The Eric Metaxas Show - Michael Guillen (Encore)

Episode Date: November 2, 2021

Michael Guillen provides enthralling evidence of Intelligent Design in "Believing Is Seeing: A Physicist Explains How Science Shattered His Atheism and Revealed the Necessity of Faith." (Encore Presentation)

Texas show with your host, Eric Mettaxas. Hey there, folks. If you know me at all, you know that I love talking about faith and science. You probably know that my new book is atheism dead. Deals with a lot of faith in science. It's nothing less than astonishing. When you realize that the idea most of us have heard in our lifetimes that faith in science are at odds is not even slightly true, It is, in fact, the opposite.

It's hard for us to shift our paradigms, but we need to. As I said, I write about it a lot in my new book. But a friend, Michael Gillen, we've had him on before, has a new book out on the very same subject called Believing is Seeing. He's a real scientist. Michael Gillen, welcome. Hey, Eric, it's so good to see you again, my brother. Looking forward to our conversation. It's great to see you and to talk.

talk to you. I love talking about all this stuff, especially with somebody who knows about it the way you do. You really came to faith later in life. You had been hostile to faith. And now you're writing books explaining to people that faith and science are friends and that this is a, it's a lie that they're at odds. In the book you talk about how the latest discoveries in neuroscience, physics, astronomy, mathematics, point to faith. in many ways. Talk about that because, I mean, what do you mean when you say neuroscience? I'm not even sure. Do I know what neuroscience is? Science of the brain. Yeah, yeah. It's a study of the brain. And, you know, I remember when I was at ABC News, I did a story on the Harvard Brain Bank,

which is the largest repository of human brains, I think in the world, certainly in the nation. So I went there. It's in Massachusetts not too far from Harvard. I was also teaching at Harvard. at the time so it was convenient for me. I remember being able to hold, they allowed me to hold a human brain in my hands. And even to this day, Eric, it was just a really weird feeling to think, you know, this is the essence of, you know, what we call humanity, if you will, never mind discussions about soul and the spirit. I mean, this is where our personalities, this is where we reside in this.

this, you know, two or three-pound brain. And the human brain is made up of two hemispheres, the right and the left. And a lot of studies have been done on that. And I talk in the book about, I think it was in the 70s, when scientists, a physician started treating patients with epilepsy by severing the corpus colossum, which is the cable-like, it's a very thick cable of nerve fibers that connect the two hemispheres. that connect the two hemispheres. And what they found was that when they cut the two hemispheres,

when they separated the two hemispheres like that, the epileptic seizures stopped, not entirely, but to a great degree. But there were some interesting side effects. And that's what I deal with in the book, because ultimately I connect that research to my exploration of faith. You know, it's a little bit complicated, and we couldn't do it justice here. but I will say this much, that when you look at these, what we call split-brain patients,

these are patients whose hemispheres have been separated. They, there's a lot of interesting side effects. For example, I quote one woman who goes grocery shopping, she's a split-brain patient, and she finds that the two hands, when she's reaching for groceries or putting groceries in the basket, They fight one another. And what I explain in the book is that what we've discovered from split brain patients is that our two hemispheres are basically at war with one another. They see the world in very different ways.

One hemisphere, the right hemisphere sees it very intuitively, very holistically. It sees the big picture. The left brain sees it very logically, very analytically. So it breaks things down to their simplest components. And what I, again, I explain how and what, that has to do with really the biological origins of what we call faith. Faith is not just believing in something

that you can't see or hear or taste or touch. It's much more than that. In the end, I explain in the book why faith is the foundation of the entire human experience and it originates within the two hemispheres of our brains. And science depends on faith as well as religion. And a lot of people do not understand that. Well, you know, you,

probably don't know this, but you mentioned everybody has two hemispheres. I have three. I skip the grade, and I'm just, I'm just a lot. I'm ahead of some people, and you know, I can't take any credit. I was born with three hemispheres, but, okay. Now, you're a medical oddity. We have to, we have to get you, oh, I'm a freak. I'm a freak. Yeah, doctors don't know what to make of it. Even geometrically, it's not possible to have three hemispheres. Spacially, it makes no sense. That's right. You We wouldn't call them hemispheres, right? We wouldn't call them hemispheres, and yet they do. They don't know what else to do.

Tramospheres, I guess. Okay, so you just shared something so bizarre. I mean, the idea that doctors would separate hemispheres surgically. It's a horrifying thing because let me ask you, why did they think it wouldn't kill the person or make the person, you know, like lobotomized? I mean, why wouldn't they expect it? It's strange to me that somebody could have their, their brain hemispheres separated that way.

I can't quite imagine. And when you say separated, you don't mean set apart but 12 inches. You just mean disconnected from each other. Yeah, because again, the left and right hemispheres, if you can picture that, they're two lobes, about the same size, not exactly and not exactly the same shape. There are a lot of similarities, but a lot of differences. And in between them is this big telephone cable with billions of nerve fibers,

and they're communicating with each other constantly. what we've discovered is that communication is very hostile. Typically, one half of the brain is saying, back off, I've got this. And the other one is saying, no, you back off, I've got this. As to whether how it came about for doctors to do these operations, very drastic. You're absolutely right. It was just an experiment. And, you know, it was kind of like, let's just try because a lot of these epileptics were just

in a very desperate situation. And, you know, the seizures were very debilitating, and they would have them many times during the day, making life pretty much impossible. And one of the doctors just tried it one day and it worked. He's like, what the heck? Let's give it a shot. Yeah, let's give it a shot. And they ended up actually winning the Nobel Prize for it.

But it's really, Eric, you know me, we've known each other long enough. And by the way, one of the things I love about you is you do have a very important. very intelligent, inquisitive interest in science. Can I be honest? That's all an act. That's an act. I couldn't care less about this junk. I just got a show to do.

I'll be who I need to be. Now, listen, this stuff is so fascinating. The more you learn, the more fascinating it is, which is why I love to talk to you because I learned so much. But I mean, that's crazy. Now, but I still don't quite get how that leads to faith or, in other words, what we've learned from this. I don't get that piece.

Okay. I spend an entire chapter so it's difficult to boil it down, but let me give you a little, I think I'll give you an illustration and I think perhaps you can begin to see the connection. And that is there was one split brain patient I talked about. His name is Joe and a very famous split brain patient. And one of the experiments the doctors did with them is to show him pictures, just ordinary pictures, but they would they would like cover it, cover one eye and then the other eye. So he would look at the pictures. first with his left eye and then with his right eye. And what they found was amazing, Eric, amazing. Because when they showed the picture, I want to make sure I get this straight. When they showed the picture to the left eye, which was being perceived, well, let me try it the other way around. When they showed the picture to the right eye, which means that the information was being processed by the left hemisphere, because there's this, you know, the right eye is controlled by the left and the left, the left eye is

controlled by the right. There's this crossing that goes on. So when he was shown the picture with his right eye and asked, what do you see? He said, a frying pan. And sure enough, it was a picture of a frying pan. No problem. All right. Of recognizing it and naming it. Okay. Then they showed it to, you know, some other time, they showed them a lot of pictures. They jumbled them up. They showed hand that very same picture of the frying pan to the left eye which means it was being perceived by the processed by the right brain and he goes like i don't see anything wait hold on this is called a cliffhangering show business folks when we come back we're going to find out what the dude saw don't know way hey folks i've got to tell you a secret about relief factor that the father

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three-week quick start for 1995, let's see if we can get you out of pain too. Go torelieffactor.com. Relieffactor.com or call 800-500-384-800-500-584. Relieffactor.com. I use it. It works. Hey, folks. I'm talking to Michael Gillen, who's a scientist, who's written a book called Believing is seeing a physicist explains how science shattered his atheism and revealed the necessity of faith. So you were just saying Michael Gillen really extraordinary experiment. They separate the connection between someone's left hemisphere and right hemisphere. And then they ask them, what do you see? Cover up one eye. What do you see? Whatever. So the first time they cover up the right eye and you, or I'm sorry, the first time they cover up the left eye, which means you had it

Right. First time they showed the picture of a frying pan to Joe, the split-brain patient, they showed it to his right eye, which means that the image was being processed by the left hemisphere, and he had no problem identifying and naming it. It's a frying pan. Okay. Then sometime later, you know, they were jumbling all these pictures. They showed that same frying pan image to his left eye, which means the image was being processed. by the right hemisphere, and guess what? He said, well, I don't see anything.

And the scientist said, what do you mean? You don't see anything? No. And then they said to him, okay, close your eyes and draw the first thing that comes to your mind. So the guy closes his two eyes and draws, guess what, a frying pan? So what that indicates to us is that we're able to perceive things that are not visible. we're able to perceive things that are invisible to the eye. And that is where I start exploring the nature of faith, because if you think about it,

faith is all about seeing or perceiving truths that we cannot see or prove in any, or even imagine. So that was just one of the things that I wanted to explain to the reader of how science is helping to illuminate our understanding about faith. Most people think that faith is just, well, like, you know, I just believe it. I just believe it. I don't know what. No, no, no, no. There's something going on in your brain that gives you the capacity to perceive truths out there, some enormous truth, profound truths, as I go on to explain in the book, that you just simply cannot see it.

And just because you cannot see it doesn't mean that it's not there. That's the whole point. I'm sorry, what? I was kidding. Don't make me repeat that. I mean, this is crazy stuff. Well, I'm trying to summarize it. If I cross my eyes, do my hemisphere switch if I go like this?

I mean, really, this is heavy stuff. We better move on before I get in trouble. What about, actually, I was thinking this would be like a great episode of a detective show or something like that, where they say, what do you see now? And he goes, well, that's the murder weapon. And they realize, we've got our man. You realize, because somebody was killed with it with a frying pan. And then he doesn't see the frying pan. He just sees it's called a murder weapon.

All right. Yeah, but if you, just to put a little button on that, too, if you think about, you know, sometimes we'll, as humans, we will have experiences, right? And they're not necessarily tangible experiences. They're just experiences that we might feel that maybe even transform our lives. You see this, especially in religion. And somebody will say, well, what happened to you? And you say, there just are no words.

for it. And one of the things that was came out, that was so interesting that came out of that split brain patient experiment was that he couldn't utter the words frying pan. He not only could not see it, he could not utter the words frying pan. He had to sketch it out. And so I make that connection, and I don't want to get too deep into this because it is very, very deep. But it's, again, an illustration of how we can have profound experiences, Eric, without being able to put them in words. You know, say, I don't know, I'm speechless. I don't know what I just have, but it changed me.

So that's, I hope you can begin to see how I make that connection with the neuroscience, and much more, by the way. We're just, well, there are other fields that you go into, you go into physics, astronomy. Let's talk about astronomy for a minute. I'm fascinated with astronomy. What do you write about in the book about astronomy? Well, I talk about because, you know, I began life as an atheist. I mean, I went into grad school just in love with science and had no time for God, no interest in God.

My motto was seeing is believing. You know, it's like unless I can see it, I can't believe it. And then I learned something that was like totally stunning and turned my whole worldview upside down, which is that 95% of the universe is invisible. It's in the form of dark matter. and dark energy, which, by the way, are names for things we absolutely have nothing, we know nothing about. And one of the things I'll share with you is just a story that came out about two, three days ago. So this is like fresh hot off the press. But there is a group of about

160 scientists that have been holed up inside a mountain, the biggest mountain in the Apennines in central Italy. Wait a minute. Are they there intentionally or they're trapped somehow? No, they're there intentionally, and they've been there for almost two years. And their whole purpose is they want to detect dark matter, okay? Because, again, we don't know what dark matter is. That name is just a placeholder for something. Is it a new form of matter? Does it indicate that perhaps...

But why do they have to be inside a mountain? I don't really... And how far in the mountain are they? And why would they think that they would be able to get a read on this from inside the mountain? All of which are great questions. They're in the heart of this mountain. And they're there because whatever dark matter is, if indeed it does exist, we don't really even know if it exists.

We have circumstantial evidence that suggests that it does. But if it is, it's what we would call very weakly interacting material. That is to say, it must be something that we cannot see and also something that just doesn't interact with the environment very, very much. And so you hold yourself up into the mountain to filter out all the other noise. And if there's anything left over, you might surmise that the... I just think 160 people breathing is going to be a lot of noise. Are they all in there at the same time?

Are they like in a dorm room? What's going on? I want answers. Inquiring minds want to know. Yeah. 160. This sounds like they're just pulling a gag. Why are there 1006?

First of all, I mean, they're, oh, well, could just continue because otherwise I will talk. It's too tempting, isn't it, Eric? Yes, it is. It's 160 scientists from all over the world, different countries. They're not always there at the same time. They kind of swap. But they're inside this subterranean laboratory, and they have what's called a liquid xenon detector. And the detector, think of it as maybe a, uh, as maybe a, uh, a, uh, a, uh, a, uh, uh, a

really super sensitive pair of eyes. In other words, it's designed to detect something that is able to get through the mountain is not absorbed or blocked by the mountain. So this is something that could perhaps qualify for dark matter. And if they see a little bling, a little smudge of light, they get all excited and say, oh, that could be dark matter because they've eliminated everything else that they could imagine. But here's the thing. So about two years ago, they came out with a big press release and they were all excited.

and we think we found a smudge of light and we think it's dark matter. And then just like three or four days ago, they came out, well, no, on second thought, no, it can't be dark matter. But we think it might be dark energy. And so the reason I'm telling you this is that these experiments. Yeah, there is because these are experiments that have become so expensive that these scientists feel pressured to come out with a headline now and again in order to keep it funding. But the larger point I'm making here is that even in physics, and this is hardcore what we call high energy experimental physics, which is what I initially was trained to be at Cornell.

Even in hardcore physics, faith plays a role because you have to have faith in this detector. You have to have faith that what you believe, what you call dark matter actually exists. So I spent an entire chapter called having faith in physics, and that's just even the tip of the iceberg. But there's an indication of when you set out to be a physicist and you set out to find something like dark matter, which again you cannot see like that split brain patient. He can't see the frying pan, but he's able to perceive it subliminally somehow, right? And in the case of physics, it's the same thing. We're looking for something we can't see. By definition, dark matter is something we can't see.

But we have enough faith in the physics, in the quantum mechanics, and in the astrophysics that suggests to us that there's dark matter that we actually are willing to spend millions of dollars and hold ourselves in the middle of a mountain looking for it. Better them than me, let me tell you. Is there a hot dog cart in that mountain? Because I don't know, how do they eat? How do they get food into the heart of a mountain? Look, I joke around, but I love this stuff because, no kidding, in my book as atheism,

did I talk about the idea? People misunderstand what science is. Science, they act as though science is only what I can, you know, feel, touch, smell here, see. But the reality is, as you're suggesting, they are creating an imaginative paradigm. And they're saying, we think, we speculate, we intuit. something. We don't have any hard evidence, but we have this kind of other evidence, and we're going on that. And we believe eventually what we think will be borne out, or it might be born out,

but that is a kind of faith. You're quite right. The book is believing is seeing by Michael Gillen. By the way, Michael, I think he got that backwards. It should be seeing is believing. You should let your publisher know. We'll be right back. Hey, folks, Eric Mattaxas here. Joe Biden and the Democrats have laid out the most social agenda our country has ever seen. Instead of following President Trump's blueprint that had the economy booming, the Dems are going to raise taxes, increased regulations, and skyrocket an already outrageous national debt. If your retirement is in traditional investments, it is in jeopardy. Americans should be diversifying their investments with gold and precious metals. Gold gives you

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That's 866-473-6204. Hey, folks. I'm talking to Dr. Michael Gillen. The new book is Believing is seeing a physicist, that's Michael, explains how science shattered his atheism and revealed the necessity of faith. Michael, it's brave of you in many ways to be talking about faith and science the way you do, because so many people in the world of science are either openly and illogically hostile to discussions of faith, or they are, like many people, simply afraid to open their mouths. And so they stay quiet and they contribute to the problem by being quiet.

So thank you for all the books you've written and for what you do and say. and thanks for the new book Believing is Seeing. You mention mathematics in the book. Obviously, math is not a science, but they bear on one another. What do you say about math in the book? Math is the queen of the sciences, and it is widely perceived to be solidly founded on logic and has nothing whatsoever to do with faith.

So of all the sciences, physics, biology, astronomy, mathematics is generally perceived, and it's a misperception, but it's generally perceived as being 100% faith-free. And in this chapter that I call having faith in mathematics, I explain that even mathematics and even logic is founded on faith. And one of the examples I give is Euclid's geometry. You know, if you go back in history, Aristotle and Euclid were contemporaries, and Aristotle was just found, more than 2,000 years ago, was just starting to create the rules for logic, for logical reasoning. And I don't want to get into too much of the weeds, but nowadays in math, we call it a two-value crisp logic. But for most people, it's just logic.

Aristotelian logic for them is just logic. They don't know there are other kinds of logic. We can get into that if we have time. But anyway, so when Aristotle was creating his rules for logic, Euclid picked up on that. And what he did was he undertook really a monumental task. People think he invented geometry. He didn't invent geometry. There were already rules of thumb having to do with geometry, figuring out the area of something and studying the shapes and so forth.

So this is in the fourth century BC was Euclid. time, correct? Yes, right around then. I don't swear by fourth century. But yeah, right around in there, yes, third or fourth century, D.C. So we're talking about more than 2,000 years ago. Fourth century BCC. Yeah, so what do you think of it this way.

When Euclid was alive and Aristotle was alive, there were a lot of little puzzle pieces. So think of the little bits of geometry knowledge that existed back then as kind of disconnected puzzle pieces. And what Euclid did was to use the laws of. Verastilian logic to piece together all those puzzle parts and to create a coherent whole, which we now call Euclidean geometry. And after the Bible, more textbooks on Euclidean geometry have been sold than any other book. So it was a very important task.

Now, why am I telling you this? That's what I want to know. Why? Why? And why did I include it in the book? Because I just wanted to. No, just kidding. Because it illustrates something very important about the role of faith and math.

What most people don't understand is that Euryst euclid had to assume 33 axioms. These were 33 axiomatic beliefs. These were beliefs that he could not prove. He had to take them on faith. But if you take those 33 axiomatic beliefs on faith that you cannot prove, you can never prove, okay? then you can derive the whole of Euclidean geometry. So here is a perfect example of what I'm talking about when I say believing is seeing. Unless you are willing to believe in Euclid's 33 axioms,

you will never see the fruits of Euclidean geometry. You will never see the fruits of assuming or taking on faith those 33 axioms. So even in math, I explain, even in math then, you have to begin. even when you're out to be very logical and very reasonable, you have to always begin with certain assumptions with certain axiomatic beliefs you take on faith. And there's no avoiding it. Can you give us an example of one of those axioms that we might be able to understand? Is there an axiom that I might understand of those 33? Yeah. Yeah. And I list some in the book. But one of them would be adding equal quantities to equal quantities will result in

equal quantities. So if you have equal quantities to start with and you add equal quantities to each, you will end up with that. Now, that seems very confusing. Intuitively correct, but you can't prove that, right? I think your great learning has made you mad. But another one, and that's a simple one, but here's another one that actually ended up biting him in the behind. One of his axioms was parallel lines, extended, infinitely long, will remain parallel. Right. And that's one of the, that's one of the axiomatic beliefs. And again, he couldn't, Euclid couldn't prove that, but he assumed that to be true. Right. And it was always a kind

of a thorn in the side of Euclini and geometry. And then we later on discovered in the 19th century, that, that belief isn't necessarily so. And that gave rise to what we call curved geometries or Riemannian geometries. Again, I explain all that. all this in the book. But that's not right because you're assuming there's a fundamental assumption in making that statement that we're not talking about curved space. Folks, we're talking to Michael Gillen. It's not easy, but somebody has to do it. Okay? And I really just love talking to you, Michael. You know how much I do. It's called Believe. The book is believing, is seeing. This is terrific. We'll be right back.

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It's time to start getting the quality sleep we not only want but need. Go to MyPillow.com or call 1-800-978 3057. Use promo code Eric to take advantage of Mike's special offer on his standard MyPillow. That's MyPillow.com promo code Eric or 1-800-978-305.7.5. 7, my pillow.com promo code, Eric. Folks, I'm talking to Michael Gillen. Michael, you said earlier that there are numerous kinds of logic. So, like, there's standard what we consider logic, and you said there are other kinds of logic. Like, what would one of those other kinds of logic be?

Like, for example, what about what they call women's intermission? Is that a different kind of logic? No, I don't even touch that with a 10 footfall. No, no. There are actually a lot of different kinds of logic. We know that now. We didn't know that back in the time of Euclid. But for example, there's a three-value logic. So two-values, like I said a moment ago before the break, Aristotelian logic, which is what people, in other words, when ordinary people are talking, well, you're not being logical. Or, yeah, yeah, I'm being logical. They're talking about Aristotelian logic, which technically speaking, we call two-value crisp logic. What do I mean by that? two value means either something can be true or false. There's no in between. Chris, I'll explain that in a second. But there are three value logics where you allow for something to be true, false, or unsure. Okay. And then there is something called fuzzy logic, which actually is amazing, and it's a whole branch of mathematics. But fuzzy logic allows you to have infinite number of truth values from zero to 100. So something can be 12% true.

true, 35% true, 100% true. And actually, this kind of logic is used in automobiles with, what do you call those brakes that adjust when you hit the brakes? It calculates all kinds of things as to how hard it should actually, when you put your foot on the brake pedal, the computer using fuzzy logic decides how hard the brake pads should actually be applied. Would that be air brakes? No, air brakes is what they have in airplanes, I guess. Yeah, they're called anti-lock brakes. Anti-lock brakes. That's what I was trying to say.

So that's called fuzzy logic. So that's why we call Aristotelian logic to value because it's only true and false. And it's crisp because it doesn't allow this fuzziness. And so even when people are claiming to be logical, you really should ask them, well, what kind of logic are you actually using? See, there's just a lot of ignorance and misunderstanding about this kind of stuff. And when you say it, if you want to get put a little English on the ball, you say, what kind of logic are you using, Bub? Yes, yes, exactly.

Just to kind of give them a little push. Say, Bub. And the other thing, I'll add a little button to that, Eric, and that is if you interrogate modern mathematicians today, they'll just, they'll laugh at Aristotelian logic. They'll scoff at it. It's like the most infantile way of reasoning, actually. Yeah, but try, hey, but these guys that think they're so smart, go back into the fourth century BC and try to invent what you're mocking. Yeah, go ahead, go ahead, try it. Go on.

That's true. That's true. Michael, the book is believing is seeing, I know people can get it, but I just want you to know, even though we're trying to help you sell copies of this thing, I have never seen it. I've never seen a copy. And, Albin, has this ever happened before where a guest expects us to help them get their message out? but they haven't taken the trouble to put a book in the mail. You know what? Cut off his microphone. Law, it's on the way, right?

Cut off his microphone. Cut it off. It's enough. It's in the mail. It's kind of, I've heard that from Laurel before. Come on. We all know Laurel. No, seriously, you, this is the kind of thing. I just eat this up.

I cannot wait to get my hands on this book because it's important for us to know how tremendously rational faith is. And the more we learn from science, I mean, you're talking about some heavy stuff. I mean, what you were saying earlier about dividing the two brain hemispheres, really deep, heavy stuff. If you're open-minded, if you're not hostile to faith, it's going to lead you in the direction of faith. But a lot of people, they're just, they bought into what we call scientism. They don't even want to hear about anything that might lead them beyond the parameters of what they define as science. And it's a really weird bias.

I mean, it didn't exist, you know, before, I guess, before Darwin, it didn't exist strongly. And it just kind of came into the... Yeah, certainly it didn't exist in the time of the pioneers like Newton and Robert Hook and Descartes and all the people who were responsible putting together the scientific method. Here's the bottom line. You know, there are people who claim not to be people of faith. And what I explain in this book ultimately is that we are all people of faith. It is unavoidable.

Faith is unavoidable. It is the foundation of the entire human experience, the entire enchilada. The only question is, what do you have faith in? So that is ultimately the message of the book. And that is why when I explain how faith is the foundation of physics, astronomy, mathematics, a scientific method, on and on and on, There's no avoiding faith. You cannot be a person without faith. You do have faith whether you want to admit it or not.

And so the ultimate message of this book is that because of faith's prominent position in our lives, it is the mightiest force in the universe. And I explain, I elaborate on that. Everything we've talked about here, and I know you realize it is trying to condense down, you know, a 300-page book into just, you know, half-hour, whatever we have here, but I'm hoping that your listeners and your viewers will get a flavor of what I'm talking about. I'm just not happy enough to say, well, what is faith? Well, it's because I believe this or that. As a scientist, I wanted to understand. I wanted to take a deep dive into faith and truly understand it. And that's what I share in this book with the readers. Well, the idea of what you're talking about, I mean, in some ways, it's not complicated. You said it with Euclid, right?

In order to come up with Euclidean geometry, he had to assume 33 things. And you just said one of them, for example, that parallel lines, you know, projected into infinity never will never meet, will never diverge, they will remain parallel as they are. The reason you say we have to assume that is because there is no way, I guess nobody's ever discovered a way, of proving that point, nor the 32-1. other axioms. You have to take them, quote, unquote, on faith, but most people don't have any problem with that. They go, well, it seems self-evidence, so I will take it on faith. It seems somehow inherently evident. But according to that definition, you know, people who are really

hidebound in terms of science and logic, they would say, well, then I can't assume those things. And you're saying, well, we know. Well, yeah, but let me interrupt you because, yes, I gave you two very easy examples, very intuitive examples, but here's one that is not so easy to imagine, and that is one of others axioms is the definition of a mathematical point. Can we take that on the other side of the break? Hang on, folks. That's a heavy point to make, and even though it is weightless and massless. We'll be right back. You'll get cut out. Make like a little lamb and wham you're shorn. I tell you chum, it's Time to come blow your horn.

Hey there, folks. We're talking to Michael Gillen. Michael, you were just about to make a very heavy point about a point. Yeah, because I know the other two axioms that I gave you as illustrations of the axiomatic beliefs of Euclidean geometry, we're pretty easy, you know, adding equals to equals, give you equals. Yeah, it's pretty easy to understand. You know, parallel lines extended to infinity will never cross. That seems pretty intuitive.

but try this one on for size. One of his other 33 axioms was this, definition of a point. And by a point, he said it was something that had no length, width, or depth, that had no dimension whatsoever. And yet it was something real. Okay, now try to wrap your mind around that. And it's not just some, in other words, think about what I'm saying, Eric. I'm saying that Euclidean geometry, which has so much practical value, you, right, and is a huge

important branch of mathematics, one of the earliest, right, is founded on something you cannot even imagine a point that exists but has no dimension. Actually, let me ask you, but I still have to ask you this, and I don't want to cut you up, but I

just have to ask you. You say a point has no dimension. But we say that a line is two-dimensional, don't we? I'm sorry, a line is one-dimensional, a shape is two-dimensional, a shape is two- and a cube is three-dimensional. So you're right, a point by definition has no dimension,

and yet we couldn't do geometry without the concept of a point. So even that. You couldn't even calculate the area of your land without Euclidean geometry. And yet this Euclidean geometry, which has such down-to-earth value, is based on something that is surreal, that is something that is supernatural. The definition of a mathematical point is something supernatural, okay? And it even goes further than that because then it bleeds into physics, which is one of my specialties. And we use mathematical points all the time to describe an electron, to describe the singularity of a black hole, to describe the beginning of the universe.

So what is going on here? In other words, this supernatural concept that we're being asked to take on faith because we can't, even imagine it is the foundation of so much of our physics. And this is what I want the reader to contemplate that when we say physics is based on logic, yeah, it's based on logic, but logic itself is based on these supernatural axiomatic beliefs. That's ultimately what people need to understand. We only have a minute left. Have other people written about this in the past? I'm sure some have, but I can't really think of any offhand. Not that I know of, certainly not using this, what I just explained with Euclid's axiomatic beliefs

as far. I've never read it anywhere else. This is just something that I learned along the way, and I wanted to try to explain it to people. And so I came up with this explanation, which I record in the book. But I'll tell you, Eric, once you read the book, you will understand what I mean when I say, faith is the foundation of the entire human experience, and faith is the mightiest force in the universe. It's not metaphorical. It's not poetic. It is absolutely true. And in the book, I explain it. So you're saying we have to read the book, aren't you? Yes, sir. And yours is in the mail. You're implying that we've got to read this book, maybe even purchase a copy. I don't like that. Sounds fishy to me, Albin. No, this is such great stuff.

And this is really seminal foundational thinking that you're doing here because this is something that people just haven't gone in these directions. So it's wonderful. Michael, just so glad. Thank you. And we'll have you back. This is just too rich. We need to keep going. Thank you so much.

Hey there, folks. If you listen to this program, you know that I care about religious liberty and that I've been begging you to make a donation to the lines of ending freedom. Why? I think they are as good as it. gets. There are so many people being challenged in the area of religious liberty. They're fighting this battle for us. Let me be blunt. It's for us. Please go to the lines of ending freedom. I've got a phone number if you prefer to call. You can always call. Well, the website, of course, is metaxis talk.com. But the number is 855-5-47-53-33-855-547-53-33-8-5-5-4-7-53-33.

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