Does God Exist ? هل الله موجود؟ مناظرة بين محمد حجاب وإدوارد تاباش (2020-02-27) ​

0:00:11 Selam stands for sharing an affection
0:00:14 love and mercy and that's what we do in
0:00:17 Sharla specific specific at the time
0:00:19 that we live where Haley's been hate
0:00:21 it's being spread by the label given
0:00:24 freedom of speech and this sometimes
0:00:26 comes at the cost of innocent people
0:00:28 dying and we saw that Christchurch we
0:00:31 saw that in London where we're from
0:00:33 innocent people getting killed Muslim or
0:00:35 non-muslim and we want to put an end to
0:00:37 this and one of our objectives is to
0:00:39 deconstruct false narratives and
0:00:41 reconstruct pure minds and that's our
0:00:44 main objective and I just wanna thank
0:00:47 every single one of you guys for coming
0:00:48 you can check our web sites around the
0:00:50 world oh okay
0:00:51 inshallah were planning on setting up a
0:00:53 team in California this is a beautiful
0:00:55 country the raw sweet flavor absolutely
0:01:01 amazing and early in the team every time
0:01:19 [Applause]
0:01:39 [Applause]
0:01:50 thank you very much for that so first
0:01:54 we'll be introducing brother Mohammed
0:01:57 hey job is a debater and public speaker
0:01:59 who engages in discussions and polemics
0:02:01 on a wide variety of topics including
0:02:03 religion politics and society he
0:02:05 completed a politics degree and a
0:02:07 master's in the history in history from
0:02:09 Queen Mary University he has taught and
0:02:11 instructed courses on humanities and
0:02:13 languages in many contexts he has come
0:02:15 he has numeracy Jazz's and some Islamic
0:02:17 Sciences and his study and numerous
0:02:19 Islamic seminaries including the shim
0:02:21 plate the Institute which employs a
0:02:23 traditional Mauritian style of teaching
0:02:25 of the sacred sciences Edward Eddy
0:02:27 tabash is a constitutional lawyer in the
0:02:30 Los Angeles area he graduated from UCLA
0:02:32 in 1973 Magnum laude with a
0:02:35 bachelor's bachelor's degree in
0:02:36 political science he graduated from
0:02:38 Loyola Law School of Los Angeles in 1973
0:02:41 he is the son of an Orthodox rabbi from
0:02:44 Lithuania and an Auschwitz surviving
0:02:45 mother from Hungary after decades of
0:02:48 spiritual reflection and seeking he has
0:02:49 determined that the universe is natural
0:02:51 with no supernatural being or beings no
0:02:54 god or gods involved in the creation or
0:02:56 perpetuation of our existence he chairs
0:02:58 the board of directors of the center of
0:03:00 Inquirer transnational a worldwide
0:03:02 organization of secular humanists and
0:03:04 scientific sceptics he's also known for
0:03:06 his legal work and separation of church
0:03:08 and state cases in which we seek to
0:03:10 preserve the equality before the law of
0:03:11 both believers and non-believers he
0:03:13 promotes a secular society based in
0:03:15 science reason and inquiry maintaining
0:03:18 strong conviction in this he's an
0:03:19 integral leader to several associations
0:03:21 which exists to separate church and
0:03:23 state a part of his work and separation
0:03:25 of church and state has specifically
0:03:27 been in opposing Trump's Muslims ban and
0:03:30 mosh although they're both extremely
0:03:32 qualified and we're very
0:03:33 excited to have them both in this debate
0:03:35 and for this reason we would like to
0:03:37 also request a certain level of
0:03:40 boundaries and guidelines for the event
0:03:42 and shot to make sure that it goes as
0:03:43 smooth as possible for both of our
0:03:45 speakers and that we ask that everyone
0:03:47 be as respectful as possible to both of
0:03:49 our speakers by doing a number of few
0:03:52 things so we would like everyone to
0:03:53 please if possible please do not shout
0:03:56 heckle Boo screen cause any form of
0:04:00 ruckus against either speakers you know
0:04:02 to in order to respect their time their
0:04:04 knowledge and everything that they're
0:04:05 doing for us today if people are causing
0:04:08 issues unfortunately we will have to
0:04:10 have security escort you out in respect
0:04:12 for both of our speakers also another
0:04:14 request that we have is that if you
0:04:16 would like to clap please feel free to
0:04:18 but only after the speaker is completed
0:04:20 with their what they're saying simply
0:04:22 because there is a time frame that each
0:04:23 of them has to be able to get their
0:04:25 points across and we do not want to
0:04:26 disadvantage either speaker by limiting
0:04:28 the other speakers amount of time and
0:04:33 with that and said please do that go
0:04:34 okay thank you so much for coming thank
0:04:35 you everyone
0:04:36 I really appreciate it and then I will
0:04:38 be passing off our the microphone to our
0:04:40 moderator which is ID number was
0:04:45 [Applause]
0:04:53 hello everyone thank you for joining us
0:04:56 as I mentioned I will be moderating
0:04:58 moderating the debate we will start off
0:05:01 with opening statements each speaker
0:05:03 will have 20 minutes to give theirs and
0:05:05 we will begin with brother Mohammad a
0:05:07 jab Somali can what happens a light or a
0:05:23 kettle first of all I want to thank
0:05:26 every single one of you for coming down
0:05:27 here I want to thank the University and
0:05:28 of course I want to thank I did have a
0:05:30 she was a really prolific you know
0:05:33 formidable opponent and a very
0:05:35 experienced atheist opponent for many
0:05:37 years and so I'm very happy that all of
0:05:39 you are here today to proceed there's no
0:05:44 doubt that there is existence there is
0:05:48 no doubt that there is existence
0:05:52 existence is divided into two things
0:05:56 possible existence and necessary
0:05:59 existence possible existence is
0:06:02 existence that otherwise doesn't need to
0:06:06 exist and its existence that could be
0:06:11 arranged in any other way its existence
0:06:15 which is dependent for example I'm
0:06:17 wearing a blue blazer this is a possible
0:06:20 existence doesn't have to exist it could
0:06:24 be arranged in another way and it's
0:06:28 dependent upon materials that were
0:06:30 created used to create it necessary
0:06:34 existence on the other hand his
0:06:36 existence which is couldn't be any other
0:06:38 way
0:06:39 existence which could not be any other
0:06:41 way is independent self-sufficient and
0:06:45 could not be how of existence now the
0:06:51 main argument today is this there cannot
0:06:55 be a world with only possible existences
0:06:58 that is the main idea there cannot be a
0:07:01 world with only possible exists
0:07:04 why because I'm going to be using the
0:07:09 sport a little bit it is only possible
0:07:11 existences you would have dependent
0:07:14 things depending upon other dependent
0:07:16 things now this can be reasoned
0:07:19 physically ontologically and
0:07:21 cosmological this by itself it would
0:07:38 require something outside an independent
0:07:43 thing in order for that series to exist
0:07:45 now as safe it was an infinite series
0:07:52 we'll get to that in one flows now let's
0:08:00 use a cosmological example we have a
0:08:03 tree that's very beautiful trees here by
0:08:05 the way in California like for integrity
0:08:09 review that tree requires the Sun to
0:08:13 photosynthesize in order to exist I
0:08:15 think it's fair to say if the treatment
0:08:17 exists of the Sundin exists the tree
0:08:19 would know exists it's fair to say yes
0:08:22 so long as that the Sun is required or
0:08:25 so long as the tree exists the Sun will
0:08:27 exist even if that was for an infinite
0:08:30 amount of time
0:08:31 now the Sun itself is part of its own
0:08:35 order and its father's own sense now it
0:08:43 requires other things in order to exist
0:08:45 and the end of this what is required
0:08:48 once again is an independent thing
0:08:51 that's this independent thing can only
0:08:55 be one wait a minute why is that because
0:09:00 if there was more than one necessary
0:09:02 existence it wouldn't be a necessary
0:09:04 existence because it could be conceived
0:09:07 that it can be arranged
0:09:08 in another way and you can't have two
0:09:11 things which are independent because
0:09:13 which one is dependent on which
0:09:17 therefore whether you conceptualize this
0:09:22 ontological cosmologically what
0:09:25 materialism dualism idealism you must
0:09:29 conclude that what is required in order
0:09:32 for any existence to exist as an
0:09:35 independent thing that is one that is
0:09:41 always an existence why because it
0:09:43 wasn't in existence if it could be
0:09:46 conceived that this thing is not in
0:09:47 existence it wouldn't be necessary so
0:09:51 has to be eternal and it cannot be made
0:09:55 up of all parts why because anything
0:09:58 which is a compound is generated
0:10:00 anything that's made up of parts is
0:10:03 dependent on those parts that's point
0:10:05 number one and point number two if it
0:10:09 was a possible existence it is made up
0:10:10 of parts you can imagine those parts
0:10:12 being arranged in a different way
0:10:13 therefore it falls into the category of
0:10:16 possible existence to summarize you
0:10:19 require any independent thing outside of
0:10:22 the series of dependent things in motor
0:10:27 for any existence to exist this thing
0:10:30 must be one it cannot have parts it must
0:10:33 be immaterial income from well supposed
0:10:37 to be
0:10:38 it must be eternal now this is what the
0:10:41 quran says in his basic definition of
0:10:42 god for who Allah Allah say is God one
0:10:45 and only a lot of cement the one who's
0:10:50 independent self-sufficient everything
0:10:52 depends upon him and he depends upon
0:10:54 nothing let me yell it will emulate he
0:10:58 forgets not to nor is He begotten he is
0:11:01 the eternal one three eternal post
0:11:03 eternal well Amir could never put on a
0:11:05 hat and there is nothing like him he's
0:11:08 in material he's not composed two parts
0:11:10 he's in copra so you see this is the
0:11:13 onion if this argument is cracked I have
0:11:17 lost in the bay this is my main argument
0:11:21 everything goes back to this argument
0:11:22 which goes back to the basic definition
0:11:25 of God what must be presented is a
0:11:29 formulation whether it's a cosmological
0:11:32 one or an ontological one which shows us
0:11:35 how it's possible their only possible
0:11:37 existences can exist without the
0:11:39 independent if that's done I'm ready to
0:11:41 be an atheist today now the quran says
0:11:46 verse 35
0:11:47 i'm holy woman why are you shaking i'm
0:11:50 holly and what a semi-wet you'll out but
0:11:53 laid open or were they created from
0:11:56 nothing
0:11:56 who were they themselves the creators of
0:11:59 themselves did they create the heavens
0:12:01 and the earth certainly they have no
0:12:03 certainty saying that the atheistic
0:12:06 position is one of male speculation you
0:12:09 can never achieve certainty with atheism
0:12:11 why because in this logical disjunction
0:12:13 you have four options either the
0:12:16 universe came from nothing which is
0:12:17 impossible ontological
0:12:20 math mathematically and cosmologically
0:12:22 possible no one has argued this really
0:12:25 it's a weak argument I don't think my
0:12:28 interlocutor with his experience will go
0:12:29 there he's very prominent and very
0:12:32 experienced you won't go there and oh is
0:12:36 it
0:12:37 eternal can it be eternal well let's say
0:12:42 it is wait a minute what did you say did
0:12:43 you consider that yes no problem
0:12:45 even if it was a tunnel for the sake of
0:12:48 argument it is dependent or independent
0:12:51 you still have the problem here but my
0:12:56 interlocutors are naturally so he
0:12:57 believes in the beginning of the
0:12:58 universe so that's not a problem for us
0:13:03 what other option do we have
0:13:05 is it self created like my friend Tom
0:13:07 does also says is it possible for
0:13:10 something to exist an artist at the same
0:13:11 time he gives the example of a mother
0:13:13 giving birth to herself
0:13:15 is that possible not possible so the
0:13:19 other thing is it was put into existence
0:13:22 by something which had the ability to do
0:13:25 so now the question is what are the
0:13:29 attributes of that thing
0:13:32 which had the ability to put the
0:13:34 universe into existence how do we reason
0:13:38 this by inference we say well if I had
0:13:41 the ability to put the universe into
0:13:42 existence it must have power because
0:13:45 that is required for that kind of thing
0:13:48 it must have creative capacity it must
0:13:51 have knowledge it must have knowledge so
0:13:58 you see we start to have a formulation a
0:14:02 question now we have to ask is why is
0:14:06 the universe one way and not another way
0:14:10 it's conceivable for example you see you
0:14:13 have celestial spheres in the universe
0:14:14 they're rotating in one direction we can
0:14:17 conceive and imagine of the possibility
0:14:20 of all of the celestial spheres in the
0:14:23 universe going the other way for example
0:14:25 we can imagine that so why is the
0:14:29 universe one way rather than another way
0:14:31 I will tell you that the only rational
0:14:36 explanation for that is that there is an
0:14:39 external particular Iser of the universe
0:14:42 say that all more time that there must
0:14:44 be an external particular riser of the
0:14:46 universe to choose between different
0:14:49 options possible options because then
0:14:52 you have no explanation for why the
0:14:54 universe is one way rather than another
0:14:56 way you have to have an external sorting
0:14:59 agent you have to have an external
0:15:03 sorting agent that decides X rather than
0:15:06 Y otherwise the question will be to the
0:15:10 Atheist how can you prove on naturalism
0:15:13 or how can you explain on naturalism
0:15:15 that the universe is one way rather than
0:15:18 another way it's a very straightforward
0:15:19 question now here's the thing if we know
0:15:25 that there is an external sorting agent
0:15:28 this implies will of this agent and if
0:15:32 there was more than one will there would
0:15:34 be a chaotic universe as the process by
0:15:37 the other blemishes are low
0:15:44 along with FS and that vessel behind a
0:15:48 line of Bellagio Sifu if there was more
0:15:54 than one of them the universe would have
0:15:56 been corrupted they haven't in the earth
0:15:58 would have been corrupted chapter 21
0:16:00 verse 22 how because if there's more
0:16:03 than one will ultimately which one is
0:16:06 steering the ship there would be chaotic
0:16:08 order but what I'm also says about in
0:16:14 chapter 23 verse 91 if there was one
0:16:18 more than one Almighty they would have
0:16:20 outstripped one another attempted to
0:16:22 outstrip one another for power so in
0:16:24 otherwise you can't have more than one
0:16:25 of those things for those reasons as
0:16:27 well and this brings me to my third
0:16:31 point which is the argument of the
0:16:37 physical coherence of the universe which
0:16:39 is a Quranic argument because today
0:16:56 [Music]
0:17:06 honey bunny Lake and bustable far see
0:17:10 how over has he that chapter 67 verse 3
0:17:15 look at the universe look up in the sky
0:17:19 look at the sky look at the coherence of
0:17:24 the universe do you see any
0:17:25 inconsistencies look again when I said
0:17:29 wait a minute look again let me look let
0:17:32 me see
0:17:32 is there any inconsistencies now I
0:17:35 thought about this verse and this verse
0:17:38 is telling us that there is a uniformity
0:17:41 of nature a consistency of nature a
0:17:43 coherence of nature the fact that the
0:17:47 universe is uniform coherence it is not
0:17:50 known by science its presupposed by
0:17:52 science wait a minute what did you say
0:17:55 let me say one more time if you look
0:17:57 from self are any introductory guide to
0:17:59 the scientific method like you got here
0:18:01 on the illustrated guide to the
0:18:03 scientific method he said that the fact
0:18:05 that you have rationalized able actors
0:18:06 that can see the universe and see its
0:18:08 consistency means that there's a
0:18:11 presupposition of science and what is
0:18:13 that presupposition that science is
0:18:14 uniform that the universe is uniform
0:18:17 it's rationalizing our behind science
0:18:20 said in his letters to solve them he
0:18:22 said the most incomprehensible thing
0:18:26 about the universe is that it is
0:18:28 comprehendible so I'm not making a
0:18:32 fine-tuning argument today because we've
0:18:34 heard enough of that every atheist and
0:18:36 every what's this fine-tuning argument
0:18:39 the argument is look at the constants of
0:18:44 nature yes you have these constants
0:18:48 which one a Goldilocks zone of life
0:18:52 permitting range if there were any way
0:18:55 this way or that way they would not the
0:18:58 universe would not exist and life would
0:19:00 not be minimus like mutton with just six
0:19:04 numbers and he says n which is capital n
0:19:07 and number
0:19:08 talking about you know the natural
0:19:11 forces he says is a billion billion
0:19:12 billion
0:19:13 billion and had any zeroes been taken
0:19:15 away yes then that would have been the
0:19:19 universe would have been completely
0:19:20 different he is another letter that he
0:19:23 talks about the conversion of hydrogen
0:19:25 into helium he says that this conversion
0:19:27 is 0.007 had it been 0.006 or 0.08 we
0:19:35 would not exist this is that way rights
0:19:37 it's not why I'm writing I'm not
0:19:39 cosmologists right that's why your
0:19:41 rights that's an argument from
0:19:43 probability that's an interesting
0:19:45 argument I think the interesting thing
0:19:48 is that many people theists Anant in
0:19:50 there atheists accept the fine-tuning of
0:19:53 the universe Stephen Hawking's accepted
0:19:54 it Richard Dawkins accepted it so it's
0:19:58 not really an area of controversy my
0:20:00 argument is about the uniformity of
0:20:01 nature the coherence of nature which is
0:20:04 presupposed by the universe by the
0:20:06 wisest scientific method the question is
0:20:10 therefore on naturalism on naturalism
0:20:14 how can you account for the coherence of
0:20:17 the universe you can't say well the
0:20:20 universe just is like Bertrand Russell
0:20:21 said because that is a circular argument
0:20:24 frankly it's a cop-out I'm asking for an
0:20:27 external explanation we are rational
0:20:29 people we should be able to explain if
0:20:32 nationally if naturalism has the ability
0:20:35 to to give us these answers then surely
0:20:37 we should be entitled to such answers
0:20:40 now I've got five minutes left and I've
0:20:44 made my arguments to reiterate my main
0:20:48 argument today is the argument from
0:20:49 contingency and it's not one that
0:20:52 liveness formulated it's a different
0:20:54 kind of argument from contingency that
0:20:57 many Western people are not familiar
0:20:59 with
0:20:59 it's from our tradition and frankly the
0:21:06 main question is this the question is
0:21:09 how can you explain the world either
0:21:12 ontological or cosmological naturally
0:21:16 that only has
0:21:21 that's the question if you can prove it
0:21:23 you've tracked the other now I know I've
0:21:25 been watching these videos incredible
0:21:28 speaker and because he's a lawyer he's
0:21:30 got that charisma that if when you start
0:21:33 speaking I might have to run away
0:21:34 actually incredible speaking but I know
0:21:37 I have a feeling of what he's gonna talk
0:21:39 about and I think it's gonna be the
0:21:41 problem of evil right now Epicurus an
0:21:46 old Hellenistic philosopher he had the
0:21:50 logical form of the problem of evil and
0:21:53 the logical form as follows that if God
0:21:55 is omnipotent and all good then if he's
0:22:00 omnipotent why does he not stop the evil
0:22:03 if he's all good then how come evil
0:22:05 exists the answer our question is as
0:22:09 follows
0:22:09 I'm going to give it to you right now
0:22:11 God is not just those two things he's
0:22:13 also also all-wise so in order for the
0:22:17 problem of evil from an Islamic
0:22:18 traditions perspective to be unlocked or
0:22:21 to make sense for a logical perspective
0:22:22 you have to show logically or
0:22:24 naturalistically or cosmologically or
0:22:27 mathematically or inductively
0:22:28 objectively any way possible
0:22:30 how how evil the existence of evil
0:22:35 contradicts the divine wisdom that's how
0:22:39 it goes
0:22:40 if we don't believe in a God with three
0:22:41 attributes goodness or two attribution
0:22:43 and omnipotence only that's not the god
0:22:45 we believe it so you have to show
0:22:47 otherwise it's an emotional argument now
0:22:50 the other thing he talks about is the
0:22:52 divine highness
0:22:53 why is God hidden from us now we believe
0:22:57 in the fifth as Muslims the immediate
0:22:59 knowledge of God the intuitive knowledge
0:23:01 of God and by the way this is the Muslim
0:23:04 specific belief we believe that we are
0:23:08 born believing in God we have the
0:23:11 immediate knowledge of God and that
0:23:14 society trains us away from that
0:23:17 knowledge of God so the Quran for
0:23:20 instance or the prophets come to
0:23:22 reinforce what we already knew prime
0:23:25 moodily if you like prime modelling from
0:23:28 a psycho spiritual perspective so God is
0:23:31 not hiding in fact he's reminding us and
0:23:33 Frances oma could never al Davina hat
0:23:36 tena basarat' sulla if an atheist dies
0:23:38 as an atheist and according to us if he
0:23:40 dies an atheist is not worth the message
0:23:42 of Islam he does not go to hell straight
0:23:45 away because since I believe so God is
0:23:48 not hiding according to us so these are
0:23:49 the two things I'm anticipating he's
0:23:51 going to be raising up some pre-empting
0:23:54 it and finally what I want to say and
0:23:58 we'll talk about this by the way the
0:23:59 Fatah the immediate knowledge of God
0:24:01 because there is empirical evidence of
0:24:03 that by the way Justin Barrett made an
0:24:05 interesting has many interesting books
0:24:06 on this he says that there is a there is
0:24:10 a divine receptivity to God and he done
0:24:14 you know studies with children
0:24:16 cross-culturally and found that children
0:24:18 naturally believe in God so atheism on
0:24:20 this idea is a social construct atheism
0:24:23 was a cultural construct so finally I
0:24:26 want to say that the Quran promises us
0:24:28 in Chapter number forty-one that Allah
0:24:31 will show us all the way in other words
0:24:33 his science he says by the blemish on
0:24:36 him January 17 hygiena philosophy
0:24:51 who seemed hot away and alone had a an
0:24:57 alum and now we'll have that we will
0:25:01 certainly show them our signs in the
0:25:02 horizons and in themselves until it's
0:25:06 made patently clear that this is the
0:25:10 truth
0:25:10 I hope today we can be as sincere as
0:25:13 possible and be open to this and I hope
0:25:16 now that we go back to that question of
0:25:19 how they can be only possible existences
0:25:21 I leave it to
0:25:25 [Applause]
0:25:53 is there some other mic I'm supposed to
0:25:55 be okay good evening everybody I want to
0:26:00 thank the Muslim Student Association for
0:26:03 putting on this debate and I want to
0:26:05 thank Mohammed for debating me I will
0:26:08 respond to his arguments in my rebuttal
0:26:10 but I will now present my positive
0:26:13 arguments for why it is more likely than
0:26:16 not that the evidence in our physical
0:26:18 universe clearly makes it so that a
0:26:22 supernatural conscious personal being
0:26:25 that is an Allgood all-knowing and
0:26:28 all-powerful deity the standard-issue
0:26:31 god of Judaism Christianity and Islam
0:26:33 does not exist argument won the argument
0:26:37 that from the way our world operates it
0:26:40 is much more likely that there is
0:26:42 nothing beyond the physical the evidence
0:26:44 shows that it is much more likely that
0:26:46 the universe is not impacted by any
0:26:48 invisible realms or by intentional
0:26:51 actions by immaterial beings the history
0:26:54 of scientific discovery has shown that
0:26:57 whenever we attributed phenomena to
0:26:59 paranormal creatures or gods further
0:27:02 examination showed such beings did not
0:27:05 cause what was happening we learned that
0:27:08 lightning is not caused by an angry god
0:27:10 or gods diseases are not caused by evil
0:27:13 spirits and by germs and demonic
0:27:15 possession has nothing to do with mental
0:27:18 illness as humanity has gone forward
0:27:20 natural explanations have always evicted
0:27:24 previously believed supernatural ones it
0:27:27 has never been the other way around
0:27:29 there's no verifiable evidence of
0:27:31 anything supernatural which there should
0:27:34 be if the supernatural existed since we
0:27:37 have no background information of
0:27:39 supernatural beings or events there is a
0:27:41 very low prior probability of them this
0:27:46 means that for instance if we were to
0:27:48 use Bayes probability theory we would be
0:27:51 predicting only natural explanations for
0:27:55 phenomena though we have never seen a
0:27:58 quark we know that the category of
0:28:00 subatomic particles particles do exist
0:28:03 evidence for the existence of
0:28:05 quartz has been steadily increasing one
0:28:08 indication of the soundness of the quark
0:28:10 model is its success in predicting the
0:28:13 outcome of high-energy collisions of an
0:28:16 electron and positron there are no such
0:28:19 equivalent empirically verifiable
0:28:21 indications of God's existence so we
0:28:25 cannot infer the supernatural from a
0:28:28 mere observation of the natural number
0:28:32 two the argument from the non occurrence
0:28:33 of miracles claims of miracles have the
0:28:36 initial problem of bearing witness
0:28:38 against themselves since by their very
0:28:41 content they are violations of the laws
0:28:43 of nature that are not supposed to be
0:28:45 violated all the supposed miracles that
0:28:48 are claimed to verify God's intervention
0:28:50 and human affairs allegedly took place
0:28:53 in a pre-scientific era
0:28:55 why don't we moderns have the same
0:28:57 opportunity to observe these miracles
0:28:59 today no verifiable events in today's
0:29:03 world correspond to the types of
0:29:05 miracles that monotheistic religions
0:29:08 claim happened in ancient times thus the
0:29:11 probability that a miracle happened
0:29:14 regardless of which religion makes the
0:29:16 claim will always be lower than the
0:29:19 probability that a miracle has not
0:29:21 occurred number three the argument from
0:29:24 the dependents of conscious minds on a
0:29:27 physical body and brain there is
0:29:29 overwhelming evidence that conscious
0:29:31 thought and awareness cannot occur
0:29:33 without a functioning physical brain
0:29:36 with operative cortical neurons and
0:29:38 synapses believing in a disembodied
0:29:42 super intelligence and in life after
0:29:44 death creates a serious dilemma if even
0:29:47 Alzheimer's disease can destroy
0:29:49 conscious awareness how can that very
0:29:52 same conscious awareness survive the
0:29:54 destruction of the entire body and brain
0:29:56 at death this would entail believing
0:29:59 that if certain portions of our physical
0:30:02 brains are damaged we lose the awareness
0:30:04 contained in those portions but if you
0:30:07 destroy the entire brain by death your
0:30:10 awareness will somehow reappear fully
0:30:13 intact in some immaterial form highly
0:30:16 unlikely if consciousness could survive
0:30:18 independently of the brain diseases
0:30:21 brain injuries and anesthetics would not
0:30:24 eclipse consciousness like they do since
0:30:27 the evidence shows there is no conscious
0:30:30 self-awareness or thought without a
0:30:32 functional brain with operative cortical
0:30:35 neurons and synapses
0:30:37 we cannot be expected to believe in any
0:30:40 God that is supposed to have a
0:30:41 disembodied thinking mind number four
0:30:44 the argument from evolution though many
0:30:47 theists believe in evolution because of
0:30:49 its sloppiness and trial and error
0:30:52 features evolution by natural selection
0:30:55 is more likely if there is no God more
0:31:01 than 99% of all species that have ever
0:31:03 existed are now extinct this is wasteful
0:31:06 we have useless components in our bodies
0:31:09 that indeed do more harm than good like
0:31:12 the appendix known to most of us only
0:31:14 when it's about to burst evolution by
0:31:17 natural selection is established by the
0:31:19 weight of the evidence for instance
0:31:21 there is a 100% match of DNA sequences
0:31:24 in the pseudogene region of beta globin
0:31:27 that is proof that humans and gorillas
0:31:30 had a common ancestor number 5 as
0:31:34 Mohammad predicted in his prophetic
0:31:37 wisdom the argument from evil the
0:31:39 evidential argument from evil God can
0:31:42 make whatever he wants happen and
0:31:44 prevent anything he doesn't want from
0:31:46 occurring so why are there holocaust
0:31:48 extremely dangerous and violent people
0:31:50 horrible diseases extreme poverty and
0:31:53 destructive natural disasters if we
0:31:56 humans need discipline we could benefit
0:31:58 from a military style training camp not
0:32:01 a concentration camp there was no
0:32:04 benefit for my mother's having been in
0:32:06 Auschwitz
0:32:06 another example malaria is a terrible
0:32:09 disease there is a gene though that
0:32:11 provides an effective defense against
0:32:13 malaria
0:32:13 it works by destroying any red
0:32:15 corpuscles that have been occupied by
0:32:18 any of the types of parasitic protozoans
0:32:21 that cause malaria but if one has
0:32:23 inherited this gene from both parents it
0:32:25 also causes sickle cell anemia why did
0:32:28 God have to set it up this way or allow
0:32:31 it to work
0:32:32 way to attempt to justify or explain the
0:32:36 horrendous evil and suffering in the
0:32:37 world the theist must be able to show
0:32:40 that God even with unlimited power could
0:32:43 not have prevented an even greater evil
0:32:45 but for the horrible evil and suffering
0:32:47 he actually created or allowed or with
0:32:50 unlimited power God could not have
0:32:52 brought about a very great good but for
0:32:54 the horrible evil and suffering God
0:32:56 actually created or allowed here the
0:32:59 theist must also be able to show that
0:33:01 the very great good that could not but
0:33:04 for this horrible evil and suffering
0:33:06 take place was indeed such a great good
0:33:10 as to morally justify subjecting the
0:33:13 victims to the agonizing pain they have
0:33:16 to endure if we take the concept of
0:33:19 God's omnipotence seriously this is a
0:33:21 very high burden for a supposedly
0:33:24 omnipotent being to meet the argument
0:33:27 number six from divine hiddenness a God
0:33:30 that wants us to know that this God
0:33:31 exists and wants a relationship with us
0:33:34 would not withhold evidence of the
0:33:36 divine existence and would understand
0:33:38 just what evidence many of us would need
0:33:41 in order to be able to believe if God
0:33:44 exists and created me God knows my mind
0:33:47 it knows that right now I couldn't
0:33:49 believe in God regardless how much I
0:33:51 wanted to just like I couldn't believe
0:33:54 in space alien visitations to earth
0:33:56 because of the absence of any evidence
0:33:58 showing these things to be true God's
0:34:01 not being forthcoming with the evidence
0:34:03 that would enable me to believe that God
0:34:06 exists while knowing that I can't
0:34:08 believe in the absence of such evidence
0:34:10 is more consistent with God's
0:34:12 non-existence than with the existence of
0:34:15 a God that wants me to know him/her or
0:34:17 it if your mother told you that your
0:34:19 father whom you've never met or spoken
0:34:21 to loves you Mary very much and wants a
0:34:24 father child relationship with you but
0:34:26 just has been too busy to ever come to
0:34:28 see you ever since you were born let's
0:34:30 say around your 18th birthday
0:34:32 you would probably conclude that your
0:34:34 dad really doesn't want a relationship
0:34:35 with you we can actually see the reality
0:34:38 of human fathers on a daily basis so
0:34:41 even if the dad and the above scenario
0:34:43 is always absent we can believe he
0:34:45 exists we don't have the
0:34:47 evidence that a God exists so if we are
0:34:49 told there is a God who loves us and
0:34:50 wants relationship with us but that God
0:34:53 never provides us with direct evidence
0:34:55 that it exists when such an all-powerful
0:34:58 God could easily provide that direct
0:35:01 evidence we are justified in doubting
0:35:03 the existence of that God and doubting
0:35:06 the desire of any such God to want a
0:35:08 relationship with us divine hip nasaw so
0:35:11 further z' the argument from evil if God
0:35:14 exists such a being would know that
0:35:16 unanswered questions about why there is
0:35:18 so much evil and suffering prevent many
0:35:20 of us from believing in such a God we
0:35:22 have a right to expect that a perfectly
0:35:24 good God would not allow such horrendous
0:35:27 evil and suffering without morally
0:35:29 sufficient reasons if we are not told
0:35:32 what those morally sufficient reasons
0:35:34 are then it is more probable that a
0:35:37 perfectly good God that wants to be
0:35:39 believed in and worship does not exist
0:35:43 six point one the argument from
0:35:45 religious confusion a subset of divine
0:35:47 hiddenness there is so much a great
0:35:49 disagreement over which religion is true
0:35:51 and even if over which branch of a given
0:35:54 religion is true if God exists and wants
0:35:59 us to know its will and follow divine
0:36:01 decrees we are justified in expecting
0:36:04 that this deity would not allow so much
0:36:06 confusion over who that God is what that
0:36:09 God wants us to believe in and what that
0:36:12 God wants us to do the presence of such
0:36:15 rampant confusion is more likely if a
0:36:18 God that wants us to know its will does
0:36:20 not exist so Catholics believe that when
0:36:23 the Pope speaks ex cathedra he's
0:36:25 infallible Protestants reject the
0:36:27 concept of a pope if only one of these
0:36:30 is true God should make clear to
0:36:32 Christians which one it is Sunni and
0:36:37 Shiite Muslims began to disagree over
0:36:40 whether Muhammad's successors should be
0:36:42 chosen by qualifications alone or need
0:36:45 to have a direct bloodline to Mohammed
0:36:48 Shiites believe that the 12th Imam in
0:36:50 the 10th century was taken into hiding
0:36:53 by God in a process called occultation
0:36:55 and will return at the end of time in a
0:36:58 full messianic
0:36:59 chasity to facilitate the final and full
0:37:02 understanding of the quran and the
0:37:04 prophets message Sunnis do not accept
0:37:07 this now even though the Sunnis and
0:37:10 Shiites share the Quran they have
0:37:13 different versions of the hadith which
0:37:15 are very important to Islamic
0:37:17 interpretation of the deeds and
0:37:19 traditions of the Prophet so if one of
0:37:24 these is true and the other is false God
0:37:27 should make clear to Muslims which one
0:37:30 it is
0:37:30 now the other also derived from divine
0:37:34 hiddenness argument from unreliable
0:37:37 revelations and translations from
0:37:39 defects and errors in the Bible and the
0:37:42 Quran if God exists we are justified and
0:37:46 expecting to discard will provide us
0:37:48 with a reliable revelation if there are
0:37:50 problems with the revelation then it's
0:37:52 more consistent with the God that is not
0:37:54 perfect both the Bible and Quran talk
0:37:58 clearly about male dominion over women
0:38:00 Genesis 3:16 says and thy desire shall
0:38:03 be to thy husband and he shall rule over
0:38:05 the surah 434 pick fault says men are in
0:38:11 charge of women because Allah hath made
0:38:13 the one of them excel the other
0:38:15 well we modern humans have learned that
0:38:18 there is no reason for men to be in
0:38:21 charge of women because women are the
0:38:23 intellectual and moral equals of men so
0:38:27 this itself this itself shows that both
0:38:31 the Bible and the Quran are incorrect
0:38:34 insofar as they vest the man with more
0:38:37 power
0:38:37 over the woman than the woman is vested
0:38:39 over the man also both the Bible and the
0:38:43 Quran talk about Hell eternally for
0:38:50 those who don't believe in the religion
0:38:52 each revelation is promoting well they
0:38:56 can't both be true it can't be true that
0:38:59 you'll go to hell forever if you are not
0:39:02 a Christian and you'll go to hell
0:39:05 forever if you're not a Muslim so if in
0:39:09 fact there is a God that bases our
0:39:12 eternity on
0:39:13 whether we choose Christianity or Islam
0:39:15 then that God should tell us which one
0:39:18 and not let us make the honest and
0:39:22 sincere mistake of picking the wrong one
0:39:24 and falling through the trap door into
0:39:27 eternal horror so the very fact that God
0:39:32 doesn't make this clear to us and give
0:39:36 us a clear choice is more consistent
0:39:38 with there not being a god that wants us
0:39:40 to find the truth now
0:39:43 also if Islam is true those of us who do
0:39:47 not speak Arabic and those of us who
0:39:50 can't read the Quran in its original
0:39:52 should be given a clear unambiguous
0:39:57 translation which is the functional
0:39:59 equivalent of Arabic or God should have
0:40:01 revealed the Quran in every major
0:40:03 language Muhammad Pickthall was one of
0:40:06 the most prominent translators of the
0:40:09 Quran into English in the 20th century
0:40:13 and in his translators forward it's a
0:40:16 direct quote the Quran cannot be
0:40:18 translated every effort has been made to
0:40:20 choose befitting language but the result
0:40:23 is not the glorious quran it can never
0:40:26 take the place of the quran in arabic
0:40:28 but then if god wants me to be a muslim
0:40:32 god should provide me with the proper
0:40:34 translation so i don't make any errors
0:40:38 now another argument from divine
0:40:41 hiddenness a subset is the argument for
0:40:43 moral confusion so many people acting in
0:40:47 good faith even members of the same
0:40:50 religion disagree about what is right
0:40:51 and what is wrong in a bewildering
0:40:54 variety of situations both the Bible and
0:40:58 the Quran condemned gay sex but most of
0:41:03 us know gay couples and our reason and
0:41:06 experience tell us that same-sex
0:41:10 relationships are no worse than
0:41:14 heterosexual relationships just like our
0:41:17 reason and experience tell us there's no
0:41:20 reason for men to be in charge of women
0:41:22 or rule over women as opposed to women
0:41:25 being
0:41:26 in charge of men and ruling over men so
0:41:29 if either or both the Koran and the
0:41:31 Bible were infallibly true and in errant
0:41:35 they wouldn't say these things argument
0:41:39 7 argument from scale or the argument
0:41:41 from human insignificance 68 percent of
0:41:44 the universe is dark energy 27 percent
0:41:47 is dark matter so a scant 5% of the
0:41:49 universe is even conceptually accessible
0:41:52 by us of that 5% virtually all of it is
0:41:55 comprised of empty space which is
0:41:58 instantly lethal to human beings so 99
0:42:01 point 35 nines of the universe is
0:42:03 basically off-limits to humans our
0:42:06 galaxy contains around 300 billion stars
0:42:08 our galaxy is one of 100 billion
0:42:12 galaxies in the observable universe and
0:42:14 we have no access to any of this
0:42:17 mathematically we are just one part in a
0:42:19 hundred followed by 39 zeroes of the
0:42:23 universe there are 20 septillion planets
0:42:26 in the universe that's 20 followed by 24
0:42:28 zeroes why would God need such a
0:42:31 literally astronomical number of excess
0:42:34 planets that we are the core of God's
0:42:36 creation and concern the universe is
0:42:39 13.7 billion years old the earth is 4.6
0:42:43 billion years old
0:42:44 we humans have been around for maybe
0:42:46 200,000 years if we are at the center of
0:42:49 creation and of God's concern why did
0:42:52 God wait 13.7 billion years for us to
0:42:56 appear an all-powerful engineer would
0:42:58 not have needed to suffer this kind of
0:43:04 inefficiency remember we are speaking of
0:43:06 a God that's supposed to be all-powerful
0:43:09 argument number eight the argument
0:43:11 against the existence of a transcendent
0:43:13 person a person is by very definition of
0:43:16 being who thinks and performs actions
0:43:17 and that in turn requires being in time
0:43:20 so how could God have deliberately
0:43:22 created anything if there wasn't an
0:43:24 environment of time and space in which
0:43:26 to operate sequentially so a could cause
0:43:29 be if the theist says that God exists in
0:43:33 and functions and some unknowable
0:43:36 metaphysical time
0:43:37 which of course there's no proof than
0:43:39 the theist is conceding that God is not
0:43:41 completely transcendent since God
0:43:44 operates in some nebulous context which
0:43:46 corresponds to time a being out that is
0:43:51 outside space and time is not working
0:43:54 within a framework in which anything can
0:43:56 be caused by anything else so we can see
0:44:01 that the overwhelming weight of the
0:44:04 evidence in our physical universe makes
0:44:07 the predictive power of atheism much
0:44:10 stronger than that of theism we see for
0:44:13 instance that the universe is not
0:44:15 perfect most of it is lethal we also see
0:44:19 that within 5 billion years the Sun will
0:44:23 burn out which means the earth will seek
0:44:25 to exist I don't see much perfection in
0:44:28 that so probabilistically taking the
0:44:32 totality of the evidence it's far more
0:44:34 likely than not that we live in a
0:44:36 natural not a supernatural universe and
0:44:39 that an all-powerful Allgood all-knowing
0:44:42 self conscious God does not exist thank
0:44:45 you
0:44:53 thank you so much for both of our
0:44:55 speakers that the next section will be
0:44:57 the rebuttal section each speaker will
0:44:59 have ten minutes to counter the other
0:45:02 speakers argument that was presented
0:45:04 during the open state opening statement
0:45:06 we will begin with Muhammad a jab and
0:45:08 then Edward tabash so on
0:45:26 I'll begin with everyone's choir all
0:45:33 right so I would made a points a
0:45:35 arguments I'm going to respond to each
0:45:37 and every sing one of them the first one
0:45:39 the verifiable evidence of something
0:45:41 which is supernatural which leads to the
0:45:42 second point which is they're not
0:45:44 evidence of miracle I'm gonna prove
0:45:45 today that Edward believes in miracles
0:45:47 what did you say let me say again
0:45:50 Edward believes in miracles what is a
0:45:52 miracle according to Edward and
0:45:53 according to David Hume is a violation
0:45:54 of the laws of nature is a violation of
0:45:57 the laws of nature what is a miracle
0:46:00 something which goes outside the five
0:46:02 senses which can't be really detected by
0:46:04 science because naturalism according to
0:46:06 the Oxford concise companion is or
0:46:09 philosophy is something which can only
0:46:11 be seen by science the response
0:46:25 [Music]
0:46:32 wah wah Miku is MIA possibly Navi he
0:46:37 says they say to us
0:46:39 they say he's strict structured example
0:46:43 and they say who's gonna raise the tents
0:46:45 when it becomes dust the one who gave
0:46:50 him life the first time now let's think
0:46:51 of this have we ever seen the transition
0:46:55 from chemistry to biology no this is
0:46:59 referred to as a bo genesis yes when
0:47:02 chemistry becomes biology every study of
0:47:04 biology presupposes this because if
0:47:07 there's no such thing as a movement from
0:47:09 chemistry topology they cannot be
0:47:11 biology therefore the dead became the
0:47:14 living have you seen that no have you
0:47:17 sensed that no is it scientific no do
0:47:19 you believe me yes it's a miracle
0:47:21 just like Jesus raising the bed it's a
0:47:23 miracle just like the day of
0:47:25 resurrection
0:47:25 it's a miracle so just as all those
0:47:28 things will happen the Quran says you
0:47:31 can believe in all of that its premise
0:47:33 on the movement for nonliving chemistry
0:47:36 to a biology you believe in it we all
0:47:39 believe in miracles if that is how its
0:47:41 defined and that's how you define it
0:47:43 number three the dependence of conscious
0:47:46 minds on the brain which is a
0:47:49 philosophical discussion frankly Raymond
0:47:53 Tallis who wrote a book called aping
0:47:54 mankind he's a neuroscientist he asked a
0:47:57 question if consciousness is in the
0:47:58 brain where is it in the brain what's
0:48:02 the natural explanation for where
0:48:03 consciousness is in the brain really
0:48:06 frankly the idea that you can lose
0:48:09 consciousness through an aesthetic and
0:48:10 then be in - self consciousness is
0:48:13 refuted by dreams the existence of
0:48:16 dreams
0:48:18 you know I closed my eyes you know why
0:48:21 see how can you explain dreams this is
0:48:26 the problem of her consciousness the
0:48:28 hard problem of consciousness you can't
0:48:29 bypass the academics this is something
0:48:32 that philosophers has been talking about
0:48:33 since time began number four
0:48:38 that the argument for evolution
0:48:40 evolution doesn't contradict theism but
0:48:43 which evolution are we talking about
0:48:44 Darwinian evolution after the 1960s one
0:48:47 thing will refute this the problem of
0:48:51 induction science has the problem of the
0:48:54 relatedness of induction interpretation
0:48:57 all of these things you can't say that
0:48:59 it's definite and he didn't say that he
0:49:00 was careful in his wording says most
0:49:02 likely but that could be reformulated if
0:49:05 new data is found it could be
0:49:07 reinterpreted it has to be interpreted
0:49:09 in fact there's more likelihood that our
0:49:13 evolutionary conceptions will change so
0:49:16 you can't really use this as an argument
0:49:19 the arguments from evil what is evil
0:49:22 here's the thing ladies and gentlemen on
0:49:24 naturalism evil does not exist construct
0:49:30 look at the works of Bertrand Russell of
0:49:33 Nietzsche post modernists even Richard
0:49:36 Dawkins in the blind watchmaker he says
0:49:37 there's no such thing as good there's no
0:49:39 such thing as evil it's all business
0:49:41 indifference that's what he says why
0:49:44 because on naturalism
0:49:45 you cannot put morality under a
0:49:48 microscope there's no way of
0:49:51 ascertaining that there is any morals or
0:49:53 naturalism there is no objective
0:49:56 morality why even are you talking about
0:49:58 for the sake of argument I say okay evil
0:50:02 this is what we said it's not
0:50:04 incompatible with wisdom of God the
0:50:07 Quran says again Oh le halal no Delhi
0:50:11 Italian luminous an one he's the one who
0:50:16 has created life and death to see which
0:50:19 one of you is best in these if there was
0:50:21 no evil that would be no test if there
0:50:23 would be no evil there would be no free
0:50:24 will
0:50:24 what's the point of life then what is
0:50:26 the purpose of this
0:50:33 Oh whatever wakame shuffle you and ye
0:50:39 fitna ye lay inert or John everyone's
0:50:45 gonna die nonsense wait a minute
0:50:47 everyone's gonna die I'm gonna die
0:50:49 Eddie's gonna die you're gonna die and
0:50:52 we will test you with good and evil as a
0:50:56 as a test and then you'll come back to
0:50:58 us it's a test without evil the remote
0:51:00 test next divine luminous we've already
0:51:05 covered this v Allah
0:51:07 we're all born with the predisposition
0:51:08 of God there is evidence for this poor
0:51:11 blue
0:51:12 Justin Barrett many people have already
0:51:14 said we have seen we have analyzed
0:51:17 empirical evidence of children how they
0:51:20 what is their natural instinct they is
0:51:24 mentioned just embarrasses they have a
0:51:27 natural receptivity they has a natural
0:51:31 receptivity to divine to the divine and
0:51:33 non anthropomorphic God not Jesus not
0:51:38 Buddha they have a net we have natural
0:51:40 inclination to God and the mass
0:51:43 reinforced by the prophets that's the
0:51:45 Islamic narrative the prophets came to
0:51:47 remind us of what we already knew it
0:51:49 says that the Quran is a reminder just
0:51:53 like if you were separated from your
0:51:55 parents or your mother and then you're
0:51:58 reunited with a she is by natural
0:52:00 instinct and the same thing with God so
0:52:05 we talked about divine from confusion or
0:52:08 so unreliable revelations I grew at this
0:52:10 point there are unreliable revelations
0:52:12 but I would want to see how that is the
0:52:14 case with the Quran there was no
0:52:16 argument there
0:52:18 chapter 4 verse 34 bad translation man
0:52:20 in charge of woman there's only one
0:52:22 translation I think or two it's men are
0:52:24 maintained as and protectors of women
0:52:25 and frankly if you didn't believe this
0:52:28 you wouldn't draft men to the army in
0:52:29 America men protect women and they have
0:52:32 done so it's not saying that they are
0:52:35 better than them the Quran the Prophet
0:52:36 sent in the money Sarah Pfeiffer Rogell
0:52:38 we're not equal to women so I mean the
0:52:43 Quran says
0:52:45 in in the y alegría hominid me come in
0:52:48 second and almost about to come about
0:52:49 that god does not let to waste any
0:52:52 action of a man or woman both but
0:52:54 anyways go back to the idea of natural
0:52:57 selection or natural selection the
0:52:59 patriarchy on feminism is justified
0:53:03 because if men can dominate women that's
0:53:05 a natural thing what's the problem or
0:53:08 naturalism
0:53:08 how can he justify feminism second wave
0:53:11 feminism or naturalism that's an
0:53:14 impossibility you cannot do it why not
0:53:17 third wave feminism why not the works of
0:53:19 Judith Butler why not please Siri why
0:53:21 not LGBT wants to be second wave equal
0:53:24 the Eurocentric understanding of
0:53:26 equality how does that natural natural
0:53:28 because want to see how he
0:53:29 mechanistically shows us that hell
0:53:31 eternity what both of us can't be
0:53:34 Muslims and Christians can be in a both
0:53:36 right the right about that but listen
0:53:38 solve any issue doesn't create any
0:53:40 problem the translation problem only one
0:53:42 way to understand the language there's a
0:53:45 translation problem with mathematics is
0:53:47 mathematics false therefore it's a
0:53:49 language if that translatable thing it
0:53:52 becomes false because of its content and
0:53:54 has to be translated than mathematics is
0:53:56 false
0:53:57 more confusion I mean yes there's more
0:54:01 confusion but just because there's
0:54:02 controversy of something it doesn't make
0:54:04 you false as a fallacy Hagen from scale
0:54:07 says ninety-nine quizzes 99.9 percent of
0:54:10 the universe is not suitable to human
0:54:13 life he's made the fine-tuning argument
0:54:14 for me and we we're on the 0.01 so why
0:54:18 is there possibility of that real I
0:54:19 agree with you a transcendent person a
0:54:24 transcendent person he defines person in
0:54:27 a certain way he says well God controls
0:54:29 tiny space simple as that
0:54:30 I mean it's not really an argument and I
0:54:33 think I've got a minute left I forgot
0:54:37 man left well well you know
0:54:45 here's the thing guys don't be swayed by
0:54:48 the red herring the red herring is a
0:54:50 moral red herring the Koran says this
0:54:52 about mended look here's the thing on
0:54:55 naturalism no one is born equal yes why
0:55:01 because actually liberalism is an
0:55:03 outgrowth of something which is called
0:55:05 the state of nature it's a fictitious
0:55:07 mythological construct which John Locke
0:55:09 and Thomas Hobbes wrong in their books
0:55:11 it's not scientific we came out of the
0:55:13 state a state of nature and we became
0:55:15 one
0:55:15 we became connected socially
0:55:17 contractually into the same this saw the
0:55:20 whole of liberalism and human rights by
0:55:21 extension is a myth it's a little mini
0:55:25 showing on naturalism how liberalism is
0:55:29 true how we are all born equal in fact
0:55:30 I'm told you know your average high
0:55:33 we're all different on naturalism were
0:55:36 all different
0:55:38 [Applause]
0:55:50 Mohamad initially said that his main
0:55:54 point tonight was the argument from
0:55:57 contingency the problem is to say that
0:56:01 there must be a necessary being for
0:56:04 everything that is contingent requires
0:56:07 that the necessary contingent situation
0:56:11 plays out in an environment with cause
0:56:13 and effect and yet Mohammed has always
0:56:16 said that the universe had a beginning
0:56:19 and there was nothing before and that
0:56:23 God created the universe out of nothing
0:56:25 here is the problem you cannot analogize
0:56:30 from cause-and-effect and necessary and
0:56:34 contingent beings from within time and
0:56:37 space as opposed to the very coming into
0:56:40 being of time and space in the first
0:56:43 place if in fact the Big Bang as is most
0:56:47 likely nothing preceded it there was no
0:56:50 time and space you can have no cause and
0:56:53 effect and we can't even speak of cause
0:56:55 and effect because there was no
0:56:57 environment for a to cause B now with
0:57:02 respect to the notion of a necessary and
0:57:06 contingent being there is a problem with
0:57:08 the concept of a necessary being the
0:57:10 problem is that a necessary fact cannot
0:57:12 explain a contingent fact without
0:57:15 introducing a new contingent fact in
0:57:17 need of explanation now let's see why
0:57:19 this is so if a necessary fact cannot
0:57:22 explain a contingent fact except by in
0:57:25 tailing it because any fact entailed by
0:57:28 necessary fact must itself be necessary
0:57:31 however the necessary fact does not
0:57:33 entail the contingent fact then the
0:57:35 explanatory connection it has to the
0:57:37 contingent fact must be a contingent one
0:57:40 which introduces a new contingent fact
0:57:43 in need of explanation and if the
0:57:45 offender of the argument replies that
0:57:47 this new contingent fact can also
0:57:49 explain by the necessary fact then the
0:57:53 same reasoning will apply introducing
0:57:55 yet another new contingent fact in need
0:57:57 of explanation
0:57:59 and so ad infinitum but the whole reason
0:58:02 for introducing necessary fact in the
0:58:06 first place was to avoid an infinite
0:58:10 regress of explanations now Mohammed
0:58:14 said that we cannot even call something
0:58:17 evil unless we have a moral foundation
0:58:20 implying that objective moral values can
0:58:24 only exist with a supernatural being but
0:58:28 he doesn't explain what the connection
0:58:30 is for instance I've shown you in the
0:58:32 Bible and the Quran where though
0:58:36 Muhammad resisted men are supposed to be
0:58:38 in charge of women I've showed you in
0:58:41 both the Bible and the Quran where
0:58:43 people are sent to hell forever
0:58:46 for not just choosing the right
0:58:48 respective religion to say that we are
0:58:51 in no position to judge whether God's
0:58:55 doing that is right or wrong
0:58:57 totally eclipses human reason and
0:58:59 there's another problem with that to say
0:59:02 objective moral values depend on God you
0:59:04 have to ask is something good just
0:59:08 because God says it is then it's
0:59:10 arbitrary and even sending sincere
0:59:13 people to hell forever for not believing
0:59:15 in the right religion would be ok just
0:59:18 as God said it or they always tell us to
0:59:22 do what is good but the standard of the
0:59:25 good is independent of God then it means
0:59:28 that objective moral values exist
0:59:32 without being created by God by God
0:59:35 recognizes them and you can't get out of
0:59:38 it by saying well no the good comes from
0:59:40 God's perfect nature because we don't
0:59:42 see that perfect nature now as far as
0:59:45 the dependence of consciousness on the
0:59:47 physical brain is concerned nothing
0:59:50 mental happens without anything physical
0:59:54 happening there is no thought or
0:59:57 awareness that comes into the human
1:00:00 brain without a physical event in the
1:00:03 brain this is very very important again
1:00:06 if consciousness could exist apart from
1:00:09 the brain
1:00:11 then diseases and anesthetics wouldn't
1:00:14 eclipse consciousness now he talks about
1:00:17 the coherence of the universe and he
1:00:21 thinks the argument from scale is not a
1:00:24 problem but it certainly is if as a
1:00:29 somebody who believes in the Quran
1:00:31 because he quotes the Quran a lot he
1:00:34 believes in a God for whom humans is
1:00:37 central in concern then why all these
1:00:40 excess septillion x' of planets also if
1:00:44 in fact the universe is so perfectly put
1:00:48 together why will the star upon which we
1:00:51 depend the Sun burn out in a very short
1:00:55 span of time and then after that we will
1:01:00 die because the earth will no longer
1:01:03 have the Sun and there can't be life on
1:01:06 Earth without the Sun also with respect
1:01:10 to the whole concept of naturalism
1:01:13 Muhammed can't just like I saw in one of
1:01:17 his tapes he tried to say that we can
1:01:19 infer the existence of God from the
1:01:21 functioning of the universe just like we
1:01:23 can infer the existence of gravity from
1:01:27 the way gravity operates but you see
1:01:29 definitionally gravity as I dropped
1:01:32 something it hits the floor or hits the
1:01:35 table but that doesn't show that there
1:01:38 is a supernatural source behind it in
1:01:43 terms of the laws of nature the
1:01:45 constants and the fine-tuning as far as
1:01:49 that's concerned well the laws of
1:01:51 physics as they appear cannot be
1:01:54 violated but if they are and if you
1:01:57 change one constant and the other
1:01:59 studies have shown you can still have
1:02:02 light for instance there was a study
1:02:04 that showed that you can eliminate the
1:02:06 weak nuclear force one of the four
1:02:08 forces and stars could still form ifs
1:02:11 could form and explode becoming
1:02:14 supernovae then planets could still come
1:02:17 about we've also seen that there is a
1:02:21 argument from cosmic inflation which has
1:02:25 demonstrated the Cosmic Microwave
1:02:27 Background and the way inflation works
1:02:30 with quantum mechanics that are could be
1:02:32 a multiverse numbers and numbers of
1:02:35 individual universes each with their own
1:02:38 pockets of different physical laws this
1:02:41 hasn't been established by proof but yet
1:02:43 it is a better argument than theism
1:02:46 because it has a Basics in physics and
1:02:49 it has natural laws that are explainable
1:02:52 the other thing that Muhammad has not
1:02:54 yet addressed is he would have to admit
1:02:58 that in 99% of all instances in human
1:03:03 technological process when science has
1:03:06 looked for an answer it has found a
1:03:09 natural answer so what would be those
1:03:13 instances that differentiate the need
1:03:16 for a natural answer to a supernatural
1:03:19 one in other words if we look at a cell
1:03:23 or a bacteria the way it behaves natural
1:03:26 explanation but we look at something
1:03:28 else and our answer is only God did it
1:03:31 there's a world of difference between
1:03:33 looking at the fact that planets revolve
1:03:38 around the Sun and that stars don't fall
1:03:42 out of the sky except when they explode
1:03:43 as supernovae and going outside right
1:03:46 now and seeing the constellations saying
1:03:50 Eddie and Muhammad you're both wrong you
1:03:53 better become Mormons there's a world of
1:03:55 difference between those two that would
1:03:58 be a supernatural event also Muhammad
1:04:02 has never been able to and I don't blame
1:04:04 them because no one can can show how if
1:04:07 in fact consciousness depends on a
1:04:10 physical brain how the greatest
1:04:14 intelligence in the universe can exist
1:04:17 and think and function without a
1:04:19 physical brain how can there be a God
1:04:22 that doesn't have cortical neurons and
1:04:25 synapses how does God think when all the
1:04:28 evidence shows that the occurrence of
1:04:30 thought requires cortical neurons and
1:04:33 synapses and also if God is outside of
1:04:36 space and time God cannot be a
1:04:38 personal being because by very
1:04:40 definition a personal being is defined
1:04:43 as something within space and time that
1:04:47 has limits
1:04:48 so again naturalism prevails over
1:04:52 supernaturalism by the weight of the
1:04:54 evidence and we can see that there has
1:04:59 never been any verified supernatural
1:05:01 occurrences and we have seen no evidence
1:05:04 of any mental process that can exist in
1:05:09 a disembodied state so the evidence to
1:05:12 date makes it more likely than not the
1:05:14 universe is natural not supernatural and
1:05:16 there is no God thank you
1:05:19 [Applause]
1:05:28 thank you very much to both of the
1:05:30 debaters both brother Muhammad a job and
1:05:32 Edward tabash so the next session would
1:05:35 be the question and answer between them
1:05:37 both however just because of the timing
1:05:39 and because now that it has come in
1:05:41 hello everyone thank you for joining us
1:05:43 back again this next section will be the
1:05:45 cross questioning section the way this
1:05:48 will work is those speakers will be at
1:05:50 the podium we will begin with Muhammad
1:05:53 hijab
1:05:53 he will ask a question you'll have one
1:05:55 minute to formulate the question and
1:05:57 wording you'll have two minutes to
1:05:58 answer this will continue until Muhammad
1:06:00 has been able to ask three questions
1:06:02 then we will alternate that means Edward
1:06:06 will ask three questions again each
1:06:08 question will be one minute each and
1:06:10 each answer this time by Muhammad will
1:06:12 be two minutes each so if I can ask both
1:06:14 Edward and Muhammad to join me at the
1:06:16 podium or go to the podium thank you if
1:06:24 you like a good wet into the just one
1:06:26 mic okay okay
1:06:37 Frank Frank Sinatra and Egon Martin from
1:06:39 1950 I'm the only one old enough to know
1:06:45 that joke okay okay I was gonna say that
1:06:56 you touched upon morality and I think is
1:06:59 an important thing to talk about because
1:07:01 I have lots of intrigue to hear your
1:07:06 answer to the particularly this
1:07:07 particular question on naturalism what
1:07:12 scientific explanation can you provide
1:07:14 for the existence or the objectivity of
1:07:17 morality the answer is that I can give a
1:07:24 better explanation for morality on
1:07:27 atheism that on theism even if it's not
1:07:29 a perfect answer because on theism
1:07:32 someone looks into a book and without
1:07:34 any proof that God really said it saying
1:07:36 well God said it therefore it must be
1:07:38 true regardless of what we think about
1:07:40 it just because God said it which
1:07:42 eclipses human reason on atheism what we
1:07:45 do is we wrestle it out with our
1:07:48 reasoning and there are a whole avenue
1:07:52 of areas by which we can assess morality
1:07:56 and even if they're not perfect they're
1:07:58 more reliable than believing in a deity
1:08:01 for instance there's consequentialism
1:08:03 the consequences of actions being good
1:08:06 or bad there is the notion that our
1:08:09 moral values stem from our biological
1:08:12 nature see the problem was saying that
1:08:17 morality comes from God is circular
1:08:19 because what you're doing is you are
1:08:22 positing a God so you can have objective
1:08:26 moral values that you can then use to
1:08:29 try to show that that God exists and
1:08:32 that's is not a valid form of argument
1:08:40 which is
1:08:43 something else on that atheistic
1:08:46 naturalism what scientific experiment
1:08:49 would you conduct those up or could you
1:08:51 refer to that tells us about the
1:08:54 existence of mathematics how can you
1:08:56 prove mathematics through science is
1:08:59 very easy we prove mathematics
1:09:01 empirically for instance two of one
1:09:04 object and two of another object equals
1:09:07 four but what's important about that is
1:09:10 that is so axiomatic that it couldn't be
1:09:13 altered for instance God couldn't appear
1:09:15 right now and say by divine Fiat there
1:09:19 are three debaters standing at the
1:09:22 podium not two and so mathematics and
1:09:26 logic are actually arguments against the
1:09:30 supernatural because they show laws of
1:09:33 logic and laws of mathematics that
1:09:36 cannot be altered you see conceptually
1:09:39 it doesn't even work
1:09:41 to say God could make 2m 2 equals 5 and
1:09:46 so on naturalism we discover the laws of
1:09:51 nature we don't invent them and they're
1:09:54 not prescribed by anybody so for
1:09:56 instance we discovered the laws of
1:09:58 geometry nobody invented them we
1:10:01 discovered the workings of calculus we
1:10:05 discovered the laws of engineering
1:10:08 nobody invented it that if we put up a
1:10:11 building this way it'll collapse if we
1:10:13 put up a building the other way it will
1:10:16 collapse we discovered it just like we
1:10:19 discover what medicines work so
1:10:21 therefore on naturalism we would expect
1:10:26 that these laws could not be altered by
1:10:29 anyone a god or any other type of being
1:10:41 so it would be very difficult to put it
1:10:43 together but on this point of once again
1:10:45 on naturalism I have another question
1:10:46 because we made mention of some
1:10:48 historical events now obviously we both
1:10:50 have believed in parts of history for
1:10:52 example we believe in you know the slave
1:10:54 trade you believe in the Holocaust we
1:10:55 believe in you know things that have
1:10:57 happened even all the way back to the
1:10:58 prehistoric age if witness testimony
1:11:02 which is what is required for history to
1:11:04 take place for example your mother's
1:11:06 history of what happened to her or
1:11:09 whatever it may be how can you how can
1:11:12 you legitimize witness testimony or
1:11:15 naturalism and if it's not legitimized
1:11:17 does that mean that we can deny things
1:11:19 like slavery the Holocaust well you see
1:11:22 the answer to that is by empirical
1:11:25 evidence we know that certain things can
1:11:28 happen if I said that I flew here on an
1:11:31 airplane today nobody would question it
1:11:34 if I said I just flap my arms and flew
1:11:36 here bodily you would question it if I
1:11:39 told you that somebody crossed a river
1:11:43 to get to the other side you would
1:11:46 accept it if I told you that somebody
1:11:49 was levitated from one side of the river
1:11:51 to the other you wouldn't
1:11:53 this shows that we have an in-built
1:11:57 already recognition through logic and
1:12:00 reason and experience of understanding
1:12:04 eyewitness events that are within the
1:12:06 realm of what we know to be probable and
1:12:09 those which are not if I said that
1:12:13 somebody drove me here tonight for the
1:12:15 debate in a car you would believe me if
1:12:17 I said space aliens picked me up in an
1:12:20 interstellar spacecraft and brought me
1:12:23 here you wouldn't believe me so we
1:12:26 shouldn't shy away from the common sense
1:12:30 experience that already helps us
1:12:33 distinguish the natural from the
1:12:35 supernatural okay Mohammed I'm handing
1:12:41 you of five different translations of
1:12:46 surah 434 each one talks about men being
1:12:51 in charge of women
1:12:53 and there's nothing corresponding about
1:12:55 women being in charge of men and each of
1:12:57 the seven translations from different
1:13:00 respected translators of the Koran speak
1:13:03 about husband's having the right to
1:13:06 under circumstances of defiance and
1:13:09 arrogance beat their wives do you agree
1:13:12 or disagree with both men ruling over
1:13:15 women in the surah and the permission to
1:13:18 beat them as set forth in the surah I
1:13:20 certainly disagree with the translation
1:13:22 because the Watauga moon in Arabic means
1:13:24 maintain us and protect us and this
1:13:26 world time I am Puma literally means the
1:13:28 stander and that's why you'll find that
1:13:31 the majority of translators translate
1:13:33 like that as for the verse that talks
1:13:35 about the lava which they are required
1:13:37 almost there is a consensus among the
1:13:40 scholars of Islam this is not to be in
1:13:43 vengeful or attacking or harmful or
1:13:46 hurtful action this is talking about
1:13:48 something which is symbolic and the
1:13:50 evidence of that is salami said later on
1:13:55 that you cannot harm or reciprocate hump
1:13:57 so I think there is a problem here with
1:13:59 the understanding of the verse and also
1:14:01 the Prophet said let totally poem Allah
1:14:05 don't hit the women slaves of Allah
1:14:07 meaning women and he says the worst of
1:14:08 you are those who hear the women and
1:14:10 that's why I think if you look at the
1:14:12 totality of evidence then there is a bit
1:14:15 more nuance than you think
1:14:19 Muhammad you quoted the Quran a lot
1:14:22 tonight let me ask you why is the Quran
1:14:26 a more credible final revelation of God
1:14:29 having been dictated to the Prophet by
1:14:32 the angel Gabriel then the Book of
1:14:35 Mormon as the final revelation of God
1:14:38 having been dictated in the 19th century
1:14:41 in upstate New York by the angel Moroni
1:14:44 to the Prophet Joseph Smith the reason
1:14:47 why is because the Quran has certain
1:14:48 parameters and certain challenges that
1:14:51 the Book of Mormon doesn't have for
1:14:53 example as the inevitability challenge
1:14:54 it has the preservation challenge the
1:14:56 Quran is the only preserved book as
1:14:58 predictions that predict the future
1:15:00 that couldn't have been no another time
1:15:02 on probability we find it very difficult
1:15:03 I explained that in the conclusion well
1:15:05 if you wanna give you more expansion of
1:15:07 what I'm saying the Quran has a language
1:15:10 that completely discos or discs of the
1:15:13 Arabic language of the people of the
1:15:15 time and it was recognized by those
1:15:17 linguists is something which was
1:15:18 extraordinary the Quran has a structural
1:15:20 feature that even Orientalist scholars
1:15:22 like Raymond Ferran have looked at and
1:15:24 said that this is something which cannot
1:15:26 be possible considering the
1:15:27 circumstantial revelation of the Quran
1:15:29 so there's many reasons and I think the
1:15:31 main point is that Perron gives us a
1:15:33 falsification challenge and since your
1:15:34 final science the fact that it gives us
1:15:36 a falsification challenge makes it in
1:15:39 many ways quite scientific Mohammed you
1:15:43 have many times embraced what we would
1:15:45 call the Kalam cosmological argument the
1:15:49 first cause argument if in fact time and
1:15:52 space began with the Big Bang and if
1:15:53 something cannot come from nothing but
1:15:57 God created Allah created the world ex
1:15:59 nihilo out of nothing how did an
1:16:02 immaterial being with no physical
1:16:04 attributes no physical brain or body
1:16:06 create everything around us in a context
1:16:11 where there was no time and space for a
1:16:12 to cause B how did he do it how did what
1:16:16 was the mechanism by which this
1:16:17 immaterial being without time and space
1:16:20 created time and space and matter
1:16:22 well as Arab say other than delete laces
1:16:24 allow Adam so ignorance if we don't know
1:16:27 how something works it doesn't mean it
1:16:28 is false however having said that there
1:16:30 is no agreement among Muslims that the
1:16:32 universe was created X neither so there
1:16:34 were some people like Al has early and
1:16:36 others who did believe this what other
1:16:37 people I couldn't tell me I believe that
1:16:38 God perpetually created different things
1:16:41 pretty eternally so once again there is
1:16:44 a scope of interpretation in the Islamic
1:16:46 texts either way the point is causation
1:16:49 doesn't even factor in it because cause
1:16:51 of course is something which brings rise
1:16:53 to phenomenon whereas dependency is
1:16:55 something which is relying on something
1:16:57 else so time or no time whether you
1:16:59 believe in the a theory of time or the B
1:17:01 theory of time you still have to reckon
1:17:03 you have to deal with the fact that you
1:17:05 have things which rely
1:17:06 on each other and if we complied all the
1:17:08 things which rely upon each other
1:17:09 together you would have no existence so
1:17:12 you have to have an independent so the
1:17:13 contingency argument does not rely upon
1:17:15 causality which is why to be frank with
1:17:17 you I didn't make thank you so much that
1:17:31 concludes the cross rapid-fire question
1:17:35 portion of the debate the last portion
1:17:38 of the debate will be the audience Q&A
1:17:40 I'll quickly give an overview of how
1:17:42 this is supposed to work I have three
1:17:44 questions here for Muhammad three
1:17:46 questions here for Edward one for both
1:17:48 of you
1:17:48 I will ask the question whoever it is
1:17:50 directed towards will have two minutes
1:17:52 to respond and then two minutes will be
1:17:54 given to the other person to also
1:17:57 respond presenting their own
1:17:58 perspectives so with that I will begin
1:18:01 with the first question okay before I do
1:18:07 that I have a request if people can
1:18:10 actually not use the Wi-Fi I think we
1:18:12 have too many people and it's crashing
1:18:14 the livestream so if you guys have data
1:18:18 Verizon is great right okay
1:18:23 all right so we'll begin the first
1:18:26 question is directed towards Mohammed
1:18:29 why would God not show himself when he
1:18:32 knows the controversy that goes to
1:18:34 everyone's mind well it's a good
1:18:37 question thank you very much the
1:18:38 question has an empiricist
1:18:39 presupposition which is that in fact
1:18:42 knowledge should be known through the
1:18:43 five senses well as we've discovered
1:18:45 today that's not actually the case so
1:18:47 things like the logic or the the logic
1:18:50 through which science is done was
1:18:51 actually based on metaphysical logical
1:18:53 principles time is not seen mathematics
1:18:56 is not based on science there are lots
1:18:58 of things which are felt which are which
1:19:01 are found out without the empirical
1:19:03 method so the this empirical
1:19:05 naturalistic presupposition is rejected
1:19:07 and if we look at the development of
1:19:08 philosophy in the 20th century we'll
1:19:10 find that even people like aja ax who
1:19:12 wrote a book on positivism he admits to
1:19:14 some of these things and he capitulates
1:19:17 intellectually to these points so Frank
1:19:20 I'll say to you is that in the answer
1:19:22 the question is flawed is based on an
1:19:23 empiricist presupposition which would
1:19:25 mean by extension that science itself
1:19:27 couldn't exist because it's based on
1:19:29 presuppositions which are unscientific
1:19:31 otherwise on thank you the issue is
1:19:36 there are things like logic and
1:19:39 mathematics where the very working out
1:19:42 of the theorems show you the
1:19:44 truthfulness or falsity
1:19:46 however the question of whether God
1:19:49 exists or not is a factual question and
1:19:53 thus makes it subject to an empirical
1:19:56 investigation whether there is such an
1:19:59 all powerful being in the universe is a
1:20:02 factual question akin to whether space
1:20:05 aliens have visited us whether in fact
1:20:08 we do live after death or not when it
1:20:10 comes to questions of fact the empirical
1:20:13 method does apply but there's another
1:20:15 problem here in that both the Bible and
1:20:18 the Quran unmistakably promised eternal
1:20:23 punishment for non belief as a matter of
1:20:26 fundamental fairness we can say that it
1:20:30 is unfair of God to punish us for not
1:20:33 believing in him if he withholds
1:20:35 evidence that would enable us to believe
1:20:38 in him and that's the argument from
1:20:40 divine hiddenness so the laws of logic
1:20:44 and mathematics don't have causative
1:20:47 properties so you can't say the number
1:20:50 seven as an abstraction causes something
1:20:52 to happen but you can say and they do
1:20:55 say as Muhammad does God does cause
1:20:57 things to happen and if an agent has
1:21:00 causative powers and can make or break
1:21:02 something that subject to empirical
1:21:04 investigation thank you both a second
1:21:11 question this is directed towards you
1:21:13 Edward why are a pious --tz-- focused on
1:21:16 a god that would service any God would
1:21:19 not function to offer us what we want
1:21:21 what so the question is basically if a
1:21:24 God exists why are why are idiots so
1:21:29 focused on the fact that a god like that
1:21:32 would serve
1:21:33 us because God Himself is transcendent
1:21:36 and he would not necessarily function to
1:21:38 offer us what we want okay the question
1:21:42 though has a problem and that's that if
1:21:46 you accept an abstract deity that has
1:21:49 not claimed to have been revealed to
1:21:52 humanity then it's understandable that
1:21:55 God would not tailor the evidence to
1:21:58 meet our needs but if a God has
1:22:00 supposedly given us a number of
1:22:03 revelations a Bible Quran Book of Mormon
1:22:07 whatever else then we have a right to
1:22:10 use our reason to expect that such a God
1:22:14 is intending to reveal itself to us and
1:22:17 the failure of that God to fill in the
1:22:19 gaps of the revelation or the failure of
1:22:22 that God to provide us with a reliable
1:22:24 revelation makes non-belief reasonable
1:22:27 if non belief is reasonable it's in
1:22:30 culpable and we are not blameworthy for
1:22:33 non belief because we weren't given
1:22:35 sufficient evidence if we are not
1:22:37 blameworthy for non belief then it's
1:22:40 unfair to punish us for not believing
1:22:42 what we didn't have sufficient evidence
1:22:44 to believe and if we are punished for
1:22:47 not believing what we didn't have
1:22:49 sufficient evidence to believe then that
1:22:51 calls God's moral perfection into
1:22:54 question because we are being punished
1:22:56 on the premise is true and what the
1:23:15 saying is absolutely correct in fact if
1:23:18 God doesn't reveal himself to you and
1:23:20 then punishes you as a result this is
1:23:22 unjust and that's why the Quran says
1:23:24 while my own my davina had Tanabata a
1:23:27 surah chapter 17 verse 15 that we were
1:23:30 not gonna punish them until we sent him
1:23:33 a messenger so scholars of Islam said
1:23:35 even if you die in atheist or a Hindu or
1:23:37 a Christian and even though you're born
1:23:41 with this philtrum with this
1:23:43 predisposition which wasn't
1:23:46 hopefully you'll talk about it this
1:23:47 predisposition to believe in God which
1:23:49 we have evidence for now even though all
1:23:51 of that is in place God will still not
1:23:53 punish those individuals until they're
1:23:55 given sufficient exposure and that is
1:23:58 exactly correct I think you're right
1:24:04 thank you
1:24:06 the next question is directed towards
1:24:08 Mohammed so it's basically the case of
1:24:11 bad design in science there is a concept
1:24:14 of the sterile futures futures that are
1:24:16 a hindrance or otherwise less than
1:24:18 perfect and many organisms if the
1:24:20 universe runs without inconsistency what
1:24:23 would explain the studio futures and the
1:24:25 particular example that was given is the
1:24:28 woman's pelvis which is far too small
1:24:30 and creates a very difficult and painful
1:24:32 birthing process well I think this is
1:24:35 called the argument of ignorance just
1:24:36 because you don't know the function of
1:24:38 something it doesn't mean this function
1:24:39 of this so for example we don't know
1:24:41 what the appendix does it doesn't mean
1:24:43 it has no function it just means we
1:24:44 haven't discovered that yet we don't
1:24:45 know why two electrons can be in one
1:24:47 place at the same time on quantum
1:24:48 mechanics it doesn't mean that's a false
1:24:50 notion even though it goes against the
1:24:52 rules of logic and it goes against some
1:24:54 of the things conventions that we
1:24:55 believe in so just because you don't
1:24:57 know something it doesn't make it false
1:24:59 so that's the first point as for the
1:25:01 second point of bad design I mean who's
1:25:03 the judge of bad design I mean at least
1:25:04 with the fine-tuning argument you have
1:25:06 some kind of probability mathematical
1:25:08 probability that can be attached to this
1:25:10 kind of equation you're saying that the
1:25:12 chances of there not being you know a
1:25:14 universe or the universe having a
1:25:16 non-life permitting rate range is X
1:25:19 which is a mathematical kind of
1:25:21 rendering so here we have to be kind of
1:25:24 honest here and say that this is an
1:25:25 aesthetic value judgment at best
1:25:27 and aesthetic value judgments are not
1:25:30 our opinions frankly your opinion if you
1:25:32 see something that's bad design that's
1:25:34 your opinion you might think it's bad
1:25:35 design but there might be a reason now
1:25:37 there's one more thing I wanna ask cuz
1:25:38 i've got a minute left I think people
1:25:40 have misunderstood my honest my argument
1:25:42 from uniformity I'll add it to the
1:25:44 conclusion like my good friend for us
1:25:46 the hobby mentioned one time in a
1:25:47 podcast I had done with him for example
1:25:49 let's take a coin if we flip a coin it
1:25:52 can either be heads or tails today
1:25:55 we can flip it it's either gonna be
1:25:56 heads or tails tomorrow is going to be
1:25:58 either heads or tails we don't expect
1:26:01 the coin to be flipped and turned into a
1:26:03 butterfly why because we accept that
1:26:06 there's a kind of coherence that exists
1:26:08 throughout kind of constants that exist
1:26:09 so in order to do science you need to
1:26:12 know or you need to presuppose
1:26:13 that this uniformity exists otherwise
1:26:16 your calculations today will be
1:26:17 meaningless tomorrow and that's why
1:26:19 Albert Einstein said that a priori we
1:26:22 expect a chaotic universe meaning from
1:26:26 the mind we expect there not to be this
1:26:28 kind of order so this underpins or is
1:26:30 even more undercutting if you like than
1:26:32 the fine-tuning argument which is why I
1:26:33 presented it so that's that's it thank
1:26:36 you the problem is that when you posit a
1:26:39 god who is supposed to be all-powerful
1:26:42 and morally perfect then defects in our
1:26:46 design are not justified based on those
1:26:50 attributes of God for instance I pointed
1:26:52 out how the gene that can help fight
1:26:55 malaria can also cause sickle cell
1:26:58 anemia we know that we humans have back
1:27:02 problems because we stood up too soon we
1:27:05 know that there are defects in our
1:27:07 bodies we could be more resistant to
1:27:09 cancer we could be more resistant to
1:27:11 viruses we could have a better digestive
1:27:15 system so God cannot get off the hook
1:27:19 here because he is presented as an
1:27:22 all-powerful being who is morally
1:27:24 perfect an all-powerful being who is
1:27:27 morally perfect doesn't make these
1:27:29 missteps in design and we already know
1:27:33 our vulnerability to disease for
1:27:36 instance we already know that we just
1:27:40 have a very few decades to be in good
1:27:44 condition and then as we get older we
1:27:48 begin to decline and so that's not
1:27:52 something that we would expect from a
1:27:53 morally perfect God we wouldn't expect
1:27:56 unnecessary pain if God wants us to take
1:28:00 our hand off the fire so we don't get
1:28:03 burned we would expect pain but if we're
1:28:05 trapped in a burning forest and
1:28:07 burned to death painfully pain has no
1:28:10 value and we wouldn't expect that
1:28:12 unnecessary suffering with no purpose on
1:28:15 theism it's more likely on atheism so
1:28:19 given the claims of God's moral
1:28:20 perfection and omnipotence a defects in
1:28:25 design are not defensible God what proof
1:28:37 do you personally need to believe and
1:28:39 how we say this is the difference
1:28:43 between me and a religious person I'm
1:28:45 subject to evidence religions don't
1:28:48 change regardless of the evidence but an
1:28:51 empirically minded atheist like me would
1:28:53 if right now Mohamed and I were
1:28:57 levitated to the ceiling if my father
1:28:59 who was dead for 18 years walked in this
1:29:02 room right now in his inimitable leader
1:29:04 Shack sent and I recognized him asking
1:29:06 me why not in my office working and then
1:29:09 floated in the air and and and and said
1:29:12 both of you Mormonism is the true
1:29:15 religion if Mohammed and I right now
1:29:18 were teleported to Mecca and I saw the
1:29:22 most amazing astronomical displays
1:29:25 telling me to become a Muslim right away
1:29:28 I would now you might say well this is
1:29:31 the result of an advanced space alien
1:29:33 but being an evidential 'us I would
1:29:35 believe it's a supernatural being
1:29:37 until someone showed me that it was
1:29:39 advanced space aliens so the difference
1:29:42 between atheists like me and those who
1:29:45 subscribe to religion is we are open to
1:29:49 changing if we have direct evidence
1:29:52 whereas there very few religious people
1:29:56 who would say if this happened I would
1:29:58 not believe in God whereas atheists like
1:30:01 me can clearly say if the following
1:30:03 things happen I will believe in God but
1:30:06 we all know they won't happen but if
1:30:07 they did I would answer yes away you get
1:30:11 two minutes we yeah the first point or
1:30:13 not being religious is the pipe that
1:30:15 depends on how you define religion
1:30:16 because frankly if you take it like an
1:30:18 Emile Durkheim approach whose
1:30:20 sociologists he defined religion and
1:30:22 more broad terms than would be found in
1:30:24 vernacular vernacular lien dictionaries
1:30:26 for example which has to be through God
1:30:28 or whatever frankly you could make the
1:30:29 argument that atheist people are very
1:30:31 religious in so much as they have axioms
1:30:34 and they have leaps of faith which they
1:30:36 believe in for instance if we take for
1:30:39 example science science and especially
1:30:41 something like quantum physics you don't
1:30:43 do the experiments yourself you rely
1:30:45 upon witness testimony you don't go into
1:30:47 laboratory and repeat experiments X
1:30:49 amount of times in order to believe it
1:30:50 so in order for you to have an
1:30:52 understanding of science you have to
1:30:54 have a leap of faith in trusting those
1:30:56 individuals who teach you about science
1:30:58 your teachers your schoolbooks and so on
1:31:00 I mean you believe in equality and once
1:31:02 again these are precepts which frankly
1:31:04 are axiomatic meaning they don't have
1:31:06 any evidence to substantiate them even
1:31:09 John Locke who is the founder of
1:31:10 liberalism he based it on God by the way
1:31:13 and that's why you're in the position of
1:31:16 independence created beings as being
1:31:18 referred to over and over again so
1:31:19 really do not have a right up estimate
1:31:21 right school to talk about equality
1:31:23 without having some kind of leap of
1:31:25 faith frankly in those things so
1:31:28 atheists have faith all the time they
1:31:30 have faith in things they don't see they
1:31:32 have faith in things they don't interact
1:31:33 with and what I'm gonna say is that this
1:31:36 is where as John Gray said some people
1:31:39 can wrap a you know discussion of
1:31:42 ideology in sociological format and make
1:31:45 it seem as if it's a religious but in
1:31:48 fact it is actually in terms of its
1:31:50 conventions and epistemic way the same
1:31:53 as any kind of religious belief as for
1:31:56 levitating and so on well you believe in
1:31:58 their levitating but it just has to
1:31:59 happen in the quantum physics realm
1:32:01 where things do levitate and things do
1:32:03 flow Harry Potter exists in the quantum
1:32:05 physics world but an atheist would never
1:32:07 believe it unless a scientist told them
1:32:09 that's belief does faith
1:32:14 thank you an expression to Muhammad what
1:32:20 God riders with autonomy and does that
1:32:23 engage the good and evil argument to
1:32:26 give you what God provide us was
1:32:29 autonomy our free will and does that
1:32:32 negate the gern and evil argument yes so
1:32:35 on Islamic traditionalism God has
1:32:39 endowed us with equal hell or the idea
1:32:41 of choice and free will and in fact even
1:32:42 is a necessary part of that because if
1:32:44 you don't have evil you cannot make a
1:32:46 decision there will just be good and
1:32:48 good to decide from you can't decide
1:32:50 from good and good they have to be good
1:32:51 and bad and therefore you must be tested
1:32:53 even a test makes no sense with the
1:32:55 existence with the non-existence of evil
1:32:57 a tests makes no sense with the
1:33:00 non-existence of evil so sometimes the
1:33:03 bad thing can be good for you well
1:33:05 assets a crochet a whole lot on the
1:33:07 Quran says you could hate something but
1:33:09 it's actually very good for you and the
1:33:10 thing is on theism on Islamic theism we
1:33:13 believe in another domain it's a
1:33:15 metaphysical domain which is young p.m.
1:33:17 the day of judgment whereby one of those
1:33:20 things that we are wronged in in the
1:33:21 dunya the worldly life you'll be
1:33:23 recompensed for that so we don't believe
1:33:25 that when a child dies that's just a
1:33:27 random rearrangement of atoms as would
1:33:29 be the case by the way or naturalism so
1:33:31 random rearrangement of atoms if I slap
1:33:33 a snowman and unlock his head off is the
1:33:35 same is if I cut a kid's head off
1:33:37 because it's just on naturalism frankly
1:33:40 it's just you know a rearrangement of
1:33:41 atoms and in order for you to make any
1:33:45 sense of that you'd have to impose a
1:33:47 subjective value judgment on it which
1:33:50 you'd have to have faith in order to
1:33:51 have in the first place so frankly I
1:33:54 mean what we believe is that the
1:33:56 injustice is of this world Hitler for
1:33:58 example was a very unjust man killed six
1:34:00 million individuals he will be punished
1:34:03 hopefully perpetually in a domain where
1:34:06 in which the punishment is not limited
1:34:08 justice cannot be done on naturalism it
1:34:11 can only be done on a kind of system a
1:34:14 metaphysical system which the undoes all
1:34:17 of the wrongs that happened in this
1:34:18 world
1:34:25 we may not like the implications of a
1:34:30 godless world but that doesn't mean that
1:34:32 a God will come into existence just to
1:34:35 rescue us from those implications we may
1:34:37 not like the fact that we end at death
1:34:39 but that doesn't mean that God will come
1:34:41 about just so that we don't end at death
1:34:44 of that God doesn't otherwise exist the
1:34:48 concept of free will is given more
1:34:52 credit than it deserves if you have two
1:34:54 children
1:34:55 you don't let one of your children push
1:34:57 the other off a cliff just so as not to
1:35:00 interfere in free will
1:35:02 and so the question of free will or even
1:35:08 the benefits of it do not justify the
1:35:12 extreme pain and the extreme suffering
1:35:15 that we undergo so for instance if we
1:35:18 need to feel pain we put our hand on a
1:35:21 hot stove that's understandable but that
1:35:24 pain does not serve a useful purpose if
1:35:27 we are being innocently burnt by evil
1:35:30 people and we have to suffer that
1:35:33 agonizing death so the fact that there
1:35:38 is gratuitous unnecessary unexplained
1:35:42 horrendous suffering goes way beyond
1:35:46 necessary slight evils and suffering
1:35:49 which would have a beneficial and
1:35:52 corrective purpose so we can't say that
1:35:56 any amount of suffering or any amount of
1:35:59 horrible experience is justified because
1:36:02 we need that in which to distinguish the
1:36:05 good even a small amount of evil or a
1:36:08 bearable amount of evil is enough to
1:36:11 distinguish the good it is the presence
1:36:13 of unexplained gratuitous horrendous
1:36:16 suffering that is incompatible with an
1:36:19 all good and all-powerful God thank you
1:36:25 last question directed towards Edward to
1:36:28 summarize essentially Islam provides
1:36:31 objective morality do you believe there
1:36:33 is such a thing
1:36:34 as objective morality and if so how
1:36:38 would you explain why a theists 30 years
1:36:41 ago would object to say homosexuality
1:36:45 well I believe that there are objective
1:36:49 moral values and they're not prescribed
1:36:52 by anybody there is no lawgiver now I
1:36:54 was just asked thirty years ago how
1:36:57 atheists would have responded to
1:36:59 homosexuality this actually proves my
1:37:02 point thirty years ago many atheists may
1:37:05 not have recognized the importance of
1:37:09 allowing such personal freedom what that
1:37:12 means is not that anybody who condemned
1:37:16 persons who love those of the same
1:37:18 gender were right or wrong then it meant
1:37:23 that we hadn't yet discovered the truth
1:37:26 that these are people that deserve equal
1:37:28 rights so for instance in the 1950s when
1:37:31 I was growing up people would be
1:37:33 arrested for being gay they would be put
1:37:36 in prison for being gay the fact that we
1:37:39 don't do that now and it's been illegal
1:37:42 to do so in any state since 2003 shows
1:37:45 that the more we evolve the more we
1:37:48 discover these moral truths not that
1:37:52 somebody invents them and imposes us on
1:37:56 them that by our natural development we
1:37:59 discover these truths for instance it
1:38:02 used to be that religious people would
1:38:04 burn women accused of being witches but
1:38:07 we don't do that anymore because we
1:38:09 discovered the moral truth that it's
1:38:12 wrong to do that to these women
1:38:14 irrespective of the Bible saying thou
1:38:17 shalt not suffer a witch to live so the
1:38:20 more we get away from religious
1:38:22 fundamentalist edicts the more moral and
1:38:25 tolerant we become which shows that
1:38:28 morality cannot be dependent on
1:38:31 religious fundamentalist or Orthodox
1:38:33 edicts because it is our pulling away
1:38:36 from them that makes us more moral more
1:38:38 compassionate and more tolerant
1:38:46 the American founding fathers had used
1:38:50 in order to form at least some period of
1:38:53 time allow slavery graces slavery and
1:38:56 what Stalin used in order to do what he
1:38:58 did what Hitler used frankly to do what
1:39:00 he did this is not the work of religion
1:39:02 this is the work of people who use
1:39:05 ideological justification in order to
1:39:07 commit certain acts the same way is
1:39:09 which something is conceivable to think
1:39:11 that some religious people will use
1:39:13 religious justification in orders commit
1:39:15 certain acts so I don't think there
1:39:17 should be an epistemic preferencing of
1:39:18 one one thing over another here I think
1:39:20 we should just realize that epistemology
1:39:24 drives us to certain forces certain
1:39:25 things and you can't really say more
1:39:27 religion is better than non religion
1:39:28 once again that would depend on how you
1:39:30 define religion in the first place but
1:39:32 having said all of that I mean we've
1:39:34 talked a lot about gay rights today and
1:39:35 all those things but on the harm
1:39:37 principle which is what John Stuart Mill
1:39:40 proposed part of social social
1:39:42 liberalism that you can do whatever you
1:39:44 want so long as you don't harm anyone
1:39:46 else well frankly that would entail that
1:39:49 sex between a brother and sister or
1:39:52 brother and a brother so long as this
1:39:54 couldn't reception news and there's no
1:39:55 deformed babies that should be allowed
1:39:57 as well and I haven't seen anyone doing
1:39:59 incest right activism in America for a
1:40:02 very long time and frankly on liberalism
1:40:05 that's what you should do you know just
1:40:07 because there are minority group of
1:40:09 people that are still in the closet in
1:40:10 the incest closet it doesn't mean now
1:40:12 that they should be treated any less on
1:40:14 liberalism so I think we have to be we
1:40:16 have to be completely honest with
1:40:18 ourselves in our social analysis and if
1:40:20 what we're doing is selecting certain
1:40:22 social things which have become popular
1:40:24 early 21st century to make a case about
1:40:26 God's existence and I think really we're
1:40:28 being academically disingenuous so I
1:40:30 think at the end of the day whatever
1:40:31 principle you're going to have you have
1:40:33 to apply it across the board and if it
1:40:36 is the hum principle and social
1:40:37 liberalism then incest should be allowed
1:40:39 in this country and people should be
1:40:41 able to do that
1:40:50 thank you final question this is
1:40:53 directed to both of you
1:40:55 Edward because you began I'll start with
1:40:57 Mohammed please address the viability of
1:41:00 Pascal's wager well I mean Pascal is
1:41:06 kind of like it's not really an argument
1:41:07 to be honest with you which is why them
1:41:09 kind of make ace Pascal was a famous
1:41:12 mathematician who talked about you know
1:41:14 basically making a wager you know
1:41:16 betting on the fact that going god
1:41:18 exists because the because doing
1:41:20 otherwise may mean that you know you'll
1:41:23 you'll you'll die and go to hell and so
1:41:24 on and so therefore what makes sense to
1:41:26 do that what we're saying is that fair
1:41:29 enough there is some truth in that I
1:41:30 mean if you think about the Quran
1:41:31 actually affirms some of that where it
1:41:33 says you know well in Kenema no angel
1:41:37 appear in the LA he's so much a B
1:41:39 what if it was from God what if this was
1:41:42 from God and you are disbelieving in it
1:41:46 so it's a for experiment right it's more
1:41:49 of a thought experiment rather than an
1:41:51 arguments I think the maximum we can do
1:41:53 with it is you have a thought experiment
1:41:54 make people think about death you know
1:41:57 make people think about the fact that
1:41:58 they're going to die and what kind of
1:42:01 ideology or what kind of belief system
1:42:03 they want to have would then one day in
1:42:05 their graves frankly because atheism
1:42:07 will not do anything as a matter of fact
1:42:08 now I'm not saying therefore God exists
1:42:10 because that's not an argument I've made
1:42:12 that clear it's not an argument to say
1:42:14 well the implications of atheism is that
1:42:16 you know you're going to be in the sick
1:42:18 bed you're gonna be maybe 75 years old
1:42:20 one and two people in United States of
1:42:23 America are gonna have cancer just like
1:42:24 in the UK put into cancer research and
1:42:26 what is better for you I mean as it to
1:42:29 be optimistic that there's going to be
1:42:31 continuation of that life or to know
1:42:33 that actually you're going to just
1:42:34 become bones and dust obviously from an
1:42:37 implications perspective theism and
1:42:39 especially theism with afterlife
1:42:41 implications has better employed
1:42:43 optimistic implications for you your
1:42:45 memories will be wiped away your
1:42:46 experiences will be wiped away and your
1:42:48 bodies will be wiped away
1:42:49 that's atheist naturalism but the
1:42:52 implications of of theism is that
1:42:55 actually there will be continuations
1:42:56 that's just the beginning and so this is
1:42:58 not an argument why it is an implication
1:43:02 well there is a problem with Pascal's
1:43:05 wager
1:43:05 now Mohammed just admitted that the
1:43:07 Quran does talk about punishment and
1:43:10 hell for not believing in Islam as the
1:43:13 Bible talks about punishment and Hell
1:43:15 for not believing in Christianity what
1:43:18 Pascal's wager did was it made the error
1:43:21 of automatically assuming that if there
1:43:25 is a God this being will judge us by how
1:43:27 we worship this being rather than how
1:43:31 good we are to each other and so the
1:43:35 wager actually is false because it
1:43:39 presupposes without proof that God is
1:43:42 such an evil being if there is a God
1:43:45 that regardless of how good we are
1:43:47 unless we adopt the right religion we
1:43:50 will burn in hell forever now I'm sure
1:43:53 that Pascal who was a Christian would
1:43:56 not have accepted that someone is
1:43:58 meeting the wager if they were Muslim
1:44:01 and I think that the defect is whenever
1:44:06 we say without any evidence whatsoever
1:44:11 other than ancient hearsay in ancient
1:44:15 books which we know were written by
1:44:17 fallible men as women weren't even
1:44:19 involved in the writing of these books
1:44:21 when we say we are certain that the
1:44:24 ultimate force in the universe will
1:44:26 punish you unless you adopt my religion
1:44:30 that is nothing but primitive
1:44:33 exclusivism I think we got one more girl
1:44:42 thank you vote that concludes our
1:44:45 audience Q&A we will now proceed to the
1:44:47 closing statements each person will have
1:44:49 15 minutes to give theirs and we will
1:44:52 begin with
1:45:16 fifteen
1:45:35 that's done
1:45:39 all right please come down 15 minutes
1:45:42 left and then we finish I'll start
1:45:46 witness quite someone expired
1:45:58 just so quickly I'm saying now just to
1:46:01 quickly kind of comment on the last
1:46:02 thing that it talked about ancient
1:46:04 hearsay and so on democracy is an
1:46:06 ancient concept liberalism is an ancient
1:46:08 concept it's still it's still adopted by
1:46:11 you know mainstream society that's the
1:46:14 genetic fallacy basically to criticize
1:46:16 something based on where it came from
1:46:18 anyway I found quite interesting in the
1:46:21 last speech that Eddie Edward had he
1:46:26 actually made an interesting
1:46:27 capitulation he admitted that 99% of
1:46:31 things natural science can explain that
1:46:35 means 1% of things are supernatural that
1:46:39 means miracles are possible so that is
1:46:42 very happy all right
1:46:48 secondly now what you talked about about
1:46:52 cause and effect now the definition of a
1:46:55 cause is something which brings rise to
1:46:56 phenomena I can cause a house to be for
1:47:01 example I can build a house yes I can
1:47:03 build a house but I can die and the
1:47:05 house will continue to be yes so I don't
1:47:08 need to exist in order for the house to
1:47:10 continue existing dependence on the
1:47:12 other hand is when you rely on something
1:47:14 else so he made the mistake of saying
1:47:16 that contingency which is dependence
1:47:19 relies upon cause and effect
1:47:21 it doesn't which is why I didn't really
1:47:23 mention cause an effect to avoid this
1:47:25 discussion altogether let us agree for
1:47:28 the same imbalance okay
1:47:30 let's agree that there's no such thing
1:47:32 as cause methane's the contingency
1:47:35 argument the way I framed it is still
1:47:37 valid because I didn't mention cause and
1:47:39 effect at all let me tell you why
1:47:43 interesting atheists when he was because
1:47:48 a logical are given the hassanis
1:47:50 argument that William Lane Craig and
1:47:51 those other guys are making popular now
1:47:53 in this country so has that is argument
1:47:55 everything that begins to exist has a
1:47:57 course the universe began to exist
1:47:59 therefore the universe has a cause
1:48:02 okay so Bertrand Russell said but this
1:48:05 is the problem of composition because
1:48:07 you're saying that just because there
1:48:08 are causes in the universe it doesn't
1:48:11 mean that
1:48:11 cause we'll be applied to the universe
1:48:14 so he says for example just because we
1:48:15 have mothers as part of the human race
1:48:17 it doesn't mean that the human race
1:48:19 itself has mother imagine a war like
1:48:23 Trump likes wolf yeah just because this
1:48:29 is Bertrand Russell is a very valid
1:48:30 argument he says just because the world
1:48:32 is made up of small parts it doesn't
1:48:35 mean that the world itself is small he's
1:48:38 right
1:48:38 Bertrand Russell was right however what
1:48:42 if the world is made up of red paths the
1:48:45 morning stuff can be read so the fallacy
1:48:47 of composition is a double-edged sword
1:48:49 because in order for it to be a proper
1:48:52 fallacy it needs to have perfect
1:48:54 knowledge of the whole if you don't have
1:48:56 perfect knowledge of the whole you can't
1:48:58 claim it to be a fallacy
1:48:59 so both the theists and the Atheist are
1:49:02 in a good line because the Atheist is a
1:49:04 well it can't be the small part can't be
1:49:08 the me but the fiercest same or the red
1:49:10 part can make red bricks can make a red
1:49:12 wall and both can be possible but both
1:49:15 both can be argued against you see so
1:49:22 this is why I use the contingency
1:49:24 argument
1:49:24 let me bring back the on Linda I use
1:49:27 causation for the sake of argument no
1:49:29 problem you can have causation let's
1:49:32 pretend you know there's no let's
1:49:35 pretend it's possible that it can exist
1:49:39 and it's possible they can't ask for the
1:49:40 universe on logical basis however
1:49:43 contingency dependents I made an
1:49:45 ontological arguments a mathematical
1:49:49 argument says yes now you can't have the
1:50:01 existence of things if everything else
1:50:06 if existence depends upon dependent
1:50:09 things existence would never exist you
1:50:11 have to either independent outside or
1:50:17 the independent this series
1:50:21 and what is it necessary independent
1:50:25 however as different yes and we said a
1:50:33 possible existence is something which
1:50:36 can be rearranged I'm not going to be
1:50:41 really great here today I know you're
1:50:43 used to this I you season is debated
1:50:45 William Lane Craig this is his argument
1:50:47 I know the weaknesses of the argument I
1:50:49 didn't use this argument I want the most
1:50:51 undercutting argument
1:50:53 no one can crack this argument I've read
1:50:56 from Plato to live lives all the way
1:50:59 through to Russell and believe me this
1:51:01 is the argument no one can solve this is
1:51:04 the uncrackable code so he tried to
1:51:07 crack the code by saying well the
1:51:09 necessary existence should be what I'm
1:51:15 saying they're complete opposite I'm
1:51:17 saying that it's impossible for it to be
1:51:19 made up of parts and still be the
1:51:22 necessary existence because a possible
1:51:24 existence is an existence that is
1:51:26 subject to change so to use this
1:51:30 phraseology if we look at the weight of
1:51:34 the evidence the totality of the
1:51:36 evidence where extraordinary claims
1:51:39 require extraordinary evidence
1:51:42 we have an extrude we have an absolutely
1:51:47 extraordinary evidence
1:51:48 which works in the mind mathematically
1:51:51 and works in physical reality
1:51:54 cosmologically and works on first
1:51:57 principles and we get the independent
1:51:59 self-sufficient one entity which we as
1:52:03 Muslims call Allah that's it what if
1:52:10 there's a multiverse
1:52:12 well if there's a multiverse no problem
1:52:15 have a multiple an infinite amount of
1:52:18 universes or more even just universes
1:52:21 because why discriminate to order
1:52:23 universes creations upon those things
1:52:27 and we said it can't be that because you
1:52:31 can envisage taking a universe in and
1:52:34 out and so it's dependent upon the
1:52:36 structure it's over
1:52:38 you see here it's important to be honest
1:52:42 with ourselves he's a lawyer a lot of
1:52:47 lawyers I referred to as liars but he's
1:52:48 not one of them he's a good man and as a
1:52:52 lawyer when he goes into the the
1:52:55 courtroom he refers to witness testimony
1:53:00 he makes abductive arguments like CSI
1:53:03 CSI forensics put the evidences together
1:53:06 it's not god of the gaps just in the
1:53:09 same ways if you put food for a dog and
1:53:12 then you go away and that and the food
1:53:15 is eaten you're not going to say that's
1:53:16 a dog of the gapps argument it's just an
1:53:19 abductive inference which he does every
1:53:23 time and if it's not that if you don't
1:53:27 do an abductive inference then all of
1:53:29 the cases he's represented have been
1:53:31 miscarriages of justice which I'm sure
1:53:33 he wouldn't do and the point here is
1:53:35 this the point is when we put the
1:53:40 totality of evidence asking for more
1:53:42 evidence you know it's like when we've
1:53:44 given you ontological metaphysical April
1:53:46 I write a post all right scientific
1:53:49 physical mathematic probabilistic
1:53:51 evidences it's like asking for a torch
1:53:55 when you're in the middle of daylight
1:53:57 give me a torch but why do you need to
1:54:00 talk to my friend everything around you
1:54:02 you're locked into the arguments
1:54:04 everywhere you go there's an arguments
1:54:07 there's evidence there's science even to
1:54:10 the extent whereby even to the extent
1:54:14 whereby you're born with that feeling of
1:54:19 believing in God and then you have to
1:54:22 socially construct according to Justin
1:54:24 barek
1:54:25 others your atheism just like you use
1:54:29 other social constructed ideas like
1:54:31 second wave feminism liberalism I don't
1:54:33 think people don't know about liberalism
1:54:35 were women by the way you're talking
1:54:37 about what about these men don't all men
1:54:39 liberalism is written by men John Locke
1:54:41 John Stuart Mill Russo wants us to
1:54:44 Thomas Hobbes I don't hear I don't see
1:54:47 any woman's names there so frankly let's
1:54:50 not play these games what I will say is
1:54:53 this what I will say is as Muslims we
1:54:59 have additional evidence and this is the
1:55:02 evidence from revelation the Koran says
1:55:04 a woolly bedroom three Admiral up woman
1:55:08 badly Halloween saleable that the Romans
1:55:11 had been defeated Lord black neighbor
1:55:13 Island and after that defeat they will
1:55:15 become victorious
1:55:17 it makes predictions which materialize
1:55:19 and look at this just as one piece of
1:55:21 evidence and you can look at my videos
1:55:23 for more but it's just one thing when
1:55:26 someone makes a succession of
1:55:28 predictions of the future why is the
1:55:31 probability that some of those
1:55:35 predictions will be false if you add all
1:55:37 of those things and you aggregate them
1:55:39 in your total probability chart and you
1:55:42 ask the question if someone makes all of
1:55:43 these if someone makes all of these
1:55:47 predictions of the future like the Quran
1:55:48 does what's the probability that this
1:55:51 could have been I guess well there's a
1:55:54 way of finding that out through
1:55:56 mathematical probability theory for
1:55:57 example or historic probability so
1:56:01 frankly we do have an argument it's not
1:56:04 and by the way there's something else
1:56:06 here very important he made a good point
1:56:08 he made a very good point
1:56:10 he said that why is it the case that
1:56:13 miracles are confined or time bound he's
1:56:15 right for a Christian that would be a
1:56:19 great argument if you say to a Christian
1:56:21 how comes Jesus rested dead when we
1:56:23 couldn't see it absolutely right mother
1:56:26 well the colossal model selected like
1:56:29 have fattened in se we have not sent you
1:56:32 to except for to Muhammad all of
1:56:35 humankind
1:56:36 the reason why those prophetic miracles
1:56:39 were localized like Jesus or Moses plain
1:56:42 to see whoever may be is because they
1:56:43 appealed or is meant to appeal to that
1:56:45 time and that people as for the Quran
1:56:49 itself it claims to be the miracle it's
1:56:52 an another Torah miracle so that you can
1:56:54 analyze it in any time in any place so
1:56:57 it's not giving an unfair advantage to
1:57:00 the primary audience you can try and
1:57:03 falsify the Quran now that gives you a
1:57:06 way to try and do so you can try and
1:57:08 imitate the Quran now challenges are the
1:57:10 challenges you to do so and you can try
1:57:13 and look at those things in the Quran
1:57:15 which claim to be happening in the
1:57:16 future and analyze whether they did in
1:57:18 hindsight now because we have seen
1:57:20 whether it happened or not for example
1:57:21 these are some examples now in the last
1:57:25 two or three minutes I want to say
1:57:29 something important putting this
1:57:32 discussion to the side you know Edward
1:57:35 is one of our friends here in America
1:57:38 and the reason why I'm putting this in
1:57:41 the end is because I've kind of finished
1:57:44 everything and I wanted to say this
1:57:46 he works actively to promote the rights
1:57:49 of Muslims in this country and its
1:57:53 people like Edwards that allow for
1:57:56 Muslims in this country and in the West
1:57:58 to be able to be guaranteed the same
1:58:01 kind of freedoms frankly that other
1:58:04 every other person should happen I
1:58:06 believe that if you're going to believe
1:58:07 in something be consistent with it and
1:58:09 though maybe not in the field of atheism
1:58:12 and God's existence you might not be
1:58:14 fully consistent but in his morality
1:58:15 he's a man of consistency he opposes
1:58:19 Trump's ban on Muslims he's a friend of
1:58:22 the Muslims and what I want to end off
1:58:25 by saying here is this is the kind of
1:58:28 person who were happy to have them as a
1:58:31 friend of the Muslim community here in
1:58:33 the USA
1:58:42 honestly after things like the
1:58:45 Christchurch Massacre or other terrorist
1:58:48 attacks happening on both sides bad
1:58:51 things are happening we need to be able
1:58:53 to build bridges
1:58:54 I believe Edward is the man or the kind
1:58:57 of person Edward is is the kind of
1:59:00 person we need to be friends with we
1:59:02 need to invite to our houses we need to
1:59:04 be kind to we need to show courtesy to
1:59:05 and we to respect highly despite
1:59:08 religious or ideological disagreements
1:59:11 we will agree to disagree but we will
1:59:14 also agree to agree where our interests
1:59:18 are mutual and where we can oppose a
1:59:22 common threat to both of our existences
1:59:26 Edward is consistent because he does not
1:59:29 like arbitrariness which is a which is a
1:59:32 theme in liberalism where one community
1:59:36 are not treated the same as another
1:59:38 community it is a law and you believe in
1:59:40 liberalism let that law be applied to
1:59:42 everyone and he has done some great work
1:59:46 he has done some great work opposing
1:59:49 arbitrary kinds of judgments that have
1:59:53 happened in different states and he was
1:59:57 telling me about that and really and
1:59:59 truly we take our hats off to him and
2:00:02 his and people like
2:00:12 finally finally I want to say in my last
2:00:17 half a minute left that if I suddenly
2:00:20 need to offend anyone here that I
2:00:22 apologize that that was not my intention
2:00:25 and that obviously this is a subject
2:00:27 which we really feel passionate about
2:00:29 and as a superior to me in knowledge and
2:00:33 experience
2:00:34 I want to thank from the bottom of my
2:00:37 heart
2:00:38 Edwards contribution to today's
2:00:40 discussion it's been edifying it's been
2:00:43 brilliant for me and I'm sure it's been
2:00:45 fantastic for you you're welcome at
2:00:47 anytime I'm sure I can say that on
2:00:49 behalf of this for the University and
2:00:51 hopefully we can meet another day thank
2:00:53 you very much
2:00:54 [Applause]
2:01:15 well thank you Mohammed the issue that
2:01:20 Mohammed raises again pinning his
2:01:24 argument on the concept of unnecessary
2:01:26 being remember the problem with that is
2:01:29 the problem is that a necessary fact
2:01:32 cannot explain a contingent fact without
2:01:34 introducing a new contingent fact in
2:01:37 need of explanation and to see why
2:01:40 notice that a necessary fact cannot
2:01:43 explain a contingent fact by entailing
2:01:45 it because then any fact entailed by a
2:01:48 necessary fact must itself to be
2:01:51 necessary and this sets up the
2:01:53 regression all the way back into the
2:01:57 past which Muhammad is trying to avoid
2:02:01 now with respect to my comment that 99%
2:02:05 of all scientific discoveries will show
2:02:09 to be natural that doesn't mean the 1
2:02:11 percent will be supernatural it means
2:02:13 the opposite it means the likelihood of
2:02:16 anything being supernatural is very
2:02:19 implausible and the way I said it was
2:02:23 that unless something appears miraculous
2:02:26 like the Stars rearranging themselves
2:02:28 telling us what to do it is a God of the
2:02:31 gaps argument as far as the qur'an's
2:02:35 prediction is concerned both the Quran
2:02:38 and the Bible have failed to make the
2:02:42 kinds of pure predictions which would
2:02:44 show the supernatural now with respect
2:02:47 to the Quran it was finished in 632 but
2:02:51 it was not codified into a final written
2:02:55 form until 2018 years later in 650 by
2:03:00 the caliph Uthman and now the only
2:03:03 earliest version we have of a 90%
2:03:07 complete Quranic text is from the mid
2:03:13 eight century
2:03:15 which could be almost 80 years after the
2:03:19 Quran was initially given to Muhammad
2:03:25 now another problem is with respect to
2:03:28 translations every time I point out
2:03:31 something to Muhammad about the
2:03:34 translations that I have before me even
2:03:37 eight or nine of them his responses he
2:03:39 disagrees with the translation I don't
2:03:43 necessarily disagree that Muhammad might
2:03:47 understand the Quran in the original
2:03:50 Arabic far better than all these
2:03:52 translations my argument is from divine
2:03:56 hiddenness if the Quran is God's
2:03:59 ultimate revelation to humanity it is
2:04:03 inconsistent with that purpose for us
2:04:06 who speak only English not to have a
2:04:09 reliable translation of Muhammad was not
2:04:14 able to demonstrate how an immaterial
2:04:18 incorporeal being created time and space
2:04:22 see what Muhammad was trying to do as a
2:04:25 valiant attempt was to rescue was to
2:04:29 rescue some vestige of the supernatural
2:04:32 from a purely natural universe and
2:04:35 ultimately it was unsuccessful he was
2:04:38 not able to refute at all my argument
2:04:41 from evolution he did not refute my
2:04:44 argument from evil he was not able to
2:04:48 explain how an all-powerful God that can
2:04:53 prevent a lot of evil still has to allow
2:04:55 so much evil he did not adequately
2:04:58 refute my argument from divine
2:05:01 hiddenness because he was not able to
2:05:04 give a reason why a God who wants us to
2:05:07 know his will would withhold the very
2:05:10 evidence that we need to be able to
2:05:13 believe in that God I as an atheist gave
2:05:17 you clear examples of the type of
2:05:18 miraculous occurrences which would make
2:05:21 me turn into a believer in fact if my
2:05:25 dead father appeared right now
2:05:27 transported Muhammad and
2:05:29 me to Mecca and told me and I knew it
2:05:32 was my dad that since dying he realized
2:05:35 that Islam was the perfect religion
2:05:38 I would convert right away so I'm
2:05:40 subject to an open to the evidence the
2:05:45 other thing that Muhammad did not refute
2:05:48 was my claim that the Quran liked the
2:05:51 Bible the Quran like the Bible demands
2:05:56 eternal punishment for choosing the
2:05:58 wrong religion I believe that we human
2:06:01 beings have a right to use our reason
2:06:04 and sense of justice to say that it is
2:06:06 wrong for any all-powerful deity to
2:06:10 condemn innocent people to eternal
2:06:13 suffering because of an honest mistake
2:06:15 in choosing the wrong religion and so I
2:06:20 believe to that extent the Bible and the
2:06:23 Quran are equally equally false however
2:06:27 I have to say the Quran did improve on
2:06:30 the Bible in one area if you read
2:06:33 Jeremiah 99 you see that God threatens
2:06:37 to make people eat their sons and
2:06:39 daughters
2:06:40 in the Quran there's no such vestige of
2:06:43 cannibalism so if God does exist I thank
2:06:46 him for in-between the Bible and the
2:06:49 Quran taking human flesh off the menu
2:06:55 the
2:06:58 [Applause]
2:07:00 Mohammed was unable to refute the
2:07:05 argument against a transcendental person
2:07:08 because if you are a person you have to
2:07:11 have some boundaries some limit to say
2:07:14 that you are not in time and space and
2:07:17 you are in time and space what are we
2:07:19 talking about like some guy standing up
2:07:21 waist-deep in a hot tub he's half in and
2:07:24 half out how can you be partially in
2:07:26 time how can God enter time in order to
2:07:29 enter time you have to have a beginning
2:07:32 in time a timeless being cannot do
2:07:36 anything either can an immaterial being
2:07:39 now I know that the concept that death
2:07:43 is the end is very difficult for most
2:07:45 people to tolerate but on atheism what's
2:07:50 true is not what we would like to be
2:07:52 true what's true is what cold hard
2:07:55 reality shows is true there is no
2:07:58 example whatsoever of conscious
2:08:01 self-awareness being able to exist
2:08:04 without a fully functional physical
2:08:06 brain if it were so then Alzheimer's
2:08:09 disease would not be able to eclipse
2:08:11 consciousness again Alzheimer's disease
2:08:14 eclipses your consciousness but when you
2:08:16 die you're fully intact in an immaterial
2:08:19 form it can't happen that way also the
2:08:22 argument from evolution with the common
2:08:28 ancestry that we have with apes we
2:08:31 didn't evolve from apes but we spun
2:08:33 often had a common ancestor if you look
2:08:36 at the fossil record of the precursors
2:08:39 to homo sapiens who we are now
2:08:42 you see we evolved from a more primitive
2:08:44 life-form both the Bible and the Koran
2:08:48 accept the notion of Adam and Eve you
2:08:51 can't have an Adam and Eve if evolution
2:08:54 is true which it is because there was no
2:08:57 such thing as the first perfect human
2:09:00 couple we evolved like any other
2:09:02 creature so if there was no Adam and Eve
2:09:06 both the Bible and the Quran are wrong
2:09:09 in saying that there
2:09:11 and of course if there was no Adam and
2:09:13 Eve then Christianity is completely
2:09:15 wrong in talking about the sin in the
2:09:19 Garden of Eden now another thing that
2:09:23 Muhammad was unable to do was to
2:09:27 demonstrate and I've seen other Muslim
2:09:30 apologists try to do this was to
2:09:32 demonstrate that the language or the
2:09:35 mode of Arabic itself used in the Quran
2:09:38 had to have a divine authorship you can
2:09:42 have advanced language or poetic or
2:09:45 useful verse or you can make innovations
2:09:48 in language but that does not show that
2:09:50 there was a supernatural origin also he
2:09:54 failed to show us what specific
2:09:57 predictions in the Quran took were made
2:10:01 that turned out to be true on one of his
2:10:04 YouTube videos he talks about a Roman
2:10:08 war which the Quran predicted the Romans
2:10:12 would lose well I looked it up that war
2:10:15 ended in 628 seee and the Quran was
2:10:18 finished in 632 CE II so the Quran did
2:10:23 not predict anything in the future the
2:10:28 other aspect of all of this is the
2:10:33 incompatible properties of the concept
2:10:37 of God the very concept of God God
2:10:39 cannot be both omnipotent and omniscient
2:10:41 if God is omnipotent
2:10:43 it means God can do anything including
2:10:46 change his mind but if God is omniscient
2:10:49 he always knew what he was going to do
2:10:53 in the very end so he cannot change his
2:10:56 mind
2:10:56 so therefore the properties of
2:10:58 omniscience and omnipotence are
2:11:03 incompatible with respect to the
2:11:06 fine-tuning argument that sort of
2:11:10 Mohammed flirted with and then moved
2:11:13 away from if we look at that on theism
2:11:17 you would not need any kind of
2:11:20 fine-tuning because God would be capable
2:11:23 of making us live
2:11:24 in any environment so the whole notion
2:11:27 of fine tuning is nonsensical but yet if
2:11:33 you look at a theism and there is no
2:11:38 all-powerful God who could make us live
2:11:40 in any environment then we wouldn't then
2:11:44 we would need fine-tuning because there
2:11:47 is no supernatural being to sustain us
2:11:49 any which way which makes fine-tuning
2:11:51 curiously more likely on atheism now
2:11:54 I've heard Muslim apologists say that
2:11:57 the Quran predicted that the universe is
2:12:00 expanding I looked at four different
2:12:03 translations and the only one that used
2:12:07 the term expanding there was Mustapha
2:12:12 kitab in 2016 the three other
2:12:16 translations including the classic
2:12:18 Pickthall and abdullah yusuf ali all of
2:12:23 them had the vastness of space already
2:12:26 existing so if the Quran did predict
2:12:31 that the universe is expanding which
2:12:34 meant that the Quran had divine
2:12:36 foreknowledge before science that the
2:12:39 Big Bang occurred then only one out of
2:12:43 four translations shouldn't be able to
2:12:46 show that so once again on divine
2:12:50 hiddenness if the Quran is what God
2:12:53 wants me to believe then the Quran
2:12:56 should have been translated into ink
2:13:06 true also on the argument from evil and
2:13:10 I've touched upon this is the
2:13:12 distribution of pleasure and pain on
2:13:15 theism we would expect that horrendous
2:13:17 pain would only exist if there's a
2:13:20 purpose that would aid our survival or
2:13:22 our reproduction so if I put my hand on
2:13:25 the hot stove it's hurt so I take my
2:13:27 hand away but let's say again I or some
2:13:30 innocent animal are caught in a forest
2:13:33 fire and were unable to pull away from
2:13:36 the pain and we suffer a horrible death
2:13:39 well the pain of that burning to death
2:13:42 did not contribute to my survival or
2:13:46 reproduction and so on atheism it's
2:13:49 understandable on theism it's it's not
2:13:53 understandable I referred earlier to the
2:13:58 Bayesian probability analysis on
2:14:01 Bayesian probability analysis which is
2:14:04 widely used you have to have prior
2:14:07 knowledge of something there's no prior
2:14:10 knowledge of the supernatural so if you
2:14:13 use Bayesian confirmation predictive
2:14:16 ability you would not be able to predict
2:14:20 the supernatural
2:14:22 if the supernatural existed there would
2:14:24 be evidence of it if consciousness could
2:14:26 exist without a functional physical
2:14:29 brain there'd be evidence of it if the
2:14:31 Bible or the Quran predicted something
2:14:34 which could only have been known by
2:14:36 miraculous means when it was written
2:14:38 there would be evidence of it if we
2:14:42 humans were specially created there
2:14:44 wouldn't be overwhelming evidence that
2:14:46 we evolved from ape-like creatures from
2:14:49 a common ancestor with apes so with all
2:14:54 of the evidence a cumulative case shows
2:14:59 the universe is natural and not
2:15:01 supernatural and that God does not exist
2:15:04 thank you
2:15:05 [Applause]
2:15:19 [Applause]
2:15:31 and with that comes about we conclude
2:15:34 the debate does that go okay to everyone
2:15:35 for coming out we really appreciate see
2:15:42 you guys again in the future and mail
2:15:43 look Andy everyone give them another
2:15:45 round of applause
2:15:45 [Applause]
2:15:51 I would also like to give a big THANK
2:15:53 YOU to with another key organizer and
2:15:55 his name is object man he did a lot of
2:15:57 this work and I want to give him a
2:15:58 really sweet donations really big and
2:16:02 it's all before everyone leaves
2:16:04 something super important again if
2:16:06 anyone is able to we are really really
2:16:08 asking for donations to help cover costs
2:16:10 for the trip I'm in fur on the event so
2:16:13 if anyone wants to marry the box with
2:16:15 their dates outside there's also some
2:16:16 any moment visit MSA and we appreciate
2:16:19 anything and everything exactly always
2:16:21 for coming everyone and shuttle have a
2:16:22 good day