Can God be Proven Rationally? | Thought Adventure Podcast #2 (2021-01-31) #

0:00:09 i hope
0:00:10 everyone is doing well welcome to the
0:00:12 second
0:00:13 episode of thought adventure podcast so
0:00:16 today uh we are going to be focusing on
0:00:21 the the question or the following
0:00:22 question can god be proven rationally
0:00:25 and today we are joined by uh brother
0:00:28 abdul salaam
0:00:45 just want to make a request to anyone
0:00:47 who's watching
0:00:48 to just make dua as his father-in-law
0:00:51 passed away recently and quite
0:00:52 unexpectedly
0:00:53 um so just make sure you keep him in
0:00:56 your prayers may allah have mercy upon
0:00:58 him and
0:00:59 make the loss easy on those who cared
0:01:01 for him
0:01:02 um i mean so yeah so where do you want
0:01:06 to begin with
0:01:07 this uh i think brother sharif he did
0:01:09 write out a couple of things he wanted
0:01:11 to kind of
0:01:12 go over so we'll need to wait for him to
0:01:14 turn up to kind of
0:01:15 go over what he mentioned there but uh
0:01:17 jake do you want to take the lead here
0:01:18 and
0:01:19 kind of open it up a bit sure so
0:01:22 the topic of discussion is can god be
0:01:25 proven rationally
0:01:27 um we the reason why we decided to have
0:01:30 a stream on this is because
0:01:32 we frequently talk with atheists online
0:01:36 and they obviously would say no that god
0:01:39 cannot be
0:01:40 proven rationally for us muslims on the
0:01:43 other hand
0:01:44 we believe that god can be proven
0:01:46 rationally and
0:01:48 we're happy to present some arguments
0:01:51 for that possibly
0:01:52 and defend it and so uh this stream
0:01:55 generally is going to be about um
0:01:58 us providing evidence hopefully um that
0:02:01 we can
0:02:02 prove that god uh exists through
0:02:05 rational means
0:02:06 not merely relying on scripture alone
0:02:10 and then we would like to have a
0:02:11 discussion hopefully we can get a few
0:02:13 atheists on to discuss this issue with
0:02:16 us
0:02:17 now there are a number of different ways
0:02:21 that muslims and muslim theologians have
0:02:24 given
0:02:24 as far as proving that god exists
0:02:26 rationally um
0:02:28 one way that i personally like and you
0:02:30 guys are
0:02:31 free to interact with it and uh present
0:02:34 your own methods
0:02:35 if if need be but one of the famous
0:02:38 arguments
0:02:38 um that was proposed by imam khazali
0:02:43 and sort of furthered by him and then
0:02:46 kind of popularized
0:02:47 today rejuvenated in a sense by a
0:02:50 christian apologist william lane craig
0:02:52 and that's the kalam cosmological
0:02:54 argument
0:02:55 uh which basically i'll just give a
0:02:56 brief summary of what it is it says
0:02:58 premise one
0:02:59 uh whatever begins to exist has a cause
0:03:02 premise 2 the universe began to exist
0:03:05 and the conclusion is therefore
0:03:07 the universe has a cause now
0:03:10 we can go into uh detail i don't know
0:03:13 how much detail we want to go into as
0:03:15 far as the introduction to the stream is
0:03:18 in terms of providing evidence for each
0:03:20 one of the premises
0:03:22 but generally speaking the first premise
0:03:25 is to me somewhat obvious that whatever
0:03:28 exists
0:03:28 begins to begins to exist has a cause
0:03:32 now typically atheists will respond
0:03:34 we'll sit and we'll say well what about
0:03:36 god
0:03:37 um well they kind of missed uh the point
0:03:40 in the premise that says whatever begins
0:03:42 to exist
0:03:43 now our understanding of god is that
0:03:46 he's eternal
0:03:47 so he doesn't fall under the category of
0:03:50 the first premise because
0:03:51 it's applying to things that begin to
0:03:53 exist it doesn't apply to
0:03:55 eternal things so um
0:03:59 i mean it's it's to me it's just an
0:04:00 obvious premise that
0:04:02 we see ever in our everyday life
0:04:04 everything that we experience
0:04:06 that has a beginning or begins to exist
0:04:08 there's some type of
0:04:09 cause behind behind it it doesn't just
0:04:12 pop into existence from nothing
0:04:14 out of nowhere we don't experience these
0:04:16 things whatsoever
0:04:18 now as far as the universe beginning to
0:04:20 exist
0:04:22 imam ghazali since he didn't have much
0:04:25 of the science
0:04:27 available to him that we have today he
0:04:29 primarily relied on
0:04:31 uh philosophical argumentation based on
0:04:34 the absurdity of an actual infidence so
0:04:37 he basically argued
0:04:38 that an eternal universe would assume
0:04:43 a um an actual infinite that means
0:04:46 like if you take a look at the uh 20th
0:04:49 century
0:04:50 mathematician george cantor who's famous
0:04:53 for set theory
0:04:54 he even explains that we can um
0:04:58 we can hypothesize or work in terms of
0:05:01 mathematical confines uh around the idea
0:05:05 of an infinite these infinite sets but
0:05:08 he
0:05:08 even says that in turn and david hilbert
0:05:11 who's a
0:05:12 german mathematician said the same thing
0:05:14 that in terms of the
0:05:15 actual infinite existing in the physical
0:05:18 world
0:05:18 we don't have it anywhere um so we have
0:05:22 evidence from modern mathematicians who
0:05:24 speak about the actual
0:05:26 infinite it doesn't exist anywhere in
0:05:28 reality
0:05:30 we can go into some of the absurdities
0:05:32 that imam
0:05:33 hazali pointed out as far as
0:05:36 contradictory things that we
0:05:38 see when we analyze the actual infinite
0:05:40 i'll just give a little simple example
0:05:43 if i ask the audience
0:05:45 what is the quantity of the set of
0:05:48 natural numbers
0:05:49 meaning all all of the natural numbers
0:05:51 that exist well they're going to say
0:05:53 infinite okay but what is the quantity
0:05:57 of the set of even numbers well it's
0:06:00 actually the same thing
0:06:02 infinite but it seems like a
0:06:05 contradiction
0:06:06 because if the natural set includes both
0:06:08 the even
0:06:09 and the odd numbers then how is it that
0:06:12 merely
0:06:12 the even numbers which is half of the
0:06:15 natural numbers
0:06:16 is also equal to the whole set
0:06:19 and so that's why even in mathematics
0:06:21 they have
0:06:22 different degrees of infinity that some
0:06:25 are bigger than
0:06:26 others and we we don't have any
0:06:28 experience of this in the real world so
0:06:30 this is all of the
0:06:32 sort of philosophical argumentation for
0:06:34 the second premise
0:06:36 basically that you wind up with these
0:06:38 absurdities
0:06:39 um from an actual infinite existing then
0:06:42 we have
0:06:43 evidence also as far as scientific
0:06:46 evidence
0:06:46 from um especially recently with things
0:06:50 like big bang cosmology
0:06:52 um cosmic microwave background
0:06:55 uh all of these different things that
0:06:57 point to an
0:06:58 actual beginning of the universe so with
0:07:01 that in mind
0:07:02 i think the two premises are uh strong
0:07:06 i think there's a lot of evidence and
0:07:07 support from them that leads us to the
0:07:09 conclusion that there is a cause of the
0:07:11 universe
0:07:12 that is outside of space and time that
0:07:14 was the creator of space and time itself
0:07:17 and we can go into more detail about
0:07:19 what the attributes of that cause is
0:07:22 uh or cause are but um that's a general
0:07:25 uh just brief summary of the argument
0:07:28 so i don't know if you guys want to
0:07:30 comment on that at all
0:07:31 or yeah the question in another way for
0:07:34 yourselves so there's two things i want
0:07:36 to touch on um
0:07:38 first is the when you're talking to
0:07:41 like bring an atheist and he likes to
0:07:43 bring up this idea of
0:07:44 well mathematics has this concept of
0:07:48 um there being multiple infinites uh of
0:07:51 different sizes
0:07:52 and so on and so forth because one
0:07:54 infinite can be bigger than the next
0:07:55 now the biggest issue here is that they
0:07:57 they move from this
0:07:59 the ideal realm of mathematics
0:08:02 and then try to apply it into like the
0:08:04 ontological
0:08:06 uh as if they're not making like a
0:08:08 category error here and
0:08:10 they're talking about specifically one
0:08:11 thing um
0:08:13 which which is theoretical it's we're
0:08:15 talking in terms of
0:08:16 uh something that's not even infinite in
0:08:18 the absolute sense
0:08:20 like there are lots of limits on a set
0:08:22 of numbers like when you're talking
0:08:24 about a you know the natural line of
0:08:26 numbers for example
0:08:27 we're not talking about pigs we're not
0:08:29 talking about camels and
0:08:30 flowers and recipes and you know blood
0:08:34 like there's all these other things that
0:08:36 we're excluding no we're focusing
0:08:38 simply on numbers and then also we're
0:08:41 focusing
0:08:42 on a particular pattern of numbers so
0:08:44 we're saying plus one plus one plus one
0:08:46 plus one
0:08:46 repeatedly forever we're not saying like
0:08:50 plus ten plus twenty minus thirteen blah
0:08:52 blah blah
0:08:53 so there's very there's a very specific
0:08:56 set
0:08:57 of rules that are applied which limit
0:08:59 how
0:09:00 we're going to progress when we're
0:09:01 talking about counting numbers
0:09:03 uh or set theory or anything when we're
0:09:05 talking infinite in terms of mathematics
0:09:08 um you apply these limits and then you
0:09:09 start talking about this is not
0:09:11 identical to the idea
0:09:13 of like an infinite being or you know a
0:09:15 being which we're saying has an actual
0:09:17 reality
0:09:18 um and isn't just ideal or you know like
0:09:22 in the realm of
0:09:22 the theoretical uh and they they often
0:09:25 kind of make this distinction and go oh
0:09:27 well in mathematics we have we have this
0:09:28 idea of set theory and we have this idea
0:09:30 of multiple infinites
0:09:31 so therefore we can apply this to the
0:09:33 creation or to the creator
0:09:35 um and say you know that there is
0:09:37 multiple infinite beings and
0:09:39 now the issue with this is that um there
0:09:42 can't be multiple
0:09:43 infinites in a real sense like because
0:09:46 the infinite if you have infinite a
0:09:48 and you have infinite be and say we're
0:09:51 focusing on
0:09:52 god's uh infinite power for example he's
0:09:54 all-powerful
0:09:56 um which is to say that everything
0:09:59 or anything that any power that there is
0:10:01 is under his control
0:10:03 he is the distributor of power
0:10:06 and whatever power there is belongs to
0:10:07 him now you can't have multiple of them
0:10:11 because the simple cases is if you have
0:10:13 uh infinite a
0:10:15 and then infinite b that these two
0:10:18 things have to be exclusive they can't
0:10:21 be
0:10:21 the same thing otherwise you're not
0:10:23 talking about multiple
0:10:25 infinites you're talking about one so to
0:10:26 say that there's an infinite a and an
0:10:28 infinite b and this can go on
0:10:30 for as long as you want infinite c
0:10:31 infinite d to say that you have to say
0:10:33 that these things
0:10:34 are mutually exclusive that they're not
0:10:36 the same thing
0:10:38 that they are distinct from one another
0:10:40 now to say that they're distinct from
0:10:41 one another is to say
0:10:42 that there is power beyond the control
0:10:45 of
0:10:46 each of them the power of a is not
0:10:48 within the control of power b
0:10:50 and the you know the all-powerful b is
0:10:52 not within the control of the old
0:10:53 powerful a
0:10:54 and so neither of them are therefore all
0:10:56 powerful that you know
0:10:58 you get into this absurdity if you're
0:10:59 talking about the all-powerful
0:11:01 whatever has power it has power over it
0:11:05 and you know when when you understand
0:11:07 this principle you understand that there
0:11:08 can only be one all-powerful thing
0:11:10 obviously that isn't to go into um
0:11:12 proving that this all powerful thing
0:11:14 exists necessarily from the comments
0:11:15 i've just made
0:11:16 it's just to talk about the absurdity of
0:11:17 trying to posit multiple
0:11:19 all-powerful beings or multiple
0:11:21 infinites
0:11:22 in an ontological sense you know in
0:11:24 terms of reality not the theoretical not
0:11:26 the ideal but
0:11:28 in you know in real the real existence
0:11:31 of something
0:11:32 if it has an infinite attribute like
0:11:34 it's um
0:11:36 it you know it's it it can only be one
0:11:38 and it cannot be one that can be
0:11:39 multiplied it cannot be divided uh none
0:11:42 of this and this is the
0:11:42 islamic conception of god you know allah
0:11:44 subhanahu wa tala is one
0:11:46 and um so the the other thing that i
0:11:48 wanted to kind of touch on
0:11:50 is uh so for me there's a number of
0:11:53 things that we can kind of go into
0:11:55 about the infinite regress um and
0:11:58 you know if someone comes on there's
0:12:00 likely going to be a number of
0:12:01 objections to this
0:12:03 that we can go over and i i won't ruin
0:12:04 it now by going into them too much and
0:12:06 we can discuss it
0:12:07 inshallah when someone comes on and
0:12:09 personally
0:12:10 i prefer to focus on contingency um
0:12:14 that is that if you know for me
0:12:17 whether or not the infinite regress is
0:12:20 possible
0:12:21 is a bit superfluous it can be a fun
0:12:23 conversation um and i do
0:12:25 think that the infinite regress uh is
0:12:27 absurd
0:12:28 um but you know when there's you'll
0:12:31 always come across people but regardless
0:12:33 of how much into the conversation you've
0:12:34 got you always end up in a dead end in
0:12:35 certain places
0:12:36 and where you can't really make any more
0:12:38 progress so personally i like to
0:12:39 focus on this idea that um anything all
0:12:42 contingent beings
0:12:44 are dependent upon something beyond
0:12:46 themselves
0:12:48 and if you take the set
0:12:51 of all dependent things that the the set
0:12:54 is itself dependent
0:12:56 and the thing that the set of all
0:12:57 dependent things is
0:12:59 dependent on cannot be in the set
0:13:02 and so it must be outside the set and if
0:13:04 it's outside of the set
0:13:06 it can't be itself dependent because if
0:13:09 it was
0:13:09 it would be in the set so the set of all
0:13:12 dependent things is dependent on
0:13:13 something outside itself
0:13:14 which itself isn't dependent and is
0:13:17 independent by necessity and
0:13:21 basically from there you get this uh the
0:13:23 idea um or of a number of attributes
0:13:25 that we're referring to
0:13:26 allah subhanahu wa ta'ala and then
0:13:28 obviously from there you've then got to
0:13:29 start to try to justify the other
0:13:30 attributes so for example life
0:13:32 will et cetera and inshallah we can get
0:13:34 into them but these are the ones that um
0:13:37 i like to focus on i find it very
0:13:38 interesting the usual uh rebuttal or the
0:13:41 you know attempts of a rebuttal to this
0:13:43 is
0:13:43 the um the fallacy of composition and
0:13:46 they tried to say oh well
0:13:48 uh you know something that applies to a
0:13:51 part
0:13:51 doesn't necessarily apply to the whole
0:13:53 um the issue here
0:13:54 i would always say is that well it
0:13:56 depends on what you're talking about if
0:13:58 i'm talking about
0:13:59 a brick and i say this one brick is hard
0:14:03 and this one brick is red if i build a
0:14:06 really big wall
0:14:07 that wall is also going to be really
0:14:08 hard and it's going to be red it's not
0:14:10 you know just because you've
0:14:12 got a number of them these particular
0:14:14 attributes don't disappear
0:14:16 and obviously if you have have
0:14:19 had experiences of building brick walls
0:14:21 you'll know that every time you build a
0:14:23 brick wall it's
0:14:24 you know it has these particular
0:14:25 attributes you know if you're using red
0:14:26 bricks the wall's going to be red
0:14:28 if it's um you know if one brick's hard
0:14:30 then all of them are going to be hard
0:14:31 and with regards to um
0:14:34 dependency or the things being dependent
0:14:37 i i would say that the dependency falls
0:14:39 into this category
0:14:40 and the reason is is because there's
0:14:43 countless examples
0:14:44 like everywhere we look you take any set
0:14:48 small or big you know my new is all the
0:14:50 things in my office
0:14:52 to as large as a solar system to a
0:14:54 galaxy and you keep looking
0:14:56 all of these things are dependent upon
0:14:57 things outside of themselves there's no
0:14:59 examples of the
0:15:00 alternative there's no examples of a set
0:15:03 of dependent things that isn't dependent
0:15:05 upon something beyond itself
0:15:06 and so i would say that you know it's
0:15:09 reasonable
0:15:10 it's more reasonable to suggest that the
0:15:12 set of all dependent things
0:15:14 when regardless of the the quantity or
0:15:16 the amount in any particular set
0:15:19 um the set of all dependent things is
0:15:21 itself dependent upon something outside
0:15:23 of the set
0:15:24 and yeah so i've gone on a bit of a
0:15:26 ramble though i'll give someone else
0:15:28 absolutely if you would like to add any
0:15:29 comments or anything in there yeah um
0:15:32 yeah so i mean i i mean i thought um
0:15:35 like would give a bit of an intro on on
0:15:38 on these arguments in general and you
0:15:40 guys have done a good job in doing that
0:15:42 but uh but personally i'd like to start
0:15:44 with um
0:15:46 with what like like with the philosophy
0:15:49 of argumentation itself what are
0:15:51 arguments
0:15:52 and and uh what might might make an
0:15:55 argument convincing to a person and
0:15:57 and personally i like uh graham opp's
0:15:59 philosophic philosophy of argumentation
0:16:02 because um oftentimes you see people
0:16:05 presenting
0:16:06 arguments in in the form that we're
0:16:08 presenting right now
0:16:09 premise premise conclusion and and uh
0:16:13 most of the work is often done in
0:16:15 between the premises
0:16:17 where you derive the the following
0:16:20 premise from the first premise and then
0:16:21 the conclusion from the first two
0:16:23 premises
0:16:24 but it's it's almost always going to
0:16:27 depend on a person's prior commitments
0:16:29 whether he accepts
0:16:30 these premises or not i mean a person
0:16:32 can simply
0:16:34 reject one of the premises you're
0:16:35 presenting for example
0:16:37 the first premise in the kalam
0:16:38 everything that begins to exist has a
0:16:40 cause
0:16:41 someone can have an alternate theory of
0:16:44 causality that
0:16:45 rejects that and and and they could just
0:16:49 simply for that reason reject the the
0:16:51 argument and say that it's not sound
0:16:54 so i i think where most of the work is
0:16:57 done
0:16:58 is really when you talk when you look at
0:17:01 the overarching theories
0:17:03 or world view of the person and you
0:17:07 an argument according to grand mopey is
0:17:09 only going to do work if you give
0:17:11 someone a premise
0:17:12 that's going to show him that his prior
0:17:15 commitments
0:17:16 will uh based on this premise lead him
0:17:18 to some sort of an inconsistency and
0:17:20 since we don't like
0:17:21 inconsistencies no one wants to have an
0:17:23 epistemology
0:17:24 that leads to inconsistencies then
0:17:27 they'll have some work to do
0:17:29 so so overall i think there's a much
0:17:32 more nuanced
0:17:33 understanding of argumentation uh
0:17:36 in general than than what it seems to be
0:17:38 in a lot of these internet discussions
0:17:41 and uh about about arguments for the
0:17:43 existence of god i mean there are
0:17:45 whether god can be proven rationally i
0:17:47 think it's a very broad question and
0:17:50 we we we have uh understandings about
0:17:54 about our justification for god all the
0:17:56 way from reformed epistemology to a
0:17:58 priori arguments like
0:18:00 ontological arguments to a posteriori
0:18:03 arguments like the cosmological
0:18:05 arguments you guys are talking about
0:18:07 and uh personally i i agree with brother
0:18:11 youssef ponders that that
0:18:13 the contingency argument is is the most
0:18:15 preferable one to me personally
0:18:17 because of because it just um
0:18:21 it just undercuts many of the objections
0:18:23 that we can find for
0:18:25 the uh uh raised at the uh kalam
0:18:28 cosmological argument
0:18:30 but i just wanted to point out make a
0:18:31 few comments about what jake said
0:18:33 i think like from my personal thinking
0:18:35 and researching about
0:18:37 actual infinite um i i think it's better
0:18:40 to say
0:18:41 that i mean i'm undecided on this but i
0:18:44 think it's better to say
0:18:45 that an actual infinite er
0:18:49 of causally connected events is
0:18:51 impossible
0:18:52 uh i don't think it's just i i don't
0:18:54 think we should put it just out there in
0:18:56 the absolute that any kind of infinite
0:18:57 is impossible
0:18:58 because i think that leads to to
0:19:00 problems not just problems
0:19:02 with uh with theism but problems in
0:19:05 general
0:19:06 um so so yes an actual infinite of
0:19:09 causally connected events
0:19:11 does lead to many kinds of absurdities
0:19:13 many of which jake has
0:19:15 mentioned william lane craig defends
0:19:17 this very well
0:19:18 and he talks about for example how an
0:19:21 infinite series of causally connected
0:19:22 events
0:19:24 for example if time was infinite then we
0:19:26 could have never reached this point
0:19:27 of time because in order to reach this
0:19:30 point of time
0:19:30 we would have to traverse an actual
0:19:32 infinite amount of time in order to
0:19:34 reach this time and
0:19:36 an actual infinite cannot be traversed
0:19:38 and you could sort of formulate this in
0:19:40 a certain way where it would take you to
0:19:41 an explicit contradiction
0:19:43 an actual infinite an act an endless
0:19:46 amount of time would literally have to
0:19:48 end in order for us to reach this point
0:19:50 of time but
0:19:51 it is endless so it by definition cannot
0:19:53 end so
0:19:55 there's a problem with that um alexander
0:19:58 prus as well as a very good defender of
0:20:00 causal finitism
0:20:01 we have a lot of uh he he puts he he he
0:20:05 uh the the he he defends the view that
0:20:08 any chain of causal events must be
0:20:10 finite in order for it to lead to a
0:20:12 certain effect
0:20:13 and there are many paradoxes that that
0:20:15 show this
0:20:16 to be true like the grim reaper paradox
0:20:18 and he has his own formulations of it
0:20:22 it's very complicated so i'm not going
0:20:23 to go through it here but there are also
0:20:25 good objections to it
0:20:26 and it's a very interesting back and
0:20:28 forth but the contingency argument and
0:20:30 the way brother yusuf put it forward i
0:20:32 think
0:20:32 is is uh it just cuts cuts to the chase
0:20:36 because as brother yusuf put it if you
0:20:39 have an infinite
0:20:40 even if you have an infinite series of
0:20:42 events or an infinite number of things
0:20:45 if we're going to ask the question that
0:20:47 uh
0:20:48 why something exists rather than nothing
0:20:51 which is the question we're asking i
0:20:52 mean it's important to know what
0:20:53 question we're asking
0:20:55 at the outset then uh
0:20:58 um appealing to the infinite series to
0:21:01 explain to the infant to explain the
0:21:02 infinite series
0:21:04 is quite circular and that might might
0:21:06 not be problematic
0:21:07 as long as you have uh something that
0:21:10 transcends the contingent things within
0:21:13 the series
0:21:13 so the reason we look for explanations
0:21:16 is because contingent things
0:21:17 require explanations and uh
0:21:21 you were talking about the fallacy of
0:21:22 composition so this this is this is a
0:21:25 an objection that's that's uh levied a
0:21:27 lot about uh regard uh
0:21:29 towards the contingency argument and and
0:21:32 there are many
0:21:33 good responses to it like um we we from
0:21:36 our experience
0:21:37 alone like we can make an inductive
0:21:39 argument from extrapolation that from
0:21:42 our experience alone
0:21:43 like if i have the if i had this this is
0:21:46 a contingent thing
0:21:47 right this cup and contingent things are
0:21:50 things that could have failed to exist
0:21:52 like there's no
0:21:53 logical necessity that would necessitate
0:21:56 this cup's existence so
0:21:58 if i have this contingent thing on its
0:22:01 own
0:22:01 i know that it requires an explanation
0:22:03 external to itself in order to exist
0:22:06 now no matter how much i multiply this
0:22:08 cups if i give you 100 cups or a million
0:22:10 cups or a thousand cups
0:22:12 we're still going to require an external
0:22:14 explanation and i think a good
0:22:15 distinction to make when it comes to the
0:22:16 fallacy of composition
0:22:18 is when we're talking about relative
0:22:19 properties and absolute properties
0:22:21 so a relative property is something like
0:22:23 size like
0:22:25 a wall is made up of small bricks but
0:22:27 the wall as a whole
0:22:28 is not small because the word small here
0:22:32 is used
0:22:33 ambiguously and the way it's used in the
0:22:35 first
0:22:37 statement is not the same way it's used
0:22:38 in the second so that's a relative
0:22:40 property that doesn't
0:22:41 apply to the whole but we have good
0:22:43 reason to assume that something like
0:22:46 contingency or the fact that contingent
0:22:49 things are dependent
0:22:51 is not a relative property because
0:22:54 there's nothing about the multiplicity
0:22:56 of contingent things
0:22:57 that rids them of a need for an
0:23:00 explanation
0:23:01 and uh yeah i think that's that's good
0:23:03 enough for an introduction
0:23:05 and um
0:23:14 uh unfortunately been a bit busy last
0:23:16 couple of days so
0:23:18 don't apologize bro yeah
0:23:21 we made a little request for everyone to
0:23:22 make dua for your father
0:23:25 so god we all belong to him we all
0:23:27 return maybe make it easy for you and
0:23:28 your family
0:23:29 i mean yeah
0:23:32 so yes i was just catching a few of the
0:23:34 points that the brothers were making
0:23:39 so although i didn't quite hear all of
0:23:41 abdul rahman's point
0:23:42 um but i think one maybe one issue that
0:23:45 needs to be
0:23:46 sort of generally explained is that this
0:23:48 topic
0:23:49 about proof for the existence of allah
0:23:51 or
0:23:52 the rational belief in a creator firstly
0:23:55 i would say that he's
0:23:56 intuitive so something that is
0:23:59 uh innate within human beings to accept
0:24:01 that there is a
0:24:03 belief in a creator that things that
0:24:06 just exist
0:24:07 uh that as mentioned about contingent or
0:24:10 limited or dependent requires an
0:24:12 explanation outside of nature itself
0:24:15 um i think that's normal that's natural
0:24:18 and i think also
0:24:19 um you know sometimes we have to go into
0:24:22 some of the details of this discussion
0:24:25 simply because atheists philosophers
0:24:27 have come in and started to muddy the
0:24:29 water
0:24:30 and i think that's why maybe uh maybe
0:24:32 some of the topics or the points that
0:24:33 i've
0:24:34 mentioned maybe seem quite convoluted or
0:24:36 high level
0:24:37 maybe even to a certain extent abstract
0:24:39 that's only because
0:24:41 the very obvious concepts and obvious
0:24:44 understanding about belief in a creator
0:24:46 has been you know uh muddied by people
0:24:49 trying to critique it
0:24:50 from various angles that's just my
0:24:54 initial thoughts anyway yeah definitely
0:24:56 it's like a
0:24:57 kid in the in the lake who's kicking mud
0:25:01 up
0:25:01 and then complaining he can't see half
0:25:03 at a time yeah but um
0:25:04 yeah so if we've not got anything else
0:25:06 anyone wants to
0:25:08 i i just wanted to add a small
0:25:09 distinction i don't think we clarified
0:25:11 that in the beginning
0:25:12 that there are um we need to make a
0:25:14 distinction between stage one
0:25:16 cosmological arguments and stage two
0:25:17 cosmological arguments so let's say for
0:25:19 example the contingency argument there's
0:25:21 the stage one contingency argument
0:25:23 and the only aim of the stage one
0:25:25 contingency argument is to take you to a
0:25:27 necessary being or a necessary
0:25:29 foundation of reality
0:25:30 um as far as that's concerned you could
0:25:33 you could be an atheist and
0:25:35 accept stage one contingency argument
0:25:37 and just believe that there's something
0:25:38 necessary that isn't
0:25:39 necessarily god uh and the stage two
0:25:42 contingency argument
0:25:44 is more concerned with the nature of the
0:25:45 necessary foundation of reality
0:25:47 and it tries to make the inference from
0:25:49 necessary being
0:25:51 to god and a lot of a lot of atheists
0:25:54 philosophers and laymen alike are are
0:25:57 are starting to find
0:25:58 the stage one of the contingency
0:25:59 argument very appealing so
0:26:02 what they normally do is they accept it
0:26:04 and they say that there is something
0:26:05 necessary
0:26:07 however that necessary thing doesn't
0:26:09 necessarily have to be god and that's
0:26:11 where
0:26:11 the stage two contingency arguments come
0:26:13 in
0:26:14 yeah definitely so should we get we've
0:26:16 got uh one guest waiting at the moment
0:26:18 just for
0:26:19 everyone else who wants to know uh there
0:26:21 is a link i'll post it in the comments
0:26:22 again
0:26:23 um for you to be able to join in the
0:26:26 stream
0:26:26 uh if you click on it it's a stream yard
0:26:28 link uh you should see in the comments
0:26:30 now but it should also be pinned
0:26:32 at the the top of the comments and i'm
0:26:34 going to add it to the
0:26:36 description box uh temporarily i'll
0:26:39 delete that after we've
0:26:40 finished the stream uh so there's three
0:26:43 places you can find it
0:26:44 do share the link to other places as
0:26:46 well um
0:26:47 or even just this youtube link make sure
0:26:49 to like comment
0:26:50 subscribe if you haven't uh as this is a
0:26:52 new channel and we're
0:26:54 relatively low on the sub counts at the
0:26:55 moment i think we've got about 250 i'm
0:26:57 doing
0:26:58 it's gone up a decent amount because it
0:26:59 really started a couple of weeks ago
0:27:01 um so yeah just make sure you share
0:27:03 subscribe like and comment
0:27:05 and inshallah if you want to join in the
0:27:07 stream click the stream link and then
0:27:08 you should be able to jump on but we've
0:27:09 got a brother here
0:27:10 uh who's called bosnian muslim salaam
0:27:13 alaikum
0:27:14 is it eden or edin
0:27:21 but um i to be honest i didn't really
0:27:23 have a question i just wanted to give
0:27:24 you like a feedback and a request that
0:27:26 that's possible
0:27:27 so yeah go ahead when it comes to the
0:27:29 streams or have you considered possibly
0:27:31 um
0:27:32 you know just cutting out like um
0:27:35 parts that you consider i guess
0:27:37 highlights and just posting because i
0:27:38 think a lot of people don't really like
0:27:39 just watch the whole stream back
0:27:41 yeah no we do plan on doing things like
0:27:44 that we did it uh
0:27:44 with the last one there was a short clip
0:27:47 we added
0:27:48 um of the the atheist it was a bit
0:27:50 clickbaity as well
0:27:51 and we went in uh atheists considers
0:27:53 becoming muslim
0:27:55 uh inshallah everyone make dua that he
0:27:57 does um but yeah no
0:27:58 it's really good we're gonna try and do
0:27:59 here's a tip as well so if you do see
0:28:01 anything you think would be worthy of
0:28:03 becoming a shorter clip
0:28:04 um a really good thing to do uh to help
0:28:07 us out and
0:28:08 just people in general is to leave a
0:28:09 comment with the timestamps you think
0:28:11 a clip should begin and end and then
0:28:13 like even just giving
0:28:14 suggestions for a potential um title of
0:28:17 that thing
0:28:18 and if you do that that just makes it a
0:28:20 lot easier because half the time what we
0:28:21 end up having to do is kind of like
0:28:23 watch the video over again in full yeah
0:28:25 um
0:28:26 and then start taking notes of where we
0:28:28 should cut and clip um whereas if people
0:28:31 they think that there is a particular
0:28:32 part that would make a really good
0:28:34 separate video on its own
0:28:35 um yeah just make a comment with the
0:28:38 timestamps beginning and end where you
0:28:39 think a clip would be
0:28:41 useful and maybe like i say a title
0:28:43 suggestion but yeah no
0:28:45 it's a great suggestion i'll definitely
0:28:47 do that um
0:28:49 i guess the request or question that i
0:28:51 wanted to ask was uh
0:28:53 like right now i'm in i have a
0:28:54 philosophy class right
0:28:56 oh my um so i'm in 12th grade and i know
0:28:59 i
0:29:00 uh i'm actually turning 18 in like two
0:29:02 weeks so it's one this won't be a
0:29:03 problem
0:29:04 but uh where are you from brother
0:29:05 bosnian
0:29:07 but i live in germany okay so uh
0:29:11 in my philosophy class like my teacher
0:29:13 she's kind of like
0:29:14 we talked about evolution right and
0:29:16 right now we're talking about
0:29:17 utilitarianism
0:29:19 and because you study philosophy i was
0:29:21 wondering if sometime in the future you
0:29:22 could maybe do a stream on like morality
0:29:25 because i love to be able to i guess
0:29:27 from an islamic point of view
0:29:28 kind of not refute utilitarianism but
0:29:30 show her why i think it's false
0:29:33 yeah well that's a a large conversation
0:29:35 because
0:29:36 there's even certain islamic theologians
0:29:38 that argued um
0:29:41 like islamic morality from a utilitarian
0:29:43 perspective as well like
0:29:44 in samia i'll be pleased with him and so
0:29:47 it's
0:29:48 you know there's a bit of a back and
0:29:49 forth i think the biggest issue um is
0:29:51 just
0:29:52 trying to quantify on quantifiables so
0:29:55 that's the thing for me so like when
0:29:56 you're talking about levels and degrees
0:29:58 of pain
0:29:59 how do you measure that how do you
0:30:00 compare that how do you um
0:30:02 compare say for example any kind of
0:30:04 level of pain that a chicken might
0:30:06 experience
0:30:07 to the painting but the thing the thing
0:30:08 is she told us uh
0:30:10 the reason why i asked that was because
0:30:11 she actually told us last lesson that
0:30:13 next lesson we are going to be talking
0:30:15 about like uh i guess what we
0:30:17 see as problematic with the uh theory
0:30:20 and obviously i found like a few things
0:30:22 like for example the whole
0:30:24 point system whatever it is like i don't
0:30:26 let's it's very like highly subjective i
0:30:28 feel like
0:30:29 yeah then it's just like one of the
0:30:31 things one of one of the things the
0:30:33 thing
0:30:33 morality is a huge discussion and we it
0:30:36 needs a stream on its own
0:30:37 but just one of the things to take into
0:30:39 consideration is that you can't really
0:30:40 look at morality in a vacuum
0:30:42 i think jake and i had a discussion with
0:30:44 someone about this before
0:30:46 it's it's like um so utilitarianism or
0:30:50 if
0:30:50 you look at like uh consequentialism
0:30:52 which which uh
0:30:53 i i think there are always some aspects
0:30:55 of consequentialism and all
0:30:57 uh uh in all um structures of morality
0:31:01 uh the fact that you label it
0:31:04 utilitarianism
0:31:05 doesn't really give you as yusuf was was
0:31:08 pointing out the metrics by which you're
0:31:10 gonna
0:31:11 base your foundation for for uh you know
0:31:14 the maximal amount of good right so so
0:31:18 fine utilitarianism you could say it's
0:31:21 okay but
0:31:22 we're not going to just uh um you know
0:31:26 take it and run with it in a vacuum
0:31:29 because there are a lot of questions to
0:31:30 ask about the foundations of your
0:31:32 morality and what
0:31:33 you know and this is where subjective
0:31:35 and objective morality comes in and a
0:31:37 theist
0:31:38 will have will have um maybe a field to
0:31:41 divine command theory or whatever
0:31:43 but generally speaking it's it's uh
0:31:46 it's it's very useful to realize as well
0:31:49 that
0:31:49 under certain world views there are
0:31:51 moral frameworks
0:31:53 that are understandable for
0:31:56 within the worldview like for example an
0:31:58 atheist tells me that his
0:32:00 basis for morality is well-being and he
0:32:02 defines well-being in a certain way
0:32:04 i i would be very understand
0:32:08 i i would be very understanding with him
0:32:09 and i would uh um
0:32:11 i would say that under your framework
0:32:14 and
0:32:15 within your world view it makes sense
0:32:17 like if i were an atheist
0:32:18 that would be my understanding of
0:32:20 well-being and
0:32:22 that would be my moral framework it
0:32:24 doesn't mean i don't have problems with
0:32:26 the moral framework
0:32:27 i can raise problems but from within a
0:32:30 different world view
0:32:31 that's why there is a more overarching
0:32:34 discussion to be had about world views
0:32:36 as a whole
0:32:37 and what your worldview entails so i
0:32:39 think it's a very complicated discussion
0:32:42 it is it is and uh just simply um
0:32:44 because the
0:32:45 this is quite large conversation and
0:32:46 this stream we're trying to focus
0:32:48 specifically on the rational proofs for
0:32:50 god and things like that if you don't
0:32:51 mind if we just leave that
0:32:52 there for the time being maybe inshallah
0:32:54 um this might be a good suggestion for a
0:32:56 future topic
0:32:58 um and we can obviously invite you back
0:32:59 on then and maybe go into it in a bit
0:33:01 more detail like that no no problem
0:33:03 uh apologies for you know uh going
0:33:04 completely it's okay okay it was only
0:33:06 a couple of minutes have you got a
0:33:08 specific brother have you got a specific
0:33:10 question
0:33:11 or comment on this particular topic
0:33:15 so uh the rational proof of god well
0:33:17 well when it comes to you know
0:33:18 rationally finding god like i always go
0:33:20 with the whole column because much
0:33:22 because logical argument type of
0:33:23 you know path where it's like everything
0:33:26 is everything has a course right
0:33:28 and yeah everything that begins to exist
0:33:31 yeah exactly exactly and then because
0:33:33 i'm not saying that we know that the
0:33:34 universe had a beginning but it's a you
0:33:36 know scientific consensus from
0:33:38 what i've understood and um well that
0:33:41 means that would mean that the universe
0:33:42 had a beginning
0:33:43 and that began because you have to have
0:33:45 a first course and you know
0:33:47 otherwise you have infinite regress and
0:33:48 then that first course would have to be
0:33:50 infinite
0:33:51 so that that was actually something that
0:33:52 i was quite confused about because
0:33:55 i'm not sure if you watch that stream
0:33:56 but when muhammad hijab was
0:33:58 on hamza stream there was this one uh
0:34:01 one guy called isan and then he was like
0:34:03 well how do you know that whatever
0:34:04 caused the universe didn't cease to
0:34:06 exist well how can it cease to exist
0:34:07 it's infinite right
0:34:10 so yeah that's right the whole point is
0:34:12 is that you're
0:34:13 coming to a conclusion of an independent
0:34:17 definition to exist and it's contingent
0:34:19 yeah a necessary being or an independent
0:34:21 being
0:34:22 so independent by definition means
0:34:24 something that has to exist
0:34:26 yeah exists by its own its own being in
0:34:29 essence
0:34:30 so by by that point then you can't come
0:34:33 to a conclusion that there is something
0:34:35 that
0:34:37 created the universe and then you know
0:34:39 cease to exist because then no longer is
0:34:41 eternal or independent uh yeah you're
0:34:44 talking about a possible being in that
0:34:46 case so
0:34:46 unnecessary being another way of wording
0:34:48 that is that it cannot
0:34:49 not exist yes and so you know it's
0:34:52 it's non-existence is impossible whereas
0:34:56 the
0:34:56 uh like a possible being its existence
0:34:59 is possible but
0:35:00 so is its non-existence and all he's
0:35:02 saying is basically a contradiction in
0:35:04 terms i mean because
0:35:05 what he's basically saying is that what
0:35:07 if the necessary being wasn't a
0:35:08 necessary being
0:35:09 so it's literally meaningless because
0:35:13 a necessary being can't not exist and
0:35:16 he's saying what if it ceases to exist
0:35:17 well if it ceases to exist then it's not
0:35:19 necessary
0:35:20 so i feel like the whole the way the
0:35:22 atheist kind of approached this like
0:35:24 like i don't mind you know an atheist
0:35:26 saying i don't believe in god and stuff
0:35:28 like okay sure but
0:35:29 it's when when they go like they go as
0:35:32 far as to say well
0:35:33 fine-tuning prove to me that the
0:35:35 universe couldn't have been any
0:35:36 different prove to me this proved to me
0:35:37 that well
0:35:38 well like at some point you have to just
0:35:40 reason and
0:35:41 you know uh you should be able to like
0:35:44 reason and not just like ask for
0:35:46 empirical evident evidence for every
0:35:48 single point
0:35:48 because you can't always give some kind
0:35:50 of empirical evidence yeah but you know
0:35:52 the issue is this is that for them to
0:35:54 ask him for empirical evidence
0:35:57 indicates that they recognize that the
0:35:59 thing that they're talking about
0:36:01 is not a necessary being yeah so for
0:36:04 example you know when we look up for
0:36:06 empirical evidence or scientific
0:36:07 evidence
0:36:08 what in essence we're looking for is the
0:36:10 reason or explanation behind why a thing
0:36:12 exists the way it does yeah because we
0:36:14 we understand
0:36:16 rationally and intuitively that the
0:36:18 thing itself doesn't explain its own
0:36:21 existence
0:36:22 yeah when we talk about contingent
0:36:23 realities as an example
0:36:25 we would never rationally or sorry
0:36:28 scientifically
0:36:29 try to understand why the internal
0:36:31 angles of a triangle
0:36:33 add up to 180 degrees on a flat surface
0:36:36 yeah so in triangle internal angles on a
0:36:40 flat surface
0:36:41 always adds up to 180 degrees nobody
0:36:43 says well we need to rationally or
0:36:45 scientifically investigate
0:36:47 why this is the case yeah but if we were
0:36:50 to say
0:36:50 uh for example why does an electron have
0:36:54 a particular spin
0:36:56 yeah then we would scientifically
0:36:58 investigate this because
0:37:00 in the first case of the triangle we're
0:37:02 saying that it's necessary by
0:37:04 its own existence that it has the
0:37:06 internal angles here
0:37:08 and when you talk about the second case
0:37:10 of an electron or an atom or anything
0:37:12 within
0:37:13 the physical world that occupies time
0:37:15 and space they're asking the reason why
0:37:17 because we know that it's not
0:37:18 necessary yeah now the issue for
0:37:21 atheists or empiricists is this is that
0:37:24 if they're going to keep asking the
0:37:26 question
0:37:26 why a contingent thing which basically
0:37:29 means something that could exist or
0:37:30 could not exist yeah
0:37:32 or doesn't have to have the attributes
0:37:34 that it has so he needs an explanation
0:37:35 outside of itself to explain itself
0:37:37 if they keep asking that question then
0:37:40 either they're going to go for an
0:37:41 infinite regress
0:37:42 yeah keep asking another question and
0:37:45 then another question
0:37:46 another question or they're going to
0:37:47 stop at a brute facts
0:37:49 which in essence is saying that there's
0:37:50 a contingent being
0:37:52 and it has it's contingent but it just
0:37:55 is
0:37:56 which is a self-contradiction or they
0:37:59 come to the conclusion of a necessary
0:38:00 independent being
0:38:01 either creator yeah so they've got those
0:38:04 three particular options
0:38:06 that are open for them now when people
0:38:08 start
0:38:09 affirming group facts they're
0:38:10 effectively arguing for magic
0:38:13 yeah and as you'd yeah and as you
0:38:16 probably know is an infinite regress is
0:38:17 something which would say is logically
0:38:19 absurd
0:38:21 yeah it's not possible but the thing
0:38:23 that i don't understand is from an
0:38:24 atheistic point of view right
0:38:26 if we say that we believe that this you
0:38:28 know infinite necessary
0:38:30 being is god but if the
0:38:33 for example energy right they for
0:38:35 science tells us that energy
0:38:37 or i don't know if it's science of
0:38:39 physics but yeah
0:38:40 energy can't be created or destroyed
0:38:43 inside a closed system right
0:38:44 but how do they even come to that so i
0:38:47 guess my question is
0:38:48 they don't know anything outside of the
0:38:50 system so how would they even know that
0:38:52 that's the case
0:38:53 only inside of the system well look
0:38:56 when we look at laws of nature
0:38:58 particularly in science like
0:39:00 uh thermodynamic laws what we're talking
0:39:02 about here is really
0:39:04 a well-established scientific theory
0:39:07 built
0:39:07 upon an inductive process yeah so it's
0:39:10 induction
0:39:11 for the maybe i'm sure you know but for
0:39:14 the audience
0:39:15 induction is where you go from
0:39:16 particular observations and you come to
0:39:18 a generalized conclusion
0:39:19 yeah so the particular observation is
0:39:21 that energy cannot be created nor
0:39:23 destroyed
0:39:23 but transforms from one form to another
0:39:25 and we generalize that to the whole
0:39:27 yeah so we therefore we then talk about
0:39:29 is a law and that becomes a paradigm by
0:39:31 which we observe things yeah
0:39:33 so when they talk about the first law
0:39:35 the second law of thermodynamics
0:39:37 what they're talking about is are
0:39:39 inductive conclusions so they're not
0:39:41 definite
0:39:42 yeah even in the the scientific basis
0:39:45 and secondly
0:39:46 is um they become a paradigm by which we
0:39:50 can then explain other phenomena
0:39:52 yeah so there's nothing necessary about
0:39:54 them and that point about
0:39:56 it not being necessary requires
0:39:59 us to ask the question why is the energy
0:40:01 the way it is
0:40:03 why does it behave in the way it behaves
0:40:05 because it's not from the definition of
0:40:07 energy
0:40:07 it's from our experience of energy yeah
0:40:10 the limited experience of energy
0:40:12 we're going to still ask the question
0:40:14 why does it behave that way
0:40:15 why does e equals mc squared yeah as
0:40:18 opposed to e equals m c
0:40:19 cube cubed yeah so you know we're going
0:40:22 to ask these types of questions
0:40:23 so the fact that we can conceive of a
0:40:25 potential different way energy behaves
0:40:27 within this universe
0:40:29 indicates it's a it's a possibility it's
0:40:32 not a necessity
0:40:35 well i guess uh i guess i can actually
0:40:38 end on that because
0:40:39 that's where my knowledge like you know
0:40:41 that's where ends um
0:40:43 uh it's watch uh how should i end this
0:40:46 well
0:40:46 may allah bless all of your brothers um
0:40:48 i mean really make it
0:40:49 very like uh confident to speak because
0:40:52 i'm usually very nervous and shy
0:40:54 so so thank you for that i'll uh you
0:40:56 know be uh definitely there but
0:40:58 when you start the next stream because
0:41:00 i'm i was actually watching uh shabby is
0:41:02 a stream right now
0:41:03 on um because i like i had a con
0:41:06 conversation with him and
0:41:08 very very intelligent person so i maybe
0:41:10 you could possibly get him on one of his
0:41:12 rooms
0:41:14 but yeah for coming on and asking your
0:41:17 questions
0:41:18 no problem bless all of you and your
0:41:19 families
0:41:26 so uh we've got a couple more guests on
0:41:29 here
0:41:29 uh the next one that was in the queue
0:41:31 was uh
0:41:33 fadi hello are you muslim non-muslim
0:41:36 atheist
0:41:42 i'm palestinian alhamdulillah foreign
0:41:50 how can we help you what's uh what's
0:41:51 your question uh
0:41:53 my my brother my brother joseph
0:41:56 i sent you a message by your twitter
0:42:00 i hope you see
0:42:04 probably not i have um like too many
0:42:07 notifications so
0:42:08 if you want to get in touch with me the
0:42:10 best bet is on email
0:42:13 uh which i'll put on the screen now
0:42:16 okay okay my brother my brother my
0:42:19 brother
0:42:19 uh i am not perfect at
0:42:22 speaking english but i will i
0:42:26 but i will but i can communicate
0:42:30 what i want inshallah really my brother
0:42:33 i i need everyone here and i will
0:42:37 explain
0:42:37 uh explain something uh please
0:42:45 the subject of the the live stream so
0:42:47 we're talking today specifically about
0:42:49 uh can god be proved rationally uh if
0:42:52 it's
0:42:53 so long as it's about this because we
0:42:55 we've already kind of gone off on one
0:42:56 tangent a little bit today we want to
0:42:58 try and
0:42:58 stay a little bit focused um so if
0:43:01 you've got
0:43:02 okay my brother my brother joseph i
0:43:04 understand what you
0:43:05 what what you see but really really
0:43:08 i am here i hope uh you can give me a
0:43:12 chance for
0:43:13 explain something inshaallah my brother
0:43:16 you my brother yusuf and jazakallah
0:43:18 my brother my mother my brother
0:43:23 what would you like to explain
0:43:28 the first i'm fed him from palestine i
0:43:31 live in gaza strip
0:43:33 everyone knows how harsh situation here
0:43:35 in gaza strip
0:43:37 uh i know i know the world around me is
0:43:40 suffering
0:43:40 but my brother yusef
0:43:44 everywhere everyone everyone everyone
0:43:47 in the in the dunya in the dunya
0:43:52 do uh doing everything for for the air
0:43:55 and reward my brother yusuf my brother
0:43:58 yousef now
0:44:00 now uh i will explain
0:44:03 uh what what i need here
0:44:09 okay go ahead
0:44:13 my brother is my brother my brother
0:44:15 joseph i
0:44:16 really my brother joseph i need you and
0:44:19 i need
0:44:20 everyone here for operation
0:44:24 in my left hand my brother joseph my
0:44:26 brother yousef i hope you see
0:44:28 what uh what uh what i am
0:44:32 what i've sent you buy uh twitter my
0:44:36 brother
0:44:36 my brother yusuf okay like i said bro
0:44:40 i probably won't get it on twitter
0:44:41 because there's just too much going on
0:44:42 there so if you send me an email
0:44:44 i'll check it out inshallah and then
0:44:46 we'll have a look into it and see what
0:44:47 we can do
0:44:54 okay bro it's been a pleasure talking
0:44:55 i'll make it easy for you inshaallah
0:44:57 i mean and uh i'll i'll get in touch
0:44:59 with you on like i say just email me and
0:45:01 we'll speak then inshallah
0:45:09 just maybe a reminder to the brothers
0:45:11 and sisters watching is that
0:45:12 we can't really accept any uh donation
0:45:16 requests
0:45:16 uh or um asking for that on this channel
0:45:19 because
0:45:20 uh we you know we don't deal with money
0:45:23 so uh
0:45:24 you know we can't really do that and we
0:45:25 obviously we can't verify
0:45:28 uh people's requests either you know
0:45:31 so you know do we do apologize and i'm
0:45:33 sure yourself
0:45:34 apologizes as well as that we
0:45:36 unfortunately can't take these types of
0:45:37 requests
0:45:38 uh on here um
0:45:42 so the the next guest we've got on here
0:45:44 now is uh
0:45:46 brother justin again masha'allah oh
0:45:51 well go on glad to be back glad to be
0:45:53 back thanks for having me
0:45:54 yeah man good to have you here how have
0:45:56 you been in the past two weeks what's
0:45:58 been going on
0:45:59 just working working a whole bunch any
0:46:01 closer to shahada yet
0:46:03 is there any closer to taking shahada
0:46:05 yet
0:46:06 um i'm learning 109 i think right now
0:46:10 oh let me see yeah yeah 109.
0:46:14 i don't know exactly what it's called
0:46:15 but i'll find out now
0:46:17 it's very close to uh 114.
0:46:22 very close to 114.
0:46:41 ahead i love that yeah yeah you know
0:46:44 that one don't you
0:46:45 112 i i know i can one one two yeah i
0:46:48 can
0:46:48 i can do uh 1 112 and 114 right now if
0:46:52 you want me to
0:46:53 yeah go for it man okay so and and i may
0:46:57 may jumble some pronunciations up but
0:47:00 i'll try to go
0:47:02 okay
0:47:22 you're doing well
0:47:27 and and then we have 112 which is uh
0:47:29 it's my favorite one
0:47:31 which is uh bismillahirrahmanirrahim
0:47:33 called
0:47:34 who i had allah who summoned lemur
0:47:46 how long have you been spent trying to
0:47:47 learn them couple months um i would say
0:47:49 probably about
0:47:50 four or five months on and off i haven't
0:47:53 constantly been trying to learn it like
0:47:55 i will literally practice one and if i
0:47:58 go for two days constantly i'll be able
0:48:00 to
0:48:01 i'll be able to memorize it um for a
0:48:04 moment with an army of children you're
0:48:06 doing really well bro yeah
0:48:07 yeah yeah you got you got a lot of
0:48:09 whipper snappers running around your
0:48:10 ankles at the same time so
0:48:13 i i got one in here trying to keep him
0:48:15 quiet playing toys
0:48:16 playing with some toys have you got any
0:48:20 questions or points that you want to
0:48:21 raise on the particular topic
0:48:23 uh and um so
0:48:29 so we're talking about is belief in god
0:48:30 rational yeah yeah so
0:48:33 the the the the topic of the show like
0:48:36 when i saw the thumbnail is it can god
0:48:38 be proven rationally
0:48:40 um and and i
0:48:43 i don't know if i would agree with can
0:48:45 god be proven
0:48:46 rationally um i think god can be argued
0:48:50 for rationally
0:48:51 i think the arguments that we've been
0:48:53 through within the last
0:48:54 six to eight months of talking to each
0:48:56 other seem very rational i mean there's
0:48:58 no reason why i could call these things
0:49:00 irrational
0:49:02 um you
0:49:05 like what how do you define proof it can
0:49:08 be rational proofs
0:49:09 something that can be something that can
0:49:12 be shown definitively
0:49:14 um without any reasonable doubt coming
0:49:17 from
0:49:18 my frame of mind and can that be done
0:49:21 purely rationally or is that explicitly
0:49:23 something here's where i am going to
0:49:26 sit on this very very small
0:49:30 edge of a building that's between
0:49:34 empiricism and logic
0:49:37 right so i love the arguments for
0:49:40 you know the contingency argument the
0:49:42 kalam all these stepping stones
0:49:45 all these stepping stones that we can
0:49:47 use
0:49:48 to get towards a argument for a specific
0:49:51 god model and they are logical as can be
0:49:56 i for some reason am convinced
0:50:00 when there's the premises within these
0:50:02 logical arguments are backed by
0:50:04 empirical data
0:50:05 and it seems like oh well justin that
0:50:07 means that you're just an empiricist
0:50:08 that you require
0:50:09 empirical data for these claims which i
0:50:12 really don't want to i can see how
0:50:14 they're reasonable
0:50:15 i can see how they're logical without
0:50:18 having to use empirical data
0:50:20 but for me to be full-fledged this is
0:50:22 what's true definitive
0:50:24 definitively you know no questions about
0:50:26 it
0:50:27 i think that empirical data might need
0:50:29 to be
0:50:30 within that and i just need i i just
0:50:33 what do you think what do you think of
0:50:35 what what do you think of what i told
0:50:37 you last time about
0:50:39 um these arguments these cosmological
0:50:41 arguments being empirical in nature
0:50:44 anyway
0:50:44 because we are looking at empirical data
0:50:48 to infer something
0:50:49 about the fundamental layer of reality
0:50:52 so
0:50:53 what do you think about that so what do
0:50:55 you mean by
0:50:56 uh well we're we're observing
0:51:00 and examining things within our within
0:51:02 our reality which would be empirical
0:51:04 data
0:51:06 the correlation that's made which like
0:51:08 we me and you have had
0:51:10 i think i think the most frustrating
0:51:13 uh conversation that i've had with you
0:51:16 uh abdul
0:51:17 um when it comes to trying to get me to
0:51:20 understand these things
0:51:21 is when we spent like three hours on you
0:51:24 trying to convince me
0:51:25 to that causality is presupposed
0:51:28 that was that was one of the hardest
0:51:31 things that i had to do was bite the
0:51:32 bullet on
0:51:34 causality being presupposed um
0:51:37 everything is just simply a correlation
0:51:38 so
0:51:40 with that it's it's almost like when i'm
0:51:42 teaching my kids
0:51:44 uh to question everything and then i
0:51:46 tell my kids to go clean the room and
0:51:48 they say why
0:51:49 and i just want to be like because i
0:51:50 said so
0:51:52 just go do it i said to go do it so just
0:51:54 go do it
0:51:55 question everything apart from my
0:51:57 exactly
0:51:59 like like what if i ask you do we
0:52:01 observe contingent things
0:52:04 we do observe contention things i would
0:52:06 and do those contingent things that we
0:52:08 observe require
0:52:10 an explanation external to themselves in
0:52:12 order to account for their existence
0:52:15 an explanation that trends do these
0:52:17 contingent things require
0:52:19 an external explanation an ex an
0:52:21 explanation that transcends
0:52:24 the contingent thing itself in order to
0:52:26 know for its existence
0:52:27 yeah necessarily so so would you call
0:52:30 that
0:52:31 uh an empirical observation
0:52:33Music 0:52:37 um because if we're gonna go back to
0:52:42 to what empiricism is
0:52:45 empiricism is basically knowledge
0:52:47 through experience
0:52:48 through sensual experience right
0:52:51 sorry sensory experience so yeah in that
0:52:53 sense
0:52:54 that uh our observation of contingent
0:52:57 things that require an explanation
0:52:59 an external explanation is something
0:53:02 that is
0:53:03 uh empirical what would you say about
0:53:05 that
0:53:07 so i would agree that we're observing uh
0:53:10 contingent empirical things
0:53:14 when it comes from where those empirical
0:53:16 things derive from
0:53:19 we're no longer within empiricism
0:53:22 anymore so the thing that we're
0:53:23 observing
0:53:25 is empirically demonstrating itself's
0:53:27 existence at that point
0:53:29 now trying to figure out where that came
0:53:31 from even though you're understanding
0:53:33 that
0:53:33 even if it's contingent that you still
0:53:36 that you still need a
0:53:39 explanation for it for because it's
0:53:41 necessary is because it's contingent
0:53:44 i would understand that i'm just trying
0:53:46 to find the causal link like we talked
0:53:48 about
0:53:49 what what is what is the correlation
0:53:51 that that cannot be denied between this
0:53:53 contingent
0:53:54 thing that we're observing and the um
0:53:58 non-empirical thing that that is the
0:54:01 explanation for this
0:54:02 well okay so think of it this way so we
0:54:04 observe contingent things
0:54:06 right and we have a let's just say for
0:54:09 the sake of argument it's a it's a
0:54:10 presupposed
0:54:12 notion of causality uh
0:54:15 and and we have to claim these
0:54:18 contingent things so we we attempt to
0:54:20 explain
0:54:21 the natural phenomena that we observe in
0:54:23 the world this empirical reality
0:54:25 that we have and then series of
0:54:28 explanations right
0:54:30 so that's the that's the empirical part
0:54:32 of the discussion
0:54:34 that contingent things require an
0:54:36 explanation
0:54:37 now if you're if you're asking
0:54:40 how we can move from contingent things
0:54:42 to a necessary thing
0:54:44 well okay for me one of the most obvious
0:54:48 and direct ways
0:54:49 and josh rasmussen he uses
0:54:52 this argument and i'm actually taking it
0:54:54 from him is that
0:54:57 the they're the totality of
0:55:00 distant ones like all of the set of
0:55:04 everything that exists
0:55:06 can that be dependent into itself
0:55:12 okay say that last part again you broke
0:55:14 up a little bit okay so
0:55:16 the totality of things that exist
0:55:18 everything
0:55:19 exists in reality just everything
0:55:23 put it in a box right everything that
0:55:26 exists
0:55:27 can that totality of things be dependent
0:55:31 on something external to it
0:55:37 let me simplify it for you everything
0:55:40 that exists
0:55:41 means everything literally so there's
0:55:43 nothing
0:55:44 other than it basically if it were to
0:55:48 depend on
0:55:49 something external to itself you would
0:55:51 literally have to say that it depends on
0:55:53 nothing
0:55:54 they can't do that i mean logically you
0:55:57 can't do that now i can't
0:55:59 show you that that's the case
0:56:02 but logically that makes sense and
0:56:05 that's where i think
0:56:06 i mean i'm not sure what other than i
0:56:09 mean
0:56:10 what more than logic you would need
0:56:12 because like
0:56:14 nothingness is just self
0:56:17 like it's it's definitionally obvious
0:56:20 what nothingness entails it entails
0:56:22 nothing it's literally the absence of
0:56:25 anything so uh
0:56:28 so what i'm telling you is basically
0:56:30 everything
0:56:31 that exists within reality
0:56:34 has nothing literally nothing external
0:56:37 to it because if there was something
0:56:38 external to it then it would be within
0:56:40 the set of things that exist
0:56:42 right
0:56:45 right so everything that exists has to
0:56:48 by definition be independent
0:56:52 because if it was dependent on something
0:56:55 sorry it has to be independent of
0:56:56 external things
0:56:57 so if because if it was dependent on
0:56:59 something external to it
0:57:01 that means that it's not everything that
0:57:03 means there's something external
0:57:05 this is true by definition right
0:57:09 so so it's quite easy to show that there
0:57:12 is an independent existence
0:57:16 you just have to take that set of
0:57:18 everything that exists
0:57:20 and show that it couldn't possibly
0:57:23 depend on anything external to it
0:57:25 because there is nothing external to it
0:57:27 so there is some form of independence
0:57:29 but then now we go back to the empirical
0:57:32 reality that we observe
0:57:33 and the contingent things so the
0:57:35 question is
0:57:37 is the totality of contingent things
0:57:40 sufficient
0:57:41 to explain the independence of
0:57:44 contingent things and i gave this
0:57:45 example in the intro
0:57:47 here's this glass of water right here
0:57:48 it's a contingent thing
0:57:50 now you're observing one glass of water
0:57:52 so you
0:57:53 naturally you naturally
0:57:56 conclude that there is an external
0:57:58 explanation that accounts for its
0:58:00 existence
0:58:01 now if i had 100 glasses of water you
0:58:04 would still say that it requires
0:58:05 something external to it
0:58:07 to explain that at least one external
0:58:09 explanation
0:58:10 yes and no matter how much you multiply
0:58:13 that set of contingent things it's still
0:58:16 going to require an explanation external
0:58:18 to it
0:58:19 otherwise you have some form of
0:58:21 inconsistency why couldn't we just stop
0:58:23 at the glass and say that it doesn't
0:58:25 require an explanation
0:58:26 right so in that sense to conclude
0:58:30 the set of everything that exists is
0:58:33 necessarily by definition
0:58:35 independent and in order to account for
0:58:38 that
0:58:39 independence you need something other
0:58:41 than the contingent things within the
0:58:43 set
0:58:44 to account for the independence of
0:58:46 everything that exists
0:58:47 that means there is something within the
0:58:49 set of everything that exists
0:58:52 that forms a foundational necessary
0:58:55 layer
0:58:57 in order to support the rest of
0:58:59 existence correct and i agree with you
0:59:01 i agree with you all the way through
0:59:03 with that and and that's i'm sure you
0:59:05 you are
0:59:06 you are familiar with psr the principle
0:59:08 of sufficient reason
0:59:09 yeah within my model of you know hard
0:59:12 determinism and materialism and all that
0:59:13 stuff
0:59:14 i necessarily have to have to presuppose
0:59:16 that
0:59:17 that is a presupposition that i hold so
0:59:19 there necessarily
0:59:20 is an explanation for every uh
0:59:24 every contingent thing in the universe
0:59:26 necessarily there has to be an
0:59:27 explanation
0:59:28 or else it wouldn't make sense i mean so
0:59:30 so what i give you right now
0:59:32 is basically it's it's it's it's
0:59:34 definitionally true
0:59:35 in in the sense that if i told you that
0:59:38 um
0:59:39 that all what's the bachelor analogy
0:59:43 all bachelors are unmarried right
0:59:46 that's an analytically true statement
0:59:49 that doesn't require empirical
0:59:51 empirical evidence to back it because
0:59:53 you have within the statement the
0:59:55 definition of of of what's what's being
0:59:57 defined the subject and the predicate
0:59:59 right
0:59:59 so so it basically doesn't really make
1:00:03 sense to ask for
1:00:04 for empirical evidence for something
1:00:05 that is just definitionally true
1:00:08 and and through this analytic reason on
1:00:11 its own i think
1:00:12 i just showed you that we can very
1:00:14 easily show that there is something
1:00:16 within reality that is independent and
1:00:19 that's basically
1:00:20 stage one of the contingency argument
1:00:23 which takes you to something
1:00:25 necessary in reality reality couldn't
1:00:27 have possibly existed
1:00:29 unless there was a necessary foundation
1:00:32 that accounted for it even if you have
1:00:33 an infinite series of things of
1:00:35 contingent things
1:00:37 so at the very end there you said
1:00:40 something that's necessary within
1:00:42 reality
1:00:43 what did you mean by that within the set
1:00:47 of existent entities as in i mean if god
1:00:51 exists
1:00:51 if god exists then god is within the set
1:00:55 of entities that exist right yeah
1:00:58 so if we if we put all of existence in a
1:01:01 set
1:01:02 god is going to be if god does exist
1:01:04 then god will be in that set right
1:01:07 so what i mean is within everything that
1:01:10 exists within that set
1:01:12 part of that has to be necessary in
1:01:14 order for there to be any existence at
1:01:15 all
1:01:16 or you can say that the whole thing is
1:01:18 necessary either way
1:01:20 it serves the purpose of the stage one
1:01:22 of the cosmological
1:01:23 sorry the contingency argument that
1:01:25 there is something necessary
1:01:26 something exists by necessity that's
1:01:28 something also that i'm that i'm
1:01:31 looking into and kind of pondering is
1:01:35 is everything within my model is
1:01:37 everything necessary
1:01:39 because if i presuppose the psr and hard
1:01:41 determinism is true
1:01:44 everything that has happened and is
1:01:46 happening and is going to happen
1:01:48 has to be necessary for this reality to
1:01:51 even be this reality
1:01:53 yeah so so there's a difference i mean
1:01:54 when you talk about determining
1:01:56 determinism and necessity what you're
1:01:57 basically saying
1:01:58 is that there is a cause that
1:02:01 necessarily determines its effect
1:02:02 right yeah there's no indeterminacy
1:02:06 that's not the same as saying that the
1:02:08 chain itself is necessary right
1:02:10 or the b or a particular being within
1:02:12 that chain is necessary
1:02:14 because yeah basically necessary um
1:02:16 refers to the existence
1:02:18 of something that cannot not exist and
1:02:21 so if you're talking about determinant
1:02:23 um determinism and you're talking about
1:02:26 a chain
1:02:27 which um one thing necessarily leads to
1:02:29 the other
1:02:30 these necessarily leading to the other
1:02:32 thing these things still perish
1:02:34 these thought these things still come
1:02:35 into being and then they have existence
1:02:38 and then they leave being and have
1:02:40 non-existence so
1:02:41 this is a different category we're not
1:02:44 talking about
1:02:45 uh necessity in this talking not the
1:02:48 causation itself the causation would be
1:02:50 necessary the existence is contingent
1:02:52 yeah so there may be a necessary causal
1:02:54 link between one thing and another
1:02:56 but that doesn't mean that any of these
1:02:58 things are
1:02:59 necessary existence that is they cannot
1:03:02 not exist
1:03:03 if they cease to exist at any point
1:03:05 they're not necessary in the way that
1:03:06 we're talking about them
1:03:08 if that makes sense so an example would
1:03:10 be like like let's say like a chair
1:03:11 go ahead sheriff no i was going to say
1:03:13 the example of like a fire underneath
1:03:15 the water
1:03:16 so the fire necessarily causes the water
1:03:18 to boil under your model
1:03:20 i'm saying but the fire doesn't have to
1:03:23 exist and the water doesn't have to
1:03:24 exist
1:03:25 so you still need an explanation as to
1:03:27 why that particular link
1:03:29 those two links within the chain exist
1:03:31 in the first how'd the fire start if the
1:03:33 fire is contingent how did the fire
1:03:34 start
1:03:35 and that's when we get into a will
1:03:36 that's when we get into you know static
1:03:39 static just doesn't cause changes to
1:03:41 which that's where
1:03:42 i've i've wanted to look and i and i'll
1:03:44 be honest with you i haven't really
1:03:46 really dove into it yet still trying to
1:03:48 have a more fundamental understanding
1:03:49 but diving into like quantum mechanics
1:03:51 and things like that or quantum physics
1:03:53 speaking about like um quantum
1:03:55 fluctuations like things that are that
1:03:57 are considered purely random
1:03:59 which i still have a hard time within my
1:04:02 model
1:04:02 being able to grasp or understand
1:04:05 because there's nothing
1:04:06 everything is necessary there is no
1:04:08 randomness
1:04:09 that's possible within my model yeah
1:04:12 just going back to what abdul rahman was
1:04:14 saying at the beginning as well
1:04:16 it may be because relatively uh you know
1:04:20 new way to look at a particular angle to
1:04:22 look at this uh point of contingency
1:04:25 what abdulrahman is in essence saying is
1:04:27 that if you put
1:04:28 all of existence into a bucket then
1:04:32 all things that exist cannot exist upon
1:04:35 something outside of itself
1:04:37 there can't be something other than all
1:04:39 those things that exist
1:04:41 so they have to be independent so he's
1:04:44 saying as a result if all contingent
1:04:47 beings
1:04:47 can explain itself then that becomes the
1:04:51 independency but all contingent things
1:04:54 require an explanation outside of itself
1:04:56 and therefore you need a necessary being
1:04:59 so the necessary being provides the
1:05:02 completeness
1:05:04 of all things that don't need anything
1:05:07 else to explain itself
1:05:09 does that make sense that makes sense no
1:05:11 i totally agree with that now
1:05:13 i think the one point to where we're
1:05:16 going to have disagreement is that and
1:05:17 this goes back to the question i asked
1:05:19 abdul rahman is
1:05:23 what do you mean by something within
1:05:24 reality because
1:05:26 i as of right now i have an
1:05:28 understanding that
1:05:30 what's consistent within my model is
1:05:32 that reality
1:05:33 is that necessary explanation
1:05:37 reality is i think there is the
1:05:39 distinction you need to know
1:05:40 between the necessity of the causal
1:05:44 chain the deterministic causal chain
1:05:46 and between a necessary existence as
1:05:50 we're using it in this contingency
1:05:51 argument so i think there's a bit of an
1:05:53 equivocation going on
1:05:54 let me give you an example of like a
1:05:56 chair so as a determinist you would say
1:05:58 that this chair
1:05:59 couldn't have not existed because the
1:06:01 antecedent
1:06:03 events that uh preceded it led to its
1:06:06 existence necessarily
1:06:08 however the chair is still a contingent
1:06:10 thing
1:06:11 because you you're going to
1:06:15 you're going to like look for an
1:06:16 explanation for why the chair exists in
1:06:18 the first place
1:06:19 so there is a certain causal chain that
1:06:22 leads to the existence of the chair
1:06:24 the fact that cause leads to effect
1:06:26 deterministically
1:06:27 doesn't mean that the causal chain had
1:06:30 to exist so i think it's important
1:06:32 to point out what a necessary being
1:06:34 means
1:06:35 a necessary being is a being that
1:06:37 couldn't have failed to exist
1:06:39 you can imagine a world without the
1:06:40 chair it's just that on your model
1:06:43 the fact that the world happens to exist
1:06:47 necessitates by cause and effect the
1:06:49 existence of the chair
1:06:50 that doesn't mean that the world
1:06:52 couldn't have not existed it could have
1:06:54 been very different
1:06:56 unicorns could have existed chairs could
1:06:58 have not existed
1:06:59 possible things or contingent things are
1:07:01 things that didn't have
1:07:03 to exist things that can go out of being
1:07:06 and i think even under your
1:07:08 deterministic model
1:07:09 that would be the case so so so
1:07:12 i think there's a bit of an equivocation
1:07:15 between the necessity of
1:07:17 a causal chain on determinism and the
1:07:20 way we're using necessary being
1:07:22 as far as the contingency argument is
1:07:24 concerned do you mind about
1:07:26 i'll just ask a question as well so in
1:07:28 terms of
1:07:29 a necessary existence are you
1:07:32 comfortable with that idea
1:07:33 now or so in terms of step one
1:07:37 establishing that there is a a necessary
1:07:40 existence of some sort you're fine with
1:07:42 that
1:07:43 the universe and everything that is
1:07:44 contained within the universe cannot
1:07:46 necessarily be
1:07:47 eternal their needs to have some type of
1:07:51 necessary existence or by necessary
1:07:53 being something that is
1:07:55 okay uh to explain it exactly
1:08:01 you accepted i mean you're not a theist
1:08:04 you could you can say what you just said
1:08:06 and still be an atheist
1:08:07 yeah i just don't want that to be a
1:08:08 barrier for you accepting the stage one
1:08:11 of them
1:08:12 yeah so you basically accept that stage
1:08:15 one of the contingency argument is sound
1:08:17 good something necessary exists now we
1:08:20 can move on then from
1:08:21 there so we don't need to go into the
1:08:23 contingency arguments anymore
1:08:25 we've got you so i want to take up the
1:08:28 rest of the show man if you got other
1:08:29 guests
1:08:32 you're just scared justin
1:08:35 was scared we wouldn't be in our cats
1:08:37 doing this every day for the last eight
1:08:39 months
1:08:40 i know i'm joking you've established a
1:08:43 necessary existence
1:08:44 now what is your
1:08:47 opinion with regards to whether or not
1:08:49 this existence has a will
1:08:52 that it that it has a will of its own
1:08:53 but it is self-determining
1:08:56 um that's that's kind of where we break
1:08:58 off
1:08:59 is because like i said i haven't really
1:09:01 studied quantum indeterminacy
1:09:03 i'm saying that uh wouldn't relate to
1:09:05 this
1:09:07 the quantum wouldn't relate to the
1:09:08 necessary being the quantum is the
1:09:11 uh you know the the quantum of the
1:09:14 so you're saying the quantum was within
1:09:16 the contingency itself yeah quantum is
1:09:17 just the tiny parts
1:09:19 of the contingent reality so you like
1:09:21 you're not going to get answers in terms
1:09:23 of the
1:09:24 necessary being um with reference to the
1:09:26 quantum the quantum is only going to
1:09:27 tell you about
1:09:28 uh you know the fundamental nature of
1:09:30 reality
1:09:31 in terms of like what makes it up and um
1:09:34 how it's parts really
1:09:36 so with regards to the necessary
1:09:37 existence i'll just give you a short
1:09:39 argument as to why
1:09:40 um i believe it's it's rational to
1:09:42 consider this necessary being
1:09:44 to have a will that's independent
1:09:48 because if it's an independent being and
1:09:50 there is nothing
1:09:51 external to it acting upon it um
1:09:54 because that's what dependency is
1:09:56 dependency is there are things
1:09:57 external to the dependent thing which
1:10:00 the independent thing relies upon
1:10:02 now if you have an independent necessary
1:10:04 existence
1:10:05 what we're saying here is there is
1:10:07 nothing outside of it
1:10:09 acting on it there is no causal
1:10:12 connection
1:10:13 so something external to it acting upon
1:10:15 it leading to an effect
1:10:17 but effects come from it all contingent
1:10:20 things
1:10:21 come from this necessary thing the
1:10:23 necessary thing is giving rise
1:10:25 to everything in contingent existence
1:10:28 now i would say here that if contingent
1:10:31 things
1:10:32 are arising from this as a
1:10:35 result of this necessary existence that
1:10:37 this must be self-determined the
1:10:39 necessary existence
1:10:41 is choosing to bring things into
1:10:43 existence
1:10:44 and it has to be coming from itself it
1:10:46 can't be coming from external to it
1:10:48 because then you're not talking about a
1:10:49 contingent thing uh sorry a necessary
1:10:51 thing anymore
1:10:52 that kind of language can only be used
1:10:54 with reference to contingent
1:10:56 existence so if this thing is
1:10:59 independent and you accept that
1:11:00 if this thing is necessary then anything
1:11:02 that comes from
1:11:03 it has to have been self-determined by
1:11:06 that necessary thing
1:11:08 self-determined yes i agree with that
1:11:10 so you can and that is what i would
1:11:12 refer to as a free will
1:11:14 and the ultimately free will
1:11:17 so the word free will doesn't go very
1:11:20 well
1:11:21 and that's cringe that's correct
1:11:24 better to say will i mean you could just
1:11:26 say will some kind
1:11:27 even even that because if if what euston
1:11:30 just said
1:11:30 yusuf just said was correct that
1:11:32 everything that comes from this
1:11:33 necessary being is necessary itself
1:11:35 would you agree with that
1:11:37 well it's not it's not necessary itself
1:11:40 because it could come into existence and
1:11:41 it compares
1:11:42 any any decision or thing that you would
1:11:44 call a choice that comes from this
1:11:45 necessary being
1:11:47 i wouldn't say it's necessary no so you
1:11:50 okay okay so those things are contingent
1:11:52 the decisions themselves are contingent
1:11:55 i okay so look so one way to look at
1:11:58 this is
1:11:58 so the necessary thing exists as a
1:12:00 foundation for the contingent world to
1:12:02 exist right
1:12:03 now one way to look at this is in terms
1:12:05 of sufficient cause
1:12:07 right so if a is a sufficient cause for
1:12:10 b
1:12:10 right then as long as there is a you
1:12:13 will always have b
1:12:16 so if if if you're and i think
1:12:20 you're you're you're on your view you're
1:12:22 already finding it quite plausible that
1:12:24 the contingent world is finite and not
1:12:26 eternal you mentioned that a while ago
1:12:29 if a always existed which it has to
1:12:32 because it's necessary and it's a
1:12:34 sufficient cause for
1:12:35 b would have always existed so a being
1:12:38 the necessary being and b
1:12:40 being the contingent world right but if
1:12:43 you already accept that
1:12:44 the contingent world is finite and not
1:12:46 eternal
1:12:47 then a has always been sufficient for b
1:12:51 but b didn't exist that would be a
1:12:54 problem you would
1:12:55 you would have to say that a always
1:12:56 existed but but
1:12:58 in a certain point in in time i mean
1:13:01 time comes with a lot of baggage here
1:13:03 but just let's just let's just use it
1:13:05 loosely
1:13:08 for in a certain point in time a brought
1:13:10 about
1:13:11 the existence of the necessary being
1:13:13 brought about the existence of the
1:13:14 contingent world
1:13:16 right so there would have to be some
1:13:18 kind of factor
1:13:19 that would allow for something that
1:13:21 always existed
1:13:23 to bring or something infinite or
1:13:25 eternal to bring
1:13:26 a finite effect into being if there
1:13:29 wasn't a factor of choice
1:13:31 then as long as a existed b will exist
1:13:35 as long as the necessary foundation
1:13:37 existed the contingent world would exist
1:13:39 why why does this necessary being
1:13:41 necessarily need free will
1:13:43 why wouldn't he just need a type of will
1:13:46 that causes things into existence
1:13:48 contingently
1:13:50 with with just knowledge that he was
1:13:52 going to do it if he's eternal
1:13:54 and all-knowing if he holds those two
1:13:55 omni properties
1:13:57 what's stopping him from just having a
1:13:59 perfect
1:14:00 will instead of free will
1:14:03 so it isn't a barrier let's forget about
1:14:05 free will for now so
1:14:06 let's just say will is sufficient okay
1:14:08 so let's just say wilson
1:14:10 i think this is the thing i don't see
1:14:12 why i can get when maybe
1:14:13 you have an issue when we're talking
1:14:15 about contingent things
1:14:17 uh why you might have an issue with
1:14:18 using the word free
1:14:20 comp or like an in an absolute sense for
1:14:23 us but with regards to a necessary being
1:14:26 that is independent and there is nothing
1:14:29 like
1:14:29 limiting it there's nothing preventing
1:14:31 it from acting
1:14:32 uh or getting in the way like things do
1:14:34 for us like i might have this desire to
1:14:37 just start flying now
1:14:38 but you know i don't have a jet pack
1:14:40 nearby there's no plane i've got access
1:14:41 to at the moment
1:14:42 yeah yeah i i have things limiting me
1:14:45 and that's to do with uh you know my own
1:14:47 ability my own power
1:14:49 you know my own resources things like
1:14:50 that now
1:14:52 god has all of these you know he's in
1:14:56 infinite quantities so he has infinite
1:14:57 power like he's
1:14:58 he's all powerful uh you know he's he's
1:15:01 all knowledgeable he's got these things
1:15:04 these uh
1:15:05 these attributes that are not you know
1:15:08 that
1:15:09 like he's basically able to act whenever
1:15:11 he wants
1:15:12 however he wants without that being
1:15:14 impeded by anything
1:15:15 so how how much more free can you get
1:15:18 than that
1:15:20 like what what what do you consider a
1:15:22 free will like it i get
1:15:23 you're a determinist the ability to
1:15:26 choose otherwise
1:15:28 okay so what would be stopping this
1:15:31 necessary being from choosing otherwise
1:15:34 his knowledge
1:15:35 his knowledge would prevent him from
1:15:36 choosing otherwise if he's eternal and
1:15:39 all-knowing
1:15:41 all-knowing within the framework that i
1:15:43 understand it is that he would know
1:15:45 everything including his own
1:15:46 quote-unquote decisions if he already
1:15:49 knows his
1:15:50 own decisions and his own decisions are
1:15:53 part of his
1:15:54 omni uh when it comes to his knowledge
1:15:57 his his
1:15:57 uh on uh omniscience
1:16:01 then to say that he could do otherwise
1:16:04 than he knows he's going to do would
1:16:06 take away his omniproperty as
1:16:07 all-knowing
1:16:10 yeah but i think the problem with that
1:16:12 justin is i think you're
1:16:13 mixing between free will
1:16:16 and the idea of doing otherwise yeah yes
1:16:19 yes so
1:16:20 well well i'm just saying you don't
1:16:22 think that's how i define
1:16:24 choice and choice is the ability to
1:16:25 choose otherwise
1:16:27 and free will within the way we're not
1:16:28 talking about libertarian free will like
1:16:31 like you know like the christians like
1:16:32 to argue for like yeah
1:16:34 i would always ask them to jump off of a
1:16:35 building and have the free will to grow
1:16:37 a set of wings and fly away
1:16:39 but i think we're not talking about that
1:16:40 kind of free will but what yourself is
1:16:42 arguing for is not
1:16:43 not saying could uh this creator
1:16:47 this necessary being do otherwise other
1:16:49 than its own knowledge of what it was
1:16:50 going to do in the first place
1:16:52 he's just simply saying that is the
1:16:55 ability to
1:16:56 choose bound by anything external to the
1:17:00 necessary being
1:17:03 not external to it but i would say
1:17:04 that's right bound by something within
1:17:07 that necessary being which i think
1:17:09 whatever
1:17:10 yeah whatever is internal to the you
1:17:12 know because at the end of the day
1:17:14 there's only so much that our mind can
1:17:16 get to in terms of the
1:17:18 the the necessary being but always all
1:17:21 we need to get to
1:17:22 is the fact that this necessary being is
1:17:25 not some
1:17:26 naturalistic or physical explanation
1:17:29 yeah it's a necessary being that it has
1:17:33 sentience
1:17:34 yeah has an idea has knowledge or
1:17:37 awareness
1:17:37 that's all we want to get to now how the
1:17:41 necessary being creates why he creates
1:17:43 what the will is how it interacts that's
1:17:45 a separate discussion
1:17:46 but the very least we can get to that
1:17:48 point that there is a will
1:17:49 yeah i think abdul rahman has mentioned
1:17:51 it as well
1:17:53 which is uh the cause the necessary
1:17:55 being is eternal
1:17:57 but the contingent realities that exist
1:18:00 they're finite
1:18:01 yeah so if you've got everything
1:18:02 necessary to produce
1:18:04 a contingent reality or the effect
1:18:07 but the effect is temporal had a
1:18:10 beginning but the cause is eternal
1:18:12 then the only explanation to that is
1:18:14 choice yeah intentionality to choose
1:18:17 yeah it can't be naturalistic it can't
1:18:20 be some sort of physical
1:18:22 force out there that has to create so
1:18:24 that therefore cannot be explained under
1:18:26 the model of naturalism
1:18:27 but it can be explained on the model of
1:18:30 the will
1:18:30 and that's the only explanation that we
1:18:32 have that's one the second argument
1:18:34 would be the fact that when we talk
1:18:36 about contingent beings
1:18:38 we're saying these are things that could
1:18:39 have a number of possibilities
1:18:41 they could exist they could not exist
1:18:43 they could have different attributes
1:18:44 than the way that they exist
1:18:46 so therefore there requires a choice to
1:18:49 be made
1:18:50 in order to determine why they exist
1:18:52 this way as opposed to any other way
1:18:55 yeah so therefore that again gives us an
1:18:58 explanation
1:18:59 and by the way all of these arguments
1:19:01 are all built upon the reality
1:19:03 they're built upon what we sense they're
1:19:04 not built upon anything outside
1:19:07 you know some you know philosophical
1:19:09 node they actually built upon what we
1:19:11 sent
1:19:11 we sense things exist and they could
1:19:14 exist
1:19:14 in another way and they required an
1:19:16 explanation
1:19:17 yeah for its existence and from that
1:19:20 we're coming to and we sense that the
1:19:22 universe
1:19:22 is temporal has a beginning to its
1:19:25 existence
1:19:26 and we've already agreed upon a
1:19:27 necessary being then the only
1:19:29 explanation we've got now
1:19:31 is a necessary being that has a will
1:19:40 i'm not sure i'm not sure how much
1:19:42 longer you want to
1:19:43 keep going justin but there's or if
1:19:45 anyone's waiting
1:19:48 till he says
1:19:51 there are other pathways as well like
1:19:53 for example
1:19:54 um when you think of an ultimate
1:19:55 explanation and the necessary foundation
1:19:57 of reality
1:19:59 i think like from an epistemic viewpoint
1:20:02 you want the least arbitrary explanation
1:20:06 the least arbitrary ultimate explanation
1:20:08 there is
1:20:09 like for example if i told you that the
1:20:12 necessary foundation of reality
1:20:14 had a power of 86 for example
1:20:18 right although we can ask the question
1:20:19 why isn't why isn't the power 87
1:20:22 why isn't it 85 uh why the
1:20:25 why that arbitrary limit i mean there is
1:20:28 an aspect of contingency there we're
1:20:30 gonna have to ask a question that
1:20:32 requires a deeper explanation and you
1:20:33 don't want that
1:20:35 with the ultimate explanation of reality
1:20:38 so and i think scientists often look for
1:20:40 these kinds of ultimate explanations as
1:20:42 well
1:20:43 and arbitrariness isn't isn't a good
1:20:46 thing for an ultimate explanation of
1:20:48 reality because then you're left with
1:20:51 a lot of contingencies that require
1:20:52 deeper answers so what is the
1:20:54 least arbitrary necessary foundation of
1:20:57 reality well you have to think of its
1:21:00 causal capacity what kind of causal
1:21:02 capacity does it have
1:21:04 again what number are you going to put
1:21:06 on that that isn't arbitrary
1:21:08 what nature does it have what kind what
1:21:11 kind of causal capacities does it have
1:21:13 so for example we have a will that you
1:21:16 can call that a causal capacity however
1:21:18 you're going to define will
1:21:19 even if you're going to reduce it to
1:21:21 causal factors or to physical factors
1:21:23 then
1:21:24 it's still a causal power so does this
1:21:27 does the nature of the foundation of
1:21:30 reality
1:21:31 have the same causal capacity that you
1:21:34 do or is that going to be another
1:21:36 arbitrary limitation on its causal
1:21:39 capacity
1:21:40 because if you have it and it doesn't
1:21:42 then why that arbitrary limitation that
1:21:44 means it's bound by certain limitations
1:21:46 so so uh the way you want to look at it
1:21:49 is
1:21:50 in terms of supremacy you want to think
1:21:52 of the most supreme nature
1:21:54 for the for the foundation of reality
1:21:57 because in that sense
1:21:59 i mean the word supreme might come would
1:22:01 come with a lot of
1:22:02 theistic exactly unlimited and better
1:22:05 better because when i say supreme you're
1:22:06 thinking of god and i don't want your
1:22:07 mind to jump there because that can be
1:22:09 a barrier sometimes when we're talking
1:22:11 to atheists but the the most
1:22:13 non-arbitrary uh nature of the
1:22:16 fundamental aspect of reality
1:22:18 is gonna be something that's unlimited
1:22:21 and if you're gonna limit its causal
1:22:23 capacity
1:22:24 to mere physical interactions well then
1:22:27 you have a lot of contingencies that
1:22:29 again require
1:22:30 a deeper explanation so so in a sense i
1:22:33 mean
1:22:34 there's another question that that
1:22:36 robert coons asks right he's like what
1:22:38 what
1:22:39 what kind of an epistemic limitation are
1:22:41 we going to place
1:22:42 on science right like like
1:22:46 when we observe contingent things in the
1:22:48 world we always want an explanation for
1:22:50 these contingent things and the job of
1:22:52 science
1:22:53 among other fields is to give us
1:22:55 explanations about
1:22:57 these observable phenomena but the
1:22:59 question is what's the epistemic
1:23:01 limitation of science where are we going
1:23:03 to stop where are we going to say that
1:23:04 that's it
1:23:05 science is gonna go no further because
1:23:07 remember
1:23:08 you can't really first of all you can't
1:23:10 observe causality second of all there's
1:23:12 always going to be the possibility of
1:23:14 unobservable things that you haven't
1:23:16 explained
1:23:16 right so what's what's the most
1:23:20 non-arbitrary
1:23:21 epistemic limitation to science well we
1:23:24 could say that
1:23:25 science can explain contingent things
1:23:29 but the necessary foundation of reality
1:23:32 shouldn't have that kind of
1:23:33 arbitrariness because if you have that
1:23:35 arbitrary limitation on the necessary
1:23:37 foundation then science has to come back
1:23:39 and do some more work to give us even a
1:23:42 deeper foundation but
1:23:43 the foundation of reality shouldn't have
1:23:45 a foundation
1:23:47 i mean there's a lot of back and forth
1:23:49 to have about this but yeah
1:23:51 but there are a lot of pathways that
1:23:53 indicate that that
1:23:54 uh an arbitrary i found a necessary
1:23:58 foundation with
1:23:59 some sort of an arbitrary nature isn't
1:24:02 something that that that
1:24:04 that looks very pretty let's just put it
1:24:06 that way you're always going to want a
1:24:08 deeper
1:24:09 explanation yeah just to briefly
1:24:11 summarize the point
1:24:12 i mean all abdehman is saying is that if
1:24:15 you're saying that the necessary being
1:24:16 is forced to create
1:24:18 then that is a limitation it's a it's
1:24:20 another limitation that you're placing
1:24:23 and you're going to ask the question why
1:24:25 does it why is it forced
1:24:28 as opposed to having the ability to
1:24:30 choose
1:24:32 and the better way the freer the
1:24:34 unrestricted way would be to say choose
1:24:37 see justin i'm just thinking every
1:24:39 single argument
1:24:41 from a rational point of view built upon
1:24:43 our observation of the universe in
1:24:45 reality
1:24:46 keeps coming back to the same conclusion
1:24:49 yes yes but the question that that uh uh
1:24:51 abdul
1:24:52 was was was was mentioning was that
1:24:57 how far does science go before we can
1:24:59 say that this is
1:25:00 outside of the bounds of science now
1:25:03 that's
1:25:03 that's the fascinating thing about
1:25:05 science itself is that i don't know if
1:25:07 we'd ever be able to say
1:25:09 this is the line this is the line that
1:25:11 we draw like right now we would draw the
1:25:13 line at anything that transcends space
1:25:15 time and matter
1:25:16 is no longer within the bounds of
1:25:18 science and that's why i'm not an
1:25:20 empiricist
1:25:21 because there are experiments i'm not
1:25:25 sure i agree with that justin i mean you
1:25:26 don't think there are
1:25:28 in principle pro like there are in
1:25:31 principle limitations with regard to
1:25:32 science like
1:25:33 for example things that are beyond
1:25:35 observation i mean
1:25:37 how is that yeah that's no no that's
1:25:39 what i just said yes so i agree with
1:25:40 that
1:25:41 anything that translates transcends
1:25:43 space time and matter
1:25:44 is outside the bounds of science now
1:25:47 there may be a scientific method that
1:25:48 may come about in the future
1:25:50 and i don't know i i really don't that
1:25:52 can observe
1:25:55 things that are outside of space time
1:25:56 and matter there may be a different
1:25:58 method
1:25:58 that's based upon things that are more
1:26:02 conceptual rather than appearance well
1:26:03 if i can observe it then it's observable
1:26:06 i mean i i don't i mean there the the
1:26:09 the
1:26:10 there are things i mean i think it's
1:26:12 indisputable
1:26:13 mm-hmm that there are and i think like
1:26:16 philosophers and scientists in general
1:26:18 would agree
1:26:20 uh and and the philosophy of science is
1:26:22 a big field
1:26:23 that that there are things that are not
1:26:26 within the purview of science
1:26:28 like morality for example i mean that's
1:26:30 that's a kind of mundane example because
1:26:32 because we're talking about more the
1:26:34 more the concrete reality but just as an
1:26:36 example
1:26:37 like moral truths and stuff that's not
1:26:40 really a scientific question
1:26:41 although it can't even early earlier
1:26:44 with the uh the brother that we had on
1:26:45 earlier i made the example i gave the
1:26:47 example of
1:26:48 the internal angles of a triangle adds
1:26:51 up to 180 degrees
1:26:53 now you don't investigate from a
1:26:54 scientific point of view as to why
1:26:57 it adds up to 180 degrees you say that
1:27:00 is
1:27:00 it is self-contained within its own
1:27:03 existence
1:27:04 yeah yeah how would it how it ends up
1:27:07 being 180 degrees you can show
1:27:09 the internal angles you could you could
1:27:11 take a protractor and actually
1:27:12 show what the angles are but why they
1:27:16 became that way that's something that's
1:27:17 not for scientists more philosophical
1:27:19 yeah it's just it's just because the
1:27:21 reason why is because it's contained in
1:27:23 its own existence isn't it
1:27:25 so it's necessary from that point of
1:27:27 view on a flat surface obviously
1:27:29 um so what we're saying here is this is
1:27:32 that
1:27:32 yeah science so if somebody now comes to
1:27:35 me and says
1:27:36 well maybe in future science will
1:27:39 investigate
1:27:40 and find a reason why well it's
1:27:42 irrelevant yeah
1:27:43 that's not the purpose of science
1:27:45 science is fundamentally about
1:27:47 understanding contingent realities
1:27:49 and the explanations of contingent
1:27:50 realities why
1:27:52 why are they contingent realities is
1:27:55 because
1:27:56 you can't work out the answer by its own
1:27:59 existence
1:28:01 and by its own definition yeah so i have
1:28:04 to
1:28:05 i have to sense it i have to observe it
1:28:08 for myself
1:28:09 in order to work out why exists that's
1:28:12 why you know when we talk about
1:28:14 uh causality that causality is something
1:28:17 that cannot be
1:28:18 determined you know uh a priori between
1:28:21 two things
1:28:22 yeah what i mean by that is that you
1:28:25 can't work out
1:28:26 just by knowing the nature of fire in
1:28:29 the nature of water the boiling point of
1:28:31 water
1:28:32 it's not contained in its own definition
1:28:33 i have to experience it
1:28:35 yeah because there's no logical
1:28:37 necessity for it to boil at 100 degrees
1:28:40 celsius
1:28:41 yeah like the internal angles of a
1:28:43 triangle is logically necessary to be
1:28:44 180 degrees
1:28:46 there's nothing necessary so for me to
1:28:48 have knowledge
1:28:49 of it i need to uh experience it
1:28:52 this is the point of science is about
1:28:54 you experiencing contingent realities
1:29:00 does that make sense justin you have to
1:29:02 experience if something is not necessary
1:29:04 from a philosophical and logical point
1:29:06 of view
1:29:07 then you're going to have to use science
1:29:08 to come to its conclusion
1:29:11 if something doesn't make sense
1:29:12 philosophically
1:29:14 no if it's not necessary from a
1:29:16 philosophical or logical point of view
1:29:19 then you're going to have to come to use
1:29:22 science in order to have some knowledge
1:29:23 of it
1:29:27 those are the only two methods that we
1:29:29 really currently have right now
1:29:33 which is what sorry to reason with
1:29:35 either
1:29:36 observation through empirical means or
1:29:40 logical arguments through philosophical
1:29:42 uh
1:29:43 conversation yeah and what i'm saying is
1:29:45 this is that where we can delineate
1:29:47 between the two
1:29:49 is if we've got a argument that is
1:29:52 contained within its premises
1:29:55 and contained within its definitions
1:29:56 that lead to a conclusion
1:29:58 then we don't need to investigate
1:30:00 further
1:30:01 yeah we don't need to now experience it
1:30:05 but if it's not contained within its own
1:30:07 definition or within its own existence
1:30:10 then i have to experience it which means
1:30:13 i have to do science
1:30:15 yeah so if i wanted to like i said the
1:30:17 boiling point of water i want to know
1:30:19 what it is
1:30:20 there's nothing there's no way of me
1:30:22 investigating other than
1:30:24 by experience yeah i can't work it out
1:30:28 if i wanted to know whether
1:30:29 light white light is a mixture of
1:30:32 different lights
1:30:34 yeah you know red blue green the rainbow
1:30:36 colors
1:30:37 or not there's no way of me working it
1:30:39 out
1:30:40 from a philosophical point of view
1:30:42 because it's not containing its own
1:30:43 definition
1:30:44 i have to go and experience it you know
1:30:47 i have to do an experiment
1:30:48 yeah so this is where science works
1:30:52 so when we're talking about okay outside
1:30:54 of the universe or a necessary being
1:30:56 then we're saying this is an area where
1:30:58 science cannot work
1:31:00 it's not even an area by which we would
1:31:02 ask the question
1:31:03 for which science is looking for because
1:31:06 we're talking about a necessary being
1:31:09 self-contained within its own definition
1:31:14 so once i've come so once i've come to
1:31:16 the conclusion it's self-contained with
1:31:17 his own definition
1:31:18 that's it i don't need to look at
1:31:20 science it's not science is never going
1:31:21 to negate that
1:31:23 there's a conclusion
1:31:34 one last thing justin i think science is
1:31:37 great and everything i don't think
1:31:38 anyone would disagree
1:31:39 but i think you might be like
1:31:43 overestimating or exaggerating the
1:31:46 epistemic value of science in the sense
1:31:49 that
1:31:49 it works great when it comes to
1:31:52 observable things and when it comes to
1:31:54 us
1:31:54 understanding the mechanisms of reality
1:31:57 but uh
1:31:58 but i mean i i think i spoke to you
1:32:00 about inductive pessimism right
1:32:03 that most of our science in the past
1:32:05 most of our
1:32:06 best scientific theories in the past
1:32:08 have
1:32:09 uh uh proven to be wrong so
1:32:12 by induction which is the same method we
1:32:14 use in science
1:32:16 some would say that it's probable that
1:32:18 our
1:32:19 current scientific series theories are
1:32:22 wrong
1:32:22 and i'm sure you don't have a problem
1:32:23 with that but the issue is
1:32:26 i mean taking that into consideration
1:32:28 it's strange
1:32:29 saying that you would want this logical
1:32:33 rational sound deduction
1:32:36 to be backed by a field that is
1:32:39 constantly changing
1:32:41 and it's good that it's changing i'm not
1:32:43 i'm advertising science here
1:32:45 and it's a self-correcting system which
1:32:47 is great but the problem is
1:32:49 i think when it comes to the deeper
1:32:51 metaphysical questions
1:32:53 you're looking at a very clear rational
1:32:55 pathway to something that seems
1:32:57 reasonably plausible
1:32:59 but you're asking for validation from a
1:33:02 field
1:33:02 that first of all isn't very relevant
1:33:05 although it might be
1:33:07 to a certain extent like when you talk
1:33:08 about stuff like fine-tuning arguments
1:33:10 and or design arguments or whatever yeah
1:33:12 but not just that but the i think
1:33:15 the the question of the epistemic value
1:33:17 of science should come into play as well
1:33:19 because you know how certain are we
1:33:22 about scientific theories and that's a
1:33:23 huge
1:33:24 scientific uh sorry philosophical
1:33:26 questions that
1:33:27 that that we can ask really i think
1:33:31 we're gonna we're where i'm at right now
1:33:34 is that i
1:33:34 i i would need something compelling to
1:33:38 believe
1:33:39 in an unembodied mind of some sort
1:33:44 and i don't know i don't know if well
1:33:48 is cutting it okay so don't don't think
1:33:52 of it like
1:33:52 don't jump the gun don't think of it in
1:33:54 terms of an unbodied mind
1:33:56 just think of it in terms of things that
1:33:58 exist because we can't really
1:33:59 conceptualize what
1:34:00 this necessary foundation of reality is
1:34:02 because so when you say unbodied mind
1:34:04 what does that mean are you picturing
1:34:05 something i don't think you are yeah i'm
1:34:07 picturing i'm
1:34:08 i'm not picturing something
1:34:10 anthropomorphized which i don't want to
1:34:12 you know blaspheme
1:34:13 or anything like that because you guys
1:34:15 don't you guys don't yeah
1:34:17 like they do with jesus and christianity
1:34:19 like i know you guys don't do that
1:34:21 yeah yeah but but that's again what i'm
1:34:24 saying is
1:34:25 when you're thinking of an uh a
1:34:26 disembodied mind
1:34:28 you're we're still talking about a
1:34:29 concrete reality so it's going to depend
1:34:32 on what you mean by body
1:34:33 even when we're saying non-physical well
1:34:35 what do we do a mind that exists outside
1:34:37 of a
1:34:38 physical brain well
1:34:41 all you're saying is you're trying to
1:34:43 work out a mind that exists
1:34:45 other than the mind of a human being now
1:34:47 this may this
1:34:48 may very well be a black swan fallacy
1:34:51 that i'm committing right here
1:34:52 it very well very uh very well may be
1:34:56 oh but i'm i'm i'm i'm trying to talk
1:34:58 about a more foundational point
1:35:00 and that that when we talk about even
1:35:02 the nature of the physical reality
1:35:04 we talk about these these ontological
1:35:07 things
1:35:07 like what is the physical reality these
1:35:10 are huge questions that
1:35:11 we don't even we're not really certain
1:35:13 about what we're talking about so when
1:35:15 you
1:35:15 when you postulate like an an alternate
1:35:19 reality and you say it's disembodied
1:35:21 well
1:35:21 what do you really mean i think to cut
1:35:23 to the chase what we're basically saying
1:35:25 is that it's just unlike the rest of the
1:35:27 contingent world it's just categorically
1:35:29 unlike it
1:35:31 but what it means for something to be
1:35:32 disembodied i'm not sure i don't know
1:35:35 uh but what we are talking about a
1:35:37 concrete reality we're not talking about
1:35:38 something abstract
1:35:40 that has a mind we're talking about uh
1:35:44 a concrete reality that has a
1:35:47 causal capacity on the contingent world
1:35:50 or
1:35:51 the world and it produces
1:35:54 so so i i'm i'm honestly not sure what
1:35:56 disembodied mind means
1:35:58 i would just say a mind unlike ours i
1:36:00 mean
1:36:01 yeah and also just as a point isn't it
1:36:03 there are philosophers of the mind
1:36:06 uh who believe in pan psychism you know
1:36:08 this idea that
1:36:09 all existence has a level of
1:36:13 consciousness even an electron or a
1:36:15 proton
1:36:16 so if we're talking about you know even
1:36:18 from from a pan cyclist's point of view
1:36:20 because the reason why the
1:36:21 the pan psychist as well by the way
1:36:23 because they can't explain
1:36:25 how mata produces consciousness so they
1:36:28 say
1:36:28 consciousness must have been a
1:36:30 fundamental
1:36:33 brute fact of reality so everything has
1:36:35 a level of consciousness
1:36:36 the more complex the matter the more
1:36:38 complex the consciousness that's just
1:36:40 the argument
1:36:41 now even under that point of view which
1:36:44 is another way of looking at
1:36:45 the mind yeah um and has certain
1:36:48 you know positions then a necessary
1:36:51 being would be a necessary would be a a
1:36:53 reality
1:36:54 that would also have a consciousness in
1:36:57 mind
1:36:58 yeah yeah so i agree with that i agree
1:37:01 with you you agree
1:37:02 you agree a lot you that
1:37:06 you said that necessary existence is a
1:37:08 reality
1:37:09 yeah yeah it's a it's a concrete it's a
1:37:12 what we mean by reality is that exists
1:37:15 it's not an abstract so now we agree
1:37:17 that the necessary being is a reality
1:37:20 okay now we have to figure out the way
1:37:23 that reality
1:37:24 has a will that's where the hang-up is
1:37:26 okay that's kind of what we've been
1:37:27 discussing but i think we can take it
1:37:29 further in future discussions as well
1:37:31 we'll have that discussion next time in
1:37:32 sheldon absolutely
1:37:36 justin
1:37:40 we'll leave it there for the time being
1:37:41 uh just because we've got a couple of
1:37:42 brothers that have been waiting for a
1:37:43 little bit
1:37:44 um but again it's always a pleasure
1:37:46 having you on justin
1:37:47 and uh maybe not today but
1:37:50 hopefully one of these times i won't
1:37:52 have a little gremlin running around
1:37:54 and uh hopefully one of them you will be
1:37:57 hearing
1:38:00 about
1:38:02 my daughter is is christian so even even
1:38:05 though me and my wife are atheist
1:38:07 uh we're not stopping our kids from
1:38:09 pursuing religious
1:38:10 you know religious beliefs so he's free
1:38:13 to believe what he wants so are you
1:38:16 oh wait wait i thought no one was free
1:38:18 for your determination
1:38:22Laughter 1:38:28 free in the sense that we are going to
1:38:29 uh three in the sense we don't
1:38:31 we're gonna play along with the illusion
1:38:33 of free will all right
1:38:35 okay it's been a pleasure anyway justin
1:38:38 and uh we'll see you next time
1:38:39 take care take care bye
1:38:42 all right uh before we go um the the
1:38:45 next guest we're going to have one is
1:38:46 someone called salah um but before we
1:38:48 bring him on there was a another brother
1:38:49 that was on
1:38:50 and then he disappeared but he asked
1:38:51 this question uh so i thought maybe we
1:38:54 could
1:38:54 respond to it because i don't think it's
1:38:55 going to take too long uh so he said how
1:38:57 do you guys define rationality
1:38:59 uh this is the private chat by the way
1:39:01 uh when you say rationality can god
1:39:04 prove
1:39:05 um when you say rationality can prove
1:39:07 god does this mean god's existence
1:39:09 depends on rationality
1:39:10 and then if rationality can be used to
1:39:12 prove god's existence
1:39:13 can rationality be used to disprove
1:39:16 god's existence
1:39:17 so with regards to defining rationality
1:39:21 um personally i would just say that
1:39:24 rationality is is just
1:39:26 the um the method or the you know the
1:39:29 attribute in which a human being uses in
1:39:31 order to
1:39:32 determine things um that you know that
1:39:35 necessarily connect
1:39:36 logically so that you know you make a
1:39:38 statement premise one you make a
1:39:40 statement premise two there's a
1:39:41 connection between them that
1:39:42 necessarily leads to a conclusion um or
1:39:45 you know if you obviously that's
1:39:46 deductive um or inductively you're
1:39:49 saying it's um most probably or you know
1:39:52 there's some level of probability in
1:39:54 terms of its inference
1:39:55 to a conclusion um so yeah rationality
1:39:59 is just this
1:40:00 attribute that humans have they look out
1:40:02 into the world and they think upon
1:40:03 things
1:40:04 um and they they try to discover truth
1:40:06 through it um
1:40:08 with regards to saying
1:40:11 if you can prove god rationally does
1:40:13 that mean god's existence depends on
1:40:14 rationally
1:40:15 no just in the same ways um if you can
1:40:18 prove
1:40:18 rationally that uh you know abdul
1:40:21 murdered sharif
1:40:22 uh for example that doesn't mean that
1:40:25 the existence of
1:40:26 any of these or the existence of that
1:40:28 murdering occurring
1:40:30 um was dependent on your ability to
1:40:32 rationally prove that
1:40:34 being rationally proving something is
1:40:36 independent
1:40:37 from something uh being dependent on
1:40:41 that for its existence like
1:40:44 it doesn't follow that you proving
1:40:47 something rationally means that the
1:40:48 thing that you've proved depends on
1:40:51 the tool in which you've used to prove
1:40:52 it this is a big jump this so
1:40:54 i say that with regard to that um and
1:40:57 the the last bit
1:40:59 i would say was contradictory so if you
1:41:00 can prove rationally that god exists
1:41:03 then i would say that it's you know
1:41:04 necessarily the case you can't prove
1:41:06 rationally that it doesn't exist because
1:41:08 if you've already proved
1:41:10 if we're talking in an absolute sense
1:41:12 here you've already proved that god does
1:41:13 exist
1:41:14 and you've done so rationally um
1:41:17 then you can't say that he doesn't exist
1:41:19 you can't then argue
1:41:21 and prove rationally that he doesn't um
1:41:24 because then you you'll have these two
1:41:26 uh
1:41:27 separate things that are conflicting
1:41:30 with one another um
1:41:32 is there anything else oh this cell is
1:41:34 gone he was here a second i'd say
1:41:35 irrational irrational belief is
1:41:37 basically something that comports to
1:41:38 reality
1:41:40 and uh and uh yeah of course god doesn't
1:41:43 depend on these rational arguments it's
1:41:44 just an epistemic tool that takes us
1:41:47 to the necessary foundation and also i
1:41:50 think you can use rational
1:41:52 tools to try and disprove the existence
1:41:54 of god but obviously
1:41:55 i think they ultimately fail
1:41:58 because as brother yusuf put it if in
1:42:01 the absolute sense if you
1:42:02 actually prove that god exists then
1:42:04 whatever rational route you take to
1:42:06 disprove that
1:42:07 uh that proposition is going to
1:42:10 ultimately fail
1:42:12 if you want to add anything just uh try
1:42:14 and make it shorter
1:42:16 here or is it yes yes yeah yeah
1:42:20 and then i'll just a few points isn't it
1:42:23 firstly i think
1:42:23 using rational arguments for the
1:42:25 existence of allah is not something
1:42:27 which is
1:42:28 absent from the quranic text in the
1:42:30 quranic methodology
1:42:33 in the quran itself calls upon us to use
1:42:35 our minds
1:42:36 to come to the conclusion about the
1:42:38 signs for the existence of allah you
1:42:40 know like in
1:42:52 alternation of night and day these are
1:42:54 signs for people of thinking you have
1:42:55 people affect
1:42:56 the depth of for so you know we
1:42:59 shouldn't think this is something
1:43:01 uh strange or unusual in terms of using
1:43:04 our mind to come to the conclusion that
1:43:05 all those panels don't exist
1:43:07 this is something that the quran itself
1:43:09 uh
1:43:10 you know encourages us to do um and
1:43:13 there's a lot to be said about that but
1:43:14 i think inshallah that sally's on
1:43:16 just really quickly as well jake had to
1:43:19 leave he had a prior
1:43:21 appointment that he had to be on so
1:43:23 that's the reason why jake's not on the
1:43:24 show
1:43:25 we didn't kick him off honest uh he had
1:43:27 to unfortunately
1:43:28 leave but yeah inshallah so i don't know
1:43:31 if sally wants to uh
1:43:33 raise a comment or question or criticism
1:43:36 just maybe yeah
1:43:45 i'm driving so i kept on waiting on the
1:43:48 in the backstage so that's why i'm here
1:43:56 it was a very nice discussion actually
1:43:58 was justin i i'm very eager to know what
1:44:00 how it will end actually and
1:44:03 and really i'm a kind of person that i
1:44:05 think if you just read the quran without
1:44:07 such rational arguments anything if he
1:44:09 kept on reading their quran i think
1:44:11 he might might uh maybe allah will will
1:44:14 give him
1:44:15 allah so my question is uh
1:44:20 regarding the argument from fitra i
1:44:22 don't see much
1:44:23 i don't know whether western
1:44:24 philosophers talked about the argument
1:44:26 from fitra
1:44:27 i just heard about that there are some
1:44:30 papers talking about
1:44:32 that babies are born with some sort of
1:44:35 um
1:44:35 prior knowledge and all of this so my
1:44:38 question is
1:44:39 does there any argument that that
1:44:41 because we as muslims we take the
1:44:43 argument from fitra for the existence of
1:44:45 what is a very strong argument right
1:44:46 i'm not mistaken so what do you think
1:44:50 is do we have such a strong argument
1:44:52 that we can't talk with atheists about
1:44:53 regarding this argument on on there is a
1:44:56 prior
1:44:57 knowing of god exists regardless of
1:44:59 rationality regardless of anything
1:45:03 yeah sorry you're going yourself sorry
1:45:05 i'm not going to go first
1:45:07 no i was going to say it it really
1:45:08 depends uh how we define
1:45:10 fitra in this context yeah so
1:45:13 because we could argue here could mean
1:45:16 the ability to make
1:45:17 rational decisions uh the
1:45:20 or it could mean the the aspect of the
1:45:22 belief in one allah
1:45:24 one created one allah so there's
1:45:27 rational ways by which we can articulate
1:45:30 the argument of further
1:45:32 as an indicator for the belief in allah
1:45:35 yeah
1:45:36 so one argument is used and there's a
1:45:39 brother who's actually written a paper
1:45:40 on this
1:45:41 recently uh brother dr safarook
1:45:43 chowdhury
1:45:44 and he's talked about the idea that
1:45:47 human beings are born with
1:45:48 rational capacity the ability to think
1:45:51 the ability to think cannot itself come
1:45:54 about
1:45:54 by naturalistic causation
1:45:58 and it has to be ultimately given to us
1:46:00 by allah through
1:46:02 direct information like for example when
1:46:05 adam adam alaihissalam
1:46:06 was given names of things yeah that was
1:46:08 the foundational concept
1:46:10 from which would now be able to make
1:46:12 thoughts so he uses this argument
1:46:14 similarly another argument that's used
1:46:16 is this idea that
1:46:18 the idea of god the concept
1:46:21 itself is not something that we is is
1:46:24 built upon
1:46:24 what we see everything that we normally
1:46:27 think about
1:46:28 is ultimately built upon a contingent
1:46:31 reality
1:46:32 yeah so if i talk to you about the color
1:46:34 move
1:46:35 if you've never seen the color move
1:46:37 before you wouldn't know what it is
1:46:39 so you have to see everything or
1:46:41 experience something or hear about
1:46:42 something that you've experienced
1:46:44 in order to understand that now the
1:46:45 concept of a cr an unlimited necessary
1:46:48 being
1:46:48 or god is not something that's in the
1:46:51 reality
1:46:52 in the contingent reality so that idea
1:46:55 itself
1:46:56 must be something that has been given to
1:46:59 us because it's not an
1:47:00 idea that we can automatically develop
1:47:02 so that's
1:47:03 one argument and the final argument i
1:47:05 think was the paper that uh it was it
1:47:06 yourself they
1:47:07 put up which is that the idea that all
1:47:10 children you know all human beings are
1:47:12 born with this innate desire to worship
1:47:15 yeah uh and worship a creator
1:47:18 yeah and that we see this are called
1:47:21 across all civilizations across
1:47:23 all times and even atheists
1:47:26 you know have written about how atheists
1:47:28 themselves although
1:47:30 claiming to be atheists actually still
1:47:32 have this innate desire not just innate
1:47:34 desire
1:47:35 but actually this innate belief in god
1:47:38 yeah yes
1:47:39 what you're referencing there as well is
1:47:40 that uh they were asked
1:47:42 to um call upon god's wrath
1:47:45 and uh they would react uh nervously so
1:47:50 despite uh proclaiming the
1:47:53 the non-belief in god uh they would get
1:47:56 the
1:47:56 this sense of fear in them when they
1:47:58 would call upon
1:47:59 god to curse them or punish them or
1:48:01 anything like that
1:48:02 and it was specifically this idea of god
1:48:04 as well like um they didn't get the same
1:48:06 kind of reaction uh if they did it with
1:48:09 santa claus or
1:48:10 you know these things that um they do
1:48:13 believe
1:48:13 or know for example don't exist um
1:48:16 whereas you know there's a a distinct
1:48:18 reaction that they get
1:48:20 uh when talking with regards to god now
1:48:22 the article that i was sharing uh which
1:48:23 i'll pull back up now
1:48:25 uh is this one so it's religion is
1:48:27 natural by paul bloom paul bloom is
1:48:29 himself i think an atheist
1:48:30 um i found an article somewhere where he
1:48:32 was having he was being interviewed and
1:48:34 he referred to himself as one
1:48:35 uh that was i don't know when that was
1:48:37 exactly him maybe inshallah he's uh
1:48:39 talking to shahada since then but uh
1:48:42 it's really a really good
1:48:43 uh article it's very short it's only i
1:48:45 think
1:48:46 maybe four pages like if that and it's
1:48:49 called religion is natural
1:48:51 paul bloom uh department of psychology
1:48:53 yale
1:48:54 and it goes into basically the evidence
1:48:57 for
1:48:58 um refutes this idea that
1:49:01 all religious beliefs are um inherited
1:49:05 or given by their parents um so there's
1:49:08 a particular bit here
1:49:09 uh titled is religion natural and it
1:49:12 goes into a little bit and it
1:49:14 it talks about um this idea of common
1:49:16 sense dualism
1:49:17 that you know from a very early age
1:49:19 children even if they're born
1:49:21 um with atheist parents they they have
1:49:23 this idea of jubilism that is
1:49:25 they've got this concept of a soul and
1:49:27 that the soul lives on
1:49:29 um and that you know it's not and they
1:49:32 also have this
1:49:32 overarching sense of um attributing
1:49:35 agency and design
1:49:37 um to creation or to you know to the
1:49:41 world
1:49:42 and so they they can't help but see
1:49:44 things in terms of their purpose
1:49:46 and and they see everything as having
1:49:47 this um
1:49:49 purpose in it and again this isn't
1:49:51 something that's necessarily
1:49:52 taught to them um and this idea of a
1:49:56 a being of some sort or a a creator
1:50:00 and um yeah it's really good so if
1:50:03 you get the chance i really recommend
1:50:04 reading that um and it just kind of it
1:50:07 it dismisses this idea that there isn't
1:50:09 uh an innate belief
1:50:11 you know i think people do really have
1:50:12 this as a huge part of their
1:50:15 their being and atheism itself requires
1:50:18 a lot of effort uh and when i say a lot
1:50:22 of effort i don't mean that it's um
1:50:24 it's rationally justified at the end of
1:50:26 it it's just you've got to try to
1:50:28 explain away so much
1:50:30 uh in order to get to that position and
1:50:32 and then to sustain it and then again
1:50:34 i'll always bring this up and i love
1:50:36 bringing it up um
1:50:39 sorry sorry uh it's okay can you can we
1:50:42 use such an argument with acst i
1:50:45 i mean i've never watched maybe when we
1:50:47 talk about we're talking with atheist
1:50:49 we're talking
1:50:50 with atheists regarding this um such i
1:50:52 don't think we
1:50:53 just come out with this argument i don't
1:50:54 think it's it's um
1:50:56 it's used a lot with um when talking and
1:50:58 trying to convince
1:51:00 atheists with with god how do you think
1:51:02 of the atheist
1:51:04 i
1:51:08 the problem is is that atheists they
1:51:10 will try to explain it on the basis of
1:51:12 evolution
1:51:13 that there was an evolutionary trait and
1:51:15 that this allowed
1:51:16 human beings to form social bonds and
1:51:19 therefore
1:51:20 promoted survival of the species so
1:51:22 that's what they try and argue
1:51:24 and so you have to then say okay fine
1:51:27 uh you know you're claiming this you
1:51:30 know
1:51:31 one let's see the evidence to try to
1:51:33 justify that's just an explanation
1:51:35 and secondly then you have to maybe give
1:51:37 further explanation so
1:51:39 i had the same similar discussion with
1:51:40 another atheist
1:51:42 uh going very close yeah but you know
1:51:44 the problem with atheists is that
1:51:46 they have a lot of emotional baggage
1:51:48 when it comes to religion
1:51:50 many of them have left christianity or
1:51:52 you know some other religion
1:51:54 like jehovah witness or mormonism and
1:51:57 they reject cr they reject the religion
1:51:59 and they think that means reject
1:52:01 all religions yeah and all belief claims
1:52:04 here
1:52:05 now i explained to him you know a
1:52:07 rational argument for the existence of a
1:52:08 necessary being a creator who has a will
1:52:10 and he agreed initially he agreed he
1:52:13 sort of slightly gone back on it
1:52:15 and then i explained to him i said look
1:52:16 within every human being there is this
1:52:18 natural fitter
1:52:19 to want to worship a creator and he
1:52:21 agreed upon that because i explained
1:52:22 he said look we can look across all
1:52:24 civilization all cultures
1:52:26 all different times uh and they've all
1:52:28 worshipped something
1:52:30 even communist societies have worshiped
1:52:32 things
1:52:33 even though they reject belief in god
1:52:35 yeah they they benefit
1:52:37 venerate their leaders you know they
1:52:38 preserve them in mausoleums etc
1:52:41 so we can see that there is a desire
1:52:44 within human beings that's not just
1:52:46 simply developed from a particular
1:52:47 civilization
1:52:48 or culture because if it was just from a
1:52:50 particular civilization that like we'd
1:52:52 learning from our parents then
1:52:53 other you know civilizations will have
1:52:55 be completely atheist yeah it'd be
1:52:57 natural
1:52:58 so he accepted that so then i linked the
1:53:00 two together i said look
1:53:01 if you accepted that there's a necessary
1:53:04 being who created the universe
1:53:06 who's unlimited independent who had a
1:53:08 will
1:53:09 who chose to create the universe then
1:53:12 everything that exists within this
1:53:13 universe everything
1:53:14 every contingent thing including
1:53:16 ourselves ultimately relies upon their
1:53:18 existence upon the creator
1:53:20 yeah and that means that every aspect
1:53:23 within us
1:53:24 one of which is this innate desire to
1:53:26 worship
1:53:27 is ultimately created by the creator so
1:53:30 even if you want to bring in evolution
1:53:32 or whatever
1:53:33 the argument is that even that process
1:53:36 of evolution would have to be dependent
1:53:38 upon the creator
1:53:39 yeah so you agreed upon that so i said
1:53:41 therefore there's intentionality
1:53:43 behind that of a human being or the
1:53:46 innate desire to worship
1:53:47 and that intentionality is from the
1:53:49 creator that means that allah has
1:53:51 created us with a desire to
1:53:54 worship so therefore it would become
1:53:56 rational if we've concluded that allah
1:53:59 exists
1:53:59 that we would seek out worship from
1:54:02 allah because that's
1:54:03 we're created with that desire and that
1:54:06 can only
1:54:07 be satisfied when allah tells us or the
1:54:10 creator tells
1:54:10 us how to worship we can't work it out
1:54:13 for ourselves
1:54:14 because our minds are limited and we
1:54:15 don't know what the creator wants from
1:54:17 us in terms of worship
1:54:19 so he agreed upon that and i think
1:54:20 that's where
1:54:22 when you talk to atheists if you just
1:54:25 start off with the fit
1:54:26 or argument in and of itself they will
1:54:29 try and dismiss it by other explanations
1:54:31 but if you fit it in then it becomes a
1:54:34 very strong argument because it's not
1:54:36 no longer like a deistic view of god you
1:54:39 know deism
1:54:40 the idea that god exists but it doesn't
1:54:42 influence the universe yeah or ourselves
1:54:44 rather it becomes a very theistic view
1:54:46 of god a
1:54:47 creator that exists and we are there to
1:54:50 worship the creator so i think that's
1:54:52 that's where it helps inshallah
1:54:54 inshallah yeah
1:54:55 yeah so um i think we uh we're just
1:54:58 closing this it seems to be the closing
1:55:00 the session so
1:55:01 thank you very much brothers and uh we
1:55:03 hope you will see you soon inshaallah
1:55:05 inshallah in next two weeks inshallah
1:55:07 we'll take on another topic and maybe
1:55:08 return to this topic as well
1:55:16 where whereabouts are you from
1:55:19 so i'm i'm from egypt and um
1:55:22 yeah and um i live in the gulf now but
1:55:26 uh my home country is egyptian okay
1:55:30 egyptian
1:55:32Laughter 1:55:36Music 1:55:45 so we've got a bit of more l on and then
1:55:48 i think we've got the
1:55:49 uh the hidden guy in the background he
1:55:52 wants to come on and say a few words as
1:55:53 well
1:55:54 yeah so we'll we'll get him on the
1:55:56 stream in a moment but
1:55:57 uh first let's get brother
1:56:05 yeah i just want to add like my two
1:56:07 cents real quick you know i won't stay
1:56:08 too long and i want to just
1:56:10 uh the questions can god be proven
1:56:12 rationally
1:56:13 now obviously the door swings both ways
1:56:15 and that question can
1:56:16 if he's even proved that they're
1:56:18 rational to begin with you know because
1:56:20 how they can they account for their uh
1:56:23 rational faculties
1:56:24 as in as a question you know a
1:56:26 philosophical question
1:56:28 and at the end of the day to be frank
1:56:30 with you is based on
1:56:31 uh world views and our presuppositions
1:56:33 you know because you cannot escape first
1:56:36 uh principles you know what i mean
1:56:38 especially in philosophy so
1:56:40 what which world view is more coherent
1:56:42 because that's what philosophy asked for
1:56:43 coherence at the end of the day
1:56:45 you know is a monotheism naturalism
1:56:47 passage and pantheism
1:56:49 you know what i mean and that's what
1:56:51 we're looking for coherence you know
1:56:53 and there are arguments like abdul
1:56:55 rahman and
1:56:57 brother youssef and also jake they
1:56:59 talked about the contingency kalam
1:57:01 you know uh design all these a
1:57:04 posteriori type
1:57:05 arguments there's also arguments uh a
1:57:08 priori arguments like consciousness
1:57:09 irrationality and even fitra by the way
1:57:11 because at the end of the day through
1:57:12 our
1:57:13 cetera our any disposition our intuition
1:57:16 we can this is how we uh accept axioms
1:57:20 if that even makes sense except our self
1:57:23 the self-evident
1:57:24 truth you know that we're rational human
1:57:26 beings we can
1:57:27 engage in disciplines like math science
1:57:29 and philosophy and so on
1:57:30 so at the end of the day what makes the
1:57:33 most sense
1:57:34 monotheism or atheism this is all i
1:57:38 wanted to say
1:57:39 yeah admit no i'm sorry that's right um
1:57:43 i was going to mention it before as well
1:57:44 i love the the double-edged sword um
1:57:47 that you put forward to the the
1:57:48 naturalist that says we
1:57:50 we came from random processes uh that is
1:57:53 fundamentally unconscious and
1:57:55 uh it's well if that's the case uh
1:57:58 you've got this issue that you need to
1:58:00 uh deal with
1:58:01 a we evolved um and this question of
1:58:05 did we revolve uh if revolve did we
1:58:08 evolve
1:58:09 um due to a a truth-focused
1:58:13 um process like is truth
1:58:16 going to give rise to the the likelihood
1:58:19 that you'll survive
1:58:20 um and if they answer yes necessarily so
1:58:22 then they've got to
1:58:24 um explain how the most rational uh
1:58:26 sorry
1:58:27 you know the most um successful being
1:58:30 happens to be throughout its history
1:58:33 mostly religious
1:58:34 that like every civilization all has
1:58:36 this belief
1:58:38 in a transcendental higher power in the
1:58:40 supernatural
1:58:41 in life after death in a soul and you
1:58:44 know
1:58:45 um in judgment and justice and these you
1:58:48 know concepts
1:58:50 and you you have to explain that like if
1:58:53 this
1:58:53 if these concepts were you know
1:58:56 have a root in truth and how is it
1:59:00 you know the we are the the most
1:59:02 dominant species on the planet
1:59:04 yes if you're going to um hold on to
1:59:06 this idea
1:59:07 that evolution developed you know with
1:59:10 with a focus on truth and the the more
1:59:11 truthful something is the more
1:59:13 successful something's going to be
1:59:14 there if you've got the most successful
1:59:18 being on there the thing that seems to
1:59:20 have set it apart from everything else
1:59:22 has to have a higher degree of truth and
1:59:25 the other um issue is if you say well
1:59:28 now
1:59:29 um you know it's not truth focused uh
1:59:32 you know it's all you know random it's
1:59:34 just these illusions
1:59:35 are uh that can give rise to survival
1:59:40 and we happen to have just really
1:59:42 successful illusions
1:59:43 is that well then you know is is science
1:59:46 not of the feeling yeah a part of this
1:59:49 does it not
1:59:50 conflicts with uh the whole mission that
1:59:52 science is trying to
1:59:54 push you know if we are fundamentally um
1:59:58 aimed at the seek uh to survive not to
2:00:00 seek truth
2:00:01 then yeah i think i'm all
2:00:04 yes i think you were talking about a
2:00:07 very fundamental point i think we need
2:00:09 to do a whole stream on
2:00:10 arguments from reason right that's a
2:00:12 huge topic on its own
2:00:13 all the way from from from cs lewis's
2:00:16 argument from reason to plantinga's
2:00:18 evolutionary argument against naturalism
2:00:20 uh i mean that's that that needs to
2:00:22 stream on its own
2:00:24 but you also spoke about fitra and i
2:00:25 wanted to
2:00:27 i wanted to just touch on that very
2:00:28 briefly because because me personally
2:00:29 i'm undecided on
2:00:31 i i understand there are very various
2:00:33 definitions of what fitzroy is mainly
2:00:35 too
2:00:36 that it's a knowledge innate knowledge
2:00:39 that we're born with or
2:00:41 a predisposition to believe in god
2:00:43 through knowledge
2:00:44 or through gaining laws through
2:00:46 experience and and uh
2:00:48 we know there's this whole debate
2:00:50 between two schools of of epistemology
2:00:52 rationalism and
2:00:54 and empiricism and and uh there's
2:00:58 something there that might be relevant
2:01:00 so so rationalists just very briefly say
2:01:02 that we
2:01:03 there are some things they don't deny
2:01:05 empiricism but they say that there are
2:01:07 some things that we know
2:01:08 innately and and
2:01:11 what it really boils down to the debate
2:01:14 is that
2:01:15 at the very least like when we're
2:01:16 observing kids and kids are playing and
2:01:18 learning things through experience we
2:01:19 can tell that what they come to know is
2:01:21 through experience
2:01:23 however at the very foundation of our
2:01:25 knowledge there is a huge assumption
2:01:27 and that huge assumption is the
2:01:30 predictability of the future
2:01:32 that's something that you cannot learn
2:01:35 through experience
2:01:36 and and there's really no two ways about
2:01:39 this because if
2:01:39 if you say that i learn about the
2:01:42 predictability of the future through my
2:01:45 experience
2:01:46 well then you have to be presuming that
2:01:48 your experience of
2:01:50 predictability is going to be repeated
2:01:52 in the future i mean there's really no
2:01:53 way about it
2:01:54 there's sorry there's no way around it
2:01:57 uh
2:01:58 our drive towards truth which is based
2:02:01 on this foundation of predictability
2:02:04 or the orderness of the world is
2:02:06 something that is
2:02:08 un undoubtedly innate right i mean
2:02:11 something that we cannot learn
2:02:12 through experience whether we consider
2:02:15 that as
2:02:16 knowledge or not that's a huge debate
2:02:18 because
2:02:19 uh i mean let's not go into that but a
2:02:21 lot of people say it can't be considered
2:02:22 as knowledge it's just an innate drive
2:02:25 but even so
2:02:26 i think that's that's on the second
2:02:29 understanding of what futra is
2:02:31 if we say that this this this
2:02:35 innate predisposition that drives us
2:02:37 towards
2:02:39 truth is necessarily going to take us
2:02:43 to god based on these arguments we're
2:02:45 having because this
2:02:47 you know this this these rational
2:02:49 arguments are based on this
2:02:50 presupposition
2:02:52 so i think it's a very good
2:02:53 understanding of fitra not that the
2:02:55 other one isn't valid i don't know
2:02:57 but but the fact that we are predisposed
2:02:59 towards truth is
2:03:00 is is i think undeniable and uh we don't
2:03:04 learn that through experience that is
2:03:05 necessarily innate i mean i think i i
2:03:07 don't think that's
2:03:08 disputable definitely so
2:03:12 for that interesting little line of
2:03:14 thought there mo
2:03:15 uh we're gonna try to wrap up now we've
2:03:18 got one
2:03:18 more person that wants to say something
2:03:20 so he's the
2:03:22 uh the secret sneaky guy that sits in
2:03:24 the back doing the modding
2:03:41 of work behind the scenes and you don't
2:03:42 see him that often but he's in the chat
2:03:45 doing his thing and uh helping with the
2:03:47 admin stuff
2:03:48 and also um i want to do a shout out to
2:03:50 uh with a criterion
2:03:52 uh on twitter if you go to um
2:03:56 our twitter page for this channel which
2:03:58 i'll bring up now as
2:04:00 at t underscore a underscore podcast
2:04:04 um if you go into the bio you'll see
2:04:07 basically the the names of everyone and
2:04:08 the criterion is the one who does all
2:04:09 the aesthetics
2:04:10 so the uh the pretty logo the background
2:04:14 the posters the thumbnails all of these
2:04:15 things are done by himala bless him
2:04:17 uh so yeah giuseppe to the the hidden
2:04:21 brothers in the background i just wanted
2:04:23 to say that sir thank you for what you
2:04:24 do yeah yes sir go bro
2:04:26 you wanted to say a few things yeah and
2:04:28 the brother that came on before you know
2:04:29 he was speaking about the fifth heart
2:04:31 and like how we can prove rationally not
2:04:32 like the fifth order exists
2:04:34 and obviously you started an academic
2:04:36 study who owes it by paul bloom religion
2:04:38 yeah
2:04:38 yeah yeah yeah so obviously for me when
2:04:41 i come when i look at this topic how can
2:04:43 we show the future exists
2:04:45 um there's obviously different angles
2:04:47 you can obviously look at this so
2:04:48 generally you know the quran itself
2:04:50 points to the argument
2:04:52 um um the i in the quran which allah is
2:04:55 talking about
2:04:57 you know when you're in danger and you
2:04:59 naturally
2:05:00 call out to allah oh my god and you call
2:05:03 out to allah like you know in danger
2:05:06 that is itself obviously in enough proof
2:05:09 that we do have this innate belief in
2:05:12 in the creator right because obviously
2:05:15 in danger
2:05:15 why do we call out even the atheist will
2:05:17 call out to the creator obviously that's
2:05:19 not the only proof but what i want to
2:05:20 get on mainly was this
2:05:21 so basically um there was an academic
2:05:23 study obviously that was conducted by
2:05:25 dr justin barrett uh dr oliver petrovich
2:05:28 dr paul bloom and several other
2:05:29 obviously
2:05:30 academics i want to mention something
2:05:32 particular so
2:05:34 doctor obvious petroit she's an
2:05:36 anthropologist
2:05:37 and so what she did was she was she went
2:05:39 to japan
2:05:41 and even british children as well and so
2:05:43 what she was showing them
2:05:44 this is an actual experiment that took
2:05:46 place so she was showing detailed
2:05:49 pictures
2:05:50 of like natural phenomenon and man-made
2:05:52 objects
2:05:53 right to these japanese children right
2:05:54 now bear in mind in japan before even
2:05:56 before the experiment actually began the
2:05:59 people were actually saying to why
2:06:00 are you even doing this experiment they
2:06:02 don't even believe in god so they're
2:06:03 going to say no
2:06:04 so what's interesting is what she was
2:06:06 doing is she was showing these natural
2:06:07 objects and man-made objects to these
2:06:08 children
2:06:10 um and then she asked she gave them free
2:06:11 choices basically
2:06:14 of each of these the origin basic of the
2:06:17 natural phenomenon
2:06:18 and i think the three choices exactly
2:06:20 i'm not one was obviously god made it
2:06:22 and another one i think was humans made
2:06:23 it and another one might have been
2:06:25 i don't know what the third exact choice
2:06:26 is but basically
2:06:28 in a nutshell all the children
2:06:31 answered god made it and she was
2:06:34 like literally she said herself this was
2:06:36 probably the most significant finding
2:06:38 when their parents all of them were
2:06:40 atheists right so the question is and
2:06:42 she
2:06:42 she herself wondered where do these
2:06:44 children get the idea
2:06:46 that creation is in god's hands right so
2:06:49 all these children
2:06:49 and and she also i'm actually reading
2:06:52 out here
2:06:53 my japanese assistants kept telling me
2:06:55 we japanese don't think about god as a
2:06:57 creator it's just not part of japanese
2:06:59 philosophy
2:07:00 so it is wonderful when these children
2:07:01 said god
2:07:03 made it right even when their parents
2:07:06 were atheists
2:07:07 and in fact dr justin barrett in his
2:07:09 book as well gives plenty of examples
2:07:11 actual personal cases where atheist
2:07:14 parents but the children believe in god
2:07:15 right so these experiments is not and
2:07:18 this is not just one experiment
2:07:20 multiple experiments to show that
2:07:22 children whose parents
2:07:23 are atheists have and believe in a
2:07:26 creator
2:07:26 and then obviously the question is how
2:07:28 do they have that innate belief
2:07:30 so i i strongly hold to that position
2:07:32 that we do have innate belief in a
2:07:34 creator
2:07:36 and there's a there's another question
2:07:37 that kind of arises from here and
2:07:38 definitely something that the atheist is
2:07:40 going to lead on to
2:07:41 uh is a will which god and uh that's
2:07:44 that's interesting because she actually
2:07:47 mentions this
2:07:48 that the belief in the
2:07:49 non-anthropomorphic god she says is
2:07:51 cognitive
2:07:52 natural and anthropomorphic or like they
2:07:55 she said basically the children don't
2:07:56 have an idea of
2:07:57 god being a man but they had the idea of
2:08:00 an un non-anthropomorphic concept of god
2:08:02 and she actually says this in her
2:08:04 article um that basically when children
2:08:06 conceive of god they don't actually
2:08:08 conceive of a man
2:08:09 in like in christianity but conceived of
2:08:10 a non-anti-mafic god which obviously
2:08:12 inshallah i can send
2:08:13 on another session we can go into it and
2:08:15 i can post
2:08:17 and also just kind of point to this so
2:08:19 with regards to
2:08:20 like if you've been listening to us and
2:08:22 you do find and i know that we can
2:08:24 often get quite abstract with these
2:08:25 arguments and you know it can get a bit
2:08:27 technical
2:08:28 but if for whatever reason you've been
2:08:29 convinced by the arguments for necessary
2:08:31 being
2:08:31 um for you know being that is
2:08:33 independent that has a will etc
2:08:37 then what this means is that it writes
2:08:40 off
2:08:41 a number of particular kinds of gods so
2:08:43 if it if there is a particular god
2:08:45 um that is being referenced and this god
2:08:47 was born so like
2:08:49 people talk about zeus or thor or blah
2:08:52 blah blah blah
2:08:53 all of these gods had births all of
2:08:55 these gods had a beginning
2:08:57 and an end they you know they're they
2:08:59 are themselves contingent beings
2:09:01 and so although people might apply the
2:09:04 word god
2:09:05 to them they would be contained in the
2:09:07 set of all contingent things
2:09:09 that is that they can exist and not
2:09:11 exist um and so therefore
2:09:13 are not the necessary being and you can
2:09:15 write them off
2:09:17 those things we're saying are not worthy
2:09:19 of worship
2:09:20 we're saying that the only thing worthy
2:09:22 of worship is the necessary being the
2:09:23 highest being
2:09:24 the creator of all things that is allah
2:09:28 and so if you are convinced by this
2:09:31 then what we're saying is that if anyone
2:09:33 professes belief in a necessary being
2:09:35 that is eternal
2:09:36 that is independent that is one and not
2:09:39 one that is a divisible one
2:09:41 or a multiple or um one that can be
2:09:43 multiplied
2:09:44 uh it is a unique being that is not
2:09:48 anthropomorphic and exists independently
2:09:51 any anything that calls to that is
2:09:53 is calling to uh tauhid is calling to
2:09:55 monotheism
2:09:56 now um obviously if you go before islam
2:10:00 you
2:10:00 have multiple religions professing well
2:10:03 even after islam but just in general
2:10:05 um we would say that these have an
2:10:08 element of truth to them
2:10:09 and allah has given us a final religion
2:10:11 which is islam
2:10:13 and you know so long as people and what
2:10:15 you find is that when
2:10:16 um people who do believe in tawheed and
2:10:18 they happen to be upon
2:10:20 other religions they often end up
2:10:23 converting to islam
2:10:24 and you know islam was easily able to
2:10:26 spread and because
2:10:28 i i would posit um the the fitra
2:10:31 people naturally inclined towards its
2:10:33 message they naturally
2:10:35 um sync up with this idea of tao he with
2:10:38 the idea of pure monotheism
2:10:40 and you know all you need to do is again
2:10:43 look at these studies that we constantly
2:10:44 pull up
2:10:45 of you know the uh the conversion rates
2:10:48 many people are leaving religions like
2:10:50 christianity
2:10:52 and they're becoming non-affiliated now
2:10:55 the the groups that are considered
2:10:56 non-affiliated that doesn't mean atheist
2:10:58 because
2:10:58 you get this a lot as well they look um
2:11:01 someone will pull up that pew research
2:11:02 and go oh look non-affiliated
2:11:04 atheism is the fastest growing thing i
2:11:06 said no no hold on a second
2:11:08 like the the biggest group so people are
2:11:10 leaving religion but that doesn't stop
2:11:12 them being spiritual
2:11:13 that doesn't mean that they don't
2:11:14 believe in a higher power
2:11:16 it just means they're not affiliated to
2:11:17 any particular religion
2:11:19 and being unaffiliated does not
2:11:21 necessitate
2:11:22 atheism in fact atheism is the minority
2:11:25 out of the um unaffiliated you you have
2:11:28 a very
2:11:29 um a large growing of the spiritual but
2:11:31 not religious types
2:11:32 um who still believe that is we're
2:11:34 saying they're still upon the fitra
2:11:36 um and it it takes a lot of effort to
2:11:38 take up um take away what that
2:11:40 uh posits what that pushes to to move
2:11:43 towards this uh
2:11:44 denial of god in any sense um
2:11:47 so i'm gonna kind of wrap it up there
2:11:50 and
2:11:50 i'm not going to say anymore really
2:11:52 quick just just for just for a minute
2:11:54 because brother muhammad hanif was
2:11:55 raising some good points in the chat and
2:11:57 i just just want to bring that to
2:11:59 attention
2:12:00 but there are issues with this view of
2:12:02 fitra in the sense that
2:12:03 um it is a bit circular in the sense
2:12:06 that you're you're
2:12:07 you're it's it might be a self-evident
2:12:09 truth but you can't really objectively
2:12:11 demonstrate it
2:12:12 uh it's not necessarily so i would say
2:12:16 that if you see if people look at it in
2:12:18 a circular way
2:12:20 and but that would basically say that
2:12:23 you you say a
2:12:24 therefore be therefore a therefore b um
2:12:28 and you know you're saying in a sense
2:12:30 that they rely upon each other
2:12:32 um but when we're talking about the
2:12:34 fitra
2:12:36 the way i always look at it is like
2:12:37 you're moving back or down
2:12:39 so if you say you're at the top of the
2:12:41 building and you're trying to figure out
2:12:43 like
2:12:43 what is it that underpins this building
2:12:46 and you so you start looking down the
2:12:48 layers of the building and you go from
2:12:49 floor to floor to floor to floor until
2:12:50 you get to the foundation
2:12:52 you get to the bottom and then you see
2:12:54 well you know this is what is keeping
2:12:55 this building up
2:12:57 you go to the bottom you figure out the
2:12:59 foundation and then you turn around and
2:13:01 you move back up
2:13:02 so that's that's not the same as a
2:13:04 circular argument when we're talking
2:13:06 about the fitra we're saying that we
2:13:07 have
2:13:08 um this this disposition to believe in
2:13:11 something
2:13:11 and that it um the truth of it just
2:13:14 screams out to you
2:13:16 and recognizing this and moving back
2:13:17 down to that foundation and seeing it
2:13:20 and then you know recognizing its
2:13:22 existence um and recognizing
2:13:24 all these other things you know the the
2:13:26 necessity of um
2:13:28 a independent being etc once you've
2:13:31 gotten this foundation you can turn
2:13:32 around you can move back up that's not
2:13:34 the same as
2:13:35 a circular argument in the form of for
2:13:36 example um how do we know that god
2:13:38 exists the quran says it
2:13:40 how well who wrote the quran god well
2:13:43 how do you know god exists because the
2:13:45 quran says it that's clearly circular
2:13:47 because each element depends on the
2:13:48 other when we're talking about the fitra
2:13:50 um you know we're talking about this the
2:13:52 sense of um
2:13:54 you can recognize the existence of the
2:13:57 through empirical studies like the ones
2:13:59 that um
2:13:59 astatine has made mention to um and you
2:14:02 can
2:14:02 look at the uh the commonality of a
2:14:06 belief in the
2:14:06 the spirit in spirituality in a higher
2:14:09 power
2:14:10 through as something that even richard
2:14:12 dawkins um
2:14:13 i don't know why uh joe roger was taking
2:14:15 this podcast down recently
2:14:17 um but he did a podcast with richard
2:14:18 dawkins and he put the question to him
2:14:21 he says has there ever been
2:14:22 a non-religious society and richard
2:14:24 hawkins clearly answered
2:14:26 to that was no there hasn't been and the
2:14:28 the question here is
2:14:29 why why is the most successful um
2:14:34 species so inclined towards spirituality
2:14:38 so
2:14:38 inclined towards the belief of a higher
2:14:40 power and again
2:14:41 there's this root of monotheism in even
2:14:44 the um the polytheistic religions
2:14:46 you look at hinduism they they still
2:14:47 have this idea of an eternal being
2:14:50 that and all these other contingent
2:14:52 beings that they can
2:14:53 keep referring to is god uh emanate from
2:14:56 this
2:14:57 thing that is that they are contingent
2:14:59 beings that come into being
2:15:01 and there is this necessary the
2:15:02 existence um that precedes them
2:15:05 and we would just say listen all of
2:15:07 these extra things that they're adding
2:15:08 on to it
2:15:09 whether it's the hindus whether it's the
2:15:11 um you know the greek polytheists or the
2:15:14 romans
2:15:14 or the vikings with their own version of
2:15:16 polytheism all of these
2:15:18 things you know they have their family
2:15:21 trees
2:15:22 and you know this thing gave birth to
2:15:24 this thing uh thor
2:15:25 his father was this guy you've got
2:15:27 chronos over here with the greeks
2:15:30 and like if you go far enough up that
2:15:32 family tree eventually you end up
2:15:33 what we're saying is you get to this
2:15:35 necessary being and
2:15:37 you know you can we can have debates
2:15:39 about whether or not
2:15:40 these things existed or not and
2:15:43 to be honest it's superfluous they may
2:15:45 have done and we can explain that
2:15:47 as just being um gin like you know they
2:15:50 could have been beings that were quite
2:15:51 powerful
2:15:52 or they could just not have existed at
2:15:53 all they could have been uh
2:15:55 human beings that existed and uh certain
2:15:58 attributes were exaggerated and they
2:16:00 became
2:16:00 uh deified and you see this with
2:16:02 ancestor worship like there's um
2:16:05 examples of that recently so in korea uh
2:16:08 one of the temples i stayed at
2:16:09 it was built by a man maybe 50 years ago
2:16:12 maybe
2:16:13 between 50 and 100 years ago and he has
2:16:16 a statue in there now that is worshipped
2:16:18 there is a statue of him in there that's
2:16:20 worshipped and this is
2:16:22 the reverence of a being that existed
2:16:24 people holds someone
2:16:26 in high regard they create an idol of
2:16:28 him
2:16:29 it's worshipped generations and
2:16:31 generations pass
2:16:32 and eventually people forget the
2:16:34 original origin of this thing
2:16:36 and you know and people add extra things
2:16:38 onto it and
2:16:40 and it develops and evolves into
2:16:41 something way beyond what it began as
2:16:44 and so for us as far as we're concerned
2:16:46 when we're looking at all of these extra
2:16:48 religions the polytheistic ones
2:16:49 um all they're dealing with is
2:16:51 contingent beings and insofar as they
2:16:53 make any reference to a necessary being
2:16:54 we're saying that necessary being is
2:16:56 allah
2:16:57 and they've just taken the focus away
2:16:58 from it and they look at other stuff
2:17:00 um sorry i said i wasn't going to say
2:17:02 anymore and then i went on
2:17:04 another year what was it what was the
2:17:06 what was his argument say it was
2:17:08 circular sorry
2:17:10 so okay so brother hanif is saying
2:17:12 basically how do you reconcile
2:17:14 the quran 1678 with the filter and i
2:17:17 think
2:17:18 that verse says that we are born not
2:17:21 knowing anything
2:17:22 right
2:17:26 1678. yeah
2:17:29 so how how do you recognize that his
2:17:31 question or
2:17:32 yeah okay okay i i'm personally
2:17:36 undecided on any of this so i
2:17:38 i'm just listening here but i think the
2:17:41 objections are good
2:17:42 and they help us really um form a better
2:17:45 understanding important
2:17:47 are we making the claim do you know i
2:17:48 mean that we're born with the knowledge
2:17:49 of god
2:17:50 when we're in the womb of our mothers
2:17:52 you know what i'm trying to say
2:17:53 allah has brought you up from the womb
2:17:56 because we're saying obviously obviously
2:17:58 the belief in our lives innate
2:18:00 it develops though doesn't it obviously
2:18:01 once we experience the world it's still
2:18:03 innate well the thing is is there's this
2:18:07 experience of god prior to
2:18:08 birth we've so we there's the verse i
2:18:10 can't remember which one
2:18:12 um but it's you know it clearly says
2:18:14 that um you know you testified before
2:18:16 this
2:18:17 now whether or not you still have
2:18:19 knowledge or there's a forgetting
2:18:20 that occurs you know that could easily
2:18:23 explain
2:18:24 um this not having knowledge anymore um
2:18:27 because you you you start young you've
2:18:29 got to develop your cognitive capacities
2:18:31 and things like that
2:18:32 so experience um doesn't you know it
2:18:35 doesn't have to follow from the fact
2:18:36 that there was an experience
2:18:37 that there is a consistent knowledge and
2:18:40 this um
2:18:40 innate uh inclination towards the belief
2:18:43 in a god or this innate
2:18:45 um understanding or uh you know things
2:18:48 like that
2:18:49 this wouldn't necessarily lead to a
2:18:52 consistent
2:18:53 remembering or a consistent you know
2:18:55 something that you can pinpoint in the
2:18:56 brain and say oh well look here's here's
2:18:58 the knowledge
2:18:59 um or what's not so for me i would say
2:19:02 yeah it's
2:19:02 it's quite simple we have a stream
2:19:04 sometime about this issue of innate
2:19:06 knowledge and the fitra and it will be
2:19:08 highly it will be
2:19:09 definitely related to epistemology so we
2:19:11 can have a general stream of
2:19:13 epistemology and brother hanif inshallah
2:19:15 can come on and give us his thoughts
2:19:17 i think just really before uh just
2:19:20 wanted to add my two pennies to it i
2:19:21 think
2:19:22 the issue is this the way i look at this
2:19:24 is that
2:19:25 um the future exists in terms of
2:19:28 the idea that human beings have
2:19:30 something innate within themselves
2:19:32 yeah whether that's mental capacity
2:19:34 whether that is instinctual drives
2:19:36 whether that is the ability to form
2:19:38 language and grammar
2:19:39 all of these things however i don't
2:19:42 think we should necessarily leave that
2:19:43 as the basis by which we then determine
2:19:46 belief in islam and we still need to
2:19:48 establish
2:19:49 certain rational arguments for belief in
2:19:52 allah and the belief that the quran
2:19:55 is the word of allah we shouldn't leave
2:19:57 it just simply to
2:19:59 an emotional uh feeling and i don't
2:20:02 think any of the brothers here
2:20:03 or prior the other brothers who came on
2:20:06 before are saying that we should
2:20:08 just simply leave it at that point yeah
2:20:10 i think
2:20:11 also the other thing is that it has to
2:20:13 be developed even if you're
2:20:15 arguing leads to belief in allah
2:20:18 you have to articulate that in a
2:20:20 rational grounding you know you have to
2:20:22 rationally ground the argument
2:20:24 uh as well so so you can't simply just
2:20:27 leave it as an emotional discussion
2:20:29 and leaving it like that you have to
2:20:30 ground it as a rational argument i think
2:20:32 you also mentioned some rational
2:20:33 arguments in terms of the fact that all
2:20:35 societies across all times and all
2:20:37 positions have all believed in
2:20:39 a god and mustaching's given a couple of
2:20:42 examples of justin barrett
2:20:44 roger trigg oxford university
2:20:47 uh you know anthropology anthropological
2:20:50 department you know they've done
2:20:51 research into this
2:20:52 so i think this is the issue that we
2:20:54 have to look at sorry mustache you're
2:20:55 going to say something to be honest
2:20:56 obviously
2:20:57 we don't have time now so we'll have to
2:20:58 go through it inshallah in another
2:21:00 session i actually want to present
2:21:01 actual a rational demonstration on why
2:21:03 the fifth order obviously exists
2:21:04 yeah we can do that we'll discuss that
2:21:07 in the air separately
2:21:08 we've already gone 20 minutes just on
2:21:11 the
2:21:12 just going back because obviously i
2:21:13 think it's important just go back
2:21:16 ultimately i think what uh moell
2:21:19 mentioned earlier
2:21:20 yeah and there's so many different
2:21:22 angles when it comes to the issue of
2:21:23 atheism and incoherency the way it falls
2:21:26 into an incoherency
2:21:28 you know one is obviously the rational
2:21:30 arguments the fact that you have
2:21:32 contingent beings
2:21:33 and you need a necessary foundation
2:21:34 secondly is the fact that
2:21:36 rationality itself cannot be grounded
2:21:40 under an atheistic materialistic
2:21:43 worldview
2:21:44 it fails you know if you're a
2:21:46 determinist
2:21:47 your thoughts are not determined based
2:21:49 upon the rational arguments
2:21:51 your thoughts are determined based upon
2:21:54 causal
2:21:55 principles or causality of non-conscious
2:21:59 physical entities that existed even
2:22:01 prior to your existence
2:22:04 yeah so your belief your thinking
2:22:06 process your ability to come to a
2:22:08 particular thought
2:22:09 is not based upon weighing up arguments
2:22:12 is based upon you know uh you know
2:22:15 non-conscious physical agents that have
2:22:17 interacted with each other
2:22:19 over you know various you know uh time
2:22:22 period etc so these so therefore even
2:22:26 you know rationality cannot be grounded
2:22:29 under an atheistic
2:22:30 materialistic point of view so
2:22:33 you know there's so many different
2:22:34 angles regardless of this but ultimately
2:22:36 and i just want to give you a very brief
2:22:38 example uh on this point which is
2:22:42 and this is where maybe sort of links
2:22:43 the fitter and the innate aspect to the
2:22:45 rational aspects of this
2:22:47 if you show anybody a painting like for
2:22:50 example a painting of the mona lisa
2:22:52 automatically the person is going to
2:22:55 conclude there is a painter
2:22:56 yeah he might not know who the painter
2:22:58 is but he's going to automatically
2:22:59 conclude there is a painter
2:23:01 his argument oh his ability to conclude
2:23:04 the painter
2:23:05 he might not be able to articulate it
2:23:07 yeah in a very strong
2:23:09 robust philosophical argument yeah it
2:23:12 doesn't make
2:23:12 his conclusion flawed or irrational
2:23:16 but if now what we have is we have
2:23:19 people saying no there is no painter for
2:23:21 the painting
2:23:22 so then you have to provide maybe extra
2:23:23 details and the primary aspect
2:23:26 of us concluding a painter from maybe if
2:23:28 we break it down rationally
2:23:30 is that we conclude the fact that paint
2:23:33 does not determine
2:23:35 the existence of a particular picture
2:23:37 yeah you need
2:23:38 something external to the paint to the
2:23:41 colors
2:23:42 to the canvas in order to produce a
2:23:44 particular painting
2:23:45 that's why we call it a contingent being
2:23:47 or a possible being because it has
2:23:49 a number of possibilities it could be
2:23:51 painted in a number of different
2:23:52 possibilities
2:23:53 and so you need something external to it
2:23:55 to give its explanation
2:23:57 as to why it's that particular painting
2:23:59 as opposed to any others
2:24:00 and that's the same argument or one of
2:24:03 those
2:24:03 arguments that we've used here which is
2:24:05 the contingency argument
2:24:07 contingency argument basis says that
2:24:09 everything that we sense
2:24:11 within the universe is something which
2:24:14 is
2:24:15 limited it has certain attributes
2:24:18 and it has existence which is not
2:24:20 necessary to itself
2:24:22 so it doesn't have to exist and it
2:24:24 doesn't have to have
2:24:26 the attributes that it has so therefore
2:24:29 we're going to say
2:24:30 it could have been another way the
2:24:32 reality could have existed in another
2:24:34 way
2:24:35 so we need something external to what we
2:24:37 sense around us the limited contingent
2:24:39 beings
2:24:40 to give ex-explanation now those things
2:24:43 that give its explanation
2:24:46 if it itself is contingent we're still
2:24:48 going to ask the question
2:24:49 what determines that as well yeah and if
2:24:52 we
2:24:52 discount an infinite regress which is a
2:24:55 logical absurdity
2:24:56 then we have to conclude that the only
2:24:59 way to explain
2:25:00 why a contingent possible beings
2:25:03 exist is by reference to a necessary
2:25:07 independent unlimited creator i lost
2:25:10 panorama
2:25:11 that's one of the basic foundational
2:25:13 arguments
2:25:14 so it's very similar to the painting
2:25:16 example
2:25:17 in this context and for many of us
2:25:20 yeah we would automatically innately
2:25:23 conclude that there's a creator
2:25:24 without going through this deeper level
2:25:26 of discussion
2:25:27 but we're going through it because of
2:25:29 the way the atheists have come and
2:25:31 tried to muddy the discussions yeah
2:25:34 so we'll leave it there so we've done a
2:25:38 nice
2:25:38 two hour 25 minutes alhamdulillah and uh
2:25:41 it's been a
2:25:42 really great conversation so would you
2:25:43 say farewell to
2:25:45 mo el jazar again for your contribution
2:25:48 there uh
2:25:49 bless you and we'll see you
2:25:51Music 2:25:53 uh so everyone uh i just want to make a
2:25:56 call again if you're watching and you
2:25:58 haven't liked already please do like
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2:26:11 uh or every second sunday inshallah um
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2:26:18 along with brother jake and then maybe
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2:26:40 justin on um and we'll just grill him
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2:27:08 brother mustachin did you uh get that
2:27:11 sorted with the
2:27:12 facebook thing because that was your job
2:27:14 wasn't it
2:27:17 you there bro you wrote me yeah
2:27:20 sorry no not yet inshallah we will do
2:27:22 soon what's going on
2:27:24 for two weeks bro we don't need to do it
2:27:28 no we didn't sheriff didn't you say that
2:27:30 no no it's i'm pretty sure he said get
2:27:32 uh
2:27:34 thingy to help you i'm uh yeah i'm uh
2:27:37 you should we said it
2:27:40 the evidence is on the group i remember
2:27:43 at that i remember
2:27:44 talking i'll get brother brother callum
2:27:46 to help you and you and him
2:27:48 do the uh the fake and the inside
2:27:51 yeah was like all right then we don't
2:27:54 need no no no no that's a false memory
2:27:56 of that bro that's what we're trying oh
2:27:57 yeah i think i did mention that to be
2:27:59 fair but
2:28:00 i don't know but then we overrided that
2:28:01 with uh okay
2:28:05 yeah so we're gonna get a facebook group
2:28:07 sorted inshallah hopefully by the next
2:28:10 stream at the latest
2:28:11 i'll give him a deadline there otherwise
2:28:12 we'll uh we'll get brother mo l
2:28:14 to uh mow you down
2:28:17 yeah so do make sure to follow us on
2:28:20 twitter which is
2:28:21 uh on the screen now at the bottom
2:28:23 underneath sharif and
2:28:25 abdul uh and other than that
2:28:28 has anyone else got any closing
2:28:29 statements they want to make or
2:28:33 no just really quickly yeah
2:28:36 yeah i was gonna say we've only really
2:28:39 touched the very
2:28:40 basic discussion on this yeah so yeah
2:28:42 there's so much more to discuss
2:28:44 uh on this i'm in charlotte we'll have
2:28:47 more discussions in future going over
2:28:49 this topic again from different angles
2:28:50 and points
2:28:52 in shuttle but um yeah other than that
2:28:54 thank you to everyone who's joined us on
2:28:56 the panel today
2:28:57 uh may allah bless you all if you are
2:29:00 convinced by anything
2:29:01 i do uh implore you all to take your
2:29:04 shahada
2:29:05 uh and accept you know the islam is a
2:29:07 religion
2:29:10 there is no god but allah and muhammad
2:29:13 is his final messenger
2:29:14 uh and let us know in the comments if
2:29:16 you do if you are convinced by anything
2:29:18 engage with us ask questions there
2:29:20 and there's a few of us and we've all
2:29:22 got access to the youtube channel
2:29:23 so we'll try and get everyone to kind of
2:29:25 take turns engaging with any of the
2:29:27 comments that might pop up in there
2:29:28 um but other than that may allah bless
2:29:30 you all and we'll see you again
2:29:32 in two weeks time insha allah
2:29:38 foreign