Micky Dee Solomon said the same, “there is nothing new under the sun” 2500 years ago in Ecclesiastes. It is not that these thoughts and words are unique or novel, it is that they are timely and in pursuit of the truth. At this time these things need to be said and heard.
Cray Wanderer The importance, imho, is that the role of religion and belief in our psychology and society has languished and is finally ascendant. We require belief, it is literally how our cognition functions. To disregard that is to increase suffering and negative affect unnecessarily. Many suffer from the effects of nihilism, which is brought about by a rejection of belief and a misapprehension about what science can tell us about reality in the place of faith. Yes, people have pondered this for eons, yet in this age we’d exchange all of this wisdom for the illusion of certainty. I’m impressed how many lay people, myself included, find meaning and motivation in this discourse. It is also timely and apodictic that a reaction to the current regime would arise from the collective unconscious and it is important we grapple with it honestly and in pursuit of the truth.
If you ask me, I would say that there's a divide between Bret and Sam, and Eric and Jordan. Sam and Bret exist within the realm of things that we can prove. The grounding they provide allow for a more courageous foray into new discussions. The problem with being in that space is that it prevents you from taking steps outside the line to ask deeper questions about the nature of reality. People like Jordan and Eric are much more willing to step into an uncomfortable environment in order to talk about deeper questions and allow for that space despite the uncertainty of it. Listening to Eric talk about music or the E8 lattice is almost like a sermon. I've been through Jordan's Maps of Meaning course multiple times and the questions he poses skirt the very edge of everything that we know about reality, and he hinges on a perspective that gives me goosebumps as I stand here and think about it. So, I generally believe that this entire group of IDW individuals is actually an interesting setup, because as Eric and Jordan and even Ben Shapiro take us up into the stratosphere, we have people like Brett and Sam to bring them back down to earth. Absolutely wonderful.
@@niggy730 Absolutely. Glad to see another fighter at the forefront of thought, sir, cheers. We can soar to new horizons, so long as we have weights and anchors to control our direction. 👍
You are onto something though it is strange that you would suggest that Sam and Bret are the courageous ones when they are far more grounded in the 'facts'. You say yourself that Jordan and Eric face the discomfort of uncertainty... they are the courageous creators. Facing the uncertainty of your soul, walking the tightrope over the abyss, is the most terrifying challenge
@@chakkaphak Oh no, you're spot on. Sam and Bret ALLOW for the courageous conversation. They connect their anchors to Jordan and Eric's hot air balloons. This is the dynamic that I see within the IDW. 👍
Leave Jordan out and I'm with you. He's nowhere on the level of these other intellectuals and his desire to always throw in some woo woo is distracting from real conversations.
Steve Spam, do you regard woo as speculations on sciences unanswered questions ie. how universe came into existence, how life formed, how consciousness is created etc?
I believe these long form TH-cam videos are a new way of building trust--we have lost trust in institutions such as the mainstream media, political parties and even organized religions. When we watch members of the IDW "think out loud," we get to decide whether they are trustworthy for ourselves. I for one distrust folks who appear to be just spouting pre-formed talking points. Sam Harris and Jordan Peterson seem to be honestly grappling with difficult questions and the process builds my trust in them.
When the common man finds himself perfectly able to follow the smooth and cogent speech of smart people we tend to think, oh my, how articulate. Meanwhile, other common men are thinking, holy crap, what a meaningless load of pompous bullshit. And there are some among them who have unknowingly absorbed a meme complex that colors every thought.
REDPUMPERNICKEL sure, but there's a big difference between Bret and a bunch of crap. Compare Stephen Fry and Michael Eric Dyson in the Monk debate. Fry is absolutely stunning and Dyson spews some word salad for most of his speaking time.
Honestly I have sympathy for wat Bret is saying. And I think Sams argument does fall short. I think modern apologist run short as well. But Bret is also falling short. He’s obsessed with the biological. But I think the biological eventually runs out as well because what’s contained in the biological is only an abstract rationality and a cultural pattern. However it seems like only Jordan has been able to marry the two using Jung’s dream theory. Because it doesn’t seems to be true that imbedded in our cognitive structure is a proclivity for story and narrative. And fundamentally for as long as these books have existed, they are practically the same. What Bret is trying to do is dilute reality to an abstract rationality. I don’t think it holds up. It’s funny that one of the most beautiful pieces of truth came from a movie like Jurassic Park. But the quote is, “God creates dinosaurs, God destroys dinosaurs. God creates man, man destroys God. Man creates dinosaurs. Dinosaurs eat man, women inherit the earth”(chaos inherits the earth) Do wat u will w it
Framing Jordan as a hardcore traditionalist because he draws good wisdom from myths (and also rejects aspects of them!) seems very unfair to me. As he has said many times, he believes the proper focus is on the individual. This shows with his self-authoring program that is about self-improvement, through to self-responsibility. He then supports these ideas with some mythological inspiration, specific arguments based on various other domains of knowledge, and straightforward argumentation. Jordan is not trying to turn back the clocks as any kind of primary focus. He constantly makes that point that the role of the hero is to go into the domain of the unknown and find meaning and order. This is not only because of corruption of the hierarchy, but also due to change. So Bret here is arguing against a version of Jordan that doesn't exist. The place that the debate between Jordan and Sam was left, in my view, is when Sam points out that there is a lot of outright bad in religion while admitting there is usefulness. Jordan agrees with this. What they cannot agree on is how to tell the good for the bad. So that is obviously the next step.
Kon Berner, be interested to hear Jordan’s take on Brett’s talk here. I got the impression Jordan believed religions should adapt with the times in a transcend and include like fashion and therefore would not be a bitter pill.
@Kon Berner: Harris is significantly unlike Dawkins and HItchens . . . which is what makes him a potentially interesting partner for Peterson. If their conversation were to continue, a very useful line of inquiry would be the practical consequences (individual and social) of the meditation traditions that Harris acknowledges the utility of (and which distinguishes him from Dawkins and Hitchens) . . .
Thank you for the wonderful content recently. It's very much appreciated. I can see this becoming a very large channel/platform. Fill the void Pangburn left. There is a strong desire for good conversations, venues, organization, etc.
The world is changing, always has and always will. Dr Peterson is adamant that the duty of the people is to take the best from the old myths and traditions and revivify and update them through honest speech. Surprising that Bret misses this crucial point.
For me it doesn't seem as clear cut. Peterson depicts his usual myths and stories as archetypal but I don't recall him often 'updating' them for the average person without diving into the religion territory or making it confusing (like his recent 'discovery' of the Father in the belly of the beast myth). I think Brett is reflecting that maybe?
it's especially suprising because I think there is some overlap between Peterson's position (update myths) and something Bret talked about regarding the switch from a non-zero sum situation to a zero-sum situation th-cam.com/video/LRsPsTrCvpw/w-d-xo.html&t=3300 maybe they just haven't talked to each other properly.
Im sure he didnt miss that. Likewise, he didnt miss the times that Sam pays lip service to religion. But is it just lip service at this point? I wouldnt fault Bret for getting that impression
Cain and Abel is about jealousy and resentment and how those emotions life destroying. That is timeless. Even secular ancient stories like the Trojan horse only need to be told once to stay with you for the rest of your life. It's touching something deep inside us. The issue is how do we keep the good parts of religion without having to continue to insist that it's historically true?
Tim To answer your question: you can’t. Religion acts as a kind of placebo effect. If you believe in the myths, that belief can have positive effects on your life. If you don’t believe, the illusion, and therefore the placebo effect, is broken. This is Bret’s point that Jordan has missed: the religious framework that has assisted our species well in the past is a dead end. As the myths are believed by fewer and fewer, aided by our increase in knowledge that makes belief ever more implausible, the placebo effect ceases to be effective on more and more people as you move through time.
@@Zummbot I disagree. That's why I brought up the Trojan horse. You can hear that story once, as a kid and be told its not true, and it will still stay with you the rest of your life. There is a reason its thousand of years old.
@Jared Lind I did use timeless wrong. I disagree that it's a truth only about our ancients. Jealousy and resentment are just as strong today. It's what fuels identity politics.
@@Zummbot I didn't think Bret's point was that the myths are all at a dead end. Instead, that we need new myths. Maybe one about over consuming and destroying your home (ie. climate). MLK's speech about a myth of future for our children. His speech full of the imagery of Lincoln's myth of the founding of America in the Gettysburg address. MLK was asking for a renewal of those myths for ALL Americans. It started "Five score years ago, a great American..." In the name of jealousy and resentment, our American myths are being thrown away and replaced with a new story of waring tribes that are inevitable and permanent enemies. I like MLK and Lincoln's myth better.
@Jared Lind You are right. I was only thinking about myth and religion for humans, not single celled organisms. Camille Paglia summed up Peterson quite nicely in a recent Spectaror Article: Peterson’s immense international popularity demonstrates the hunger for meaning among young people today. Defrauded of a genuine humanistic education, they are recognizing the spiritual impoverishment of their crudely politicized culture, choked with jargon, propaganda, and lies. I met Peterson and his wife Tammy a year ago when they flew to Philadelphia with a Toronto camera crew for our private dialogue at the University of the Arts. (The TH-cam video has had to date over a million and a half views.) Peterson was incontrovertibly one of the most brilliant minds I have ever encountered
@@arreca09 spiritual truths may be more significant than that fact.. which matters how to you exactly? A spiritual truth could change your life dramatically for the better, I recommend that you seek them
Bret, I think a lot of people share my feeling that your friends are very fortunate to know you. You are brilliant, courageous, and present yourself with such dignity and good will. Thank you for all you do. You are part of the hope for our collective progress. It feels like you are a personal friend--a pleasant illusion.
The audio production value of Rebel's content is so high, out of the hundreds of hours of watching and listening to Brett talking, after watching this video, this is the first time I've ever noticed his lisp.
Omg. This conversation is so simplistic yet so unbelievable true. That is, I agree with 99%, and I hope the implications are profound enough on those simplistic of minds, including myself. I write this as my poodle attempts to pull herself together - the most standard of traits.
I wish you guys had Graham Hancock discussing the implications of his work and how they affect modern philosophies and our views on elder philosophies.
One of the most important interviews you’ve done so far. Bret’s summary of the situation surrounding the relationship between religion and the new atheists is perfect. Love the analogy between Morgan’s Sphinx month and religion.
For most of my life I've heard people say that the old rules don't apply because we live in a different time.... if you look back in history people consistently said that the paradigm has changed and things are different so the old rules don't apply...each generation believes that their generation is unique and the challenges that they face are unique ...this is as old as time and creates the generation gaps that we see in each successive group...young people telling their parents that their parents just don't understand... People love to think... especially the young love to think... that they are unique in human history and that all the old rules don't apply... this is nonsense Bret... sorry but it's just nonsense...
@@KRGruner I tend to agree and if Bret would simply admit that all of his fears would be for naught if every human being could control their shadow and adhere to a judeo/ Christian moral code then we could get to a constructive conversation... He realizes like we all do that we struggle and are imperfect which is I think the reason why the great religions evolved...evolution knew that if we did not control that side of our instincts that we would destroy ourselves.... and of course I'm always irritated by his sky-is-falling prognostication coupled with his utter lack of any suggestions...
"if you look back in history people consistently said that the paradigm has changed and things are different so the old rules don't apply" I think you're wrong. In middle ages (before enlightenment), people were not saying such thing, quite the contrary.
@@jansamohyl7983 It's hard to know how many contrarians there were during a time when heresy was vigorously stamped out. Though you are probably correct in suggesting there was significantly less philosophical uncertainty among the people at large during orthodox periods
I enjoyed this short discussion. Fuller & Weinstein, thank you both for this dignified, intelligent, thoughtful conversation. As someone who believes in the 'being in the sky who meddles in affairs', I find great benefit in hearing from thinkers in other streams.
Thanks to the disturbed students at Evergreen College for plucking Bret Weinstein out of academic obscurity, and into the national spotlight. His unique perspective adds a lot to the conversation.
I am broadly sympathetic to the original New Atheist aims. But I think Bret's distillation here of the progress made in the conversation between SH and JBP is very useful.
I don’t agree w Bret, but he continues to be one of my favorite ppl to listen to in that category. Bret & Eric both make me really happy by reminding me I can enjoy conversations w ppl who think differently as long as there’s mutual respect. 😅
""We have placed our chair in the middle," your smirking says to me; "and exactly as far from dying fighters as from amused sows." That, however, is mediocrity, though it be called moderation." --Thus spoke Z ...
Weinstein makes a good point: Harris seems like he has more adjustment to make than Peterson, because he's more categorical about his position. But he's still way better than Dawkins or Hitchens . . .
The problem is that Bret Weinstein does not know what religion is and so he is ill-placed to criticize it. When he says, "there is no being in the sky who meddles in your affairs", that is the most embarrassing comment anyone can make because no Church Father, no Christian mystic has ever believed anything that nonsensical.
Brett was framing the perspective of the typical Atheist. He wasn’t saying this as his own belief, he was saying this is what modern Atheists have come to conclude, and that they are underprepared for people like Peterson. Also, plenty of the religious folk believe in a literal god in the sky and they believe in a literal heaven and hell and all that other bullshit. Don’t act like that’s a rarity, I’ll take you to any Baptist Church in my state and you’ll be shocked.
09:30 I would encourage you to watch that again, i think you may have confused his summation of the new atheist movements’ general belief, with that of his own, however that’s not the case.
You're right, but I don't think he meant that Church Fathers and Christian mystics believed that in perticular. I think he was criticizing the extremes, the fundamentalist side , the ones that in within the religious believes systems, don't understand it at all in a phylosophical way and simplify it to something only practical, thus missing the whole purpose of their believes. That is as misinformed as trying to refute that there were a real Adam and Eve... that's what new-atheist try to do and it's completely useless to their "cause". Of course there were no first 2 humans... it's a story. But new atheists have a very hard time debunking the big picture behind those stories, they're only good to tell everyone that multiplicating fishes is impossible.
Interesting discussion and distillation of arguments to date. In my own wondering I keep coming back to a question today. Our understanding of what we sense around us in this universe has increased many times in the last two or three hundred years, and I ask “how much of reality do we really understand now?”. I have no idea but I tend to believe it is still not much. How important is this debate? Thinking we actually know reality is a pretty big leap.
His deffinition of what "dillusional" means certainly panders to religiousity ^^ Just because something fullfils a function, does not mean that its core traits are not an illusion.
@@albirtarsha5370 When you recognize it as a metaphor, you're correct. But how many believers think the stories in their holy books are historically accurate and factual? I think there are a great many atheists that see religion and as delusional when treated as facts but are quite content to concede that religious stories have plenty of utility as parables.
Of all the public thinkers right now, Bret has the most similar, seemingly close to identical, perspective as mine. It helps to have taught evolution as a theory, as well as to have felt it's hand in all the living world.
This is an extraordinary interview and Bret Weinstein is superb in both his reasoning and presentation. I am not convinced however of his assessment of Peterson's view of the great importance of ancient myths arguing in effect that as societies develop and evolve that these myths can become irrelevant. Such myths tell us ultimate truths about human nature and instincts, and human behaviour; and essentially what works for the benefit of human society. These do not change at least within any time period relevant to us today. They can be ameliorated or channeled by cultural evolution, as has male aggression for example, but they do not disappear rather they remain within each individual ready to resurface at any time although perhaps in different forms. Technological change does not override human nature: it only presents a different environment for its expression. Certainly we see today the disparaging of many of the truths of the past as, for example in the attacks against the stable two parent family based on the traditional idea of marriage. Such changes are not based on experience and natural evolution(progress?): they are occurring because of the imposition of ideological beliefs from a certain segment of intellectual society, ignorant of and uncaring of consequences.
This is a very good overview of what I think is a pivotal issue in contemporary culture. I would have liked to hear BW expand at greater length on the historical boundedness of mythic stories, especially seeing as JBP has put much thought and attention into how they connect with the inner life of the individual. There is a seeming paradox with stories: the more anachronistic they are, the more meaningfully they can be "inhabited" ! This is not only true for Biblical stories, Homer and other ancient narratives, but also for the "mythic" novels of Dostoevsky, Balzac and Melville among others. who are not afraid of allegorical tales. This is because the freight of existence--the awareness that one lives in the consciousness of death, limitation and obligation--is carried forward across generations and cultures. What's more, symbolic representation is broadly cross-cultural, at least to the point of identification through exposure. The critique of "ahistoricism" which is the same as essentialism, levels by BW at JBP misses the point of the arts and has effectively hollowed out human experience when approached from a rational-materialist analytical perspective. I'd go so far as to say, that scientism is at least as responsible as the postmodernist-neomarxist amalgam for the collapse of the Humanities and the SJW's who JBP rails against are only symptoms of this. It would be great if BW, who clearly has a very powerful intellect, explored further the "academically discredited" frameworks developed by depth psychology, phenomenology and structuralism. In so doing, he could arrive at deeper possibilities inherent myth than what is allowed for within the historical framework any given myth has emerged. My hope is that the longer JBP hangs around, the more seriously his "word salad" will have to be taken.
One point of disagreement I have is the claim that such principles are not timeless. Certainly many elements are contextual, I don't dispute that. What I do believe is that some elements may be and likely are "timeless". I think that many value systems and human behaviors are actually driven by Game Theoretical principles. That is, many human behaviors and values are geared toward facilitating the Game Theory of cooperation that is essential to forming cooperative societies. So to the extent that there are behaviors and values that actually serve the Game Theory required to form such cooperative societies, that then would in fact be timeless. If Game Theory describes such behaviors and values derive from Game Theory of cooperation, then those behaviors and values are timeless as they are universal and required for forming cooperative systems irrespective of context. That is, they are driven by basic principles that are "mathematical" in nature and not contextually dependent. A simple example, at the risk of oversimplification, but for the purposes of illustration, would be "tit-for-tat" human behaviors. Game Theoretical analysis and simulation shows this to be a superior strategy for a society over "always cooperate" or "always zero-sum" strategies. So to the extent that humans exhibit "tit-for-tat" behaviors, this is a timeless behavior conducive to societies (over the other strategies) because it is logically emergent out of the principles, irrespective of context. From an evolutionary perspective, to the extent that such behaviors can emerge that are supportive of forming cooperative societies and in that cooperative societies are a "survival strategy" as being more successful than non-cooperative groups, it would be expected that such behaviors would evolve as "pre-programmed" behaviors as individuals in a gene pool exhibit such behaviors and such behaviors enable cooperative societies, and cooperative societies have a survival advantage, than that is what would evolve.
@Sebastian: Someone needs to take the blame for Integral Theory not being part of this important conversation today. And who else can we blame for that . . . but Wilber himself (?) He had a 20 year head start on it . . . and dropped the ball.
@chakkaphak: I sincerely wish that were true. But by its nature, only Wilber that had the authority to speak for Integral theory. Unfortunately, he wasted it with a lot of bad decisions . . .
15:25 "a spectrum from (...) the sacred to the shamanistic (...) the sacred (...) is so fundamental to function that one ought not tinker casually (...) the shamanistic is that which is open to interpretation, open to hunches, to following a thread and seeing where it leads" -- Brett Weinstein
According to Bret's logic, we should consider parasites and viruses to be extended phenotypes too, which probably bestow some genetic advantages, since you know, those things have been with us for longer than religion and are also pretty stable in form. Or he could quit trying to revolutionize a concept that Dawkins got right the first time.
Or, you could try listening to what he says and not overlay your bias against him, and actually end up hearing what he's discussing. The only contradictions he has with Dawkins or others overall, is basically the assumption of dementia by default of disagreement. Kind of like what you're doing. So I guess that makes sense then. Nevermind. Carry on.
@@MandrakeDCR Dawkins nailed right at the start of their discussion. Bret mentioned there was no revolutionary breakthrough since "The Selfish Gene", to which Dawkins replied, in other words "maybe that's not because there are more breakthroughs to be found, but maybe I/we actually got things right". Bret's clearly fishing for a revolution in the field. He's biased in that regard but everyone has their biases. Also I didn't have any bias against him at all, in fact when I heard this argument I was first pretty agreeable toward it until I realized it makes little sense. Never did I assume he's demented. I mean, I actually applaud his effort. Agreeing with those who have already answered the question doesn't push us forward. In his mind the chance that he's onto something is worth grasping onto. But I also know he's more than smart enough to see why he's wrong here.
There is of course the micro-biome, which is now regarded as essential to human metabolism [and wider, including psychological, health]. I've heard 90% of the cells (by number) in the human body have foreign DNA I.e. Are either parasitic or symbiotic.
The spectrum he describes at the very end between the Sacred and Shamanistic is very interesting. I'd be interested to hear him discuss this point in more detail with Peterson to see how close they are on their definition of "sacred". I suspect Bret would say that even the most "sacred" religious teaching or practice will deteriorate in its utility over darwinian time, whereas Peterson may say that the most sacred archetypes are more or less static. I do think that just as there are static ("sacred") features biologically speaking within the human population e.g, having eyes, needing water, sexual desire, shelter, food etc. so too should there be static factors in culture that relate to those static biological requirements e.g our behaviours and practices toward food, shelter, water, sexual desire etc. They may vary in their outward presentation over time, e.g fuller figured women being more desirable in the Victorian era than today but the underlying biological attraction to women is static over time. More clarity on this point between Bret and Jordan would be interesting.
Rebel Wisdom is doing a fantastic job of finding and staying upon the current bleeding edge of philosophical relevance! I totally agree with Jordan Peterson that Humanity must seek out and find transcendent values,.. the next question becomes does transcendence necessary have to include supernaturalism in order to ground it. Personally, I think not,... but it's a great question to explore. I find Daoism, along with Buddhism, and in particular Zen Buddhism, does the best job of grounding transcendent values within the mundane without having to invoke outside supernatural first causes. All of existence consists of Yin & Yang constantly striving to resolves themselves, but never being able to totally do so. It's fascinating to me that Sam Harris insists he does not believe in free will,... and yet, he insists that consciousness exists and is the first fundamental primary of our existence. The material determinist processes that can't give rise to free will, by principle,... emphatically do give rise to consciousness?! One is impossible but the other must be true. Humanity does not have free will but we have moral responsibility for the consequences of our actions?! Just how is it that mere material computation give rises to subjective experiences? Why is it that all forms of animal life demonstrate having the qualities of self-will and self-regard,... but no machine or combination of computers have these qualities at all? *_There is no significant example in history, before our time, of a society successfully maintaining moral life without the aid of religion. France, the United States, and some other nations have divorced their governments from all churches, but they have had the help of religion in keeping social order. Only a few Communist states have not merely dissociated themselves from religion but have repudiated its aid; and perhaps the apparent and provisional success of this experiment in Russia owes much to the temporary acceptance of Communism as the religion (or, as skeptics would say, the opium) of the people, replacing the church as the vendor of comfort and hope. If the socialist regime should fail in its efforts to destroy relative poverty among the masses, this new religion may lose its fervor and efficacy, and the state may wink at the restoration of supernatural beliefs as an aid in quieting discontent. “As long as there is poverty there will be gods.”_* ~ Will Durant *_If by God we mean not the creative vitality of nature but a supreme being intelligent and benevolent, the answer must be a reluctant negative. Like other departments of biology, history remains at bottom a natural selection of the fittest individuals and groups in a struggle wherein goodness receives no favors, misfortunes abound, and the final test is the ability to survive. Add to the crimes, wars, and cruelties of man the earthquakes, storms, tornadoes, pestilences, tidal waves, and other “acts of God” that periodically desolate human and animal life, and the total evidence suggests either a blind or an impartial fatality, with incidental and apparently haphazard scenes to which we subjectively ascribe order, splendor, beauty, or sublimity. If history supports any theology this would be a dualism like the Zoroastrian or Manichaean: a good spirit and an evil spirit battling for control of the universe and men’s souls. These faiths and Christianity (which is essentially Manichaean) assured their followers that the good spirit would win in the end; but of this consummation history offers no guarantee. Nature and history do not agree with our conceptions of good and bad; they define good as that which survives, and bad as that which goes under; and the universe has no prejudice in favor of Christ as against Genghis Khan._* ~ Will Durant *_To the unhappy, the suffering, the bereaved, the old, it has brought supernatural comforts valued by millions of souls as more precious than any natural aid. It has helped parents and teachers to discipline the young. It has conferred meaning and dignity upon the lowliest existence, and through its sacraments has made for stability by transforming human covenants into solemn relationships with God. It has kept the poor (said Napoleon) from murdering the rich. For since the natural inequality of men dooms many of us to poverty or defeat, some supernatural hope may be the sole alternative to despair. Destroy that hope, and class war is intensified. Heaven and utopia are buckets in a well: when one goes down the other goes up; when religion declines Communism grows._* ~ Will Durant *_While Catholics were murdering Protestants in France, and Protestants, under Elizabeth, were murdering Catholics in England, and the Inquisition was killing and robbing Jews in Spain, and Bruno was being burned at the stake in Italy, Akbar invited the representatives of all the religions in his empire to a conference, pledged them to peace, issued edicts of toleration for every cult and creed, and, as evidence of his own neutrality, married wives from the Brahman, Buddhist, and Mohammedan faiths. His greatest pleasure, after the fires of youth had cooled, was in the free discussion of religious beliefs. … The King took no stock in revelations, and would accept nothing that could not justify itself with science and philosophy. It was not unusual for him to gather friends and prelates of various sects together, and discuss religion with them from Thursday evening to Friday noon. When the Moslem mullahs and the Christian priests quarreled he reproved them both, saying that God should be worshiped through the intellect, and not by a blind adherence to supposed revelations. "Each person," he said, in the spirit - and perhaps through the influence - of the Upanishads and Kabir, "according to his condition gives the Supreme Being a name; but in reality to name the Unknowable is vain._* ~ Will Durant *_The invention and spread of contraceptives is the proximate cause of our changing morals. The old moral code restricted sexual experience to marriage, because copulation could not be effectively separated from parentage, and parentage could be made responsible only through marriage. But to-day the dissociation of sex from reproduction has created a situation unforeseen by our fathers. All the relations of men and women are being changed by this one factor; and the moral code of the future will have to take account of these new facilities which invention has placed at the service of ancient desires._* ~ Will Durant *_I feel for all faiths the warm sympathy of one who has come to learn that even the trust in reason is a precarious faith, and that we are all fragments of darkness groping for the sun._* ~ Will Durant *_Education is a progressive discovery of our own ignorance._* ~ Will Durant *_Neurosis is always a substitute for legitimate suffering._* ~ Carl Jung, 1938 _Psychology and Religion_ *_Filling the conscious mind with ideal conceptions is a characteristic of Western theosophy, but not the confrontation with the shadow and the world of darkness. One does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light, but by making the darkness conscious._* ~Carl Jung; _The Philosophical Tree;_ CW 13: Alchemical Studies. P.335 *_People don't have ideas. Ideas have people._* ~ Carl Jung *_As a child I felt myself to be alone, and I am still, because I know things and must hint at things which others apparently know nothing of, and for the most part do not want to know. Loneliness does not come from having no people about one, but from being unable to communicate the things that seem important to oneself, or from holding certain views which others find inadmissible._* ~ Carl Jung *_The most terrifying thing is to accept oneself completely._* ~ Carl Jung
I am a Jew living in Israel and with my People there are Atheists and Religious groups. but the majority are Traditionalists (like me). We accept the being of god and follow the traditions of the Jewish culture. Because we feel very Jewish we do not see how following the orthodocs religius practice is the will of god. We believe that his will for us is to live in Israel and to strive continuasly to be better people.
I like how "we have now phones and electric cars" somehow will affect ideas of "being good, telling the truths and not to kill each other" but somehow behind abstractions it sounds like we need to get rid of most of it because it doesn't make sense to us how it works. Each day we find out something new that changes science we don't through it all of are we?
A VERY interesting commentary from Mr. Weinstein. Thank you for posting this video for us. Of course, one could add to it: the fact that someone is articulate doesn't mean they are right.
What I noticed was JBP helped advance a debate that had gotten stale, and it's become fun again in the sense that as an atheist, I get to have my worldview challenged in an honest way; and I think the same goes for religious folks (Christians in particular).
The debates devolved into Peterson slipping into the meta-semantics of defining truth. It was like watching one boxer run around the ring refusing to fight. Furthermore, nobody is disputing that religion serves a purpose. Sam Harris spends 80% of his time trying to teach the benefits of spirituality and practices, without the myth and dogma, in order to help people fill the void in the absence of faith.
indeed that time is different now and then, but i would argue that human itself have not change much. we still face a lot of same problem we face before, whether they come from our biology or society.
"We must respect the other fellow's religion, but only in the sense and to the extent that we respect his theory that his wife is beautiful and his children smart." --H.L. Mencken
I think the missing link in Jordan's arguments is the need for a living prophet. Instead of looking at the myths/legends of the past and trying to make them fit to our circumstances today, we need to have the same type of person, a prophet, that provided the myths/legends of the past. That person could reinforce, clarify where needed, and offer new insights into the particulars of modern society. There is such a person.
Bret had commented at the beginning of the first one of these discussions in Vancouver how history could be made but it might go badly as history sometimes can, etc. He said things could get more muddled and might not get better. I thought he was just being thorough, careful but wow. As an observer with great interest, I am sadly left totally wondering how in the world no one stood up to Sam's talk of all people of religion as if they were all like the extremists of religion that often are also heretics of their religion. Sam, as a moral philosopher with such an amazing platform and opportunity, instead of promoting good with that, brings divisiveness and ironically elevates all people of religious faith that believe in a "live and let live" mentality, above his own. What was worse, he should have been shot down in that or asked to explain his rationale for such negative talk that seems to continue on into the latter debates as well. Using extremists or obviously evil actions that cause people to lose life and limb isn't sufficient rationale to tossing out the whole. Then, people that are supposed to be against that sort of thing, are left wondering at the "opposing" side that in reality doesn't really oppose this too much at all when all is said and done. In fact, Jordan's opposition really just fueled Sam's seeming need to put down all people of religious belief. I enjoy a lot of Peterson but he isn't what Sam is really against, and is moving the whole scale or bar much farther to the side Sam is on, and no progress is being made and only regress. It is a much more moral stance in a world full of people that disagree on matters of faith, to encourage a coexistence, or a live and let live mentality. This isn't even hard and protects all people from such divisiveness. It is such a weak stance also from someone that wants so badly to come off as strong, moral and that has a better way. If this is among "the best", we are in real trouble. This is part of my takeaway. Yikes people.
There are fundamental principles that have always existed and apply equally to science and theology. They are timeless and immutable. The closer we get to identifying these principles, the more likely we are to reach agreement on what seems to be two very different perspectives.
I think I disagree with Brett on this, human beings evolutionarily speaking are pretty much the same today as they were 2000 years ago and more ,so the archetypes still stand to guide us how we are to interact with one another and the world around us. And morality that’s important for human piece has nothing to do with logic and reason, whats logical or Rational isn’t necessarily what is moral, that’s one of the dangers I find with the new atheists which I do agree with Brett on .
"what's logical or rational isn’t necessarily what's moral" If a claim regarding morality isn't logical or rational, how are you supposed to convince people (including yourself) of it without religious indoctrination? Why would you believe anything that isn't logical or rational?
I disagree that mythologies aren’t timeless. Just because we don’t live in a world that is anything like 2000 years ago doesn’t mean that the world our descendants live in 2000 years from now will be anything like the present, it may even be more like the past.
I have to say, the comments here make for entertaining reading. I'm not sure we could survive a night out in the pub together, without at least one brawl in the car park after, but it sure is refreshing to know you lot are out there and concerned about these issues. I work in a brain dead egg carton - very hard to find anyone who can formulate or understand these ideas in day to day life.
![[MV] A leap of faith...ความเชื่อใจครั้งสุดท้าย (From "Petrichor the series")](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/U1piZH2CNXA/mqdefault.jpg)
Please pick up where Pangburn left off Rebel. These guys need a good platform to get together on.
I support this.
Sure, without Sam though.. Well, if it brings his followers I suppose he can be invited
chakkaphak hi my name is Jeff
Yes, I was thinking this too.
Not sure I like the name rebel seems as if it's unnecessarily placed as a outsider, even though most it's contributers are main stream academically.
Brett is a marvel; he speaks with immense clarity and humility
Has his own channel now, Darkhorse, hope you have found it.
Yes
These are some of the most important discussions going on anywhere right now. Thanks Rebel Wisdom.
Yes thanks.
th-cam.com/channels/VRwDECjLoQJgoA-TNbuBCQ.html
Neil Patton these are really not. None of their thoughts are original in any ways. It’s just easier to listen to this than to read a philosophy book.
Micky Dee Solomon said the same, “there is nothing new under the sun” 2500 years ago in Ecclesiastes. It is not that these thoughts and words are unique or novel, it is that they are timely and in pursuit of the truth. At this time these things need to be said and heard.
Cray Wanderer The importance, imho, is that the role of religion and belief in our psychology and society has languished and is finally ascendant. We require belief, it is literally how our cognition functions. To disregard that is to increase suffering and negative affect unnecessarily. Many suffer from the effects of nihilism, which is brought about by a rejection of belief and a misapprehension about what science can tell us about reality in the place of faith. Yes, people have pondered this for eons, yet in this age we’d exchange all of this wisdom for the illusion of certainty. I’m impressed how many lay people, myself included, find meaning and motivation in this discourse. It is also timely and apodictic that a reaction to the current regime would arise from the collective unconscious and it is important we grapple with it honestly and in pursuit of the truth.
If you ask me, I would say that there's a divide between Bret and Sam, and Eric and Jordan.
Sam and Bret exist within the realm of things that we can prove. The grounding they provide allow for a more courageous foray into new discussions.
The problem with being in that space is that it prevents you from taking steps outside the line to ask deeper questions about the nature of reality.
People like Jordan and Eric are much more willing to step into an uncomfortable environment in order to talk about deeper questions and allow for that space despite the uncertainty of it.
Listening to Eric talk about music or the E8 lattice is almost like a sermon.
I've been through Jordan's Maps of Meaning course multiple times and the questions he poses skirt the very edge of everything that we know about reality, and he hinges on a perspective that gives me goosebumps as I stand here and think about it.
So, I generally believe that this entire group of IDW individuals is actually an interesting setup, because as Eric and Jordan and even Ben Shapiro take us up into the stratosphere, we have people like Brett and Sam to bring them back down to earth. Absolutely wonderful.
Great comment, I like the way you think. Actually gave me a bit of insight and helped me categorize them. Well done
@@niggy730 Absolutely. Glad to see another fighter at the forefront of thought, sir, cheers. We can soar to new horizons, so long as we have weights and anchors to control our direction. 👍
You are onto something though it is strange that you would suggest that Sam and Bret are the courageous ones when they are far more grounded in the 'facts'. You say yourself that Jordan and Eric face the discomfort of uncertainty... they are the courageous creators. Facing the uncertainty of your soul, walking the tightrope over the abyss, is the most terrifying challenge
@@chakkaphak Oh no, you're spot on. Sam and Bret ALLOW for the courageous conversation. They connect their anchors to Jordan and Eric's hot air balloons. This is the dynamic that I see within the IDW. 👍
@@flowstategmng I'm glad that you feel that way and admire your expression of it then friend
Bret Weinstein is fascinating. So clear-headed. Thank you.
would like to see Brett, Jordan and Jonathan Haidt conversation.
Would be too polite. Haidt can debate Ezra Klein. You need to accept the unacceptable to do that...
Spinnaker TheGreat, why do you think that?
I’m frothing at the mouth for this conversation...
Leave Jordan out and I'm with you. He's nowhere on the level of these other intellectuals and his desire to always throw in some woo woo is distracting from real conversations.
Steve Spam, do you regard woo as speculations on sciences unanswered questions ie. how universe came into existence, how life formed, how consciousness is created etc?
I believe these long form TH-cam videos are a new way of building trust--we have lost trust in institutions such as the mainstream media, political parties and even organized religions. When we watch members of the IDW "think out loud," we get to decide whether they are trustworthy for ourselves.
I for one distrust folks who appear to be just spouting pre-formed talking points. Sam Harris and Jordan Peterson seem to be honestly grappling with difficult questions and the process builds my trust in them.
He's so damn articulate
@@brando3342 Obama was really popular too
Articulate!! You wouldn’t say that if he was white!!
When the common man finds himself perfectly able to follow the smooth and cogent speech of smart people we tend to think, oh my, how articulate. Meanwhile, other common men are thinking, holy crap, what a meaningless load of pompous bullshit. And there are some among them who have unknowingly absorbed a meme complex that colors every thought.
REDPUMPERNICKEL sure, but there's a big difference between Bret and a bunch of crap. Compare Stephen Fry and Michael Eric Dyson in the Monk debate. Fry is absolutely stunning and Dyson spews some word salad for most of his speaking time.
Honestly I have sympathy for wat Bret is saying. And I think Sams argument does fall short. I think modern apologist run short as well. But Bret is also falling short. He’s obsessed with the biological. But I think the biological eventually runs out as well because what’s contained in the biological is only an abstract rationality and a cultural pattern. However it seems like only Jordan has been able to marry the two using Jung’s dream theory. Because it doesn’t seems to be true that imbedded in our cognitive structure is a proclivity for story and narrative. And fundamentally for as long as these books have existed, they are practically the same. What Bret is trying to do is dilute reality to an abstract rationality. I don’t think it holds up. It’s funny that one of the most beautiful pieces of truth came from a movie like Jurassic Park. But the quote is, “God creates dinosaurs, God destroys dinosaurs. God creates man, man destroys God. Man creates dinosaurs. Dinosaurs eat man, women inherit the earth”(chaos inherits the earth)
Do wat u will w it
Framing Jordan as a hardcore traditionalist because he draws good wisdom from myths (and also rejects aspects of them!) seems very unfair to me. As he has said many times, he believes the proper focus is on the individual. This shows with his self-authoring program that is about self-improvement, through to self-responsibility. He then supports these ideas with some mythological inspiration, specific arguments based on various other domains of knowledge, and straightforward argumentation.
Jordan is not trying to turn back the clocks as any kind of primary focus. He constantly makes that point that the role of the hero is to go into the domain of the unknown and find meaning and order. This is not only because of corruption of the hierarchy, but also due to change. So Bret here is arguing against a version of Jordan that doesn't exist.
The place that the debate between Jordan and Sam was left, in my view, is when Sam points out that there is a lot of outright bad in religion while admitting there is usefulness. Jordan agrees with this. What they cannot agree on is how to tell the good for the bad. So that is obviously the next step.
Kon Berner, be interested to hear Jordan’s take on Brett’s talk here. I got the impression Jordan believed religions should adapt with the times in a transcend and include like fashion and therefore would not be a bitter pill.
@Kon Berner: Harris is significantly unlike Dawkins and HItchens . . . which is what makes him a potentially interesting partner for Peterson. If their conversation were to continue, a very useful line of inquiry would be the practical consequences (individual and social) of the meditation traditions that Harris acknowledges the utility of (and which distinguishes him from Dawkins and Hitchens) . . .
@@QED_ I think you unintentionally made a dove into a hawk.. it's Dawkins not Hawkins. :-)
Well, he did say that Jordan is the mix of the new and the old, that precisely makes him hard to pin down.
@Jan Samohýl: Yes, thanks. I guess the prospect of the alliteration was just too much for me (Harris, Hawkins, and Hitchens . . . ).
Thank you for the wonderful content recently. It's very much appreciated. I can see this becoming a very large channel/platform. Fill the void Pangburn left. There is a strong desire for good conversations, venues, organization, etc.
The world is changing, always has and always will. Dr Peterson is adamant that the duty of the people is to take the best from the old myths and traditions and revivify and update them through honest speech. Surprising that Bret misses this crucial point.
Exactly.
“That’s the story of Pinocchio, Bucko.”
For me it doesn't seem as clear cut. Peterson depicts his usual myths and stories as archetypal but I don't recall him often 'updating' them for the average person without diving into the religion territory or making it confusing (like his recent 'discovery' of the Father in the belly of the beast myth). I think Brett is reflecting that maybe?
it's especially suprising because I think there is some overlap between Peterson's position (update myths) and something Bret talked about regarding the switch from a non-zero sum situation to a zero-sum situation th-cam.com/video/LRsPsTrCvpw/w-d-xo.html&t=3300
maybe they just haven't talked to each other properly.
Im sure he didnt miss that. Likewise, he didnt miss the times that Sam pays lip service to religion. But is it just lip service at this point? I wouldnt fault Bret for getting that impression
in today's world hearing people like Bret, Jordan, Sam etc simply soothes my soul - thanks for posting
I'm a Sam Harris fan boi, but Bret is my new spirit animal.
Cain and Abel is about jealousy and resentment and how those emotions life destroying. That is timeless.
Even secular ancient stories like the Trojan horse only need to be told once to stay with you for the rest of your life. It's touching something deep inside us.
The issue is how do we keep the good parts of religion without having to continue to insist that it's historically true?
Tim To answer your question: you can’t. Religion acts as a kind of placebo effect. If you believe in the myths, that belief can have positive effects on your life. If you don’t believe, the illusion, and therefore the placebo effect, is broken. This is Bret’s point that Jordan has missed: the religious framework that has assisted our species well in the past is a dead end. As the myths are believed by fewer and fewer, aided by our increase in knowledge that makes belief ever more implausible, the placebo effect ceases to be effective on more and more people as you move through time.
@@Zummbot I disagree. That's why I brought up the Trojan horse. You can hear that story once, as a kid and be told its not true, and it will still stay with you the rest of your life.
There is a reason its thousand of years old.
@Jared Lind I did use timeless wrong. I disagree that it's a truth only about our ancients. Jealousy and resentment are just as strong today. It's what fuels identity politics.
@@Zummbot I didn't think Bret's point was that the myths are all at a dead end. Instead, that we need new myths. Maybe one about over consuming and destroying your home (ie. climate).
MLK's speech about a myth of future for our children. His speech full of the imagery of Lincoln's myth of the founding of America in the Gettysburg address. MLK was asking for a renewal of those myths for ALL Americans. It started "Five score years ago, a great American..."
In the name of jealousy and resentment, our American myths are being thrown away and replaced with a new story of waring tribes that are inevitable and permanent enemies.
I like MLK and Lincoln's myth better.
@Jared Lind You are right. I was only thinking about myth and religion for humans, not single celled organisms.
Camille Paglia summed up Peterson quite nicely in a recent Spectaror Article:
Peterson’s immense international popularity demonstrates the hunger for meaning among young people today. Defrauded of a genuine humanistic education, they are recognizing the spiritual impoverishment of their crudely politicized culture, choked with jargon, propaganda, and lies.
I met Peterson and his wife Tammy a year ago when they flew to Philadelphia with a Toronto camera crew for our private dialogue at the University of the Arts. (The TH-cam video has had to date over a million and a half views.) Peterson was incontrovertibly one of the most brilliant minds I have ever encountered
Loving these!
Learn from the past, participate in the present, and welcome the future.
well said
sure, let's learn from people who didn't know the earth orbits around the sun.
@@arreca09 Because they knew it was flat.
@@arreca09 The Universe of Femtards and Flatards has no Balls.
@@arreca09 spiritual truths may be more significant than that fact.. which matters how to you exactly? A spiritual truth could change your life dramatically for the better, I recommend that you seek them
Thanks. GREAT VIDEO
Adam be mine!
Bret has such an ability to see both sides with clarity. A joy to listen to.
I disagree: Weinstein seems more like 60% toward Peterson and 40% towards Harris . . . and not mid point.
That would be taking sides.
I agree. He does not want to take sides, and wants to credit both for their contribution to the current debate.
Yeah...I think so too
Don't ever take a fence down until you know why it was put up. GKC?
I didn't have my glasses on when this video started and I was very curious why Sam Harris and Jordan Peterson were discussing Rebel Wilson.
Bret, I think a lot of people share my feeling that your friends are very fortunate to know you. You are brilliant, courageous, and present yourself with such dignity and good will. Thank you for all you do. You are part of the hope for our collective progress. It feels like you are a personal friend--a pleasant illusion.
Brett carefully addresses the questions, giving them the respect they deserve. Enjoyed this.
Wonderful interviews. I am enjoying them so much!!
The audio production value of Rebel's content is so high, out of the hundreds of hours of watching and listening to Brett talking, after watching this video, this is the first time I've ever noticed his lisp.
The warmth between these two men is palpable.
I support what you're doing, mate. Subbed on Patreon. Heck yeah.
Omg. This conversation is so simplistic yet so unbelievable true. That is, I agree with 99%, and I hope the implications are profound enough on those simplistic of minds, including myself. I write this as my poodle attempts to pull herself together - the most standard of traits.
I wish you guys had Graham Hancock discussing the implications of his work and how they affect modern philosophies and our views on elder philosophies.
One of the most important interviews you’ve done so far. Bret’s summary of the situation surrounding the relationship between religion and the new atheists is perfect. Love the analogy between Morgan’s Sphinx month and religion.
digging that Eames chair in the corner...along with Bret's thoughts, of course.
Thanks guys. Hope to see the recent QandA soon
For most of my life I've heard people say that the old rules don't apply because we live in a different time.... if you look back in history people consistently said that the paradigm has changed and things are different so the old rules don't apply...each generation believes that their generation is unique and the challenges that they face are unique ...this is as old as time and creates the generation gaps that we see in each successive group...young people telling their parents that their parents just don't understand... People love to think... especially the young love to think... that they are unique in human history and that all the old rules don't apply... this is nonsense Bret... sorry but it's just nonsense...
@@KRGruner I tend to agree and if Bret would simply admit that all of his fears would be for naught if every human being could control their shadow and adhere to a judeo/ Christian moral code then we could get to a constructive conversation... He realizes like we all do that we struggle and are imperfect which is I think the reason why the great religions evolved...evolution knew that if we did not control that side of our instincts that we would destroy ourselves.... and of course I'm always irritated by his sky-is-falling prognostication coupled with his utter lack of any suggestions...
"if you look back in history people consistently said that the paradigm has changed and things are different so the old rules don't apply"
I think you're wrong. In middle ages (before enlightenment), people were not saying such thing, quite the contrary.
@@jansamohyl7983 It's hard to know how many contrarians there were during a time when heresy was vigorously stamped out. Though you are probably correct in suggesting there was significantly less philosophical uncertainty among the people at large during orthodox periods
He talks as if he's outside of time, outside of context, outside of the processes he says are governing.
In the distant past, almost nothing changed. Change is a relatively recent phenomenon and is exponential.
"Delusional" and "maladaptive" are different things, Bret. And I think you are perfectly aware of this.
I enjoyed this short discussion. Fuller & Weinstein, thank you both for this dignified, intelligent, thoughtful conversation. As someone who believes in the 'being in the sky who meddles in affairs', I find great benefit in hearing from thinkers in other streams.
Thanks to the disturbed students at Evergreen College for plucking Bret Weinstein out of academic obscurity, and into the national spotlight. His unique perspective adds a lot to the conversation.
our circumstances have changed but can we? What if our drives/archetypes are too deep to rewrite? Perhaps we should embrace them and work with them?
Bret is something special. Love this guy!
I am broadly sympathetic to the original New Atheist aims. But I think Bret's distillation here of the progress made in the conversation between SH and JBP is very useful.
I don’t agree w Bret, but he continues to be one of my favorite ppl to listen to in that category. Bret & Eric both make me really happy by reminding me I can enjoy conversations w ppl who think differently as long as there’s mutual respect. 😅
Brett's eyebrows are absolutely fascinating
I would like to see a debate between Jordan Peterson, Bill Maher, weinstien brothers, San Harris, Ben Shapiro, Steven Pinker, and Joe Rogan.
Very nice. Thanks.
""We have placed our chair in the middle," your smirking says to me; "and exactly as far from dying fighters as from amused sows." That, however, is mediocrity, though it be called moderation." --Thus spoke Z ...
Weinstein makes a good point: Harris seems like he has more adjustment to make than Peterson, because he's more categorical about his position. But he's still way better than Dawkins or Hitchens . . .
Hitchens stopped being a Marxist long before his death. Not that I think that particularly bears on what he had to say about religion.
Yeah, only religious morons would call Dawkins dumb. Disagree with him all you want, but the man is a genius and important scientific figure.
Great summary. Very helpful.
The problem is that Bret Weinstein does not know what religion is and so he is ill-placed to criticize it. When he says, "there is no being in the sky who meddles in your affairs", that is the most embarrassing comment anyone can make because no Church Father, no Christian mystic has ever believed anything that nonsensical.
Don't the Mormons think God is an actual man living on another planet?
I think everyone understands what is meant by the "man in the sky" phrase.
Brett was framing the perspective of the typical Atheist. He wasn’t saying this as his own belief, he was saying this is what modern Atheists have come to conclude, and that they are underprepared for people like Peterson.
Also, plenty of the religious folk believe in a literal god in the sky and they believe in a literal heaven and hell and all that other bullshit. Don’t act like that’s a rarity, I’ll take you to any Baptist Church in my state and you’ll be shocked.
09:30 I would encourage you to watch that again, i think you may have confused his summation of the new atheist movements’ general belief, with that of his own, however that’s not the case.
You're right, but I don't think he meant that Church Fathers and Christian mystics believed that in perticular. I think he was criticizing the extremes, the fundamentalist side , the ones that in within the religious believes systems, don't understand it at all in a phylosophical way and simplify it to something only practical, thus missing the whole purpose of their believes.
That is as misinformed as trying to refute that there were a real Adam and Eve... that's what new-atheist try to do and it's completely useless to their "cause". Of course there were no first 2 humans... it's a story. But new atheists have a very hard time debunking the big picture behind those stories, they're only good to tell everyone that multiplicating fishes is impossible.
You are obviously, factually wrong. Don't confuse your opinions with those of others.
Interesting discussion and distillation of arguments to date. In my own wondering I keep coming back to a question today. Our understanding of what we sense around us in this universe has increased many times in the last two or three hundred years, and I ask “how much of reality do we really understand now?”. I have no idea but I tend to believe it is still not much. How important is this debate? Thinking we actually know reality is a pretty big leap.
Have you watched Don Hoffman's TEDx talk? If not, buckle up Dorothy...
Great interview...holy crap
What a speaker and what a thinker.
If Bret Weinstein wrote a book covering what was discussed in this interview it'd be an instant best seller.
so very thoughtful
Human nature is timeless.
His deffinition of what "dillusional" means certainly panders to religiousity ^^ Just because something fullfils a function, does not mean that its core traits are not an illusion.
Embracing an illusion for a purpose of utility as a metaphor is not a delusion.
@@albirtarsha5370 When you recognize it as a metaphor, you're correct. But how many believers think the stories in their holy books are historically accurate and factual? I think there are a great many atheists that see religion and as delusional when treated as facts but are quite content to concede that religious stories have plenty of utility as parables.
Of all the public thinkers right now, Bret has the most similar, seemingly close to identical, perspective as mine. It helps to have taught evolution as a theory, as well as to have felt it's hand in all the living world.
When asked if he was an atheist, Brett should of said “No...I’m a Naturalist” nice and to the point
"Evolution adapts us to the environment of our ancestors", absolutely right. This is key I think.
Great interview.
Excellent commentary.
"Evolution is essentially conservative, it builds on what came before"
Not really, conservatism doesn’t seek to build on what came before, it seeks to return to what came before.
This is so so good
This is an extraordinary interview and Bret Weinstein is superb in both his reasoning and presentation. I am not convinced however of his assessment of Peterson's view of the great importance of ancient myths arguing in effect that as societies develop and evolve that these myths can become irrelevant. Such myths tell us ultimate truths about human nature and instincts, and human behaviour; and essentially what works for the benefit of human society. These do not change at least within any time period relevant to us today. They can be ameliorated or channeled by cultural evolution, as has male aggression for example, but they do not disappear rather they remain within each individual ready to resurface at any time although perhaps in different forms. Technological change does not override human nature: it only presents a different environment for its expression. Certainly we see today the disparaging of many of the truths of the past as, for example in the attacks against the stable two parent family based on the traditional idea of marriage. Such changes are not based on experience and natural evolution(progress?): they are occurring because of the imposition of ideological beliefs from a certain segment of intellectual society, ignorant of and uncaring of consequences.
This is a very good overview of what I think is a pivotal issue in contemporary culture. I would have liked to hear BW expand at greater length on the historical boundedness of mythic stories, especially seeing as JBP has put much thought and attention into how they connect with the inner life of the individual.
There is a seeming paradox with stories: the more anachronistic they are, the more meaningfully they can be "inhabited" ! This is not only true for Biblical stories, Homer and other ancient narratives, but also for the "mythic" novels of Dostoevsky, Balzac and Melville among others. who are not afraid of allegorical tales. This is because the freight of existence--the awareness that one lives in the consciousness of death, limitation and obligation--is carried forward across generations and cultures. What's more, symbolic representation is broadly cross-cultural, at least to the point of identification through exposure.
The critique of "ahistoricism" which is the same as essentialism, levels by BW at JBP misses the point of the arts and has effectively hollowed out human experience when approached from a rational-materialist analytical perspective. I'd go so far as to say, that scientism is at least as responsible as the postmodernist-neomarxist amalgam for the collapse of the Humanities and the SJW's who JBP rails against are only symptoms of this. It would be great if BW, who clearly has a very powerful intellect, explored further the "academically discredited" frameworks developed by depth psychology, phenomenology and structuralism. In so doing, he could arrive at deeper possibilities inherent myth than what is allowed for within the historical framework any given myth has emerged.
My hope is that the longer JBP hangs around, the more seriously his "word salad" will have to be taken.
would love to see Bret discuss "The Revolutionary Phenotype" with Gariepy
One point of disagreement I have is the claim that such principles are not timeless. Certainly many elements are contextual, I don't dispute that. What I do believe is that some elements may be and likely are "timeless".
I think that many value systems and human behaviors are actually driven by Game Theoretical principles. That is, many human behaviors and values are geared toward facilitating the Game Theory of cooperation that is essential to forming cooperative societies. So to the extent that there are behaviors and values that actually serve the Game Theory required to form such cooperative societies, that then would in fact be timeless. If Game Theory describes such behaviors and values derive from Game Theory of cooperation, then those behaviors and values are timeless as they are universal and required for forming cooperative systems irrespective of context. That is, they are driven by basic principles that are "mathematical" in nature and not contextually dependent.
A simple example, at the risk of oversimplification, but for the purposes of illustration, would be "tit-for-tat" human behaviors. Game Theoretical analysis and simulation shows this to be a superior strategy for a society over "always cooperate" or "always zero-sum" strategies. So to the extent that humans exhibit "tit-for-tat" behaviors, this is a timeless behavior conducive to societies (over the other strategies) because it is logically emergent out of the principles, irrespective of context.
From an evolutionary perspective, to the extent that such behaviors can emerge that are supportive of forming cooperative societies and in that cooperative societies are a "survival strategy" as being more successful than non-cooperative groups, it would be expected that such behaviors would evolve as "pre-programmed" behaviors as individuals in a gene pool exhibit such behaviors and such behaviors enable cooperative societies, and cooperative societies have a survival advantage, than that is what would evolve.
I enjoyed his first response about the Vancouver debate because I also walked away with that.
They need to understand Integral Theory in order to move forwards any further, but they've done reasonably well anyway.
@Sebastian: Someone needs to take the blame for Integral Theory not being part of this important conversation today. And who else can we blame for that . . . but Wilber himself (?) He had a 20 year head start on it . . . and dropped the ball.
@Nats: Source, please (?)
@@QED_ Wilber's not the only one that can speak to this
@chakkaphak: I sincerely wish that were true. But by its nature, only Wilber that had the authority to speak for Integral theory. Unfortunately, he wasted it with a lot of bad decisions . . .
@Nats: OMG. That's excellent. Thanks for the heads up . . .
Bret looks older without his beard
I noticed something was different.
Brett speaks so concisely
15:25 "a spectrum from (...) the sacred to the shamanistic (...) the sacred (...) is so fundamental to function that one ought not tinker casually (...) the shamanistic is that which is open to interpretation, open to hunches, to following a thread and seeing where it leads" -- Brett Weinstein
Bret Weinstein > Sam Harris & Jordan Peterson 😎
I'd like to hear Peterson and Deepak Chopra go one on one.
Omg lol one word, EPIC!!!😂
THIS
I can see them getting along quite well.
2 hours of nonsensical babble, I'm down for that.
well there's nothing important to say. Peterson vacillates on belief, and Chopra is a word salad generator.
According to Bret's logic, we should consider parasites and viruses to be extended phenotypes too, which probably bestow some genetic advantages, since you know, those things have been with us for longer than religion and are also pretty stable in form.
Or he could quit trying to revolutionize a concept that Dawkins got right the first time.
Or, you could try listening to what he says and not overlay your bias against him, and actually end up hearing what he's discussing. The only contradictions he has with Dawkins or others overall, is basically the assumption of dementia by default of disagreement. Kind of like what you're doing. So I guess that makes sense then. Nevermind. Carry on.
@@MandrakeDCR Dawkins nailed right at the start of their discussion. Bret mentioned there was no revolutionary breakthrough since "The Selfish Gene", to which Dawkins replied, in other words "maybe that's not because there are more breakthroughs to be found, but maybe I/we actually got things right".
Bret's clearly fishing for a revolution in the field. He's biased in that regard but everyone has their biases. Also I didn't have any bias against him at all, in fact when I heard this argument I was first pretty agreeable toward it until I realized it makes little sense. Never did I assume he's demented.
I mean, I actually applaud his effort. Agreeing with those who have already answered the question doesn't push us forward. In his mind the chance that he's onto something is worth grasping onto. But I also know he's more than smart enough to see why he's wrong here.
There is of course the micro-biome, which is now regarded as essential to human metabolism [and wider, including psychological, health]. I've heard 90% of the cells (by number) in the human body have foreign DNA I.e. Are either parasitic or symbiotic.
@@tbayley6 Well stated!
Bret is the most even-handed of the IDW I've seen.
You don't take sides in this, your believes put you there.
7:33
I guess Peterson's evolutionary argument is not "bollocks" if you ask Bret - evolutionary biologist of the moment. #GQ #HelenLewis
The spectrum he describes at the very end between the Sacred and Shamanistic is very interesting. I'd be interested to hear him discuss this point in more detail with Peterson to see how close they are on their definition of "sacred". I suspect Bret would say that even the most "sacred" religious teaching or practice will deteriorate in its utility over darwinian time, whereas Peterson may say that the most sacred archetypes are more or less static. I do think that just as there are static ("sacred") features biologically speaking within the human population e.g, having eyes, needing water, sexual desire, shelter, food etc. so too should there be static factors in culture that relate to those static biological requirements e.g our behaviours and practices toward food, shelter, water, sexual desire etc. They may vary in their outward presentation over time, e.g fuller figured women being more desirable in the Victorian era than today but the underlying biological attraction to women is static over time. More clarity on this point between Bret and Jordan would be interesting.
Rebel Wisdom is doing a fantastic job of finding and staying upon the current bleeding edge of philosophical relevance!
I totally agree with Jordan Peterson that Humanity must seek out and find transcendent values,.. the next question becomes does transcendence necessary have to include supernaturalism in order to ground it. Personally, I think not,... but it's a great question to explore. I find Daoism, along with Buddhism, and in particular Zen Buddhism, does the best job of grounding transcendent values within the mundane without having to invoke outside supernatural first causes. All of existence consists of Yin & Yang constantly striving to resolves themselves, but never being able to totally do so.
It's fascinating to me that Sam Harris insists he does not believe in free will,... and yet, he insists that consciousness exists and is the first fundamental primary of our existence. The material determinist processes that can't give rise to free will, by principle,... emphatically do give rise to consciousness?! One is impossible but the other must be true. Humanity does not have free will but we have moral responsibility for the consequences of our actions?! Just how is it that mere material computation give rises to subjective experiences? Why is it that all forms of animal life demonstrate having the qualities of self-will and self-regard,... but no machine or combination of computers have these qualities at all?
*_There is no significant example in history, before our time, of a society successfully maintaining moral life without the aid of religion. France, the United States, and some other nations have divorced their governments from all churches, but they have had the help of religion in keeping social order. Only a few Communist states have not merely dissociated themselves from religion but have repudiated its aid; and perhaps the apparent and provisional success of this experiment in Russia owes much to the temporary acceptance of Communism as the religion (or, as skeptics would say, the opium) of the people, replacing the church as the vendor of comfort and hope. If the socialist regime should fail in its efforts to destroy relative poverty among the masses, this new religion may lose its fervor and efficacy, and the state may wink at the restoration of supernatural beliefs as an aid in quieting discontent. “As long as there is poverty there will be gods.”_*
~ Will Durant
*_If by God we mean not the creative vitality of nature but a supreme being intelligent and benevolent, the answer must be a reluctant negative. Like other departments of biology, history remains at bottom a natural selection of the fittest individuals and groups in a struggle wherein goodness receives no favors, misfortunes abound, and the final test is the ability to survive. Add to the crimes, wars, and cruelties of man the earthquakes, storms, tornadoes, pestilences, tidal waves, and other “acts of God” that periodically desolate human and animal life, and the total evidence suggests either a blind or an impartial fatality, with incidental and apparently haphazard scenes to which we subjectively ascribe order, splendor, beauty, or sublimity. If history supports any theology this would be a dualism like the Zoroastrian or Manichaean: a good spirit and an evil spirit battling for control of the universe and men’s souls. These faiths and Christianity (which is essentially Manichaean) assured their followers that the good spirit would win in the end; but of this consummation history offers no guarantee. Nature and history do not agree with our conceptions of good and bad; they define good as that which survives, and bad as that which goes under; and the universe has no prejudice in favor of Christ as against Genghis Khan._*
~ Will Durant
*_To the unhappy, the suffering, the bereaved, the old, it has brought supernatural comforts valued by millions of souls as more precious than any natural aid. It has helped parents and teachers to discipline the young. It has conferred meaning and dignity upon the lowliest existence, and through its sacraments has made for stability by transforming human covenants into solemn relationships with God. It has kept the poor (said Napoleon) from murdering the rich. For since the natural inequality of men dooms many of us to poverty or defeat, some supernatural hope may be the sole alternative to despair. Destroy that hope, and class war is intensified. Heaven and utopia are buckets in a well: when one goes down the other goes up; when religion declines Communism grows._*
~ Will Durant
*_While Catholics were murdering Protestants in France, and Protestants, under Elizabeth, were murdering Catholics in England, and the Inquisition was killing and robbing Jews in Spain, and Bruno was being burned at the stake in Italy, Akbar invited the representatives of all the religions in his empire to a conference, pledged them to peace, issued edicts of toleration for every cult and creed, and, as evidence of his own neutrality, married wives from the Brahman, Buddhist, and Mohammedan faiths. His greatest pleasure, after the fires of youth had cooled, was in the free discussion of religious beliefs. … The King took no stock in revelations, and would accept nothing that could not justify itself with science and philosophy. It was not unusual for him to gather friends and prelates of various sects together, and discuss religion with them from Thursday evening to Friday noon. When the Moslem mullahs and the Christian priests quarreled he reproved them both, saying that God should be worshiped through the intellect, and not by a blind adherence to supposed revelations. "Each person," he said, in the spirit - and perhaps through the influence - of the Upanishads and Kabir, "according to his condition gives the Supreme Being a name; but in reality to name the Unknowable is vain._*
~ Will Durant
*_The invention and spread of contraceptives is the proximate cause of our changing morals. The old moral code restricted sexual experience to marriage, because copulation could not be effectively separated from parentage, and parentage could be made responsible only through marriage. But to-day the dissociation of sex from reproduction has created a situation unforeseen by our fathers. All the relations of men and women are being changed by this one factor; and the moral code of the future will have to take account of these new facilities which invention has placed at the service of ancient desires._*
~ Will Durant
*_I feel for all faiths the warm sympathy of one who has come to learn that even the trust in reason is a precarious faith, and that we are all fragments of darkness groping for the sun._*
~ Will Durant
*_Education is a progressive discovery of our own ignorance._*
~ Will Durant
*_Neurosis is always a substitute for legitimate suffering._*
~ Carl Jung, 1938 _Psychology and Religion_
*_Filling the conscious mind with ideal conceptions is a characteristic of Western theosophy, but not the confrontation with the shadow and the world of darkness. One does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light, but by making the darkness conscious._*
~Carl Jung; _The Philosophical Tree;_ CW 13: Alchemical Studies. P.335
*_People don't have ideas. Ideas have people._*
~ Carl Jung
*_As a child I felt myself to be alone, and I am still, because I know things and must hint at things which others apparently know nothing of, and for the most part do not want to know. Loneliness does not come from having no people about one, but from being unable to communicate the things that seem important to oneself, or from holding certain views which others find inadmissible._*
~ Carl Jung
*_The most terrifying thing is to accept oneself completely._*
~ Carl Jung
I fucking love this channel.
Bret Weistein: The dark horse of the intellectual dark web.
I am a Jew living in Israel and with my People there are Atheists and Religious groups. but the majority are Traditionalists (like me). We accept the being of god and follow the traditions of the Jewish culture. Because we feel very Jewish we do not see how following the orthodocs religius practice is the will of god. We believe that his will for us is to live in Israel and to strive continuasly to be better people.
Oh man, when Bret is on, he's fuckin ON. I love this man.
I like how "we have now phones and electric cars" somehow will affect ideas of "being good, telling the truths and not to kill each other" but somehow behind abstractions it sounds like we need to get rid of most of it because it doesn't make sense to us how it works. Each day we find out something new that changes science we don't through it all of are we?
You are Russian?
A VERY interesting commentary from Mr. Weinstein. Thank you for posting this video for us. Of course, one could add to it: the fact that someone is articulate doesn't mean they are right.
What I noticed was JBP helped advance a debate that had gotten stale, and it's become fun again in the sense that as an atheist, I get to have my worldview challenged in an honest way; and I think the same goes for religious folks (Christians in particular).
The world really needs to hear a lot more of Bret Weinstein
The debates devolved into Peterson slipping into the meta-semantics of defining truth. It was like watching one boxer run around the ring refusing to fight.
Furthermore, nobody is disputing that religion serves a purpose. Sam Harris spends 80% of his time trying to teach the benefits of spirituality and practices, without the myth and dogma, in order to help people fill the void in the absence of faith.
indeed that time is different now and then, but i would argue that human itself have not change much. we still face a lot of same problem we face before, whether they come from our biology or society.
"We must respect the other fellow's religion, but only in the sense and
to the extent that we respect his theory that his wife is beautiful and
his children smart." --H.L. Mencken
mind blown within 3 min...
I think the missing link in Jordan's arguments is the need for a living prophet. Instead of looking at the myths/legends of the past and trying to make them fit to our circumstances today, we need to have the same type of person, a prophet, that provided the myths/legends of the past. That person could reinforce, clarify where needed, and offer new insights into the particulars of modern society. There is such a person.
Bret had commented at the beginning of the first one of these discussions in Vancouver how history could be made but it might go badly as history sometimes can, etc. He said things could get more muddled and might not get better. I thought he was just being thorough, careful but wow. As an observer with great interest, I am sadly left totally wondering how in the world no one stood up to Sam's talk of all people of religion as if they were all like the extremists of religion that often are also heretics of their religion. Sam, as a moral philosopher with such an amazing platform and opportunity, instead of promoting good with that, brings divisiveness and ironically elevates all people of religious faith that believe in a "live and let live" mentality, above his own.
What was worse, he should have been shot down in that or asked to explain his rationale for such negative talk that seems to continue on into the latter debates as well. Using extremists or obviously evil actions that cause people to lose life and limb isn't sufficient rationale to tossing out the whole. Then, people that are supposed to be against that sort of thing, are left wondering at the "opposing" side that in reality doesn't really oppose this too much at all when all is said and done. In fact, Jordan's opposition really just fueled Sam's seeming need to put down all people of religious belief. I enjoy a lot of Peterson but he isn't what Sam is really against, and is moving the whole scale or bar much farther to the side Sam is on, and no progress is being made and only regress.
It is a much more moral stance in a world full of people that disagree on matters of faith, to encourage a coexistence, or a live and let live mentality. This isn't even hard and protects all people from such divisiveness. It is such a weak stance also from someone that wants so badly to come off as strong, moral and that has a better way. If this is among "the best", we are in real trouble. This is part of my takeaway. Yikes people.
audio on Bret makes this impossible to listen, goes up and down like we're trying to copy a protected VHS - not that I've ever done that ;)
Incredible
There are fundamental principles that have always existed and apply equally to science and theology. They are timeless and immutable. The closer we get to identifying these principles, the more likely we are to reach agreement on what seems to be two very different perspectives.
I think I disagree with Brett on this, human beings evolutionarily speaking are pretty much the same today as they were 2000 years ago and more ,so the archetypes still stand to guide us how we are to interact with one another and the world around us. And morality that’s important for human piece has nothing to do with logic and reason, whats logical or Rational isn’t necessarily what is moral, that’s one of the dangers I find with the new atheists which I do agree with Brett on .
"what's logical or rational isn’t necessarily what's moral" If a claim regarding morality isn't logical or rational, how are you supposed to convince people (including yourself) of it without religious indoctrination? Why would you believe anything that isn't logical or rational?
I disagree that mythologies aren’t timeless. Just because we don’t live in a world that is anything like 2000 years ago doesn’t mean that the world our descendants live in 2000 years from now will be anything like the present, it may even be more like the past.
I have to say, the comments here make for entertaining reading.
I'm not sure we could survive a night out in the pub together, without at least one brawl in the car park after, but it sure is refreshing to know you lot are out there and concerned about these issues.
I work in a brain dead egg carton - very hard to find anyone who can formulate or understand these ideas in day to day life.
Nice to hear somebody say so much in so little and understandable words.
That's true intelligence in my opinion.
You had me at vindication