In this episode of Sacred Tension, I’m joined by my sister Elizabeth Schultz. Elizabeth is a conservative Christian, classical educator, and homesteader. She asks me probing questions about my agnostic atheist worldview, and we compare and contrast our perspectives. We get into a lively discussion about God, why we do and don’t believe in him, whether it is possible to have a moral foundation without him, how we might find common ground across our worldview divides, and much more.
I really appreciated and enjoyed this episode, but I do have to say I was rather startled by how poor Elizabeth's arguments were. Early on she asks several times what evidence would convince Stephen, but the problem is evangelicals are not operating from an evidence-based worldview. I like how Stephen uses the example of the search for truth like a murder mystery. I have often thought of it that way as well, but the problem with evangelicals is that they have decided they know who the murderer is before looking at any of the evidence, and no matter who the other possible murderers are or what forensic evidence is available nothing will ever convince them that their pick is wrong
On a second listening, I noticed an interesting difference in how Christians and Satanists view God as the ultimate law giver and how that affects their view on morality. Everyone agrees that power corrupts and that people are fallible. In Christian mythos, God is a perfectly good and infallible being, so Christians are completely fine with giving him total authority over deciding what's good and evil instead of letting humanity decide for themselves. Power corrupts imperfect people, so people cannot be trusted with absolute authority. In Satanic mythos, God is an imperfect tyrant corrupted by power, so Satanists reject God and do not trust leaders with too much power. *Power corrupts imperfect people, so people cannot be trusted with absolute authority.*
There is one observation that I kept having throughout this discussion. There's a reason you all spent so much time trying to define what you mean by "God". I think that reason is because nobody has ever clearly established what characteristics their capital G God is supposed to have in any sort of consistent, falsifiable way. And if one can't even precisely define what they believe in, it's not even worth considering. (This is the basic premise of ignosticism/theological noncognitivism, which I subscribe to).
I thought it was hilarious how casually you destroyed deism by saying that a God that isn't involved hands-on in the universe it created is a meaningless God 😂
I also thought a lot of the questions she had for you only make sense from her point of view. In particular, the question of what you worship struck me as odd. I feel like it should be fairly obvious that when you strip a religious person of their orthodoxy, all that is left is their orthopraxy. Your answer of maximizing human flourishing and minimizing human suffering reminded me a lot of Sam Harris' definition of morality and it's one I wholeheartedly agree with. I think TST's endorsement of compassion, empathy, social justice, and bodily autonomy are affirmative calls to action and form the basis of our orthopraxy. And I think it should be safe to say many Satanists do practice a form of self worship to various degrees, but it's complicated to explain that we don't think we're gods and we aren't practicing self worship in an egotistical way as if other people matter less, so I don't particularly blame you for not jumping down that rabbit hole.
I thought that your discussion about doubt was frustrating because she didn't seem to grasp (at least at first) that doubt wasn't a conscious choice for you. The only part of your deconversion that was a choice was removing your Christian label. I thought your professing to be an honest heathen rather than a dishonest Christian was a really great way of describing your doubt and was glad to see that made sense to her.
All in all, I thought it was a fantastic discussion even if neither side was moved much.
I really appreciated and enjoyed this episode, but I do have to say I was rather startled by how poor Elizabeth's arguments were. Early on she asks several times what evidence would convince Stephen, but the problem is evangelicals are not operating from an evidence-based worldview. I like how Stephen uses the example of the search for truth like a murder mystery. I have often thought of it that way as well, but the problem with evangelicals is that they have decided they know who the murderer is before looking at any of the evidence, and no matter who the other possible murderers are or what forensic evidence is available nothing will ever convince them that their pick is wrong
On a second listening, I noticed an interesting difference in how Christians and Satanists view God as the ultimate law giver and how that affects their view on morality. Everyone agrees that power corrupts and that people are fallible. In Christian mythos, God is a perfectly good and infallible being, so Christians are completely fine with giving him total authority over deciding what's good and evil instead of letting humanity decide for themselves. Power corrupts imperfect people, so people cannot be trusted with absolute authority. In Satanic mythos, God is an imperfect tyrant corrupted by power, so Satanists reject God and do not trust leaders with too much power. *Power corrupts imperfect people, so people cannot be trusted with absolute authority.*
There is one observation that I kept having throughout this discussion. There's a reason you all spent so much time trying to define what you mean by "God". I think that reason is because nobody has ever clearly established what characteristics their capital G God is supposed to have in any sort of consistent, falsifiable way. And if one can't even precisely define what they believe in, it's not even worth considering. (This is the basic premise of ignosticism/theological noncognitivism, which I subscribe to).
I thought it was hilarious how casually you destroyed deism by saying that a God that isn't involved hands-on in the universe it created is a meaningless God 😂
I also thought a lot of the questions she had for you only make sense from her point of view. In particular, the question of what you worship struck me as odd. I feel like it should be fairly obvious that when you strip a religious person of their orthodoxy, all that is left is their orthopraxy. Your answer of maximizing human flourishing and minimizing human suffering reminded me a lot of Sam Harris' definition of morality and it's one I wholeheartedly agree with. I think TST's endorsement of compassion, empathy, social justice, and bodily autonomy are affirmative calls to action and form the basis of our orthopraxy. And I think it should be safe to say many Satanists do practice a form of self worship to various degrees, but it's complicated to explain that we don't think we're gods and we aren't practicing self worship in an egotistical way as if other people matter less, so I don't particularly blame you for not jumping down that rabbit hole.
I thought that your discussion about doubt was frustrating because she didn't seem to grasp (at least at first) that doubt wasn't a conscious choice for you. The only part of your deconversion that was a choice was removing your Christian label. I thought your professing to be an honest heathen rather than a dishonest Christian was a really great way of describing your doubt and was glad to see that made sense to her.
All in all, I thought it was a fantastic discussion even if neither side was moved much.