Survival of the fittest does not mean the strongest will survive. It means the those that are most adaptive to their environment will survive. Humans' ability to cooperate is what makes us fit. If look at other primates those that transgress could be killed or ejected from the group, which is just as good as being killed. So you can see how altruism would be more favored than selfishness evolutionarily.
This is also why animals with strong familial structures have prospered as much as they have. While it's true humans domesticated them, they were only able to be domesticated because they had structures innate that humans recognized as familial. The pack mentality was key to their survival and being able to adapt to the human "pack" allowed them to prosper much better than animals like the buffalo and zebra which have no family structure and suffered drastically for it. Cats and dogs will never be at threat for extinction because they could be tamed by humans whereas other animals can't.
@@infiniteshay8660 this is also the leading theory on why modern humans beat out Neanderthals in survival. Larger family groups and more/better inter-group socialization meant that humans could profit from interactions that Neanderthals would tend to avoid.
Evolution is a very blind process. For human species having big brains has been a good trait to pass on. Meanwhile having wide hips hasn't been since it made running difficult. This is how we ended up with painfull and dangerous birth proces
Gosh, I'm responding 4 years late, but I think while this is true to an extent, it's an oversimplification. While on one hand, yes, cooperation has lead thus far to our species becoming in some respects the most dominant and influential on the planet, on the other there's nothing to say that at some point or even presently from some angles, our drive to cooperate cannot also be seen as a hindrance. Who knows, after all, what kind of a species might have come out if we had less of a drive to cooperate, we might look upon them as gods, or we might see them as lesser. There's likewise nothing stopping someone from saying hey, Neanderthals were better than us. Better at surviving in the particular context of their extermination? No. But I might hold certain aesthetic or moral values that might lead me to condemn the path we've taken evolutionarily, and to condemn where we are today. That is to say, these things are relative. Maybe we value survival too much, maybe a shorter lifespan makes for a happier person, maybe the global domination of civilization over what is deemed "nature" has actually set us on a path of self-destruction. Or maybe all of our concerns will be proven irrelevant and we all get wiped out by an asteroid. :D We live in a meaningless and uncaring world, and I find that the best thing we can do is... play around. Play around and find out what we like, play around and be creative with our ideas, values etc. It's a form of art. It's what we've always done. But with a certain level of material security we get doubtful of ourselves and our own capabilities. Suddenly it takes an exceptionally strong will to be creative. It doesn't come "naturally" anymore. But it is, fundamentally, a function of our bodies, of us as organisms. It happens every time you make a decision, every time you fall into the present moment. The present is always creative. So instead of relying on evolution and science to give us values we can "believe in", we should try going with the flow, as much as it might mean going against the grain of our capitalist society, and realise that evolution can only be observed after the fact - it cannot tell us anything about the future or how we should act in the present. Every present moment desires something different for different individuals and societies. It's they who need to figure it out themselves. That's what I find anyway.
Seeing a lot of hate for SJ here but I seriously respect that as a Christian she still admits that the cosmological and teleological arguments point only towards deism, not Christianity. A lot of monotheists don't get that.
@@Hastenforthedawm I am no longer as interested in religious discourse as I was 2 years ago; however, I will clarify what I meant here. By my understanding, deism doesn't SPECIFICALLY believe that there is a god that definitely doesn't care about humanity, just that there is a god, but this god DOES NOT NECESSARILY involve itself in human affairs. Whilst most deists may lean towards this god not being involved, my understanding is that deists simply believe that they may or may not be generally involved. I might be wrong by that understanding though, as by that definition it's s essentially just a specific facet of general theism.
Loved listening to this and hearing from everyone else. I was raised Catholic, became an Atheist, then Agnostic and then explored Paganism aaaand then I fell into Norse Paganism. With all do respect, listening to SJ made me happy to be done with Christianity. I can't stand living that lifestyle and having that mindset and living in constant fear of Hell. And going to Heaven to go to Church and praise God is... Not something I want to spend an eternity doing!!! That to me sounds like a personal Hell!
I felt like this conversation was a bit stacked against her favor in the sense that polytheism, atheism and Satanism have a lot of stances where they can overlap depending on the person in question, meanwhile Christianity has very strong polarizing views with black and white on many subjects. I'm not saying that it was intentionally against her favor but the religion sticks out like a sore thumb when mixed into a crowd of more diverse beliefs.
I really enjoyed this video, I liked hearing the different perspectives. I've been an "atheist" for years. I say "atheist" because I don't know what else to call it. I don't believe in anything, but I've been delving into the world of Norse Paganism and Heathenry. I like the ideas of paganism, but have a hard time in believing the gods exist. When I started getting into it, I found Wisdom of Odin, and after watching a couple videos of his I found you. You made me realize he is not the kind of person I should follow and ever since I've been watching your videos daily. I love your perspective, and have enjoyed learning from you. I recently purchased a few of the books you recommended. I am bad about reading, but hope to start reading more, and read these books.
luckily paganism, especially Norse Heathenry doesn't need you to believe in order to be "saved" or whatever. some people use the gods as a sort of archetypical study and use the stories as lessons. But I don't think most within our path view the stories as like...literal know? The Gods are agents with their own disembodied minds. paganism is all about the journey. you are not REQUIRED to believe anything. also, I was right there with you, WoO was my start and I had a gut feeling about his stuff and stopped watching. Then ocean and many others did a video confirming my suspicion. hope all is well! Hail.
This is primarily why I ended up converting to heathenism. Of all of the things I've read and understood, belief was never a core tenant. Assuming Odin is the true God compared to Yahweh, whether you believe in Odin or not, doesn't matter. Odin judges you on your deeds, whereas Yahweh judges you on you belief. Which would you consider to be more merciful? Positive judgement because you are of good moral character or positive judgement because you believe in the right deity regardless of your moral character? When compared to Marcus Aurelius' stoicism, it points toward the heathen gods being good and just because they judge you on being good and just and give you mercy in regards to belief. My best friend recently got serious about his Christian faith, and we spoke about belief and "knowing" vs "believing" and all of that. I brought up a point to him that his religion condemns mine, but my religion doesn't condemn his, and he wants to claim his god is the merciful god. It made him stop and think for a moment. Just want to say, despite his views on religion and our differing views, he's a good dude, and if he wasn't I wouldn't be friends with him. He does debate our religions a lot because he knows I was a Christian pastor at one point, and wants to bring me back into the fold. He is worried about my soul, and wouldn't any good friend be worried about their friends?
Ive been there and personnally i think i might still be there but instead of Norse it was Welsh Paganism and bits of norse and greek and others but ive been personally going off what i remember plagius was, with how you live life with wisdom and aristotles thoughts of Morality is just a habit etc.
That’s awesome! I’m a secular humanist, Slavic witch, with some Celtic traditions smattered in! I don’t literally believe in the supernatural, as opposed to the wisdom that comes from the stories. I even glean wisdom from the Bible, even though I believe it to be a bastardized text! There’s still value, in small doses!! Im very interested in Old Germanic paganism, including Nordic paganism, so I totally get what you’re saying! Slavic tradition has a mix of the Old Slavic religions with Christian Orthodox, Nordic, and even Celtic!
LMAO the Christian made it less than a minute before jumping straight to Godwin’s law and comparing anyone who disagrees with her to nazis🤣. This is gonna be a fun debate
I don't see why being able to scientifically explain something would mean that a god had nothing to do with it. You could explain that an encounter with a god was some kind of neurological phenomenon, but wouldn't it make sense that beings such as the gods would cause such phenomena here on earth? These are powerful beings after all, but any interaction in this universe would have to follow the laws of physics and therefore would be understandable through science.
Throughout history, people have explained various phenomena (such as the cycle of night and day or the existence of complex life on Earth) by saying their god(s) created them. Moreover, often they have taken certain natural phenomena as proof of the existence of their god(s). For example, even today some Christians say they are sure their god exists because they can’t imagine a better explanation for all the characteristics of life on Earth. Later, scientists have shown that no divine intervention is needed for these things to exist. That blows a hole in the argument that goes “Phenomenon A exists; therefore my god created it; therefore my god exists.” It is possible that gods exist, but there is no objective phenomenon for which the only explanation is the existence of a divinity. There is no definitive evidence of a god anywhere. Theists really do have to “have faith.” The argument usually goes back to the Big Bang. Scientists can reasonably explain or make pretty good educated guesses about the origins and reasons for nearly all objects, forces, and other phenomena in the universe of which anyone is aware. And their best guess at this time is that our Universe and Time itself originated with the Big Bang. Before that is an unknown. So some theists will seize on that gap in scientific knowledge and say the gap is proof of the existence of their god. But that gap follows the pattern of others before it. Scientists have found natural explanations for previous knowledge gaps. It seems reasonable to imagine they’ll eventually find a similarly natural explanation for the origin of the Universe. Even if they don’t, a lack of knowledge isn’t proof that a god exists. Gods might exist, but they just as easily might not. Finally, even if I were to accept that a god made the Universe, the existence of that god would suffer from the same lack of explanation as the Universe itself. Who or what made that god? Another god? I have heard some people say that their god is the one entity that has always existed. That sounds a lot like one hypothesis for the origin of the Universe. Some hypothesize that the Universe itself has always existed. If a theist accepts that their god(s) always existed then made the Universe, why not simplify the matter and just accept that the Universe always existed?
Hey, atheist here, and more specifically the atheist in the debate. I see no issue with someone believing this, and am more than willing to explore a discussion about this with any pagan willing to have the discussion.
I'm quite comfortable with that idea, actually. Most of my personal spiritual experiences tend to work in a similar manner: whatever's "talking" to me tends to find it easier to get the point across using my own memories (of thoughts, feelings, tastes, smells, sounds, etc). Since pagan spiritual (being, experiences, etc) are natural and not supernatural, there's no reason why your point can't be valid.
I loved this, but I almost felt bad for SJ. The other three seemed to get along so well and SJ seemed to be left out for the majority of the debate. That being said, she was fairly dismissive on a lot of topics and didn't raise very many cohesive points. I could be biased as a polytheistic Satanist, however.
This is most likely because Squircifer, myself, and Ocean have pretty similar points of view about most things. We disagree on the god(s) question, but for the most part can get along. SJ, on the other hand, is just... Just awful.
She not only was dismissive, she seemed to be uneducated on a lot of philosophy terms. She wasn't intentionally left out, she just couldn't debate on something she didn't understand, and she knew it. That's my interpretation. Like the thing about Ultimate Reality, she jumps right to a people having a defined ultimate purpose (this is because Christianity is the peoplecentric religion, and Polytheism sees us all all part of a web, but I digress.)
I laughed out loud at the fact that "... if that makes any sense whatsoever." was all we heard in-between a lot of breaking up. I'm sure it would make sense if we could hear it.
What I noticed. SJ claims she heard the voice of her god speaking to her, fortelling events that are about to happen, but she didn't tell us what happened. Only making the claim even more vague and dismissable. Lying for Jesus? I must say that Ocean and the Satanist hold the views in which I can relate to both. Of course, Pagan as I have eventually turned out to become, Anton LaVey was in fact a very important inspiration suring a very trying point in my life. His Satanic Bible was what I needed during this time and it served to be a true benefit. However, as a Pagan, I do accept the existence of a variety of Gods.
I was really interested in the satanists perspective, but I felt we missed a lot of it because of the connection. I’ll have to find his channel. I’m a huge fan of the Satanic Temple, and the work they do, but I’m less familiar with “the philosophy of self”, with Lavey’s teachings.
I can think of so many examples like Loki being fluid, Achilles crossdressing (and passing), and literally any shape shifter. One of my favorite myths is that sometimes Apollo gets drunk and puts people in the wrong bodies.
@@grell5108 the myth was probably a way for trans people to explain their experiences, and as a trans person, i can safely say that no the hell you dont lol. I wouldn't wish gender dysphoria on my worst enemy. If for whatever reason you do want to be a different gender, maybe hang out in some trans circles for a little bit
34:30 Ocean addresses a problem with afterlives being eternal. The Problem of Ennui is troublesome in any eternal afterlife (such as christianity) since with infinite time, boredom and lack of fulfillment is possible. Afterlives that have an end (certain interpretations of Ragnarok) or afterlives where consciousness is eventually extinguished but life of some form will always continue don't suffer from this problem. In the christian afterlife, without YHVH interfering or altering the conscious mind (soul), it's only reasonable that at least some individuals would be suffer from something resembling ennui. Lightning Returns: FFXIII and Death Wish from Star Trek: Voyager demonstrates this problem in one way or another.
So you're saying a dead Christian might at some later point either become an atheist or a pagan? I really don't think you were trying to say that, but the thought of the possibility of it had me rolling. I wonder if a dead person can immigrate between afterlives...
@@jamestown8398 I am called an extremist in that regard by friends sometimes, because each time the "life is interesting/meaningful because it is short" topic comes out, I burst. Personally I'm quite sure I can maintain interest in my life for some hundreds of thousands of years, but infinity is infinitely longer than that, and that's a bit too much even for me.
@@LoisoPondohva I'm not sure I understand this. Like, if your favorite hobby would still be enjoyable after 500,000 years then why would year 500,001 be any different? My thinking is that, in a state of contentment, time would start to bleed into each other. Apart from that, infinite times would mean infinite new things to try and infinite new people to meet. You could afford to be really picky and still never exhaust the pool of possibilities.
I’m surprised that SJ argues so much with Ocean, I’d think a mono and polytheist would have enough in common to support each other in such a debate. Really not into how pushy and antagonistic she is compared to the others
@@Boddah. monotheistic people expecially christians are taught that polytheistic are horrible and borderline worse that satanism- in their view. I 100% think they should agree more on things. It is also confusing because Christianity praises the holy Trinity which is, in fact more than one THING, not a god. Though they do seem to praise Jesus even tho they say not to.
Monotheistic people have a long history of oppressing anyone who doesn't follow their God. This means they hate any other Monotheistic faith, but they're even more extremely hostile typically to pagans and Polytheists. Since we have fundamentally different theological viewpoints
As a pagan myself, not surprised at all. Most Christian think I'm a devil worshiper, and they get very frustrated when all their arguments which are constructed for atheism or a "lasped" Christian who still believes on some level, doesn't even apply to me.
as a former christian, I still find it interesting that the Christians consider morals to be objective when within their own variety of denominations, is also a large variety of rights and wrongs. This can be seen even in christian history as martin luther and many others throughout the renaissance as many left the existing christian mold, changing it vastly over time. To even say that christianity has survived is very loose and inaccurate.
@@1950sTardigrade But then we have to get into this whole debate on how a supposedly omniscient god isn’t able to clearly communicate with his creation, otherwise we wouldn’t have thousands of vastly different versions of christianity if you will. I think the reason why christianity is still so present in modern day society has to do with the fact that it became traditions and not because it has a strong foundation.
@@1950sTardigrade her argument was exactly the opposite. That all around the world we have the "same" moral framework and values and we know when we violate it.
It's strange that the Christian gave so many book recommendations when there should be one enough, right? Biblie is not just a simple collection of fun stories. It's apparently inspired by God himself. Shouldn't it be enough? Why we need more and more books written by flawed people when we have something straight from the source Ironicallly reading Biblie made me an atheist. Not because it was full of terrifying images but because it was boring af. It made me realize there's special about it and, by extension, Christianity. She's constantly proving my point by recommending anything but Biblie
Some morals are rational for all human beings to live together in a community. We are social animals and evolved to have empathy. We wouldn't have survived the ice age of we were selfish. I don't understand why Christians think we need God to explain our moral sense. The "absolute" nature of some of our morals only extends as far as our species. Do you think the moral sense Christians think comes from God makes any sense to a mosquito or a bacterium?
Ocean great work just want to say your wrong about what Greeks taking care of the lower class. the Romens did not care for the poor.The Greeks had ''Xenia''
Christianity is polytheistic...You have Yahweh and Jesus, Satan, demons and angels, seraphs... you have many deity going on with one god that poly right there
Two years late but... I've always wondered how it is that an all powerful, all knowing, all loving, perfect creator could be at war with his own creation AND lose a third of his angels and most human souls. There's supposedly war in heaven. How? Who is Satan that Yahweh requires a plan to begin with? Why is Yahweh caught in a struggle against him? It sounds like at least two equal powers fighting. Add to that Yahweh described himself as a jealous god, responsible for evil and deceit.
I find great humor in christians bouncing from "We have objective morals" to "Welll that was for then, not now" when it comes to god calling for genocide and slavery.
SJ contradicts herself when she says Christians don't go off of word but faith and then QUOTES SCRIPTURE. Scripture is just going my someone's word about something happening and that the Bible is true. Faith IS going off of someone's word. Also I really wish someone had asked how she knew for sure it was the Christian god speaking to her and not Odin or Mercury or Shiva, etc. Cause that's a big difference in a lot of convos between polytheists and Christians in my observations. Polytheists are willing so say "it's a vibe i got" or "these correspondences stood out " but Christians tend to make baseless claims of "there's only one" or "i just know" without being able to back it up. And that's kind of the issue i have with it having grown up with it: surety without evidence. "I'm right, you're wrong because my book says so." It's a rare Pagan i come across that's unable to say "i don't know" or "no we can't prove it".
As a hellenic polytheist who belives in the stories and see the gods and goddesses as not omnipotent, omniscient or omnipresent with some exceptions. The greek gods and goddesses teach us how to live and what to do in our life . The 9 muses inspire people to discover new things in science , music , poetry etc. People should enjoy life that includes love ,intercourse ( consensual) , drinking etc . Whatever brings pleasure without destrying yourself in the process ofcourse, there must be moderation in what we do . The afterlife part is easy , there are 3 distinct places in the underworld : Tartarus (the bad place where you get tortured) , Asphodels fields ( the middle place) and Elysium fields ( paradise ) . I believe you can move through these 3 places ,as you can fall from grace on earth ,you can do it in the afterlife too . The life in the afterlife is mimicking the life on earth as in my religion the Earth goddess is the mother of all life , she was the first divine being to exist out of the primordial soup ( Chaos in greek religion). It's very complex to talk on these topics. Btw , Plato , Aristotle and Socrates were heretics , they did not believe in the gods and goddesses. They thought a distorted, perfect beings that were never bad and never got angry ,which is ridiculous when we apply polytheistic logic.
I don’t like the way said what he said about classes of people and dirty work. Just because someone is doing a dirty job that nobody else wants to do doesn’t mean they are of a lower class of people. 1:44:49
I think this was a great panel of voices and different perspectives, however, the host needs to do a better job with directing and engaging the panel members.
@@CrypticArchives Why be anti-something you don't believe in? Seeing as how atheist states are just as bloody (and at times more) bloody than secular and religious societies you can't really make the argument that "God" or religion causes all this bloodshed. Heck, technically morality as a whole would be a relative social construct, therefore, making any sort of argument from atrocity moot. All in all, atheism can be sensible, but unless you are some kind of Satanist antitheism makes little sense.
On the first point, that the Christian worldview that morality is grounded in us - we all know we should follow the ‘golden rule’ whether we do or not. Even if that is true, assuming/accepting that’s true. Can that not be explained in the same way you might explain animal instincts? Mothers love and protect their children no matter the species etc. it’s evolutionarily advantageous for us to cooperate and avoid violence - so we mostly do.
The big bang may not contradict any of the religions, per se, but the date of it as well as the subsequent chain of evolution definitely contradict all religious accounts of how the world started. Also, in several of your debates/discussions you say that the gods are immaterial... I would argue that whether or not gods visit our plane or not could be a question, but worshiping something immaterial is about as useful as worshiping a metaphor... SJ believes that her god spoke to her once in the past and that is what makes him real... a single time in her entire life hearing from an omnipresent, omniscient, omnipotent being? Even as an ex-Christian in my late 20s I could have sworn I heard him talk more often than that, but now I realize it was an over-active imagination filling in the silence.
Out of all four I've noticed that polytheists and atheists actually get along pretty well seeing that I'm a polytheism 90 percent of my friends are atheist
Left wing "Pagans" are basically atheist in their social beliefs. So that's why they get along more with each other. Any true religious person would not get along more with an atheist.
