DEBATE Christianity or Secular Humanism Which is Best for Society? Planet Peterson Vs @rattlesnaketv

And you think that God's not real. So then you think we should use this metaphysical concept of reason to arrive at a at a thriving society. Have I steel-manned it? Well, that's not bad.

[music]

Okay. Well, that that means nothing. You just described it and you're going to tell me that it means nothing. Meanwhile, in Muslim majority countries, none of them allow gay marriage. Uh, most of them outlaw abortion, and they were [music] the last to forfeit the right for women to vote. So, do you envy them?

>> Do I envy Sierra Leone? No.

They said Planet Peterson punched someone in the face yesterday. Jake didn't punch someone in the face yesterday. Who is morally superior?

[music]

I'd need to know a little bit more about the person.

>> But if you had to guess, you'd probably go with yourself.

>> If you just won't You're not You won't You refuse to engage in this.

>> It's a stupid question. Let's be fair.

>> It's not a stupid question. It is. You're just a

>> We are going to do a mass propaganda [music] campaign to get women out of the workforce and back into the kitchen, baby.

[laughter]

>> I want to introduce Zach Gelpy from Maine First, the premier conservative organization in New England that's fighting for conservativism. Thank you very much, Zach, for being with us today and sponsoring Debatecon 6. I give you a chance to share about Maine First.

[cheering]

>> Thank you very much, James.

[applause and cheering]

Thank you, Chris crew, for showing out. How's everyone doing today?

[cheering]

I don't really hear you.

WHAT?

>> THERE we go. There we go. Well, Maine First Project is the premier conservative organization that has been fighting for over a decade the leftist policies in Maine. Now, you might think, why Maine? Why here? Why should I even care? Most, if not all, of the leftist policies originate in Maine. It is the testing ground. So if you want to fight and stem the tide of these communist policies, you need to support Maine First Project. All of our information is over there, and please go to mainfirstproject.org and sign up. Thank you.

>> Thank you, Zach. I like Zach. Say hello to Zach. Very fun guy.

>> I appreciate that, brother.

>> Yes. We're going to get rolling here with the actual debate. So Bob is going to step in and moderate for me in just a moment, but I am going to introduce our speakers. So for our debate that we are starting on Christianity or secular humanism, which is best for society. I'm going to start by introducing Planet Peterson, as he'll be going first. He makes entertaining and educational content with a goal of teaching those who want to learn and combating misinformation. Please welcome Planet Peterson.

[applause]

Also, please join me in welcoming Jake, who runs the channel Rattlesnake TV, a channel focused on unabashedly discussing important and controversial topics using humor and extensive research, and which has over 895,000 subscribers. Please join me in welcoming Jake as well.

[cheering]

[cheering]

I like your enthusiasm, folks. We're going to get rolling. I'm going to hand it over to Bob, who is going to moderate this debate as I get the other room rolling. Bob has been with us since Debbcon 1. He is one of the most loyal people I've ever met and one of the most sacrificial people I've ever met, and also has 20 years of military experience. I um am eternally grateful to have Bob as a friend, given his vast life experience and his support of modern-day debate through the years. So, Bob, I just can't thank you enough for being my friend.

>> That's right.

[applause]

>> All righty. Thank you very much, James. I'm not sure I recognize the person he was describing there, but uh, he did call. Some of you may remember Sideshow in the moderation there. That's me, actually. That's my call sign in the Air Force. Former C-130 navigator, did combat search and rescue. But this is not about me. This is about you two here today. Looking at the format I am looking at while James is introducing the debate next door. We're [clears throat] going to start with 10 to 15 minute opening statements with Eric going first. During the opening statements, there is no interruptions. Please do not interrupt, no matter what they may say, how much it may rile you. We'll cut you off at that point. With that being said, though, the floor is all yours.

>> Check. Check. Can you do I got Do I got to hold it?

>> Testing. Testing. One, two, three.

>> I take that holder. See if you can hold it up close.

>> Testing. Testing. That's pretty good. Okay, I can hold it. That's

>> in the back.

>> All right.

>> All right. Um, so I'm not sure what a modern society ruled by Christianity would look like, but a modern society ruled by secular humanism, I think you can just look around you because the axioms of secular humanism are barely different from the enlightenment principles that Jefferson, Madison, Franklin, and Payne championed. They and the people who inspired them, such as Locke, Hume, Montesquieu, Spinoza, and Voltaire. They thought that a governing politic should be sourced in human consent and human reason, not divine right or command, and that morality and justice can be reasoned from human nature. So, are we a society traditionally composed of Christians? Sure. Uh, ruled by a Christian ethos? I don't think so. Uh, there's not a single syllable of the Bible that's pro-free speech, anti-slavery, pro-religious liberty, against cruel and unusual punishments, pro-privacy, pro-consent, pro-democracy, or makes any sense whatsoever to the extent that the vast majority of good Christian people believe in those things. Thank secularism for that. Of course, there are abundant claims about what Christianity stands for. I really hope we don't hear anything about abolishing slavery. Yes, there were Christian abolitionists, but all of the anti-abolitionists were Christian as well. Locke, Montesquieu, Ditto, Rousseau, Condorcet, Voltaire, they all openly argued against slavery on non-Christian grounds years or decades before the Quaker abolitionist movement. So, I don't think you get to show up last and then say this was our idea. Christians also lost two wars they fought to preserve slavery. The Bible is overtly pro-slavery. Permanent abolition was first accomplished by non-Christians. The French anti-Catholic humanists abolished it in the French Revolution, only to have Napoleon reinstate it. And Anglican Texas went to war for independence from Mexico because Mexico was abolishing slavery. So why did it take 1800 years for Christians to start do anything about this? What were they doing before that? Well, largely practicing slavery. For example, in the 16th century, the Pope said, "You're allowed to conquer whoever you want in the New World." And then Spanish theologians wrote the Requerimiento, where they would tell the natives, "You are now conquered and must to convert to Christianity, or else, quote, we shall take you and your wives and your children and shall make slaves of them and as such sell and dispose of them," unquote. The spark that lit the abolitionist movement, which drew massive participation from Quakers and other Christians, came from a secular humanist source that emerged only after 1800 years of Christians living in comfort with slavery. I hope we don't hear the argument that the founders used Christian ideas to create a country for Christian people. This is not true. The quote about our nation being for a moral and religious people, it's not in the Declaration. It's not in the Constitution. It's from a private letter that John Adams wrote to Jefferson. And what he meant by that was the common folk are too uneducated because they don't read philosophy or history. They need religion to babysit them, which is condescending, but it was a pretty common sentiment at the time, not just amongst them, but their influences like Spinoza, who wrote that religion was necessary for the common folk who lack the ability to perceive things clearly and distinctly. Not even 10 years after the Constitution was ratified, Congress clearly stated, "The United States is in no way founded on the Christian religion." Now, the Declaration does say the laws of nature and of nature's God. Jefferson wrote the Declaration, but it was created by a committee of five. Among them was Adams. And Adams said plainly, quote, "We can never be so certain of any miracles as we are from the revelation of nature." That is nature's God. This is what that term means. It's not Christian. It's not even theistic, really. There's this argument that gets tossed around that everything we have that is good is thanks to Christians and Christian ideas. As I stated earlier, I don't find a shred of anything in the Bible that supports the important rights we currently possess. The stuff we all are fans of that you do find in the Bible, like don't lie, don't murder. These are universal ideas. They're not Christian ideas. The Enlightenment was profoundly instrumental in creating the better systems we currently enjoy. And it was explicitly grounded in humanism and reason, not moral authority from God. This is where secular humanism draws its inspiration from. People try telling you that the Enlightenment was an extension of Christianity. I don't think they know what they're talking about. Even among the minority of Enlightenment philosophers who were Christian, like Locke and Montesquieu, they vehemently opposed Christianity as the ruling force. They openly preached for religious toleration, the separation of powers, and that reason ought to be our guiding principle. I think if they rose from the dead, they would stand on my side. Others such as Kant, Voltaire, Rousseau, Spinoza, Jefferson, Paine, and Hume, they weren't even Christians. In fact, the Enlightenment was so anti-Christian that its core tenets, such as natural law and reason, were labeled heretical by Christian authorities throughout the 18th century. And later, Pope Pius IX wrote the Syllabus of Errors, where he condemned basically everything in the Enlightenment and what it wrought. So if you want to know if that movement was a Christian movement, read what the Christians at the time were saying. They will tell you no. Crime and punishment and civic order. These are important parts of living in a complex society. So many of you probably noticed that a lot of trials are the people versus so and so, or this person versus the state of blank. This comes from Immanuel Kant and a secular humanist appeal to reason for that idea. Can you imagine how terrifying it would be to be put on trial versus God and to have the jury or judge decide based on their private faith because God's not in that courtroom, how badly your crime went against God? And furthermore, what does a crime against God warrant as a punishment? Anything. Read the Bible and what God did to people and what Christians were doing to people for centuries. Thankfully, secularist ideas did away with that. Um, we'll probably hear some stuff about fertility rates. Uh, highly religious people, they do indeed have more children on average, but there actually isn't a single state in the US that is at replacement or trending upward. In fact, Mormons are the only Christian denomination that is above 2.2, and I think most people don't even agree that they are Christians. Uh, it's the same story in Europe. There isn't a single European country that is at replacement. Africa and the Middle East are just about the only places with positive fertility rates. And I think I've seen enough from culture war Christians to know that their politics don't really work with mass immigration from those areas. So I don't think Christianity is offering a solution yet to this science. Uh, maybe we'll hear something about how Christians were inspired to invent science because they believed in a creator who made nature's laws intelligible. I think this is a cute story, but I think it falls apart. It's also not really scriptural in any way. To draw an identical comparison, if I said to you, well, teams that believe in God are more likely to win the Super Bowl. And then as my reference, I showed you their post-game speeches where they thanked God. Or they said, "Oh, I just trusted God. God was on our side." I think we all think that that's pretty specious, and that's because self-reporting is nothing but pumping your own biases into a situation. Our intuitions always come primary, and then we strategically reason those biases into our explanations. And early men of science did the same thing when they claimed, "I do this to proclaim the glory of God." Furthermore, the Bible says that God makes the springs pour water, that he makes the grass grow, that he loads the clouds with moisture, that he scatters lightning and all kinds of things. According to God, and by God, I mean the flat-earther who wrote those verses, there's no water cycle. There's no photosynthesis. There's no lightning. That it's all God. The origins of the Christian God are a belief in one who has absolute dominion over nature at all times, which is no different from other countless gods that have been imagined. The prevailing wisdom throughout history was that nature was not natural, but God's continuous intervention. Scientific discoveries caused massive consternation in the Christian world, and they were greeted with as much rejection as celebration. Furthermore, the idea of God being logically deducible from nature was thoroughly debunked by someone who believed in God, Immanuel Kant. A creator who necessarily transcends nature cannot be deduced to be part of a causal chain of natural events. This is a category error. Now, we don't live in the past, but it's worse today. The most popular and influential people who are anti-evolution, anti-vax, anti-climate change, and flat-earthers, they're almost entirely Christian. The biggest enemy of science today, unfortunately, is Christianity. And I don't think it's even close. The biggest benefactor of science today is for now the billions of dollars of funding from our secular government. And secular humanism fully embraces science. You're welcome. Uh, if we go back to the past, Ibn al-Haytham beat Francis Bacon, Roger Bacon, and all the other Christians to the formulation of the scientific method by multiple centuries, and his formulation was superior in many ways. He embraced mathematics, whereas Bacon, for some reason, didn't think that math and science really were important to go together. Um, furthermore, more than a millennium before even Ibn al-Haytham, pre-Christian

>> 10 minutes in, five minutes left.

>> Yep. Thank you. Um, pagan and pre-Christian Greek and Romans were doing extraordinary science well over 200 years before Jesus, or sorry, works. Uh, Aristarchus was able to calculate the distance to the moon with almost 100% accuracy well over 200 years before Jesus was even born. Uh, going back to Francis Bacon, if you read, and he's credited with inventing science, but if you read his book *Novum Organum*, you can tell from the very beginning that Bacon is a strict natural empiricist. He explicitly claims that man can only be revealed truth through nature and through his senses, and actually chastises early Christian zealots for their lack of scientific wisdom. The only reason that the axioms of science work is because they are entirely naturalistic. God created nature, and nature has regularity that can be studied. These are two axioms, but you only need the first one to be able to do any kind of science. Secular humanism is committed to the idea that reasoning should be the core to how we structure a society. I think Christianity is and always has been opposed to this if you take it seriously. Maybe Jake will kind of admit to this tacitly by insisting that what we should do is bow to God's authority for no reason other than God says so, therefore do it. And the final problem, as I see it, is that Christianity is just incredibly and obviously false. Maybe a long time ago, even the brightest minds believed in ideas like this. And you could use a fictional story to persuade people. But today, most people don't believe in the supernatural. Christianity is dying, and a perhaps sorry, Christianity is dying a natural and perhaps inevitable death. Christians have done very good things between the atrocities, and you can find good ideas in the words of Jesus, but I don't think it can be best for humans, humanity's future, because I don't think it has a future. The only choice would then be to force Christianity onto a population that rejects it, which has never worked, not even for Christians. People have died on scales, per capita wise, that at times dwarf even Poland or the USSR during World War II in past conflicts such as the Thirty Years' War, the St. Bartholomew's Day Massacre, the English Civil War, the Scottish Covenant Wars, the Dutch Revolt, the Swiss Capel Wars, the Irish Confederate Wars, and the Taiping Rebellion. Those were all primarily predicated on Christians forcing Christianity onto other people, and actually usually Christians, a practice that not only doesn't work, but is blatantly against the New Testament's teachings as well. Secular humanism is merely the idea that human reason, ethics, scientific inquiry, and a few other things are the best tools for understanding the world and improving the human condition. Every Christian embraces the fruits of this endeavor. Even Christians have embraced secular humanism's principles that human reason can bring us to understanding even moral truths. I will end with a sentiment from John Locke, an Enlightenment Christian philosopher, who said, "Even if humans or sorry, if humans do not have a natural moral instinct, then we can't even know that Christianity is good. If it is good, uh, even if that were to be revealed to us, without the natural instinct, we could never possibly know it. We are the way." Thank you.

Alrighty, and thank you for that opening statement. Pretty much right on 14 minutes there. Jake, you ready to go?

>> Roll.

>> All right, your time starts now.

>> All right, first of all, it's a bit of a funeral in here, guys. So, first of all, make some noise.

>> [screaming]

>> One more. One more. One more.

[cheering]

>> All right. Sorry, I had to do that. My bad. Okay. Thank you for the history lesson, Planet Peterson. I appreciate that. Didn't hear many arguments, but the history lesson was well enjoyed. So, let me introduce you guys to my argument today, which is the Christian Authoritarian Humanist Manifesto. A precursor to the Christian Authoritarian Humanist Manifesto of 2025. Christian authoritarian humanism is a conservative philosophy of life that with supernaturalism affirms our ability and responsibility to lead ethical lives of personal fulfillment whilst aspiring to the greater good of humanity. The life stance of Christian authoritarian humanism is guided by reason, inspired by courage to confront the unknown, and informed by self-serving yet self-evident experiences, encouraging us to live life well and fully. It has persisted throughout the ages and continues to evolve through efforts of thoughtful people who recognize the values and ideals necessary to achieve the greater good. These values adapt as our knowledge and understanding of the greater good advance. This document is part of an ongoing effort to articulate the conceptual boundaries of Christian authoritarian humanism. It provides what we must believe, and if necessary, we will enforce consensus, and what we and in what we do believe in the spirit of absolute divine justice and for the integrity of all of mankind. It's actually remarkable how closely my views align with my opponent's, albeit with a subtle but crucial nuance. And it reads as follows: Number one, knowledge of the world is derived by observation, experimentation, and rational analysis. Human beings are complex, imperfect creations. Yet, Christian authoritarian humanists hold that science is an effective tool to guiding humanity towards its ideal form. Whilst original sin corrupted man, science can assist in enhancing the qualities necessary for flourishing. Humans are an are integral part of nature. The result, number two, humans are an integral part of nature, the result of divine creation. We recognize nature as self-existing and accept the life God has given us as sufficient and complete. Number three, ethical values are derived from God's preferences, needs, and interests, as tested by human experience. Christian authoritarian humanists ground their values in God's concern for human welfare, extended out to the global ecosystem. We are committed to cultivating individuals of inherent worth and dignity, making informed choices in the context of intelligence and resilience, and acting responsibly towards family and God. Number four, life fulfillment emerges from participation in the service of God's ideals. We strive for our fullest development, animating our lives with purpose rooted in God. We find wonder in the pursuit of intergenerational human flourishing, embracing challenges and tragedies, even in the inevitability of death. Christian authoritarian humanists rely on the rich heritage of biblical culture and God's providence to provide comfort in times of want and encouragement in times of plenty. Number five, humans are social by nature and find meaning in relationships with those who resemble them. We aspire toward a world of mutual understanding grounded in shared racial, political, and social relations, resolving differences cooperatively without resorting to violence. The combination of individuality and state guidance enriches our lives and inspires us to enrich the lives of others just like us, fostering peace, justice, and opportunity for those of our kind. Number six, working to the benefit of the state benefits society, which maximizes individual happiness. Conservative cultures have tirelessly worked to elevate humanity above the brutalities of foreign savages, degenerates, and all who defy God's edicts, promoting human flourishing, reducing suffering, and developing a global community among those of shared values. We aim to minimize inequities of circumstance and ability using science to preemptively eliminate conditions that hinder the development of intergenerational human flourishing. We advocate for positive stewardship of nature's resources focused on mankind's ability to utilize them for life flourishing and progress. In conclusion, what I'm advocating for through my manifesto is maximal intergenerational human thriving for all, where the church and the state have a symbiotic relationship. We believe in elevating the social status of women, whose central role in humanity must be recognized through education and their nature and their natural capacity for motherhood. Humans cannot exist without women, and their contribution is both vital and sacred. In the name of progress, justice, and the continuation of humanity, we advocate for the responsible cultivation of this resource. And what does my opponent advocate for? Well, what you're going to notice throughout the the entire course of this debate is that he will advocate for measures that are low time preference, meaning only good for the here and now, autonomy, my freedom, my rights, at the expense of future generations. I argue within reason for the responsible use of authority to prevent behaviors detrimental to future generations, securing long-term flourishing of humanity and the realization of the greater good. With that, I cede my time.

>> That's how you open.

>> Alrighty. Thank you for that opening statement. I wanted to quick take a moment to say thank you to our friends at Maine First Project for sponsoring Debatecon 6, as they also believe in the values of free speech and fair debate. Maine First Project is fighting for conservativism in New England and beyond. So check out their link in the description box below.

>> We'll now enter into the 60-minute open dialogue. As a reminder, both debaters, please remember open dialogue is organic. It is a dialogue. It is not your opportunity to try to overtalk your opponent. Keep interrupting them. So try to wait till the end of the question. But if you do ask a question, the your opponent has the right to answer what you've been asked. So as long as we can keep it civil and there's minimal interruptions, my job is easy and we'll go from there. 60 minutes open dialogue.

>> All right. Uh, Planet Peterson, I would first like to know which uh humanist manifesto you follow. Is it one? Is it two? Is it three?

>> I don't follow any manifestos.

>> So it's the Planet Peterson manifesto.

>> No. Do you know what? I don't think you know what secular humanism is.

>> Well, secular humanism has three manifestos, right?

>> It's that the manifestos are not what secular humanism is. I I defined it in my opening.

>> But so so what's like what do you follow then? Is it just Planet Peterson's manifesto?

>> No, I don't know what you mean by what do I follow? I mean, I try not to break the law. Uh, I have all kinds of private ideas and yeah, try not to. I have all kinds of private ideas, but I get my inspiration from the culture I live in. Everybody does that. I think the vast majority, I went over this in my history lesson, but the vast majority of the good ideas uh that have shaped this world that you and I can comfortably live in, anybody of any walk in faith can comfortably live in uh are reasoned from a a kind of secular humanism. So

>> private ideas. So it is so you are the authority on secular humanism.

>> Explicitly said actually kind of the opposite of that. I said I do have my own private ideas, but I draw inspiration from the culture.

>> You draw inspiration, but in a way we're talking about your ideas. We're not talking about you know, this sort of fluffy language about I draw inspiration from the Who is the authority? Does does your worldview have a normative authority or not?

>> I'm the authority of Christian authoritarian humanism.

>> I don't think that it has an authority because [laughter] I don't think I actually have a question about that in here. That's really funny that you said that. No, I don't claim to be an authority. I don't want to live under authoritarianism. I don't think you do as well. I mean, like you believe God has like the ultimate authority. So like in that

>> I think we already live under authoritarianism.

>> I mean, okay, that's interesting. But no,

>> that's what's interesting about it. Tell me how we don't

>> what's how do we not live under authoritarianism?

>> Yeah,

>> because we have a society that is structured under the consent of the governed. What is what do you think authoritarianism is?

>> Buddy, I'm not doing stupid like this.

>> You made a claim that you don't live under authoritarianism. What is it?

>> And you're trying to like you've straw-manned me already. You've called me dictator of the world. And now you're just trying to say every time I make a statement, you say define the last word that you said. So we live in a democracy. Democracies are not authoritarian.

>> I'm going to ask you again. You may not want to answer the question, but it is a debate. So what do you think authoritarianism is?

>> Um, that's a good question. I would say it's something like subjugating I would say it's something like subjugating the masses under ideas that are held by the few, the powerful, whatever. I've actually got a definition. So, we don't have proprietary definitions here. Proprietary definitions. I'll pull I'll pull up a definition of authoritarianism and see and see if we can both agree to it. Okay. James, the Wi-Fi is a little bit slow in here. Hey, it's okay. All right. So, favoring or enforcing strict obedience to authoritarian to authority at the expense of personal freedom.

>> Do you think that that's bad?

>> No.

>> Okay.

>> I think we live under that right now. Your secular humanist society that we currently live under.

>> I asked you if you think it's bad.

>> No.

>> Oh.

>> Do you think that we should have unlimited personal freedoms and never have any authority? Is that what you're saying?

>> No.

>> So then you think it's good?

>> No. Because if it comes from the consent of the governed, then it does then it's not then it's not top down and dictatorial. That's what democracy is. You elect an authority and then you you are obedient to the authority.

>> Yes. But we have representation and we have the power to dispose them if we want to.

>> But then there's another authority.

>> useful means.

>> I if you're just going to say that everything is authoritarianism, then okay. I this isn't very interesting. And

>> I find it really interesting. The audience has nothing to do with Christianity.

>> I mean,

>> look, like we we live under an authoritarian I think maybe you're thinking I'm going to give you charity here. Maybe you're thinking of totalitarianism. That's not what I said. I said Christian authoritarian humanism, and we already live under an authoritarian society.

>> Yeah, we just disagree about that.

>> Okay, but let me let me help me to understand. Does your worldview, this secular humanist worldview that you adhere to, is there a normative authority? And what happens if another secular humanist comes to you and says, "You know what? These Christians, I don't believe in God, but they make some pretty damn good points and they and they govern." What's what's your beef with that?

>> What's my beef with if secular humanists say, "Hey, I listen to some Christians and they have good ideas."

>> Yeah. And we're going to govern accordingly according to the Christian Authoritarian Humanist Manifesto.

>> The Yeah. Which doesn't exist, by the way.

[laughter]

He copy and pasted the Secular Humanist Manifesto 3 and then just sprinkled Christianity on top of it.

>> I would never do that. I would never do that. But I'm glad you know what the Secular Humanist Manifesto is at least a

>> a little bit.

[laughter]

>> Um, where were we before?

>> I don't know. Can I I want to ask you some questions.

>> No, we need to understand.

>> No, you don't get to tell me no. We need to understand what the authority is for secular humanism according to Planet Peterson. What do you principles of democracy already?

>> So democracy

>> yes I think democracy I think that's a very fine system to use.

>> Listen, what do you do if another secular humanist comes along and says, you know what, all this human thriving, these Christians, Christian authoritarian humanists make a pretty damn good point. We're going to govern like that. What's your problem with that?

>> If if the inspiration that those Christian secular humanists, Christian secular, that's funny, uh, if the inspiration they draw from that come is grounded in uh trying to understand the human condition and improve upon it and believing that reason is our guiding principle, and they don't do it by saying, "God is telling me we should do this, therefore we should do it," then it is just secularism, and I don't have a problem with that.

>> Okay. What is reason?

>> Reason is Huh? That's an interesting question. I would just say it's the tool we use to try to the mental tool we try to use to understand the world.

>> Am I using reason?

>> I I don't think you're being reasonable, but I think so.

>> I think I'm using reason. So

>> yes, that's that's very secular.

>> So I used reason. I'm a secular. I'm I'm a If I'm a secular humanist and I've used my reason to come to the conclusion that Christianity and the principles of Christianity, Christian authoritarian humanism are better than yours, what is your problem with that?

>> I Well, I already answered that question, but this is hypocritical of you because you're not relying on authority from God. You have separated yourself from God to do this.

>> I mentioned him.

>> Yeah, you mentioned him, but you have you have not drawn your inspiration from it. You You haven't proclaimed.

>> Where else did I get the

>> You didn't pray about it. You didn't consult Council of Bishops.

>> I feel like you would have said so. You're not You're not

>> You are not like God isn't in the equation anywhere in here.

>> God isn't in the equation.

>> No, you haven't brought him up.

>> I use God's preferences.

>> No, you didn't. I said, "Dear, are you not listening?" I said, "We I want to adhere to God's to God's preferences." Honestly, I don't even know if we if this debate can move forward unless I really understand like the crux of your worldview, cuz right now it is just pure fluff. It is just whatever Planet Peterson says about being governed by reason. I've just demonstrated that I use reason. So what's the difference between you and

>> if you would have listened to my history lesson, you would have heard how I invoked philosophers who are both Christian and not Christian that informed the worldview that I espouse that I think is preferable. So you're I don't know what you're doing, but this is just

>> I'm trying to understand your worldview. I think I'm being pretty good faith here. I'm trying to understand. So you're saying that your philosophy, Planet Peterson, is an amalgamation of various different philosophers over history. Okay. And you think that God's not real. So then you think we should use this metaphysical concept of reason to arrive at a at a thriving society. Have I steel-manned it? Well,

>> that's not bad.

>> Okay. Well, that that means nothing.

>> You just described it and you're going to tell me that it means nothing.

>> I can describe something that means

>> magic doesn't exist. What you believe is magic. Therefore, it's nothing.

>> I'll grant it. Sure.

>> Okay.

>> All right.

>> How do we become a Christian society? Well, a Christian authoritarian humanist society. You mean

>> Jake, I'm actually interested in trying to have a somewhat intellectual exercise here.

>> I would love to, but I have no idea.

>> You're not going to.

>> Great.

>> You're saying that you said to me before that things should be governed by reason. I demonstrated that I'm using reason. If somebody comes along to you as a secular humanist and secular, and they are using different principles, you actually have no way to combat that. There's nothing to combat because you literally just appealed to a secular process of reason.

>> I take

>> How is reason secular?

>> Because you're not sourcing it in God.

>> When you use reason to arrive at God,

>> Jake, when you reason, where is God doing any of the work? If I use my own rational faculties, I'll grant to you. Maybe God's not real, though. Okay. Maybe God's not real. If I even my rational faculties to arrive at God, how am I not using reason?

>> I didn't say you're not using reason. I said, we're back to the future. Equal playing field. I'm using reason. You're using reason. What separates us?

>> You you the way you keep twisting this is insane. I said God's not part of the equation. And then you admitted it. And then you flipped around and said to me, "So Peterson, what's the problem?" I don't have a problem here yet. Your problem is that you're just abandoning your faith. How have I abandoned my faith? Because you explicitly said God's not part of the reasoning process. There's a difference between saying I will grant an argument for the sake of debate and saying that God isn't real. That's not what I said. I said I'll grant it for the sake of the debate just so we can potentially get somewhere with this. You should have listened when I interrupted you because I said even if God exists, the process of us using reason is secular. How is it secular?

>> So you're saying Christians can't use reason.

>> Where does God enter the equation when you have thoughts?

>> Nowhere. You said that it's not part of the process.

>> Listen, if so, you're saying that Christians can't use reason. No, I said when they use reason that is divorced from God, it's not secular. There's no such thing as Christian math. There's no such thing as Christian science. There's no such thing as Christian me having an idea in my head. That makes zero sense. But there is such thing as secular science, not just science. Science just is secular.

>> So So secular science is a thing.

>> I couldn't I couldn't hear you.

>> Secular science, that's a thing. Science is secular.

>> It's not. There's no God in the science.

>> Science is science.

>> Yeah.

>> It's not secular science. It's just science. Christians use science just as well as secularists use science.

>> When I say secular, what I'm really meaning is that it's just devoid of this one thing. So then, yes, it just becomes tautological. Science is science. Math is math.

>> There's no there's no Jesus math. There's no Buddha math. There's no science. There's just those things just are what they are. I mean like I'm willing to even grant for you for the sake of the argument maybe God isn't real. But what we're trying to arrive at here is outcomes. What we're trying to arrive at here is human flourishing. So I actually want to know based on Planet Peterson's authoritarian secular humanism, because this is just coming purely from your brain, how do we arrive at intergenerational long-term human flourishing?

>> I have already answered that question and I've already addressed how you're straw-manning it by saying it's according to me. It's not according to me.

>> But if we're going to talk about um flourishing, so the I looked up the countries that have the 10 biggest Christian populations. Uh, only one of them outlaws abortion, but Egypt, Iraq, Sierra, Sierra Leone, Senegal, and uh, these are all Muslim countries. It's all illegal there. And throughout the Middle East and North Africa, it's extremely restricted. Half of the biggest uh Christian countries have legal gay marriage. There isn't a single Muslim majority country that allows it. Uh, as far as women voting, they can vote in all but two countries. But Christians were the first to give to give them the right to vote. Muslims were the last to do it. So, do you envy them? Those Muslim countries.

>> Where is this happening in Christian authoritarian humanist societies?

>> Do you envy these Islamic countries?

>> Where is this happening? That

>> if you're not going to answer any questions, then I will not answer any of your questions, too. I'm done with the clown show.

>> Listen, this is not a clown show, buddy. You have got just as much as you you your worldview. You can't even explain it. You're just saying it's by wish.

>> You can't answer a yes or no question.

>> I'm just giving you what you're giving me. That's all I'm doing. Yours comes from your brain. Mine comes from my brain. What's

>> never said that. Do you envy these cultures?

>> Say it, but it's but it's self-evident.

>> I promise you that I will ask you this exact same question for the rest of the time we have today. Do you envy these cultures?

>> So, what? We're going to just uh take the debate hostage.

>> You're the one doing that by not answering the question.

>> Why don't you ask me about Christian authoritarian humanism, which is construction rather than Muslim cultures?

>> Do you envy them?

>> Where is this happening? That

>> If you want to ask me about Christian authoritarian humanism, you can do so.

>> I am there's a question about that.

>> Do you do which group is more morally superior?

>> One? Sorry.

>> Which group is more morally superior? Who

>> I'm asking you out of like Sierra Leone and the Muslims or

>> these Muslim majority countries that outlaw things that you're in favor of, outline the Christian countries largely don't. Which one is morally superior?

>> You'd have to give me more context about the societies.

>> just based off of that knowledge.

>> You just as morally superior. If they said Planet Peterson punched someone in the face yesterday, Jake didn't punch someone in the face yesterday. Who is morally superior? I'd need to know a little bit more about the person. But if you had to guess, you'd probably go with yourself.

>> If you just won't You're not You won't You refuse to engage in this.

>> It's a stupid question. Let's be real.

>> It's not a stupid question. It is.

>> You're just a

>> If you want, we can talk about what I think rather than about what Sierra Leone thinks.

>> We can't talk about what you think. I asked you what you think and you refused to answer the question. So, you won't tell me what you think.

>> Listen, when I won't do it,

>> when I asked you about your worldview, you were saying, "Oh, this is a stupid question. This is a stupid question. You said to me, uh, secular humanism is basically based upon reason. It's my interpretation of secular humanism that should govern society.

>> I am not the only person that has the capacity to do reason. Maybe in this room, yes. But this is a human universal thing.

>> Oh, it's a joke. Good grief.

>> All right, keep it down in the

>> If you can't laugh at yourself, then you're dead inside. Okay.

>> listen. There

[laughter]

is

>> that's a good one.

>> There is no let me just make this very clear. Okay. There is nowhere in the world right now that is actively practicing Christian authoritarian humanism. Okay? Equally so, there is nowhere in the world right now that is practicing Planet Petersonism secular humanism. Okay? Nowhere in the world.

>> So we are on an equal playing field. So now we're going to talk about prescriptions for the future based upon our worldviews and what we think. Okay? Not about Sierra Leone, not about Egypt. We're going to talk about what we think. Okay? Does that sound fair enough?

>> Sure.

>> I can examine your worldview. You can examine mine.

>> No, I can't remember.

>> Topic of the debate is Christianity or secular humanism. Which is best for society?

>> Yes. Okay. Can I ask you a question?

>> Go for it.

>> So like long as I get to ask one next.

>> Yeah, that's totally fine. So, like I I've seen some of your stuff and you seem to rant a lot against like feminism and like uh sexual immorality stuff like that.

>> And all this other stuff. So, I haven't really heard you say how any of that would be bad for society beyond maybe like birth rates go down. So, the the other stuff is just stuff that you don't like. So why like is having to coexist with people you don't like your idea of an unhealthy society?

>> No. I think that you can coexist with people that you don't like all the time. I mean, in terms of feminism and degeneracy and these sorts of things, I think that you can see widespread negative effects of this, such as things like STDs amongst the population. You can also see obviously declining birth rates. Declining birth rates is actually not something that's insignificant. Declining birth rates means that over a long period of time, we're going to uh suffer significant population decreases.

>> I agree and we have to do something about that. But there in the United States, even the Christians are having fewer and fewer and fewer children. So

>> you said you said in your opening statement that all of the states are below replacement.

>> Yeah. No state in the United States is above the 2.2 threshold.

>> That was a very disingenuous straw man. I noticed that because do you know what the replacement rate is amongst Catholics and Orthodox?

>> I said there isn't a state. You're talking you're you're breaking it down to individual. But you're implying there that Christians aren't having kids anyway. That's a strong

>> No, I'm implying that there are states uh in the United States that are more or less Christian. But overall, um I I want to ask you a question. Do you think that we are a Christian nation? Just I'm not gonna like

>> I rode a kangaroo to school every day and I'm a filthy unwashed Australian. I'm not going to talk to you about American history. So listen, do you know

>> I just I just mean like presently. Is that what you think?

>> It it's it's irrelevant to the debate. It's irrelevant to the debate.

>> It's not.

>> Listen, what do you actually know what the birth rates are amongst Catholics and Orthodox?

>> I've I've looked at the last time I saw I looked at some Pew Research and they hover between 1.8 and 2.2. Definitely true for Catholics in America.

>> Yeah. And so they're at it. But that's why I wanted to ask, do you think we are a Christian? So even though we have a lot of Christians in this country, it's still is not coinciding with uh positive birth rates. So I don't who's having if the Christians are above replacement rate, the the traditional Christian churches are above replacement rate and the secularists are

All way below, then who like who's holding up the ship here? The we're largely Christian. So like if you're then you're argu. So is your view then eventually all the secularists are going to die? The population of the country will go down because of that. But then once all the people like me are dead, then the Catholics and whatever will have more babies and then the population will go back up.

Because I don't think that's true. That's not the case because your birth rates are also declining. They're presently at replacement but they've been declining. So there's no reason to not think that in 20 years or whatever when we do these studies again, that Christians won't also be below replacement. You might be right about that. But here's what I would say. I'd say the most positive thing that you can do is to promote family policies and to promote widespread propaganda about why people should have. You ever seen those Instagram reels where the the woman's holding one like a little baby cow in one arm and a baby in the other and she's on a farmstead and all this sort of stuff?

No. You never seen that? No. Well, you should watch it. It's good good content. But but this this this is [laughter] this is this is an example of the kind of propaganda because what do you see right now? You see boss babe. Oh, I'm in Dubai. But if you had more propaganda aimed towards family policies, then I think this would be a positive thing. And the whole crux of my argument here is not that we're going to just start, you know, turn the lights down low making love and doing it right. You and me. No, definitely not.

[laughter] [gasps] Um, that's not the crux of my argument. The crux of my argument, if you noticed in my opening statement, is intergenerational human flourishing, which means the promotion of family, family policies that takes a long time. Look, I may be dead and gone by the time we achieve this, but I'm willing to lay down the seeds right now. The seed right now [laughter] that that will that will grow a fruitful tree in the future. The problem that I see with the secularists is it's about my freedom right now and you don't like you clearly don't even care about this problem.

About the replacement rate. Yeah. No, I do. What's your prescription to fix it? There are lots of ideas that have been tried. Not a lot of them work, unfortunately. Like some other countries, they've tried doing things like we'll give you like a massive first-time home buyers discount if you have like a few children or whatever and it works in the short term and then it stops working in. Yeah, I think they did that. So, I don't know. I my hope about the about the way it is. First of all, we have to get the like cost of living down because that's that helps too. And uh, I I wish Christians would speak out more against like greed, corruption, and promote like austerity. I don't I don't see enough of that like in our politics, which is there's so much Christianity in our politics. So I hope that a positive Christian movement starts to infiltrate and help us out with that.

Can I what can I say? Like like I actually like I agree with you that that economics is an aspect of it and I agree with you that a lot of times these sort of uh family policies where they give first home buyers grants and everything to families they sort of like can flatten the curve and then in terms of economics when you look at urbanization around the world that's when birth rates tend to decline but I think that what you're the argument that you're making is that this is a cultural problem that this can't be fixed by throwing money at it.

Um, a little bit. So I'll I'll try to make this point quick. What I kind of hope and it is really just sort of hope for an issue like that is we'll just get to a point in our society where the just sort of collective conscious of the society which will which will penetrate everybody regardless of what you believe in. Yeah. See, hey, you started us down this road. So, we're going to penetrate everybody, first of all, and then and I'm the [laughter] authoritarian far. And that I'm just hoping the look on your face is priceless. And then I I just hope that that swings things. So, like I'll give a r I'll give kind of a weird example, but like you know how smoking used to be the most normalized thing in in restaurants and airports or whatever.

Smoky man bad. If you look at but if you look at a graph of lung cancer rates, it like like in World War II, it was lower than any other type of cancer for like the death rate. And then it shot up and was stronger than all of the other cancers almost combined. But it's plummeted by like 50% since then because it just as a society, we just said, "Look, we now know that this isn't good. That it's not healthy and there were educational campaigns for that. So a country can do that whether or not nobody in it is Christian or everybody in it is Christian. That's my hope.

So you're saying that you're hoping that the collective consciousness eventually turns around and everybody gets penetrated by consciousness. I hope yes. I hope we appeal to that secular process of human reasoning. So So your prescription is that I hope in the future we have education campaigns. What would those education campaigns look like? For well education? What would they be promoting? Well, I don't Well, they would be promote I don't know, making babies, I guess.

So, women not being in the workplace, for example. Would this be lack of like maybe don't have an abortion? Like, what are we talking? Um, I don't I mean, I haven't really thought about what it will look like, but. So this this is my problem with this. This is not a small problem. And I believe that the Christian authoritarian humanists have a serious plan for this moving forward. And I and we can we can. What's the plan? Well. We are going to do a mass propaganda campaign to get women out of the workforce and back into the kitchen, baby.

[cheering] [applause] Disincentivizing higher education for, you know, un unless it's something that they really need more into support roles. And we're going to encourage uh motherhood as not something that's frowned upon or you're just a mom. Motherhood is going to be something that is venerated. That's what we're going to do. Okay? And this you you may turn your nose up at this, but this is a cultural prescription. I think we've identified that it's a cultural problem. You can't just throw money at it. So, we need to be culturally incentivizing people to make babies.

Don't you agree that um like I can agree that single motherhood isn't like even a secuist could agree that single motherhood isn't as preferable to like dual parent uh parenthood child rearing because the kid has two parents and so there's more people to take care of them so they'll be help. But don't you know that or don't you agree that it's Christians who stigmatize single mothers the most? And so if I were knowing I was going to be a single mother and the predominant culture around me is Christian and stigmatizes me for that and calls me a or whatever, then why would I want to have a child?

So you're saying that single motherhood should be venerated? It doesn't. So just because it's not vilified doesn't mean that we're going around saying it's the preferable thing. Look, if a single mother walked into a church tomorrow and said, "Guys, I'm in just say into it, a Catholic orthodox church. I'm in desperate need. My I've got my kids here. I'm struggling." Do you think that they would say, "Ugh, get out, bitch." Or do you think or do you think that they would welcome her in? This is literally there's a social experiment on this going on right now. This woman has been calling all kinds of churches throughout the country and saying, "I'm a single mom. I don't have any baby formula. Will you help me?" And she's gotten about 10 yeses and 33 nos.

And unfortunately, we don't really have baby formula on hand a lot of the time to be fair. Well, isn't Christianity big on charity? Like they could dip into the collection plate and buy $5 worth of formula to help a baby starve. But a lot of them say, "Well, you're not a member of our church, so no." Look, if what you're saying really checks out and if uh this woman is just a neutral observer and she's just forming this experiment and she has no political bias whatsoever and she's asking. Political biases have nothing to do with whether or not the Christians are helping her. Yeah. Well, well, the idea here is that Christians will stigmatize will stigmatize motherhood, right? Like. They do do that. It does happen. I'll. I'm not even arguing it's most but it happens. So, in terms of uh single motherhood, we would acknowledge that it's not the ideal, but if a single mother walks into a church tomorrow, I would bet my bottom dollar that they would welcome her with with open arms.

Open arms. The So, again, this social experiment, whatever, it's very anecdotal. I will admit that. And I would hope that they would too. I don't have like national numbers or something over this, but that's fine. Like, I don't have a problem in a secular humanist world. You would have religious freedom. Churches would be able to do whatever it is that that they do, the charity work and all that kind of stuff. I do I I did want to say. But the problem is though that the secular like the secular world promotes single motherhood. So it doesn't promote it. It. If you have a giant wealth single motherhood don't stigmatize it and you just stigmatized it I feel like with that welfare state comment, right? So this is actually so this is an important thing. Christians. So Christian like they give a lot to charity. I looked up some numbers. The like the total Christian giving I found in the United States was $146 billion. Give yourselves a round of applause. That's very good. However, uh that's like that's not even 10% of what is paid out in meansested welfare and assistance programs. And unfortunately, and I just saw it, unfortunately, who is against helping people? Christians. You want to take away welfare that helps people. There's nothing Christian about that.

Jesus would say, "What's wrong with you?" Relax. So, uh, well, are you are you in favor of dismantling the welfare state? Yeah. What's Christian about that? Listen, chapter and verse. When you when you square this with Matthew 25 where he said if you do the least of these if you do not do the least of these then you do. Manifesto but I'll get to maybe I need to add another section in my manifesto but. This is anti-Christian. Matthew 25 sheep are those who feed the hungry give drinks to the thirsty welcome strangers clothe the naked care for the sick and visited prisons based. Now some of that based but you just said I'm in favor of taking the way we've structured our society to dole out assistance and get rid of it. Read me the quote about government welfare. About about about a welfare state. Read you a quote about welfare welfare state. Go. I don't have one off the top of my head. So what you're talking about there is individual charity. You're talking about people doing acts of individual charity. We're not talking about an entire state that keeps people indebted and in welfare slavery. That's not what that's talking about here. And I certainly don't mention that in the Christian Humanist Manifesto. If you incentivize single motherhood as you're saying, oh, oh, don't stigmatize single motherhood. Single mother. Do you think single motherhood is good or bad or what do you think? I think for the child it's preferable to have two parents and even like I'm a I'm a big fan of um like extended multi-generational families. I was my grandparents helped raise me on my dad's side. So my parents didn't have to pay for daycare. Um and I and I had responsible adults around me and they were great people and that was a wonderful thing.

But this should be encouraged, right? Yes. But saying we're not going to call single mothers or we're not going to stigmatize single motherhood is not the same thing as saying what we want is for the women to get knocked up and then not have men in their lives. We don't say. You don't say it. What you guys do is you just pussyfoot around the issue and you will just say, "Oh, well, you know, single motherhood, we shouldn't stigmatize it. Yeah, it's preferable to have two parents in the household, but we shouldn't stigmatize it. There should be no sort of cultural sort of push towards the the the nuclear family." Like, what's actually the argument there? Is it good? Is it bad? Like, what what should we we do about single motherhood? Just give them a bunch of state resources. Um, I think in the interim that's a good idea. I mean, I'm in favor of. What's after the interim? I don't know off the top of my head. Yeah, exactly. Well, like the idea that things couldn't change in the future and then uh perhaps we're not relying on some sort of system like that or whatever. I mean, all the jobs are going away in two years because of AI anyways. So, I don't know what's going to happen. That's speculative. That's speculative. It's literally like already happening. Amazon's announced 140,000 layoffs over the next couple of years. Like, we're in for some pretty uncomfortable things. Yeah, look, here's the problem, and I think that you've demonstrated this time and time again throughout this debate. You're operating on a system of low time preference. So, you're operating on a system of what's best right now. We don't want the single mothers to feel bad right now. We would rather them feel good and just hand them money in the interim, you say. And everything that you've pretty much said dur throughout the course of this debate is about like personal feelings in the here and now. What I'm talking about is high time preference. I'm talking about intergenerational human flourishing. Obviously, we need the birth rates for that. You can't just say, "Well, I hope that, you know, in a few years everybody sort of collectively changes their mind and then the freaking AI comes along and makes little little babies." I don't know what even your prescription was. There was no prescription there. You're just operating on a low time preference. It doesn't feel good right now. We're not going to do it. In the United States, the most religious states have the highest rate of poverty, the highest rate of obesity, the highest rate of infant mortality, the highest rate of maternal death, the highest rate of STDs, the highest rate of teen pregnancy, are the least educated, and have the highest murder.

That is extremely racist, my friend. Yeah. So, that is extremely racist. Why should we be more Christian if being more Christian comes with those things? That was one of the most racist things I've ever heard. Now, if you so insectic about your own beliefs. Let's take STDs for example. How about in what's that what's that state called? The really white state. What's the whitest state? Keep going. Pretty sure it's Wyoming. No. Really? No. There's lots of hot hot white girls there. I can't remember what it's called. It's I think it starts with a W, but it's up it's up north somewhere. No. Montana. Montana. Thank you. It's not a W. It's an upside down. See, he's from Australia. So, it was upside down. Sometimes we see things upside down. No. [laughter] Uh I I you know, I've I've heard you say this, Eric, and I looked into it, and if you look at the whitest states in the United States, they have the lowest rates of STDs. So, I don't understand this this racist dog whistle that is coming from you right now. Literally, you're the one that said it. You brought it up, my friend. I didn't bring it up. You're you're you're just talking here about rates of STD, obesity. This is a massive problem in the black community. A lot of these Bible belt uh that you're talking about, Hold on a second. Hold on a second. That's an interrupt. Don't interrupt me. Alabama, Georgia, all these different places have some of the have some of the highest black populations and they have big problems with obesity and STDs and the likes. So, which do you want to what do you want to do about those? Which race is the most Christian in America? I think per capita it will probably be black people. Yeah, the black people. So, is your argument that Christianity is good, but black people are somehow immune to the goodness of Christianity? I'll grant the argument as long as you grant that black I'll up. I'll grant the argument as long as you'll grant that black people are the problem here and we have to do something about it. You. Jesus Christ. 5 minutes until we go into Q&A. 5 minutes. Listen, uh I wasn't expecting a racist dog whistle, but we got one. Uh, I to my black black brothers and sisters out there, I I would never sort of, you know. You literally just did. I would never come at you guys like that. You literally just did. You were the one pointing out the problems in their communities. You were the one who did that. STDs, abortions, and the likes. STDs, abortion. Majority of them are Christians. So, apparently their Christianity is causing this. If only they secularized. Separate it by racial groups and see what happens. If it's a problem. Separate it by uh religious versus non-religious and see what happens. Yeah, you get a lot of the Christianity is what's causing it therefore. Yeah. But anyways, once again, if you looked at the STD rates in Christians alone and not just in states, similarly like you actually did before with in your opening statement about the states, you would probably find it's different. You said in your opening statement that the birth that the birth Well, I mean, I've got the facts for this one. Go ahead. You said in your opening statement that the birth rates are all below replacement in the states. But then we find out that amongst religious communities, they're a little bit higher. They have been declining. We don't We live in the middle of history, not the end of history. Well, that's actually your idea, Francis Fukyama. The end of history and democracy and that that's actually your. I know who that is. Yeah. Well, maybe you should. It's not my guy. Yeah, well, anyways, this is about democracy and liberal world order. It's the end of history. This is your people who say these sorts of things that we live in the end of history. But anyways, can a man know can a woman take a in a jar and send it to a man to eat it? In your worldview. You can do what we like murder is illegal. You can murder somebody. No. No. Is it legal? I No. So you would that would be that would pro you you'd get arrested for terrorism because that would probably be classified like as a biological weapon. If he if he orders it online. What about a fart in a jar? A what? A fart in a jar? Can a fart in a jar, cover it up, send it for profit? I have no idea. I wouldn't support it. What if God told him to do it? Would it be wrong? Well, you'd have to give me a proper hypothetical because that's not within God's. Natural God and it told him to do it. See, when you debated Craig on this, you refuse to run away from it because you pretend to have an objective ethic, but your ethic is just. If God says so, then it's fine. So, if God told you to kill a baby, would it be wrong? It's an impossible hypothetical. Has God killed babies before? No. So, if you're just lying, then are we at Q&A time? I about say with that, we're going to pull out a little early. But the BUT THE FERTILITY RATES if you do that. And we'll slide into the Q&A now. Keep it in. [laughter] Once we slide in, yeah, you might have to pull it out quickly during the Q&A though to make sure that we do not get stuck with any one question. Where do we. All right. If you line up along the to the right or left hand side of the tape here, we'll do Q&A until lunchtime. We have approximately 20 minutes for Q&A. 20 minutes for Q&A. We'll make sure we get here. All right. And your question? My question is for Planet Peterson. If secular humanism is so good for society, why is it the selfishness of people that's causing issues among. People? People always when they're more selfish are automatically more aggressive. So I don't I'm not sure I heard your question. If secular humanism is good for society, what about selfishness? It leads to selfishness. Says who? It seems to be the thing because it's the worship of self. Uh, no. Secular humanism is not the worship of of self. So, I just I reject the premise of your question based off of that, but I mean like literally we were talking about I hate to go back to welfare earlier, but uh, my taxes, don't take my taxes and give it to the blacks or whatever it was. That's a very Christian thing. It's liberal, agnostic, Jewish people in our government that are fighting to make that system more robust and largely Christians that are against it for whatever reason. And Jesus said it's harder for a rich man to to enter heaven than a camel to walk through the eye of a needle. So, we should be trying to save Jeff Bezos by taking all of his money.

All right, thank you very much. Next question. And please be advised, we do have quite the line here, so make your questions very pathy and try not to do any follow-ups and answer as best as you can. Next question. One minute. Okay. Oh, I'm sorry. Okay. So, I have a question for Jake. Um, so um about this trap that you can't get out of the secular trap of preference or whatever. So, how can you actually truly escape it though? I'm not telling you. [laughter] How can a secularist escape it? Wait, say it again. How can a secularist escape that trap? Don't answer the question with a question. I'm getting clarification on the question. It's between the two of us as well. So. Well, I'm just asking you like um. So, are you saying how can a secularist get out of the trap or how can a Christian get out of the trap? How can both? Well, a secularist can't get out of the trap. They're screwed. But uh it would go into a more of a theological debate, but but a Christian can ground their uh their morality in God. Well, what's the difference between what God um what God's morality is and what Christianity's perception of God's morality? Because God would exist absent the human mind. It would be it would be an an objective source. Okay. All right, thank you for the question. Next. This is for Peterson. Jake said during the debate, if a single mother walked into a Catholic or an Orthodox church, they would help her. You cited a social experiment about a woman calling asking for formula to multiple churches. Well, I'm sure you read the numbers. All Protestant churches said no. Mega churches hung up on her multiple times. The only Christians that said they were help were Catholic. She said, uh, she called all three. All three of them said, "Yeah." So, why are you even knowing this experiment using Protestant denials to attack Catholics and Orthodox?

[applause] Peru. So, I didn't know off the top of my head what the numbers were by denomination. If the Catholics are doing that, that's awesome. I wasn't trying to attack anybody. Uh, you know that the Muslim the mosque said they would do it. Yeah. So, it was three Catholic churches said, "Yeah, two mosques and one church of Satan." So, again, why are church? [laughter] So his point was the Orthodox. 100% from our. The Orthodox and the Cath also 100% for Catholics. She only called three. So his question was well the Orthodox and the Catholics would help her. You use this to deny that. So I I already said this. I didn't know how it broke down by denomination specifically. I was just treating it as Christian overall. So what would you say to him now that you know that information? Uh thankfully we have a secular first amendment and Catholics have the right to establish churches and have taxexempt status which at the beginning of this country they didn't have and if if Christianity became the law of the land then who knows which denomination takes over there goes the good work that Catholics are able to do potentially. I'm not in favor of that. I'm in favor more of religious liberty which is a secular idea.

All right, thank you very much. I'm going to grab a water real quick. Your question is for our. We'll let him go grab. Grab the man of water. Good job. And again, as you're standing in line, try to make sure you get your questions ready when you get up here so we can get through as many as possible. We have 15 minutes left for questions. You ready, sir? Yeah. Sorry. All right. I just have a quick statement and then a question for you, Planet Peterson. So my first statement is that secular ideals do support single motherhood because they support sex before marriage. So that's my first statement and then I have a question and my question is that a lot of times like for this whole debate you quoted a lot of John Lockach and John Lock was a Christian and he himself said in his second treaty that we are all equal and independent because we are all made of the workmanship of one maker. And so I wondered why you're using him so much even if he was a Christian and did believe in God.

Yeah, that was that was his personal belief. But the reason I pointed to him is there's different ways we can be like a Christian society. I wanted I tried to ask Jake but he wouldn't answer. Is it just bottom up like we have a totally secular government but everybody's Christian in it and that makes a healthier society or should it be like like our governing force top down is Christian? Lach was vehemently against that idea. Um, so that's why I went to him because I think it's pretty powerful for my side to be like, look, even the most influential Christian philosophers that created this great country were in favor of separating Christian rule and making that like the law of the land or whatever. That's why. Good question. Thank you. Next. This is for Peterson. So, your brain is the product of evolution, which uh selects for survival, not truth. So why would you think your a uh brain is aimed for truth? Uh true is uh that which corresponds with reality. Even if I'm not deciding what my beliefs are, I can adopt a computational theory of mind and test uh either using the environment or engaging with other minds that are also merely part of the environment whether or not the beliefs I have correspond with reality. If if everybody in this room said that my shirt is pink uh but Jake said uh or sorry if everybody in this room said my shirt is black but Jake said no it's pink. We could say okay that's the thought that doesn't correspond with reality.

All righty. Thank you very much. Hey thank you so much. Uh I have a question that uh someone in the back wanted answer but didn't want to come up real quick and then I have my own. Uh both for you though. Uh the first was he wants to know how would you know what people want through democracy when we could see that there's sort of a form of manufactured consent where you have sort of popular people that could use their influence and stuff to influence the majority of people but it wasn't an organic true belief that they had themselves. Yeah. You know who Edward Bernay was? I do. Yeah. So like he's he's the father of uh propaganda basically. Okay. So yeah, this is a problem and Nam Chsky has the book about uh manufacturing consent. So in order to combat that, I would just say we have to have really robust systems that emphasize critical thinking and education. Uh compulsory public education is an indispensable tool. I worry that Christians kind of want to do away with that and make all education private. A lot don't, but some do. Um so that would be the primary way I would say to combat that I guess. But then we also have to have uh because they can even if you have an informed public they can get in bed with government because of greed and corruption. I just think we need political reform to deal with that.

Okay. And then my question was um it seemed with the high time preference that Jake's talking about, he's talking about human flourishing that would come in the f future of future generations which would be magnitudes larger than the people that exist today. If you're focused solely on things today and women saying, "Hey, let's just go out and have sex before marriage and abortions and it's not about prioritizing birth rates and motherhood, right? Two-part question. One, doesn't that minimize human flourishing because we won't have the future generations that could have maximum h human flourishing because there's less of us? And second, if you're acknowledging that Islam is the group that's outproducing, doesn't that mean that the people you want to protect through your progressive values will live under a future of Islam because you won't prioritize the actual plans that's being offered by Christian authoritarian humanism by Christian authoritarianism. [cheering and applause] Um, I'm trying to remember your first question. So. People in the future. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I'm prioritizing short-term versus long-term. I don't think any I mean I was told that what I prioritize is short-term, but I don't think so because if we try to come up with uh ideas that are wellreasoned and researched and whatever, and if we assume that human nature isn't just going to radically change 50 years from now, then I don't see why any of our ideas would not be good for uh also in the future. I mean, all kinds of policy ideas have have, you know, paid off, I would say.

All right, we need to move on with this. We've been up here a while. Yeah, there's a lot of people. All right. All right, just for the other questioners here. Uh, he got away with that one cuz we did not have the rule. You cannot ask a question for someone else. You can only ask your own questions. Minimize the multiple part questions as well because we do have quite the line here. Great job. Well, gentlemen, I have plan for a question for Peterson. Uh, in your the back and forth, you made an interesting statement a little afternoon. I'll try my best to quote. I hope a positive Christian movement infiltrates the government. I just want to get some confirmation on that. Will you take a stand with many of the people in this building who say, "We don't want fake Christians. We want real Christians in the government who are actually standing on principle and not actually just using the moniker as a socopolitical currency to get their own pork into bills and make fat off of our taxpayer dollars.

I Okay. I I don't know again how you square that with the teachings of Jesus. Jesus was all about austerity and helping the least among you. He even said the parable of the good Samaritan is about a foreigner. Okay. And so the most hardline Christian people are the most against what Jesus actually said of anybody I know. And so I when you say real Christian, I don't know what you mean by that because it doesn't have anything to do with Jesus. And then I just have like you, I have mistrust in the government. And so now all of a sudden, what if the denomination you're not in favor of is the ones that take control in the government and they start saying, "We're going to do top- down Christian rule on you." and all of you that are they'll just call other denominations blasphemers and they'll they'll tyrannize you. I'm not in favor of that. Religious liberty is the best thing for Christians.

All right, thank you very much. Next question. Hey, thank you both gentlemen. My question is for Peterson. So, is secular humanism basically maximizing human flourishing while minimizing suffering? And if so, my question is who gets to determine what those two things are? And do you see the problem with that? And how is that better for human flourishing? So secular humanism is not what the secular humanist manifesto is. Secular humanism is the idea that human reason, ethics, science, and a few other things are the best tools for understanding the world and improving the human condition. And it sort of largely rejects uh like revelatory or authoritarian dictations from God. That's really all it is.

All right, thank you. football. No, you can talk to me afterwards. All right, next. Great job, gentlemen. Uh I have a question for Planet. Um your goal in this debate is to justify the secularizing of Christians, but secularizing Christians has led to the degradation of the family unit, which leads to a replacement rate that you agree is problematic across the West. How do you reconcile this obvious contradiction? So, I'm not trying to secularize Christians. Again, there's like different ways in which like Christianity becomes like the thing we do or whatever. If the whole nation was made of Christians, but we at least had a secular government that protected their rights and stood for all these things that I'm in favor for, then that's totally fine and we'd probably have good replacement rates, right? Um, so I'm not trying to like secularize you in any way. I'm not I'm not an anti-theist. We didn't really get into this, but I I'm personally not. And so I mean I could also just say like look if we if we have really good ideas but we all die because we're not porking it enough then I guess you win. And so in a thousand years from now maybe I'll say congratulations.

All right, thank you. And next. Hey what's up Eric? I pointed this out in our debate but I see you continue to make the ecological fallacy when you say that a majority Christian state has high STD rates. Therefore Christians aren't doing anything about STD rates, for example. Could you show me any data that actually shows that in those states, the Christians are the ones themselves contributing to the high SED rate? Off the top of my head, I don't have one, but I [clears throat] don't have a study for you on that. But even if it were the case um that they have the lowest, how is it that they so maybe it's not the Christians, but maybe it's the broader culture that they produce because they're so against doing like sex education, for example. Um and so that just leads kids to not understand sex as well. And so they're more likely to engage in unprotected sex, which increases STDs and teen pregnancy. So even if it's not the Christians, they're creating this I don't want to call it ethic or whatever, but this system that is still producing that. And so we'd be better off if we I'm not saying like get rid of the Christians or anything like that. We'd be better off with organizing our ideas because people vote on their beliefs and intuitions and ideas. We should aspire for them to be less dogmatic in the religious sense.

All right, thank you for that answer. Next question. Hello. Question for both. My question is in one word, what is the cure to race? The cure to race. Yes. I don't want to cure it to race. What does that mean? Okay. So, we're seeing race as external, as in groups, ethnicities, etc. We're looking on the outside rather than looking on the inside. So for me, the cure for race would be grace because we're looking internal. So internal has to be of light and not of darkness. So my thing is. Look, I I I see what you're saying, but then you it's implicit in the question that there's a cure for that. I don't think there is. Well, the cure in one word would be grace because again, Christianity standpoint has to be the grace of God.

All right, remember this is a question, not the debate here. Did you have an answer plan? I I mean I would say I would say humanism, right? If we can agree that we're all human, then. All right, thank you very much. Yeah. So, this question is for Peterson. I actually want to push back on something you said about halfway through the dialogue about uh Christians not being uh gen or being the least generous. Um I believe that's roughly the sent or um it was regarding uh they because we don't want to support the welfare state. Does that do you remember that? So, are you familiar with the concept of stewardship? Stewardship. Yes. I I mean kind of. Okay. So, if the welfare state includes things um like for example a big topic is like healthcare uh things like gender affirming care or even abortions uh why ought Christians support the welfare state and pay into it if they're doing things or if the welfare state is doing those things and how would that be me practicing good stewardship just by buying into it or paying into it. Right? So like if if the like tax dollars or whatever are going things that to things that you find objectionable, why should you like support it or whatever? Well, I would I would say that um that's not you being harmed. I mean, you don't like it. But Jake said, look, we have to live in a society of people we don't agree with or necessarily like. Now, some people want to make us into a whatever like a ethnost state or a cristofascist state or whatever. I'm not gross. But um no, I would I would say that those things don't harm you. So that's just kind of the reality of how we form a society. So like like atheistic societies like Stalinism or whatever that oppressed Christians because like well, we say Christianity is wrong so we won't let you be one. And they killed people and all that I'm 100% against that. You just you we have to coexist with people unfortunately. Well.

All right, thank you very much for the question. I have based on the time our final question tonight. We'll have time for two more right here and then we'll have to call at that time. Oh, sorry. Uh according to secular humanism, is abortion wrong? Um and kind of a follow-up to it. No follow-ups, so apologize. Yeah. So, according to secular humanism, is abortion wrong is the question. I mean, I would just say not necessarily. Secular hum secular humanism and Christianity are actually they're very very opposite, which makes these conversations kind of weird because Christianity does come with it uh like commandments and taboos, right? But secular humanism doesn't. It's just a view of how to best formulate ideas. So really the answer to does it say it's wrong is basically not necessarily.

All right, thank you. And our final question for the day before lunch. All right, thank you. Um as you can see I am blind. I have been blind since birth. Um in for both of you. In your ideal world, um, what would be the place of someone like me who is disabled, uh, has almost a 0% chance of being a net benefit to society and how do you come to that from your philosophy? Well, first of all, thank you for being here. Round of applause. Yeah. And I would say that uh in a my ideal society, you'd be looked after and you'd be a part of a church and you'd have a community of around you of people who love you and care for you. Um I would I mean I would express basically the same sentiment except for not necessarily like a member of a church. I don't think that's necessary. Look, as a as an atheist, Jesus is my favorite moral philosopher because of all the stuff he t it's so leftistcoded. All the stuff he talks about about caring for the least among you, care for immigrants, like the egalitarianism of it, it's all great. And if if churches are the community where people are able to uh collect together and have better social health and all that, I had a whole bunch of slides about this that we just didn't get into because the conversation didn't go there. Then that's good. But, you know, in a society like ours, I mean, like we have the college I went to had a school of the blind right next to it. Um, and so we have ways of taking care of people and we can do that just as well as anybody else can. Can you get there without um borrowing from Christianity? Yeah, I think so because um like I don't the the idea of like look no personally believes man I wish people were oppressing me or not helping me out. And so if that's the case then there's no logical argument you can make that well I don't desire these metrics of harm but it's okay for me to impose these metrics of harm onto other people. There is no logical pathway toward that. And but this the reasoning there is completely devoid of Christianity. If you want to make the presupposition that we're all created in God's image and we're all beautiful and I'm worth it, then that's awesome. But that's just you don't need that is what I would say.

All right, let's give it up one more time here for Planet Peterson and Jake of Rattlesnake TV.