The Corruption of Atheists LIVE CALL IN SHOW

Name: The Corruption of Atheists LIVE CALL IN SHOW
Uploaded: 2025-07-02T20:20:41+00:00
Duration: 1 h 8 min 56 s
Channel: Stefan Molyneux

Stefan Molyneux

3 months ago

Wednesday Afternoon FLASH Live Chat 4 June 2025

In this episode, I engage with a caller to explore the philosophical nuances of atheism and emotional maturity. We examine the relationship between one's beliefs and maturity, considering the notion that true atheists may outgrow the need for authoritative figures. The discussion introduces the concept of "fake atheists," who seek guidance from political ideologies, blurring lines between belief and emotional dependence. As we define atheism and dissect emotional maturity's impact on morality, I propose the necessity of a rational moral framework to prevent subjective chaos. Our conversation navigates the intersections of philosophy, virtue, and personal autonomy, underscoring the importance of clarifying our understanding of morality and maturity. Ultimately, we invite further exploration into the complexities of belief systems and the ethical structures that underpin them.

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00:00:00Yes, yes. Hi, everybody.

00:00:01Sam Molyneux from Freedom Main.

00:00:02Hope you're doing well.

00:00:03And it's the 4th of June 2025.

00:00:09And I am happy to chat with you all.

00:00:12Freedomain.com slash donate to help out the show.

00:00:14Deeply, humbly, and gratefully appreciated as always.

00:00:18And I was hoping to go for a walk today and chat.

00:00:21But no, it is crazy windy.

00:00:23It is a jolly green giant post-bean burrito fart wind.

00:00:29Going on out there.

00:00:30So, yes, we shall stay confined to the indoor.

00:00:35See, sometimes it's because of winter.

00:00:36And other times it's because of summer.

00:00:39So, it's good to know that Canada brings that kind of variety to your outdoorsy experience.

00:00:43Although I actually did a really nice hike today with my daughter along the Bruce Trail.

00:00:47It was very, very nice.

00:00:48Very refreshing.

00:00:50Endless amounts of up and downy.

00:00:51And so, I hope you're having a great day.

00:00:53I'm going to pause here in case.

00:00:56Well, not in case.

00:00:56I hope, of course, that people have questions and comments.

00:01:01You can, of course, I think just raise your hand.

00:01:03Or maybe this is one of these freaky situations where you can just speak.

00:01:10Otherwise, I'm going to go over some questions from listeners.

00:01:16But I'm happy to chat with you if you have a question or a comment.

00:01:23Yeah, I've got a question.

00:01:25Yes, sir.

00:01:25Go ahead.

00:01:26Yeah.

00:01:27What about the concept of somebody has a philosophical idea that they want to run by you?

00:01:33Oh, listen.

00:01:34I mean, it's funny, you know.

00:01:35And I'm sorry to jump in just as you're studying.

00:01:38But, you know, people are like, hey, man, how come you do call-in shows where people are talking about their life problems?

00:01:42And it's like, because that's what people want to talk about.

00:01:44There's nothing in the call-in show that says it has to be about, you know, it can be about UPB.

00:01:48It could be philosophical issue, free will, whatever's on your mind.

00:01:51So, yeah, I'm thrilled and happy to get philosophical ideas run past me.

00:01:56If that's on your mind, I'm all ears.

00:01:58Yeah, and even if you were to tear it down, that would be no problem.

00:02:02Like, you know, if you were to show me that I didn't know what I was talking about, that's fine.

00:02:07Well, if it's any consolation, I do that to myself.

00:02:09With, like, 99 out of my 100 ideas, I shoot down myself.

00:02:12So, it's not just you.

00:02:14Don't take it personally.

00:02:14But, yeah, go for it.

00:02:16Okay, so I have this idea.

00:02:18What I've been finding is that a lot of people with words and language, we use it, but we never really deeply think about it.

00:02:26But, because, you know, there's a billion people who use it, you think it must be legitimate.

00:02:32But when you stop and think about it, I mean, there's a bazillion examples like that.

00:02:36But I have an idea that the word atheist is not really complete.

00:02:43I think that an atheist actually emerges out of something deeper and more profound.

00:02:50And I don't think the word atheist quite does it justice.

00:02:53And one of the things that I think about is that there may, I believe that there's something called a fake atheist, which is, and I know that immediately you say, well, that's not the way the word atheist is used.

00:03:06But I'll just bear with me here.

00:03:07Just as much as Christians say that there are such a thing as fake Christians, they call each other that, I think that if we open up the idea that there's such a thing as a fake atheist, then it kind of opens up a kettle of worms about what does atheist really mean.

00:03:25So that's my intro.

00:03:26No, I think that's great.

00:03:27Now, if you're going to say there's a real X and a fake X, of course, the challenge is to define X, right?

00:03:32So hit me with your definition.

00:03:36Yeah.

00:03:36So what I think is that atheism is, I know that atheism just means I don't believe in God or a spirit or anything or the supernatural.

00:03:46But I think that atheism emerges out of something more profound.

00:03:51And I believe that atheism is actually an element, which is one of many elements, which emerges out of healthy emotional maturity.

00:04:04So as people grow more mature, they less and less need a parent and they less and less need a replacement parent.

00:04:14So by the time you get to what I call a real atheist, they've discarded all forms of replacement parent, church, government, teachers, everything else until they become healthily self-parenting.

00:04:32So I think, like I said, a lack of belief in spiritual elements really points to a person having discarded all need for replacement parents, imaginary ones also.

00:04:46So then that means that there could be such a thing as a fake atheist, which doesn't really work with the normal definition of the word.

00:04:55But if atheism really emerges from emotional maturity, then there's a fake atheist in that they don't believe in spirits or supernatural, but they still crave a replacement parent in the form of a Karl Marx or a Stalin, like a real person who they look up to and considers to be perfect, looks after them, cares about them, has their best interest in mind.

00:05:17So that's my intro to the idea of such a thing as a fake atheist.

00:05:22Okay.

00:05:23And I appreciate that.

00:05:24So I still think you need to provide, is your definition of atheist confined to somebody who does not believe in a God?

00:05:34Well, this is a part that needs discussing because the classical, I'm using the word atheist in this classical sense, which doesn't really apply to what I'm talking about.

00:05:44There would need to be a new word which could come out of this or redefine atheist or something.

00:05:52So I'm not there yet.

00:05:53I'm just introducing the concept that there's a spectrum along which humans grow and atheism comes out naturally at the very peak of the growth of human emotional maturity is what I'm saying.

00:06:08So the definitions that, that could be remained to be seen.

00:06:12That could be a piece of work right there.

00:06:14So I'm, so it's a little bit confusing now because I don't have the actual word for it when I'm misusing the normal word.

00:06:19Right. Okay.

00:06:22Now, I don't want to jump in on your thoughts or your ideas.

00:06:25So if there's more that you want to add, I'm happy to hear.

00:06:28Obviously, it provokes a cavalcade of thoughts within me, which could be right or wrong, good or bad.

00:06:33But I don't want to sort of storm in and elbow you aside in this very important topic.

00:06:37So if there's more that you want to add, I'm happy to hear.

00:06:38Well, I have more to add, but I think I've given enough of a description where if you had questions about it, I may be able to provide a defense for it.

00:06:51Now, if you tear this down completely, I'm happy, happy with that, too, because I don't want to go off in the wrong direction.

00:06:56Well, but you're not making a definitional or syllogistical argument.

00:07:00You're saying that people who don't believe in God are divided into two categories, the emotionally immature who still need parenting and turn to, say, socialism instead, and the people who are mature and don't turn to either the state or God or any other sort of collectivist social construct for their belief system.

00:07:21Is it something like that?

00:07:22That's right.

00:07:24So the problem we have is that, hey, you're an atheist?

00:07:27Well, look at that retard over there.

00:07:29He's an atheist, too.

00:07:31So the Christians run into the same problem.

00:07:34You know, yeah, I'm a real Christian, but that retard over there is behaving like an insane person.

00:07:39Well, that's a fake Christian.

00:07:41Right.

00:07:42So, right.

00:07:44So, I mean, not believing in God is a very specific subset of not believing in things that do not exist.

00:07:52So there are lots of people who don't believe in a God but believe in the healing power of crystals or that weird thing where you heal yourself with drops of water or believe that the earth is flat or, you know, that's just.

00:08:05So, not believing in God, if it is part of a general, I don't believe in things that fail the reason and evidence test, then if somebody doesn't believe in God and, as you say, shifts their belief in irrational things to other areas, then they may be an atheist with regards to God.

00:08:30But they're equally, if not more, irrational when it comes to the existence of other things that don't exist or don't make sense.

00:08:38I'm sort of trying to trace your argument here.

00:08:42No, that's really good, I think, because the difference there is that I'm talking about how atheism emerges from the lack of need for a parent figure.

00:08:53So, a parent figure from the childish perspective is perfect, absolutely loving, from their, you know, their delusional perspective, is all-knowing and is omnipotent.

00:09:05That's what I mean as a replacement parent.

00:09:08So, if you believe in the healing power of crystals when it's not real, well, the healing power of a crystal does not really supply the idea of a replacement parent.

00:09:20That's just you not being skeptical enough.

00:09:23That's it.

00:09:24Well, okay, but most people accept the healing power of crystals based upon an argument from authority because it's not like they've experimented themselves and found them to work.

00:09:33They just find some, you know, woo-woo, dusty corner store by a fairground where someone says, oh, you have this problem, you should take these crystals, they're guaranteed to heal.

00:09:42And so, there's some sort of argument from authority.

00:09:45People don't usually come up with these irrational beliefs on their own.

00:09:47And so, it would still fall into the category of accepting things because you're told.

00:09:53I mean, the big one is not God.

00:09:56Like, the big question for me is, what can you tell about an atheist?

00:09:59Just only on the knowledge that the person does not believe in a god or does not believe in gods.

00:10:07What can you tell about an atheist based upon that singular piece of knowledge?

00:10:14Now, statistically, what you would get from an atheist knowing only, nothing else, only that he doesn't believe in gods,

00:10:24is that he's a state-sucking, violent toady who worships the oligarchical political power.

00:10:33That's what you would know.

00:10:35In other words, he is much more likely to be a socialist if he is an atheist.

00:10:40In other words, he does not believe in an abstract god that has no direct power here on earth.

00:10:48Instead, he worships an abstract conception called the state that has dismal, violent, and sometimes genocidal power here on earth.

00:11:01So, I think to your point, if he is immature, then he has said, well, I don't want a god that tells me what to do.

00:11:09Instead, I want a government that forces me to do things.

00:11:15I don't want to be told or encouraged or bribed with an afterlife reward or punishment.

00:11:21I don't want to be told what to do to be exhorted or encouraged what to do.

00:11:26I want people to pull out their weapons and force me to do things.

00:11:32And that's what you know about atheists most likely, again, not all, but the most likely thing that you know about an atheist is that he's a socialist or a communist.

00:11:45And therefore, he views God as an ineffective means of power compared to the state, because God does not directly compel people to do anything, whereas the state, of course, does.

00:12:03So, he worships a much more dangerous entity called political power rather than a faith-based encouragement entity called God.

00:12:16He wants force, not encouragement, or it would be nice if, or, you know, sort of afterlife reward or punishment.

00:12:24He wants direct violence in the here and now, not abstract encouragement from a deity.

00:12:31And he's far more dangerous than, say, a Christian, because a Christian will only encourage you, whereas the state will compel you.

00:12:45So, I think he has a bad parent.

00:12:49Atheists have violent parents, which is why they're drawn to politics.

00:12:53People who are religious, particularly Christians, tend to have less violent parents, at least if, you know, because the New Testament is not the same as the Old Testament, of course.

00:13:00I think Old Testament people have more violent parents.

00:13:03So, I would say that both are not completely self-actualized views of the universe, and we'll sort of get to that in a second.

00:13:12But the atheist, because he worships the state, is far more primitive and dangerous than the Christian.

00:13:18Yeah, and actually, the way that you describe that actually perfectly leads into my other missing element, or not missing, but a new element to introduce to help explain this.

00:13:33And if I were to go through the typical spectrum of a child growing to maturity, emotional maturity, the first stage is the baby where they need a real parent.

00:13:47Like, you couldn't raise a baby through Zoom.

00:13:52They only want a real parent, a real human, and nothing else will satisfy.

00:13:58But then, by the time they get to kindergarten age, the only way that they can go to kindergarten and still not cry for the two hours that they're there is because they've learned to develop an avatar parent in their head, a stand-in parent.

00:14:11A parent that they can imagine, or they know, they can imagine where the parent is right now, and it soothes them.

00:14:18So, that gets them through kindergarten.

00:14:21And then, eventually, the next stage is where they don't need a real parent, and they can get by.

00:14:29Like, say you're a 10-year-old, you can get by with an avatar parent to soothe you.

00:14:33So, if your parents died at 10 and you were orphaned, there are people that continue to grow and can feed themselves and everything else like that.

00:14:40But, if you were going to go for, like, a weekend camping trip or something with friends, you know, across the province at 10, well, you need that avatar parent in your head to soothe you.

00:14:53I mean, if you knew that you're going to go on a camping trip and your parents would be a moved house by the time you, when you left, and by the time you came home, they'd be gone, well, you wouldn't leave.

00:15:01So, you have this, now you're at the third stage, which is a pure avatar parent.

00:15:07And then, as you get older and you become a real adult, an emotionally mature adult, you don't need a real parent, and you don't need the avatar parent either to soothe yourself.

00:15:17You've now become self-parenting.

00:15:19So, if I compare that to what you just said, you've said that the socialist has an extremely dangerous type of parent.

00:15:29Well, that matches the first level of parent, which is a real person.

00:15:34It's the most immature need of a child, the view that's least connected with reality.

00:15:40Sorry, you can't explain that.

00:15:42Sorry, hang on.

00:15:43I need to turn.

00:15:44What is the most immature view of a child or perspective of a child?

00:15:49The baby, where the baby must have a real parent.

00:15:52No, no, I understand that the most immature is a baby, but what's the view that is the most immature?

00:15:56I want to make sure I understand that.

00:15:59They have an idealized view, and they need a real human, and they're only satisfied with the real human.

00:16:05Okay, that's not immature for a baby or a toddler, of course, right?

00:16:08It's just immature if you hold on to that longer, right?

00:16:11Exactly, yeah.

00:16:12It's appropriate for a baby.

00:16:14But that also means that's why a socialist is the least mature, because in what I'm talking about, the socialist, the communist is on the far left, and they want a real person for their parent.

00:16:31In other words, they want to see Stalin, they want to see Hitler, they want to see Mao, and that's why it's much more dangerous, because they're mimicking the least mature aspect of humanity.

00:16:46And then next comes the fake Christian.

00:16:50In other words, they believe in a spirit, but they also think that their pastor is perfect, and is beyond reproach on how to raise a family, how to be married, and how to raise children by a guy that is not married and has no children.

00:17:07And they're like nodding and going, yeah, yeah, right?

00:17:09So there's zero skepticism about people, which is the next stage of development.

00:17:14So I'm saying that the fake atheist is absolutely the worst and most dangerous, as we see with communism.

00:17:25And then next comes the real Christian, where they've asked a real Christian before, what do you think about your pastor?

00:17:30Do you think he, and they turn their nose up, no, he's just human, he's not perfect, not at all.

00:17:35So these real Christians have graduated to the next level, matching human emotional maturity, where they've got that fake avatar parent in their head for emotional soothing purposes, but they're way beyond thinking that humans are perfect or even needing that.

00:17:52So that, instead of getting your thoughts on that, so far.

00:17:59Right. Now, outgrowing parenting, I understand, but the question is, to what? To what do you outgrow parenting?

00:18:09So parenting, of course, I believe in its foundation is the inculcation of a moral, of moral reasoning on the part of children.

00:18:20And the problem is that prior to UPB, there was no rational proof of secular ethics.

00:18:27So how are you supposed to inculcate or internalize moral reasoning if there is no reasoning morally?

00:18:39And so how are you supposed to outgrow parenting if, like this is a syllogism, right?

00:18:45If the purpose of parenting is to have you morally reason, but there is no moral reasoning to be had, then you can't ever really outgrow your parents.

00:18:52Because parents inculcate moral reasoning through threats and bribes.

00:19:00I mean, that's how moral reasoning, it's not really moral reasoning, but that's how the moral sense has developed over the course of human evolution is threats and bribes, right?

00:19:11So, either the threats and bribes come from God, right? Heaven or hell, approval or disapproval.

00:19:24Or in some more extreme cases, the wages of sin is sickness and death, like you're sick because, like, you got an illness because you defy God or something like that.

00:19:31So there's some sort of punishment, some sort of reward, or, of course, it's through the parents punishing or rewarding, which is here's a piece of cake or here's a beating or a spanking.

00:19:43And then, of course, in school, when I was a kid, it was rewards and punishment.

00:19:48And you got beaten or you got some sort of benefit.

00:19:57And, of course, in school, as a whole, it is punishment and reward still, in that you can get held back a year, at least it used to be the case.

00:20:06I think that's less the case now.

00:20:08You get something negative or you get something positive.

00:20:14And those punishments and rewards are kind of important, right?

00:20:25Yeah, but then there's the concept of people that behave morally completely opposite to what they've been taught or even demonstrated.

00:20:33Or maybe it's because they were demonstrated.

00:20:35But, I mean, I met a young man who was in high school and he was just walking home in the middle of the day before school was done.

00:20:43And it turned out that they had told everybody that to go into the gym, they had to put on a pride flag on their shirt, a clip, to be granted entrance to the gym.

00:20:56So he basically told them to go to hell and he just turned around and went home.

00:21:00So there's an example of somebody with a level of morality that goes totally against what they're trying to put in him.

00:21:09He's not religious.

00:21:11And his mother didn't know anything about this.

00:21:14So who knows where that morality came from?

00:21:18I'm just trying to say, could morality just be emergent from people who are emotionally healthy?

00:21:24Well, no, that's like saying that the scientific method is just emergent among people who are emotionally healthy.

00:21:32I mean, I don't think that would make sense.

00:21:33I mean, he might just have had a very negative experience with gay people.

00:21:37He could just be rebellious and hates being told what to do in any kind of way.

00:21:41He could be gay himself and resisting it as a sort of stereotype goes.

00:21:44There could be any number of reasons why he would resist such an injunction.

00:21:49And so I don't think reason in morality is not a matter of maturity.

00:22:00Because prior to UPB, there was no rational proof of secular ethics, yet there were emotionally mature people in the world.

00:22:07So if everybody who's emotionally mature grew into a rational morality, then all emotionally mature people would spontaneously generate UPB, which has not been the case.

00:22:23So I don't know how you can reason morality without any kind of rational proof of morality.

00:22:32That would be sort of like saying all emotionally mature people accept the scientific method.

00:22:37Okay, we can say that that's valid.

00:22:39However, there were emotionally mature people who did not generate the scientific method spontaneously.

00:22:45That was like Francis Bacon and sort of other people in the 16th century.

00:22:49It's not like if you're emotionally mature, you understand scientific principles sort of innately.

00:22:54They still have to be sort of reasons for improving in an objective and rational and empirical framework.

00:22:58So I don't think we can say emotional maturity leads you away from gods and governments because in order to be led away from gods and governments, you have to be led away from the punishment and reward method of controlling human behavior.

00:23:18We have to be more than zoo animals that are fed or punished based upon, well, not zoo animals, I guess circus animals that are fed or punished, rewarded or punished based upon our compliance with what the trainer wants.

00:23:31You actually have to be able to think for yourself morally and prior to UPB.

00:23:35I mean, I may do this in the show tonight.

00:23:37I was looking at a little bit more of the Jordan Peterson debate with the atheists.

00:23:41And there was a fellow who was talking about how, well, you know, you can look back at Neanderthals and there are people who've got broken limbs.

00:23:52The limbs are bound up and they're kept alive and this, that and the other.

00:23:56And that apparently is morality.

00:23:58But being nice is a terrible way to approach morality because it actually, it's a sort of being nice or being altruistic and so on is a great way to destroy your society.

00:24:11Because you're then just preyed upon by cruel people who know that you want to be nice and then just promise to call you nice as long as you do what they want.

00:24:19And so that ends up being a sort of terrible thing that wrecks society and destroys society on a regular basis.

00:24:25But that's what, that's generally what the perception of morality is.

00:24:29I mean, there was a fellow, there was a black fellow who's talking about like the Neanderthals and monkeys and altruism and being nice and so on.

00:24:36What the hell does that have to do with morality?

00:24:39Being nice.

00:24:39My gosh.

00:24:40I mean, so I don't think that people can outgrow the punishment and reward.

00:24:45Sorry.

00:24:45Are you clicking or talking or moving or is that you or someone else?

00:24:48Like this constant noise in the background.

00:24:49Oh, no.

00:24:50I subconsciously move something on the table here.

00:24:54Never mind.

00:24:55Yeah.

00:24:55If you could not do that.

00:24:57It's kind of distracting to try and reason with the clicks and bops in my ear.

00:25:01So, yeah, I don't think that.

00:25:04Oh, sorry.

00:25:04I'll wait till that settles down.

00:25:05Now there's more.

00:25:07Okay.

00:25:07No, it's good.

00:25:08Okay.

00:25:09So, I don't think that we can move beyond the punishment reward metric any more than we can move beyond mysticism until we get the scientific method.

00:25:18We can't move beyond the punishment reward system and it's not a matter of emotional maturity.

00:25:22Now, an emotionally mature person may resist certain immoral temptations such as, you know, me going along with the mob, right?

00:25:31Sort of the 12 angry men where you push back at some irrational thing that's going on.

00:25:35So, it could be that there's some morality that is available to you or some resistance to the collective, right?

00:25:45But if you sort of look at the modern world, right?

00:25:48And look at, I mean, just sort of from my sort of direct experience, the punishment and reward metric is still, you know, entirely how modern society runs.

00:26:00So, for instance, if you don't talk about X, Y, or Z controversial or topics that upset people, then you get to have a platform.

00:26:09And if you do talk about them, then they'll punish you.

00:26:11They'll punish you by taking away your platform and destroying, you know, massive swaths of your life's work and access to the audience that you've built up over the years.

00:26:21So, that's still just punishment reward.

00:26:23We'll reward you with money and a platform if you don't talk about things that upset us or go against the political power that we want.

00:26:32If you do talk about those things, we will punish you severely, take away your income, savage your reputation, and we will just do the strangest background noises I've ever heard.

00:26:47So, I don't think that we can move beyond.

00:26:50It's not just a matter of emotional maturity, although that may help with certain very sort of primitive go-along-with-the-group kind of stuff.

00:26:56But until people understand UPB, and that's going to be 100 to 200 years until that's more generalized, just sort of based on other paradigm shifts in human history, such as the development of the scientific method and anti-slavery.

00:27:08I mean, anti-slavery took like 150 years to reach its fruition.

00:27:12Now, of course, you can say, well, but yes, we have better technology for communication, and that's true.

00:27:17However, of course, we also have better technology for miscommunication, for lying, and so on, right?

00:27:24So, that's also a challenge.

00:27:27So, I would say that, yeah, I like what you're saying about atheism, but I don't think it's just a matter of you become moral when you're emotionally mature, because emotional maturity does not give you the rational proof of secular ethics.

00:27:41So, sorry, I had a long speech there.

00:27:42Tell me what you think.

00:27:45Oh, well, I read your book on the art of the argument, and that was really good.

00:27:53I mean, that's a missing link that nobody's being taught.

00:27:56So, I wanted to first say that was a great book.

00:28:01The other thing is that when we talk about philosophy, everything's interconnected to 100th degrees.

00:28:10So, a person can go off in all sorts of directions, and then you just don't, pretty soon you just lose the thread of what you're talking about in the first place, right?

00:28:19So, here's my ask.

00:28:21Could you ask me a question?

00:28:23If you don't, if there's something that, let's just say there's something about what I said that you totally don't agree with.

00:28:28Can you, I mean, there's other stuff you may just not know, or you may be, or you know, or you don't.

00:28:33But if you, let's just say there's something you just don't, you know is wrong about what I'm saying.

00:28:38Could you ask me a question about that thing?

00:28:42Unformulated question about that, that I could not answer.

00:28:45Yeah, I did it in a fairly long-winded way, so I apologize for that.

00:28:48So, how does emotional maturity produce rational morality?

00:28:51Because with emotional maturity naturally arises empathy.

00:29:02And out of empathy comes morality.

00:29:06In other words, I just don't want to hurt other people.

00:29:09So, I'll give you an example is that my son, I've never talked to him about girls, never talked to him about how to behave around a woman.

00:29:16But he was dating one girl for like, I don't know, at least six months, and then he broke up with her and said, this is, I don't see this going anywhere.

00:29:24But what was interesting is that he did not have another girl to go to.

00:29:29In fact, he was single for another six months after that.

00:29:32So, I thought it was really good that he did not waste her time.

00:29:37And he didn't monkey branch or anything like that.

00:29:41But I've never taught him any stuff like that.

00:29:42I never gave him those man talks.

00:29:45He just, he was empathetic to this young woman.

00:29:49So, that's my point there.

00:29:52Okay.

00:29:53So, are you saying that empathy is the same as morality?

00:30:00Well, what I could be saying is that morality emerges from empathy.

00:30:03No, no, no.

00:30:03Not what you could be saying.

00:30:05No, hang on, hang on.

00:30:06Not what you could be saying, what you are saying.

00:30:09Yeah, that's true.

00:30:10Okay, so empathy is the same as morality.

00:30:15No, no.

00:30:16Morality emerges from empathy.

00:30:18No empathy and morality shivers.

00:30:22Okay.

00:30:22And then you need to be taught it.

00:30:23So, hang on.

00:30:24So, what is your definition of empathy?

00:30:29Empathy is just knowing when you're hurting someone else or you could hurt someone else.

00:30:35And you'd rather not do that because hurting them kind of hurts you.

00:30:41I mean, sorry, aren't there times when telling the truth is going to upset other people and hurt them emotionally?

00:30:49Yeah, well, I've told people what they need to hear, which hurts their feelings, but it's for their own good.

00:30:57Okay, so you understand that you've changed the definition.

00:30:59You said empathy is not wanting to hurt other people.

00:31:02And then you're saying, well, but you must hurt people for their own good sometimes.

00:31:06Okay, then.

00:31:07So, what if it was more accurate for me to say, I don't want to do anything to anybody else where I degrade them, so to speak, by fraudulent or theft or violence?

00:31:24So, you don't want to do people, you don't want to do things to people that will degrade them.

00:31:31Is that right?

00:31:32Yeah.

00:31:33So, I did kickboxing and I would, you know, hit someone.

00:31:38But then once I hit them in this vulnerable spot, they knew where that vulnerable spot was for themselves to use against someone else.

00:31:49I'm sorry.

00:31:49I don't follow the argument.

00:31:52We've gone from your son to telling people things that are harsh, that are good for them, to kicking people in kickboxing.

00:32:00I feel like we're dancing all over the place and I need to know what principles we're working with here, not sort of specific examples.

00:32:08Oh, well, I guess we could say that my son hurt her feelings and he was the author of that, but he did it to not rob her of value.

00:32:21In other words, he hurt her, but it was overall for her own good.

00:32:25Okay, so I just asked you to not give me specific examples, but to give me principles and you're giving me another specific example.

00:32:34What is the principle?

00:32:36Yeah, okay, then.

00:32:38We're talking about what is empathy, right?

00:32:45Yes.

00:32:46What exactly is empathy?

00:32:46You're saying morality grows out of empathy.

00:32:48I'm asking for your definition of empathy.

00:32:50You said it's not hurting other people.

00:32:52And I said, but don't we hurt people sometimes when we tell them the truth?

00:32:55And you said, yes, I've done that before.

00:32:57So then it can't just be that.

00:32:58So then you said, well, doing things that don't degrade people.

00:33:01But then, of course, if you say that being good is just not doing, insert negative word here, I need the definition of what does it mean to degrade people?

00:33:10And how does it apply?

00:33:11And so on.

00:33:12Yeah, so I guess what we're thinking about is that we can hurt other people, but is it for their good or is it not for their good, despite being empathetic?

00:33:28Okay, so you're saying that empathy, which is to not hurt other people, is less important than doing things for people that is for their good, that is good for them, right?

00:33:39Um, well, empathy can be where if I don't hurt this person, if I, you know, if, if their feelings don't get hurt right now, then I could be putting them in danger or I could be letting them down.

00:33:56Okay, so these are very abstract phrases.

00:33:58I still need to know what the principle is.

00:34:00I mean, putting them in danger, letting them down.

00:34:02I don't really know what that means.

00:34:04So if you can give me a principle, again, just to nag you about it.

00:34:08Well, yeah, well, we're working on this, which is good.

00:34:14So empathy, okay, so empathy is not necessarily a lack of hurting someone if it's for their own good.

00:34:22How about that?

00:34:24Okay, how do we, how do we know what is for people's own good?

00:34:27I mean, saying that empathy is acting in a way that is for people's own good does not solve much because I don't know how, how that, what principle is generally being applied here.

00:34:36Because for someone's own good is to some degree subjective, right?

00:34:41That's right.

00:34:42So, again, we have subjectivity with regards to morality, which whenever there's subjectivity, people can legitimately disagree, right?

00:34:51So if I say I like jazz and you say you like blues, we can legitimately disagree with each other's tastes and it's not a contradiction because we're talking about subjective preferences.

00:34:59So what are the objective rules by which people, because you're saying, listen, I want people to be emotionally mature, which means that they have their own reasoned sense of morality, then we have to give them away to reasoned morality.

00:35:10Does that make sense?

00:35:11Like we can't just say, well, empathy, right?

00:35:13Because that's subjective or for people's own good, which is to some degree subjective.

00:35:18So what are the principles by which we can come up with a rational morality so people can be independent of parental state and religious authority?

00:35:27Yeah, so this is where we're getting all this branching off, each of which is important.

00:35:34It's just that my original statement is really about the growth of emotional maturity.

00:35:41So what is emotional maturity?

00:35:41Okay, sorry, have you decided to not answer my question because it sounds like you're going on a tangent?

00:35:48No, that's what I'm talking about is tangents.

00:35:51Like everything that you're doing is a legitimate...

00:35:53Hang on, I don't want you to go on a tangent.

00:35:55I want you to answer my question.

00:35:56Yeah, I don't mind.

00:36:02I'm just saying that I'm just trying to drag it back to the original statement that I made.

00:36:10Well, okay, but you understand that it's kind of...

00:36:12Hang on, hang on.

00:36:13But if I...

00:36:13You talk about empathy, right?

00:36:15So do I want you to answer my question, which is how do we know what objective morality is, right?

00:36:22I mean, I want you to answer my question, right?

00:36:26Otherwise, I wouldn't have asked it, right?

00:36:29Okay.

00:36:29So you believe that empathy is being sensitive towards other people's feelings and addressing legitimate needs or requirements, something like that, right?

00:36:37Yep.

00:36:38Okay.

00:36:39And also for their own good, right?

00:36:43Now, is it good for you and I and the listenership if you can answer my question about objective morality?

00:36:49Sure.

00:36:53Okay.

00:36:54Unless it...

00:36:55Is it...

00:36:55Hang on, hang on, hang on, hang on.

00:36:57Is it empathetic to me?

00:36:59Are you being empathetic towards me if when I ask you a question, you answer it or tell me you're not going to answer it?

00:37:07Well, my empath...

00:37:12Okay.

00:37:14I'm not...

00:37:14Is it...

00:37:15Hang on.

00:37:15No, this is not complicated.

00:37:17Is it...

00:37:17If I ask you a question, which is definitely part of our discussion, if I ask you a question, is it empathetic, is it sensitive to my feelings to address my question or at least tell me you're not going to, or is it not empathetic to go on a tangent that I don't follow?

00:37:33Well, I also...

00:37:34You're explaining to me what the purpose of the tangent is.

00:37:35Sorry, go ahead.

00:37:37Yeah, so, um, if we were to include empathy for the audience, we would want to make sure that they're not confused with too many tangents, is all I'm saying.

00:37:48Now, I'm not saying that we are going on too many tangents, but that is an empathy that I have towards the audience.

00:37:53Okay, so...

00:37:55If they can't follow.

00:37:56Hang on.

00:37:57So, if we're not supposed to go on too many tangents, why would you go on another tangent rather than directly answering my question?

00:38:04Well, I've been trying to answer the question, and we're digging down on that, which is fine.

00:38:12Well, but if I ask you a question and you go on a tangent that's incomprehensible to me, is that empathetic towards my needs and preferences?

00:38:19Um, well, I think that our loyalty is to the question, the original statement.

00:38:32I mean, not the question, the statement that I made that needs questioning.

00:38:35No, no, that's not our loyalty, because we've worked on that question, and I'm asking you a more specific question, which is, how are we going to define universal morality, right?

00:38:46And I'm willing to work within your definitions of empathy and what's best for people and don't degrade people, but I just, I need definitions to know what that means, right?

00:38:54That's fair, right?

00:38:56Because otherwise, it's a subjective bunch of stuff.

00:38:59Like, what might be degrading for you might not be degrading for me.

00:39:03Degrading is somewhat of a subjective term, which doesn't mean we can't do anything to make it more objective.

00:39:10But if you've given me a bunch of standards by which we can know if something is moral, and then I ask you for more definitions of those standards, that's a reasonable place to be in the conversation, right?

00:39:25Yeah, that's what I got from your book.

00:39:27It's probably standard philosophy.

00:39:28So then my question is, is it empathetic to not answer my question, to go on a tangent, and to not tell me, I'm going to answer your question, and here's how I'm going to do it.

00:39:40I'm going to go X, Y, or Z, right?

00:39:41So earlier when you said people have emotional maturity, and that means they get morality, and I gave you a case like, okay, not everyone who's emotionally mature is moral, because in the absence of UPB, it's pretty impossible to reason things morally and so on, right?

00:39:57So I sort of gave you an answer to that that was directly related to your question.

00:40:01I didn't go off on a tangent and say, well, my daughter did this when she was six, and you can't really sort of stitch it all together.

00:40:07So I guess, I mean, the reason I'm sort of hammering this point, which I think is really a very interesting interaction that we're having here, is you're saying empathy and what's best for the other person is really important when it comes to morality.

00:40:19So then what happens is, I say, I need an answer to this question, I need definitions of things like what's best for people and what it means to degrade people and so on.

00:40:29But you don't act in an empathetic manner.

00:40:32You act in a bit of a selfish manner, and this is not any big criticism, I'm just sort of pointing it out, which is you talk about the things you want to talk about.

00:40:39Like I specifically say, I don't want specific examples, I want general principles, and then you tell me more about your son and this girl, which is a specific example.

00:40:47That's kind of selfish, because it's what you want to talk about, rather than empathetic, which is what I need for satisfaction and reasonable satisfaction.

00:40:56I need that for satisfaction in the conversation.

00:40:59To move the conversation forward, I need definitions of what you're talking about with regards to morality.

00:41:04So, and the reason I'm saying this is not any big criticism of you at all, I think it's very interesting what's happening, which is you say, empathy and what's best for people is really important when it comes to morality, but then when it comes to our conversation, you don't display empathy and what's best for people, and you don't even notice that you're not doing it.

00:41:22And that's what I mean when I say you can't define morality in these subjective kind of ways, because people always end up doing what they prefer, rather than what is rational and empathetic, if that makes sense.

00:41:36So, sorry, go ahead.

00:41:38Yeah, so I don't think that I brought up the subject of morality, or even maybe I spoke about empathy, but I didn't talk about morality.

00:41:48I was really talking about just the spectrum of emotional maturity.

00:41:53Come on, hang on, hang on, hang on.

00:41:54I'm sorry to interrupt you, but that's just not true.

00:41:57Right?

00:41:58You said morality grows out of empathy, right?

00:42:01I said, well, what's the basis of morality if it's not going to be sort of rationality?

00:42:04You said, well, morality grows out of empathy.

00:42:07So, you did bring up morality.

00:42:09Yes, because you asked me about that, but I'm just saying my original thing that I'm talking about, I'm only talking about the spectrum of emotional maturity.

00:42:17Now, of course, that naturally brings out all sorts of other questions about what is that, and those are all legitimate, but I'm just saying that I'm hoping to stay in a lane just so that it's more comprehensible.

00:42:32And I'm saying that, of course, everything needs to be explained and given explanations for, but that could keep going on.

00:42:40Hang on, hang on, hang on, but that's kind of rude, which is you're saying, well, I have to keep it confined in these terms so that it's more comprehensible.

00:42:49And I'm saying it's not comprehensible to me.

00:42:52And you're saying, well, Steph, I'm not going to answer your questions because I want to keep things more comprehensible when I don't understand what you mean by empathy.

00:42:59I don't understand what you mean by what's best for people.

00:43:03I don't understand what you mean by don't degrade people, right, because definitions of terms is really important, right?

00:43:10I agree with that.

00:43:11So when I say I need to have things be comprehensible and you say, well, I don't want to answer that question because I want to keep things comprehensible.

00:43:20I mean, it's not comprehensible to me.

00:43:22That's why I'm trying to ask.

00:43:23And when you said empathy is not hurting other people, right, that was your definition of empathy.

00:43:27And I said, well, isn't there times where we tell the truth that's very upsetting to people and you said, oh, yes, well, no, we have to do that, right?

00:43:34But you didn't include that in your original definition of empathy, right?

00:43:38So I need to understand what is being talked about.

00:43:43Now, of course, I approached the conversation with you with some skepticism because I've worked for 40 years on the problems of morality and wrote a whole book 15 years ago on rational proof of secular ethics.

00:43:54So you don't have the answer to morality.

00:44:00You have a bunch of nice sounding words.

00:44:01And I say this with no criticism whatsoever.

00:44:04I mean, neither did I until UPB, right?

00:44:06So you have a bunch of pleasant sounding words.

00:44:09Oh, empathy.

00:44:09What's best for people?

00:44:10Don't degrade people.

00:44:12But that's just a bunch of adjectives, just a bunch of words.

00:44:15I'm looking for a universal rationality, a universal proof of morality that is objective

00:44:23and does not rely upon any subjective terms.

00:44:26Like UPB does not rely on any subjective terms like niceness or altruism or what's best for people or anything like that.

00:44:32It doesn't rely on any of that whatsoever.

00:44:34So you keep bringing subjective terms into your moral arguments, which is completely understandable.

00:44:40And it is the default position of all moralists throughout human history because even Christianity has subjective terms in it, right?

00:44:46Because God works in mysterious ways and sometimes people are rewarded by horrible punishments and, you know, in sort of spiritual matters and so on.

00:44:54So you bring subjective and largely emotional terms into a moral argument.

00:45:01And then when I ask for definitions and clarity, you don't give them to me, which, again, I completely understand.

00:45:10But you can't.

00:45:11Because when I ask you for definitions of your moral terms, I mean, the very first thing you said was empathy was not hurting other people, not upsetting other people, not hurting other people.

00:45:23And then when I pointed out something which is like, well, what about this?

00:45:25And you're like, oh, well, we have to hurt other people in these kinds of ways.

00:45:28You didn't even pause and say, holy crap, Steph, I was talking about empathy.

00:45:32I said it was about not hurting people.

00:45:34And then you pointed out, and I agreed with you, that hurting people was sometimes the best thing.

00:45:38And I guess I don't really know what I'm talking about because I just came up with a whole definition of morality, which was not hurting people.

00:45:44And then I immediately was corrected about hurting people for their own good.

00:45:47So then I have another standard.

00:45:49But you just kept moving on.

00:45:50And then you wanted to move on on more tangents.

00:45:53And I know the answer for that.

00:45:54The reason for that is that you don't have, I guess you haven't read UPB or anything like that, which is fine.

00:45:59But you don't have an objective definition of morality.

00:46:03You have a bunch of nice words that don't add up to anything objective, if that makes sense.

00:46:10And it's not a criticism.

00:46:12I mean, that's the default position of moralists.

00:46:15Well, I think the idea is not to criticize.

00:46:18Criticism is not the problem.

00:46:20The idea would be to ask me a question that I have no answer for, which would be me self-criticizing myself.

00:46:28You know, there's no escape from me that.

00:46:29But the thing I have to say is, sorry, I don't understand what you just said.

00:46:36No, I'm just saying that you understand.

00:46:37I'd appreciate it.

00:46:38When it comes to philosophical arguing, you could criticize me.

00:46:43Or what is more powerful is ask me a question I can't answer, which is way more powerful as a criticism.

00:46:49But I have asked you questions and you haven't answered them.

00:46:52So I'm not sure what you're talking about.

00:46:54I've done exactly that.

00:46:55Yeah, so my statement is that nothing that I said at the beginning had anything to do with morality, empathy, or UPB.

00:47:05The only thing that got close to that was I was describing the spectrum of emotional maturity leading to adulthood.

00:47:14So that's what I'm saying.

00:47:16And adulthood was being free of external punishment rewards authority, right?

00:47:23Yep.

00:47:25Okay.

00:47:26So if we're free of external punishment and rewards morality, oh, sorry, punishment and rewards authority, then we need a moral guide, right?

00:47:36Otherwise, we're just hedonists.

00:47:38And then we just have an internal pleasure-based hierarchy, right?

00:47:43So if I'm going to say, well, I'm so emotionally mature, I don't need to listen to gods or governments.

00:47:47I'm beyond punishment and reward.

00:47:49That's great.

00:47:50But then what am I subjected to?

00:47:52What am I controlled by?

00:47:54How do I organize my moral hierarchies and decisions, right?

00:47:58Because otherwise, I'm just saying, well, governments can't tell me what to do.

00:48:02Gods can't tell me what to do.

00:48:04And that's kind of Satanism.

00:48:05I'm not calling you a Satanist.

00:48:06I'm just saying that that's kind of Satanism, which is do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law.

00:48:10It's like Satanists are not confined by God's rules.

00:48:13Satanists are not confined by the laws of the government.

00:48:16They just do what they want, what they prefer.

00:48:18It's kind of like an animal's existence.

00:48:19So if we're going to say, well, I have this emotional maturity, I'm beyond punishment and reward from external authorities, then I do have to have an objective morality to subjugate myself to, right?

00:48:31In other words, if I want to be a scientist and I say, well, I'm not going to get my science from the Bible and I'm not going to get my science from what the government tells me is true.

00:48:39I'm going to think for myself.

00:48:41Well, then you have to have some methodology by which you're going to think for yourself.

00:48:44And that's going to be the scientific method, right?

00:48:47You're going to have to pursue the scientific method.

00:48:48Otherwise, you're just in chaos.

00:48:50You've just rejected accumulated authority, both in terms of religion and government laws.

00:48:56And you haven't reached a place where you can reason and think for yourself.

00:49:01And, of course, we would say that emotional maturity has to do with reasoning and thinking for yourself, which means if we're going to escape the laws of the state and we're going to escape the commandments of the gods, we need a standard by which we can organize our own morality.

00:49:16And that's why I was asking you about these things.

00:49:19Well, what does it mean to be moral and all of that?

00:49:22So that's why the questions came up.

00:49:25Yeah, not a single thing that you're saying I consider to be an illegitimate question at all.

00:49:32I'm just saying that a person can...

00:49:34Sorry, illegitimate or illegitimate?

00:49:36Nothing you're saying is illegitimate.

00:49:40Okay.

00:49:41Everything you're saying is legitimate to me and a perfectly sensible question.

00:49:47My only thing is that this is always a problem with philosophy where it's all interconnected.

00:49:55And can you have a discussion about the main thing without branching off so far that we forget what we originally talked about?

00:50:05Like, everything does need defining for sure.

00:50:09Okay.

00:50:10So then why are you resisting my request for definition?

00:50:15I'm just saying it can be endless.

00:50:18And so, like, I'll repeat myself.

00:50:19I never mention anything about morality, empathy, or UPB.

00:50:25So, I mean...

00:50:26Well, no, you hang on.

00:50:27No, you did in response to my questions.

00:50:32You did define morality as empathy.

00:50:35You said morality grows out of empathy, right?

00:50:36So we started having that discussion.

00:50:38And then you said, well, it's not just about being nice to people or not upsetting them because sometimes you do have to upset them.

00:50:45And then so I asked for further clarification.

00:50:47And then you said, well, it's about not degrading them through theft or fraud or something like that.

00:50:52And then I said, well, what's the definition of degrading or, you know...

00:50:54And so, you know, for you to say, I have an argument for morality that it comes out of empathy, and then for me to ask what that morality is, that's perfectly legitimate, isn't it?

00:51:06It's absolutely legitimate.

00:51:07It's just where's the boundaries where we don't even remember what we're talking about in the first place is all upset.

00:51:15No, no, I remember.

00:51:17You just don't want to answer the question because you don't have answers.

00:51:20And I don't blame you for that.

00:51:21I mean, without UPB, there is no answer.

00:51:24So when I'm asking you...

00:51:25You say, well, I don't want to, you know, it's bad to degrade people.

00:51:28And it's like, okay, sure, but what does degrading people mean?

00:51:30That's a reasonable question.

00:51:33And you are fogging up and around the edges because you don't have an answer to that question.

00:51:38Now, if emotional maturity means being beyond gods and governments but having a strong moral sense,

00:51:45if you don't have a strong moral sense or a rational set of moral arguments,

00:51:50then you can't be, by definition, emotionally mature.

00:51:53And maybe that's part of what you don't want to deal with or face is that if you don't have a rational way to examine moral questions

00:52:03or a rational framework for morality, which UPB would provide,

00:52:07then what you've done is you've said, well, I want to be beyond the rules of external punishment and reward systems, which is fine.

00:52:17But I also don't want to have a rational moral system because that would constrict my behavior or restrain my behavior.

00:52:22Maybe it's something to do with that.

00:52:24But I just noticed when I asked you for clarity with your definitions of morality,

00:52:28you jumped out of the argument and said, well, I didn't bring this up and it's too tough to decide.

00:52:32I'm just trying to keep things comprehensible for the sake of the audience.

00:52:35That's all just a bunch of fog and nonsense.

00:52:37Sorry to be blunt, but, you know, we have to tell people the truth according to you, even if it upsets them.

00:52:42But that's just a bunch of bluster and nonsense.

00:52:44You don't have a rational system of ethics because you haven't studied UPB.

00:52:51You just don't have it.

00:52:52And again, that's no big criticism.

00:52:54I mean, I spent most of my life with that one as well.

00:52:56So, you know, we're all in the same boat as far as that goes.

00:52:59But you have to be aware that you are strongly resisting giving me clear definitions of what it means to be moral.

00:53:09Because you say, well, morality grows out of empathy.

00:53:11Okay.

00:53:12So, you're claiming some expertise in morality.

00:53:14But, you know, in the old Socratic reasoning style, when I ask you to explain your expertise in morality, you jump out of the debate.

00:53:21I mean, that's clear to me.

00:53:22It's clear to, I think, just about everyone in the audience.

00:53:24It may not be quite as clear to you, but that's the sequence.

00:53:28But my original statement did not contain the word morality.

00:53:32Okay.

00:53:33So, we're just going round and round in circles?

00:53:34Yes.

00:53:35Yeah, we are.

00:53:35Yeah.

00:53:35So, I don't really want to do that?

00:53:37Well, I do realize that me posing a question, a philosophical question in front of you, is like me putting my head on the chopping block, which is on purpose.

00:53:47And so, I've got no problems being put through the mill at all.

00:53:51I've done that deliberately.

00:53:54I don't really know what that means, other than you're not answering my questions and saying that somehow, somehow, because you didn't use the word morality in your original foundation, that you don't have to answer any questions about morality.

00:54:07But given that you're talking, we talked about atheists as being addicted either to gods or to governments, and the governments being the more dangerous of the two.

00:54:16And you talked about how people are supposed to outgrow the need for parental figures.

00:54:21And I said, okay, so we move beyond punishment and reward, but we need a moral argument, otherwise we're just hedonists.

00:54:27So, that's sort of the next stage of what it is.

00:54:30And then you claimed some expertise on morality.

00:54:32I started to ask you questions, and you jumped out of the argument rather than just admit, you know, I don't really have a good argument for morality.

00:54:40Empathy is not a strong argument.

00:54:43So, again, I don't want to just have you repeat, well, I didn't bring up the word morality, like that's some magic shield about things.

00:54:52So, I'm happy if there's anything else that you want to add, or we can move on to other questions or comments.

00:54:59I appreciate the discussion.

00:55:00Yeah, and just I'll rephrase what I said in terms of helping people understand a philosophical discussion, is that by me bringing up this idea of mine for review, that's me putting my head on the chopping block in front of someone who is experienced.

00:55:19And so, for me to be getting a hard time is not a big deal to me.

00:55:24In other words, it's not a surprise.

00:55:26I'm the one that put my head on the chopping block, and I have no complaints.

00:55:31Oh, no, but you didn't keep your head on the chopping block because you just jumped your head off the chopping block by not continuing the discussion and jumping into, well, I didn't bring up morality, and I'm trying to keep things more comprehensible for the audience and not answering my questions, right?

00:55:45And so, you just jumped your head off the chopping block, which, again, I have no particular issue with.

00:55:49I just – that is what happened.

00:55:52Okay.

00:55:52Because keeping your head on the chopping block.

00:55:54Keeping your head on the chopping block would be to continue on with the definitions until you realize that none of your definitions fit anything objective.

00:56:02And then saying, well, you know what?

00:56:02I guess I don't have a very strong sense of rational morality, and therefore, I lack some maturity because you need rational morality to substitute for gods and governments.

00:56:11That would be to keep your head on the chopping block, which you didn't do because you kind of fogged out in tangents and irrational pushback.

00:56:21Yeah, but that's still – even so, even if I didn't do it, it's still a good lesson for philosophical discussions.

00:56:26So, is that your claim, that what we're engaged in here is a good lesson for philosophical discussions?

00:56:35How would you know if that's a good – I think a good lesson for philosophical discussions is to stay in the discussion and admit where you don't have adequate definitions, then work to refine them so that they make more sense.

00:56:46I think jumping out and fogging is not – I mean, that's not a good example.

00:56:50It's a very common one, but I don't think it's a good one.

00:56:52No, a failure, even a failure, is still a good example of what not to do.

00:56:57For example, if I were to use – what do you call it?

00:57:00Logical – what do you call them?

00:57:02Logical fallacies, and you pointed them out.

00:57:06You know, that would be a failure on my part, but it's still a good example to show how it works.

00:57:12That's all.

00:57:13Okay.

00:57:14Well, I appreciate your time, and I guess I'm not even going to say we're going to agree to disagree, but we do disagree.

00:57:19And I appreciate your time, and it was a very interesting discussion, and I do appreciate the chance to talk about the distinctions between the reactive atheists and the rational atheists.

00:57:31So, thank you very much.

00:57:32I appreciate that, and you're certainly welcome back any time.

00:57:36And I will put – yeah, thank you.

00:57:37I will put out – anybody else who wants to comment on this or any other topic, I am thrilled to hear.

00:57:43We've got back an hour till the show, and I'm happy to spend another little bit of time if people have questions or comments or want to give me feedback on the interaction that we just had.

00:57:52Rising nature, I don't know that if I need to unmute you, I'll allow you to speak if you wanted to bring something up.

00:57:59Go for it.

00:57:59You might need to unmute if you are muted.

00:58:13You had your hand raised.

00:58:14Maybe that was from a time ago.

00:58:18All right.

00:58:18Going once, going twice.

00:58:23Testing one, two, three.

00:58:24Shelly, if you say, is this thing working, you are not muted, so you can unmute yourself if you wanted to talk.

00:58:33I'm certainly happy to hear.

00:58:47Oh, hi, Stefan.

00:58:48Can you hear me?

00:58:49Hello.

00:58:50Yes.

00:58:51Oh, hi.

00:58:52Yeah.

00:58:53Nice to talk to you.

00:58:55Thank you, too.

00:58:56What's up?

00:58:57Oh, not much.

00:58:59I didn't really have much to talk about.

00:59:01I was just kind of listening.

00:59:02So I figured you were not muted.

00:59:05No, that's fine.

00:59:06No problem.

00:59:07If you don't have anything that you wanted to add, that's totally fine.

00:59:09I thought you had assisting working like you were trying to talk and you weren't being heard.

00:59:14Oh, no.

00:59:15No, I think that might just be like auto-generated or something.

00:59:18I don't know.

00:59:19Yeah, yeah.

00:59:19Okay.

00:59:20All right.

00:59:20Well, no problem.

00:59:21I appreciate everyone who's dropped by tonight.

00:59:24A nice little chat.

00:59:26And I also appreciate the difficult questions and the challenging questions because they do help me map things out a little bit better.

00:59:32So I will stop here, have a little food, and then I will see you guys at 7 p.m. for the Wednesday Night Live.

00:59:41So, yes, sir, go ahead.

00:59:43Sorry.

00:59:43Yeah, I've just finished sorting out my microphone.

00:59:45Can you hear me?

00:59:46Yep.

00:59:47Oh, wonderful.

00:59:48Okay.

00:59:48So I had a quick question that I've been thinking about just today, and I haven't had much time to flush it out.

00:59:54But it's essentially the difference between morality and virtue.

01:00:00I'm sorry.

01:00:01Did you sell this as a quick question?

01:00:05Oh, yeah.

01:00:06Sorry.

01:00:06No, hang on, hang on.

01:00:08Is that honest?

01:00:10Just, you know, if you could just differentiate between morality and virtue, Steph, that would be excellent.

01:00:15Is that a quick question?

01:00:16I'm just curious.

01:00:17Are we starting off with the moral ideal called honesty or not?

01:00:23Yeah, I think what it was is I meant quick for me to ask, but maybe not quick to answer.

01:00:28Okay, go ahead.

01:00:30Yeah.

01:00:30So, yeah, it's the difference between morality and virtue, because I feel like, or maybe I think there is a difference between the two.

01:00:39And I even asked the StephBot AI, but the answer that it gave was a little bit, well, unsatisfactory.

01:00:46I could go to the answer that I got from StephBot AI, and then we could continue from there.

01:00:50Okay, and why would you assume there is a difference between the words morality and virtue?

01:01:00And maybe there is, and I certainly have some thoughts on it, but what's important for you in the distinction?

01:01:08So, I think what it came down to was the definition of love that you gave the poor, which is that it's the involuntary response to virtue.

01:01:16I'm sorry, can you just slow down?

01:01:17I had a little trouble hearing you.

01:01:18Can you just speak to that again?

01:01:20Can you hear me now?

01:01:23Yeah.

01:01:24Yeah, so I think it came from the definition that you gave before, with regards to the love being an involuntary response to virtue.

01:01:32So, when I was considering why virtue specifically, rather than morality, I think that's where I started to think about it.

01:01:40Ah, I see, I see.

01:01:41Yeah, okay.

01:01:42Got it.

01:01:42Because I was thinking, for example, that if you look at the coma test, someone who is in coma can be considered moral, but maybe they can't be considered virtuous, because morality is about what you don't do, whereas virtue is about what you do.

01:02:00So, going on from there, the question will then be whether or not someone who is in a coma could be considered someone who is, I don't know, lovable, maybe, according to the philosophical standards that we're using here.

01:02:14Okay, that's, sorry, I interrupted you before.

01:02:22Is that the end of the question?

01:02:24Yes, that's correct.

01:02:24Okay, so this is sort of my way of formulating it.

01:02:29I'm not saying this is what you'll find in Merriam-Webster dictionary.

01:02:33So, in my way of formulating it, morality is the theory, virtue is the empirical practice.

01:02:40In the same way that the scientific method is the theory, and an actual scientific experiment that conforms to the scientific method is the practice.

01:02:51So, virtue is what is manifested in action, whereas morality is the theory, it's the blueprint, right?

01:03:00So, in a sense, you could say that morality is like physics, and virtue is like engineering, like it manifests things in the real world,

01:03:15which is why, given that love is empirical, not theoretical, right, which is why if somebody says they're a pilot, we don't necessarily let them fly a plane, right?

01:03:28If they fly a plane very well, then they're a pilot, and love tends to be empirical.

01:03:34If somebody claims, it says, well, I believe in honesty, that doesn't mean that we love them.

01:03:39If they just say, well, I hold honesty as a virtue, I believe in honesty, blah, blah, blah.

01:03:45We don't necessarily love them.

01:03:47However, if somebody consistently practices the morality of honesty, then he is a virtuous person.

01:03:59He is manifesting the theory, because lots of people can have, like, there are tons of people who, you know,

01:04:06they understand the theory of UPB, but they're not necessarily honest in their daily lives in any sort of big old consistent way.

01:04:13So, I would say that a virtue is the physical manifestation in an empirical sense of the theories of morality.

01:04:23Does that sort of – and that's why I use the word virtue in my formulation of love, because love is not just – love doesn't respond to what people say.

01:04:32It is respond to what they do, because love is an – in a sense, it's an operation of as much of the body as it is of the mind.

01:04:39It's an operation of the heart.

01:04:40It's an operation of the gut sense.

01:04:41It's an operation of a sort of deep, illicit brain respect and admiration and so on.

01:04:45And because it involves the body more than just abstract conceptions, then it is empirical in the same way that if you read a diet book, it doesn't cause you to lose weight.

01:04:55Like, if you want to lose weight effectively, it's probably a good idea to read a diet book or consult with a nutritionist or something like that.

01:05:02But if all you do is read the diet book and then continue to stuff your face, your body responds not to the theory, but to the practice.

01:05:08And in the same way, love being as much an operation of the body and the mind, like the body, the heart, the gut, and all this sort of stuff, it responds to empirical action.

01:05:17It doesn't respond merely to theory.

01:05:19Now, to be consistently virtuous, you do have to have good moral theories, but good moral theories are necessary but not sufficient for consistent moral actions, which would be defined as virtue.

01:05:31Does that make sense?

01:05:33Yeah, it's definitely consistent.

01:05:35I suppose what I would add to that would be how one would distinguish between the applications that are universal and applications that are not universal.

01:05:50And what I mean by that is if, for example, we say that preferable behavior exists and universally preferable behavior is the best standard for morality, then anything that isn't universal, like let's say you decide that

01:06:05you're feeling, because I mean sometimes people say, for example, kindness is a virtue and generosity is a virtue, but you can be selective with regards to who you're kind or who you're generous to.

01:06:15It's not necessarily universally applied or an expression of any universal principle, maybe it's just a context that determines who you're nice to on a given day, whether or not you stand up for someone on a bus and you give them your seat, or whether or not you choose to volunteer to, I don't know, clean the beach when it's listed with plastic and any other sort of material or waste.

01:06:43I mean, I think it's just a context that is a lot of things that are not necessarily.

01:06:45I think it's a context that you're not going to be able to do with actuality, but it's a context that you're not going to be able to do with actuality, but it's a context that you're not going to be able to do with actuality.

01:06:55I'm sorry, have you read UPB?

01:07:01Yes, but I would say I would hesitate to say I have a complete grounded understanding of it.

01:07:08Well, do you remember there are five categories?

01:07:14There's UPB compliant and then there's aesthetically preferable actions or APAs, UPB and then APAs, aesthetically preferable actions.

01:07:22These are things like being on time or maybe generosity or obviously volunteering to clean up the beach.

01:07:27Things that are positive but cannot be enforced through coercion.

01:07:31Right, so bodily integrity can be enforced through coercion, right?

01:07:36If some guy wants to stab you, you can shoot him and kill him, right?

01:07:41Because he's initiating the use of force against you.

01:07:43So UPB is that which can be enforced through coercion, whereas you can't shoot someone for being late.

01:07:49So aesthetically preferable actions are things which are positive but not inflicted through coercion and therefore not enforceable through coercion.

01:08:00If you've got a friend who's consistently late, you can just stop doing things with him.

01:08:03He's not holding a gun to your head and saying, stand here and wait for me, right?

01:08:09So, yeah, there are aesthetically preferable actions.

01:08:14Politeness could be considered one, but you can't shoot someone for being rude, right?

01:08:19And so if you just want to go over the bit in UPB on aesthetically preferable actions, I think that that's the answer you're looking for.

01:08:27All right, thank you.

01:08:28You are very welcome.

01:08:30And I thank everyone for your time today.

01:08:33A great pleasure to chat with you all.

01:08:35I will talk to you in about 46, 40, 49 minutes in the Wednesday Night Live.

01:08:40I hope you'll drop by for that.

01:08:41We're going to do, I think we're going to do some more Jordan Peterson stuff because I think that was very enjoyable for people, certainly for me.

01:08:46And the views are pretty good.

01:08:48So I'm a slave to the market.

01:08:50So thanks everyone so much.

01:08:51I will talk to you soon.

01:08:52Lots of love from up here.

01:08:53Bye.

01:08:54Bye.