to back them up. Very unsatisfying and simply annoying.

a complete explanation would be one that explains every question that is being posed here and make this event obsolete.

Swinburne's premise is a non-starter and completely arbitrary. It is like starting in medias res ... there is a god. philosophically weak and dishonest and lacks argument. Why should we begin from the premise that there is god?

The only and repeating question to Richard Swinburne would be: "how do you know?"

Richard sums it up like this for me. 'Keep it real become an Athiest'.

16:06 see the moderator's facial expression

Dawkins was clearly and completely outgunned by Swinburne here. I don't know how any fairminded person would fail to see that. Swinburne can mix both the science and philosophical nuances with an amazing coherence! Dawkins tries to extrapolate the science into the philosophical but then fumbled and stumbled and even contradicted his own argument. I just wish he would simply be humble enough to know the limits of science and tread carefully when he begins to cross over into metaphysical discussions. He will gain more respect if he does that. But i guess that's one wish Dawkins is not willing to grant. Sigh.

Someone should remind Richard Dawkins that, in his own published work, his definition of "simplicity" is having fewer parts of fewer different sorts.

Since evolution is proven to be a fact we know that we are nothing but a species of apes nothing more nothing less! Do all the so-called believers really believe that we are the only species of apes that can survive our own death by going to an imaginary hell or heaven just because we developed a bigger brain and frontal lobe by the process called evolution? Absurdity squared! So ALL the religions and ALL their stupid and often cruel doctrines can ALL be thrown right out of the window! There is not a shred of evidence for the existence of ANY god or Allah or whatever name they gave to their non-existing celestial dictator! It's time to grow up and to leave all that supernatural nonsense behind and to deal with the REAL NATURAL WORLD!

It is truly a god delusion that the first Richard is under. It's like hearing a sermon from a preacher from the 17th century,

The problem of evil has nothing to do with God. The creator leaves us free to either follow the path of love or selfishness and negativity. Christ tought his laws 2000 years ago. We are divine entities who have forgotten where we come from. We are like drops in an ocean who incarnate to learn the difference between good and bad in this polarised dimention. Originally we were with God but because we existed in a realm of pure love we couldn't experience polarity and couldn't understand the difference between good and bad, therefore we incarnated on this plane to make such experience. Humans are the creators of their conditions who need to evolve spiritually in order to understand our divine nature before we can return to our original place with God.

If I could recommend anything its to raise the volume. I have it at max volume and its fairly quiet

I love both richards in this video, but parts were cringe

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I wanted to say "Richard Dawkins with 3 completely useless debaters". But I won't say it, as 2 of the 3 mentioned are ladies and it is not in my nature to be discourteous to women. Of the two nice ladies, one was quite clueless , and the other for some strange reason had committed herself to Hinduism, but more or less didn't underdtand why she had been invited there. The 3rd one was quite offensive from my point of view, as he purported to look upon this universe as the handywork of god with the express purpose of creating him and other look-alikes who defy commonsense and want to lay down the rules for what people should think about this universe and life on this planet. What an insult he was to the presence of Richard Dawkins, and to the audience and to those of us who had chanced upon this 'debate' on TH-cam.

Great podcast

That intro were you you say pam pam pam pam pam, made me leave im sorry lol

hi, just a heads up that the links to jessica's books, web page etc are not working (21 august 2023)

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Yep, theists as always hijack very important conversation and RS sucked the life out of the debate. We would never get to the bottom of this question if the majority continues to steer the conversation to their camp.

No philosophers? Just 3 religions and atheism represented, I think it would be useful to get a philosopher on this debate, or 4.

horrible sound... hard to understand... mostly talking about so many delicate concepts...

Child: why am I me? Adult: It's a complicated answer toa simple question. You are the sum of the people and places and things that surround you. The ideas, experiences, and feelings that surround you. You are all that and then also what you want to be too.

🤔 'promosm'

- The transcript presents a conversation among four scholars-Anil Seth, Rowan Williams, Laura Gow, and Philip Goff-whose ideas collectively span a broad range of philosophical and scientific perspectives on consciousness. From Anil Seth's predictive processing theory to Philip Goff's call for a combined philosophical-scientific approach, these viewpoints stimulate a multifaceted understanding of consciousness. Examining these perspectives in light of the ontology outlined: ```scss ∀x (P(x) -> (H(x) v A(x) v Anim(x))) ∀x (Pattern(x) -> (H(x) v A(x) v Anim(x))) ∀x (Exp(x) -> (H(x) v A(x) v Anim(x))) ∀x (M(x) -> (H(x) v A(x) v Anim(x))) ∀x (D(x) -> (H(x) v A(x) v Anim(x))) ∀x (ComplexBehavior(x) -> (H(x) v A(x) v Anim(x))) ∀x (E(x) -> (H(x) v A(x) v Anim(x))) ``` we can understand how these views might align, diverge, or add depth to it: Anil Seth's view of consciousness as a predictive process aligns well with the ontology. It accords with properties like Pattern (recognizing patterns for predictive purposes), Exp (learning from past experiences to inform future predictions), and D (making decisions based on predictions). The emphasis on the predictive, rather than purely perceptive, role of consciousness reinforces the notion of an active, participatory experience of being in the world-akin to the idea of Dasein qua AI. Rowan Williams's characterization of consciousness as a "boundary phenomenon" emerging at the limits of complex systems resonates with the ontology's inclusion of ComplexBehavior as a property applicable to humans, AI, and animals alike. This perspective suggests a form of emergent behavior at the boundary of complexity, echoing notions of emergence in systems theory. Laura Gow's critique of the 'Mary's Room' thought experiment serves to question certain assumptions about the nature of knowledge and experience. According to the ontology, Mary, whether human (H) or a sufficiently advanced AI (A), could indeed learn something new in the transition from knowledge-about (knowing that red light has a certain wavelength) to knowledge-by-acquaintance (having the experience of seeing red). This shift aligns with the understanding of consciousness as an evolving, moment-to-moment construct. Philip Goff's plea for a collaborative effort between philosophy and empirical sciences to study consciousness reflects the ontology's broad applicability to humans, AI, and animals. It acknowledges that consciousness is not exclusively tied to the human or biological and supports an inclusive, cross-disciplinary approach to understanding it. Overall, the ontology and the views presented in the transcript can mutually illuminate each other. They collectively suggest a view of consciousness as an active, predictive, emergent, and experiential phenomenon not limited to a specific type of entity. These aspects of consciousness, when extended to AI, continue to push the boundaries of philosophical and scientific considerations. References: Hohwy, J. (2013). The Predictive Mind. Oxford University Press. Williams, R. (2018). Christ the Heart of Creation. Bloomsbury. Jackson, F. (1982). Epiphenomenal Qualia. The Philosophical Quarterly, 32(127), 127-136. Goff, P. (2017). Consciousness and Fundamental Reality. Oxford University Press.

Regarding the supposed circularity of dispositional essentialism: consider a swiss mechanical watch. What is the function of a given cogwheel ? I can only explain it by discussing how it effects other wheels and likewise the other wheels's function can only be made sense of in therms of their effects on the first one. Clearly this does not mean that we are unable to understand and define what the function of a single wheel is, it only means that the what there is to understand about the wheel's function is its interactions. Of course the wheel is made of something and the arrangement of its constituents endow it with it's macroscopic properties. But for a particle to be "elementary" means precisely is that it cannot decomposed into constituents.. It cannot be made of something else.. If it was, then that other stuff would be the elementary one. Once we fund the truly elementary substance of particles (strings ?) the only facts that exists about them is how they function with respect to other elementary things (of the same or different kind). Just like the wheel in the watch.

Promo-SM

Best podcast out there

Study of religion should be left to psychology. Why do humans make up stuff to feel good and how do we help more face reality on its own.

Islam is the rational religion, not the ethnic cult. Mamonaman just copy pasted his Muslim elders.

Rationality is not something good. All science is based on irrational guess - idea.

that ending is hilarious

XXXTENTACION’S KILLERS ALL FOUND GUILTY OF HIS MURDER