I’m interviewed by Fuad Abdullah Harahap (@fubilosophy) about my deconversion, the sad state of Christian apologetics, my issues with the skeptic community, free will, the afterlife, agnosticism, and a few other topics.

Fubilosophy

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What would convince you of God’s existence? Specifically, the Christian God. What would change your mind and cause you to convert?

I name three things: Christian aliens, miracles, and religious experience. That’s not an exhaustive list, but those things would dramatically raise my credence in Christian theism.

I spend the most time talking about religious experiences, mainly for two reasons. First, their epistemic significance is not always appreciated by nonbelievers. Second, I’ve noticed that some Christian apologists really hate it when nonbelievers say the experience of God would convince them of theism and thought that was worth examining.

/ Videos referenced in the episode /

Jimmy Akin & Emerson Green – Debunking the Skeptics on UFOs

The Argument from Miracles (Panel)

Countering the Argument for the Resurrection of Jesus

What would make atheists accept a miracle claim? | C.M. Lorkowski & Real Atheology

5 Mistakes Atheists Make About Epistemology 

4 Things I Learned About Epistemology

Phenomenal Conservatism with Michael Huemer

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The world is religiously ambiguous: It can be interpreted in various incompatible ways, and the interpreters are not necessarily violating any standards of rationality in doing so. As for me, I don’t feel any position being forced on me by the evidence. My best efforts to judge the total balance of evidence weighing for and against theism leave me thinking that no one has a decisive case; and the main way to give the impression of having a decisive case is to ignore the total evidence, focusing solely or primarily on the facts that support your position. Put a spotlight on the things that favor your view, and minimize or cast aside the things that don’t fit.

Over time, I’ve come to appreciate the force of some of the evidence against the hypothesis of indifference and in favor of a “value selection hypothesis“, e.g. psychophysical harmony, fine-tuning, and the axiological trajectory of the universe. These, along with a few other considerations that favor theism more directly, have gradually moved me to more of a middle position on theism vs. atheism. (Today, I don’t dive into a full-fledged defense of those arguments.)

There are plenty of sources of epistemic uncertainty that have increasingly led me to hold on to my beliefs more loosely. How am I supposed to alter my confidence in light of peer disagreement? How should I set my priors? How am I supposed to reckon with the inescapable contingency of my beliefs? Richard Rorty often spoke about a certain kind of philosopher with “radical and continuing doubts about the final vocabulary she currently uses, because she has been impressed by other vocabularies, vocabularies taken as final by people or books she has encountered” (1989). Rorty goes much further, in ways that I can’t get behind. But what can I say? I’m impressed by many of you. The problem is that you have mutually exclusive, incommensurable worldviews. At least for me, at this point, agnosticism seems like the most honest reaction to my epistemic situation. (Of course, God can settle this whenever he likes.)

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Returning guest John Buck joins me to debate universalism, eternal conscious torment, and other topics related to hell and the afterlife.

My Playlist on Hell

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We wrap up our series on the moral argument for theism, summarize several problems with the argument famously associated with William Lane Craig, and discuss two other moral arguments for God that are not abysmal failures like the standard moral argument.

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In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. And morality.

The standard moral argument popularized by William Lane Craig and others goes as follows:

(1) If God does not exist, objective moral values do not exist. 

(2) Objective moral values do exist. 

(3) Therefore, God exists. 

Today, we cast some doubt on the idea that morality is objective only if God exists. We also define some crucial terms, refute a few apologetic canards, and discuss a few ways in which apologists have misrepresented the field of metaethics and failed the audiences that rely on them.

Here’s the overview of the whole moral argument series. Today, in part one, we’ll be covering sections (1)-(5).

(1) Introduction

(2) Defining Terms

(3) Apologetics vs. Metaethics

(4) “Humans are just animals” (Moral agents vs. patients)

(5) The Moral Law Giver

(6) Euthyphro & Intrinsic Value

(7) Hume’s Law

(8) Why Obey God?

(9) Groundless Morals

(10) Two Classes of Moral Realism

(11) God Cannot Provide the Basis for Objective Morality

(12) Good Moral Arguments

(13) What’s wrong with the moral argument?

A few resources mentioned in this episode:

Majesty of Reason – Moral Realism | Dr. Michael Huemer & Dr. Don Loeb

Is God Necessary for Morality? | William Lane Craig & Shelly Kagan

Moral Objectivity Without God | Russ Shafer-Landau

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Ayaan Hirsi Ali recently announced her conversion to Christianity. But has she only adopted a form of cultural Christianity? I examine her reasons for becoming a Christian and draw some parallels between Ayaan and another political convert: Andrew Tate.

I think her reasons for adopting Christianity are quite clearly explicated, even though some Christians have been trying very hard to ignore them. She argues that Christianity can sustain the liberal values of the Enlightenment that she cherishes so deeply. Those values are under attack, she says, from Islam, Russia, China, and woke ideology. Every purely secular strategy tried in response has been insufficient. Christianity, on the other hand, could function as a far more effective weapon against her political enemies in this existential clash. But why does it matter that the west prevails over its cultural and geopolitical foes? Christianity can help with that, too – not just on a civilizational level, but individually as well. It’s the antidote to nihilism, the heart of liberalism, a panacea for wokeness and illiberalism. These considerations together lead her to adopt Christianity, even if she doesn’t think it’s actually true.

Maybe in the future, she’ll affirm something more than cultural Christianity. Until then, I’m honestly inclined to see Ayaan’s “conversion” as further vindication of the death of God: even the converts don’t really believe anymore. A good deal of true believers are apparently so desperate for a morale boost, they’re willing to look past that.

Ayaan’s guiding light is liberalism, the Enlightenment, and western civilization. She is a positively zealous believer in what the west represents to her, and this is absolutely crucial to understanding her conversion to Christianity. She may not believe in the literal resurrection of Jesus, but she believes in western civilization. She believes this is the best way – perhaps the only way – to save it from withering.

Watch this episode on YouTube 

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I recently asked for your questions, and I posted my responses on YouTube here. We touch on compatibilism, NDEs, aliens, euthanasia, abortion, death anxiety as an atheist, idealism, incest, Islam, Mormonism, subjectivism, psychophysical harmony, and more. (For those listening via podcast, I left the introduction in to preserve the timestamps for those who want to skip around to different sections.)

00:00 Intro
00:46 Atheistic platonism?
01:22 Why are you gay?
01:30 Are you still a naturalist?
05:47 What kind of compatibilist are you?
09:41 If I settle your debt with PragerU, will you become a libertarian?
10:12 What’s your biggest gripe with physicalism?
12:42 On the abortion debate, when do you think personhood / full moral status begins?
17:22 Do twinks make better philosophers?
17:56 Are you agnostic about anything in philosophy?
19:37 Why are you such a sucker for spooky stuff?
30:49 Who makes those guitar transitions?
32:34 Favorite music?
34:30 Who are some of your favorite Eastern philosophers?
35:03 Which religion would you choose to be true?
40:54 Who are your favorite theist and atheist philosophers?
42:18 Arguing for dualism from mereological nihilism?
45:48 Euthanasia?
48:43 What are your thoughts on each general era of philosophy?
55:00 Thoughts on Jordan Peterson?
58:55 Have you looked into Islam?
1:03:57 Does your mother know you spend so much time talking to strangers on the internet?
1:04:04 What is your opinion on the resurrection?
1:08:23 The best argument against veganism?
1:21:18 What is the primary goal of adopting panpsychism?
1:23:20 Best defenses of objective morality?
1:24:34 How would aliens affect theism and atheism?
1:30:53 Are you a dualist or a physicalist?
1:31:31 Isn’t solipsism simpler than panpsychism?
1:33:37 Thoughts on idealism?
1:35:41 Which political system do you think is right?
1:39:34 Thoughts on metaethical naturalism?
1:41:52 Is incest wrong?
1:45:27 When will you have some Mormons back on your show?
1:46:34 Why atheist and not agnostic? Where can I find good philrel content?
1:49:54 Would necessitarianism defeat fine-tuning and psychophysical harmony?
1:57:38 Do you accept physical causal closure?
2:00:00 How do you explain psychophysical harmony?
2:02:34 Kant’s transcendental idealism and free will?
2:07:56 Are we obligated to refute false beliefs even if they’re meaningful?
2:13:01 Is there any profound nugget of wisdom that Christianity has first or exclusive ownership of?
2:15:17 Analytic/Continental divide?
2:18:05 “Emmerson”
2:19:03 Does the phenomenal powers view weaken psychophysical harmony?
2:22:04 Is time necessary for consciousness?
2:28:49 If you did reconvert, would you be a Christian or a generic theist?
2:32:20 Finite theism?
2:36:22 Top three philosophers who are wrong about everything?
2:37:57 Moral subjectivism with normally functioning humans as the (collective) observer(s) morality is stance-dependent upon?
2:48:52 Are you afraid of death? How do you cope with death anxiety as an atheist?

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I’m joined by Andrew Hronich, author of Once Loved, Always Loved: The Logic of Apokatastasis. We discuss universal reconciliation, eternal conscious torment, annihilationism, and much else! 

Watch the interview here

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