Summary

Here’s a summary of the debate between Mike Jones (Inspiring Philosophy) and Dan Barker (Freedom From Religion Foundation) on whether Christianity or secular humanism is better for society:

• Opening Statements:
  • Mike Jones: Argues Christianity is better due to its historical contributions (missionary work, education, medicine), promotion of charity and pro-social behavior, positive impact on mental health (lower depression and suicide rates), and role in suppressing authoritarianism. He also claims secularism leads to unsustainable birth rates and societal decline.
  • Dan Barker: Contends that secular humanism, with its values of reason, compassion, tolerance, science, morality, and democracy, is better. He argues that many good Christians borrow from humanistic values and that Christian values are ill-defined and often contradictory. He criticizes the Bible for its endorsement of slavery, subjugation of women, and lack of democracy.
• Key Debate Points:
  • Origin of Values: Jones argues that many values attributed to secular humanism actually originated from the Judeo-Christian tradition, citing historical evidence. Barker counters that these values are inherent to humanism and predate Christianity.
  • Divisiveness: Barker claims Christianity is divisive due to conflicts and differing interpretations within the faith. Jones challenges this, arguing that Christianity promotes community bonds through charity and volunteering and cites research supporting this view.
  • Sustainability: Jones emphasizes secularism’s unsustainable birth rates, leading to societal collapse. Barker questions whether sustainability is necessarily a good thing if the society itself is not morally sound.
  • Science: Jones asserts Christianity’s crucial role in the development of science, while Barker points out that science existed long before Christianity.
  • The Bible: Barker highlights what he sees as immoral teachings and internal contradictions within the Bible. Jones argues against literal interpretations and notes the cultural context of the Bible.
  • Slavery: Jones states that Christianity was a major driving force in ending that.
• Overall Arguments:
  • Jones: Christianity creates more optimal, enduring societies that generate progress.
  • Barker: Good Christians embrace humanistic values. Claims that many good Christians do not adhere to many biblical principles and values. Secuar humanism is inclusive.

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Content

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Main Arguments

Key Disagreements

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Mike Jones Books & Research Mentioned

1. Rodney Stark – For the Glory of God: How Monotheism Led to Reformations, Science, Witch-Hunts, and the End of Slavery

• Purpose: Cited to argue that Christianity was the decisive moral and institutional force behind the abolition of slavery.
• Main Idea: Stark demonstrates that Christian theology—particularly the belief in the spiritual equality of all souls before God—was the unique catalyst for abolition.
• Why Mentioned: Supports Jones’s claim that historians agree Christianity stopped slavery, contrasting it with societies where slavery persisted without moral challenge.

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2. Ben Wright – Bounds of Their Habitation: Race and Religion in American Evangelicalism

• Purpose: Used to show that even secular academic historians acknowledge the centrality of Christian abolitionists to ending slavery.
• Main Idea: Evangelical theology simultaneously shaped racial hierarchies and generated the religious and moral energy that fueled abolitionism.
• Why Mentioned: Demonstrates that the Christian role in abolition is recognized by professional historians, not just religious apologists.

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3. Tom Holland – Dominion: The Making of the Western Mind

• Purpose: Supports the claim that Western moral concepts like equality, compassion, and human dignity originate in Christianity, not secular humanism.
• Main Idea: Christianity redefined power, weakness, and moral worth, shaping the modern conscience that underlies ideas like abolition and human rights.
• Why Mentioned: Counters Dan Barker’s argument that morality is purely humanistic and pre-Christian.

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4. John Coffey – Exodus and Liberation: Deliverance Politics from John Calvin to Martin Luther King Jr.

• Purpose: Demonstrates that Christian abolitionists grounded their movement in biblical theology, particularly the Exodus narrative.
• Main Idea: The story of divine deliverance from bondage provided the theological framework for abolitionist activism.
• Why Mentioned: Strengthens the argument that abolitionism emerged from scriptural tradition, not Enlightenment secularism.

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5. James Hannam – God’s Philosophers: How the Medieval World Laid the Foundations of Modern Science

• Purpose: Supports Jones’s broader claim that Christianity fostered not only moral but also intellectual progress.
• Main Idea: The Christian worldview and scholastic institutions of the Middle Ages paved the way for modern science.

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6. Toby E. Huff – The Rise of Early Modern Science: Islam, China, and the West

• Purpose: Highlights that Christian Europe’s legal and theological assumptions about rational order enabled the development of science.
• Main Idea: Western science arose uniquely within the Christian intellectual tradition.

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7. Seb Falk – The Light Ages: The Surprising Story of Medieval Science

• Purpose: Used to challenge the “Dark Ages” myth, showing that Christian Europe nurtured science and learning.
• Main Idea: The Middle Ages were a period of steady intellectual advancement under Christian patronage.

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8. James Ungureanu – Science, Religion, and the Protestant Tradition

• Purpose: Demonstrates that Protestant theology cultivated an environment that encouraged rational inquiry and empiricism.
• Main Idea: The so-called “conflict” between science and religion is historically exaggerated; Protestant traditions often promoted science.

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9. Joshua Berman – Created Equal: How the Bible Broke with Ancient Political Thought

• Purpose: Supports the argument that the concept of human equality originates from the Hebrew Bible, not Enlightenment rationalism.
• Main Idea: The Bible introduced the notion of moral equality and universal dignity.

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10. William Cavanaugh – The Myth of Religious Violence

• Purpose: Counters claims that Christianity inherently causes war or division.
• Main Idea: Early modern conflicts often attributed to religion were largely political and economic in nature.

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11. Robert Alter – The Hebrew Bible: A Translation with Commentary

• Purpose: Used for contextual analysis of the Phinehas episode (Numbers 25) to refute Barker’s claim that the Bible endorses racial purity.
• Main Idea: The passage addresses idolatry and covenantal fidelity, not ethnicity or supremacy.

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12. Allen Vaughan – New England Frontier: Puritans and Indians, 1620–1675

• Purpose: Provides a nuanced view of Puritan–Native American relations, showing cases of cooperation and voluntary conversion.
• Main Idea: Christianity’s role in colonial history was complex, including mutual alliances as well as conflicts.

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Summary: The Slavery Argument Anchor

When Mike Jones said “historians agree Christianity stopped slavery”, the key supporting sources are:

• Rodney Stark – For the Glory of God (primary historical argument)
• Ben Wright – Bounds of Their Habitation (academic corroboration)
• John Coffey – Exodus and Liberation (theological framework)
• Tom Holland – Dominion (civilizational synthesis)

Robert Fogel: Without Consent or Contract: The Rise and Fall of American Slavery
Amazon - Hume’s Abject Failure: The Argument Against Miracles

Mike Jones Studies Mentioned

1. Meta-Analysis on Religion and Charity

Likely Study:
Brooks, Arthur C. Who Really Cares: The Surprising Truth About Compassionate Conservatism. Basic Books, 2006.
Also supported by:
Bekkers, René, and Wiepking, Pam. “A Literature Review of Empirical Studies of Philanthropy: Eight Mechanisms That Drive Charitable Giving.” Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly 40, no. 5 (2011): 924-973.
https://doi.org/10.1177/0899764010380927
Why Mike Used It:
To support his claim that religious commitment, particularly Christian practice and church attendance, strongly correlates with higher rates of charitable giving and volunteering — even to secular causes.

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2. Cross-National Studies on Religiosity and Volunteering

Likely Study:
Ruiter, Stijn, and Peter Achterberg. “Religious Attendance and Volunteering in Cross-National Perspective: Evidence from 60 Countries.” Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 49, no. 2 (2010): 228-248.
https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-5906.2010.01506.x
Why Mike Used It:
To show that religiosity is not merely correlated with charity within one culture but holds across dozens of countries. It reinforces his argument that Christian practice promotes civic engagement and social capital at the national level.

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3. Religion and Mental Health / Suicide Prevention

Likely Studies:
Koenig, Harold G. “Religion, Spirituality, and Health: The Research and Clinical Implications.” ISRN Psychiatry 2012 (2012): 278730.
https://doi.org/10.5402/2012/278730
VanderWeele, Tyler J., et al. “Association Between Religious Service Attendance and Lower Suicide Rates Among US Women.” JAMA Psychiatry 73, no. 8 (2016): 845-851.
https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamapsychiatry/fullarticle/2523114
Why Mike Used It:
To argue that declining religiosity corresponds with rising depression and suicide rates, especially in Western societies. He cited this to show Christianity’s positive influence on mental resilience and well-being.

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4. Religiosity and National Corruption / Governance

Likely Study:
Treisman, Daniel. “What Have We Learned About the Causes of Corruption from Ten Years of Cross-National Empirical Research?” Annual Review of Political Science 10 (2007): 211-244.
And supporting data in:
La Porta, Rafael, et al. “Trust in Large Organizations.” American Economic Review 87, no. 2 (1997): 333-338.
https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.polisci.10.081205.095418
Why Mike Used It:
To link religiosity with stronger “voice and accountability,” lower corruption, and higher trust in institutions — supporting his claim that Christianized societies sustain freer and more stable democracies.

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5. Religiosity and Refugee / Immigrant Support

Likely Study:
Storm, Ingrid, and Brian J. Grim. “Religiosity and Attitudes Toward Immigrants and Immigration Policy in Europe.” Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 54, no. 2 (2015): 325-342.
https://doi.org/10.1111/jssr.12178
Why Mike Used It:
To counter the claim that religion breeds xenophobia. He argued that frequent church attendance, not nominal affiliation, predicts more generous and pro-refugee attitudes.

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6. Demographic Sustainability / Fertility and Religion

Likely Studies:
Blume, Michael. “The Reproductive Benefits of Religious Affiliation.” Human Nature 20, no. 3 (2009): 291-300.
https://doi.org/10.1007/s12110-009-9068-0
Kaufmann, Eric. Shall the Religious Inherit the Earth? (2010).
https://global.oup.com/academic/product/shall-the-religious-inherit-the-earth-9781848871440
Why Mike Used It:
To demonstrate that secular societies are demographically unsustainable due to low fertility, while religious populations (especially Christians) maintain replacement-level or higher fertility rates.

Debate Summary

00:00–16:24 — Mike Jones Opening: “Christianity yields more optimal, durable societies”

Topic

Central claims: (1) Christian societies produce stronger pro-social outcomes than secular ones (charity, volunteerism, education, health); (2) Christianity restrains nationalism/authoritarianism better than secularism; (3) Secular cultures underperform on fertility and thus are not demographically sustainable. 

Speaker A’s Argument (Mike Jones):

• Missionary legacy: Christian missions historically created written languages, schools, hospitals, and medical progress worldwide; literacy, hygiene, human rights, and economic development followed.
• Pro-sociality & charity: Meta-analyses and cross-national studies associate religiosity with higher charitable giving and volunteering (including to secular orgs). Religious contexts elevate volunteerism nationally.
• Mental health & suicide: Religiosity correlates with lower depression and suicide; as religiosity declines (e.g., U.S. past 20 years), suicide rises.
• Nationalism/authoritarianism: “Christian nationalism” is strongest among the least-churched; traditional religiosity suppresses far-right/radical voting and fosters “voice and accountability,” civil liberties, and lower corruption.
• Immigration/refugees: Individual religiosity (esp. frequent attendance) predicts more generous refugee attitudes; societies with higher “unaffiliated” shares trend restrictive.
• Demography/sustainability: Secular nations are below replacement fertility and rely on immigration; highly religious/conservative groups have higher fertility. Therefore, secular cultures cannot sustain or propagate their norms across generations; Christianity can, making it “better for society.” 

Speaker B’s Argument:

• Not applicable (opening segment).

Speaker A’s Counter:

• Not applicable.

Speaker B’s Rebuttal:

• Not applicable.

Notes/References

Meta-analyses and cross-national volunteering/giving/suicide studies summarized by Mike (titles/authors not fully enumerated in-speech); sociologists/historians referenced include Phil Zuckerman (on pro-sociality acknowledgments), Eric Kaufmann (fertility and religious growth), Michael Blume (evolutionary views on religiosity and fertility), and Philip Gorski / Rogers Brubaker (on nationalism and “political religions”). 

16:24–31:16 — Dan Barker Opening: “Humanistic values, not biblical Christianity, drive social good”

Topic

Central claims: (1) The goods Mike praises are humanistic, not distinctively Christian; (2) The Bible lacks democracy and centers obedience and submission; (3) Christianity is historically divisive, while secular humanism is universalistic; (4) Highly secular nations (Nordics, Japan) perform well on social outcomes. 

Speaker A’s Argument (Mike Jones):

• Not applicable (responds later).

Speaker B’s Argument (Dan Barker):

• Humanism’s core values—reason, compassion, tolerance, science, moral responsibility, democracy—best serve societies composed of humans.
• Bible critique: No democracy in Scripture; emphasis is on obedience/submission to God; slavery permitted; women’s status diminished; threats/curses outweigh “love.” Therefore “Christian values” invoked by modern Christians are borrowed from broader humanistic morality, not biblical doctrine.
• Diversity among Christians: Deep disagreements (abortion, gay rights, immigration, guns, climate, vaccines), undermining the idea of a stable “Christian value” set.
• Secular exemplars: Denmark, Nordic countries, and Japan have low crime and strong social outcomes with far less religiosity; secular humanists volunteer and give without supernatural incentives (e.g., FFRF members, Red Cross).
• Colonial/missionary harms & Native Americans: Missionary history also includes harm/disease/cultural destruction; Native societies often treated women better and many “rescued” captives preferred returning to Native life. 

Speaker A’s Counter:

• Not in this segment.

Speaker B’s Rebuttal:

• Not applicable.

Notes/References

General appeals to Scripture (Deuteronomy curses; NT obedience passages), modern Nordic/Japanese indicators (not formally cited here), Native American cultural comparisons. 

31:57–39:14 — “Are ‘human values’ actually biblical? Mesopotamia, Israel, and Phinehas”

Topic

Whether the moral emphasis on internal guilt/moral worth versus honor/shame is distinctively biblical; dispute over Numbers 25 (Phinehas). 

Speaker A’s Argument (Mike Jones):

• Ancient values: Cites historians (e.g., John Bottéro et al.) that Mesopotamian religion lacked our moralized “right/wrong” focus; Moses/Israel introduced a revolution centering moral worth/internal guilt rather than honor/shame. Thus, modern “human values” are historically biblical inheritances, not generic.
• The debate should assess effects of Christian worldview, not cherry-picked biblical stories. Historians widely attribute abolition’s Western success to Christianity. 

Speaker B’s Argument (Dan Barker):

• Israel is part of the ancient world and exhibits the same hierarchical/violent structures that arose with cities/kings.
• Phinehas case (Numbers 25): Claims the Bible praises Phinehas for killing an Israelite man and Midianite woman to prevent “interracial mixing,” rewarding him for “protecting the master race.” Hence, biblical morality is not a source of modern humanistic values. 

Speaker A’s Counter:

• Denies “master race” framing; argues the episode concerns stopping a cultic/immoral practice, not racial purity. Urges reading with scholarly context (e.g., Robert Alter). Returns focus to macro-effects (charity, empowerment). 

Speaker B’s Rebuttal:

• Insists the biblical text commends the killing; challenges Mike’s reading; urges returning to what “Christianity teaches” if outcomes are credited to it. 

Notes/References

John Bottéro, Carl Vander Torn, John Walton (Mesopotamian/ANET scholarship as named); Robert Alter (biblical literary commentary); abolition claim (general historical appeal). 

39:20–45:02 — “Is Christianity divisive? Causation vs correlation; ‘Wars of Religion’”

Topic

Dan asserts Christianity is divisive; Mike demands causal evidence and cites political/economic drivers. 

Speaker A’s Argument (Mike Jones):

• Requests causal evidence beyond historical anecdotes. Cites William Cavanaugh’s The Myth of Religious Violence arguing so-called “wars of religion” (e.g., Thirty Years’ War) were driven by political/economic alignments (e.g., papal support for France against the Habsburgs), not simply theology.
• Positive associations: Reiterates empirical research tying Christian religiosity to volunteering, civil society membership, voice/accountability. 

Speaker B’s Argument (Dan Barker):

• Points to historical intra-Christian conflict (Calvin vs. Servetus; Catholic–Protestant bloodshed) and denominational fragmentation as evidence of divisiveness. Admits he’s not positing a formal causal model but claims the pattern is plain. 

Speaker A’s Counter:

• Notes atheists also fight atheists; fragmentation alone doesn’t demonstrate Christianity causes division; asks again for data that secular humanism produces better social outcomes. 

Speaker B’s Rebuttal:

• Reiterates that, if Christianity were a coherent value system from God, internal fragmentation and violent conflict should not be so prominent. 

Notes/References

William Cavanaugh (on political drivers of early-modern conflicts). Servetus execution by Calvin (historical episode). 

45:09–51:07 — “Secular exemplars vs demographic sustainability”

Topic

Are low-religion countries (Nordics/Japan) evidence for secular humanist superiority? Mike shifts to replacement fertility and long-run viability. 

Speaker A’s Argument (Mike Jones):

• If Denmark, Sweden, Japan, etc., have low fertility well below replacement, their social models are non-reproducing and thus unsustainable without immigration, risking cultural replacement by less liberal norms. Short-run performance doesn’t equal long-run societal goodness. 

Speaker B’s Argument (Dan Barker):

• “If it’s good, it’s good”: Strong present outcomes matter even if fertility is low. Points again to lower crime and gun ownership rates in secular countries relative to U.S. 

Speaker A’s Counter:

• Returns to his opening data: higher depression, lower volunteering, rising polarization in secularizing contexts; claims secular nations are “collapsing.” 

Speaker B’s Rebuttal:

• Distinguishes “secular” from “secular humanist”; says he’s defending the latter (values-based), not all secular regimes. 

Notes/References

Mike references Eric Kaufmann and Michael Blume again on fertility; general claims about Nordic/Japanese indicators by Dan. 

51:12–56:02 — “Define secular humanism; Did Christianity ‘create’ science?”

Topic

Dan defines humanism; Mike claims Christian doctrine and institutions were crucial to the rise of science. 

Speaker A’s Argument (Mike Jones):

• Humanism vs Christianity: If “humanist” = reason/compassion/democracy, these grew within the Judeo-Christian arc (Torah → Prophets → NT → Church).
• Science: Cites Noah J. Efron (Galileo Goes to Jail), James Hannam, Toby Huff, Seb Falk, James Ungureanu, arguing Christianity’s separation of spheres and theological ideas (imago Dei plus Fall) fostered experimental method and scientific institutions. The Fall implied cognition is marred, necessitating empirical testing—“Christian doctrine lent urgency to experiment.” 

Speaker B’s Argument (Dan Barker):

• Concedes that Christians contributed to science but denies Christianity (biblical doctrine) deserves credit; scientists rose “in spite of” the Bible. Claims there is “no democracy” and scant “love” ethic in the Bible compared to threats/obedience. 

Speaker A’s Counter:

• Points to Deuteronomy’s egalitarian elements and biblical roots of human rights (e.g., work by Joshua Berman; books on Christianity and human rights). 

Speaker B’s Rebuttal:

• Reasserts that biblical texts don’t ground modern democratic norms; asks “Where is democracy in the Bible?” 

Notes/References

Noah J. Efron (on Fall and experimentation), Toby Huff, James Hannam, Seb Falk, James Ungureanu; Joshua Berman (Created Equal). 

56:02–1:02:48 — “Pre-Christian societies, cities, Native Americans; ‘superior ideology’?”

Topic

Do long-standing non-biblical societies show human values pre-date Christianity? Are cities/Christianity “superior” or just different pathways? 

Speaker B’s Argument (Dan Barker):

• Human values—care, cooperation, observation/proto-science—existed millennia before biblical religion (e.g., Native American cultures). Cities brought hierarchy, lords, and coercion; Christian Europe shouldn’t claim moral monopoly. 

Speaker A’s Argument (Mike Jones):

• Acknowledges non-Christian societies can function, but argues Christian ideology was superior in social effects: cities enabled universities/hospitals; Puritan–Native interactions sometimes cooperative; some tribes converted for benefits; New England Frontier (Alan/Allen Vaughan) cited. Emphasizes we must assess net societal outcomes.

Speaker B’s Counter:

• Warns against lumping all Native cultures; objects to claims of “beneficial” conversions given historical harms. 

Speaker A’s Rebuttal:

• Reiterates that different Native groups varied widely; some alliances and conversions were voluntary and pragmatic; returns to macro-outcome comparison (institutions, science, rights). 

Notes/References

Allen Vaughan, New England Frontier (Pilgrims/tribal relations); general references to Puritans, Squanto, Mohegan/Massachusetts peoples. 

Synthesis & Evaluation

Bottom-line synthesis

• Mike’s strongest line is empirical/comparative: religious participation → higher giving/volunteering; associations with better mental-health indicators; and the demographic sustainability claim (fertility/replacement). He supplements with historiography tying Christianity to science and rights.
• Dan’s strongest line is conceptual/historical: the values driving modern social goods are humanistic and predate (or run independent of) biblical Christianity; the Bible centers obedience/slavery/anti-democracy themes; and highly secular countries perform well on many present-day social metrics.
• Core faultlines:
  • Provenance of values: Are compassion/democracy/rights biblical inheritances (Mike) or human universals/humanist achievements (Dan)?
  • Measurement window: Short-run social indicators vs long-run demographic viability.
  • Causation vs correlation: Whether religion causes pro-social outcomes (Mike seeks studies; Dan stresses counter-examples and textual ethics).
  • Text vs outcomes: Dan presses biblical passages; Mike insists the debate is about societal effects, not proof-texting.

Analytical notes on reasoning and assumptions

• Mike’s assumptions: Religiosity measured via attendance/affiliation approximates “Christian society”; pro-social correlations are directionally causal; demographic replacement undermines the “goodness” of secular models.
• Dan’s assumptions: Social goods are fundamentally humanistic; biblical texts are normatively binding for “Christianity” and often conflict with modern ethics; present performance outranks long-run reproduction.
• Shared ground: Both esteem charity, safety, health, and freedom; both acknowledge historical harms by religious actors and that non-religious societies can function. 

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Transcript

0:00

Andrew Wilson and Muslim debater Daniel Hookie Kachu collide in Nashville, Tennessee this November 15th and 16th at

0:07

Debatecon 6 on whether or not Christian or Islamic values are better for

0:12

society. You don’t want to miss it. Grab your tickets by clicking on this link right now so you don’t miss out on this

0:18

epic debate conference featuring that debate and many others.

0:33

Hey everybody. Tonight we’re debating Christianity or secular humanism. Which is better for society? And we are starting right now with Mike Jones’s

0:41

opening statement. Mike Jones started and continues to run the popular Christian apologetics channel inspiring

0:48

philosophy with over 490,000 subscribers and has debated top atheist

0:54

thinkers including Dr. Lawrence Krauss, Dr. Michael Shurmer, and Matt Dillah Hunty. That introduction, thanks for

1:02

being with us, Mike. The floor is all yours for your opening statement. All right, can you see my slides?

1:09

And now we can I’m just going to adjust a little bit so it’s fitted.

1:15

All right. Tell me when to start. You bet. For the audience, these opening

1:21

statements are 15 minutes long. And just adapting the screen once more. We’re

1:27

ready for you, Mike. All right. Thank you, James, and thank you, Dan, for agreeing to this debate.

1:34

Which is better for society? I will argue the answer is clearly Christianity. But first, I want to point

1:40

out I’ll not be arguing that if we all became atheists, tomorrow society would collapse or that we would experience

1:46

immediate moral decay. I will only be arguing that Christianity creates more optimal societies that can endure and

1:53

generate progress. Again, the debate is about which is better for society. Demonstrating that Christianity is

1:59

better does not mean other types of societies cannot flourish or endure. I just argue they do so in a less optimal

2:05

way. Now, by Christian societies, I mean those that are based on Christian values, and the majority of the

2:10

population identify as Christian regardless of governmental laws. And by secular societies, I mean those that are

2:17

based on secular values, and the majority of people identify as secularists. And I want to be clear, I’m

2:22

not arguing for theoc theocracy or any type of government. Now, it’s abundantly

2:28

clear from multiple studies that Christianity has made the world a better place through missionary work.

2:33

Christians believe that everyone should be able to read the Bible. And so, when missionaries encounter cultures where the vast majority of people could not

2:40

read, they developed written languages and schools to educate people. They also wanted to keep people alive. So,

2:45

Christians invented hospitals and advanced the study of medicine. Research demonstrates missionary activity has led

2:52

to higher literacy literacy rates, more education, better hygiene habits, medical care, economic progress,

2:58

freedom, human rights, and a host of other positive benefits. And this was not only accomplished in historical

3:03

right white regions, but in places all around the world. Without Christianity, the world would not be as educated and

3:10

advanced as it is now. See my recent series. Secularists have not gone out and done this. And there is nothing in

3:16

anything we could call secular doctrine that compels them to spread their worldview and educate people in the

3:21

process. Christianity has Christ commanding the great commission which makes it our duty to make the world a

3:27

better place. Now, one might say that secular humanist cultures are relatively new and so haven’t had enough time to

3:34

generate the same amount of positive change. That could be true, but research pushes back on that. Numerous studies

3:40

show religiosity is associated with more charitable giving to religious and secular organizations whereas secularism

3:47

is not. When compiling the data from multiple studies, this systematic review concluded, “Our systematic literature

3:54

review covering 77 studies reveals that religion measured as group affiliation,

3:59

values, beliefs, and the importance of faith to the believer as well as religious service attendance in private

4:05

private prayer most often positively relates with giving to outgroup and secular organizations.

4:12

Another study looked at 53 nations and found that frequent churchgoers are more active in volunteer work and that a

4:18

devout national context has an additional positive effect. So when a nation is religiously Christian,

4:25

volunteer work is increased across the board. Religious citizens also volunteer more for secular organizations. But when

4:32

nations secularize, religious individuals still volunteer at high rates, but secular individuals end up

4:38

volunteering less. They even say if secularization is an ongoing process in

4:43

rich post-industrial societies, we expect declining levels of volunteering due to composition and context effects.

4:51

Similarly, another study found that volunteering levels were only maintained or increased if someone remains

4:56

religious into their adulthood. If people become less religious, volunteering decreases. Now, it is clear

5:03

secularists do give money to charities in volunteer times, but not at the level that Christians do. Christianity has

5:09

been one of the greatest institutions for wealth transfer from the rich to the poor in the history of humanity and this

5:14

was accomplished throughout the world because of missionary and charity work and as noted numerous studies show

5:20

Christianity has made the world a better place through missionary activity. One study says in a crossnational

5:26

investigation of 126 countries with a total of over 179,000 respondents

5:32

religiosity was correlated with likelihood of helping a stranger. Notably, people within countries with

5:37

greater religious diversity and members of minority religion were even more likely to help strangers. Additionally,

5:43

an analysis of data from the World Value Survey with a total of over 10,000 respondents from 31 countries revealed

5:50

that voluntary action in cultural with cultural, political, and social organizations was greater for those who

5:57

attended religious service frequently. Now, you may think Christians may only be doing this out of obedience to God,

6:03

but at least we’re still doing something. The fact remains secularists are not doing the level of charity work

6:08

that Christians do. And given the state of the world, a ton of charity work is still needing. So the data indicate

6:14

Christianity leads to more charity work inside a nation and beyond its borders. And this in turn has led to more

6:19

economic progress, medical care, freedom, etc. many other positive benefits. If nations secularize, this

6:26

will decrease, which I think we all could agree is not a good thing. So on this issue, Christian societies clearly

6:31

outperform secular ones. Even the sociologist Phil Zuckerman had to admit uh religiously involved individuals also

6:38

exhibit greater manifestations of pro-sociality than do those who are not religiously involved. Several studies

6:44

have found that religious people tend to be more charitable, more generous, and more likely to volunteer and donate

6:49

blood than their secular peers are. Furthermore, a proliferation of religious devotion, faith in God, and

6:54

reliance on the Bible has historically been a determining factor in establishing schools for children,

6:59

creating universities, building hospitals for the sick and homes for the homeless, taking care of orphans and the

7:05

elderly, resisting oppression, establishing law and order, and developing democracy.

7:11

Meta analyses have also found that religiosity is associated with more pro-social behavior and self-control. In

7:17

an everinccreasing hostile world fueled by social media, more Christianity would be extremely beneficial in aid in ways

7:24

secularism can’t. Related to this is the issue of suicide and depression.

7:29

Research that pulls mostly from sample sizes of Christians has demonstrated that religiosity is positively

7:35

associated with lower levels of depression and suicide. And these conclusions are robust considering

7:41

multiple systematic reviews and meta analyses have found them. One study from Switzerland relied on census data of 3.7

7:48

million adults in the death certificates of 5,082 suicides and found that suicide

7:54

rates were the highest among those with no religion, more than double the rate of Catholics. Suicide rates have

7:59

dramatically increased over the past 20 years in the US. And given the research tying religiosity to lower suicide

8:05

rates, it should come as no surprise that this increase has occurred as religiosity has been decreasing. And

8:13

unfortunately, people like my opponent have indirectly contributed to this since they’ve been on a crusade to eradicate Christianity from our modern

8:20

public world. Religiosity is also positively associated with better mental health as seen in this metaanalysis that

8:27

compiled the data from 850 studies. So the reality is Christianity results in

8:33

better mental health, lower depression, lower risk of suicide than secularism. Now the next issue I want to focus on is

8:40

the rise of nationalism and authoritarianism. With the recent rise of Christian nationalism, many people

8:45

are worried about the effects Christianity may have. But you might be surprised to find out that Christian nationalism seems to be more motivating

8:52

among the least churched individuals on the right. A study from 2021 found that among politically right individuals,

8:59

Christian nationalism was found among those who are the least religious. They say, “We find no evidence that Christian

9:05

nationalism mobilized church-based support in the election.” And they say, “White nationalist groups in the United

9:11

States explicitly use Christian nationalist rhetoric.” But those who identify with such movements tend to not

9:17

be strongly involved in mainstream Christian congregations. And similar results were found in Europe. One study

9:23

found that although populist radical right parties tend to advertise themselves as defending Christian

9:28

identity and values, they don’t attract many Christian voters. They say these parties take pains to show that they are

9:34

defenders of Christian identity and values. And yet they do not widely attract religious Christian voters. Our

9:40

analyses confirm that paradox. As religiosity increases, the odds of voting for a PRR party instead of a

9:46

mainstream right party decline. In earlier research, it was found that anti-religious sentiment uh has been

9:53

found to be more distressing to individuals who do not attend regular church service and unchurched Christian

9:58

nationalists who are more likely to favor an authoritarian figure using populist appeals. In fact, Christian

10:04

religiosity tends to aid in making one less likely to vote for a far-right radical party. One may ask how this

10:10

could be the case, but the logic isn’t complicated. It’s simple. When individuals on the right leave traditional Christian religiosity, they

10:17

keep a lot of the symbols and cultural heritage and then reinterpret them in political ways, thereby creating

10:23

political religions that have repurposed Christian symbols. Philip Gorski says, “Loose from its religious moorings,

10:29

religious nationalism floats free of the ethical tether of Christian ethics and drifts even further in the direction of

10:36

secular messianism and political authoritarianism.” Roger Brewbaker writes, “It is precisely

10:42

the ongoing erosion of Christianity as doctrine, organization, and ritual that makes it easy to invoke Christianity as

10:49

a cultural and civilizational identity characterized by punitively shared values that have little or nothing to do

10:55

with religious belief and practice. We see similar results with immigration.

11:00

One study found one study looked at the acceptance of refugees at the individual, regional, and national

11:05

level. It found that at the individual level, Christians with the exception of Catholics and have and the unaffiliated

11:12

are relatively similar in their policy preference regarding admittance of refugees. Religious service attendance

11:18

is associated with more generous policy preferences, but at the national and regional level, percent unaffiliated is

11:25

associated with more restrictive preferences. Other studies found that greater religiosity was linked to things

11:31

like personal altruism towards strangers and refugees. So it seems traditional Christianity

11:37

works as a suppressor of political religiosity. Without it, we’ll see an increase of secularization and that

11:43

tends to lead to authoritarian ideologies and the erosion of freedom and civil liberties.

11:49

This should come as no surprise since other research research has found that Christianity is associated with citizen

11:54

empowerment, voice and accountability, democratic values, human rights, and lower levels of corruption. Humans tend

12:01

to be naturally religious, even though a small minority can refrain from this. Removing Christianity from the West

12:06

means man’s natural religious inclinations are harnessed elsewhere. In an in an increasingly secularizing

12:12

world, they are manifested into political religions, which often result in more authoritarianism, the erosion of

12:19

rights, civil and civil liberties. So, keeping a society Christian seems to be better. Not only will we see charity

12:25

work increase, but we’ll also see more freedom and less authoritarianism. Now, finally, I want to look at the most

12:31

damning issue for secularism. Now, a secular culture may create high levels of well-being and life satisfaction, but

12:37

it would not be good for humanity if it cannot sustain itself for multiple generations because it would die out and

12:43

possibly be replaced by a less optimal culture like traditional Islam. So, any given culture must be able to sustain

12:49

itself as part of the case as to why it’s good for humanity. Christianity uh has historically been able to do this by

12:56

producing replacement populations through sustainable birth rates and so later later generations can carry on the

13:02

culture and generate progress. But secularism appears to not be able to do this. To be clear though, I’m not saying

13:09

higher birth rates are necessarily better. If a society produced 10 children per woman, that might create

13:14

problems in food supply chains. What I am saying though is that a functioning society needs to at least have a

13:20

sustainable birth rate. But the countries that have secularized the most and who have the most people who have left traditional religion behind have

13:27

the lowest birth rates of any nation. In fact, as secularism has been exported around the world through the internet

13:33

and media, all nations birth rates have decreased. But secular nations are are now below replacement levels. Eric

13:40

Kaufman notes that it is the conservatives and fundamentalists who are producing the most children because

13:45

of religious tenants about being fruitful and multiplying. So he predicts in a few generations the religious will

13:50

once again take over and the secularist will be in the minority. Evolutionary biologist Michael Bloom argues that

13:56

religiosity has been selected for its evolutionary advantage because it results in more offspring. Now this

14:03

study conducted a multivariable analysis looking at 58 countries and found that secularism even in small amounts is

14:10

associated with population stagnation or even decline absent substantial immigration. Whereas highly religious

14:17

countries have higher fertility rates that promote population growth, many of the modern secular nations have to rely

14:23

on immigration to deal with their aging and declining populations. But that means importing people from

14:28

other cultures who tend to be more religious, who go on to have more children and in time increase in population and replace the declining

14:35

secularists. Also, Eric Kaufman notes, “If pious children simply assimilate into the secular mainstream, the radical

14:42

effects of religious fertility quickly dissipates.” So, secularism doesn’t seem to be something that can endure multiple

14:49

generations. It has to allow immigration from other cultures to keep its populations level sustained. But this

14:55

opens it up to being taken over by harmful cultures like traditional Islam, where rights and freedom, especially for

15:01

women, will be removed. Even if it’s eventually replaced by a more optimal culture like traditional Christianity,

15:08

the point is still that secularism is unsustainable. It cannot produce long- lasting well-being or progress if it

15:14

slowly diminishes and is replaced by something else. Christianity, on the other hand, is able to produce

15:19

sustainable cultures that endure and has historically led to a ton of human progress, thereby making the world a

15:25

better place for humanity. Secularism cannot do this and therefore it is not as good as Christianity has been.

15:32

Now, there are many other variables I could look at, but I don’t have time to cover now. But in terms of charity work, pro-sociality, generating progress,

15:39

levels of depression, and keeping authoritarianism at bay, Christianity clearly outperforms secularism. Secular

15:46

societies also do not provide replacement populations and so cannot generate the prog progress if they

15:52

cannot endure. Because of all these factors, Christianity is clearly better for society. Now, I want to remind the

15:59

audience this is the exact same opening statement I used in my debate with Lawrence Kra Krauss a few months ago.

16:04

It’s very similar to my opening statement I used with Phil Zuckerman about 11 months ago. So, I have been

16:10

putting out this material for a while. I hope my opponent has some good responses because if we remember those past debates didn’t go well, but I am look

16:17

forward to hearing what Dan Barker has to say. I appreciate him being here and I’ll turn it over to him now. Thank you.

16:24

Thank you very much for that opening statement. Thank you very much for that opening statement. We are going to indeed kick

16:31

it over to Dan Barker for his opening. But first, I do want to give an introduction. Dan Barker is an American atheist activist and musician who served

16:38

as an evangelical Christian preacher and composer for 19 years but left

16:44

Christianity in 1984. He and his wife Annie Lori Gayler are the current co-presidents of the Freedom

16:52

from Religion Foundation and he is co-founder of the Clergy Project. Thank you very much for being with us here as

16:58

well. Dan, the floor is all yours for your opening. Thank you, James. This is fun. And thank you, Mike. That was very well prepared.

17:06

Of course, you prepared it months ago. So, um, and it was very well researched

17:11

and you are very articulate. Um, and James, when you invited me to this

17:17

debate, you said the topic would be what is better, Christianity or secular humanism, not necessarily secularism.

17:26

And um because there are many Christians who call themselves humanists as well.

17:31

They embrace humanistic values. In fact, uh I think I think Mike is right. Most

17:38

Christians are good people. There are jerks in every every group. There there’s bad Christians. There’s bad

17:43

Muslims, there’s there’s bad atheists, but the values um that well

17:52

Mike didn’t necessarily articulate them, but the values that he is implying are

17:57

not necessarily exclusively Christian values. Those are human values. And I

18:03

want to talk about that in just a minute. So I didn’t prepare some fancy slide thing. I just want to talk as a

18:10

human being to another human being because how many listeners are going to remember all those points. Uh I don’t I

18:15

don’t even remember half of them. But um society a society is a collection of

18:21

individuals of humans. What is better for a collection of humans than human

18:28

values? Humanism values reason. Humanism values compassion. It

18:36

values tolerance, science, moral principles,

18:42

accountability, responsibility, and it values democracy.

18:49

Democracy is one of those values that you do not find in Christianity. There’s no democracy in the Bible. If

18:55

Christianity is anything, it is what the Bible teaches. And I think Mike agrees. The Bible is the bedrock for Christian

19:02

teachings. You don’t have any basic recognition of human value or human

19:08

worth intrinsically in the Bible. In the Bible, humans are secondary. They are worms. Paul even called himself a slave

19:16

in the Bible, which is the basis for Christianity. Uh the big value there is not democracy or the consent of the

19:23

government governed. The big value in the Bible is obedience, submission. And

19:28

if you look at the teachings especially of the Old Testament, you don’t find humanistic values. You don’t find good

19:34

human values. What you find is God values. You should obey me. You should

19:39

submit to me. You should worship me. By the way, I think any person who demands

19:44

to be worshiped is not worthy of worship. Worship should be earned on its own. So, um I guess I would ask Mike the

19:52

these humanistic values that I just uh referenced, um compassion and reason and

19:58

science and and responsibility and and and morality and all of that.

20:05

What is wrong with any of those? Those are good values. And I think most good Christians are borrowing from humanistic

20:11

values when they are are expressing their charity. I’m glad they are charitable. The members of the Freedom

20:17

from Religion Foundation, we have 42,000 paid up members right now. Uh, an

20:22

overwhelming majority of them do volunteer work. They do contribute not because they want to get to heaven, not

20:28

because they want to impress some king or master or lord, not because they’re afraid of being punished in an eternal

20:34

hellfire and for none of that. It’s just for the love of humanity. If you are

20:40

doing good for some other reason than doing good for humanity, then that you’re bringing in your own selfish

20:46

motives. I want to please my lord. I want to get I want to earn points to get to heaven. So humanistic values are good

20:53

values. Uh there are places where they are stronger in some countries than in others. But uh what are Christian

21:01

values? And Mike did not delineate. He did not articulate what actually is Christian values. uh if if you ask

21:08

Christians themselves, Paul, the Christians themselves, um you won’t find any agreement.

21:15

There’s no agreement among Christian believers about the social issues. We’re talking about society here. Uh you won’t

21:23

find agreement on, for example, gay rights or gay marriage. You find good, devout, bibleelving, praying, moral

21:31

Christians on different sides of those issues. Uh women’s rights, for example.

21:37

um birth control, abortion. There are good church-going, devout Christians who pray, who love Jesus, who who who

21:44

contribute to charity, who help the missionaries. They are in favor of abortion rights. And there are those who

21:49

are opposed to it. uh doctor assisted suicide or in vitro fertilization or the

21:55

war or immigration as Mike mentioned uh state church separation

22:00

uh climate change for example or or vaccines um and so on especially gun control. Do

22:08

you know what demographic uh has the highest percentage of go gun ownership? It is evangelical Christians.

22:16

For for some reason this these people who follow the prince of peace feel like they have to be armed to the teeth. They

22:23

apparently don’t have enough trust in God. They need to trust in these arms. Whereas other countries that are more

22:29

secular like Denmark or the Nordic countries, gun ownership is very very low. There there are atheists who own

22:36

guns, but atheists are half as likely to be gun owners as are evangelical Christians. So when you’re talking about

22:42

Christianity, what exactly are you talking about? Some nebulous idea of let’s all just all be good people. All

22:50

religions talk about love. That’s no big deal. All religions talk about peace.

22:55

That’s nothing surprising. All religions talk about let’s get all all get along together. And so Christians say that

23:01

too. And it’ be no surprise to find a religion like Christianity that that sometimes talks about love. However, if

23:08

you look at the Bible, talk about love is is is very small in the Bible. There’s not enough love in the Bible

23:14

really to to fill a communion cup. There’s most often in the Bible is threats and curses. If you disobey me,

23:22

look at the um covenant that the Christians God established over his people in Deuteronomy. Uh it starts with

23:30

a bunch of blessings, but if you obey me, here’s all the blessings. But then if you disobey me then there’s four

23:37

times as many curses pyromaniacal pestilential infanticidal genocidal. Uh

23:43

the Bible is not a good moral book. Those Christians who are good people like Mike I’m sure Mike is a good person

23:51

are are good not because of Christian teachings not because of the Bible but

23:56

in spite of it they have risen above the brutality of that book. So I would ask

24:03

what do you mean by Christianity? Christianity has a pessimistic view of

24:08

human nature whereas humanism has at least an optimistic view of human

24:13

nature. We’re not all perfect. We’re not all going to be great. We’re going some of us are going to fail. Depends where

24:18

you fall on the bell curve. But um the um well I guess I’ll save it for a

24:25

rebuttal. This thing about sustainability because it’s sort of it’s sort of a nonsequiter. So Christianity

24:32

at its core is anti-democratic. You won’t find democracy in the Bible.

24:38

Christianity endorses and and embraced slavery. And in fact the southern slave owners in the United States quoted from

24:45

the Bible there. Jesus never out never said anything against slavery. In fact, he endorsed it by quoting it. He even

24:52

said, “There are some slaves you should not beat as hard as other slaves.” No mention anywhere in the Bible about the

24:58

depravity of owning and beating another human being. Uh the status of women in

25:03

the Bible. So, and of course, if we look at Christianity, we can see the the divisions and the fights and the murders

25:10

and the killing. Not just Christians against Muslims and others, but Christians against Christians. some of

25:16

the most brutal bloodshed in history has happened between Catholics and Protestants in Europe. So it’s it is not

25:22

a religion of peace. I’m still I am applauding those Christians who are good people and I think so I think it’s great

25:28

that Mike you are joining us humanists. It is wonderful that you value human

25:34

life more than the God of the Bible did obviously. So um

25:40

and even even if one of us turns even if it turns out in this debate one of us says okay this one is better than the

25:47

other secular humanism or Christianity it doesn’t mean that either of those is the best in the world there are other

25:56

cultures there are other systems for example I’m a member of a Native American tribe Native American values

26:02

served very very well on this continent for thousands of years before the Christians came over with a gun in one

26:08

hand and a Bible in the other and enforced by by bloodshed their views and

26:14

exterminated in the name of God. Uh all all of those people in my tribe almost went extinct because of that. And who’s

26:21

to say that u Native American values aren’t maybe better if you look at Native American societies. And there’s

26:27

many stories of white Europeans who were raised in Native cultures who when they

26:32

were finally rescued did not want to go back. They didn’t want to go back to the Christian so-called civilized societies

26:39

because especially the women because women had a lower status. They were women in the Native American cultures

26:45

were treated better. They were treated more respectfully. They had more autonomy. They had more rights. And so

26:52

um yes, I think we can pick different countries around the world. If uh look

26:58

at Japan for example, Japan is not a religious country. certainly not a a

27:04

Christian country, but Japan by any measure is a secular country with with

27:09

good values, with a good economy, with good people. And they let me get a drink

27:16

of water here. When you debate, you tend to not um you tend to not pause enough here.

27:24

Look at Japan. Look at at Denmark right now. About 4% of the people believe in God. About half of them would call

27:30

themselves cultural Christians. Uh and so uh they have Japan has much

27:36

less crime than the United States and so do the Nordic countries have much less crime. The gun gun ownership and gun

27:43

possession is really low down there. Women are treated better under secular values. So my argument is that yes there

27:50

are good Christians in the world but their values that are propo that they are promoting the values that Mike

27:56

actually lives by are not Christian values. They are humanistic values. They

28:01

were they are values that have long predated Christianity and long predated Jesus. The golden rule was said before

28:08

Jesus said it many times even better than Jesus said it. So I would say um

28:16

since religion is divisive at its core, Christianity is divisive. It it creates an in-groups and outgroups.

28:23

Secular humanism is not divisive. secular humanism isn’t trying to repopulate the world as if we were some

28:29

kind of a you know like a cultic community or something. Uh in fact most humanists

28:37

that I know uh would prefer not to have too many children because then how

28:43

arrogant is that? We want to have as many kids as we can so that our views can be populated. Many secular humanists

28:48

have built hospitals. Many secular humanists have done charity work. I volunteer with the Red Cross, which is a

28:54

secular organization. Um, most of the members of the Freedom from Religion Bound Foundation are are um volunteers

29:03

and and charitable people give to charity. And I know there are these studies that say people who go to church

29:09

give more. But uh I think there’s one advantage of church membership and is that it gives people more of a chance to

29:15

regularly meet together. And in that sense, you have a local bonding. You see it with Jewish communities. I play piano

29:22

in a Klesmer band sometimes. Um, and I see the Jews get together. I I see the

29:28

love, the the connection, the giving, the the charity, the I I see that how

29:33

beautiful that community is. And I think you’re right that most secularists don’t have that kind of a weekly place where

29:40

they get together unless you’re a Unitarian or you belong to one of these other, you know, local groups. So these

29:47

values that you are trumpeting, the values of literacy for example, that’s a secular value. Uh and and by the way,

29:53

missionaries have also done a lot of harm. They haven’t just taught um you know taught reading. They’ve also done a

30:00

lot of harm. They and they’ve and missionaries have exterminated basically through disease. There are some good

30:05

missionaries and I used to be one and I was a a good missionary through Latin America and I know that. But uh mission

30:12

work if you look at the whole picture uh is more about promoting the faith than it is promoting human values. And

30:21

ultimately the Christian system itself is authoritarian.

30:27

You must submit. You must obey. You must Paul said bring into captivity every

30:32

thought unto the obedience of Christ. No freedom of thought in Christianity. Um

30:37

in Proverbs lean not on your own understanding. And Paul even said to Christians, you there should be no

30:44

disagreement among you. You should all think the same. So there’s an authoritarian rigidness built into

30:50

Christianity itself, which I’m glad Mike is rejecting. I’m glad he’s rising above

30:56

those biblical principles. I’m glad he’s rising above the Christian principles.

31:02

And I I salute Mike and I salute other Christians for good work that they are doing. But the good work they are doing

31:07

is not Christian work. work. It is humanistic work.

31:16

You got it. Thank you very much for that opening as well. I’m going to do a couple of quick little promotions. Folks, if you had not seen pinned at the

31:23

top of the live chat is our insider list. You can join it. It’ll let you

31:29

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including Mike Jones, Inspiring Philosophy. He will be there. Come out, meet your favorite, basically meet your

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favorite debaters as well as see them debate at Debatecon 6 as you can see at the bottom right of your screen and

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click on that link pinned at the top of the chat for a discount code on your tickets. With that, we’re going to jump

31:52

into the open dialogue. Gentlemen, thank you very much. The floor is all yours for open discussions.

31:57

He called us gentlemen. Did you hear that? That’s great. Yeah. So, thank you for that, Dan. uh it seemed your main point

32:03

was a lot of the values that Christianity has been showing to be promoting and correlating with in the

32:08

studies are just human values that they don’t actually come from Christianity. These are just human values. My question

32:15

is how much ancient Neareastern scholarship or scholarship of the ancient world have you read about the values of like the ancient Romans or the

32:22

Mesopotamians or the Egyptians? How much have you read on that topic? Well, I’ve read something. I’m not a PhD

32:28

in it, but I’ve read a number of books. So, can I ask can I uh I would like to quote John Bero in his his he’s a French

32:36

uh historian. He wrote wrote a book called Religion in Ancient Mesopotamia. And you’re going to find similar quotes

32:42

in like Carl Vander’s work, John Walton. This is nothing controversial, but he says this. He says, “Did morality,

32:48

honest and righteous behavior, have an authentic religious and cultural value, a place in the practice of religion, a

32:54

direct influence on the gods? We’ve never found any response. And all of our documentation is such a question. A

33:00

question that we ask ourselves from our own religious and biblical point of view. The ancient Mesopotamians never

33:06

overtly concern themselves with or imagined such preoccupations which are so familiar to us. Then he says this. He

33:13

says, “This must have been one of Moses’s greatest revolutions in Israel.” In other words, Dan, the reason why we

33:20

have focused not on honor and shame, but our focus is on moral worth, integrity,

33:25

uh doing right and wrong, internal guilt, this comes from the biblical worldview, which is saturated and took

33:31

over the modern values. These are not human values. If you study the way a lot of the ancient cultures operated, they

33:36

functioned more around honor and shame, public appearances. Uh you could read this as well in family religion in

33:43

Babylonia, Syria and Israel by Carl Vanderorn. Uh this is just so like for you to say these are just human values.

33:49

It just that’s just ahistorical. That’s not actually accurate. Well, of course um with Mesopotamia,

33:56

we had the first cities. We had the first hierarchies of humanity. Cities only go back 6,000 years. And it was at

34:04

that time where we started to have what we would call kings and emperors. Before that there were local leaders of course

34:10

but there was no concept of a great regional lord, king, emperor, master that we all

34:17

must bow down to in order to maintain that hierarchical society. Then violence was introduced and of course slavery

34:24

came into existence at that time as well. And then there was of course that middle class. But you find the same

34:29

thing in the Old Testament. You don’t find human values in the Old Testament. You find God. You find the king, the

34:35

Lord. And if you if you if you read um just read the Old Testament, just read

34:41

some of read the story of Fine. What do you think about Fineas? That story. Phineas. Is that what you’re talking

34:47

about? Yeah. What do you think about that story? Yeah. It’s an interesting story, but I have no idea what that has to do with the topic. Are we talking about what is

34:54

in the Bible or if it’s bad or what are the effects of the Bible? You can sit here and you can hold on. You can sit

35:00

here and say, “Oh, I don’t like this thing in the Bible.” The topic of the debate is what are the effects that come out of the Christian worldview? And you

35:06

may not like it, but historians are pretty unanimous that the reason slavery is now, you know, been abandoned in the

35:12

West is because of Christianity. And you can go, “Oh, yes, it’s true. You can read, you

35:18

can read, hold on. You can read his story.” Go back to my question. James, he’s getting off the question is not to do with the actual

35:24

debate though. One second. We’ll let James decide that. He’s the moderator. Okay. What was uh the question is I

35:32

think I want to ask Matt Mike. I think Mike’s concerned it’s it the question itself is not on topic though

35:38

and you’re you’re concerned that he’s not on topic in answering it. But I think to go back he’s like but but wait, it’s

35:44

not even on the topic. That’s why I think he’s not on topic with what you asked. Well, well, Mike brought up Mesopotamia and I’m bringing up the

35:50

ancient Israelite culture from But I but hold on, let me clarify. I brought that up because to refute your

35:55

idea. Hold on. I brought that up because you said these are just human values. And I just said, well, no, we can see clearly different values in the ancient

36:02

world contrasted to the values that come out of the biblical worldview. Now, can I get a difference? Let me point then. The ancient

36:09

Israelites were part of the ancient world, right? Yes. Exactly. So, Fineas or Phineas, however

36:16

you want to say it. Do you think he he was a good man? The Bible says he was a good man. Do you think he was?

36:22

It says that he was righteous and he followed God. I believe. Yeah. And you know why? What he did?

36:27

Yeah. Because he stopped in a horrible cultic practice from engaging in

36:33

he murdered two people. He took a sword into the tent. He The Israelites were told don’t mix with those Midianites.

36:40

That’s a sin. God decreed that it was a sin for them to have misogynation to marry outside of the tribe.

36:47

because it would it would be be a a threat to the purity of their race to

36:52

mix with the Midianites. Well, there was an Israelite man who found a Midianite woman and they got together and Fineas

37:00

who was the grandson of Aaron. He was so angry that they were mixing. They they were basically interracial marriage. He

37:07

went in with the sword and he stabbed them both and killed them both. And then

37:12

he was rewarded. Moses rewarded him for doing a good thing. That murderous act

37:18

was a good thing because it protected the purity of the master race of Israelites. And he was rewarded then.

37:25

Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Where does it say the Israelites are a master race? Where does it say that? Well, because he he was the race chosen

37:31

by God. The Israelites were Okay. Wait, wait, wait. Why were they chosen? God I don’t know why this God chose

37:37

them. He He It doesn’t say anything about them being a master race. It says that they were chosen out of God’s providence. They say

37:43

they’re stiff necked people. It never says they were chosen because some special far off topic because just with the

37:49

topic being whether or not Christianity versus secular humanism is best for society. I do want to just redirect us.

37:55

Yeah. And again, this has nothing to do with what the effects came out of it. Listen, I say this all the time. You

38:01

brought it up and and I’m I’m not respond. I’m not respond to what you bring up. No, let’s go back to the point you made.

38:08

The point you made is all the values I’m promoting are just human values, baby. that’s all they are. And I’m like, well, no, they’re not. The Historians have

38:14

pointed out the values that we hold dear come out of the Christian tradition. This is that that Tom Holland has argued

38:20

in his recent book, Dominion. You can see this in the book, Christianity and Human Rights, an introduction. You can

38:25

see it in Samuel Moy’s book, Christian Human Rights. Have the last word on this, though. But but you’re skiing my point.

38:32

The Christianity is based on the Bible. Christianity comes from the Bible. And

38:37

the values in the Bible are what you think are the Christian values. And I’m asking you, was it good for FineA to be

38:45

rewarded and praised for doing a good act, for killing people to stop them from interracial marriage? Was that

38:51

good? You have to say yes. No, I don’t because that’s a lie. They would know. God never says, “I need to

38:56

stop an interracial marriage.” That doesn’t happen in the Torah. What are you talking about? They were engaging in a cultic practice. And it was

39:03

All right. I have no We do have to You don’t know your Bible very well. We do have to We have to go back to the

39:09

topic. All right. I recommend you read Robert Alter on this. He covers this more extensively.

39:14

I recommend that you read the Bible, Mike, on this. Read that chapter. That’s what this is. This is We have to go back, gentlemen. Okay. All

39:20

right. Read the Bible, Michael, and and then tell me that Fel was a good man. The Bible says he was

39:26

We have to go back. Let’s get back to the topic. We have to I got a Okay, I got a question. Okay. You said, for example, Christianity is

39:34

divisive and secularism isn’t. But I cited a bunch of research on this. I did not say that. What did you say

39:40

then? Christianity is divisive. That’s what Okay. So again, you said Christianity is divisive and you said

39:46

secularism isn’t. No, I didn’t say that. So secularism is divisive. It can be. Yes.

39:52

Secularists who who will fight with each other as well. Okay. So then what is the actual

39:59

evidence that Christianity causes divisive? And don’t be like, well, this is what I think happens. Don’t do

40:04

armchair science. Do you have research? Do you have evidence? because I cited a bunch showing that it leads to more

40:09

volunteering and charity work that gets pes better and stronger communities when you’re out actually helping people on

40:15

the streets. Um I cited research that it leads to more citizen empowerment. Remember Roland to Salem study? It leads

40:21

to more uh non-GO membership uh voice and accountability in government. How is it divisive if it’s causing these kind

40:28

of good things? Well, that’s a that’s that’s a nonsequator. Christianity is divisive.

40:34

What’s the data that shows that? Well, look at history. Look at Catholics and Protestants killing each other, right?

40:41

Okay. What’s the evidence Christianity caused that? What’s the evidence Christianity caused that? Because I could just say, “Yeah, look, if

40:47

secularism leads to death, look at the USSR.” And you wouldn’t accept that. But why should I accept what you’re saying?

40:53

Because Catholics and Protestants are based on a religion based on the same book,

40:59

right? The Bible. They both read it. They claim to understand it. They claim to interpret

41:04

it correctly. And yet John Calvin, for example, had Cervatus murdered because

41:10

of a doctrinal difference. He had him burned at the stake because of a doctrinal. We know historically that

41:16

Christianity is divisive. It it builds walls. It it makes insider, if nothing

41:21

else, it makes Christianity a cultish circle from the rest of the world, the

41:27

outsiders, the world out there. There’s a divisiveness within Christianity. And humanism embraces the entire planet.

41:34

Humanism embraces you Christians. There are many Christians who call themselves humanists. So it’s a fact that

41:40

Christianity historically is divisive. Okay. So again, what is the evidence? I

41:45

can’t just say secularism causes communist states like the USSR because of the USSR. That’s a bariate means

41:53

comparison. You’re looking at two variables and you’re making a jump conclusion. For example, like we’ve seen

41:58

this throughout research in the past. people thought like certain things, you know, would lead to like this effect and

42:03

we find out that’s not actually a thing. We This happens in medicine all the time. We think like this nutritional aspect leads to like poor health and

42:10

then we find out, oh, it was just a correlation, not a causation. So, what you’re citing here is correlative. Do

42:16

you have any evidence of a positive association to suggest a causal link? Because I could cite someone like

42:22

William Kavanaaugh in his book, The Myth of Religious Violence, where he says, “We must conclude that the myth of the

42:27

wars of religion is finally incredible, which is to say false.” And he went

42:32

through a lot of this data that you’ve cited between Catholics and Protestants fighting. And he made the case this was

42:37

more about political disputes. For example, during the 70 years war, the pope uh sided with the with France and

42:44

the Protestants against the Holy Roman Emperor. Many of Charles’s forces were of Protestant origin. this wasn’t

42:51

divided on religious lies and he makes the case in his book this was more about political economic factors that led to

42:56

that war not Christianity. So what is the evidence for a positive association to make a causal link?

43:02

Well I wasn’t making a causal link. I’m simply pointing out that Christianity is divisive. I wasn’t making some some

43:08

link. If if if Christianity is this wonderful system of values, right, based on a

43:15

Bible that’s revealed by God to the world, then why is it that Christians are fighting other Christians? Why is it

43:21

that even in the New Testament you find disagreements? You don’t find unitary.

43:26

So it’s it’s simple. It it’s not that there’s a causal connection between this and that. I understand all you can make

43:33

the same argument about slavery. Was slavery motivated by the Bible or by economics?

43:38

Well, the Bible supported that economic argument and many Christian wars were

43:43

supported by the Christian arguments. Sure, there were greater factors involved in that, but you you did make a positive claim.

43:50

You said Christianity is divisive and then I asked you for evidence and you said I’m not making a causal link. Well,

43:55

yes, you are. You’re saying that there’s divisive things. Christianity is the cause, and I’m asking for evidence of that. What I’m saying is that if

44:02

Christianity is a viable system of values, then there should not be that divisiveness within.

44:08

Where is the what is the evidence? You just can’t look at people being divisive and say that’s Christianity’s fault. Just look at just look at Christians

44:15

against Do you do you deny that Christians have fought with against Christians? Do you deny that? No, of course they fought just like

44:20

atheists have fought against atheists. So what? Well, I guess I don’t see the point you’re making here. Christianity is

44:26

divisive. There’s Baptists, there’s Pentecostals, there’s Catholics, there’s Jehovah’s Witnesses, there’s Mormons,

44:33

there’s you name, there’s thousands of different Christian denominations. They are all different. They all think they

44:39

have the right one because they are blessed with the proper interpretation just like you think you are. And yet it

44:45

is divisive. They are not united. And even though Paul said there should be no

44:50

division among you, and yet there is division among them. So right there, Christianity is failing. If nothing

44:56

else, it is divisive. Are all secular humanists on the same page on every issue? No, of course not.

45:02

Okay, then there you go. Then it’s the same problem on your side. What is the evidence that your side is actually going to be better for society? So far,

45:09

Dan, at this point, so far you’ve given no evidence whatsoever, no studies, no

45:14

data, no evidence that secularism is actually better. Let me finish. No better. I’ve given multiple studies. All

45:20

you’ve done is you’ve said like, well, there’s problems in Christianity. Okay. What is the actual reason that secularism is even better? You just

45:26

can’t be like, “Well, I don’t like Christianity. I think it’s divisive. Therefore, my side is better.” I need actual raw data because even if you can

45:33

show problems with Christianity, that doesn’t mean your society that you envision is better. You need to make a

45:38

positive case. You’ve not done that here. Yes, I have. I pointed to countries, huge societies that are much better off

45:46

and almost every measure that you would look at of What are the birth rates in those countries? What are the birth rates in

45:51

those countries? What does that have to do with how well off they are? That has to do with everything because

45:57

it shows they can’t even if they don’t have sustainable birth rates like in Denmark, in Sweden, in Spain, in

46:03

Britain, they can’t produce a longlasting society because basically it’s going to dissipate into nothing and

46:09

be taken over by like Islamic Christian. It doesn’t matter if it’s reproducible. If if it’s good, it’s good.

46:15

Wait a minute. Wait. So, so let me get this straight. If you think a farm produced fruit for one year and then didn’t produce fruit for hundreds of

46:22

years after that, would it be a good farm? If the fruit was good, it was good fruit. So it was good for one year and after

46:27

that it sucked, right? Yeah. Okay, then that’s my good fruit. So right right now there are

46:33

countries like Japan, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, people countries that are much less religious and much less Christian

46:40

that are much better off than for example the United States with its crime rates and and and violence and and

46:47

prison populations. What studies show that? What studies show that and what studies shows from from like religiosity?

46:53

You referred to Phil Zuckerman and you know he’s got a number of good books out on showing Oh, I’ve read his books. I’ve debated

47:00

him about 11 months ago. He was just as unprepared as you are for this and didn’t have any good response to this

47:06

kind of stuff I’m bringing up. So citing him, please everyone go watch that debate as well. Please, I I promise you

47:12

it it’s going to be a good time. I don’t know what to tell you. Citing him isn’t going to really help you because I’ve gone through his research.

47:18

I would ask viewers to actually read his book. So yeah, and I cited his book in my opening

47:23

my statement. Did you remember that? Yeah, I know. And you know, he’s very gracious. He he he admits that there’s a lot of good Christians in the world. He

47:29

admits that there’s a lot a lot of good things that Christians have done. He’s not like some angry screaming atheist. I

47:36

admit that there’s a lot of good things that Christians have done as well. But my point here is what they’re doing does

47:42

not come from the Bible. It comes from human principles. The Bible does not

47:47

support any of those values that you think are so wonderful Christian val Christians might use the Bible as an

47:53

excuse to be good. But but ultimately a good person is a good person because they want to be a good person. And what

47:59

what is their value? What is their measure? Those are human values which means humanism. You don’t find it in the

48:07

Bible. Okay. Then they’re not secular values either. Then then by your own logic you just can’t claim they’re secular values.

48:12

What is the evidence? Well then then you’re saying they’re human values. What is the evidence that secular humanism is

48:18

better than Christianity? Because in your logic, you’ve just pushed all these values off the table. They’re neither

48:23

from your side or from my side. So, what is the evidence secularism is even better. They’re from both of our sides, Mike.

48:28

Both of us want a world with less violence, right? You want a world, we do. You want a world with more more

48:34

understanding. You want a world with less pedophilia, with more rights, with more democracy. We both want those same

48:40

things. We’re both human beings. My point is that these values that you and I are both embracing and I applaud you

48:47

for it. They are not Christian values. They are human values. And our debate was I I was told the debate was about

48:54

humanism, not secularism. That’s what I was told at least in the email that we were talking about humanism. And

49:01

well, I mean it doesn’t it doesn’t matter because I still made the case that a lot of the values you cherish are nurtured and grow more in Christian

49:08

societies. They’re not growing and nurturing in secular societies. Take the countries you mentioned like Denmark and

49:13

Sweden. Higher levels of depression, lower levels of volunteering, unsustainable birth. These are societies

49:20

collapsing. Forgive me for the interruption. To be fair, Dan, uh, just to be sure we’re on the same page, I’m looking at the email

49:26

I sent you on Friday, September 19th. I said, “Mike is interested in the topic

49:31

of Christianity or secular humanism.” In your response, you said, “That works for me. I assume this is online.”

49:39

that. So when you say humanism, hold on, let me finish. When you say James asked me about

49:44

humanism and I said yes, just to be clear, I said secular humanism. You seem to agree to it. So to

49:50

not lie about me, I don’t lying about you. I think you’re just mistaken.

49:57

I’m just saying that um the word humanism was not in Mike’s talk. He’s

50:03

talking about secularism. And there are many Christians who call themselves humanists. And there I think most good

50:09

Christians are humanists. So I’m focusing on the humanism as a value.

50:16

Okay. But again, what is the actual evidence that you know secular humanist societies will produce more optimal

50:22

values that get that put out more what you call humanist values? Because the data I went through meta analysis,

50:28

systematic review, uh studies that have looked at multiple countries say that when countries secularize, these types

50:34

of values decrease. We see more polarization, as John Compton’s research shows, from atheists, for example. We

50:41

see lower levels of volunteering and charity work, which lowers community bonds. We see more depression, more

50:47

higher suicide rates. And of course, again, collapsing societies because of low birth rates. If your society is

50:54

collapsing, if secular societies are collapsing, they’re not good for humanity or anything because they can’t sustain themselves.

51:01

So, I’m not arguing for secularism. There are secular societies that are really grossly atheistic. There have

51:07

been. I’m talking about secular humanism. Not Can you define terms? Because like I

51:12

defined my terms in the beginning of my opening statement. Maybe you should define your terms.

51:18

Well, I think I did. I I defined what humanism is. Humanism is committed to

51:23

these basic values of um reason, compassion, tolerance, science, moral

51:30

principles, accountability, responsibility, and democracy. These are

51:35

values. Most of these values you won’t find in the Christian system. These areistic values.

51:41

Christianity is crucial for the development of science. I don’t know if you knew that. Oh, I don’t think so. I think

51:47

Okay. So when Noah there was science long before Christianity. No. Okay. So when Noah J. Efron who

51:53

again not a Christian when Noah J. Efron says that generations of historians will say that uh Christianity was crucial for

52:00

science in his chapter in the book Galileo goes to jail and other myths. He’s wrong. He’s a liar. He’s an

52:05

historian. He’s wrong. You know better than him. Well that’s one historian but

52:10

okay. What about Seb Faulk in light ages? What about James Uniano popes and unicorns? What about James Hanam in the

52:16

Genesis of Science? Uh, I mean like I keep going on. I literally just posted a video on my channel today titled How

52:22

Christianity Created Science and I went through study after study. You could read you I cited Toby E. Huff, the rise

52:28

of early modern science. He again his the point of his you might find his book kind of interesting, Dan, because he’s

52:33

wrestling with this idea in his book. How come modern science came out of Christian Europe and not Middle East of

52:40

Islam? And he basically comes to the conclusion it was the different religions. Christianity fostered and gave rise to modern science whereas

52:46

Islam let it stagnate. It used what they called the foreign sciences uh as much

52:51

as they could help the Islamic tradition and when they were done they discarded it. Meanwhile, Christianity gave us the

52:57

separation of church and state. Again that’s not controversial. Historians will tell you that. And then from that

53:03

it allowed different institutions to develop. One of them being the institution of science. So yes, Christianity was crucial for the

53:09

development of science. And I could cite numerous historians on that because I just uploaded that video today. Okay. So, let me agree and disagree. I

53:17

think I agree with you 100% that Christians contributed to the growth of

53:22

many things. It’s not what I said. Christians did. It’s not what I said. Christian Yeah, you said I know you

53:28

didn’t say that. What I’m saying is that I agree that

53:33

James here, James. Um, I’m trying to I’m trying to make and he’s being a little

53:39

snarky here. Um, you said Christianity

53:44

Mhm. created these things. I would say I would agree with you that Christians, many Christians, like Isaac Newton, for

53:51

example, many Christians were instrumental in rising above their Bible. But it’s not Christianity that

53:58

did it. It was Christians that did it. Christians did it in spite of Christianity. Because all of these

54:04

values that you talk about, all these things that you think are great and so do I, they don’t come from the founding

54:11

document of Christianity, the Bible. You sure about that? They’re not there. Tell me where is democracy in the Bible. Where is it?

54:17

Uh when it it’s okay. Well, you can just read uh Joshua Burman’s book created equal. It’s throughout Deuteronomy, for

54:23

example. He points out that Deuteronomy envisions um let me finish. Deuteronomy envisions an egalitarian society. It’s not modern

54:30

democracy but there is that those elements there where the people are called to for example decide if they

54:35

want a king to call to do certain aspects in terms of like electing court

54:40

of uh people like judges for example so again you can read this about in Joshua Burman’s book created equal and a month

54:46

or two ago I uploaded a video titled how Christianity created human rights but you were talking about science here you

54:52

said science doesn’t come from the bible okay that’s just false a lot of aspects that you we have in the scientific

54:58

method come from Christianity. Let me quote Noah J. Efron again. He notes, “Augustine’s notion of original sin,

55:04

which held that Adam’s fall left humans implacably damaged, was embraced by advocates of experimental natural

55:10

philosophy. As they saw it, fallen humans lack the grace to understand the workings of the world through cognition

55:16

alone, requiring in their disgraced state painstaking experiment and observation.” Then he goes on to say,

55:21

“In this way, Christian doctrine lent urgency to experiment.” In other words, the idea of the fall which lack was

55:28

which was missing in like Islam, far eastern religions, ancient Greek thought. The idea that we were we are

55:33

created in God’s image but marred means we have to do constant experimentation to verify results. And historians are

55:39

pretty clear on this that led urgency to this the scientific method developing because you couldn’t just go on your

55:45

initial thoughts. You had to do an experiment to back it up. So this idea that Christian doctrine didn’t help

55:51

science advance completely ahistorical nonsense. What doctrine? The doctrine of the fall.

55:57

The fall. The doctrine of the fall. Okay. So, you know, I’m a member of a

56:02

Native American tribe. Um, and okay, my ancestors were on this continent

56:08

probably 15,000 years ago. Uh, which was what at least what 10,000 years before

56:17

God gave his ten commandments to the Israelites or whatever you want to call it. There were cultures during that time

56:24

of people loving each other, taking care of each other, learning, observing,

56:29

finding herbal remedies, finding scientific. They wouldn’t have used the word science and they wouldn’t have used

56:35

this formal logic. But those people in those cultures long before there were

56:40

even any cities or kings or masters or lords or or these, you know, big gods

56:46

doing science. It wasn’t formalized. It wasn’t the same, but they they were trial and error. They were using their

56:53

brains. They were using their compassion and they had, you know, they had low

56:58

birth rates obviously because they were mostly nomatic groups. And they they they succeeded for thousands of years

57:06

without Christianity, without Judaism. Those societies of people and and I I

57:13

hope you wouldn’t suggest they were bunch of ignorant violent savages. They were they were

57:18

viable, functioning, sustainable societies for thousands of years before

57:24

Judaism or Christianity came along. And the values they were based on, even if they didn’t have a formal way of saying

57:30

it, those were human values. Christianity cannot take credit for the

57:35

progress and the learning and the science and the observation and love and morality that our species has had u many

57:42

many thousands of years before the Jews claimed the copyright to the so-called ten commandments. These are human

57:48

values. They are not religious values. They are not Christian values.

57:53

David, I’m going to go back to something I let me go back to something I said in my opening statement. Again, this debate is about which is better for society.

58:00

demonstrating that Christianity is better does not mean other type societies cannot flourish and endure. I

58:05

would just argue they do so in a less optimal way. End quote. That’s what I said in my opening statement. So, I

58:11

agree other societies can continue on and flourish. They just do so in a less optimal way. Like secular societies are

58:16

less optimal than Christian societies. So, I’m not saying secular societies. I’m saying secular humanist society. I I

58:24

think there’s a lot of secular societies that are rotten, but societies that are based on humanistic principles.

58:31

What even Christians will base their lives on humanistic principles? Those principles, those values are what we are

58:38

all embracing. And that’s those are the values by which I can call you a good person. Not because you’re aligning up

58:43

with some doctrine or for some Christian teaching, but because you are respecting and you are admiring and taking care of

58:50

human values, not bowing down to some Lord, Master God who’s telling you what

58:55

to do, but using your brain, either formal or informal type of science. And

59:00

that’s what we all are. We’re all human beings trying to live our lives. If you’re a good person, you want to

59:06

respect human values, not godly values. And what’s the evidence that secular

59:11

human societies are more optimal than Christian ones? Again, don’t do armchair sociology. Give me actual data that

59:18

shows they’re more optimal because I went through a ton of studies to show that Christian societies are far more

59:24

optimal. So, what is the evidence? Secular humanist. And by the way, when I say secular, I’m just using that as shorthand for secular humanism.

59:30

So, humanism, right? Yeah, I’m just using secular as shorthand. So, are you saying Christians are not

59:35

humanists? def again define humanists. I just did twice.

59:42

Okay. In that sense, yeah, they they hold the human’s values and I argue those comes out of the Christian tradition. Those values you call human

59:49

values, they they were not as uh as prized in the ancient world as they were in the Judeo-Christian system as I

59:55

showed in the recent ancient world. Not like in my ancient Indian society that long

1:00:01

predated these kings and cities and emperors and all that and Mesopotamia and

1:00:06

yeah they had different sets of values and the values that you cherish today. The values that you hold dear you call

1:00:12

humanist values are values you got from the Judeo-Christian tradition. They came out of Christianity starting with the

1:00:19

Torah moving through the prophets moving into the New Testament and then the early church fathers. This is very easy

1:00:24

to show when you read historians like again read the book Christianity and human rights and introduction read Tom

1:00:30

Holland’s book dominion read Joshua Burman’s book created equal these stuff come these ideas come out of the

1:00:36

Christian tradition so that you have the fortunate the fortunate uh of saying these are human values that wasn’t so

1:00:43

3,000 years ago yeah but but that’s because of cities I think cities were a scourge on our species when cities came

1:00:50

into existence it created hierarchies it created kings, lords, masters, emperors

1:00:55

that which people must bow down and education and hospitals and systems

1:01:00

of learning and universities. I wanted just to be sure that Dan got to finish that thought in case he was mid-sentence. Sorry. Go ahead.

1:01:06

Boy, there’s so many thoughts flying around here. My brain is uh Look, I don’t think cities are perfect. There’s a lot of problems in cities, but

1:01:13

there’s good things that came out of cities. We would not have had like the like universities, for example, if

1:01:18

Christian Europe didn’t develop them and they were developed in cities. You need that kind of that that manpower structure to develop more advanced

1:01:25

institutions to develop things like you know like massive hospitals for example. Hunter gatherers aren’t going to develop

1:01:31

that kind of medical technology. Are you saying then that the European Christians were superior people to my

1:01:38

Native American ancestors before they came over here? No, I’m saying they had a superior ideology known as Christianity.

1:01:44

Superior in what way? in and superior that

1:01:49

didn’t my didn’t my ancestors have good cultures love family values learning

1:01:55

well here’s the thing I mean you’re you’re lumping all Native American cultures into one thing and that’s

1:02:00

absurd like the Irakcoy did many horrible things the Aztec did horrible things but for example like the um uh

1:02:08

what am I thinking of like the Massachusetts tribe up there uh they were pretty good compared to what we were able to find they actually welcomed

1:02:14

Puritans and pilgrims in they got along. A lot of them converted to Christianity when they realized how beneficial it was. Mind you, you can read about that

1:02:20

in the book New England Frontier by Alen Vaughn, for example. Oh yes. Yeah, the Moheagans though. No, no, no, no, no.

1:02:27

You need to read Alen Vaughn’s book New England Frontier. Uh the the pilgrims showed up, Dan, and they actually were

1:02:33

welcomed and they evangelized. For example, uh the um the main tribe, the tribe that um that um Squanto came from.

1:02:41

Most of them didn’t actually convert to Christianity and they were still able to work with the Puritans for many generations. In fact, they made it a law

1:02:48

that they didn’t have to swear on the Bible if they were going to testify in court. You can read about this in his book New England Frontier by Alden

1:02:55

Vaughn. The Puritans were all about religious freedom. Okay? Things changed after King Phillip’s war when that thing

1:03:01

happened. But for the first several decades, they lived in peace. They evangelized and they did not force

1:03:07

religion. Now, did that happen to some Native Americans? Absolutely. But the Puritans, no, they weren’t like that.

1:03:14

So, um, all these books, you’re very well read and I’m impressed with it. Um,

1:03:19

um, but I would encourage you to read a book that I don’t think you’re that familiar with. It’s called the Bible.

1:03:26

It’s the Old Testament especially. Um, the values that you find in that book. I mentioned Phineas, and you agree that

1:03:33

Moses and the God of the Bible praised him for committing this murderous act. Uh there are many other stories just

1:03:40

like that of genocidal stories of um and it’s not just Psalm 137:9 where the

1:03:46

Bible says you should be happy to take innocent babies and dash them against the rock. Does it say that? Yes.

1:03:52

It says that we it says God commands that we ought to be happy when babies are smashed against rocks.

1:03:58

Blessed are they who take the little ones and dash them against. So that word blessed can be happy or blessed.

1:04:04

Who’s the speaker? Who’s the speaker? We don’t know the psalmist. The psalmist. Yeah, it’s it’s coming from a psalmist.

1:04:10

And historians and scholars have noted this is a lament. This is a this is not God saying this. This is a lament of a

1:04:16

guy who’s been taken Babylonian captive. Blessed should you be. Satan says a lot of things in the Bible,

1:04:22

too. Doesn’t mean we have to follow it. Really? So, we don’t have to follow the Bible. The Bible is not God’s word.

1:04:27

We don’t have to follow. When Satan says something in the Bible, Dan, that is we don’t make that like an actual command.

1:04:33

When a human says something in the Bible, that doesn’t mean we have to follow it. And again, this is a lament. He saw that happen to his children in

1:04:39

Jerusalem. So now he’s lamenting. Well, you don’t know who wrote it. Nobody knows who wrote it. But are you

1:04:45

saying Satan inspired the Bible then? Parts of the Bible. No, I’m saying that Satan speaks in the

1:04:51

Bible, doesn’t he? And so they record those conversations between like Jesus and Satan. Jesus or Satan tells Jesus,

1:04:58

for example, to throw himself off a temple. That’s not a command for Christians. Obviously, sometimes humans say things in the Bible. Abraham does

1:05:04

dumb stuff. He tries to give his wife away to Pharaoh. That’s not a command for Christians to follow. The point of

1:05:10

the point of the stories of the patriarchs often is to learn from their good behavior and their bad behavior, not follow everything they do.

1:05:17

Do you know the context of that verse? Which one? Psalm 137:9.

1:05:22

Yeah, I told you. It’s a lament. But do you know the context of it? Yes. It’s after the Babylonian captivity

1:05:28

was taken. They’re taken back. Yeah. He used that word blessed. that was exoratory. There are many other verses

1:05:33

in the Psalms that use that word blessed are they. And this comports perfectly

1:05:39

with the actions and the commands of the God of the Bible himself who also

1:05:44

committed infanticide, who also killed innocent children because uh he was

1:05:50

angry. In fact, the most the biggest personality trait of the God of the

1:05:55

Bible is anger. He’s always anger and wrathful and he’s he’s punishing with

1:06:00

fire and with genocide and with infanicide. And in in my book here uh

1:06:07

God, the most unpleasant character in all fiction, I list dozens of of places where the God of the Bible did commit

1:06:14

and command infanticide. And in context, Psalm 137:9 fits perfectly with the

1:06:20

moral values of the God of that Bible. It is not a good moral guide. And I

1:06:26

would What does that have to do with the effects of Christianity today? Well, I’m trying to point out my point

1:06:32

is that there are many Christians who have done good things, but it’s not because of Christianity.

1:06:38

It’s because of humanism. It’s it’s because they are good human people. They are better than the Bible. They’re

1:06:45

better than the book that you pretend to worship. They are smarter. They are kinder. They are more generous. they are

1:06:52

more loving than this book. Sure, there’s a few verses of love and Jesus was a little less violent than the God

1:06:58

of the Old Testament, but the values that you are promoting that are that are done by good Christians are human

1:07:05

values. So, humanistic values uh and and and I think

1:07:11

and and and here’s a question though. All humans have these same values. Well, humanity has it. There are sick

1:07:18

humans. There are people all human. Okay. But what about does all human societies have these same values

1:07:23

that we cherish today? Well, all the all the societies that you and I would call good all of those

1:07:30

interesting. So these so not all these are not human values. These are values that came out of the Christian worldview

1:07:36

because you acknowledge there are many human societies that don’t share the same values. So where do these values you hold dear come from in terms of

1:07:42

their historical origin? Well, do you even have to ask that question? We’re human beings, right? We don’t want to suffer. We want to

1:07:48

prosper. We want to flourish. We don’t like pain. We don’t like deprivation. We

1:07:54

don’t like illness. We there’s the things that threaten us as human beings are things that we attempt to avoid. And

1:08:00

the avoidance of that are human values because we are human beings in a natural

1:08:06

environment. And so naturally we we want to contribute toward those things. But

1:08:12

there are some people who are mentally ill. There are psychopaths. at least 4% of the population is psychopathic who

1:08:18

have no empathy. And I I think it’s I think it’s a bit of a bell curve. You you probably fall way over toward the

1:08:24

side of compassion and goodness. I’m sure you do, but others fall more over here. But in general, if we’re going to

1:08:30

measure what we think goodness is, we’re not going to do it by a deity. We’re going to do it by what those values are

1:08:37

good for our species as opposed to those values that are bad for our species. So, let’s go back in time. Let’s go back

1:08:43

to the ancient Roman world and or the ancient Greco Roman world. Let’s just say that. Um, have you ever read a book

1:08:49

called When Children Became People by Owen Baky? Uh, no, I haven’t read that. Okay. So, let’s just say we’re back in

1:08:55

the ancient Greco Roman world. And he notes in this book and other historians like John Martins has noted this as well

1:09:00

that it was a good human value to um have PDF interaction with boys that that

1:09:06

was important for them and they would have said that was a that’s a very common human value. In fact, Bruce Ry documents in his paper that was a very

1:09:14

common value throughout the world in Southeast Asia, in Africa, in the Americas even to actually engage in that

1:09:22

type of behavior with children until until Western missionaries showed up and

1:09:27

put an end to that kind of stuff. So, could we say it’s a human value to be engaging in that kind of aspect

1:09:33

considering it was pretty ubiquitous about human cultures outside of Christianity? Well, ask the boys.

1:09:40

I don’t think they would have enjoyed that honestly. Are you saying that if they Okay, great. Therefore, that is not a good human

1:09:47

value. It was harming. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. No, no, no. I didn’t say good human value. I said it was a human. It was a ubiquitous

1:09:53

human practice for the most part across cultures. So, by your own logic, shouldn’t we say that is a human value?

1:10:00

Because you’re trying to say all the good things that we like that came out of the Judeo-Christian worldview are actually just human values. But if we

1:10:06

read Bruce Ryan’s paper on hepophilia, he notes it was pretty ubiquitous across cultures to engage in this pedacy

1:10:12

nonsense. That was that was a valuable thing for the ones engaging in it, but not to the

1:10:18

ones who were the victims of it. It was not exactly but that was a human that was a common

1:10:23

human practice until Judeo-Christian values eradicated it. Okay. So why can you now take credit for the human value

1:10:30

that came out of Christianity, but you’re not going to take credit for the human value that was ubiquitous in all these cultures?

1:10:36

Well, slavery is another example, right? Okay. Slavery was supposedly a human value in

1:10:42

the ancient world. Okay, that doesn’t answer my question, though. Like what you’re we’ll get to slavery in a minute because I definitely

1:10:47

want to point out how Christianity ended slavery. But for example, you’re saying, well, these are everything I say is good

1:10:52

coming from the Christian worldview. You’re saying those are just human values. Okay. Okay, well let’s look at what humans were actually doing before

1:10:58

Christianity and they were routinely gauging in pedarasty. Okay, so how is that not a human value contrasted with

1:11:04

what comes out of Christianity? Why do you get to take credit as a humanist for all the good things Christianity gave us

1:11:09

and not these other human values? You and I can both agree based on the principle of harm that some of these

1:11:16

practices were harmful to other human beings. They were beneficial for some and harmful for others. Right? There was

1:11:22

an a power imbalance involved. You and I can agree, but they didn’t agree. No, they didn’t. And that’s why we are

1:11:27

progressing. Why are we progressing? We’re progressing because we’re putting more value on good human humanistic

1:11:35

values. Not Why are we putting more value on the good humanistic values? Well, not because of some mandates from

1:11:41

a deity. Because you don’t find anything about that in the Bible, do you? Yes, you do. The IMO day, for example,

1:11:47

that all humans are created equal and in the image of God. Something that was lacked in every culture before the rise

1:11:52

of Christianity. every culture. Yeah. There was no ubiquitous idea of universal human equality. In fact, even

1:11:59

this comes into Darwin. There’s a great book called Darwin’s sacred cause. He note they note there the two leading

1:12:04

historians on Darwin wrote this great book. You’d love it. They note that his idea uh of this universal human descent

1:12:11

came out of the abolitionist tracks they devoured as a family and it went back to Adamic unity. So this idea of universal

1:12:18

human uh equality, human rights comes out of the Christian tradition as

1:12:24

numerous historians have noted. Well, doesn’t Christianity have a

1:12:30

hierarchy? Aren’t there aren’t there priests and rabbis and and leader? Aren’t there’s not total equality within

1:12:36

Christianity? And how do you know that my Native American ancestors did not have a a

1:12:41

concept of basic human rights? Maybe they didn’t formulate it in the same way. Maybe. Maybe they mad. Maybe they rode

1:12:48

magical unicorns. I don’t know. We have to look at the data we have in front of us. But you said every single human culture.

1:12:54

How do you know? I said for the most part. I added that caveat. For the most part, from what we can study, you can check out Bruce

1:13:00

Ryan’s paper hepophilia as a mental disorder where he surveys a whole bunch of the pedarasticity practices.

1:13:05

Well, how did any of my native ancestors live a good moral social life without

1:13:11

Christianity? How did that happen? without the Christian values. Okay, once again, I’m not saying every

1:13:18

society is completely and totally going to collapse without Christianity. That’s demonstrabably false because you have

1:13:23

Buddhist societies and Islamic societies that have existed. Okay? I’m not I’m saying Christian societies are more

1:13:29

optimal. They got rid of harmful practices like pedarasti and slavery and they created systems of human rights.

1:13:36

They were c Christianity was crucial for the development of science which has given us this beautiful technology we

1:13:41

can use use around us and all the medical technology we have Christianity was crucial for that not saying it was

1:13:47

only Christianity I’m not saying other societies do not cannot have good values in them but I’m saying the most optimal

1:13:54

form of society is a Christian one and how does that work I mean how’s the structure how can you say the most

1:14:00

optimal form of society is a Christian one when Christianity ity. Christianity

1:14:06

itself is based on the Bible. How do you connect the dots? Aren’t you really just

1:14:12

borrowing humanistic values and calling them Christian? Because you you know slavery is bad. You know that harm is

1:14:19

bad and and and you won’t you won’t find any of those principles. You won’t connect the dots to any Christian

1:14:25

teacher. Jesus never spoke out against slavery. Who was the first person to call for the end of slavery?

1:14:31

Well, who cares who the first person was? And what was their reasoning? This was Gregory of Nissa in the 4th

1:14:36

century. And his reason was because of the imgo day. Humans were made above creation. We should not be treating our

1:14:43

fellow brothers and sisters as if they are animals because they were made in the image of God. Therefore, they should

1:14:49

be on a level where we are all equal. Okay. You can also So that was the first person do it. And he did it because of

1:14:54

what he was reading in the Bible.

1:14:59

Well, that might have been a good excuse, but really if you look if you unpack it, if you unpack it, it’s a

1:15:06

human value. It’s not because we are all created in the in the image of a god. It’s because we are all human beings on

1:15:13

this planet. And there were ancient culture had that value besides and there were many non-religious people

1:15:18

involved in the abolitionist movement as well. Oh, let’s talk about that. Have you read Robert Fogle’s book uh without consent

1:15:25

or contract? There’s people like Thomas Payne who was a non-Christian who was a

1:15:31

strict a very strong early abolitionist who did not credit Christianity. He did

1:15:36

not credit God. Uh he was also in favor of women’s rights and women’s voting as a

1:15:41

nonbeliever who wrote a a book critical of the Bible of the absurdities of the Bible. So it wasn’t just Christian.

1:15:48

There were there were good solid humanistic reasons to be opposed. Not because some god says you have to do it

1:15:54

or because you think we’re all there were there were many people who did not believe in God who did accept the

1:16:00

equality and universality of human beings in in basic intrinsic human

1:16:05

rights. Um and by the way it doesn’t follow that if we are all created in the

1:16:10

image of God that necessarily we should all be treated equally. It doesn’t follow logically. In fact if we’re all

1:16:17

created in the image of God it could be that we should all be slaves because God was a slave owner. God God is a slave

1:16:23

master. No, no, no. That actually was what that’s actually what contributed to the end of slavery. If you read 1

1:16:28

Corinthians 7, Paul says, “Because we all belong to God, you cannot become a slave to anybody else.” This is what

1:16:34

motivated the abolitionists. No one can be a slave to another human because we all belong to God as his servants and

1:16:41

children who he loves. So because of that, that’s the reason you can read like Ben Wright, John Coffee, uh Robert

1:16:48

Fogle, who is an atheist, mind you, who notes it was Christianity that was crucial for ending slavery. Now, you are

1:16:54

right that there were non-Christians that were trying to argue for the end of slavery. In fact, in the 1700s, the

1:17:00

anti-slavery movement tried to argue from secular values. And Robert Fogle says it fails. He says adherence to the

1:17:06

natural right doctrine embarrassed those southern politicians who were prepared to concede that slavery was a violation

1:17:12

of the natural rights of the enslaves. Adherence to the doctrine also embarrassed northern politicians who

1:17:18

although they despised slavery felt compelled to concede that the doctrine protected masters who would not

1:17:23

voluntarily man the slaves. So they tried in America to argue for the end of slavery from John Lock’s work from

1:17:29

natural rights. It failed and that’s why slavery took a while to end in America.

1:17:34

They was revitalized in about the 1820s with the Methodists and the Quakers and

1:17:40

the Northern Baptists. And there, as Robert Fogle and Ben Wright both point out in their books, that’s what ended

1:17:45

slavery. Slavery was a sin. It was not a violation of a contract between men, it was a sin because God said it was wrong

1:17:52

and that’s what ended slavery. And then he notes that these abolitionists after they got rid of it in Britain first,

1:17:57

then America, they started going around the world. They went to South America, they ended it there. they were going

1:18:02

into Africa and the Islamic world was the finally the last to give it up in the 20th century. So yes, very much so

1:18:09

Christianity was motivated by principles like the imo day like Paul saying that

1:18:14

all are equal like the idea that uh you know you shouldn’t either become a slave to another human as he says it over as

1:18:21

well as init in first Timothy 1. So these ideas were very crucial for motivation.

1:18:26

Sorry Mike I was trying to I was forgive me I was I didn’t realize I was muted on Zoom. I was trying to say, all right,

1:18:31

let’s kick it back over to Dan just because Okay. Yeah. I want to be sure it’s split time approximately.

1:18:38

Well, are you saying then therefore that universally or cosmically or whatever

1:18:44

word you want to use, the only reason that slavery is bad is because God says

1:18:49

so. Uh, no. I’m saying the only reason we now live in the western society that got

1:18:55

rid of slavery uh is not the only reason but Christianity was a major major

1:19:00

driving force in ending that.

1:19:10

So, do you think um maybe this is off the topic and you can tell me, James, um

1:19:16

assuming that Christianity is based on the Bible, a book that I encourage you

1:19:21

to read, Michael, in detail, um that um it’s supposedly a science

1:19:28

book. Uh did a snake speak human language? Did the sun stop in the sky?

1:19:34

Did somebody walk on water unaided? Is de is demon possession the cause of mental illness? Uh and

1:19:42

let me let me answer those four. I’ll I’ll I’ll answer those four really briefly even though it’s not related. Uh my position is that this was a

1:19:47

rebellious serap in Genesis 3. Uh if you look at iconography from the ancient near east, seraphs are depicted as wing

1:19:54

serpents. So this would be a divine creature basically. Uh you mentioned uh like what walking on water. Yeah, Jesus

1:20:00

was able to do miracles. He’s God. Uh the Bible never says all mental illness is caused by demonic possession. Uh in

1:20:06

first Timothy, Paul even tells Timothy to drink some wine for his frequent stomach ailments. He doesn’t say go see

1:20:13

an exorcist. So nowhere does the Bible say all mental issues or all diseases are from demonic possession.

1:20:20

So what was that creature in the Garden of Eden? It was some divine angelic type creature basically

1:20:25

a supernatural being. And then supernal. So how do miracles comport with science?

1:20:31

Uh they’re not bound by the rules of natural laws. This is If you’re going to try to bring up David Hume, I’m gonna

1:20:37

bring up John Airman’s book. Well, there was some kind of a creature

1:20:43

in the garden. Some physical creature. Yep. Right. Well, I mean, it’s complicated is what I

1:20:50

would say. There’s a lot of scholarly literature on this. Why don’t we just say it was a myth? It didn’t really happen.

1:20:55

Okay. That doesn’t change whether or not Christianity is better for society than secularism. Yeah. But it does throw some question on

1:21:01

the idea of the scientific reliability of the book that you say is the basis for all of science. And those are just

1:21:08

four brief examples. Talking donkey, a talking dragon with seven heads and um and you

1:21:15

know um have you heard fertility the fertility cows by by staring at a striped pole?

1:21:23

There’s so much non s so much bad science in the Bible and you want to

1:21:28

interpret it metaphorically or allegorically or somehow but um I I hope

1:21:34

you will join me in agreeing that much of that is metaphorical and is not literal. Have you heard of the paper the

1:21:40

coexistence of natural and supernatural explanations across cultures and development where they note that uh

1:21:46

believing in the supernatural does not inhibit natural naturalistic explanations in most people. In other

1:21:51

words, you can be a Christian or a Muslim and believe in the supernatural without that somehow inhibiting science

1:21:57

because you can have scientific natural na scientific or naturalistic explanations alongside like supernatural

1:22:03

ones. So this is all irrelevant because this doesn’t actually show anything. I agree with it. But if the Bible is the

1:22:09

basic, it’s your book, Christianity, if Christianity is anything, it’s the Bible. And we can’t

1:22:16

escape what the Bible says. And the Bible is vulnerable to a lot of criticism. You have to agree and and

1:22:22

even Bible believers don’t agree on all of that. Even though they’re supposed to agree on it, it’s a very primarily as a

1:22:30

book, it is primarily unscientific. And there’s some history in it, but there’s also a a lot of unhistorical things.

1:22:37

There’s also a lot of immoral teachings in the Bible. Teachings that you and I would be a gasast at that we should rip

1:22:43

those pages out of the book. And if Christianity is anything, it’s that book and that book alone. In fact, I list

1:22:50

more than 1500 passages in here showing what what an absolute monster this deity

1:22:57

is in the Bible that I used to worship and that I think you still worship and you still admire this being. I don’t

1:23:03

know why. I think I do know why. I think because you’re better than him. You’re smarter. You’re more humanistic than the

1:23:10

teachings that are in this book. No, I’m not better than God. I’ve not been able to die for the sins of humanity yet. Uh and probably will never

1:23:17

because I’m not as good as Jesus is. But uh again, this is all irrelevant. Well, you can you can say that, but it’s a

1:23:23

lie. But this is irrelevant to the topic. You can attack the Bible, but here’s the problem. What you’re getting at. You’re saying you look at these

1:23:29

verses and you think they’re bad and they’re going to but that doesn’t mean they’re going to lead to bad effects.

1:23:34

This is armchair science. We need to look at what the actual effects are Christianity in the field of sociology

1:23:40

because I could sit here all day and be like, “Well, I think you know secular humanism is going to lead to, I don’t

1:23:46

know, persecuting religious people.” You would be the first person, Dan, to tell me, “What’s your evidence for that?” I’m

1:23:52

going to say the same thing to you. You may not like something in the Bible. I’m going to be like, “What’s your evidence that leads to negative effects?” Because

1:23:58

the data doesn’t show it.

1:24:09

Well, you didn’t ask a question, but um well, you can respond. Wouldn’t would you would you agree that it would be

1:24:15

absurd for me to say I think secular humanism leads to the persecution of religious people because I just decided

1:24:23

so I saw something I like. You know, like Dan Barker goes around saying that religion is bad for society. You know

1:24:28

what he’s going to do one day? he’s gonna get power and then he’s going to start taking children away from parents because he doesn’t want them raised

1:24:34

being taught these horrible the what he thinks are these horrible ideologies. That’s what he’s going to do. Wouldn’t

1:24:39

you be the first person to say there is no way that’s going to happen? You need to show evidence that my secular humanism would lead to this

1:24:45

authoritarian measure. Wouldn’t you be the first to say that? I agree with you. I I’m not disagreeing with you that

1:24:52

Christians have done good things. I’m applauding that and I’ve repeatedly said that. What I’m saying is the reason for

1:24:59

it is not Christianity. The reason for it is humanism. Yes, there are many, you

1:25:05

know, Isaac Newton was a Christian. And look at the great things he did for science, right? He had some wacky

1:25:11

religious, he had some wacky Christian views. I think you know about that. But he was a Christian, but he was able to

1:25:17

separate his religion from his scientific work and do some excellent work. And so I think he was a good

1:25:23

Christian in that sense. And I think you’re probably a good Christian. But when I say good, I mean the measure of

1:25:29

the good is humanism. And that was our debate tonight was humanism. So let’s go back to your point then. You

1:25:36

say there’s bad things in the Bible. With my analogy, you agreed with me. It’d be wrong for me to say from the

1:25:41

armchair, secular humanism is going to lead to authoritarian measures and persecution of religious people. How can

1:25:47

you then say that, well, I learned this thing in the Bible. I didn’t like it. It’s now going to lead to these bad effects that are against human values.

1:25:53

What is the evidence for that beyond just doing armchair science? Well, history, look look at the history of, for example, the the Christian

1:26:01

church. Look at how there were there’s a there’s an old saying, and this is this is not totally true, but it’s a good

1:26:08

saying. There was a time when religion ruled the world and we call it the dark ages.

1:26:13

Oh, for the love of God, the dark ages didn’t exist. That’s a myth. That’s another myth. I know that. I just told you that. That

1:26:19

is a bit of a stretch to say that. But fair point. My point is the church did pretty much rule the world and look at

1:26:26

the persecution that came from it. Look at look at how the Catholic church controlled. Look at their you know you

1:26:32

know the inquisitions and the and the uh intolerance and the u the treatment of

1:26:38

women and of w because there’s a there’s a verse in the Bible that says thou shalt not suffer a witch to live. Uh

1:26:45

no it says that necromancer uh that’s a necromancer. Whatever the word is, you shall not suffer that

1:26:51

person to live. Whatever you want to call it. So, how many witch burnings happened before the year 1000? There were very few witch burnings

1:26:57

actually. How many witch persecutions happened before the year 1000? There were thousands of before when?

1:27:03

Before the year 1000, I don’t know how many. I I don’t know that. Very few. Let’s go to the Lumbard Code

1:27:09

of 643 AD. They say, “Let nobody presume to kill a foreign serving mate or female

1:27:14

servant as a witch, for it is not possible, nor ought to be believed by a Christian mind.” The councils of Elvra,

1:27:20

for example, and Trulo, for example, they merely imposed penances for those who confessed to being devil

1:27:25

worshippers. They were not going after this. Now, Nathan Johnstone, he is an atheist like you. He wrote a book called

1:27:31

The New Atheism. You know why? Because he thought a lot of the ideas coming on new atheism were pretty bad. He’s an

1:27:36

historian. Here’s what he says about the rise of the Inquisition, the witch trials that happens in the second

1:27:42

millennium. He says between the end of the Roman Empire and the late 12th century, torture had fallen into disuse

1:27:47

in Europe. Sam Harris might be surprised to learn that Christendom owed its reun reintroduction not to bloodthirsty

1:27:54

clerics, but to scientific jurists concerned to free justice from its reliance on God’s intervention and to

1:28:00

champion human judicial competence. In both medieval Europe and modern day America, then societies that had

1:28:05

abandoned torture contemplated its reintroduction as a rational necessity. But the medieval story, the one for

1:28:11

which we know the ending, recounts the failure of rationalism to control its offspring. So this is why I talked about

1:28:17

earlier you finding actual, you know, connections here. If you read the historians, they’ll say this comes out of rationalism.

1:28:23

I think you just I think you just proved my point, Mike, that Christians are have risen above the

1:28:30

Bible. Christians are better than the Bible. The Bible says you should not suffer a witch or whatever to live. They

1:28:37

their blood shall be upon them. they should be killed as people were routinely killed and massac even

1:28:42

innocent people in the Bible. So those later Christians were smarter than their Bible. They were kinder than their

1:28:49

Bible. They rose above biblical Christian principles to embrace what you

1:28:54

and I should be calling humanistic principles because human value is how we

1:28:59

determine if something is really good or bad. We do have to jump into the closings.

1:29:05

This is a good chance to transition. I will set the timer for uh you guys good

1:29:12

with we had talked about beforehand five minutes. We just went slightly over for the open dial. Are you guys Can you

1:29:17

squeeze it into four minutes? I can do four. Okay. Well, I didn’t I didn’t prepare an

1:29:23

actual closing. So, we should we should just talk for a few more minutes. Is that it?

1:29:28

You’re gonna do closing statements. Is uh if you guys each have four minutes

1:29:34

and we’ll start with Mike and then Daniel have the last word. So timer is set and four minutes. Mike,

1:29:41

just on that witch thing, one more thing. Uh that’s in the Old Testament. Christians are under the new covenant. There’s nothing about that. That’s why

1:29:47

these medieval Christians were very much open to not doing that kind of stuff until it was reintroduced by

1:29:52

rationalism. As Nathan Jston’s notes, Jason Nathan Jstone. Now, as for the entire debate, let me reiterate my

1:29:58

opening statements. We’re talking about which is more optimal for societies. I’ve done a lot of research on this because I’ve been told by secularists

1:30:05

and new atheists for years, you’re harming society. You’re making it worse. I said, “Fine. Uh, bet.” And I did all

1:30:10

the research and she found out that’s absurd nonsense. You look into the historical research, uh, the

1:30:15

sociological research. Christianity is far better. And without it, society, western societies will collapse because

1:30:22

of declining birth rates. Secularism, secular humanism that is, if we’re going to do there, uh, is unsustainable. It

1:30:29

cannot produce lasting societies because it cannot produce replacement populations through sustainable birth

1:30:34

rates. Therefore, it’s bad for humanity and society if it cannot even produce societies that last for more than one or

1:30:40

two generations. But I want to remind everyone this is that for years we’ve heard from new atheists like my opponent

1:30:45

that religion is harmful, needs to go away. It’s a relic of the past. We now know that’s false. Uh Christianity is

1:30:52

essential for progress, for building better societies, for creating better communities, lower levels of depression.

1:30:58

We have a meaning crisis right now because the new atheist movement has destroyed Western civilization, telling

1:31:04

a lie to us that they’re going to make the world a better place by getting rid of religion. And now we know that’s

1:31:09

nonsense. So if you’re spreading secular humanism, the sad truth is you’re making the world a worse place. Sorry if that

1:31:15

offends you, but that’s just a fact. And the data bears that out. We need a strong religious foundation. Secularism

1:31:21

cannot replace it. Christianity needs to be the foundation of the West. It’s what gives us our values. Our values are

1:31:28

don’t just come from just humans being humans. Our values come from the Judeo-Christian tradition. The ancient

1:31:34

world was built around honor and shame. It was built around this idea that there was a definite defined inherent

1:31:40

hierarchy which Christianity obliterated. Hierarchies now were based more on role, not on inherent value. In

1:31:46

the ancient world, no, the kings had more inherent value. The nobility had more inherent value. And then the Christian tradition obliterated that.

1:31:53

The hierarchy still exists today, but it’s a hierarchy based in role in systems, not on inherent value. In

1:31:58

Christianity, we have an uniquely inherent value that is spans across all humans. That’s what Christianity gave

1:32:04

the world. These other human societies did not because they did not have it. So, what my opponent calls human values,

1:32:11

he needs to read Tom Holland’s book. And by the way, Tom Holland is an atheist. He wrote Dominion. The what he’s calling

1:32:17

human values came out of Christianity. He’s just lucky enough to live in an age where he can think they’re just human

1:32:22

values. and not realize where they came from. It all goes back to what Christianity gave the world. And we just

1:32:29

can’t cherrypick the Bible. We got to actually go through and read the cultural context of things. A lot of the

1:32:34

verses he cited are not the marching orders for Christians because Christians are under the new covenant. And under

1:32:39

the new covenant, we have very specific values which were for all humanity. I’m not an ancient Israelite who’s bound by

1:32:44

the the borders of Canaan. So, a lot of the stuff he’s bringing up in the Torah is irrelevant for this point because we

1:32:50

are under the new covenant. And of course we see that Christian and he did many great things. It ended slavery. It

1:32:56

gave value to children. Uh it gave us human rights. It was crucial for the development of science. Christians have

1:33:02

been crucial for developing you know hundreds of written languages so people could read around the world because they

1:33:07

were obsessed with getting people to read the Bible. That didn’t come from other cultures. These are uniquely

1:33:12

Christian ideas that were able to actually flourish unlike other ideologies and other values. So what

1:33:18

makes the world a better place? It’s Christianity. What creates the most optimal societies? Christianity. And I’ve yet to see any evidence from my

1:33:24

opponent in this debate as to why secular societies, secular humanist societies are more optimal. We need

1:33:30

Christianity. Christian societies are more optimal. Thank you. So I will kick it over to Dan for his

1:33:35

closing as well. I have the timer set for you, Dan. Four minutes. Thank you, Mike. Um, so I I think you

1:33:43

kind of just proved my point. Um, the difference between the Old Testament and the New Testament. Now, you were saying

1:33:50

at least parts of the Old Testament Christians should ignore and can ignore and have ignored to their credit,

1:33:56

they’ve risen above that book, which is which is a book about the very God that

1:34:03

they today claim to worship. That very God that Jesus in the New Testament said, “If you’ve seen me, you’ve seen

1:34:09

the Father. I and the Father are one.” He quoted that Old Testament God with

1:34:15

approval on many occasions. So he was not throwing out the Old Testament God.

1:34:20

He was he was endorsing every jot and tit of that old law. And yet you to your

1:34:26

credit, Mike, I applaud you, you seem to be saying, “Let’s throw out some of that ancient, primitive, harmful teaching

1:34:33

that was in the Old Testament.” And I’m saying that’s what humanists are doing with the even the New Testament. All of

1:34:40

these teachings are irrelevant to human value and to human societies. Yes. And

1:34:45

I’ll repeat it. Many Christians are good people and have done good things and many of them have done it thinking they

1:34:51

are doing it crediting it to their religion. But it’s not because of Christianity. You have not connected any

1:34:58

dots between actual Christianity to these modern humanistic values that

1:35:05

most modern Christians like you and and James are embracing in spite of the

1:35:11

teachings of the Bible. So, um,

1:35:17

what I’m saying, our debate tonight is about humanism and human values. Um, and

1:35:22

and and of course, you don’t you won’t find what we would call normal representative democracy in the Bible

1:35:29

anywhere. Uh, and and you won’t find any denunciation

1:35:34

of uh owning h other human beings on this earth at least. I know in Galatians

1:35:40

it says in heaven there’s neither slave nor free. Uh but that only applies to baptized Christians. So I would like to

1:35:49

hope that in spite of our differences, in spite of the intensity of our debate here, and and you are very intense,

1:35:55

Mike, and you’re very well read, and and I and I understand that. Uh you’re very evangelical about it, I guess, and and I

1:36:02

mean that as a as a compliment. In spite of that, I think we can embrace our shared humanity.

1:36:08

And the good things that hum that Christians have done in history that you credit to are done. My point in this

1:36:15

whole debate is they’re done not because of Christianity. The teachings in the

1:36:21

Bible, they’re done because Christians have risen above Christianity. And they’re still Christians of course and

1:36:27

they like to get together and love God and worship and do all those things but they’re doing it because of human

1:36:33

values. Society has progressed obviously and it’s a good thing that society has progressed and it happens in tandem with

1:36:40

the existence of current religions and time. The fact that it happened in tandem and scientific revolution and so

1:36:48

and moral revolutions in tandem with Christianity does not mean Christianity is the cause of it. It might mean that

1:36:54

many Christians can take credit for some of that progress but it’s not because of

1:37:00

Christianity for society. The good things that have come in society and by good we mean good for humans are based

1:37:07

on principles of humanism of compassion of science and of reasoning. And most

1:37:13

human being most humanists would say we wouldn’t use imod we wouldn’t say that

1:37:18

but we would say we are all part of the same species. We’re all part of the same family. We are all one huge global

1:37:25

species, one human family and that gives us all equal human worth. And when you

1:37:31

consider that the good things that have happened in society, whatever they are, they are credited not to Christianity.

1:37:37

We society would be much better doing those very same things without

1:37:43

Christianity. Thank you very much for that closing as well. Folks, we’re going to jump into

1:37:49

the Q&A. As I load the questions here, I want to let you know we want sincere substantive questions, not insults. Uh,

1:37:55

some of these questions will be in the form of the comment. Um, because if they’re super chat, we allow that and I just try to put it in the form of a

1:38:00

question. But you get the idea. And if you have not noticed folks, debate con 6

1:38:06

linked in the description box. Grab your tickets. You don’t want to miss out. This conference is going to be huge.

1:38:11

With that, jumping into these questions. Thank you very much. This one, appreciate it, Kobe McQueen. I

1:38:16

appreciate your super chat, but I was really confused by what you meant. They said, I’m going to give it a shot, but

1:38:23

said you don’t, they didn’t say who this is for. They say you don’t gallow the argument or give credence to the

1:38:30

utterances of your opposition. Have nothing to offer but absur.

1:38:36

Uh, so it doesn’t really say who that’s for. Um, that’s not a question though. That’s not even a question,

1:38:41

right? I agree with Dan. Yeah, some of them will be in the form of a question. the when people put in a super

1:38:46

chat. We let him have more flexibility with like raising an objection, but that one just confused me. This one coming.

1:38:53

I just want to say thank you Dan for the debate. I appreciate it. I think you’re a good guy, too. I don’t want to avoid that. And by the way, anyone uh

1:38:58

watching, I’m going to do a debate review on my channel immediately after this. Even Lord asks, “Mike, what is

1:39:05

inherently wrong with authoritarianism and far rightwing ideology?” I think they’re saying like, “Why is it bad?”

1:39:12

like uh it’s oftenimes it’s just claimed but they’re saying but is it actually

1:39:18

bad? I mean if you’re a red-blooded American like I am and you enjoy freedom of speech, freedom of expression, yeah it

1:39:24

can be bad. And again if I remember Milton Friedman saying where are you going to get these angels that are going

1:39:29

to run society humans as Emanuel Kant said out of the crooked timber of humanity nothing straight has ever

1:39:35

grown. So I’m a big fan of Thomas Soul and his philosophy his political philosophy. I don’t think any type of

1:39:41

authoritarian government is going to be good until kingdom come. So you may

1:39:46

think it’s going to be good because they’re going to enforce your values, but it they can easily be turned around

1:39:52

against you. So I think the best optimal forms of political structures would be

1:39:58

stuff like what we have in terms of like a nice, you know, constitutional republic for example. And Toby Huff

1:40:04

notes that these were being developed throughout Christian Europe in his book, The Rise of Early Modern Science. So I

1:40:09

think these are very in line with the way Christianity is functioned and developed. I’m glad we agree about that. I’m glad

1:40:16

uh we often march there’s often Christians and atheists and agnostics marching in

1:40:21

the same marches protesting kingships and authorities. Uh however uh not to

1:40:28

sound like a broken record but the Old Testament at least was quite authoritarian.

1:40:33

We’ll go with this one from even Lord says, “Dan Barker, since you value science, could you please tell us the

1:40:38

scientific method? Uh then they have a second question.” I’ll let you go at that first one, Dan.

1:40:45

Well, there have been dozens of people trying to formulate what is the

1:40:51

scientific method. Um but basically it’s observation

1:40:57

and creativity and forming hypotheses which if they are confirmed by testing

1:41:05

turn into theories um and and and theories can be overturned but I I would

1:41:10

say at its basic the scientific method is observation looking taking taking

1:41:16

account that’s what Darwin did he just he spent decades before he even wrote down his he just looked

1:41:22

He saw, he observed. So um and then of course of course um you know is it

1:41:31

falsifiable? Is it repeatable? Is it testable? Is it empirical? Those kinds of things. Uh and people give different

1:41:38

definitions of the scientific meth. I don’t think there is the scientific method in my reading anyway. But um we

1:41:45

all do science. Every every child is doing science looking around what is this? What is how do I learn from this?

1:41:50

And so it’s just science is just kind of organized curiosity. I think this one coming in from JSS Tiger says

1:41:57

secularism is the middle ground when you’re in a country with freedom of religion. It allows Christians and

1:42:02

Muslims to get along. So again, some of these are comments. Yeah, I can comment on that. Um what do

1:42:09

you mean by secularism? Because there’s a concept of the secular in the Christian tradition that Augustine

1:42:14

develops in his book city of God. Uh the separation of church and state as I noted comes out of the Christian

1:42:19

tradition. It’s developed it comes from Jesus saying render unto Caesar the things that are Caesars’s. Render to God

1:42:25

the things that are God. It’s developed by Augustine Augustine that is. And then it’s really comes to its proition in the

1:42:31

Protestant Reformation. Read the last uh article of the Auxburg confession. I

1:42:36

think you would really like that. Uh it’s very much this idea. So what do you mean by secular? The idea that we have a

1:42:41

a secular uh is very much something that comes out of the Christian tradition. I think secularists go too far with it.

1:42:48

But I think you have you have like for example like traditional Islam and other societies that don’t have that. I think

1:42:53

Christianity is going to be a good middle ground in how that is developed and used in a society. So you’re calling you’re calling the

1:43:00

middle ground Christian and I would call it secular. Mhm. Well, no, I’m saying I’m saying um it

1:43:06

depends on how you define secularism is what I mean. This one from Solar PvP says, “Dan, are

1:43:14

you aware of the Mgrim experiment? Do you not think that that experiment

1:43:19

warrants Christianity’s pessimistic views of human nature?”

1:43:25

I can give a refresher if if you’re not familiar with that study. Yeah, remind me. But I remember I

1:43:30

remember reading like the famous Mgrim shock experiment. Oh yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I forgot his name. Yeah. Where they where people uh were

1:43:37

following orders. Yep. They were doing because they were following orders. Yeah. I think that’s one of the flaws in our human nature. I

1:43:44

mean our human nature is not perfect. We we evolved optimally but not perfectly.

1:43:49

So there’s a lot of problems we have. And I think uh the tendency among many

1:43:54

of us, not all of us, to just follow orders and fit in is very dangerous. And

1:44:00

which I think underscores the value of freedom of thought and freedom of expression to be able to dissent from

1:44:08

maybe what the majority or from what the authority even tells you. There’s one coming in from do appreciate

1:44:14

it. Even the Lord says, uh, but Dan, what about the verse, sell your cloak and buy a sword in Luke 22:36?

1:44:21

I think it came in when you had said like, why are all these Christians buying guns? Like, don’t they have faith in God to protect them?

1:44:28

Yeah, I know. And then and uh um yeah, if you don’t have a sword, sell your

1:44:33

cloak and buy one. Yeah, that does show that there was that Jesus was not a complete what we would call complete

1:44:39

pacifist. He believed in weaponry of the day. Um so and and there are Christians

1:44:46

who debate that. In fact, we just interviewed uh William J. Cole who has this brand new book that’s just coming

1:44:52

out next week. It’s called In Guns We Trust. He’s a he’s a devout Christian

1:44:58

and he’s arguing it from a Christian position. He’s ashamed at how at least in this country the evangelicals

1:45:06

are married to their guns. And I’m not going to solve that debate right here. But Christians Christians don’t agree

1:45:12

with each other on that. And he um he thinks if you have to trust in guns,

1:45:18

you’re not trusting in God. Really?

1:45:24

Okay. This one from Roken says, “Dan, this debate is not about the Bible. It’s

1:45:29

whether or not it’s good or evil. Instead, it’s about who contributes to better society.” Right.

1:45:36

It is about the Bible. What is Christianity? If you’re gonna connect the dots

1:45:43

and you’re gonna say Christianity is better, then well, what is Christianity? So, this has to be about the Bible.

1:45:50

This one from Even Lord says, Dan, could you define what a woman is?

1:46:00

Well, um, I don’t think I could give a scientific definition. And I think most people would say a woman has a vagina

1:46:07

and a uterus. Well said. What does that have to do? What does that have to do with anything there? He he’s he’s assuming you can’t

1:46:15

because there’s people that go around saying that a woman is whatever a woman wants to be. But I appreciate what you said. A woman is a biological female.

1:46:23

Roken says, Dan, this debate is we got that one. Even Lord says Japan and the Nordic nations are majority racially

1:46:30

homogeneous. Should that be prioritized in society? Um I think they’re saying

1:46:35

like when we talk about the atheistic countries many of these are also like uh

1:46:42

in Japan’s case all Japanese not all but almost all Japanese people or the Nordic nations almost all Nordic people I think

1:46:50

they’re saying by that reasoning should we say that homogeneous society of like all whites or all Japanese people is

1:46:58

like better for society. Well, that’s not I don’t know if that’s

1:47:03

the topic of the debate. I mean, he’s making an analogy. You mean we could find

1:47:09

I mean, the point is is that we can’t just look at like do this by very means comparison. You say there’s a lot of atheists in Japan and they have like,

1:47:17

you know, good benefits there. Therefore, that’s comparable because you could do the same thing with like homogeneous races and say, well, that’s

1:47:24

thing. In fact, racists like Amy Wax have done that. They said the reason Europe is so good is not because of secularism. is because of their white

1:47:30

skin and she’s a horrible human being of course but that’s the pro that’s the that’s the danger of doing a by very means comparison when you look at

1:47:36

nations and positive effects I think very quickly there’s one interesting thing we can say about Japan

1:47:41

is under Hirohito they did have a religious government they had hirohito

1:47:47

was the god he was the the son god and they were all raised to obey him and

1:47:52

give their lives for him and look at the atrocities committed under that religious government I’m not comparing

1:47:59

that with Christianity, but I’m just saying that once they got rid of that religious authoritarianism, and

1:48:05

basically it was the bomb that did it. I’m not going to argue that issue right now. But once they got rid of the

1:48:11

religion and started running their country in a purely secular way,

1:48:16

non-Christian secular way, the society has vastly improved.

1:48:22

Got it. I would also want to just say that Japan is not mostly atheists. They’re Shinto and Buddhists mostly. You just

1:48:28

want to point that out. Lefty Dawa troll has says, “Has secularism improved the UK?”

1:48:37

I would say no. Dan, my guess is you’d say yes.

1:48:43

Well, I guess you would have to ask on by what measure. What are you What measure are you talking about? Uh,

1:48:49

I would say in terms of like healthare authoritarianism. No, I would I would say in terms of like authoritarianism,

1:48:55

lack of freedom of speech, freedom of a lot of freedom of rights have been eroded now. I mean, they just banned people owning ninja swords. It’s just

1:49:01

become a it’s become like a authoritarian nightmare in terms of what they’re doing. And this Real ID stuff they’re coming out is also

1:49:06

overall overall like net good for a society that’s flourishing.

1:49:12

Maybe they would say what’s the average Dan for your opinion?

1:49:17

I think so. I think uh on on balance I think the UK is doing I mean they’re

1:49:23

having some serious problems right now and immigration is part of their struggles they’re having

1:49:29

but on balance I would say I I would I would

1:49:35

I mixed feelings about the UK but yeah I think on balance I think yes you got it this this one from the lamb

1:49:43

apologetics says Dan you’ve made moral claims about Greeks being better moral peoples than Christ himself. Could you

1:49:50

give the arguments as to why about Greeks? I didn’t say Greeks, did I?

1:49:57

Maybe maybe he’s referring to something in the past you’ve said. I don’t know. No, I don’t I didn’t say anything about Greeks. Um

1:50:04

thinks you’re a Greek supremacist, but Sassy Dan says uh this is a different

1:50:09

Sassy Dan. They say Japan had generations of civil war and had almost every prime minister assassinated up

1:50:16

until its civilization was taken over by the West after World War II.

1:50:25

I think they’re trying to say like Japan is actually not that great

1:50:30

morally speaking. They do have a a functioning society. Yeah, I guess they have problems. I’ve

1:50:37

only been to Japan once, so I’m no expert on it. No. By the way, I just want to say what people This is a spray bottle I’ve been

1:50:43

flipping. It’s much better. And maybe Hassan should get one when your animals start acting up so you don’t

1:50:48

actually harm them. Just want to throw that out there when I was playing with all the whole time because my cat started fighting when Dan was doing his

1:50:54

opening statement. So, if we did a a public debate, you wouldn’t squirt me with it. Might

1:50:59

I might. I don’t know. Paulos Christian Apologetics says doing

1:51:05

good things for quote other reasons such as heaven or God means you’re rational.

1:51:11

Having non-ircular foundations for your morals is noble, not quote unquote disingenuous though, right Dan?

1:51:19

Boy, I don’t follow that at all. Say that again. I think they were saying like

1:51:24

doing good things for other reasons rather than good in and of itself. Such

1:51:29

as if you say like, “Well, hey, I want to do it to please God.” I think he’s saying that’s just rational. Like, you have a reason. Like, if someone asks for

1:51:36

why you’re doing something, you actually have a reason for why you’re doing it. And well, okay, I get it. Um, well, yeah,

1:51:43

you might have a reason, but it may not be a a good reason. I mean, look at the Neuremberg defense. They were they the

1:51:50

things that the Nazis did, they had a good reason for it. They could give you a rational to protect their own skins or

1:51:56

to follow their fur or whatever. That doesn’t mean it was a good moral reason.

1:52:01

You got it. This one from Appreciate it. The Lamb Apologetics also asked that Dan, the topic is about things that come

1:52:09

from Christianity versus secular humanism. Why are you claiming that talking about ending slavery is off

1:52:16

topic? Did I claim that ending slavery is off

1:52:21

topic? I don’t think I think it’s right on topic. Oh, there might have been they must have misunderstood. They

1:52:28

Well, we we we both agreed that there were believers and non-believers involved in abolition

1:52:35

and and some of them credited God and others of them just create credited what we would call humanistic principles.

1:52:41

It’s not good to own and and torture another human being for that reason alone, not because some god tells you

1:52:48

that it’s bad. This one coming in from do appreciate it. Evan, thanks for your kind words.

1:52:54

Bubblegum says it is a fact that Christianity has been detrimental to

1:52:59

let’s see the white Anglo-Saxon nations Christianity teaches multiculturalism

1:53:05

and evolution as core idea. I don’t he might be on some kind of drugs. Uh GS

1:53:10

tiger. I don’t know what that meant. Hey, listen. I’m I’m I’m Christianity is not a white

1:53:17

supremacist religion. I appreciate him saying that. It definitely is not. We believe that all races are the equally

1:53:23

the image of God and we celebrate that and that’s going to be the future. Uh not this white Anglo-Saxon supremacist

1:53:30

nonsense. Yeah, I used to I used to sing, you know, red and yellow, black and white, they are precious in his sight.

1:53:36

So I I was like that. I I was really surprised at how a lot of American

1:53:42

right-wing American conservative Christians have really twisted what I thought was a more pure version of

1:53:48

Christianity. You got it. This one from Apollos says for Dan. So a worldview should be judged

1:53:56

based on only correlations. This same logic is used to show science

1:54:01

in secular institutions is racist or sexist. I’ve never said a world view should be

1:54:08

based on correlations. I never said that. Um if if you’re if by world view

1:54:14

you mean morality, if that’s what he means. If if if that’s true, then I

1:54:20

would say the the value is based on harm, avoiding harm to our biological

1:54:26

organisms that we are. That’s that’s the basis of morality. But maybe I’m misunderstanding what he

1:54:32

means by world view. You got it. This uh from JSS Tiger says,

1:54:38

“No society should be run on faith over fact, dogma. Religion is beliefs and

1:54:43

cares nothing for truth.” Mike, all right. Well, just go read all the

1:54:49

books and studies I cited. Nazar says, “Humanism values its own

1:54:55

extinction. How is the replacement rate in Japan?” Oh, this is interesting. I know Dan earlier you mentioned I can’t

1:55:02

you probably touched on it during the debate but in terms of like Mike saying hey uh Christianity seems to lead to

1:55:08

like more babies and Dan I think you said this is what I think this person is

1:55:13

asking about I want to hear your thoughts Dan on this question well I I touched briefly replying to

1:55:19

Mike about the idea of sustainability uh

1:55:25

why assume that sustainability is a good thing unless By society you mean if you want that society to continue then it

1:55:33

needs to breed. Well, we could say the same thing about a virus or a bacteria. We could say it’s sustainable and it’s

1:55:39

reproduced. That doesn’t mean it’s a good thing. The fact that it is sustainable just means that it can last

1:55:45

and therefore society lasts. Are you saying humanity is like a virus

1:55:50

that I mean like there’s a big difference between a virus lasting and humanity? I mean, if the debate is, you

1:55:56

know, what is going to be good for human society, I think we need an ideology that would basically allow human

1:56:02

societies to continue on. If secularism can’t do that, then you’re kind of agreeing it’s not good for human

1:56:08

societies. But there are many different kinds of societies. There are good ones and there are bad ones. So, would you

1:56:14

would you judge a s a bad society that is more sustainable

1:56:20

to be better than another society that is less sustainable? What is actually more moral? Which one is better? Is the

1:56:26

sustainability what makes it better or is it the inherent moral value what makes it better? I said in my opening statement, it’s not

1:56:33

the amount of sustainability. It’s that they just they need that’s a threshold. You need to at least be sustainable. So

1:56:39

in your example, the one that’s less sustainable is going to be better because it still is sustainable. It’s just not as sustainable. So I compare

1:56:46

like for example birth rates among Muslims and Christians. Muslims have higher birth rates, but their societies are far worse than Christian societies,

1:56:52

even though our birth rates are slightly smaller. So, I would still prefer Christian societies because of other factors, but both are sustainable

1:56:59

because of birth rates. Secularism can’t even get in that because it doesn’t it can’t produce sustainable birth rates. So, if Islam is more sustainable than

1:57:06

Christianity, does that make it a better society? You I literally just said no. Like, I

1:57:11

just explained that all to you. Well, then what’s the point of sustainability? You need it. You need it to even be it’s

1:57:17

a threshold. It you you need to at least be over that threshold. After that, it’s relevant, but you still need to get to

1:57:23

that threshold. This doesn’t mean it was bad. Even if it fails the threshold, doesn’t mean it was

1:57:30

bad. I have to go to the next one. Juan Santiago says, “For Dan, what are human

1:57:35

values in Christianity? Everyone is capable of good because everyone is made in the image of God.” Right. Let me just

1:57:42

quick get my cord to plug in. I’ll give you a chance to answer that, Dan. Well, humanism says everybody’s capable

1:57:48

of good as well, capable of it, and nurtures that and and champions that.

1:57:56

And if it’s just because of God, then actually there’s no moral intrinsic moral value within the species itself.

1:58:02

It comes from outside somewhere. And what humanism says is that we are intrinsically valuable because of who we

1:58:09

are as human beings. And if we choose to be moral, and and by the way, I don’t

1:58:14

think there is such a thing as a moral ought. It’s not a thing. I think a moral

1:58:20

ought is just the second half of a conditional statement. If you want to be a good person, then you ought to act in

1:58:28

ways that minimize harm. That’s a good perfectly functional naturalistic moral

1:58:33

philosophy that I think most of us intrinsically follow because we know that we we avoid harm. We don’t like

1:58:40

harm. We don’t you know by by nature all of us are trying to minimize the amount

1:58:46

of harm and that is an actual natural measurable scientifically measurable

1:58:52

consequence of actions. Whereas pleasing a deity is not measurable. It’s not

1:58:58

I reject that. I reject that form of ethics. My I’m a virtue ethicist. It’s about maximizing virtue. If harm like

1:59:04

for example like you know working out or developing patient may cause mental harm at first uh but it maximizes virtue

1:59:11

that’s a good thing. So harm principles are are useful but most of all it should

1:59:16

be subordinate to virtue of all things. What’s virtue? So love joy patience peace kindness

1:59:22

self-control. But humanists embrace all of that as well. We wouldn’t I wouldn’t necessarily call it a virtue.

1:59:28

I’m just clarifying I I think that virtue is primary harm. We should not the primary form of ethics should not be

1:59:34

reducing harm. It should be promoting virtue and decreasing vice. And then harm and pleasure are secondary.

1:59:40

No, I well you said this is a well that you said this is a naturally human thing. But here I’m I’m giving you an

1:59:46

entire field of normative ethics called virtue ethics which agree which disagrees with you. So when you’re

1:59:51

having this utilitarian outlook, you’re not actually expressing human values. You’re expressing your specific type of

1:59:57

values you get from a tradition in moral philosophy. And that’s not ubiquitous across humans, let alone even in the

2:00:03

West. Well, what I’m saying is as long as there do exist viable naturalistic moral

2:00:10

philosophies, then there is no need to go to the supernatural to get your moral

2:00:16

basis. Maybe you disagree with mine, but at least we secular humanists and

2:00:22

naturalists can present a viable moral philosophy.

2:00:29

This one from Basil problem says, “Is psychology a science? Is it reproducible?”

2:00:36

The experiments have to be reproducible. This one from Than Chrisopoulos

2:00:44

says, “For Dan, it seems like you’re conflating the source quote unquote of

2:00:49

these values with the question, what group cohesion system best implements

2:00:55

these values, Christianity or secular humanism?” Uh, this is I don’t know, you

2:01:01

kind of respond to this many times, but if you want to, you can definitely respond again. Well, I I guess to say it very shortly

2:01:08

again that these good Christians are good Christians because of good

2:01:15

humanistic values, not because of Christianity. And if Christians want to

2:01:20

gather to if good Christians want to gather together and do good things, I’m all for that. I might even join their

2:01:26

parades and their marches and their whatever and contribute to their charities. But what they are doing are

2:01:32

not Christian things. They are humanistic things. You got it. And this one from do

2:01:39

appreciate it. Colobby McQueen tried to clarify. They said, uh, and this is

2:01:44

still a little bit. They said, uh, but Dan, do you think it’s the case that you gave no credence to what it means to be

2:01:51

a moral person and what it means to allow a symbiotic relationship between the fact-based and philosophical?

2:01:58

forgive the said uh that’s what they said. It’s in short what they said.

2:02:04

I don’t know if I I don’t know if I followed that at all. Um I’m more confused than you are. Uh this

2:02:11

one from Well, I’ll ask him. Kobe clarify in chat if you want. Lewis though asks for Dan with uh with Mike

2:02:18

Jones preparing with a bunch of studies that he talked about in his argument not changing for 11 months. Uh why didn’t

2:02:25

you bring studies of your own? Well, I didn’t know what kind of debate this would be. I thought we were just

2:02:31

going to have a nice casual conversation. I’m impressed with Mike did with did, but actually he did all of

2:02:38

his preparation months ago. And um so I’m um

2:02:45

so that’s why I um I’m showing up just to talk. And I bet you most of the

2:02:50

viewers and listeners are not going to touch 2% of the books you mentioned.

2:02:55

Mike, you impressed everybody with your your scholarship, but how many of them are actually going to pick up those

2:03:01

books and how many of them are going to remember most of those? I disagree. I I teach my followers every

2:03:07

day, read what I site. Read what I site. You want the studies, I’ll send it to you. I have a PDF, I’ll send you the

2:03:12

book. I have a lot of followers who do read a lot of the books I site. Well, maybe some of them do. Okay. But

2:03:17

well, then I would encourage them also to read the Bible. Yep. This one from Do appreciate it. Uh Kobe

2:03:25

McQueen says ask Dan if he can justify infanticide is bad. They tend to

2:03:31

obiscate uh they say atheists tend to obiscate and uh what morality is in the modern.

2:03:38

So basically they just said Dan can you justify why infanticide is bad on your

2:03:43

position? Well I I think I I think the questioner would agree with me that it is bad but

2:03:50

he’s asking for a justification of it. And I would just go back to harm. It harms a biological human being. It’s

2:03:59

causing harm to kill to kill someone. And by by definition, if morality is the avoidance or the minimizing of harm to

2:04:06

our to any of us, then that’s what makes it bad.

2:04:12

And if God did it, God did something bad. You got it. Nora Belrose says, “Dan, are

2:04:18

you trying to take credit for every good thing humans have ever done by calling it quote humanist? What doesn’t count as

2:04:25

humanist?” Well, um, any anything that disrespects

2:04:32

human values is not humanist? So, authoritarianism, fascism,

2:04:38

um, many of the actions of the God of the Bible are not humanistic. They were very um you know they’re they’re

2:04:45

bullying basically. Uh you look at the covenant in Deuteronomy where I

2:04:50

mentioned that there were blessings and curses. It was it was kind of like a marriage vow between God and his people.

2:04:57

Uh, what if wedding vows said, “I promise to love you, and if you love me, I will take care of you. But if you even

2:05:04

look sideways at another man, I’m going to poke your eyes out and pull your hair out and spread dog poop on your face.”

2:05:12

And I’m not making this up. This stuff’s in the Bible. What if vows were like that? Blessings and curses that that

2:05:20

bride should run away from that marriage. And that’s what we find in the Bible. We find curses and threats and

2:05:27

not just curses and threats but they are actually carried out. Innocent people. It was a tribal people in the Bible who

2:05:33

were innocent who were doing nothing wrong who were exterminated and destroyed because one of the tribes of

2:05:38

Israel needed a place to live. The Bible even says they were a kind, gentle, innocent people who were murdered and

2:05:44

killed in the name of God. That is morally reprehensible. And anyone who

2:05:50

pretends to worship a god like that, who would even defend such a creature, has no concept

2:05:57

of what morality is. What’s the tribe? The the Danites. And

2:06:02

the Danites were Israelites. I know. They were a tribe of Israel. Who’ they wipe out then?

2:06:08

There was a city called Lakish or Lashish. Oh, from the book of Judges, the one where it ends by saying, “In those days

2:06:14

there was no king, so everyone did what they what they thought.” So basically it’s pointing out that they were acting

2:06:19

on their own and doing what they thought was good, not following the law of God. That’s the point of the book of Judges. The point of the book of Judges is that

2:06:25

it got so bad that even the judges like for example Samson and Jeepa were doing

2:06:30

all sorts of evil things. That’s the point of Judges. It’s a you read the judges they get progressively worse

2:06:35

until by the end there’s no judge and everyone’s running around doing whatever they want like doing the Jeepa did. Jeepa did not do an evil

2:06:42

thing according to the Bible. Jeepa did. Where where does it say that? because he was rewarded with a judgeship after he

2:06:50

burned his daughter. No, does not say that at all. No, it doesn’t. Read the Bible. You need to read your

2:06:55

Bible, Mike. You need to read, you need to actually read it as well. And you also should read what scholars have to

2:07:00

say about this. Read Robert Alter, John Walton, uh, for example. All sorts of great scholars. Jeep burnt his daughter

2:07:07

as a sacrifice to God and was rewarded with a judgeship and he was buried with honors back with in the family in the

2:07:14

village that he came from. He was a horrible man and God honored him. He was a horrible man. Not honor him.

2:07:21

I hate to we got to move forward just because we have so many questions. This one from Lefty Dawa says, “Dan, are you

2:07:27

sure you read the Bible or taking Dawa points?” I think they’re saying like,

2:07:32

“Are you using critiques that the Islam apologetics

2:07:37

commonly uses?” They say, “Have you studied the cultural context?”

2:07:43

Well, um, yes, but none of us have studied everything. Of course, I mean,

2:07:48

there’s just too much and there are so many different authors at so many different times and different languages as well. But assuming, you don’t have to

2:07:57

assume this, but if you do assume that the Bible is is God’s word to the human race, and Christians are always telling

2:08:05

us, read the Bible. We were just down down there at the Scopes trial courthouse, and it has the big sign

2:08:10

there, read your Bible, as if the Bible was this great source of moral teachings. If that is God’s word to the

2:08:16

human race, it’s God’s word to me. I am intended to pick it up and read it and

2:08:22

interpret it and understand it as I see it. And if it needs scholars and experts

2:08:28

in order to explain to us what it really means, then God was inept at communicating his message to me. When

2:08:35

you open a Bible in a hotel room and there’s a Gideon Bible, there’s no scholars there. Well, by Greek, you need

2:08:40

to interpret it this way. Can you read Greek and Hebrew? Can you read Greek and Hebrew? I can read the Greek. Yeah, I can read

2:08:46

the Greek. But you can’t read the Hebrew. So you need scholars to tell you what the Hebrew says, right? Well, well, assuming that they trans,

2:08:52

you’re right. There are so many different translations and they disagree with each other. A lot of them disagree, right? You find

2:08:59

different this I have to go to the next one just because I hate to go off topic, but Fan

2:09:05

says for Dan, can you provide any studies to suggest secular humanism is

2:09:10

good for society? We haven’t seen any. Well, I referred to Phil Zuckermanman

2:09:16

whose work I do admire and I know Mike, you think you really struck him out, but

2:09:22

uh his work is highly respected among sociologists. Yep. And the statistics that he give is

2:09:27

highly respected among sociologist and I know you want to pick at it. Uh but uh there um you know and he’s

2:09:34

actually a good friend of mine. He and I both did a debate together at Oxford a couple years ago. Really a wonderful

2:09:39

friendly guy. But um yeah, he has he he does site a lot of the studies as well.

2:09:45

And um I didn’t I I could have gone to the library and to our library and brought a bunch if I thought this was

2:09:51

the kind of debate it was going to be, but uh so I apologize for that. This one from Mother Hold says, “Dan, it

2:09:58

seems part of your stance rests on an anacronistic view of humanism, though.

2:10:03

Ancient people in no way were behaving from modern humanist values. Christian

2:10:08

values informed humanists, not vice versa. Don’t you agree?

2:10:16

No, I don’t agree. I think humanist values informed Christianity. Because if

2:10:21

you look at Christianity, what it is, the Bible, the teachings of the book, modern modern Christians have vastly

2:10:29

improved over those primitive brutal teachings. And so maybe the word humanism wasn’t there, but the back

2:10:36

underlying values that we’re all referring to here are humanistic values.

2:10:42

You got it. This one from JSS Tiger says, “Dear Mike, did Christian societies condone slavery?” Yes, they

2:10:50

answered for you. Uh, yeah. And if you look at the development through Europe, you actually see them start to eradicate it slowly.

2:10:58

Tom Holland makes this point. He says Christianity was like a depth charge. It took time for people to figure out what

2:11:03

these values mean, how to implement them, how they so you’re going to expect that to be a slow progress. Also point

2:11:10

out that if you read, for example, scholars like Rodney Stark, they note that like a lot of societies became Christian because like the the elites

2:11:16

converted, but it took time for the populace to actually convert. I remember reading Clifford Bachmann in the book

2:11:22

Worlds of Medieval Europe. He notes that like uh like a French peasant would have been lucky if he saw a priest once a

2:11:27

year. like it wasn’t this idea that everyone just converted on mass in the medieval ages was 100% Christian. A lot

2:11:34

of times churches were empty. Uh this was more of a cultural change that took time. At the founding of America only

2:11:40

17% of people belong to a church and then you go through the second great awakening that goes up to like 37% and

2:11:46

then you get the abolitionist movement out of that second great awakening. So it took time for Christianity to saturate the culture and change things.

2:11:53

But even with that, we see Europe slowly starts to get rid of Christ, start to get rid of slavery. Uh, and that’s why

2:11:59

they had to go, they had the transatlantic slave trade because they had basically freed all the slaves in Europe and they had come to the

2:12:04

conclusion Christians could not other Christians as slaves. I document all this in my video, how Christianity ended

2:12:10

slavery. And you probably also document that it wasn’t just your idea of Christianity,

2:12:16

but there were other economic reasons why slavery was no longer viable. So, it it probably would have happened anyway.

2:12:23

No, no, it was crucial. Christianity was the spark and then they they leaned on economic and political stuff as well,

2:12:29

but Robert Fogle will note the spark that actually started all was Christianity. This one from aiming upward says, “Dan,

2:12:35

since you’re morally imperfect like me and lacking in that area, approximately how certain must you be that the core

2:12:42

gospel is true and it holds the cure to your condition for you to actively put your trust in Jesus?”

2:12:50

Boy, I don’t know what kind of question that is. What? How certain am I that what

2:12:55

I think you’re saying like if you’re if we as humans are morally imperfect

2:13:00

then how certain can we be that the core of the gospel is

2:13:06

true and it holds the cure to our condition

2:13:11

for you to actively trust in Jesus. Yeah. So that could cut both ways, couldn’t it? That question could go both

2:13:17

ways. Uh yeah, none of us are perfect. And so um what what a moral principle

2:13:24

does is it gets gets you outside of yourself. You’re following a principle. And there are people who who acknowledge

2:13:30

principles but they they don’t follow them. There are people who like there are pedophiles. I’ve just read a book

2:13:35

about these priests and ministers who are who are sexually abusing children. And it’s it’s really epidemic. And it’s

2:13:41

not just Catholics. In fact, there’s more Protestant ministers who abuse children than Catholic priests. And many

2:13:48

of them admit that they know what they’re doing is wrong. And so they they admit there’s a principle there that

2:13:55

this should not happen. But there’s something pedophilia is a disease in most cases that has no cure. They’ve

2:14:02

tried to cure it and the only real cure for it is to just keep them away from from children. So uh yeah, I’m not

2:14:08

certain about everything. Now who’s certain about everything? But I do know that if we have a principle that I mean

2:14:14

do we even have to say this harm is bad, right? Do we do I have to say that we

2:14:19

want to avoid harm? And so acting in ways that minimize harm,

2:14:25

maybe we could even call that a virtue if you want to use that word. Uh it’s it’s it’s a good moral principle. I

2:14:31

think it’s the only basic universal moral principle that we all share. Not because we want to avoid hell or go to

2:14:38

heaven or please the god or we’re doing it for some extr extrinsic reason but because intrinsically we recoil from

2:14:47

harm and we want to have the world with less harm less violence and more understanding and maybe none of us are

2:14:54

perfect in that regard but at least we have some some principles we can follow.

2:15:00

You got it. This one from Lewis Sia Verala says for Dan with Mike Jones

2:15:05

preparing with a bunch of studies. Oh, we got that one. The great grilled cheese says, “Dan, why do you assume

2:15:10

Christians are ignoring the Bible and not giving credit to the New Testament teachings like love your enemy and that

2:15:17

we’re all equal in Christ?” Well, uh, many of them do. And I think there are some good teachings in the

2:15:23

Bible. And it’s not all bad. Um, test all things and hold fast to that which

2:15:29

is good. I think that’s a good teaching. Uh we do have to remember the context though of of love your neighbors and and

2:15:36

that um that the Old Testament verse that was being quoted at that point was

2:15:42

the neighbors only were your Hebrew neighbors. They didn’t express much love to their neighboring tribes, but for the

2:15:48

cohesiveness of their own, and they brought in slaves from the neighboring tribes. But um um

2:15:56

boy, it’s getting late. brain is is fuzzing out here, but no problem. We’re gonna that Thank you

2:16:02

very much. We’re folks, no more questions. We’ve got a number that we’re gonna try to read through fast here. So,

2:16:07

just for sure, I want to be clear. Real quick, James, for anyone interested, I’m going to just go to live on my channel after this if anyone wants

2:16:13

to join us. You got it. Marilyn said, “Dan, you’re fabulous. The kingdom of God is within

2:16:18

you and your humility is a beautiful example of being Christlike. You don’t boast but deserve all the praise. I see

2:16:24

and hear you, King. I think you have a fan. This one from Yeah. says, “Mike and Dan,

2:16:31

what did you guys would you rather live in a Christian or Islamic society?” Christian.

2:16:41

Oh, was I asked that question too? Yeah. Well, it depend. There are some

2:16:46

wonderful Islamic societies uh and there are some horrible Christian societies. So, I guess it depends which one.

2:16:52

There’s different Islamic structures and political systems in different countries. Uh we we owe a lot to Islam

2:17:00

although Islam has been extreme faction of Islam has been horribly violent and

2:17:05

we need to denounce that. But um I I think there are many non-believers in

2:17:11

the world who are not too unhappy living in certain Islamic countries. Not all of some of them are really repressive. And

2:17:19

in fact, we have a good friend named Betty Ipsyami who wore a t-shirt that

2:17:25

said Allah is a lesbian. She just wore a t-shirt that said that she’s serving 30

2:17:30

months in jail. So that’s horrible. I mean that in that case I would rather live in a country Christian or or

2:17:36

otherwise or you know or you know like Japan or maybe in the Nordic countries

2:17:42

that at least outlaws blasphemy. You got it. This one coming in from

2:17:48

let’s see basil problem says uh Mike what do you

2:17:54

believe the age of the earth is 4.6 billion years old. This one from Nazir says how Dan answers

2:18:02

every question. Uh I just can’t quite let’s say this. Mike

2:18:08

says do you like apples? And they say Dan responds humanists invented apples. The Bible hated apples.

2:18:16

See, but Dan, my guess is that’s a good that’s a good characterization, a good cartoon characterization of the debate.

2:18:23

See, some of these are a little simple, but Stitz four says, “If Christians do

2:18:29

selfless things and say it’s on behalf of Christianity, how are they not doing it because they are Christian?” How is

2:18:34

that falsifiable?

2:18:40

I don’t understand the question. I think most Christians are good people and most of them are doing it saying that they’re

2:18:45

doing it because of their Christianity. I think it but underlying all of that the goodness of those principles are

2:18:53

humanistic values. You got it now. We’re near the end. Uh

2:18:59

says as a Greek Dan is wrong about us. We are not that great. That’s just a joke from that earlier.

2:19:06

Greek someone thought you were a Greek supremacist. Wayward Frequency says, “I’d love to see IP Mike Jones debate

2:19:13

Andrew Wilson or Made by Jim Bab on what Christian national because Andrew No, Andrew Wilson’s view

2:19:18

of Christian nationalism is not the the Christian nationalism. I’m against it’s more like Christian populism.” When I

2:19:23

heard him debate Gnostic informant, I was like, “Yeah, this is nothing I’m against. It’s just Christian populism. It’s not like the authoritarian

2:19:30

government has to enforce Christianity.” So, I was in against anything. So, it would have be a really boring debate, honestly.

2:19:35

Christian Theologetics says, “What would convince Dan that Mike is right on this issue tonight?” The debate topic.

2:19:45

What would convince me? Yeah. I guess what would convince me is for

2:19:50

Mike to draw a line and connect some dots between Christianity

2:19:57

and the thoughts and deeds of Christians.

2:20:03

You got it. Even Lore said, “But more people died in the French Revolution, a secular humanist government, than the

2:20:10

series of Inquisitions under the Catholic Church.” Dan, don’t you agree?

2:20:16

Well, that may be true, but it’s not necessarily true that the French Revolution was humanistic.

2:20:24

You got it. We’re actually pretty close to the end here. Let’s see. We going to wrap up. Uh, just let me skim if I in case I

2:20:31

missed any last ones. They say humanists are consequentialists. So

2:20:37

um enslaving women for the sake of world peace would be okay.

2:20:45

I think um you you can’t say that all humanists are consequentialist. What I’m saying is

2:20:52

that I am a humanist and an atheist with a naturalistic moral philosophy that is

2:20:59

consequentialist. uh the harm principle. Other humanists and other atheists might formulate it

2:21:05

different. In fact, some would disagree with me, and we welcome the disagreement, by the way. But you would

2:21:10

have to show me that um the um that there was any

2:21:16

any any good in doing that uh for the species and for those individuals.

2:21:23

Obviously, we we all understand that sometimes to minimize harm, you have to create some harm. Uh, you might have to

2:21:29

cut off a limb in order to save a life. Nobody wants their leg cut off. That’s horrible. But you might have to do

2:21:34

something like that occasionally for overall greater good. That doesn’t

2:21:40

mean cutting off a leg is a good thing. It’s actually a bad thing, but sometimes you have to do bad things, especially in

2:21:47

self-defense. In self-defense, you might have to do something that on its face is

2:21:52

bad, but it’s, you know, you’re protecting the lives of your children or whatever. than uh I don’t think any

2:21:58

humanist would say it’s all just rosy goody goodies. Um it’s a it’s a weighing

2:22:04

of values and in and comparing the relative merits of the consequences of

2:22:09

different actions in the big picture and there’s no simple answer to some of those questions. Sometimes there is no

2:22:14

answer to some of those questions. You got it. And that’s actually the ra

2:22:21

that’s all of our questions. So, I want to say folks, check out our guest links.

2:22:26

Even if you disagree with them, I want to encourage you in the chat, everybody who’s watching, there’s a value from

2:22:32

even if you disagree, check out Mike or Dan’s links

2:22:37

because you’re at least getting their positions straight from them. You’re not getting it from someone else who says like, well, they say this and they’re

2:22:43

summarizing it. It might not be a fully strengthened, you know, filled out

2:22:49

summary. So, I do want to say thank you very much for our guests. They’re the lifeblood of the show and they’ve made

2:22:54

an amazing debate tonight. People really enjoyed this. I want to say thank you, Mike and Dan. It’s been a true pleasure

2:23:00

to have you guys here tonight. Yeah, appreciate it. Well, really happy to meet the legend Dan Barker. I

2:23:05

appreciate it. Do I have 30 seconds to mention a book? Yes, please do. There’s a Christian book

2:23:11

coming out called by Erdman’s Publishing called uh Debating God’s Existence, a

2:23:16

friendly debate between believers and skeptics. It’s based on a debate I did

2:23:21

and they have enlisted six theistic scholars and six atheistic scholars to

2:23:27

comment on our debate. And since it’s published by a Christian publisher, they consider it to be well balanced. And

2:23:35

it’s going to come out sometime early in the early in the spring, debating God’s existence. And you’ll get to you’ll get

2:23:40

some leading atheist and leading theistic uh scholars involved in it

2:23:45

commenting on how well each of us did on our debate. I debated Dr. Adam Ly

2:23:51

Johnson there. So look for that book. That’s really cool. That does sound like a great book. Folks, check out Dan’s

2:23:58

link. My guess is you might be able to get would they may be able to get updates at your link. Uh Dan from

2:24:04

Freedom from Religion. Yeah, ffr.org.

2:24:11

You bet. That’s linked in the description box below as well as Mike Jones’s YouTube channel. I’m going to let our guys go as they’ve been here

2:24:17

late. I want to say once again, thank you guys and folks in the chat. Stick around. We’ll be back in just a moment to talk about upcoming debates. Thank

2:24:24

you very much, gentlemen. [Music]

2:24:33

that [Music]

2:24:42

[Applause] [Music]

2:24:51

come my [Music]

2:24:57

dancing in the street. There’s nothing to it.

2:25:04

We’re on a winning streak. Amazing. Want to say thanks so much for

2:25:10

being with us. Thank you so much. We’ll put a poll in the chat. I know folks are saying, “Hey,

2:25:15

what about a poll?” I will put that in there right now. I want to say thank you guys for your support though in terms of

2:25:21

hitting like. Please do. It does help more people see this debate. If you thought, “Hey, I felt like my side was

2:25:27

really well represented in this debate.” A great way of people seeing it more is

2:25:33

if you like it, it tells the algorithm like, “Hey, okay, recommend this to more people.” And so, thank you guys for

2:25:39

hitting like. Uh, that’s only if you thought your side was more persuasive. If you thought your side was not more persuasive, then probably wouldn’t be a

2:25:46

good idea to hit like because then uh more people would see it. Uh, but I want

2:25:52

to put this uh I’m going to put the actual title.

2:25:57

question is Christianity or secular humanism best for society is

2:26:02

Christianity and then secular humanism I’m putting that as the option and then

2:26:10

you can vote right now and Basil I know you asked like why did I

2:26:16

not read all your questions for one is Basil like I’m not going to read something where you’re slandering me uh

2:26:22

so you’re like I thought this was a free speech channel it’s like okay Well, but you’re slandering. You said this is a

2:26:29

Christian nationalist channel. I don’t even I got to be honest. I don’t know what Christian nationalism means. Like I

2:26:35

like I I don’t know how to define it. So, uh the other thing is it’s true. We host people that are openly Christian

2:26:43

nationalists like Andrew Wilson or Doug Wilson I think is openly Christian nationalist. Uh but we also host

2:26:51

atheists. So, if you’re like, “Well, if you host a Christian nationalist, this mean then it is a Christian nationalist

2:26:56

channel as you said.” It’s like, “Well, then we’re also an atheist channel because we’ve hosted atheists.” I It

2:27:02

just doesn’t make sense to me. It seems like I got to be honest. No offense. I think you’re drinking. I You got a uh I

2:27:09

don’t mean to embarrass you because I know it sounds really bad, but there’s something going on over there. I don’t

2:27:14

know what you’re on, but you’re you’re just kind of acting strange tonight. and but thanks for being a member.

2:27:22

Apparently, you got one of the gifted memberships. So, hey, you’re welcome. But thank you

2:27:29

for being a member. Everybody who is a member. Walk with the spirit, thanks for being a member. Marilyn, thanks for being a member. Basil problem, thanks

2:27:36

for being a member. Even if you’re one who says that what is it that uh you slander me uh but thank you.

2:27:42

Action-packed. I see you there in the live chat. Now, I’ve got to tell you guys about all this fun stuff coming up

2:27:47

because you guys are like, “Hey, well, what is it that’s all coming up?” I will show you. And what I’m going to do is

2:27:54

show you the web page for Debate Con. So, this is our in-person debate conference. If you didn’t know that this

2:28:00

is happening in Nashville, baby, it’s going to be big. So, I want

2:28:06

to show you right now because you’re like, “Well, uh, it’s an in-person

2:28:11

debate conference. This is new for me.” Uh, what is that exactly? Casual Crypt,

2:28:17

thanks for becoming a member at the spectator level. Appreciate that support. Yeah, for real. Thank you guys

2:28:22

for your support as members. Frank V, thanks for being with us on paper. Good

2:28:28

to see you there in the chat. Bluey, thanks for coming by. Dear Williams, glad that you are here. And let’s see.

2:28:36

Basil problem says, are you embarrassed to say you’re a doctor? Uh, no. I I mean, it doesn’t bother me really. It’s

2:28:43

we try to synthesize it with the brand, you know, where it says like Dr. James all over. Uh just because it gives a

2:28:49

little more credibility to the channel. I don’t care that people call me doctor. And the funny thing is when you get

2:28:55

called doctor, I feel like I get more people who when they learn that I have my doctorate, they try to insult me for

2:29:01

it rather than calling me doctor. And that’s okay because I never insisted they call me doctor. But it’s often if

2:29:08

whenever you do something stu like stupid, they go you got a doctorate.

2:29:14

It’s like I hear that all the time. That’s like it’s not original. I The funny thing is I think they think

2:29:19

they’re original. I think it’s uh there’s something like weird, some sort of weird bitterness about those people.

2:29:24

But you know what? You can’t let them get you down. I’m excited about the future and I’m happy and just grateful

2:29:30

for you guys. Uh let’s see. Dry Tit says, “Can’t bash the quests, the

2:29:38

guests. Too bad.” Oh, we actually do allow a lot. We let people sail an awful

2:29:43

lot, but we do like within reason like sometimes people are just mean and it’s

2:29:48

so now somebody complaining that they can’t insult the guests enough is that

2:29:54

they’re kind of like guys come on we want to let you say what you want to a degree but sometimes people you can do

2:29:59

it a little bit too much but 99% of you are super positive and I want to say thank you for that. action-packed. Jack,

2:30:05

Bluey, Moonlight, Cats Bible, Tippy River, Casual Crypt, you’re all so positive and

2:30:12

I appreciate that so much. Now, let me show you this. I’m going to show you the little screen share here is you might be

2:30:19

thinking, James, what exactly is

2:30:24

do a little window capture of Zoom Debatecon 6? It’s in Nashville. It’s a two-day conference

2:30:31

filled with debates. And it’s going to be huge. So, let me

2:30:36

show you what I mean by that because you might you may be thinking like, uh,

2:30:41

James, is it really going to be huge? Well, let me hit you with some knowledge

2:30:48

at the Zoom meeting. There it is. Thanks for your patience. Is

2:30:55

here’s why I say it’s going to be huge. It has guests

2:31:01

inspiring philosophy apostate prophet Andrew Wilson made by Jim Bob Rachel

2:31:09

Wilson Jake of Rattlesnake TV. I want to show you this right over here. So you

2:31:14

can see it. You can click this ticket this button get tickets where I’m waving

2:31:19

the cursor or you know if you scroll down it’ll say when and where? Saturday, November 15th, Sunday, November 16th.

2:31:27

So, that’s coming quick. I mean, that’s about a month. That’s 35 days away, you guys. Like, don’t get will sneak up on

2:31:32

you. Grab your tickets now. They’re linked in the description box. Now,

2:31:38

10:00 a.m. as you can see on screen. Let me double check that you actually can see on screen. Yeah. Yeah, it’s showing. Okay.

2:31:45

Is VIP attendee back room outnumber debate, inspiring philosophy versus five skeptic challengers. Then we’re going to

2:31:51

have Jake of Rattlesnake TV versus Planet Peterson. Christianity or secular humanism. Which is best for society?

2:32:00

It’s going to be juicy. It’s going to be controversial. Rachel Wilson at 3M versus Craig on whether or not feminism

2:32:06

is more good or bad for society. Andrew Wilson versus Daniel Hikachu. Christianity or Islam, which is best for

2:32:13

society. And oh, there’s more. That’s just the first day. It’s going to be a

2:32:19

massive behemoth conference. So on Sunday, you can see it says, “Made by Jim Bob versus Planet Peterson. Does

2:32:25

naturalism explain better than theism. It’s going to be huge.” That’s another

2:32:30

one I’m really excited about. And Fatty Ibraham, thanks for being a

2:32:36

member. And yeah, BA, they said, “Basil problem. All you spout is baseless accusations. Why are you so salty?”

2:32:41

Yeah, Basil, like you just seem like you’re so angry. Uh they say the 99% are

2:32:46

chubby Christian nationalists. You think there are losers at golds. Now he’s attacking their physique.

2:32:54

What is going on? It’s like you you’re just stop. You’re making yourself look

2:32:59

worse. Like don’t it’s I’m I want There’s an old Chinese proverb. Never

2:33:05

interrupt your enemy when he’s making a mistake. I Let’s just let him say what he want. I think he’s just trolling us.

2:33:10

He’s not being real cuz he’s making his side look so silly that is like he can’t

2:33:17

be for real. He’s got to be trolling to like make fun of his own side. Um but yeah. Yeah. I wouldn’t Thank you for

2:33:24

your kind words. The great grilled cheese. Appreciate that. Uh highspeed drifter. Thanks for your kind words. I

2:33:29

never like if you really wanted to get a PhD like cool but I wouldn’t recommend

2:33:36

it. Like it’s not like you, you know, it’s not like you need to uh get a PhD to be smart. Like that’s for sure. You

2:33:43

can be smart with a PhD. Everybody knows that. That’s obvious because sometimes I see people in chat are like you can be

2:33:49

smart without one. And likewise, there are some people with a PhD that um

2:33:55

you can certainly see flaws in a lot of their thinking and reasoning. And frankly, I’m not going to tell you which

2:34:01

fields, but when you do IQ tests on different fields, uh, people with a PhD in economics have a much higher, uh, IQ

2:34:09

average than certain other fields. That’s just an example, but I don’t want to pick on the fields that have lower

2:34:14

IQs for their doctorates. Um, but yeah, I want to say thank you for your kind

2:34:20

words and support. So, yeah, in other words, Master Optics, good to see you there. I see you there in the old live chat. Glad that you were here. Tippy

2:34:26

River says, “Winter is coming. It’s time to put on some insulation. That’s so true. We should become chubby. Very

2:34:32

chubby because that will bother Basil problem. Uh if we become chubby and

2:34:38

insulate ourselves from the cold and Moonlight Cats Bible says, “Funniest debate on this channel.” Now, going back

2:34:44

to Debatecon 6, what I’m going to put is if you’re thinking about it and you’re like, “Well, I’m thinking about it.” You know, it’s in Nashville. There is a way

2:34:51

that you can get a discount. So, we do have it’s a $25. We’re going to have a flash sale where it’ll be $25 off. And

2:34:59

uh I’m going to put that link. If you sign up for our insiders list, I just

2:35:05

put the link in the live chat. I’m pinning it to the top. If you sign up, you can get like a heads up on when the

2:35:15

flash sale will be and you’ll get the discount code. So, so you can use it and get your discount. get 25 bucks off and

2:35:22

you take that 25 bucks, spend it on something else. You can either go invest it or you can buy yourself some

2:35:27

Chick-fil-A, whatever you want. But I want to say thank you guys

2:35:33

for hitting like, we’re up to 484, which is fantastic. 485

2:35:39

is if we can just get 15 more. We’re just 15 away. I know that Frank V

2:35:48

in the live chat said he would email everyone in chat feat pics. So if you

2:35:54

want some feet pics just 15 more likes away now. Let’s go

2:36:01

back to this. Uh yeah. Yeah. Check out that pinned chat that has our insiders

2:36:07

list. Get on that list. It’ll will give you updates on like, hey, here’s when there’s going to be a flash sale, all

2:36:14

that cool stuff. So, that’s one thing.

2:36:19

And if you didn’t know, we have channel memberships. Check them out. At least

2:36:25

peek over and see because you might find something you like. Here’s an example. Let’s say you’re like, well, I’m

2:36:30

considering it. What are the cool things? Well, at the spectator level, this is $2.99 a month. So basically a

2:36:38

cup of like probably cheaper than a cup of coffee now. Like it just the way that they’re devaluing the dollar that the

2:36:45

way that you know the the way things are playing out. The dollar is becoming

2:36:50

weaker. So I mean now it’s not even 299 compared to like five years ago. I mean

2:36:56

it’s like this is pocket change is like pennies is you get the loyalty badges

2:37:02

next to your name. You get the custom emoji to use in comments and in live

2:37:07

chat. So, we never use those enough. I should I’m going to put those in the live chat. I Here are some examples. I’m

2:37:12

putting them in there. So, there’s amazing. And then there’s juicy. If you

2:37:17

want to see some juicy debates, we got a lot of them coming up. There are these ones with my face. I don’t know why

2:37:23

you’d want to use those. Frightening. Uh this is it’s back when I used to wear my

2:37:28

I used to use those blue light blockers. Uh because when I lived in a time zone,

2:37:34

I whenever I’d stream in central time, it was like later because right now it’s 8:42 p.m. But in Wisconsin, it’s 10:42

2:37:42

p.m. So I’d want to block that light out. And let’s see.

2:37:49

My basil problem is so triggered. Uh Issa Kabir, thank you for becoming a

2:37:55

member at the spectator level. See, Easter recognizes that if you, you know,

2:38:02

$299, it’s just worth pennies now. It’s just become so devalued.

2:38:07

Consider buying gold or a channel membership. Uh because the dollar is

2:38:13

just you’re, you know, not worth much. Now, Master Optics says, “Hi, James. Nice to

2:38:19

see you, too.” Thank you very much, brother. Glad that you are back. We are 12 likes away from those feet picks.

2:38:27

Don’t forget and thank you for being with us. Christ bear guru pastor, happy to have you.

2:38:33

Jeremy Crawford, happy that you were with us. And Alex Ojugu, thank you for

2:38:40

coming by. Andrew Nazario, happy to have you with us. And Jeremy Crawford, glad that you’re with us. Now, I’m going to

2:38:46

go back to the channel memberships. I want to tell you about these. If you click the join button, I don’t know if you ever have. You may be like, I don’t

2:38:51

like what is it there? I’ll show you. Uh so basically you get those cool perks.

2:38:57

You get access to membersonly polls, photos and status updates and immunity from slow chat uh from chat slow mode.

2:39:04

So if we ever do flip- on slow mode, which once in a while we do. I don’t like using it to be honest, but we do it

2:39:10

once in a while if things get really fast and the moderators are like, “James, it’s just please, you have to.

2:39:15

This is killing me.” Now you can go up a level. The middle level, $4.99 a month,

2:39:22

is you get membersonly videos, membersonly shoutouts, which reminds me, I’m going to do those shout outs right

2:39:27

now. Channel members at the debater level, Tony’s Tech and Custom PCs, Pedo,

2:39:34

Michael Dresden, and Alyssa, thank you for becoming members at the debater level. Appreciate that. As so at the

2:39:42

debater level is like the middle level. You get the your name shouted out at the end of a debate. Patreon members at the

2:39:47

M MDDD VIP tier also get their name shouted out. Oliver Catwell and Andrew Barry, thank you for your support. Also,

2:39:57

you get early access to new videos. So, Debbcon, we will actually like in truth

2:40:03

if you sign up at the highest tier, the final word, that level of membership. Uh

2:40:09

that’s how you can watch all of the Debatecon debates live from at home because I know some people they’re like

2:40:15

I just can’t travel out to Nashville for what would be three three nights or so is they’re like I I can’t do that.

2:40:23

You actually if you remember it’s only at the final word. It’s the highest level. So it’s 14.99 is that you’d

2:40:30

actually be able to watch those. But I’m I’m not supposed to announce that for another five days. So uh

2:40:36

now the debater level is epic because you get membersonly live

2:40:43

streams in particular our Patreon meeting is going to be streamed so you can watch that early access to new

2:40:49

videos. So that would be like our outnumbered ones.

2:40:54

Those have been released early for members at the debater level. And then the final words, if you’re like, “Hey, I

2:40:59

am huge. I’m a huge fan.” Your name would be on screen

2:41:06

in the little ticker at the bottom of the debate and you can share your

2:41:11

thoughts at the MDD monthly Zoom meeting. But yeah,

2:41:18

thank you guys for all of your support. Jupiter Darin says, “You’re ever going to do a Debate Con in the Kansas City area?” Possibly. I got to be honest,

2:41:24

it’s not in the near future. Probably the next one we’re going to be doing uh like it’s not really debate con. It’s

2:41:29

going to be more like Rashio Christie Con. Uh but Modern Day debate is helping collaborate to put it on. That is going

2:41:36

to be uh in San Antonio, Lord willing, in January. Not for sure yet, but

2:41:42

probable. Then probably in Chicago, probably like late April, uh maybe early

2:41:50

April, we plan on hosting Debate Con 7,

2:41:56

that will feature uh that’ll be in Chicago, Lord willing. That’s the plan. And then once it gets

2:42:06

cold again, uh, so like probably a year from now or so, uh, we probably will go

2:42:12

down to Orlando. So, lots of Yeah, because you were like, “Hey, we got to go to Dallas again. I I

2:42:18

do want to go back. That’d be fun.” Basil problem says, “Did you ever meet Jared?” No, I did not meet your friend

2:42:23

Jared. You’re obsessed with him. But yeah, yeah. Demodri, thank you for

2:42:29

coming by. I’m going to show you guys more. H two seconds.

2:42:35

So if you are looking on screen, you can see the main event for the whole

2:42:41

conference will be Andrew Wilson versus Dr. Richard Carrier, Christianity or secular humanism, which is best for society. Apostate prophet will be taking

2:42:47

on Javad Hashmi. That is going to be a super juicy debate. And then if you’re

2:42:53

like, “Hey James, like what else is going on?” Uh, let me

2:42:58

So, promoting. So, you might be thinking, James, okay, cool. Good for, you know, good for the conference. That

2:43:03

sounds fun. But what about uh let me just see if I’ve got this right.

2:43:08

Delete this. Thanks for your patience. Audio, I got that. That’s just got to stay. Camera, I got to delete that. And

2:43:16

then you’re thinking, James, what else is uh to see? Oh, wow.

2:43:23

is okay. Let me just fix this. I’m going to move. Here I go. Now I’m in the middle of the

2:43:28

screen showing you the perks for our Indiegogo crowdfund. If you look at the top left,

2:43:35

you can give without a perk to the crowdfund. So this is at Indiegogo. I am going to put that link in the live

2:43:43

chat. So, if you are like, “Hey, I can’t go to Debate Con, but I went want to get in on some of the action is that you can

2:43:49

check out new membership, uh, new channel membership, including Oh, let me get this.” Oh, wait. If you

2:43:56

last but not least, let’s say you have a tw if do you guys have Amazon Prime,

2:44:03

let me know in chat if you do because if you happen to have Amazon Prime, if you

2:44:10

support Modern Day debate, uh you can if you want to support Modern Day, I should say, if you go to our

2:44:18

Twitch, which I’ve put in the live chat, I just

2:44:23

pinned it. I’m going to pin it as a comment. You can support Modern Day Debate by using your free sub. So, if

2:44:29

you have Amazon Prime, you get a free sub on Twitch every month, a free subscription. That’s what I mean by sub.

2:44:36

And you can use it toward Modernday Debate, which I just linked at. It’s like the pinned chat is that helps

2:44:44

Modern Day Debate. I think we get like $2 every time a person uses their Amazon Prime sub toward um Modern Day Debate.

2:44:52

We do appreciate that. That’s another way of supporting us and we do appreciate it. 492 likes. We’re

2:44:57

only eight likes away from the big 500. So, that’s really cool. Uh, but yeah,

2:45:04

check it out. The chat that is pinned at the top of the chat right now. Use your

2:45:10

Amazon Prime subscription on Twitch to support Modern Day Debates Twitch

2:45:17

channel. So, we do appreciate that. It means more than you know. Now, also

2:45:23

though, as you can see on screen,

2:45:28

the Indiegogo crowdfund, I’m going to put this, which I have not apparently

2:45:34

put in. You can get a sign photo of your

2:45:40

favorite speaker and other cool perks. Check that out.

2:45:51

Okay, now that I’m going to pin in the top of the chat as well. So, I’m pinning that

2:46:00

and I’m getting a little tired myself.

2:46:06

So, that link that I just pinned at the top of the live chat, I’m going to show you the perks that come from that

2:46:13

crowdfund. As you can see at the top left of the screen, what you’re looking at now, you can give without a perk. You’re like, “Hey, here’s five bucks.

2:46:18

Just like what you guys do, want you to keep doing it. We want to encourage you to do that. Thank you for your support. It means more than you know.” Otherwise,

2:46:25

you’re like, “Hey, well, I actually, you know, I want my name in the post debate credits as like a mini sponsor. I’m

2:46:30

willing to throw 20 bucks in. We do appreciate that more than you know. Please consider supporting at that

2:46:36

level.” And then maybe it’s like, hey, uh, I really want a signed emblem page

2:46:42

that says Debatecon 6, as you can see at the top right of the screen, with all the autographs of all the debaters.

2:46:49

That’s another perk you get. Or maybe you’re like, “Hey, I really want a signed photo of my favorite debater, as

2:46:55

you can see in the bottom left of the screen.” That’s another cool perk you can get.

2:47:00

As that example shows, Andrew wishes his handwriting was that good. It’s not really that good. I’ve seen it. That’s

2:47:08

just a little mockup. And then at the bottom right of the screen, one- on-one

2:47:13

Zoom chat with Dr. James. And then Basil Problem says, “How much funding have you

2:47:19

received from tenant media?” Oh my gosh, this guy is on drugs. He’s got to be

2:47:24

trolling because like I’ve never received a dime from any tenant media or anything even like it. Uh let’s see.

2:47:33

You guys are funny. I don’t know about you, Dutch. Dutch, I see you there in the chat. Thanks for coming by. Um,

2:47:40

let’s see. Yeah, we’re so close to 500 likes.

2:47:48

495. Come on, gang. We can do it.

2:47:53

There’s got to be five people out there that are like, “Oh, yeah.” Like, did I hit like yet? I don’t know. I would be so grateful. Now, I want to show you

2:47:59

last but not least, one of the coolest emojis from our channel membership says, “Soy boy.” As you can see in the chat, I

2:48:05

just put that right there so that you can call people a soy boy, too. All you

2:48:12

have to do is become a member. Marilyn’s doing it. Thanks, Marilyn. Appreciate you showing that off. And uh, thanks

2:48:18

Mill 999 says, “James, I’m late. I’m sorry. I love you, buddy. Keep up the good work.” Thank you for your kind words. Glad to see you here. We’re at

2:48:26

496 likes. That must have come from Mill 999999. Thank you for that. And Taylor

2:48:33

D, good to see you there. And uh but yeah, thank you guys for your support.

2:48:40

Yes, Basil problem. You got Well, the thing is like you’re just so all this stuff is so outlandish. like, “Yes, the

2:48:46

Russian government was funding modern day debate cuz they’re like, “Oh, yes,

2:48:52

we want to want to like influence like America through a neutral debate channel

2:49:00

because like if it’s neutral, that’ll show favoritism toward us like how would it be favoring one side if it’s

2:49:07

neutral?” Thank you, Jupiter. Dharmis is there. There’s my obligatory like. Thank you

2:49:13

for that. We’re at $4.99. So, can you please, if you’re out there listening,

2:49:18

can you be the last person to hit like and get us over that hurdle? But, uh, basically,

2:49:24

yeah, we never even host debates on Russia, though. So, I don’t I’m confused by that. But, yes, Samuel S. Samuel 33

2:49:32

says, “Aliens, hey, we might do a debate on whether or not alien abductions are legit in the next month.” It’s like a

2:49:39

big maybe. Crash TV, thank you for coming by. Says, “So you don’t deny it.”

2:49:44

That’s funny. You guys are characters. Says, uh, Mill says, “We must protect this channel at all costs.” Thank you

2:49:50

for your kind words. We are a neutral channel. It’s important to us that we

2:49:56

really do. What’s the word I’m looking for? Uh, yeah, we want to call it like right down the middle. Uh, want to give

2:50:02

everybody equal time, all that stuff. I want to say thank you for your kind words. Thank you for your support. 501

2:50:09

likes. The 501st like. What movie reference is that? The 501st. Uh but

2:50:15

yeah, want to say thank you for your support. We will see you at the next debate. Keep

2:50:20

sifting out the reasonable from the unreasonable. Oh, you know what? I’m going to show you members only. Let me copy this.

2:50:32

Share screen. We’ll do this. Paste reference. Yeah.

2:50:41

Now, last but not least, you can see check out our new membersonly playlist, including our most juicy debates and

2:50:46

over 350 debates in total. So, this is if you support at the uh debater level,

2:50:54

membership level, you get all these juicy debates. Andrew Wilson versus Alex Stein and many other

2:51:01

juicy debates. Milo Yiannopoulos and many others. uh Nick Fentes, Stefan

2:51:08

Walloo, just all sorts of juicy stuff. But yeah, so yeah, consider becoming a

2:51:14

member. Thanks for all your support. I love you guys. Keep sifting out the reasonable from the unreasonable. Did I get everything? I think like there’s so

2:51:20

many different things. Thank you guys for all your love. I’ll

2:51:25

see you at the next one. Take care, folks. Appreciate you. I hope you’re you’re all well, no matter how

2:51:32

hard of a day you had, if you had a hard day, I hope you know. I do appreciate you. Thanks for hanging out here. Seriously, hang in there. Things will

2:51:38

get better. If things are hard right now, I’ve been through really hard times myself. They will get better. Sometimes it takes

2:51:44

a long time. It takes, you know, but keep your hope that things will get

2:51:50

better and that you’ll learn things from these hard times, even if it is just perseverance,

2:51:55

which is way more valuable than we ever talk about, by the way. So, yeah, thank

2:52:01

you guys for your support. Keep sifting out the reasonable from the unreasonable. We’ll see you at the next debate.

2:52:06

[Music]