I went onto NonSequitur Show for an interview. It turned into a bit of an atheist vs Heathen debate with Eric Murphy from Talk Heathen. Twitter: / oceanthewizard Eric's Channel: / @talkheathen
The idea of religion being exclusively about the afterlife is a christian influence. There are many religions in which the afterlife is unimportant. They are about living right in THIS world! (life affirming as opposed to life denying)
I’m a nontheistic Satanist and even before I claimed that label, I held the belief that the only evil possible by way of a spiritual perspective is world-denialism/life-denialism. Religion can be bad for other reasons, but those tend to be political at their root. World-denialism is inherently dangerous
@@matthewsteele5229 Agree Matthew. We are living in this world, so we have to navigate in this world. The Christian mindset, is reminiscent of a scholar so focused on graduation, that he doesn't do his classes.
@@jaxthewolf4572…that’s Gnosticism, which is a Hersey and has been condemned for millennia. Now, of course, you will probably find Protestants unaware that their beliefs are heresies, but oh well.
Oof okay. I have to comment on eric saying he wants to stop people from making any life choices without empirical evidence that it is correct. Because to me that just invalidates all emotion based relationships and ethics in general. Not everything can be based on empirical data.
Anyone find it interesting that Eric made plenty reference to Kant, but ignored Kant's explanation on how metaphysics are justified? Kant, like Ocean, explained how the physical and the immaterial cannot overlap based on the very definition of what physical and immaterial/metaphysical means. Since they necessarily don't involve each other, you cannot use methods from one to interact with, explain, or prove the other.
Does anybody realize that the word Emperical comes from the Greek word to mean,wait for it..........Experiance......sigh, Hail the Aesir and Vanir Ocean!
Yeah, its as if we need another method to verify and ground our experiences in reality ? So we then can investigate it and relay the information. Um, maybe something like...................'the scientific method' i think I'll call it. Oh, wait a minute!
More importantly than the etymology... the philosophy of empiricism, which grounds all of science, is that we can only base our metaphysics in experience. Science is just a methodological way of collecting empirical data (data originating in experience). If you change the definition of empiricism now, you have no backing for science. I feel like atheists in this debate don't understand how their own belief systems are being supported.
I think this discussion accents one of my biggest frustrations with the state of the atheist call-in shows. Even if the person (Eric in this case) doesn't hold to it personally, the entire conversation is framed as "it's either empiricism or irrational" and the conversation *always* returns to "how do you know that, empirically specifically?" Someone feel free to correct me, but it in my experience, it's a rarity that a god believing person thinks there's some science test one could use to demonstrate their existence. This kinda leaves the believer with things like arguments, philosophy, and most commonly, experience. For clarity, I'm not saying that the atheist is left in a position of necessarily holding the theist's position as true, there are counter arguments for nearly everything. I'm only saying that pinning any and every position you disagree with into the "can you prove it empirically?" bottle isn't the way to do it.
Thanks for this Ocean. I've just come to Heathenry in the last couple of years and it's wonderful to have you talking about this. I agree with you that every Heathen I've ever met has come to it because of a personal calling.
Eric doesn’t seem to understand that _he_ is making decisions based on how an experience feels. What happened happened to his uncle made him (and his uncle, and the rest of their family no doubt) feel bad, and that seems to be the source of his hostility toward “giving personal experience a pass.” The experience included actual harm, yes...yet he extends this hostility toward things that _don’t_ do such harm, and sometimes toward things that do actual good. Why are bad feelings (outrage, fury, grief) a more valid reason for unquestioned beliefs than good ones (strength, inspiration, compassion) are...?
And from his perspective he wants to share the truth and apretiates the truth. Yet he shares his claims that are not based on scientific methods. Nobody can tell if there is really some entity or there is none. Science just can´t prove somebody is wrong, because we are talking about something that we can´t measure. It is just his opinnion and it doesn´t mean that it is true. He just came to this conclusion because of his experiences. And that makes his opinnion some kind of religion or ideology. He is just talking over Ocean, that it is the one true religion and there is any other. (sorry for my English, It is not my main language) I mean I feel disrecpect from him.
@@chillwithjoe2100 Exactly, his beliefs are just that beliefs. Even in science there are things that cannot be absolutely proven and by Eric's standards those things do not exist. He's created his own spirituality and it's not necessarily healthier than anyone else's.
I have no problem with people who want to believe whatever they want regarding religion or spirituality. What I do have a problem with, is when people try to shove their beliefs/or non-beliefs, in your face or use them to hurt other people. I don't know who this Eric guy is but my intuition is that he is one that doesn't believe in anything and tries to shove it in your face, so on that note, I willfully leave this interview!
To be more specific, Eric hasn't thus been convinced by most God claims he has been presented with. He believes in many other things tho, but those things are rooted in reality. He also doesn't shove anything in your face, but he's ready to discuss and defend his lack of faith at the drop of a hat.
Nor does he ever aim to or think he hurts anyone by doing so. And if he doing so hurts someone in the way he does it, the fault is not his. He's likeable, relatable, smart and knowledgeable about a whole range of topics.
It is not good to let people think things that are false or have not been proven are a fact . It isn't all about religion but religion is one big thing that prevents critical thinking . Look at America and all the things that go against facts that people believe such as global warming . Religious thinking hurts us all. People can do good without religion.
Neither could I. But I'm also used to this kind of conversation. In these conversations people interrupt each other. My thing is though that if someone is going to interrupt me, they better be okay with me interrupting them because I'm going to do it.
Ocean: Gives a system Heathens use to try to quantify experiences with divinity. Eric at 29:44 ignoring everything that was just said: “I’m just asking you to quantify it at all.” Me: *facepalm*
@@sigalius He was definitely rude, but he's not necessarily incorrect. The method Ocean describes is not quantitative; it's qualitative. For it to be quantitative, there would need to be numbers involved in the measurement of something. Since you can't measure a story or an experience it wouldn't make sense here to even try to quantify anything. There is nothing to quantify. I think (and this is just me) that it might have just been a poor choice of words. If you are willing to trust my personal insight, I think what the conversation was driving at is that these claims are not investigable by scientific means. Therefore, the claims cannot meet scientific standards of evidence. As a direct result, unless a person has a personal experience which they themselves believe is credible, they would not be rationally justified in holding a belief in gods, spirits, or other numina. Bear in mind also that if someone holds a satisfactory naturalistic worldview, they would also be justified in explaining such an experience through psychological and biological means without need to appeal to supernatural influence. fr tho, I though Eric was kinda rude in an unhelpful way. I don't think it helped him make his case.
@@rennidenni7792 they are not scientific claim you might as well be mad at a book on history while your at it as much of those theories are not substantiated in a scientific way but based on individual accounts.
@@crushinnihilism I think that there is a difference between everyday personal experience and the more formalised scientific approach. I'm not a scientist myself, but it's reasonably common knowledge that a lot of effort goes into minimising the impact of personal apprehension of data. There's a lot of checking and re-checking, as well as an insistence upon repeatability by different teams. The point that I'm trying to make is that even if supernatural experiences are real, many of them wouldn't be able to meet these sorts of standards. So yes, everyone trusts in their own personal experience in their everyday life. We don't really have any other option. But if in your experience, supernatural elements are real but in mine they aren't, then we would have to appeal to something else to settle the difference.
@@doktordanomite9105 I'm not exactly sure what you're getting at. History isn't repeatable on command, so we can't be as confident in the accuracy of our theories about past events as we can be about natural mechanisms. That's true enough. Historians don't typically take every account that they read at face value, though. They try to read it in the context of other works as well as archaeological evidence to put together a less incomplete picture. Even then, they're often not confident that they know what really happened. That element of uncertainty is just part of the practice of history as a discipline.
Speaking as someone who moderated/mediated debates. I would have booted him out of the debate. If He cant work with the stated rules of conduct and simple manners he's not getting his word in.
You can not have a debate with out some common assumptions. Eric Murphy can not accept the possibility something that is 'immaterial' can exist. Therefore there can not be true debate.
Exactly! I’ve recently been realizing that all belief and knowledge rests on various axioms that you accept and yet can themselves not be proven. You can be rational and objective within a given set of axioms, but you never fully can prove the axioms are true. Eric is just arrogant about his axioms and claims the perspective derived from them are the only way to verify things. Honestly this is the biggest flaw that New Atheists like Eric have.
There's NO EVIDENCE that anything "immaterial" exists. That's all that Eric's pointing out. The mere possibility thereof would need to be evidenced as well.
@@grantcarpenter6685in fact nobody is able to demonstrate to have feelings, thoughts, consciousness and so on. Therefore people substantially doesn't exist because their most direct activities and experiences are not material at all.
I've tried to watch this probably 5 times now. Between the moderator guy's voice and Eric being a jerk, I can't. Men like that are why I left Christianity: Machiavelli, proven once again.
Eric is absolutely arguing with Ocean about the wrongs of Christianity while Ocean is discussing polytheism and non-Christian religion. The basic claims about how gods and spirituality work between Christianity and every other religion are fundamentally different. Eric is hostile towards Christianity, as we all should be, but he’s applying that same hostility across the board and that is not ok.
Seems like Eric was on the ropes. Ocean had to let up the pressure for the talk to move forward, more than once.. He even helped him out of the truth in experience part..
I’m late, but this Eric guy gives Vaush a run for his money when it comes to being an angry antitheist. I agree with most of his other opinions (Vaush, that is), but they both have the issue of framing all religion through a Christian lens. Which is ironic, considering they’re atheists.
I don't have god belief, but I am very attracted to Polytheism at the same time, so I've been trying to work that out for a few years now. Christianity brings out a reaction like Eric's, but that's because Christianity wants to impose itself on you, and it is psychologically abusive to its members. It proselytizes at you with these arguments trying to convince you, while at the same time making itself incoherent, so of course it is painting this big fat bull's eye on its back. Christianity is like the Borg, and I don't take kindly to assimilation attempts. Polytheism does none of that, it's more like meeting regular populations, that you can actually engage with respectfully, with each of us keeping their individuality. So the notion of trying to convince a polytheist to give up their religion strikes me as weird. It's like trying to convince someone to change their shower routine. It doesn't make any sense that I should even have an investment in that, it's personal to them. Whether belief in deity is rational or not feels like the wrong question to ask. It doesn't matter. The person has spiritual needs, their religion fulfills that. I think the relevant question to ask is whether the person proselytizes, is anti-science, or a folkist. If the answer to those is "no", there shouldn't be an issue.
I don't understand Eric's logic. He doesn't trust experience, but that's literally what all of human history is... people experiencing events and things that happen to them and writing it down. So if he trusts books and history and things like that, that's ALL EXPEIRENCE FROM THE PAST. I don't get it, but good on Ocean for standing his ground.
I feel like on the whole, these people were very disingenuous with Ocean. At the beginning Eric said he was going to be respectful but throughout the entire discussion he was extremely arrogant and disrespectful. It also seemed like he wasn't really interested in understanding Ocean's position, rather Eric was interested in interrupting, dismissing things that had already been mentioned, and insulting people. Instead of discussing the subject of how someone can know something apart from experience--because that question made Eric uncomfortable--he changed the subject to "How can you get from inductive to deductive?" Seriously? He then unwittingly contradicts himself by saying "We're doing our best to learn as many true things and as few false things about the world that we're in". Ok, well that's deductive, and it's based on the value assumption related to "truth", assuming that truth exists, that we can know the truth, and that we ought to. These are all values that scientism rides on. Also when Eric interrupted, that was totally fine; but when Ocean tried to clarify something Eric was mischaracterizing, they were like "Let him finish." at 35:10
assuming that all belief is harmful due to magical thinking is just as bad as assuming that all non belief is harmful due to non emotional or spiritual thinking. You can run circles all day since the absence of evidence isn’t the evidence of absence
Oh wow, that Eric guy was really obnoxious... Ocean, I would like to maybe make a point here, wouldn't divination be a good point to bring up once asked about means to prove the gods' presence in one's life? I realize that not every heathen uses divination, but it is still a very considerable practice amongst us.
It would. Its just not a point that atheists tend to listen to. It would open up the conversation, but I find that atheists are far more interested in the epistemology of an idea (how we know it) vs ontology (what that idea is and how it works). And questions leading into that area often have an agenda of attempting to undermine the experience rather than honestly discussing it.
@@Le_GingerBeardMan I haven't even heard that name since... like 2014 when everyone was hopping on the anti-sjw bandwagon. Did his whole "it's just a meme bro" thin-end of the wedge ass facade fall apart?
Eric seems really pompous. Seems like he refuses to acknowledge the experiences of others. Seems also to refuse to accept the Richard Dawkins perspective that since one cannot disprove the existence of God or gods, that it is impossible to be 100% sure that God or gods do not exist. As pompous as Dawkins is, he's not nearly as pompous as Eric seems to be.
OK is such a good debater. Id enjoy a sit down over coffee with him...not to debate because I support his side...but just because I'm sure there could be great discussion. Even if just to play devil's advocate back and forth for fun. Keep up the good work, OK. You set a wonderful example on how to handle people from the other side of the fence in a polite, respectful and knowledgeable way that lends to be a good example to be set for all. Thank you. You're a good apple...*anyone seen Adam and Eve? I hear they bite good apples...
8:17 I got a nickname: BadDebaterEric. Seriously how they didn't let you finish after you got interrupted by douchnuzzleEric totally makes me not want to watch anymore debates by NonSequitur. I should start a debating YT with my rules of conduct. But I don't have the energy or drive for it.
I appload what Ocean is trying to do here... but the debate is based on an erroneous assumption that faith has to be scientifically verifiable. Of all the heathens I have ever encountered... none were ever recruited to the faith. We come to it on our own. To me that is the biggest difference between being heathen and other faiths... there is no great commandment to go out and recruit new members This faith is logical to us... based on experience and reason. But there is no need to convince others.
I’ve still yet to know what personal experience with a god means… how can that ever be verified, not just by an outsider but by the individual themselves? They could have thought they were having this experience but it was simply a dream, delusion, hallucination, etc…
Eric has some very strong "I remember my first beer" vibe going on in regards to being Atheist. Too many of them don't realize being the most smug doesn't make you the most right.
I think one of the main tensions here between the two positions arose from two different meanings behind the word rational, that were eventually equivocated, which is a fallacy. I am talking about the difference between forming a belief via rationalizing an experience through reflection, with a strive for consistency, with internal coherence in mind, and being rational _about_ a formed belief via holding one only in proportion to what is known, i.e. what evidence we have to ground our belief into. Interpersonal experiences are great for post hoc rationalizations about what we experience in life, but these are simply insufficient to count as evidence, for the *exact same reasons* no judge will solely rely on testimonies: hard evidence to back up the witnesses' testimonies will be demanded, for hard evidence does not change with the people that experience it, it is _objective_ evidence. Both theists and atheists that aren't solipsists are working with the assumption that reality is objective as far as everyone can tell, since it reliably stays consistent, independently of whoever observes and experiences it. Therefore, and very much because of this premise, it is irrational to hold a belief which _isn't_ based on at least _some_ kind of objective evidence, as personal, or indeed interpersonal experiences are, necessarily, subjective. They _do_ change from person to person, case in point: you've said yourself that there was uncertainty and debate along your heathen peers as to what is exactly experienced and from which god it comes, what meaning it bears etc. Finding commonalities and thus feeding your confirmation biases doing just that won't count as objective evidence either. At best, it will indicate that you've arrived at some intersubjective framework that you can all agree upon, as a community, but then what you have isn't 'verified interpersonal gnosis': what you really have here is just a consensual opinion within your particular community, aka doxa. I don't see how normalizing one's beliefs and experiences in this way can ever equates to having a rational system, as consensus can and does arise time and again even about purely delusional things, as it is possible for humans to seek coherence and agree to a shared experience that is effectively divorced from reality, and yet these people cling onto it anyway, even though they do know they lack evidence and, in fact, also possess evidence _against_ what they believe in. All this to say: this isn't how rationality works, and because consensus about experience alone can yield irrational conclusions, it follows that this type of rationalizations do not preserve rationality within one's reasoning. The ability to reason irrationally is not one of facts and logic, but one of impressions and games of connect-the-dots: that _is_ magical thinking in a nutshell, as this term stands for people's tendency to draw imaginary causal links between two unrelated phenomena, simply because they were coincidental. Here, the link is drawn between having experiences of altered states of consciousness at the same time as trying to communicate with gods, even there is no actual causal link between the two, as these experiences from the stimuli induced by whatever process, atmosphere, or other conditions practitioners were creating for the session, _not_ from the intangible deity that these set ups were supposed to call upon. And this is evident because these altered states of consciousness can and have been recreated almost at will, either using psychedelics, or using magnetic stimulations of the brain sections responsible for these sensations. So, unless the gods just happen to keep talking to us right at the moments we trigger these devices or take these chemicals (or any other method), every single time, which would be one hell of an unbelievable coincidence, it does experimentally follow that these personal experiences _do not_ support the idea of a communication between known material beings and hypothetical immaterial ones (which by the way, makes you wonder how that's even supposed to be done without leaving any kind of signature or trace that an interaction occurred).
The TL;DR version is the following: • It is indeed necessary, for a belief to be rational, to have at least a justification for it; necessary, yet insufficient. • Having evidence that aligns with one's belief is however sufficient for it to be a rational one, so long as the necessary justification is consistent with that evidence: i.e. encountering supporting evidence for your belief by happenstance _after the fact_ does not make it rational a posteriori, as it is completely possible to hold a belief for irrational reasons which happens to be true, or at least to coincide with some fortunate evidence.
In my case its the experience of insane coincidences. Stuff that has a 1 in a million chance of occuring and it just happens with perfect timing multiple times in a row to the point where "oh lucky coincidence" is just not a likely answer. Like...it is theoreticly possible that random events of the universe cause an iphone to pop out of a volcano, its just insanely unlikely. So if you find one your conclusion should be - oh a human made this on purpose and lost it. So as example i asked if i should sacrifice my blood for the offering - window open, a severe gust of wind on an otherwise still day sweeps through the room and flings a needle right infront of my hand. As in a second later. Then i ask if i should still wear the Valknut symbol on my amulett and as i pick it up the thing breaks. Its a valknut made of bronze, those things arent easy to break yet i lift it up and it breaks. After years of working perfeclty fine with no cracks or issues. Then i ask whats the holy animal of this god and a raven lands on the roof, and i need to mention that ravens arent even native here. crows are and i know the difference. I havent seen a raven in 15 years of living here and suddenly...there was one making those so distinct raven sounds that crows are incapable of. Then i ask which holy symbol i should use and this night i dream of a symbol i havent seen before at least not consciously. Then i ask how i should learn about the god in question and my youtube starting page has a video about that god from 2 years ago from a youtuber ive never interacted with and before i searched the term on google or youtube. Algorythm is sometimes weird but the coincidence... basicly - the ammount of perfectly timed coincidences amasses to a point where coincidence doesnt seem like a valid explanation anymore. COULD it be? yes, natural desasters could line up so perfectly that by sheer coincidence a working car results of it. Its not impossible but the likelyhood of that happening is so infinitely small that, if you see a car, your assumption wouldnt be "oh what a coincidence"
@@OceanKeltoi it was definitely frustrating to listen to, I'm just glad that we have you in the community to have these discussions as you're so knowledgeable about the religion and are patient enough to not lose your cool when you're in these debates. It's honestly pretty impressive.
With regard to all this "magical thinking" arguing malarkey: I'd just like to say, that I have a fictional character (as yet unpublished) who is a Witch. (A very practised, experienced witch: not a teen witch! 🙂) And one of the things she says is: "A WITCH knows, that *sometimes*, magical thinking, channeled in the right way, by the right sort of talents, produces MAGICAL RESULTS..." 🙂 Perhaps that is what J K Rowling meant, too, by her Hogwarts. It seems to have worked magic on her life! 🙂 And no: you CAN'T just disregard "feelings" all the time, and go by "logical sense" alone. That only uses one small part of the brain anyway: and hasn't it just been the West's "original sin" since the Enlightenment anyway? The one that allowed "us" to trample on all other cultures and ways of thinking? A sort of supremacist thinking? 😏 And I must say: a business person, or any other achiever, really: who *never* went by hunches, or even allowed inspiration from sleeping dreams (quite a few scientists did!) Would probably not be much of a high achiever. 😏
This was incredibly hard to watch, Eric was just so damn arrogant the entire debate! Not to mention his comments on deciding what's respectable! Just uncool and condescending.
I’m an atheist but i hate this Eric guy. I’ve experienced spiritual intervention before first hand, and that’s a reason why I never dismiss anyone’s personal experiences. I had a spiritual experience yet my belief is that there’s no god or if there is one it does not matter to us. Others come to a different conclusion than I, and that’s completely fine.
I don't believe that someone saying" God is the universe," is a misuse of the term "God" at all. The core concept of a god is something that is infinite and everywhere and as far as we know that is what the universe is. As people try to personify God they tend to fall short and that attempt at personification is what's given us our most common understanding of God today which I don't believe really shows the whole picture when discussing this concept. The personification is whee a lot of issues come into play. To assume that all people mean the same thing when they talk about God is an insanely oversimlified approach to something that we as finite entities are inherently incapable of understanding in its entirity much like the universe itself. People try to personify the concept of God in an attempt to relate to it better. I think a lot of the problems that arise from religion are unfortunate side effects of what occurs when we try to institutionalize our perception of belonging to or being a part of something bigger. I would argue that science itself is an attempt to get closer to an understanding of God At least that's how I se it from my understanding of the concept. I'm a science major but I love taking world religions classes. I find them fascinating. I'm not that far into the video I just really wanted to get that thought out before I lost it. I love this discussion.
At the end Eric suggest going in to discords of other faiths to start shit. Religious or in this case atheist aggression is colonist to its core and we should all do our best to avoid becoming like that. Personally I think its beneath us especially how a lot of us come from religious backgrounds where we actively see this shit happening on a minute to minute basis. Eric should realize that the Atheist mindset is a passive one and should not be forced on others like a ad. I say that as a Dutch person, with the netherlands being majority religiously neutral to atheist. So being more like christians in that way turns people off. Its what they tried to get away from. Even in jest its a shitty thing to suggest
I'd have to say I largely agree with Eric, but there are more questions I'd like to know the answer to because your position seams to me to be a little inconsistent. Good talk to listen to Ocean!
I do not entirely agree with you political takes, but damn I would send anyone to you on Heathenism. Especially your take on individual UPGs. I was brought into Heathenism by a cultist who proclaimed himself to be of a heritable line of Armenian Vitki’s named “Cyrus Gorgani.” His group that I was apart of and was investing frith and fiscal time was called “The Heathen Way.” I even purchased his personal translation of the Havamal. His inner circle eventually outed him for being a liar and fraud. So nothing more than a cult leader, yet his inner circle even attested that his knowledge appears to be sound yet his position as a true Vitki was bullshit. He and I had one heated argument about Christians vs Muslims, I having a soft spot for Christians and he having one for Muslims. Our argument ended with the both of us at a stand still and agreeing to disagree. That same situation caused me to see his cult leader position. Yet my individual UPG experiences are all what have pushed me, not just influenced me, but was a direct cause for my position on the universe and where I stand in it. You’re certainly the best rational voice for our movement in this day and age. Love you man, health and happiness to you and your’s! Edit: Cyrus did not bring me to Heathenism, my UPG’s did. His education and experience on the topic did further my own knowledge of Heathenism though.
Why not contact Eric himself if you're so confident you can 'destroy' him? He and Vi La Bianca have a new show called Skeptic Generation, and you could either talk to him there or arrange a debate.
The question at the heart here is how can the gods interact with us if they are not empirically testable. How can the non-material affect the material? I know that the response here is often to say that logic is non-material, but logic occurs in our brains, and logic is our conclusion based on our tested observations of reality.
Consciousness is immaterial. Also, logic doesn't occur in our brains, it's a set of universal laws that reality must follow, it's not the rules of reasoning but reality, more specifically deduction/inference.
@@mrmoth26 Consciousness is immaterial? Perhaps you can demonstrate this? Logic isn't what reality must follow. It is how reality functions. It's descriptive, not prescriptive.
@@crushinnihilism Experiences occur in the brain. Logic is a precise language used to describe reality. Nothing in any of that requires anything beyond the natural.
@@crushinnihilism You are the comprehensive collection of your neurons. Harry Potter is the invention that occurred in someone else's collection of neurons.
What evidence am I looking for? I know with as much certainty as reality offers that my cat exists. I interpret her behaviors as meaning some things and not meaning other things, though this interpretation is less certain. Science provides us a method of testing experience that clears away errors in interpretation. Experience, by itself, does nothing without working out its meaning, but that meaning all too often can be divorced from reality--can be an interpretation that cannot be verified objectively. I also think it's unfair to dismiss the comparison to Harry Potter. Mythology is a branch of storytelling. The difference only seems to be that a group of people has put one set into practice--or in the monotheistic case, has taken a particular set of stories as historical and scientific truth.
Tsk, tsky, tsk: I found a lot of thar tiresome, and annoying! 😏 I think I'm just going to quote a bit from one of my first neopagan "mentors": the late Druid and writer on magic, Isaac Bonewits. 🙂 "When examining polytheistic ideas about divinity and the nature of worship (and vice versa), we must first take down some barriers to clear thinking of which many people are unaware. Discussing spiritual matters with modern Westerners, even the religiously inclined, is often like discussing rainbows or sunsets with someone who has worn dark sunglasses for his or her entire life. First you must persuade them to remove the sunglasses, at least temporarily, in order to show them what you are talking about. This is especially difficult if the person is unaware that the sunglasses exist, or that they can be removed. Unless you have carefully prepared them for the experience, the odds are high that their reaction to an unfiltered rainbow or sunset will be to scream in horror, replace their sunglasses as quickly as possible, and attack you violently." 😏 "Christian fundamentalists confronting the evidence for evolution, Roman Catholic leaders refusing to ordain peni-less priests, or Islamic fundamentalists burning the works of Salman Rushdie, all demonstrate this common Western reaction to ideas coming from outside of their established worldviews. What may not be so obvious is that third-rate stage magicians and mediocre scientists “debunking” evidence for psychic phenomena, intellectual members of liberal religions ignoring the magical aspects of liturgy, or ordinary people rejecting ideas about multiple deities and other spirits, are behaving in exactly the same fashion - prisoners of the conceptual sunglasses they don’t even realize they are wearing. Once you have decided that the only “real” religion (usually your childhood one) is “unscientific,” and therefore “unworthy of belief” by a modern intellectual (who has been taught that science is the only way to judge proposed reality constructs), it’s a short step to declaring all those other “inferior” religions, magical systems, and psychic technologies to be even more unscientific and absurd. The philosophical term for this type of logic is “throwing out the baby with the bathwater.” The usual result is a conversion to atheism, agnosticism, Marxism, or some other non-theistic (but still dualistic) faith. One of the most popular choices is Scientism (also known as “Scientolatry” and “Secular Humanism”), which is the worship of the previous generation’s scientific worldview, and the acceptance of any statement made by an elderly man wearing a white labcoat. People who are devout followers of Scientism share a number of quaint dogmas, the most important of which is the one that they don’t have any. These people will always declare themselves to be open-minded and willing to be convinced of the error of their ways - and then set up the logical rules of their game to exclude all non-Scientistic reasoning or evidence as fallacious. That’s because there’s only one reality, and only one way to understand it - does this sound familiar?" Yup!! 😄😄😄 "Scientism is dualistic, just like the conservative monotheistic philosophies from which it is descended (see my Evolution of Dualism Chart for a graphic explanation). All statements are Absolutely True or Absolutely False (except in the area of subatomic physics, where Scientistic types will usually (if reluctantly) admit the necessity of the “Uncertainty Principle”)." www.neopagan.net/Scientism.html
Jonestown and the like are anomalies. Everything has anomalies. Religious behavior doesn’t equate to cult at all. Experience... I was at a game and saw the best home run of my life. It was a religious experience. Others shared that experience. No one decided to drink the koolaid.
Im very late to this but My first (stop the video and question Eric) moment was literally him trying over and over to ask for evidence, Ocean saying that experiences are evidence then further stating thats the case for every human basically and eric then saying "I dont put stock in experience". soooo.... you put no stock in yourself because all a person is, is an accumulation of experiences. And you dont put stock in those so how can you put stock in yourself or your beliefs. the. he states "Humans are flawed". as a person trying to completely dissuade a religion from their beliefs as be seems, you can never say you are flawed or experience has no stock because now youre saying you yourself are completely untrustworthy. how can i trust your personal accumulation of experiences or your flaws. And you might feel the same about me but now were in an infinite loop with that line of thinking.
In this debate Ocean rests his supposed case on 'all knowledge comes from experience' while ignoring the independent verification used in the Scientific Method.
It's that there is no way to confirm the truth without personal experience. If you test something and I want to independently verify it through the scientific method, I would have to experience it first hand.
@@RandomThoughtBox The key difference is that this type of "personal experience" can be independently verified by anyone else doing the same science, whereas UPG has no system of independent verification.
Nobody denies evidence before them (no one here anyway) but a lack of evidence isnt in and of itself evidence. All relationships are inherently non imperical. You cant prove love, friendship, hatred, or religiosity
@@ivybennett2274 I've actually just demonstrated that relationships *are* empirical - follow the neurochemical reactions people have toward one another. Also, so what absence of evidence isn't evidence of absence? That doesn't mean we have good evidence to believe any gods are real.
@@grantcarpenter6685 abscence of evidence isnt evidence of abscence. Thats just fact. And i never said we did have evidence of gods. And your theory diesnt hold up well. The nuerochemical reactions can be wildly different even interaction to interaction between the same people let alone between two totally different sets of friends. All the nuerochemical trail leads you to is emotions. That you like or enjoy or feel comfortable around someone. I respect science and my beliefs never contradict it to the best of my ability. But some things are simply immaterial and subjective, unable to be broken down into numbers, data points, and replicatable experiences. Even outside of divinity. Relationships, morals, personal taste are all things that science just cant really give us a solid ground on. Science alone is not sufficient. It must be the basis for how we view the world but it has always been, and must always be tempered by the immaterial nature of humans. Wether you call that morality, the human soul or whatever. To me religion is made of feeling and coincidence. Things that i feel and know but could not prove or replicate. My personal experience drives my religious beliefs but i dont push that onto others. Because i know i have no evidence to base my opinions in any showable proof. So i let their personal experiences drive their religious belief or lackthereof
@@ivybennett2274 Everything you described happens in the human brain. Go ahead and believe whatever you wish - I simply don't have any good reasons to share your beliefs. And science alone *is* sufficient. There's ZERO EVIDENCE of an immaterial reality.
@@grantcarpenter6685 literally not once have i asked you to hold my beliefs. Ive only defended why i believe them. And that entire depends on your definition. Is there an immaterial WORLD? probably not. But are there things that exist purely in concept and yet effect our lives every day? Certainly
@@WolfTheRed It's actually foolish to criticize the dismissal of that which cannot be evidenced. "What can be asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence." - Christopher Hitchens UPG falls into the category of "without evidence."
All relationships are inherently unimperical. You could observe me and my friend talking for hours and you cant scientifically prove were friends. Similarly paganism (and mist deific religion) is a relationship with the god gods or entities
@@grantcarpenter6685 Anything outside of the existence of the mind can not be proven or evidence to exist independently of the mind. If you accept that, then you must accept solipsism.
@@mrmoth26 I don't accept that actually. Hard solipsism's key problem is that reality doesn't magically fall apart when a person with a brain dies. And UPG still doesn't make for good evidence, especially given its contradictory nature between people. If we start using UPG as an epistemology, then we can learn nothing about the reality we inhabit. The scientific method and its attendant methodological naturalism are the best tools we have for the discernment of reality.
