The Atheist Experience 28.13 with Jim Barrows and Armin Navabi

In today’s episode of the Atheist Experience, Jim Barrows and Armin Navabi sort through evidence for a designer, Barnum statements, and upholders of consciousness.

Ameen WA is contemplating reasons to come out as an atheist to his Muslim parents. What would be the two main costs and benefits to making this decision? Considering this will upset your mom, how long will it take for her to get over it? What will you do if the costs outweigh the benefits? What can be done to help fill the void your mother would feel? Showing support to your family is not the same as believing something. Sometimes you need to play a little peek at a boo with the mask. Don’t do it fast and get them scared.

Andrew in FL says that Armin failed to debunk the slippery slope argument about sexual relationships being allowed that have no potential for harm. How can you claim a failure when you don’t know everything that was said? The potential for harm with incest is much higher than it is with LGBTQ, that is why it is not fair to compare on to another. Incest will have the problem of power dynamics that makes it hard to demonstrate consent. The emotional harm can’t be prevented as easily as STDs can.

Bjorn in Norway has research that connects consciousness with god and every real life moment has to have the potential of becoming a realization. If you are trying to prove god’s existence, please define god beyond a name. What is god? How would you demonstrate this? How can we connect all these random sentences together and tell us why consciousness is necessary? How do you know that something can’t exist alone? Why do we care about things that are potential but not probable? How do you know what happened before the Big Bang?

Jason in WI has a prophetic message from god about things that will happen. What will happen specifically and what is the exact date and time? Making Barnum statements is not the same as prophecy. Don’t waste our time.

Jake in AR says the world would be better off without religion. Would a society that has closer beliefs to reality have a better chance of prospering than one that does not have true beliefs? As Forest would say, all models are wrong, and some models are useful.

Lucy in Lithuania says that religiosity can breed toxic positivity. We agree and this is also a way for religious governments to take advantage of people.

Josef in MI asks what god the hosts have an issue with and uses DNA as an example of why he believes god exists. We have a problem with all claims without evidence. Your interpretation of an experience is going to be heavily influenced by the culture in which you are raised. What do you think a good standard for god is and are we there? It must be proven the designer exists before we can prove that things were designed. Why would we assume that the supernatural or god has anything to do with our existence more than chemicals? Why would DNA being fascinating be an argument for the existence of god? How do we find the creator of the body like we can find the designer of a car?

Thank you for tuning in! Question of the week is: Why is Satan competing for god’s followers?

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