Transcription
I've got a quote here that's um linked to what you just said. It's from Uvel Noah Harari who you mentioned. He says, "Humans are now hackable animals."
>> Yes.
The whole idea that humans have this soul or spirit and they have free will and nobody knows what's happening inside them, that is over. And Sam Alman said, "The most successful founders do not set out to create companies. They are on a mission to create something closer to a religion. And at some point, it turns out that forming a company is the easiest way to do so." And lastly, a former Google engineer said, "What is going to be created will effectively be a god. It's not a god in the sense that it will will make lightning or cause hurricanes, but if there is something a billion times smarter than the smartest human, what else can you call it?"
>> It's odd. Thank you for quoting that because I was going to quote it to you. the the Sabalwood's point about about making a religion and that is what is happening and people have pointed out the obvious here you have a system even now that has got some of the qualities we normally associate with God it appears to be omnisient you can ask it any question it is omniresent through the internet etc etc and therefore already there are worship groups to worship AI high. And some people welcome this and say, "Well, this is the way we should go." And other people say, "Just wait a moment. There's something very strange going on here." And in the end, you are bowing down to something that in the end is idolatrous because it is less than God. But it's very tempting to do that.
>> I mean, people are basically praying to it now. They're confiding in a in a way that they might.
>> Absolutely. Doing it. And you know, I'm fascinated by this. I've never seen one of these before, but I like it. And I tell you why I like it.
>> So, for people that can't see what we're doing, it's a brain.
>> It's a brain, and it's got two halves. And one of the people who've influenced my thinking about AI a lot is uh Dr. Ian McGillchrist, the author of this fascinating book called The Matter with Things. and he has studied the fact that this brain has two hemispheres,
>> two halves.
Both halves are involved in almost every cognitive event. But the two different halves have different ways of paying attention to the world. One is narrow focus, the left side of the brain, and the other is the big picture. And he says what has happened historically in the west is for the last five or so hundred years we have concentrated on the narrow rationalist reductionist left side of the brain and we've forgotten the right side that contextualizes everything so that quote we now find ourselves in a world where we understand how almost everything works but we know the meaning of nothing. And what he calls for is to open this sphere up. And of course that includes to beauty, culture, art, music, and religion. Step by step, he appears to be creating more room for God because God makes sense of the space he feels is very necessary to fulfill. And I find that absolutely fascinating. And you probably noticed it too, the number of intellectuals who are step by step taking the Christian faith more seriously as giving a rational account of what's going on that makes very big sense of the big picture.
>> What is going on in society? because it does feel like more and more people have these sort of existential questions about meaning and they might be turning to Christianity or Islam or other but what is from a 30,000 foot perspective happening to us which is making us ask some of these questions and for you know younger generations it might be spirituality however they define that but there's certainly a macro picture here of something happening
>> oh there is I agree with you entirely and I think it's because we've had pushed at us for too long a very reductionist view of the world. It's nothing but physics and chemistry. It's nothing but this is that and people rightly feel it's too small a world to live in. They're looking to break out of this. Isn't there a bigger picture that can make sense of my world and make sense of my life and giving some meaning? Because if you reduce everything, it ends up in a black hole of meaninglessness. And that's one of my uh top reasons for not being an atheist because it destroys rationality by almost by definition because it tells me that my brain which does all the thinking it's not my mind it's connected and those are two different things and that's another big story but this is the end product of a mindless unguided uh process and I have fun with scientists you know sometimes I ask them uh about the brain and how it arose and they tell me something like that and I said and you trust it tell me if the computer that you use every day if you knew it was the end product of a random process would you trust it every single scientist and some of them are very highowered that I've asked that question to have said no I would not so I say you've got a problem haven't you atheism goes too far It undermines the very rationality we need to do science, let alone to believe in atheism. And that's my main beef with people like Richard Dawkins and the new atheists. But I see they're fading. They're fading. So here's the irony. Atheism claiming rationality destroys it. Whereas I believe the Christian faith also claims rationality in in the sense that evidence-based we shout about that a lot in science and medicine and rightly so. What we trust in ought to be evidence-based. I claim exactly the same thing for Christianity and that's why I'm a Christian because I believe the evidence supports it otherwise I wouldn't.
>> So I guess how do I identify? Maybe as someone that's agnostic, like I'm I don't really know.
>> Well, that's okay. But does that mean you're open to know? You'd like to know?
>> Yes.
>> Well, that's I'm always open.
>> That's that's wonderful to see. That's that seems to me to be exactly the right attitude. Jesus actually challenged someone in his day and says, "If anyone wants to do the will of God, he shall know of the teaching whether I'm speaking from myself or whether it's from God." I notice what he doesn't say. He doesn't say, "If anyone wants to know, he will know." If anyone wants to do, he will know. And the difference between the two, and I'd be interested in your response to it, is that being prepared to do something when you know it is more than just knowing it and possibly just leaving it on the table. In other words, Jesus is interested in people who are going to take the step of trust and following him. And that's the big deal.
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>> Do you know what it is? I find all I find all explanations as to like the bigger picture to be like fundamentally incomplete.
>> Yes.
>> Because there's many things you said about the nature of Christianity and religion that I go amazing. Yes. Yes. Yes. And then there's a couple of things I go well. Uh, and the same when I sit here with a physicist that's telling me about the big bang. Yes.
>> I have the same thing where I'm going, "Yes, yes, of course, yes. Oh, we've got evidence that the universe is expanding. Okay, mate." And then they'll say other things and I go, "Well, that's not complete."
>> And so I find myself sat on the fence. I would love you to convince me. I mean, it's not your responsibility to do so, but where does that journey of of believing begin for someone like me? Because, you know, people say the Bible, and I go, "Well, it's kind of like what you said about the computers. It's like if you're using something to justify the same thing is true.
>> Yes.
>> Then that circular reasoning I find to be incomplete. Cuz I could write on this piece of paper, uh, Steven Bartlett is a lizard.
>> Yes.
>> And this piece of paper is true. And then you then use that same piece of paper to justify the validity of that same piece of paper.
>> Mhm.
>> And I know that's not solid reasoning.
>> No. But you see, I could say, Steven Bartlett, there's a red Ferrari parked in the street outside.
>> Yeah.
>> And it's yours if you want to take it. We could sit and discuss it for a thousand years. You would never know whether I was true or not unless you went and looked.
And it seems to me the word skeptic is a very interesting one. I regard myself as a skeptic. But in Greek, skept means to look at something from a distance. Now, if you are ever going to get to know a person, you've got to begin to give up your distance. You will know that from everyday life. And it seems to me one of the things to try to begin to grasp is God is not a proposition or a philosophy or even a religion. God is a person. And as a person, he has entered our world. However incredible that may seem. Although this is the irony of the Harrari position, if I might just say it on a side, people come to me as they've done with their transhumanist agenda and say, you know, we're going to solve the problem of death and we're going to increase human happiness and I look at them and I smile and I say, "You're too late." And they say, "What? We haven't got there yet." I said, "You're too late." What do you mean we're too late? Well, I said the problem of physical death was solved when God raised Christ from the dead 20 centuries ago. And as for human happiness and uploading us into eternity, you know, I'm waiting for the biggest uploading that's ever going to happen in history when Christ returns and raises me from the dead because that is precisely what he promises. And it's most interesting watching people and I say, "Isn't it fascinating that your transhumanism consists in humans reaching out to become little gods?" Whereas Christianity is the exact opposite. It talks about a god who became human so that he could give us life and give us a new relationship with him. What really completes the circle for me is that my relationship with God is a relationship which is based on the solution to the really hard problem and that is the problem that I by nature have not always done good and by my own standards I have failed. Now all this talk of transhumanism, AI and everything else, what it's trying to do is to build paradise, utopia without facing the problem of the damage that humans have caused to themselves and one another. They will not face the sin problem. Christianity to me doesn't compete with any anything else because Christ offers me something nobody else offers me. Nobody else offers me peace. The peace of knowing that I have real forgiveness. The peace of knowing that I have a friend and a companion to whom I can talk all the time. That's been so meaningful in my life as I spell out in detail my autobiography. And the peace of having been given a new life that will not end when I die. I'm 82 now. I'm probably more than twice as old as you are. As I look towards the future, I have in my heart a certainty. Not because I've merited it. The exact opposite. Because I couldn't merit it, but because Christ has done something for me through the cross and the resurrection. That may sound all mumbo jumbo at the moment, but has done something that enables me to have a relationship that is secure, that floods over the whole of life and has made my life what it is for the last 70 years, more or less.
I think everybody, especially in a world that's getting increasingly lonely and disconnected and isolated for many reasons,
>> is looking for that secure relationship.
>> They are.
>> They're looking for their own, you know, a home that can't fall down.
>> Yes.
>> Yes. And a peace that doesn't fade and a an inheritance that doesn't Exactly. You're right.
>> If I could choose that, if I could press a button and have it, I would have it. But there's this other part of my brain which will naturally interrogate whether it's real
>> or it's true.
>> You're absolutely right. Why am I sitting in front of you talking about this stuff? Because I've interrogated myself about it and its truth for over 70 years. I've made myself totally vulnerable. That's why I got into all the debates with you atheists and all the rest of it because I want to be sure. But it won't come about by pressing a button. It will come about if you're open enough to say, "God, I'm open. Reveal yourself to me, and I'm prepared to take the steps that I feel are leading me onto solid ground. I do not believe that this is a process of taking a leap into the dark, but it's making a commitment on the basis of what you know already and taking a step further forward." And the interesting thing about this is the trust that's at the heart of everything. I trust my wife. I've been married to her for 58 years this year. It's evidence-based trust. I don't trust her for no reason. And the same is true of my friends, as would be the case with you. evidence-based trust in science and in Christian things. I don't regard myself as religious particularly and the reason is this and it's an important reason. Most religions prescribe a moral way that you try to follow and you've teachers, gurus, imams, all the rest, priests to keep you on the way and then you come to a judgment at the end. And I usually draw a scale of justice. And if your good deeds tip over the bad deeds, then you get in to whatever it is, heaven, nirvana, all the rest of that's religion. It's not Christianity, though many people think it is. Because if you ask them, are you a Christian? and say, "Well, I do my best and I hope that God will be kind." That isn't Christianity. It's the exact opposite of Christianity. That's a meritbased religion. And you see the irony of all this is that we would never at least I don't know some people might but in a human relationship we don't base our affection and relationship with someone on the basis of their merit. I have a little analogy I use that sometimes tickles people's minds. I say that I met a beautiful girl on my second day at Cambridge. I'd been warned she might be there. And she was sitting at church. And I decided that I'd like to marry her. So I bought the most expensive cookery book I could. And uh I came and I handed to her and she said, "What's that?" Well, I said, "You know, we have a interesting tradition in our family, you see. Uh and if anybody gets married, they give the potential bride a cookbook. Why?" Well, look at page 152. Here is the the laws for making an apple cake and I like apple cake. So law 1 222 take so much flour sugar. Now I said it's going to be like this. If you keep those rules for the next let's be generous 40 years or so I will accept you otherwise you can go back to your mother. Now when I say that to an audience they rock about with laughter but it's exactly the way many of them have been taught to think about God. keep the rules as best as you can and hope that God is generous. When actually I did no such thing. I've given my wife several cookbooks, but they're not the basis of the relationship. And because the relationship is based on acceptance that comes at the start of the common journey, it sets her free to live and do other things that she wants to do. And I have noticed often that once people begin to realize that they're beginning to understand a basic concept which is grace that God does everything. And if we trust him, he it is that gives us the certainty. So it's not arrogance to accept it from him. It's arrogance actually to reject and say, "Oh, no, no, I'll go my own way and I'll try my best and hope that you will accept me." And the heart of the Christian message which I believe is there is that the trust is based on what someone else has done what Christ has done not what I have done and that's what's given me the power and as I said earlier completed the circle and enabled me to live that was a a really beautiful description and definition of what what the Christian faith is about. it still leaves me with a question about whether it's true
>> and this is the sort of central question that I need to find my way over.
>> Yeah, I agree with you. Absolutely.
>> And this is I find myself often I've sat with a few um like Christian apologists and asked them similar questions about like how do I know if it's true? I guess so so far I've got you know if there's a red Ferrari outside you'd have to go outside and see for yourself. That's the only way you're going to know. But what how do you know that this thing you've committed yourself to and you've believed and you know talked about for 70 years of your life is true and could it be the case that it's not true?
>> Okay, let's handle that. That's a hugely important question. I have two approaches to this which I call roughly speaking objective and subjective. And it depends entirely where someone's coming from. They may start very far back and say, "Look, we read about this chap Jesus. How do we know he ever existed?" Well, then you go to the ancient historians and you find that most of them, whether they're atheists or not, believe that he existed and so on.
>> I accept that he existed.
>> Yes. Yeah.
>> Okay. Well, that's a good start. You know, some of the disciples when Jesus rose from the dead, they just didn't believe the story. Ridiculous. And there's a famous story of Thomas who said to the others, he said, "Unless I see the marks in his hands and so on, I won't believe." And then Jesus stood among them and he didn't make fun of Thomas's objective. He said, "Thomas, come and have a look. You never know what swimming is until you get into the water." Isn't that true?
>> It is true. And all I can say is that step by step, keep asking your questions. Absolutely. I don't believe that God will ever ask us to take a step with which we should be uncomfortable. I just don't believe that.
>> Could you be wrong that Christianity So could it be the case that Christianity was was about a real guy called Jesus? uh based on a real guy called Jesus. But the stories told, you know, there was decades passed between the things that happened and people
>> not so much as you'd think. Actually,
>> what for four decades for the first time?
>> When you when you say to me, could you be wrong? My academic mind says theoretically, yes. But practically, no. Could I be wrong? It would be like asking me, John, you know, you've been married to Sally for 58 years. Could you be wrong that she loves you? Well, theoretically, yes, but actually the evidence all points in the other direction. And that's what I would say that I have built up in my life. And I'd love you to ask me that question when you've read that autobiography.
>> Why would you think it would reach?
>> Because I I think what I relate there is enough evidence for someone outside who's skeptical to say there may well be something in that. But in the end, you won't know until you step into the water and then you'll find that Christ is there to catch you.
>> And what did you find in the water when you stepped into the water?
>> Well, I was very young. You see, my parents taught me quite clearly that I wasn't born a Christian. You become a Christian by trusting Christ. That's to have somebody born or made a Christian by some ceremony is absurd to my mind. And so in my simple way, I responded as a child. I didn't have any great feelings or anything else. But what happened to me as I grew, especially as I I went to university in Cambridge, and I decided, look, I really believe this stuff is true. I'm going to stand for it. And it was when I began to stand and share with others that a great deal of the underpinning came in and the certainty came cumulatively. Not all a big I've never had these big flashes of anything. But I have had several experiences of what I can only put down to direct divine guidance and I record them in the book. If you love the D CEO brand and you watch this channel, please do me a huge favor. Become part of the 15% of the viewers on this channel that have hit the subscribe button. It helps us tremendously and the bigger the channel gets, the bigger the guests.