Cognitive Dissonance - Episode 124: A Manual For Creating Atheists

Episode Date: November 11, 2013

Special thanks to Peter Boghossian, Author of A Manual For Creating Atheists. Buy the book now on Amazon: News

Do you want to get cognitive dissonance streamed to your iPhone or Blackberry? If so, download Stitcher free today at Stitcher.com. Hey, Tom and Cecil. Glad to hear that you guys are eating all your kids' holiday candy. That's great. This is David from Boston. I just wanted to congratulate you on getting Jesus as a guest. I don't know how you pulled it off.

Did you resurrect him? What happened? But that's awesome. Glory hole as always. And I did want to let you know also that my case of the clean case is cleared up. I don't know. I'm healed thanks to Pat Robertson. I'm still deaf though so I don't know what the hell to do.

You guys keep on trucking. Whatever the hell you call it, and bye. This here is Pastor Mark Grizzard of the one and only true Bible-believing, amazing Grace Baptist Church here in Canton, North Carolina. You, too, need to be minding your own business. You're radical and gridded. You are messing with a man of God, and my God shall not have it. I've got your number, boys, and I have a good mind to buy Chicago and Satanist New York and burn them to the ground. You are of the devil, and Satan is going to love you in hell.

I don't come to your work at Dunkin' Donuts and mess with you. You have no business with us here in God's country. Jesus says I'm to kill the unbeliever, but I'm not going to do it. You have no business with us here in God's country. Jesus says I'm to kill the unbeliever, but I'm not gonna do it. You'll get yours, but I'll warn you this. Yuns in your fancy sky buildings are cursed. The Lord Jesus himself laid it upon my heart to curse you. I've seen two woolly worms yesterday, and when I see that third, may your entrails be read by maggots you get ready boys because Jesus is coming and he is pissed I kid you not the King James Version is the one and only true version and you Billy Graham TD Jakes and all your buddies is going to fry like a crispy piece of bacon

you're nothing but a bunch of lowlife, Yankee-fied, lily-livered pigs sucking sodomites. May God have mercy on you fools. Strike up, mate. I laugh as God gnashes your teeth and grinds your bones to dust till we part. May Jesus' wounds drip the blood upon your head. Hey, guys. This is Jack in Columbus, Ohio. Love listening to the show.

I noticed this number is a 740 number, which is Ohio. I thought you guys were in Chicago. So who do you know in Ohio? Anyway, your glory hole is my horny goal. Keep it up, guys. Later. Later. Be advised that this show is not for children, the faint of heart, or the easily offended.

The explicit tag is there for a reason. This is Cognitive Dissonance. Every episode we blast anyone who gets in our way. We bring critical thinking, skepticism, and irreverence to any topic that makes the news, makes it big, or makes us mad. It's skeptical. It's political. And there is no welcome at. This is episode 124. This is the Peter Boghazian Show. Yay!

We finally succeeded. We finally succeeded in a couple of different things i must say tom you sound spectacular well you know see so that would be because i have a brand courtesy of the money our listeners gave us yeah yes that's money from our listeners gave us. Yes, that's money from our listeners. So if you think that we're using it just to buy Halloween candy and then gorge ourselves on it, that only accounts for 85% of its use.

The other 15% goes toward porn. 1% goes toward the equipment. That's why it took us 120 shows but no we both got some new equipment now and we're very nearly uh fleshed out as far as well we've been fleshed out cecil for a long. Good Lord. We're very nearly to the point where our equipment is not substandard, I think. I think that's the standard we're going for is anything over sub. We are close. I'm Raymond Massey, and I have a special message for senior citizens.

Today's doctors, drugs, and medical devices truly work medical miracles for young and old alike, but there are some as phony as a $3 bill. Investigate before you invest in health services or products. Help stamp out quackery. So Cecil, the first story I want to talk about actually comes from the New York Times. Herbal supplements are often... Did I just say herbal? Herbal. I just said herbal.

You're British now. Wow. Herbal supplements. Have you got any aluminum foil? Take your vitamins, sir. Look, our police have no guns. Quick, get on the lift. Hop a lorry over to the station.

I don't even know what a lorry is. Herbal supplements. Now you're Jewish. Wait a minute. You know, I got to tell you real quick a story. I was at my parent-teacher conference thing for my kid the other day. And his teacher at a, my parent teacher conference thing for my kid the other day. And his teacher, um, is a, uh, like she just immigrated from Germany, I don't know,

eight or nine years ago. She said something like that. Um, whenever our kids were born, she got like a third or fourth grader. So eight or nine years ago. Um, and my kid has kind of a speech thing going on. So we're going to have them screened by a speech pathologist. And she's saying like, yeah, you know, he's pronouncing a lot of words like in the back of his throat, like kind of a guttural. And I almost said, well, then he can learn German so much more easily.

And it was like, it was on the fucking tip of my tongue. I was like, I was going to make like a German joke. Like your language is ugly. Wow. You sure do talk funny. And I bit my tongue at the fucking penultimate moment. I mean, like, I had opened my mouth to insult this kind woman whose only job it is to help our children be learning stuff. Oh, that's awesome.

It was pretty great. I told Colleen as we're walking back, and she just fucking looked appalled. Like, what is wrong with you? Tom, these are things you should keep to yourself. There's so many things. You know it's bad when you tell your wife, your life partner,

and she gives you a look like, what the fuck is wrong with you? So herbal supplements are often not what they seem. This is a great article. Basically, they did a study. They took a look using DNA profiling of what's actually inside. Like you buy these herbal supplements. It says you're getting, you know, ginkgo biloba or St. John's wort or fucking whatever.

Well, they say, well, you know, what is it really? So they take a look at it and it's like fucking like rat poison and sawdust. Not quite that bad. It's like a dead person's teeth enamel. Not quite that bad. It's like a dead person's teeth enamel. It's like things that they got out of their dustbin that they just pour into these things. Jimmy Hoffa's fingernails. Oh, this is great because it says – I'm going to read directly from this article, and this is from the New York Times.

If Tom didn't mention it already, I can't remember. article and this is from uh from the new york times if tom didn't mention already i can't remember it says using a test called dna barcoding a kind of genetic fingerprinting that has also been used to help uncover labeling fraud in commercial in the commercial seafood industry canadian researchers tested 44 bottles of popular supplements sold by 12 companies they found that they were not what they claimed to be, that the pills were labeled as popular herbs were often diluted or replaced entirely by cheap fillers like soybean, wheat, and rice. And the wheat thing, right? There's people with wheat allergies who could, you know what I mean? Like there's a couple of things in here where there's problems with what

they're putting in there. Here's another one where we say, among the findings were bottles of echinacea supplements. And I know a million people take echinacea, right? That's fucking, that's the thing now. It's like, take your drops of echinacea. Well, it says it's used by millions of Americans to prevent and treat colds. And it says it contained a ground up bitter weed, a parthium, I don't even know how to pronounce the next word.

And it's like an invasive plant in India and Australia that has been linked to rashes and nausea and flatulence. I don't need to take pills for flatulence. I got to take pills to get rid of the flatulence. The St. John's wort. It says two bottles of St. John's wort were tested. One contained nothing but rice and the other one contained only alexandria alexandrian senna an egyptian yellow shrub that is a powerful laxative well these manufacturers are so full of shit yeah i mean they figure this is just appropriate well it says st john's where

it's made for treating depression so maybe you get happier as you shit right well i don't know right because the very next sentence is um ginkgo biloba supplements promoted as memory enhancers were mixed with fillers and black walnut a potentially deadly hazard for people with nut allergies there's fucking people who like if, if they fucking see Mr. Peanut on TV, like, their nut allergies are so fucking severe that the very thought of a monocle causes them to break out in a rash. They can't even play Monopoly. It's that bad. And they could be accidentally like, oh, well, I remember to take my ginkgo biloba from memory. Hey, I'm dead.

Great. Great. Yeah. And it says that unlike prescription drugs, supplements are generally considered safe until proven otherwise. This, I think, is a great way to show, you know, I mean, obviously people are going to be upset because they're going to be like, hey, man, there's no snake oil in my snake oil.

What the fuck are you doing? But really what I think it shows is that most people who say that these supplements help them are probably just experiencing placebo effect. Wow. So, you know, I mean, it kind of proves what the fuck people have been saying about these things for a long time. Well, how could it be any other way when you didn't get the thing you thought you were getting? You know, it's like, oh, man, I love when I take fucking ginkgo biloba. I remember stuff so much better. Really?

Because it's black walnuts. Oh, I meant black walnut helps me. I just forgot that it was black walnut. I forgot to mention. That helps my memory. Yeah. We've replaced his St. John's wort with black walnut. Will he notice?

It's like those commercials. We've replaced his St. John's wort with black walnut. Will he notice? It's like those commercials. We've replaced it with this powerful laxative. Will he notice? Oh, he actually got the flatulence pills. I like too that it's not just filled. It seems to be what they

filled it. Seriously, it seems to be with whatever was growing behind the factory. Totally. It's like they would be filled with cat vomit if they had it in hand. You know, they'd be like, we got a bunch of cat vomit. These bat guano pills are delicious. Do you believe in UFOs,

astral projections, mental telepathy, ESP, clairvoyance, spirit photography, telekinetic movement, full trance mediums, the Loch Ness Monster, and the theory of Atlantis. If there's a steady paycheck in it, I'll believe anything you say. This comes from The Raw Story. Three men arrested after accidental shooting during Bigfoot hunt.

You know, I read this whole article, and there was no word on the size of the feet involved in the shooting. So it may have been legitimate. It's true. I'm not sure. What if the guy was like one of those monsters with like a size like 14 foot and you shot him? I mean, he kind of did shoot Bigfoot. Maybe your friend looks like Andre the Giant.

And I mean, I don't know. I could be convinced that that guy's a Sasquatch. It does not look human. Well, especially now because he's all fucking dead he's pretty dead yeah what the fuck is this picture i don't know i was wondering the same thing it's such a like it looks like an embarrassed sasquatch who like just burped and is like covering his mouth like oh fuck no no he had flatulence pills oh that's the problem is he's like oops that was my ginkgo biloba it doesn't agree with my system um it is a really weird picture because it's like it's like a weird big footy costume thing but they're sitting down in the snow and you can see their foot oriented toward a tree and that's very strange it's real weird it's real weird so see so this story these fucking three goobers are out in the woods in Oklahoma.

Okay. Sounds good. Shocks, right? Yeah. Hunting for fucking Bigfoot. Oh, wow. Does they have live ammunition? One of them gets freaked out and shoots his friend in the back.

So the answer is yes, they had live ammunition. It turns out. And now they're searching for the gun. What do you mean you're searching for the gun? Like, how does that work? Like, you shoot. Like, you and I are Bigfoot hunting, and I shoot you in the back. And then I just throw my gun in the air like, wah, I don't know what to do.

And I just pitch my gun in the sky. The Bigfoot has it. That's what happened is they were hunting Bigfoot. Bigfoot wrestled the gun away from him and shot him and ran off with the gun. Now we have armed Bigfoots in Oklahoma. Way to go, guys. Truly the most dangerous prey. Now, I've never actually mistaken a friend of mine for Bigfoot, but I have mistaken my aunt for Snuffleupagus.

actually mistaken a friend of mine for Bigfoot, but I have mistaken my aunt for Snuffleupagus. It's like, I'm walking through the woods. I'm actually surprised I've never been mistaken for Bigfoot. Like walking through the woods. No, they say Bigfoot's tall, my friend. They look, they take one look at me. They're like, nature doesn't make them that rotund. What is that, a hobgoblin? What is that thing? There's not a big enough body of water to submerge his bulk. His legs will give out at any moment. I didn't think Nessie lived on land.

I get shot in the woods prophylactically. We knew it was you. We knew. We're just not taking any chances. We just didn't want you to eat the woods. He stripped three square miles of all the wildlife. We asked him what happened. He said it was breakfast.

He's like an all-consuming hobbit. Can demonic spirits attach themselves to inanimate objects? The answer is yes, but I don't think every sweater you get from Goodwill has demons in it. But in a sense, your mother's just being super cautious, so hey, it didn't hurt you to rebuke any spirits that happened to attach themselves to those clothes. So the story comes from Right Wing Watch. Brian Fisher explains how to exercise your new home to rid it of demonic spirits.

So, Cecil, among the other fucking concerns you have when you first take on the task of purchasing a new home, now beyond the home inspection, beyond the disclosures, beyond buying the furniture and making your final adjustments to the decor, now you've got to walk around shaking oil at your house. Let me read here real quick. This is from White Ring Watch. It says, As such, Fisher recommends that his listeners walk the perimeter of their property, anointing the corners with oil and vocally commanding all spirits to leave

before likewise anointing the house and praying in every room and even over the furniture and appliances in order to rid the house of all unwelcome spirits. And you know what this strikes me as is like demons are just like really nasty farts, right? Like if you wave your hand around and you throw some scented oil around, poof, they're fucking gone. Fucking demons are just like the guy who aerosolizes, I don't even know if that's a word, but if he, if you can aerosol, if you could turn holy water in an aerosol, that guy's going to make a million bucks because he basically created like a Jesus Febreze and you can just, you can just walk right up there.

Up. There you go. We win. Sorry. Demons got to go away. It's like a Pope nightlight. Like the Pope light, like ping. that you plug in.

The Pope light. The Pope light, like, bing, and every couple of minutes, it farts out a little thing of holy water, like those Glade plug-ins. Holy oils of some sort, yeah. It's like a Glade plug-in of holy oil. That's exactly it. We got to make this. Why don't we have a patent on this?

Well, I already think there is a Jesus-scented Febreze because they already sell the air fresheners for cars, the Jesus-scented ones, the ones that look like crosses. I see them in everybody's rear view mirror. Are they fucking Jesus sent to them? Do they smell like resurrected corpses? They smell like resurrections. They smell like a three day old dead body.

This car doesn't have a new smell at all. You can't make it. Mmm, putrefaction. Yeah. Demons feel so weak, though, don't they? They're just like, oh, no, look out. He's got a little bit of oil. Like, Jesus, don't come near me. I'm eating French fries.

Couldn't you just extend this whole idea to just going to, like, the four corners of the earth and shaking some oil? And then all the demons have to leave the earth. But the earth's a sphere. Okay. But it's still bullshit. So, I mean, seriously. It would be good because then you'd send them to find the corner of the earth, which would be useful.

Go find the corner of the earth. Give me a call when you get back. Yeah. But I mean, like, I don't even understand how this works. You go to the edge of your property. Right. And there's a demon, what, inside? Yeah, there's a surveyor

demon that decides which property to go on, so you have to anoint to get rid of him. And then they go to what? Your neighbor? That doesn't seem right neighborly, does it? It's like flushing all the fucking moles out of your yard and into your neighbor's yard. Right? Your neighbor's

like, fuck you, dude, I got fucking your neighbor's yard right your neighbor's like fuck you dude i got fucking moles in my yard you're like yeah but i don't have them in my yard so i mean i'm sure you could it's like it's like everybody's got a fence and like you find a skunk in your backyard instead of like getting rid of you just throw it your neighbor's yard like enjoy sk, fucker. So this story comes from thecontributor.com. This week, David Barton both was and was not considering a run for senator. And when I tweeted this, he was maybe sort of. With shirts like that, Cecil, with clothing options like he's got in this picture,

how could you not vote for him? First of all, he looks like he's wearing something Ron Paul shit out. He looks like it actually like until I saw that it was like like kind of a shitty flag, like a real shitty, stupid fucking flag shirt. It's not even the right color. I know it's the wrong colors. There's like only two fucking stripes. It's just a the right color. I know. It's the wrong colors. There's like only two fucking stripes. It's just a fucking shitty flag. Well, that's because this guy's saying, oh, well, when they first created the flag, it was black and red and white.

Just so you know. Because this guy just makes shit up. Black, white, and red. We had to take that down because it was insensitive to African-Americans. There's only two stripes because he only recognizes Texas and the rest of the world. Texas and Alabama. He's like Grandpa Simpson. He's like, I'll be long in my brain before I recognize the state of Missouri.

Oh, that's awesome. But there's this list of crazy fucking shit this guy has said. That this guy gets any traction anywhere is fucking maddening Cecil. So let's just talk about a couple of these things. Yeah, sure. The one that I want to talk about because there's nothing to do with the show, but it's so egregiously crazy is number two. We had to destroy the Indian tribes. Barton justified the slaughter of Native Americans as a defensive war.

How does that work? A defensive war. How does that work? Well, because they invaded England. I don't know if you remember. And then we fought them back over here to go kill them. It's a defensive war. That's like somebody camping out in your living room.

Somebody like fucking, you are coming home from work. You're like, oh, man, what a day. You open your front door, and there's just fucking people in your living room with fucking guns pointed at you. They're like, defense, defense. They fucking shoot your wife and children. Yeah. We did that. It's self-defense.

And then they get off with it, of course. Right. Then they fucking throw smallpox blankets at you. Shuffle you outside in the name of defense. Oh, that's awesome. It was a defensive murder. Like, I murdered that guy defensively. It was a preemptive strike against the Native Americans.

Right. I like this one. This one's my favorite. Number four, the Bible opposes net neutrality. It says, did you know the founding fathers, pilgrims, Puritans, and the Bible all oppose net neutrality? And I keep wondering to myself, I'm like, you know, like what did the founding fathers have a conversation around? Be like, hey, Jefferson, how was sex with that slave last night? By the way, what do you think of net neutrality?

You know, like, how did that conversation come up? And, you know, like, really what the founding fathers would have thought net neutrality was is like fishermen's rights. Rights, no kidding. That's what they, like, really? They don't fucking, there is nothing. I mean, you could go as far as close as close back as like probably I would imagine. I don't know exactly, but let's say like the seventies and there would not be any inkling of what the internet is.

No. You know what I mean? Like maybe there's some sci-fi people out there who had some sort of ideas or whatever. And some people who were sort of futurists who maybe had some ideas, but on the collective consciousness of the United States and the world, people didn't fight. They were like fucking, you know, cause yeah, the fucking, the internet itself has lasted since the cold started in the cold war. But most people didn't know about it because he just didn't. I mean, they're just like, that was a system to make sure that we could fucking shoot more bombs at Russia if they brought up the Capitol. That's what it was for.

Right. Right. You would seriously, like, if you took one of the founding fathers and you brought them to 2013 and showed them the internet, their fucking head explode. Yeah, exactly. That's all that happens. Like, you would melt them like a fucking candle. Like, that's what happened.

You'd be like, ah, I got a fucking John Adams pile again. What the fuck? I got a couple more of these that I want to talk about. This, this one here is good. Prayer stopped the BP oil spill. And it says during a religious right conference, Barton maintained that,

uh, state declarations of prayer ended drought in Georgia and also prevented damage on the Gulf coast in the BP oil spill. And the only thing I could think is like the oil spill is like when you, like it is to God like when you have pasta on the stove and it boils over. And so the only way he knows is like if we all pray about it. We're like the alarm, the fire alarm that goes off. That's like, wah, wah, wah, wah, wah, wah, wah.

And he's like, God, I just put that pasta on a few minutes ago what had i put a spoon over it and everything it's all bubbling all up over my stove you know like that's where the fucking nasty little fire alarm is that's the only i mean that's the only way that makes sense right no you can't make that make sense. You can't do it. You cannot do it. You know, the other thing, too, is that I'm sad that he's not running because I want to read this here. It says on October 30th, Green, this person, Green, who's a co-host of some fucking thing, said that if this draft page he had for him to run for Congress gets 5,000 likes in a few days. He'll know if he wants to run. And, you know, the first thing that came to mind is if he gets enough likes on Facebook, he's going to run. But then he's going to make sure that little girl gets enough like so she

can get that cancer therapy that she needs. And then he's going to share Disney's photos so he can get a free trip to Disneyland. Right. That's how serious political decisions are made. Right. Is how many people like you on Facebook. I would also point out. That's how Obama decided on Obamacare. Right. He was just like, like if you want Obamacare.

He's like reading the comments section like all night. Michelle, I think we've got a winner. I think. It says Travis W agrees. Yeah, Travis. Yeah. Oh, we've gotten four shares. This is exciting, Michelle.

Oh, we've gone viral. I like to. I couldn't help. So I could not help it. When he said like five thousand likes, I couldn't help. Be like, we've got more. We've got more than David Barton. We're running for Senate, bitches.

We should both run for Senate as one person. We should. And like run entirely. We're like the Voltron of candidates. We turn into like a super legislator. All you have to do is just. Actually, you don't need more than one of us. Actually, more than one of us can't even fit on

behind a podium. Yeah, well, they need to reinforce most stages. And by most, I mean all. Our campaign car is like a semi. We have to make the old-fashioned railroad stops. What were they like?

They go to start the engine, it's like... Shunk. Yeah. Shunk. Shunk. Shunk. Shunk.

And they're just like... Oh, we're already out of diesel. Yeah. We're like taft, you know? We're that size. We're like waving off the back car. Like, ah. I would...

I'll tell you what. If this show hadn't horribly destroyed any chances of any kind of... I mean, there's no way. Like you and I could run for fucking dog catcher. No way. After doing this show. It's just, that's it. Like we're just fucking destroyed forever.

That's our fucking children's children. Like we have destroyed the political aspirations of generations. This is his dad. Jesus. What did you say do you know that i'm a field day with this um the only other one i want to bring up real quick is no limits on the second amendment i love that shit under the second amendment there's no limit no limit to what type of weapons people should possess could could possess, including tanks, bazookas, and fighter jets.

And I can't help but remember the time you and I got to drive the skid steer, the little bulldozer thing. Yeah. And how much fun that was. And if somebody gave me a fighter jet to fly. Oh my gosh. I would die that day. Oh man.

I can just, what I see is like him, making a phone call from his fighter jet. Like, when he's flying in the air, like, maybe he's tweeting from his fighter jet. I don't even know. He's, like, checking how many likes he has on Facebook from his fighter jet. 4,999. Looks like I'm running, boys. In the name of Jesus, we speak that. What's on the feeling?

I'm high on believing So we've got to have Fisher back on the crazy train. This is also from Right Wing Watch. Citing an article from CNS that reported that First Lady Michelle Obama would be hosting an event on Tuesday to mark the Hindu Festival of Diwali, or the Festival of Lights, to honor Lakshmi, the goddess of wealth and prosperity. Brian Fisher warned that Obama was inviting demons into the White House. Yeah, demons into the White House.

What they need is they need it. They need to have like a presidential glade sprayer. That's, you know, that's all they need to do. And, you know, here's the thing. Fucking Brian Fisher says he's, they're warning that Obama's inviting demons into the White House. Isn't he already the fucking antichrist to them? I, right.

Hasn't he already been called the antichrist many times on many occasions? What the fuck? Doesn't the antichrist like fucking invite the demons over for dinner? Do demons need an invitation? That's the thing that occurs to me it's like yes fucking rude people just show up right and all that is is just fucking rude people if you're a demon you're like i would like to go to the white house yeah i don't have any like they stopped like i'm just picturing like Damn it. The Secret Service is standing there. They're like, do you have an invitation, sir?

I'm a demon. I am Legion, blah, blah, blah. I have many heads and fucking less horns than heads for some reason. Sir, you can't get in without an invitation. But I shit out grasshoppers with helmets. Aren't you terrified? Like, I am, but you can't get an invitation, sir. I'm sorry.

Do you validate demonic parking? And then as he's walking over, he, like, kicks the plant over. He's so mad. God damn it. Pissed off. He's like, go sit. I'll get in there eventually. Once Michelle sends me that invitation on presidential paper.

I can't wait till the Festival of Lights when I get a proper invitation. I got some chill then. I'll just be a quiz nose. Extra sauce, please. I'm drowning my sorrows in ranch. It's so fucking stupid. Although this demon we've created kind of sounds pretty cool. I would hang out with him.

I would certainly eat a fucking sandwich with him at Quiznos. I'll have a turkey carbonara. Yeah. Hold the demon. I want to mention before we move on from this story. Which we barely covered. Yeah, no, whatever. This fucking guy's a dimwit.

But, you know, you're going to notice, and I don't know if this is going to be fixed by then, but you're going to notice that when you go to play these movies, you'll see that the YouTube YouTube account of right wing watch has been disabled by YouTube. It's that fucking Klingerschmitt guy wound up filing a bunch of complaints to get them to take it off. guy wound up filing a bunch of complaints to get them to take it off. And he actually posted this like this victory blog today about like how I got right wing watch taken down or whatever. Do yourself a favor, go to right wing watch or go to our Twitter account if you can. On our Twitter account, I posted a link to the right wing watch page that calls Klingerschmidt out for this. Also tweet or send messages to YouTube to let them know that right wing watch is, is doing fair use. Um, they're not comment they're, they're, they're using this as a, as a way to comment on these videos. They're not altering the videos. These are these own people's

words. So there's nothing here that is, uh, that is, uh, that is removing their brand. Their brand is already, they're already saying this stuff. They're not editing it to change what they're saying. So this is all, this should all fall under fair use criticism. And this has been around for a long time, right wing watch. So this is, I mean, this is really the bread and butter of what they do too. So this could be a big blow to them if people don't get on the bandwagon and start yelling at YouTube to change this back and give them back their channel. Yeah, and how fearful does this show that they are, that they're afraid to have their own words repeated? I mean, that's really what it is.

It's like, oh, man, I said that. Now I look foolish. Fucking I don't want video of me saying that anymore. So we need to take action if possible. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, you know, we put out a shitty show every week, but we edit that show and we make sure that our message is as clear as it can be. And sometimes it's not as clear as we'd like. And we are called out on certain things and we have to defend ourselves. These people say crazy shit every

week and they should have to defend themselves. Right. You know, you're putting it out in the public sphere. You should be able to defend it. And if you can't, then, you know, you shouldn't be you shouldn't be putting these things out there. So they're actually getting like a free pass. Basically, what right wing watch allowed people to do is not have to fucking watch the whole thing. I know. I know. And now you have to watch the whole.

You have to watch all the fucking Klingerschmitt fucking jerking off on camera. Who wants to watch that? Who could watch that? all the fucking klingerschmitt fucking jerking off on camera who wants to watch that who could watch that nobody could watch it's not even pot you would have to be a quiznos eating demon to make it through this guy's boring even i think he's an asshole yeah but seriously it's like it's like the soup right it's like you don't watch i don't know if people are familiar with the show the soup on e but it's like the soup, right? It's like you don't watch – I don't know if people are familiar with the show The Soup on E! But it's like nobody would watch all that crazy shit they watch just to find the goofy clips they find. But the goofy clips they find are gold and the same thing here. It's like nobody would sit through all of fucking Brian Fisher's talk.

I would fucking – I'd rather punch myself in the groin for an entire hour than watch Brian Fisher talk for a minute. But these people are heroes and they should be decorated as such. Yeah, no, I think that's a fair trade, my friend. So this next story comes from examiner.com. Fatwa forbids Muslims from traveling to Mars. Muslims are forbidden from traveling to Mars.

Islamic cleric issues a fatwa against any man mission to Mars. Muslims are forbidden from traveling to Mars. Islamic cleric issues a fatwa against any manned mission to Mars. So now none of the Muslim countries that currently are planning a trip to Mars. They'll all have to cancel. See, so Iran and Saudi Arabia

and Mali, they're all going to have to cancel their Mars missions. They were going to have to cancel their Mars missions. They were going to have like a really phallic rocket too. It's just a giant like. It's like a giant pulsating penis that was going to shoot up into the sky. Which way is Mecca?

I don't know which way is Mecca. The thing is, is like 477 Saudi citizens have applied to go on Mars 1 and 6 have been accepted. They just want to leave Saudi Arabia. Fucking A. Exactly. They're like, we will send you to the moon with no equipment. All the hands get raised up in the air. All the stumps.

Like all the stumps are like, can we just. All the stumps. The only problem is. All the necks with no heads are like craning. They've got to have big oversized buttons for them to press. Everything is like a huge 1950s button. They're like trying to steer the ship. It's like voice activated.

They're like, yar, ship. They got to do it like it's like voice activated they're like your ship they gotta do it like it's star trek where you just stand on the bridge spinward ship just give commands like this is like the this is i read this and i started laughing i'm like there is no i mean there's no chance. There's no chance of any Muslim country putting together their own mission to Mars, right? Like that's not going to happen. When you subjugate half your population, you have half the brain power. Right, right. It's like you guys are purpose – you guys are working hard to hold yourselves back. Of all the fatwas that have been issued, this strikes me as one of the least relevant. There's very little danger of this actually happening.

You want answers? I think I'm entitled. You want answers! I want the truth! You can't handle the truth! So this comes from rawstory.com. the truth. So this comes from rawstory.com. Indian Hindus nurse their bruises after annual

cow trampling festival. This appears, if I understood this article correctly, to be totally backwards. You're supposed to tenderize the cow, not the other way around.

Sarah said the same thing she said in India. Meat tenderizes you. It's so weird. I guess. It's not weird if you have a cow trampling fetish. I guess. I guess. You know.

So what they do, I guess, in part of Western India, you spray paint your cow. Right. Like day glow orange. Like it's going to go to Burning Man. You basically Banksy your cow. Your cow's performance art. Like your cow's like, whoa, man, it's like blowing my mind. It's awesome, too, because the cow is kind of looking Crockett at the picture here. It's like, whoa, man, you're blowing my mind.

Actually, you're just dragging me over people. The cow has no interest in stepping on people because cows are just like, I can break a fucking leg doing that. Yeah. And then I'm, why? The cows are all pacifists right they're like i could be a double stack if i do this wrong like that's a bad deal um but i guess like you lay on the ground and then cattle are i don't know cattle step on you and then god answers your prayers yes it says here it says it is believed that if a cow's feet touches a person, his problems will be reduced and so will his lifespan.

But his problems specifically will be reduced. Yeah. It's like, well, I no longer have. So, for example, like if a cow steps on like your spine on your lower back. Oh, no. Right. Then your problem of how will I get to work tomorrow is reduced because you no longer can work tomorrow completely reduced you know like or like if you're like having sexual problems with

your spouse like and a cow steps on your dick then you're like well i don't have any more sexual problems because i can't have sex because a cow stepped on my dick there are people with like like uh ball trampling sort of fetishes. I wonder if they could go over there and get off with their, you know, I mean, they do have a cow do it rather than like a person in like heels, but still you'd have to have a ball.

You'd have to have like a cock and ball torture fetish and a bestiality fetish. Bestiality. It's like all mixed into one. You'd have to be like the most specific fetishist ever. And this is like your one chance every year. Colored cows. Right. It's like all mixed into one. You'd have to be like the most specific fetishist ever. And this is like your one chance every year. I really love colored cows.

Right. You're like flying over to India, like fucking rock hard in anticipation of getting your fucking dick stepped on by a cow. Like, this is going to be great. I can't wait for that bovine cock and ball torture. That's going to be super sweet. So we're going to take a break. When we return, we're going to have Peter Bagusian on, which we mispronounced and probably did again.

But he will be on finally. We mispronounced his name at the beginning of the show, too. So four different ways to pronounce his name. Just cover all your bases. I'm going to call him Peter B. We're on that kind of first name sort of a basis, like he and I. I think we developed a real rapport

during that interview. So we're going to have him on in just a few moments. Stay tuned for the good part of the show where we're here with Peter Boghossian, the author of A Manual for Creating Atheists. Peter, thanks for joining us this evening. My pleasure. Thanks for having me.

Could you tell us a little bit about yourself? A little bit about myself. Well, I live in Portland, Oregon. I teach philosophy, atheism, critical thinking, reason, rationality, and values, et cetera, at Portland State University, full-time faculty. and Values, et cetera, at Portland State University, full-time faculty. And I'm a speaker in a number of different organizations, Richard Dawkins Foundation for Reason and Science. And I've just written a manual for creating atheists.

So I want to get into your book a little bit here because Tom and I spent many hours reading your book, which is a very well-written book. But I want to talk, and I think this will give you a good platform and sort of to jump off from, could you just explain to our listeners what a street epistemologist is? Sure. So epistemology is roughly, it's how you know what you know. And a street epistemologist is somebody who helps people clarify how they know what they know. So a street epistemologist is somebody who helps other people, who helps, excuse me, disabuse people of bad ways of thinking about the world, that is ways of thinking about the world that don't align their beliefs with reality.

And they help them to align their beliefs with reality. They help them to give them, just through talking, through conversational tools, they help them to give them just through talking, talking through conversational tools. They help them to, uh, be in gender, certain attitudes, like a trustfulness of reason and a willingness to reconsider. And they, they, uh, help them embrace reason and shed superstition. So, you know, one of the things that I know we've read the books, he's on, I've read the book. Hey, by the way, I just want to say, thank you for reading the book uh i know i know that sounds insane but i've had a lot of interviews recently and without naming any names uh some people didn't read the book and i was i just found myself incredulous at that so thank you for reading the book i wouldn't dream of having you on the show i can can't imagine what the purpose would be.

I don't know what I'd even say. Right. Could you read the book to us? I don't even know. Have you got about four and a half hours if you could just sit and read the book to me? It's going to be a short interview in that I'm only going to ask one question, and that is, what does the book say start to finish? Ask one question, and that is, what does the book say start to finish?

So for the benefit of our listeners, though, who have not had the opportunity to read the book yet. So your book, and I'm going to do it a terrible injustice, but it's a manual for creating atheists, right? And that's very much what this book focuses to do. what this book focuses to do. It focuses to provide the tools that somebody would need to use the Socratic method, to use conversational techniques to undermine the idea of faith as a good way of knowing. Why is this work important? Why does this matter to you? And is there a target audience for street epistemologists that they should focus on? All right. So can we back up? So it's about, it's not about changing beliefs, but it's about changing the way people form beliefs. So once we get that, then the way we can help people form beliefs that help them align what it is, the ideas and cognitions they have with reality.

And that is important, not because of whether or not they believe in God or they have any other particular belief, although of course there are some beliefs that are harmful or dangerous. But it's important that we give people reliable ways to see the world to differentiate reality from make-believe land. Because as it is right now, people are acting upon things that they think are right or true or just, but they're not. And the consequences of that are not only are they leading bad lives, but in a democracy, it's a horrific cascading consequence of, when you value the wrong thing, things that you think are good will happen, but don't happen. So in other words, you've, I mean, you could take extreme examples like Saudi Arabia or Iran or places, but the consequences of, of in aggregate of people having a way of

viewing the world that will not lead them to reality or that they make worse communities and everybody ends up suffering. So you, you, you make a distinction in the book, um, about talking about working on people to try to get them to release them from faith, but you're not talking about, you're trying to avoid religion. Why the distinction? God, I am so, I just, I'm just sitting here just beside myself, happy that you guys read the book. I don't even want to talk about the book. I just want to talk about my feeling state of how happy I am that you read the freaking book. So again, I don't know.

Thanks for reading the book. I can't say how much that means to me. It makes the whole conversation so much easier. God, I just – let me just bathe in my current feeling state for a moment while I'm being interviewed by people who actually read the book. I'm sorry, what was your question again? Cecil, this is the one thing we may have done right in our entire podcasting career. This is the only time a philosophy professor has actually said anything like remotely positive about what I've done. So this is exciting.

Yeah, it's funny. I mean, if somebody says, you know, I mean, I had, I had, I mean, I just had a crazy interview on the Alan Combs show and, uh, Oh no. Yeah. I probably, I probably shouldn't have said who it was, but I mean, it makes it unbelievably difficult to have a conversation about something in which the other person doesn't have the faintest clue about the thing in which you're discussing. It's just – it's not even an exercise in frustration. I just – it's much better for me in those interactions, and I'm not answering your question at all, but we'll get back to it. To like talk to someone who's a fundamentalist, I have much better than trying to explain – I can't even.

Now the frustration is going. Okay. Give me the question again. I'll answer your question. The question is the distinction between faith and religion. Oh, yeah. So religion is beset with rituals and it's beset with – there's nothing inherently irrational about going through rituals.

The problem is that people use an unreliable epistemology. They use an unreliable way to know the world. That is what empowers religion. That is the support beam, if you will, for why religion is so problematic. The problem isn't that people play bingo or sing songs or what have you. The problem is that people believe that these rituals like the communion way for what have you, or the, you know, speaking in tongues or whatever, that there's some objective thing in the world that these states correspond to, and then they act upon that. So the way to deal with that is to not deal with it at all. We can just step to the side and deal with faith. Faith is the real problem. So in your book, you focus a lot on using the Socratic method. So the Socratic method

is, as I understand it, the primary tool used in a lot of the conversations that you have with the faithful and that you suggest that street epistemologists use when discussing issues of faith with the faithful. Can you explain what the Socratic method is and why you think it's the right tool to discuss faith? Sure. The Socratic method is the primary tool, and that's in chapter five, but the other chapters revolve around, so that comes from a very specific set, literature set, philosophy, pedagogy, et cetera. Pedagogy is like teaching, instruction, but chapter four deals with all of the things that surround that. So if one had the Socratic method, but did not have the other tools drawn from diverse bodies of literature in chapter four, those interventions, helping to disabuse people of faith and live in embraced reason as a value wouldn't really work. So the Socratic method is part of the solution, but again – and it's the primary tool.

It's like the scalpel. But unless you have everything surrounding it, it just – it's the, the primary tool, it's like the scalpel, but unless you have everything surrounding it, it just, it's really not going to be that effective. So to answer your question directly, Socratic method has five stages. I've published extensively about this, what the Socratic method is, how it achieves its ambitions. And basically it starts in wonder. And, and then somebody has a question and then there's a very strict template that you can use to just follow line by line to and you don't even really need to uh have a have a in-depth knowledge of what you're talking about the truth claims you just have to have a knowledge of the

validity like if things follow um and it's, it's a way to guide people through a conversation in which you're asking people if they agree with themselves. That's ultimately what it is. You say that there's many, there's been a few encounters you've had that where people have been hostile to you, where are you getting, you get a range of people when you, when you start this conversation. Yeah, more than a few, but yeah. I got to ask, is anybody, because there's, I mean, these, I'm reading these, these example, what is it? What's, what do you call that? Dialogue. Dialogue. Thank you. Jeez. I can't even remember my own words here. Words, Cecil, use your words. Okay. So, so the example dialogues that are in the book, some of these are pretty, I mean, there's one where you talk about with this guy and you're having a conversation with

him and you talk, he says, you say, would it be about with this guy and you're having a conversation with him and you talk. He says you say it would be OK to murder other people if you heard a voice in your head, just like the Abrahamic tradition. And he says, yes, if God if I knew it was God. And then you go through this sort of graphic depiction of what it would be like to say murder someone, which I thought was brilliant because it really sort of brings the person back down. Has anybody ever been like physically hostile with you? Like because of this sort of sort of shaking of them? No. No, I was thinking about something Christopher Hitchens said where someone was hostile to him once. But no, no, nobody has ever. I have quite a few stalkers and I've been afraid of some people would snap. But in the context of an intervention, no, people have been upset.

They've been – I mean you get the whole range of emotions. I mean you're really talking about very, very root core central issues. central issues. And the reason people get those emotions is because, again, it's because you're basically asking them if they agree with themselves. You don't get that emotion, for example, if I say, how far are you from the door? And you say eight feet. And I say, well, how do you know you're eight feet? Or let's see what happened if we measure that out. Or what happened? You find out you're 10 feet. You don't go berserk. So there are certain issues that have an emotional valence like faith issues. And if you use the techniques in Chapter 4, then you can disarm that right away. And again, there are some people who suffer from brain injury or what have you and that these techniques don't work on.

But I've never – I've experienced hostility. I've never experienced physical violence. And if I did, I you know, I'm not too good of a runner anymore. I just run away. Just run away. I got asked, though, you say, you know, there's some people that, you know, that it's not worth it. Have you ever started talking to somebody and then just been like, this is not going to be worth it? No, I never said there are people who are not worth it. I said that if you have, there are some. Yeah. Like the brain injury. Yeah. If you have a brain injury, then there's no dialectical intervention will be effective. You know what I'm saying? Like, is there somebody like, let's say the Westboro Baptist church lady and you are having a conversation, you, would there be a point where you would just give up and just be like, this is not going to work?

I can tell you with total sincerity, with an open heart from the bottom of my heart, I have never, ever given up hope on a single person. Wow. Wow. I am floored. I don't even know what, like. Because I've given up hope on like nearly everyone at this point. I mean, there's, I mean, that's awesome, because there's this idea that atheists are cynical, or atheists are pessimistic by nature.

And I think as—I mean, just the idea that you can have an example in front of you, like the lunatic from the Westboro Baptist church, um, who may have a traumatic brain injury. It's, you know, it's very possible, but that, that you would not, that you would engage her in these conversations and would do so with an open mind and would do so, you know, without giving up, because I would give up hope first. Like I would just hope. And I would, it would have abandoned people who have some very, very serious epistemological problems. they've come out of it. I mean I give a list in my book of about 20 people who were pretty hardcore, and now a lot of those people happen to be good friends of mine. I mean people have recovered from some pretty serious cognitive illnesses. And again, I'm not mad at somebody.

I'm really, I'm not upset at all. I want to help them. These people, they're not well. They really have their, some kind of epistemological damage to the wiring of their brain. And we need to help, we need to rewire their brain through conversation.

We need to help them. Reason is the tool. It's an immense, it's a tool of emancipation. We can give this to them just by talking to them. So there's no reason to get mad at them or frustrated with them. I mean, if anything, they're trying to be good, decent people and they think that what they're doing is right. Oh, sure. I mean, right. Nobody sees themselves as the villain. You know, that's it's one thing I want to I wanted to talk to you about. And Cecil actually has a great example, I think, here is how do you start these conversations? So, you know, for myself personally, I don't get into a lot of casual conversations with the neighbor down the street about faith. We just don't. I think maybe perhaps this is a Midwestern values thing, but people sort of have this idea that, you know,

religion and politics, at least among people who aren't close, are sort of off limits. And Cecil, you've got people outside your building, right? Yeah. I have a group of people that are from the church nearby, and they set up a booth. It's not a booth. It's more like a briefcase with books in it. Yeah. But it's like – so they got this thing, and the sign-out says, what does the Bible really say? And then they have all these free books.

That's great. That would be a great opportunity. They want people to do it. So, okay, so I'm coming to you for guidance. Give me some guidance on how I could start that conversation. What would you do in that situation? Here's what I'd do, and I said this in my INR3 talk. Every single conversation you have has to begin with sincerity, has to continue with sincerity, and has to end in sincerity.

So don't say things you don't mean. Don't sugarcoat it. Say what you mean. Be blunt. Be forthright, but also be very, um, again, I don't want to keep coming back to chapter four, but, um, don't create adversarial relationships with people. Say what you mean. Be sincere. People might, sorry, I'll add one thing. People are terrified of being sincere because they think that people will hate them.

Yeah. I mean, maybe people will dislike you, but, uh, I guarantee you. And if you watch my Jesus, the Easter bunny and other delusions talk, people will respect you. People respect people who are sincere. They don't respect cowards. Don't be a coward. I suddenly feel urged to talk to them. Either that or I'm guilted into it. I'm not sure. So you just say, hey, so tell me what you think here. Tell me about this. If you want to learn, say I want to learn. If you don't want to learn, then find something you want to find.

You must have some question, right? I mean – The question I want to ask is why should people care what the Bible really says? That's the question I really want to ask them. Why don't you ask them? Well, like you said, it's a rude thing to say. Well, what would you say? Well, hey, you could frame it like this. I'm really trying to understand this. And remember in the book, I tell you how to frame the statements and you should frame them as questions. And I go through

what words you should use. I'm, I'm, I'm really interested. Why should one, right? So you put it on yourself, put the onus on yourself. Why would one want to be interested in this? Like, why should this matter? If that's the question you're interested in, ask that question. And then just wait to see what they say and really genuinely listen to what they say. See if you can really understand where they're coming from. You'll find, not 99% of the time, 100% of the time, that it has to fall back on the – I mean I'm telling you.

I do this – there's almost a moment of the day that doesn't go by where I don't think about this. And it always comes back to the same thing. I mean there are only so many things people can tell you. Yeah. How many chances do you have though like with just – like Tom was saying, his neighbor. How do you get that conversation started with your neighbor? You want beer? Come on over for dinner.

How's it going? Yeah, okay. Fair enough. It just feels – It's difficult. I think you you know, you say that, um, and you've obviously been doing this for a long time and there's a comfort level you have with the process that I think, you know, obviously somebody who hasn't done it before is not going to walk into this with that same comfort level. And there's a certain amount of social distance that

we all, I mean, even before you do anything, we're talking about being honest with yourself. Sure. You have to be honest with yourself and you have to be comfortable with being honest. And if you're sincere and if you're honest, people will pick up on that. Don't bullshit anybody. So in your book, one of the things that you talk about a lot, and this is I I think, one of the pieces that you come back to quite a bit. You say it's okay not to know. Absolutely.

What is that about? What's that about? It's about not pretending to know something you don't know. It's about sincerity. It's about being honest with yourself and being authentic. It's about being honest with what you know and who you are. And there's no room in that to pretend. So it's a perfectly, like if someone were to say something about evolution, let's say they were to say something.

Our conversation were to steer to evolution. Yeah. And they were to say something that I didn't know about evolution. I should just be okay with saying, yeah, but I don't know that. I mean, yeah, of course. I mean, what? Yeah, but wouldn't you be conceding? At that point, though, aren't you conceding a point, though?

I mean, not saying that you don't know it, but I think that there are some other rhetorical ways in which to soften that blow. It feels like you're almost just giving them a point. But the evolution, when they say, because then they feel like they've got to. Hold on a second. But did you see how you worded that? I did. I'm wording it very specifically for your book here.

Yeah, so you worded that like give a point. There are no points. Street epistemology isn't about points. It's not about winning or losing. And that's a key mindset that you have to change. You're not debating people. You're conducting an epistemological intervention. You're intervening in the way people think to help align their beliefs with reality.

And one of the techniques, one of the strategies to do that is to model the behavior that you want them to emulate. So if you want them to say, I don't know, when you ask a question about the resurrection or, you know, Muhammad flying and having a winged horse or fetons trapped in human bodies or whatever it is, the happy hunting grounds, or then you need to model that behavior yourself. And when you say, I don't know, don't look down at the floor or the ground. You look someone in the eye and you say, I don't know the answer to that question. It's not a matter of shame that you don't know something. Yeah. I liked, I really liked that part. It makes me feel good because I don't know much about anything. So I felt suddenly empowered by that. I was like, oh, OK, I can say that and more now. That's great. Yeah, I mean, I would think so. And I think that if you if you model the behavior and if you show people that it's OK not to know, again,

we're looking at these interactions as interventions we're not looking at these interactions as debates or arguments or berating someone or belittling someone we're trying to help people and the way that you help people is first and foremost to be honest with yourself so if you're in a conversation and someone asks you a question that you don't know you say hey man i don't know but as long as you're honest and sincere about helping people and about finding what's true and about really listening to what people say because maybe they know something you don't know something someone asked me an interview today well what if you know what if the this produced a million muslims look that's. I think that would be fantastic. If Muslims formulate their beliefs on the base of evidence and there's evidence for the Koran, then sign me up.

I'm ready to go. Right. Yeah. And that's so funny because that's something that's lost like every time. It's like, you know, we're not trying to – there's no intent to dissuade somebody from being a Christian. There's no intent to dissuade somebody from being a Christian. There's no intent to dissuade somebody from being a Muslim. The intent is to dissuade people from using faith as a tool for knowing about their world. That is the intention here. The intention is not to damage somebody's traditions.

We're trying to help them realize that faith will not help them align their beliefs with reality. In fact, quite the contrary. But telling people that isn't, they have to come to, you have to help them come to that conclusion themselves. It's funny because they have to have a coming to God moment about coming away from God. They have to have, that's what a crisis of faith is. You know, it's someone who's struck by the realization that they've been pretending to know something they don't know.

I actually wanted to read a paragraph from your book toward the end of the book about faith in the academy because it speaks to something that Cecil and I have talked about a lot on this show. And so I wanted to kind of read it and then give you a chance to kind of chat about it a little bit. Sure. Everybody loves that chapter. Yeah, go ahead. Sure, everybody loves that chapter. Yeah, go ahead. Multiculturalism and associated ideologies grant diverse epistemologies,

especially faith processes, immunity from criticism. Multiculturalism buttresses faith-based processes from criticism by conflating race with culture and by making attacks on faith and reasoning processes ethically synonymous with attacks on race, gender, and other immutable characteristics. Rational critiques thus become immoral actions. That paragraph was of particular note to me just because it's a topic Cecil and I have discussed quite a bit on the show. I think you worded it very well in that paragraph. Can you talk a little bit about, you know, kind of what you were driving at in that section a little bit? Yeah, I'm sure my colleagues love that paragraph.

I'm sure they love that whole chapter. Do you have tenure? Do you have tenure? Can they kick you out? No, no, but I think I'm on my way out anyway, but that's a long story. So what I wanted to do is I wanted to give a genealogy or I wanted to give an account because many people who are outside of academia don't realize how completely dysfunctional and inverted the entire system has become. And so I wanted to spell out for people, particularly those who are student activists, so we can try to make some changes in this.

And that's one of the things that I talked about in my conversation with Dawkins, how we came to be in this current mess and what we can do about it. So it is the case that there are invasive parasitic values that have latched on to traditional notions of liberals. I'm sounding like an academic. I don't mean to. mean to um there that there there are these invasive values and attacks on attacks on ideas that we look we have to make a fundamental distinction between an attack of an idea and an attack of a person and as i've said many times before ideas don't deserve dignity people deserve dignity and so we need to, I think that's the simplest notion in the world, but for whatever reason, my colleagues can't seem to grasp that

concept. So, and I don't, certainly don't mean all of them, but epistemological critique, critiquing the way people come to knowledge, especially in the Islamic tradition is absolutely, especially in the Islamic tradition, is absolutely, absolutely off the table. But in other faith-based epistemologies as well. So sometimes people conflate the right to hold the belief. Again, it's not about a belief. It's about a way people form belief. But the right to hold a belief, and they look at it as a type of, I think I said in the book, epistemological hegemony or colonialism or something when the professor tries to change those. And that's because everyone's been indo we just got done a couple of weeks ago

you know engaging a an email that we had had on the show with somebody who very much was falling into that camp of feeling like you know hey you guys are are talking about islam you're talking about islam you know stop don't pretend you're not anti-Islam. And it's, and, and there was a total inability to differentiate realistically critiquing Islam as, as a, as a faith versus critiquing the people. Like there is no critique of the individual. The individual is, it's different than the faith. The individual and the faith are not one in the same. And it's I found that this chapter particularly engaging because of that. We really need to make some some changes because the situation is out of control at the moment. Speech codes, diversity boards, any kind of epistemological critique, you know, critique on how people know things.

Sometimes people think it's a proxy for race. And as I've said before, outside of the academy, there are some very nasty, bigoted, mean, angry people who legitimately are racist and they use Islam as a proxy for race. And these people are horrible, hideous human beings. And we need to talk about that and we need to be honest with it. We also need to make sure that we have the freedom to criticize ideas. Islam is an idea. Christianity is an idea. Faith is an idea. Faith is an epistemology. Again, once people grok that, once people really, truly understand what that means, that's a game changer. So you're talking about criticizing the way people formulate beliefs and come to ideas. And again, in the last part, chapter eight in the book, I gave a template, a literal word by word, step by step template that you can guide people

through to help disabuse them of any kind of epistemological relativism. The problem is that political correctness is so rampant in our institutions right now that even talking about some of these things is problematic. Peter, if people were going to find your book, where would they look? Well, hopefully not on some illegal source, which everybody I've told it's one of the most illegally downloaded books right now. I'm not sure what to make about that. You should buy this book, period.

Yeah. I mean, look. So the other thing is we went to – we went straight to paperback because it's the book. I'm looking at it right now. It's $9.84. Come on. $9.84. I mean like really? I've never heard. It took me a literal lifetime of research and experience.

And you're not going to drop 10 bucks on a book to like I mean like what's up with that but anyway they can go to Amazon and they can get it in Kindle or they can get it in paperback and then once they get it in paperback when they finish with it

they can lend it to a friend or they can they can leave it in a hotel in place of the bible but keep the book going give it to the local library so so other people can have it but it is vital that we take action immediate action to eradicate the faith virus we must stop the spread of the faith virus we might we've had spread of the faith virus. I've had enough. You guys have had enough. We've all had enough. Now it's time to do something about it. I'm not saying this is the definitive tool that will lead to the eradication of the faith virus.

Certainly hope it is. But at minimum, if we can get this tool, this book, in the hands of as many people as we can, and again, it's not just about getting the book in the hands of as many people as we can. And again, it's not just about getting the hands in the book in the hands of people, but we then need to encourage and motivate people to use the techniques. So your neighbor, get them over there for a beer, the people down the street, the book sale, you need to use these as opportunities. I got to say for nine bucks, that's the cheapest any professor has ever sold his book ever, period. No kidding. I know.

Come on. Like really? Like I didn't even do a hardcover. I'm thinking, OK, because it's not about the money, right? I mean I think I only make 50 cents a book or something like that. It's like – I don't know if you know how publishing works, but the publisher takes most of it. So it's not about the money. I'd love to recoup some costs.

It's caused a damage to my family, a damage to my health. I haven't done jiu-jitsu. I haven't really done – watched TV or played games or done any of the fun things. I haven't hung out with my kids. Fighting the virus is like a full-time occupation. I mean literally it's a night and day job. The other thing is I am one guy, right? As I said, my best weeks, I only liberate five people of the virus.

So I need as much help as I can from guys like you, from other people, I need as much help as I possibly can to get the book out to get it in to have people use what's the it's all there. So, so I not only need help with that, Then we need to devise some system of feedback where people post their interventions on YouTube. Something happens where we can constantly refine these techniques. That's actually a really good idea. Is there an existing forum for that right now? I think somebody put up both on YouTube and Facebook a thing called Street Epistemology. And I think he's from England.

Leaf is his name. He's been an amazing guy. And other people have put up some other things. But so the book is like the first draft of how to do this. It's a pretty detailed draft, I have to say. But I would love it if some point we aggregated or we looked at, really took a look at what worked and we really sat down and we refine and hone these techniques. And then we got it in the hands of even more people. I mean, that's would be that would be fantastic.

That would be like a dream come true. Right. It would be really nice, you know, if that gets up and running to get, you know, interviews with people who have been the subject of, of these interventions, you know, to say, Hey, you know, we talked and, you know, things have changed. We've had 10 conversations since our first one. And, you know, your, your ideas have changed. Can you help map out, you know, kind of your process? Cause that way you can kind of get that feedback from the other end. Yeah. And so one of the things that I'm going to do is the first time I reveal this right now, one of the things that I'm going to do is I'm working with a guy who's evidently doing a documentary on me, but so I'm going to, uh, we're going to do a Kickstarter project and I'm going to, we're going to go out into the streets and I'm going to deconvert people

on the spot or I'm going to get, that's awesome. You guys read the book. So the trans theoretical model, I'm going to move them through various stages of behavior change and belief change. So we're going to have a recording and we're just going to do that. And then we're just going to put that online as YouTube videos. Yeah, this is, this has been a very good book to read and we actually read it. So, so we want to make sure that the people also that are listening to the show, buy this book and read it because it's a great book. Peter, it was wonderful having you on and talking about it. Thank you so much for coming on our show.

It was my absolute pleasure. And if at some point in the future you guys want to come back, you get your neighbor, you get the people at the stand, you want to come back and just take notes. Maybe you can ask them if it's okay that you record the conversation and we can talk about that so you can have your neighbor over again or go to the stand or what have you. If you would like to hone or refine your techniques, I think you two guys would be fantastic street epistemologists. Oh, wonderful. Yeah, that sounds great. Thank you. Thanks again for coming on the show. All right, guys. Have a good one. Thanks. So moving on to some email here, we want to send a special thanks out to Renee and Tom for your generous donations. Your donations go a long way to making sure the show continues and is possible.

So thank you very much for donating to the show. That's something that Tom and I both really appreciate. Yeah, thank you very, very much. So last week I messed up and I said that I was going to put somebody's photos, WMX's photos on the fucking web, but I forgot to put the, on the notes. So when I, and I normally mix like on like Saturday afternoon or something, so I'll get it mostly mixed on Saturday afternoon. Then I'll mix it most, finish it up like Sunday night. And then Sunday morning, I normally upload it. Well, I forgot about that part. So if you're looking for an image of WMX standing out in front of an opera house, it's next week. I'm going to put it for this week's show, 124. I'm going to put it on there. So I messed up and put it on the wrong

episode. I actually, I just messed up and forgot about it, but I'm going to put it on this episode this week. So if I forget this week, um, I don't, I don't even know what I'm saying. I'm just grounded. Like, I don't know. I'm just grounded forever. Like I'll shake my finger at you, but I'm not going to eat all my candy or what? Right. That's, I mean, that's, that's my typical punishment. Yeah. I just, I'll buy you candy and then eat it in front of you. We got an email that talks a little bit about cultural relativism, Tom. This is from Alan. I agree that Muslims should in no way be exempt from ridicule when they do stupid or horrible things in the name of their religion. I say the more extreme the act, the harsher the condemnation should be.

And you guys do a pretty good job of equal opportunity religion bashing. But there are two points that I think need to be kept in mind while ripping on the Taliban, Saudis, or any other Islamic nutjob. First is that Islam in and of itself is no worse than any other religion. All that nonsense about forcing women to wear a veil or a burqa and making women second-class citizens isn't in the Quran. And as religious books go, the Quran's not even as morally fucked up as the Old Testament. Islamic extremists are just doing what all extremists do. They pick and choose quotes out of their magic book to justify whatever immoral crap they want to do.

The other point that I feel needs to be made is that while it is true that most of the world's worst trouble spots and theocracies in the world today involve Muslim extremists, they're not causing all this trouble and misery because they're Muslim. If being Muslim were the cause, then wouldn't it follow that the world's largest Muslim country would cause the most trouble? That country is Indonesia, and while it certainly has its problems, Islamic extremism isn't one of them, at least not like it is in the Middle East. Yes, the extremist scumbags like the Taliban and Saudi regime use their religion as the excuse for all the shitty things they do.

But people who want to do shitty things will always find some excuse to do them, whether it be religion, nationalism, communism, or some pseudoscientific belief like eugenics. I'm just glad there are shows like yours that vent outrage at these awful people and laugh at the insane logic they use to try to justify their actions. Thanks much, guys. Keep up the good work. This is interesting.

And while I agree completely, I think there is some things I want to note. You know, while it isn't in, I don't know if it's in the Koran or not, and I would never make that claim because I've never picked the Koran up ever, period. I've never even opened it up. I don't know what's in it. the Quran up ever period. I've never even opened it up. I don't know what's in it. Um, but you know, we watched a, we watched a video last week where this guy in Norway is talking about how, you know, women should be separate and how people should be stoned to death. And, you know, I mean, this isn't, it's not isolated to the middle East. There's people in, in the UK that are beating

other people, physically injuring other people because they have a beer in their hand walking through a neighborhood. So, you know, while you say, you know, like these people are using this to sort of push other people and they're using it in their own countries as a way in which to gain power, I don't disagree with that. But we also have to look at how Islam is being treated in the rest of the world. And I do see problems in other places too, not just the Middle East. I think it's important to note that while, yes, religion is often used as a tool by despots to seize and maintain control of vulnerable populations and, you know, groups of people. It is somewhat telling that this violence comes, that this violence is disproportionately coming from this religion. It works is the problem. If the Holy Book didn't have anything in it at all

that supported this violence, it wouldn't work. If the whole thing, you know, was like, you know, seven pages long and it's a fucking chick pamphlet and it says, you know, be kind to your neighbor, you know, buy them some shoes if they need them. Let's everybody give each other a hug. Awfully difficult to use that to justify strapping on a bomb and blowing up a marketplace or, you know, doing any of these other horrific acts that are often perpetrated in the name of Islam. So while I agree I'm not as familiar with the Koran as, well, anybody who's ever looked at one, for example, I do think it's worth noting that the Koran is often the thing that is cited. It's not like I'm citing the Quran for them. They're citing their own religion as the motivating factor when, you know, cutting off hands, cutting off heads, subjugating women. They're the one using that as the justification. So when they're doing that awful shit, it's totally fair to point the finger at what they point the

finger at. Like if that's their justification, then that gets, that's the bedrock. And I get to criticize that. And that is a fair criticism because that's where their motivation or at least a rationalization comes from. We got an email, Tom, from Eric, and he mentions Girl Scout cookies and magic markers. He does. He says, don't forget that before you take a magic marker and black out anything to do with Girl Scouts in America, you have to take out another magic marker and black out the word magic from the magic marker, because magic is not biblical either. In fact, it's expressly forbidden.

Yeah, you need to get a permanent marker to mark out magic marker. You have to get a Sharpie. It's the only acceptable. It's like this marker is the only acceptable marker. It's like Harley Davidson's the only motorcycle you can ride in the octagon.

Like Sharpie's the only one you can crush it on a box with. We got a bunch of different emails from people talking about like just surprise racist people. And we got one specifically from Will that just says surprise racist dudes. I know. It's great because that is like it struck a chord. like other people have found themselves clearly in that same position. I think surprise racist dude should be a thing. It's like surprise racist dude.

That's the worst party, by the way, is when it's just a surprise racist dude party. Surprise racist dude. Oh, fuck. Oh, he he's gonna say something awful oh god and you know one of the emails that we got um you know says basically that we should be taking these people on um we got an email from somebody who who's take on the surprise racist dude was hey man fucking fight it in fact it's called fight ass hattery um And this email is from Mike, and Mike's right. You know, the thing to do is to not be a fucking do what I do in my life and be a big fucking pussy about it and back off and feel uncomfortable and make jokes on my podcast.

What we should be doing is pushing back. It's one thing to say no quarter. It's one thing to say no quarter. It's another thing to give no quarter. Yeah, I know that when it's a regular person and I hear it like with some weird – like when it's like – when it's not me having a conversation with them but what's like sort of overheard sort of conversation, I have in the past like called people out as being racist. conversation I have in the past like called people out as being racist but when it's like me I feel like I don't know like I feel like there's a there's a friendship they're already starting or something I don't even know what it is but there feels like to be like this this sort of polite fiction that we both you know don't want to upset the other person but the fact is is that they're upsetting me when they say that stuff so I shouldn't feel bad

upsetting them when I shake them and say hey no you don't get to talk like that to me. You don't know me. You don't know anything about me. So don't presume that I'm a racist too. And so great, great email. And yes, that's how you should react to it. It's tough to do though. But like Peter says, you should be more authentic.

You know, like Peter says, you should be more authentic. And I think there's something to be said about, you know, being sincere. And you should be sincere with other people when they're saying stupid shit like that. This is interesting, Tom. Kenneth sent an email about Islam and how the atheist community, atheists kind of love Islam. Atheist community, atheists kind of love Islam. And if you go into an atheist group and say anything negative about Islam, at least according to Kenneth, the atheists kind of come out of the woodwork and rush to Islam's defense, he says. Yeah, that's not something that I have experienced at all. The atheist love for Islam is not something that I'm – but it's clearly something we've encountered on the show with some of the criticisms that we've gotten. There seems to be this pushback that says, whoa, whoa, whoa, Islam's not so bad, or it's not just Islam, or Islam's not any different than any of the other religions.

As if we somehow can't draw a distinction between levels, as if there's not a marker on a continuum that we can use to say, okay, who's doing the most harm? Like what are the objective measures of harm we can use and then measure these ideas against those objective measures. That's not something I was familiar with. I didn't know that the atheist, but it makes sense, right? Because that, you know, it's that, it's that secular liberalism that, that we've talked about in the past where people feel like, whoa, I can't criticize another culture. Yeah. Criticize their own all day. Yeah.

So we're going to be in talks, we hope, this week. We're going to try to talk to DJ and see if we can maybe figure out to get him on the podcast. We're hoping in the next one or two weeks. And then we're also going to have a couple other guests coming up. Um, we're going to keep trying to get a couple of guests at least a month if we can, uh, especially with our new setup. We're so excited to use our new setup. So, uh, so we're hopefully going to get a few more guests here and there. Uh, but maybe DJ's on next week. Maybe not. Who knows at this point, somebody said, Jesus should be on your show. One of the voicemails

you heard is like, I can't believe you guys got Jesus on your show. And it's so true. It's just like, it could have been anything, you know? Well, anyway, that's it for this week. We want to thank Peter Boghossian for coming on the show. Peter was a great guest. He wrote a really, really great book. So if this is something that interests you, if street epistemology was one of those things and you would have a passion for, you think that maybe you would be good at this sort of thing. Like Peter says, it's a good thing to shake people out of their faith. And Emanuel for Creating Atheists is really one of those books that when I was reading it, I thought, you know, it seems like a great workbook to sort of get through some of those difficult conversations that you find yourself in.

So Peter's book is very good. So please, if you think it's worthwhile, go and purchase it. It's on Amazon. The Kindle version is like under $9. The paperback is a little over $9. So if you have an opportunity, go take a look at it. See if it's worth your while and pick it up. Well, that's it for this week. And we're going to leave you, as always, with the Skeptic's Creed. Credulity is not a virtue. It's fortune cookie cutter, mommy issue, hypno-Babylon bullshit.

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employers, friends, families, or of the local dairy council. so you you you said you teach atheism at – you teach them at a university? I do. I do. Your tone leads me to think that you find that to be shocking. I am shocked. What's so shocking about that? I would have fucking totally taken an atheism class. I'm trying to make it a MOOC. I think it's going to be a MOOC at some point.

But yeah, the class fills up very quickly. Are you shocked because there are so many religious studies programs and so few atheists? Yes. Absolutely. Absolutely. And I went – I'm a philosophy undergrad and when I was taking classes, all of them were on like Kant and Heidegger and stuff I didn't understand. And this would have been a great class. Yeah, there's a bias in philosophy against applied philosophy, which is what – applied epistemic. Anything applied. They don't like anything applied in general. Would you go to college?

I went to school. A fine Catholic university. A fine Catholic institution. They love themselves some Kant. They loved Aquinas too. They were huge fans of Aquinas. Yeah, yeah. Too bad none of those arguments work.

I tried to say to the Greeks myself because I couldn't understand a lick of what Heidegger said. No one does. Thank you. Thank you. Holy shit. Finally. Vindication. The validation, Cecil.

The validation. Yeah, well, The validation, Cecil. The validation. Yeah, well, you know, it was interesting. I don't know if you saw my TAM talk or the TAM panel I was on. I did. We have created entire cultures. We have made it a value of pretending to know things you don't know. That's awesome. And not just in regard to faith, but the way that academic disciplines have been institutionalized you get

everybody's pretending to know something they don't know you know i i in my uh my tam panel i mentioned that when i go to these cars studied philosophy my whole life i read philosophy exclusively i i um well not exclusively but uh i read philosophy quite a bit, perhaps at a level that's damaging to myself. And I go to these places and people will be talking about something unbelievably esoteric. And undergraduates will be sitting there nodding their head like they understand. And I'm just thinking to myself, like, come on, man. Really? Come on, man. Really? Come on. But there's something about the culture that we've created that people seem to – they seem to desire that or think it's desirable.

Again, it's a culture of pretending. I cheered. When you said that, I was sitting and I'm just like, yes, somebody else because I ran through my whole undergraduate degree. And the whole time, I felt like there was an inside joke I wasn't in on. Like I just kept on going to these classes and they would stand up there. And I remember specifically this Heidegger class where we wrote down all these really questions because we couldn't understand a lick of what that guy said. I mean, he's he used being in the same paragraph like 40 times. And I was just like, that's a nonsense word now.

And so we finish it. I'm like, I don't understand any of this. So we write a bunch of questions down. And I remember reading them off to the teacher. And the teacher's like, those are really good questions. And then he didn't answer a fucking single one of them. So it's just this, I don't know, like it feels like I totally get what you mean. Like there is, it's like a culture of pretending, especially in that discipline.

you mean? Like there's a, there is a, it's like a culture of pretending, especially in that discipline. Yeah. It's unfortunate because philosophy is a, or it certainly can be a, a remarkable opportunity for people to experience ideas and grow intellectually. And sometimes it's stifled. Sometimes it's not stifled, but the pretending, we just have to stop the pretend. We have to end the culture of pretending.