well welcome everybody to the night's
event my name is Laurie Roberts I am the
President of the United States here at
VCU the United States is a group of
atheists agnostics secular students
apparently the people in the back cannot
hear me can you hear me now good okay
like I was saying I'm Roy Roberts
president of the United secular Alliance
we are a student group dedicated to
promotion of secular ideals and I
provide and providing a community for
the non-religious students here at VCU I
would like to thank the Honors College
and the College of Humanities and
Sciences for their financial
contributions without which this event
could not have happened and I would like
to thank some certain individuals such
as Shelley Mount Joy which I'm here at
the moment
Anthony Ellis who Larry Mendoza and Dana
marks who I believe is manning a camera
at this moment for their help with
making this a possibility I would also
like to thank Dean
Timothy Halsey of the Honors College who
will be moderating this event and I will
yield the floor to him
Thank You Roy
and thanks to the VCU chapter of the
United secular Alliance for arranging
tonight's event good evening and thanks
to all of you for coming to what I am
absolutely certain will be a very
entertaining and informative evening
this evening as you all already know
we're honored to have Christopher
Hitchens and Frank Turek with us to
debate an ancient and modern question
does God exist there is perhaps no more
contentious issue that we could consider
accordingly this debate will follow
specific guidelines to begin each
speaker will have 20 minutes to make his
opening statement
dr. Turek will speak first since he
argues in the affirmative following the
opening statements each speaker will
have five minutes to rebut his opponent
followed by an opportunity to question
his opponent directly each speaker will
be allowed three questions of the other
with questions limited to one minute and
answers to five after the direct
questioning speakers will respond to
questions from the audience asked by me
from the cards that you were handed when
you entered the room as your questions
occur to you please write them on these
cards and at a point in the debate I'll
ask the ushers come forward and collect
them if you would pass them we will ask
as many of them as we have time to do
given the nature of tonight's debate it
is vitally important that everyone in
attendance act in accordance with the
highest standards of social behavior
anyone acting rudely or behaving disrupt
League disruptively rather will be
thrown out
really and now our speakers Frank Turek
is a speaker author columnist and
founder of cross examine org an
organization dedicated to preserving
rather to presenting evidence for the
Christian worldview at universities high
schools and churches he is a columnist
for Town Hall comm and is the co-author
of two books including I don't have
enough faith to be an atheist he has
appeared on numerous TV and radio
programs including The O'Reilly Factor
Hannity and combs and politically
incorrect with Bill Maher
dr. Turk has a doctorate in apologetics
from southern evangelical seminary in
Charlotte North Carolina at a master's
degree in public administration from
George Washington University where he
also taught courses in leadership and
management Christopher Hitchens is the
author of more than 10 books including
most recently God is not great how
religion poisons everything he is a
contributing editor to the INEC monthly
in Vanity Fair and has written
prolifically for American and English
periodicals including the nation the
London Review of Books
Granta Harper's Slate and The Washington
Post
he's a regular television and a radio
commentator appearing on hardball with
Chris Matthews the Charlie Rose show
Real Time with Bill Maher the Tavis
Smiley show and c-span's Washington
journal among others mr. Hitchens is
also taught as a visiting professor at
the University of California Berkeley
the University of Pittsburgh and the New
School for Social Research in Manhattan
now according to the rules of our debate
dr. Turek will make his opening comments
dr.
good evening ladies and gentlemen my
name is Frank Turk before I get started
let me ask you to ask you this how many
have heard me before or this is your
first time how many of you are here
tonight
how many do not respond to surveys three
out of 10 don't respond to surveys Dean
this is my first formal debate so give
me a little grace if I can't cram
everything I want to say into twenty
minutes I will say however I've had many
informal debates most of them with my
wife and I have not fared very well
there I will say however that she is
probably the perfect sparring partner
for Christopher Hitchens because her
nickname at our house is nails and nails
is the type of woman that if she ain't
happy ain't nobody in the house happy so
hopefully I'm prepared for a very
formidable opponent in Christopher
Hitchens and I do want to say that I
very much like Christopher Hitchens I've
been following him for many years I'm
kind of a political junkie so I've seen
him around quite a bit and I appreciate
his charm and his wit and I agree with
him on a lot of things obviously not the
issue of god that would make a very
boring debate but I will say that I went
up to Christopher just about a half-hour
ago and I shook his hand I said
Christopher I'm actually a fan and he
smiled and he said the night is young
I want to I want to thank the United
secular Alliance I want to thank Daniel
Pendergrass where's Daniel you here
Daniel he was my contact here I also
want to thank Dean Tim Timothy Halsey I
also want to thank of course Christopher
for doing this debate I think it's
impossible not to like Christopher and
as I mentioned I do he's carrying the
cross for atheism and he carries it very
well tonight I'm going to carry the
cross for theism and I want to point out
that I think we're both trying to
explain the world around us we both have
the burden of proof to explain why
reality is the way it is I have to show
how reality is best explained by theism
and Christopher has to explain how
reality is best explained by atheism and
I think we should follow the evidence
where it leads I think that the evidence
we see all around us and within us leads
to a spaceless timeless immaterial
personal powerful intelligent moral
creator ie what we would call a theistic
God and this creator created this
universe and the life within us or the
life within it I should say now I'm
going to try and summarize my 450 page
book at least the first 200 pages of it
in the next 20 minutes or next 18
minutes at this point now and that is an
impossible task that would be about 20
pages a minute actually I probably can
do it because I'm originally from New
Jersey see I speak it 150 words a minute
with Gustav 350 so if I go a little
quick and you want to see more of the
evidence please get the book I don't
have enough faith to be atheist and I
want to point out that all the proceeds
from the sale of the book will go to
feed needy children mine okay see I've
got three sons the oldest two are in
college right now so I need a little
help and one of them is sitting right
over here all right Christopher on page
282 of God is not great available at
fine bookstores everywhere says this
thanks to the telescope and the
microscope religion no longer offers an
explanation for anything important I
think that is exactly
wrong I think due to the telescope in
the microscope we are seeing evidence
that leads directly to God I'm going to
give you three major arguments for this
and then I'm going to give you four more
that are a result I think of a theistic
worldview and spend most of my time on
the three and then I'll just mention the
last four the three are the cosmological
argument from the beginning of the
universe the next one is the
teleological argument from the design of
the universe and the design of life and
the third is the moral argument let's
start with the cosmological argument and
this is basically the argument from the
Big Bang that the universe had a
beginning if it had a beginning it must
have had a beginner now for some reason
Christians are afraid of the Big Bang
I'm not afraid of the Big Bang I believe
in the Big Bang I just think I know who
banged it now
the evidence for the Big Bang is good
I'm going to give you evidence in an
acronym Serge su are GE I'm not going to
spend a lot of time on it because I
think even Christopher in his book on
page 65 says the Big Bang is the
accepted origin of e of the universe
S stands for the second law of
thermodynamics that the universe is
running down as that Sun is up there it
is burning out ultimately we will go to
heat death as Christopher has said in
his book well if the universe is eternal
that Sun would have burned out a long
time ago but since the Sun is still up
there and we still have energy here the
universe must have had a beginning the
second law of thermodynamics also says
that ordered things go toward dis order
it affects the this school we have to
paint the walls we have to put gas in
our car the second law of thermodynamics
also affects us as human beings when you
get older the second law of
thermodynamics is is seen by the fact
that we all get dressed or diseased
that's when our chest falls into our
drawers see that's the second law of
thermodynamics the UN surge is the fact
that the universe is expanding
discovered by Edwin Hubble in 1929
Hubble deduced that if the universe is
expanding if you watched everything in
Reverse you would see it collapse back
to a point mathematically and logically
to nothing so the universe exploded into
being out of nothing the G stands for
the great galaxies R stands for the
radiation echo discovered by accident by
Penzias and Wilson two scientists
working at Bell Labs in Holmdel New
Jersey they
discovered basically the radiation
afterglow or the remnant heat from the
initial Big Bang explosion the heat is
still out there it's just a couple of
degrees above absolute zero now good
theories predict predict future
discoveries and they said if the
radiation afterglow is out there and the
Big Bang really did occur we ought to
find very fine temperature variations
among the radiation afterglow so they
set up a satellite in 1989 to circle the
earth it's called a Kobe space satellite
to measure this radiation afterglow and
for three years they found nothing until
they tuned their instruments just a
little bit more precisely and found that
there were temperature variations in the
radiation afterglow and they were down
to one part in 100,000 George Smoot the
leader of the expedition said if you're
religious it's like looking at God
Stephen Hawking said this is the
greatest discovery of cosmology perhaps
the greatest discovery of all time those
temperature variations allowed galaxies
to ultimately form so we could
ultimately be here the Ian surd stands
for Einstein's theory of general
relativity which says time space and
matter are Co relative you can't have
space without time you can't have time
without space and matter
and in effect it says that the universe
came into existence with space and time
together in other words once there was
no time once there was no space once
there was no matter and then bang out of
nothing the universe exploded into being
what is nothing Aristotle had a good
definition of nothing he said nothing is
what rocks dream about nothing there was
no thing there was not positive and
negative energy as Isaac Asimov has said
there is not a vacuum there was not
swirling mathematical points as dr.
Atkins has said from Oxford there was
nothing what rocks dream about which
means that the universe exploded into
being all space all matter all time out
of nothing and several scientists have
pointed this out Stephen Hawking said
almost everyone now believes that the
universe and time itself had a beginning
at the Big Bang agnostic astronomer
Robert Jastrow the man who sits in Edwin
Hubble's chair or who did until February
when he died he was an agnostic he sat
at Mount Wilson and looked through
telescope he wrote a book in 1978 called
God and the astronomers and here's what
jestro wrote or here's what he said
actually in an interview he said
astronomers now found they painted
themselves into a corner because they
have proven by their own methods that
the world began abruptly in an act of
creation to which you can trace the
seeds of every star every planet every
living thing on in this cosmos and on
the earth and they have found that all
this has happened as a product of forces
they cannot hope to discover that there
are what I or anyone would call
supernatural forces at work is now I
think a scientifically proven fact why
isn't it agnostic astronomers saying
supernatural forces are at work
why couldn't nature have created the
universe because there was no nature
there was nothing what rocks dream about
and then the entire space-time continuum
left into existence if it's not a
natural cause by definition it must be a
supernatural cause something beyond the
natural in fact Arthur Eddington the
contemporary of Einstein who was an
expert in general relativity said quote
the beginning seems to present
insuperable difficulties unless we
agreed to look on it as frankly
supernatural so the cosmological
argument leaves us with one question
either no one created something out of
nothing or someone created something out
of nothing the atheistic view is no one
created something out of nothing the
theistic view is someone created
something out of nothing which view is
more reasonable I think Julie Andrews
had it right nothing comes from nothing
nothing ever could that's the
cosmological argument the teleological
argument the design argument actually
has two arguments contained within it it
is the argument from design and there
are dozens of factors about the universe
that are precisely died of design for
the existence of the universe and life
so not only did the universe explode
into being out of nothing it did so with
incredible precision Stephen Hawking has
noted that the universe would not exist
if there was a decrease in the expansion
rate one second after the Big Bang by
only one part in 100,000 million million
this led Hawking to conclude it would be
very difficult
to explain why the universe should have
begun in just this way except as an act
of God who intended to create beings
like us not only is it designed in terms
of its expansion but the gravitational
force is so precise if you change the
gravitational force by one part in 10 to
the 40 nothing would exist what's one
part in 10 to the 40 stretch a tape
measure across the entire known universe
set gravity at 1 inch on that anywhere
on that tape measure
if you move gravity the force of gravity
one inch in either direction we don't
exist
there's also factors about our universe
in particular our solar system that
cannot be explained unless there's a
designer behind it for example the earth
rotation 24 hours just right if it was a
little bit more a little bit less we
wouldn't be here the axial tilt 23 and
1/2 degrees just right change that a
little bit we're not here the Jupiter
being in its current orbit if Jupiter
wasn't there we'd bump up be bombarded
with space material why because Jupiter
acts as a cosmic vacuum cleaner it
attracts all the cosmic space junk to it
rather than us there are a number of
other factors I don't have time to get
into but Arno Penzias the man who
co-discovered the are in surge the
radiation afterglow said this astronomy
leads us to a unique event a universe
which was created out of nothing one
with the very delicate balance needed to
provide exactly the right conditions
required to permit life and one which as
an underlined one might say and one
which has an underlying one might say
super natural plan a friend of
Christopher a theist Stephen Weinberg
who is an atheist put it this way life
as we know it would be impossible if any
one of several physical quantities had
slightly different values so not only is
the universe precisely tweaked and by
the way there would be no life unless
the universe was precisely fine-tuned as
I just mentioned but life itself is
designed let me take you to your
breakfast table for just a second
suppose you wanted to have a bowl
alphabet cereal you're a teenager and
you come down
ere's have bowl alphabet cereal and you
see the alphabet cereals knocked over
and the letters from the alphabet cereal
are spelled out on the placemat and it
spells take out the garbage mom what are
you going to assume cat knock the box
over earthquake shook the house or are
you going to say no that's intelligent
design from an intelligent being
or let's say you're laying out on the
beach and you see in the clouds drink
Coke what're you going to assume unusual
cloud formation no you're going to say
there has to be a skywriter up there
even if you didn't see and why because
messages oh we only come from mines well
it turns out there's a message in all
life called DNA we all know about it all
life has a message
I have DNA you have DNA a banana has DNA
in Darwin's day it was not known how
incredibly complex simple so-called
simple life is and they thought that
maybe simple life could come together
without intelligent intervention and
ultimately natural selection could take
over it's the theory of macro evolution
I'm sure you've heard of it from the goo
duv of the zoo from the infantile to the
reptile to the crocodile to the Gentile
that's the theory of macro evolution the
problem is is that now we know that this
intelligent life couldn't have come
together by natural laws because we now
know that the simplest life has the
amount of specified complexity or
information and in terms of DNA about
thousand complete sets of Encyclopedia
Britannica now who is that according to
not a Christian not a theist
that's according to Richard Dawkins from
his book blind watchmaker I think it's
page 116 now to believe that that
resulted by natural laws like believing
that the Library of Congress resulted
from an explosion in a printing shop see
I don't have enough faith to believe
that so life appears to be designed in
fact Antony flew who was a atheist a
very prominent atheist but recently
became a theist or at least a deist as a
result of this evidence said it is
impossible for evolution to account for
the fact that one single cell can carry
more data than all the volumes of the
Encyclopedia Britannica put together it
now seems to me that the findings of
more than 50 years of DNA research have
provided materials for a new and
enormous ly powerful argument from
design how am i doing on time Dean five
minutes okay thank you
it design is so prevalent that even
people like Francis Crick the
co-discoverer of DNA sir Fred Hoyle who
can who coined the term Big Bang in a
derisive way are now or were proponents
of panspermia seeds everywhere in other
words that life got deposited here by
aliens which is just kind of a
backhanded way of saying that there's no
way we know how life came by natural
causes here there must be aliens out
there that brought it here which of
course just puts the question off one
more step where did the aliens come from
right there's a lot more on the design
argument but I'm running out of time
here let me just give you one quote from
Chandra Wickramasinghe who is a student
of Sir Fred Hoyle
he said the emergence of life from a
primordial soup on earth is merely an
article of faith sir Fred Hoyle said a
common sense interpretation of the facts
suggests that a super intellect has
monkeyed with physics as well as
chemistry and biology and that there are
no blind forces worth speaking about in
nature so cosmological argument
teleological argument now let's move on
to the moral argument if there is no God
you can't say that decapitating a man on
a bus is objectively morally wrong
that's just your opinion as Dostoevsky
said if there is no God everything is
permitted now I want to be very clear
here I'm not saying that a theist can't
know morality they do I'm not saying
that a theist can't be moral they can
I'm not saying that believing in God
makes you more moral as Christopher has
pointed out and as they say I agree with
much of what he writes here I'm not
saying that religious people are
necessarily better than atheist that's
not the argument the argument is is that
there's no way to say that a given act
is moral or immoral unless there's a
standard beyond humanity it's not just
my opinion it's not just Christopher's
opinion or Mother Teresa's or Hitler's
there's a standard beyond everybody that
defines what is right that standard is
God's very
nature since objective moral laws exist
there must be an objective moral
lawgiver you say no there doesn't need
to be any moral lawgiver if there's a
prescription there must be a prescriber
if you go to the pharmacist and say here
I'd like you to fill this prescription
and the pharmacist says who prescribed
it you go nobody are you going to get
your prescription no now there's again
there's a lot more on the moral argument
maybe we can talk about a little bit
during the QA but what can we learn from
these three arguments for God we can
learn from the cosmological argument
that this beam must be spaceless
timeless and immaterial why because it
created space-time and material it must
also be powerful why because it created
out of nothing must be personal why
because you can't go from a state of
non-existence to a state of existence
without making a choice and only
personal beans make choices impersonal
forces do not it must be intelligent why
because it created in such a highly
designed razor's edge way it must be
moral why do to the moral argument and
of course it must be a creator these
attributes are the attributes of what
the Bible would call God let me sum up
what agnostic astronomer Robert Jastrow
said after going through evidence like
this he said for the scientist who has
lived by his faith in the power of
reason remember he's the agnostic the
story ends like a bad dream he has
scaled the mounts of ignorance he's
about to conquer the highest peak as he
pulls himself up with a final rock he's
greeted by a band of theologians who've
been sitting there for centuries two
more minutes take three thank you sir
those are the three main arguments now
I'd like to say there's four additional
truths about the universe that are
better explained by theism than by
atheism first of all reason in the laws
of logic Christopher is a self-described
materialist but if atheism is true we
have no grounds to know it because
reason and thoughts are just chemical
reactions in the brain how can you have
even Einstein believed this Einstein was
a determinist how can you trust what
Christopher says if it's just chemical
reactions going on in his brain and
chemical reactions in our brain see
chemicals don't reason they react now
I'm not saying there's no connection
between our thinking and chemicals there
is but if it's nothing but chemicals how
can we trust them
even Darwin recognized this it's called
Darwin's doubt he said if we are just
the product materially of primates why
shy to even why should I even trust
anything much less my theory of natural
selection so the next major reason is
the laws of mathematics science depends
on the notion that the universe is
rational and mathematical at all levels
but how does rationality and mathematics
arise from randomness how do they come
from matter rationality and mathematics
are the product of mind not matter so
you got reason in the laws of logic the
laws of mathematics and then number
seven or seven in my list here three in
the edition human freedom and the
ability to make choices Christopher is
somebody who is very concerned about
human free and about freedom as I am but
again if we are just molecules in motion
how do we have human freedom William
provine from Cornell he's the
materialist of Darwinist he points out
that we don't have any human freedom if
all we are is molecules in motion now
Christopher ought not scold anybody for
being a snake handling bible-thumping
fundamentalist Preacher
because according to his own worldview
that person is that way because these
are just chemicals going on in his brain
neither could you say that Hitler had
done anything wrong if it's just
chemicals going on in his brain I mean
what is the murder molecule how much
does justice weigh these are questions
that have no answer in a materialistic
worldview but that is Christopher's
worldview it seems to me that it makes
much more sense to say that reason and
laws of logic mathematics and human
freedom come from a great mind that
granted us these immaterial realities
the final argument is consciousness do
you know that a heap of sand and a human
brain have the same elements why are
some carbon-based molecules conscious
and others are not materialists have no
answer for this Daniel Dennett another
person who would agree with Christopher
on many things he's a materialist says
that consciousness is in a
lucien because he's a materialist you're
not really witnessing right net this
right now you it's just an illusion
now one wonders if he was conscious when
he wrote this but again there is no
explanation for this in an atheistic
worldview now I have a couple other
arguments on the bench but I don't have
time to get to them let me just sum up
in one minute we need to take all this
data in context not just one argument
but all of them what is the best
explanation Christopher has to explain
these eight truths about the universe
from an atheistic perspective he must
explain how the universal rose from
nothing how extreme fine-tuning and
design rose from chaos how life arose
from non-life how morality arose from
materials how reason in the laws of
logic arose from matter how mind arose
from mud how mathematics arose from
molecules how human freedom arose from
blind repetitive forces and how
consciousness arose from chemicals if he
can't give evidence to explain these
truths about reality from an atheistic
perspective if he's just going to state
unsupported speculative possibilities
that rely on faith then I think theism
is a more reasonable worldview thank you
for your attention I appreciate
Thank You dr. Turk will not have 20
minutes from mr. hitches at his opening
State
Thank You mr. chairman thank you ladies
and gentlemen for coming thank you dr.
turret for that very spirited opening to
the evening I should say first it's a
great honor to be in the capital of the
great state of Virginia I'm a in a small
way a biographer of Thomas Jefferson and
his memorial as you know omitted
dimension of his presidencies and vice
presidencies and preferred to focus on
his work at the University and his
authorship of the Virginia statute on
religious freedom which is the embryo
and basis of the First Amendment to our
Constitution which makes this the only
country in the world that has ever
decided that God and constitutional
matters should be separated and it's in
defense partly of a civilizational
impulse that I rise this evening to
satirize the idea that we're here by
somebody else's permission and owe that
person an explanation which is what it
is to be atheist if not a dears to say
Lyrae I almost never watch television
and I'm usually glad that I do but now
I'm glad that I sometimes I'm forced by
my daughter to watch Family Guy because
you may possibly have seen the moment
when the chubby father comes down in the
morning and looks at his cereal in the
bowl
accepting your some one of your more
sophisticated challenges and he says it
says woo
and it's always says there's a Cheerios
but I accept the ontological challenge
and I accept it in this way the answer
to the question which with with which we
confront ourselves tonight or are
confronted if you prefer does God exist
is to me yes it does it must do it must
do because it is so real to those who do
believe in it there are people of whom
it may be said that for them God does
exist I've become perfectly persuaded of
this by now there is no form of
persuasion that would make me assent to
this proposition some of us are born we
are born to in answer to Blaise Pascal's
own problem the one that made him write
his plan say and addressed them to those
who are so made that they cannot believe
those of us to whom almost everything
that dr. Troy just said would be the
mere equivalent of white noise I suppose
it's my job deceive you to explain on to
logically how that is the case perhaps
I'll do it by a force of example
recently very recently that as little go
in time as last year the Vatican
announced that limbo the destination of
the unbaptized child soul no longer
exists there is no such place
Saint Augustine was in error it appears
in sending so many children at least the
souls of so many are baptized children
to this destination for so long
among the comments that I heard about
this one the mildest actually was that
of a woman raised in the Catholic faith
whose child had died before baptism
could take place who had for many years
believed that that's where her own
baptized child had gone and she said
they can't tell me that place doesn't
exist it's been as real to me as
anything possibly could be for so long
they have no right to tell me now that
this no longer is it ontologically limbo
exists for those who believe in it just
as God does I'm not here to deny
that it's only a few decades now since
the rival church Church of Rome the
Church of England announced really no
one actually goes to hell it could be
that after you die or forbidden God's
grace but there's no real place of
eternal unending infinite torture and
torment with which those who claim the
grace of God in the redemption of Jesus
made a living for so many years and how
do they make their living by lying to
children think of it hundreds and
hundreds of years of people proudly
earning their keep by lying to children
and terrifying them and saying that
because they could do that they were
morally superior to us reason common
sense decent ordinary decency rebels
against this kind of mind forged manacle
however charmingly or humorously it's
expressed but hell exists in the minds
of several people I've spoken to you
just today on this campus in the in the
intervals of other conversations for
them it's real and I don't say that it's
not what I want to show is that it can
if it does exist nonetheless be
abolished like many other mine forged
manacles and manmade tyrannies that
confront us and in fact that this belief
in a supreme and unalterable tyranny is
the oldest enemy of our species the
oldest enemy of our intellectual freedom
and our moral autonomy and must be met
and must be challenged and must be
overthrown I want to argue for nothing
less than that it's actually rather
wonderful isn't it the religious
authorities used to say they were
infallible say just take the last Pope
just the last I know I'm not talking
with the Catholic apologist this evening
but nonetheless the church when people
say the church they know which one they
mean they mean the one in Rome the one
where when Stephen Hawking was invited
and was asked at the conference on the
church and science is there anything
he'd like to see in Rome while he was
there he said he'd like to see the
records of the trial of Galileo
don't please be invoking mr. Hawking by
the way as if he was a deist
the last pope just in the last decade of
his tenure apologized he said we were
wrong about the Jewish Question we
probably shouldn't have said for so long
the Jews were responsible for the murder
of Christ we were probably wrong in
forced conversion of the peoples of the
Indies as they were thought of the
Isthmus and the Southern Cone of our
hemisphere we were certainly wrong we
owe an apology to the Muslims for the
atrocities of the Crusades we are an
apology to the Eastern Orthodox churches
for the incredible butchery to which
they our fellow Christians were
subjected by us the Roman Catholic and
we probably only polled you to the
Protestants for saying and so many awful
things about them and torturing and
burning and killing them too so having
now said we were completely wrong and
completely cruel and completely sadistic
and completely violent and retarded
human civilization for that many
centuries in that many countries and
continents
we're quit and now we can go back to
being a fallible all over again there
are there are people who on faith will
accept being spoken to in that tone of
voice and in that way but I ladies and
gentlemen and not one of them and I
don't think there's any form of
persuasion that should allow you to be
spoken to as if you were serfs or slaves
either proceeding with the ontology with
which I began the Aquinas point that if
you can conceive of something whether
it's a ghost a phantasm or deity if you
can conceive of something it is in some
sense real if it's real in your mind and
showing with the obvious fallacy that
has always attended that is it
nonetheless possible for an atheist to
say it proclaimed atheists to say as I
do
proclaim myself to be that God
positively can be said not to exist no
it's a very common misunderstanding
about my fraternity sorority I'll just
take a moment to clear it up the atheist
says no persuasive argument for the
existence of God has ever been advanced
or adduced without convincing rebuttal
that no argument in favor stats or has
been found to stand the test of
we cannot say that we know that there
could be no such entity among other
things we are too reverent of the
extraordinary time of discovery
innovation pushing back of the frontiers
of knowledge and and understanding
that's taking place just in our own time
to make any such remark but by saying
this we say I think quite a lot there is
no valid or coherent or consistent
argument that would not work if it comes
to that for the existence of any God now
I noticed it was a by a slight work of
elision a bit of tap dancing there the
doctor turret went from being a deist to
a theist and then from being a theist to
a Christian now I know he does not
believe in the existence of the Sun God
raah I'm practically certain he doesn't
believe in the existence of Zeus if
you'll pick up a copy of my portable
atheist a selection of the finest
writings by non-believers Charlie isn't
just turn to the three pages where
Menken HL Mencken lists the easiest to
name 3000 gods that used to be
worshipped and that no longer a hell to
exist by anybody you'll spare me the
trouble of reading them out no he thinks
he doesn't just know dr. Torah that
there is a God he knows which one is the
right one from a potentially infinite
list actually from the list that's as
long as the number of people there are
or have ever been in the human species
because if you ever argue with a theist
or a deus as I do every day you'll find
they all believe in a God of their very
own do they often say a personal God
indeed they often say a personal Savior
so out of out of what are we really a
concept that applies to all of us out of
nothing but wish thinking and nonsense
and fear and ignorance and above all and
I'm not quitting on this point servility
everyone in this room is an atheist
everyone can name a God in which they do
not believe let them advance the case
that the one in which they believe is
the superior one dr. torrid be the first
person I've ever met to do that
convincingly this evening and I will
show him due respect I don't think the
task can actually be undertaken now the
same trap dancing hopes you will not
notice but deism and theism are two
quite different things the Deus argument
says that there is so much order
apparent in nature and in the cosmos in
the universe that it might be unwise to
assume that such order has no-one
interested in ordering or design that
assumption might be a nun might be not
Safeway the philosopher Paley in his
natural theology said desire implies a
designer he came up with the very famous
image of the watch if you come across
watch if you're a primitive tribes
person in the Sahara you may not know
what it's for but you know there's not a
rock or a vegetable you know it has a
purpose and someone made it that way
until quite recently that was the
default position of most intelligent
people including mr. Jefferson who
despite his intermittent atheism my
judgment was a theist I'm so sorry it
was a deist was a deist he would debate
with among the many skills he had was a
very advanced level of paleontology he
would debate with the greatest
paleontologists of his time the Cantor
before how how comes it how can it be
that we find seashells so high on the
mountains of Virginia how can this be
not even the most intelligent people of
that day and it's very recent it's an
instant in historical time had any idea
how that could be there isn't anyone in
this room who wasn't educated and
brought up knowing exactly how that is
it's just a shame that Jefferson and
many other intelligent and humane and
will education literate people just
couldn't see that far he wasn't to know
though Darwin was born in his day on the
same day actually in 1809 as Abraham
Lincoln the very same day the two great
emancipator's Darwin being in my
judgment the greater of the two now we
know we know this proposition to be true
the proposition that was ridiculed so so
pathetically I have to say I thought by
dr. Tory there is no explanation for the
origins of our species
for the origins of our cosmos for the
origins of our globe itself there is not
one explanation left which requires the
existence of a deus ex machina in every
case we have a better or sufficient
explanation I think that assertion of
mine will stand any challenge this
evening I'm looking forward to hearing
some more of them of course jawan used
creationist images he actually set out
to vindicate Paley's theology thought he
could do it by his study taxonomical
study of nature Einstein we have used
God images when he spoke of the
extraordinary majesty
of the cosmos it's it's it's in us it's
in our vocabulary it's hardwired in us
you might almost say to use images of
all inspiring godly modes Archean you
might you might say or even
Shakespearean images when talking about
these things but when we come down to
the actual analysis of them we find that
we don't need the prime mover at all and
that most of the prime mover
explanations if not all of them have
been positively misleading so that the
deist may propose a designer and I may
not be able to show you convincing you
that there could be no such person
but the theist has all their works still
ahead of them from this designer how do
we get to the designer who answers
prayers
did you hear a thing I mean just as
phrase even an implication even a
suggestion from anything my opponent
said that you could by I know him from
design proven answered prayers or prove
that someone born of a virgin was
therefore the son of a god or could
prove that resurrections occur and that
by people being tortured to death
thousands of years ago we are now
redeemed that we are variously forgiven
our own offenses by human sacrifice how
does deism help you to that it doesn't
it quite simply doesn't and can not
the attempt to build from one to the
other is a conjuring trick of a very
vulgar I think kind we live in the
childhood of our species so when Stephen
Hawking says that if we could understand
the event horizon that surrounds the
black hole we would in some sense know
the mind of God he proves that our
vocabulary is still that of our infancy
he makes no concession to the idea of a
theist or theocratic dispensation I
better ask now harm doing for time good
not sure I'm going to need all that but
I'd like to try and reply and fight on
my feet when I can't and I made some
notes about about what dr. Turek had
said and I feel that they were
challenges to me that I would be ignoble
if I didn't respond to the first and I
thought the most frankly the most
egregious was this I find it
extraordinary that it can be said on a
university campus in this year of grace
but that without God humans are capable
of doing anything that there is no moral
restraint upon us if we don't concur in
the idea that we are the property and
creation of a Supreme Being I am making
the assumption that all of you check in
every now and then with some kind of
news outlet and have a view of what's
going on the rest of the world isn't it
as plain as could be that those who
commit the most callous the most cruel
the most brutal the most indiscriminate
atrocities of all do so precisely
because they believe they have divine
permission shall I answer my own
question should i insult you by adding
more who can't think of an example of
this kind let me put the question in
another form that I've put in now every
forum from YouTube to c-span to the
wireless to the print to the radio to
the television and it numeral forums to
those who say that without God that can
be no morality you are to ask yourself
two questions you were to name a moral
action not to take it
or a moral and ethical statement made by
believer by daresay you can do it you
were then to say that you can not
imagine a non-believer
making this moral statement or
undertaking this moral action can you
think can you now think can any of you
think you have don't have to answer now
you have all night and and you have my
email and I've done this with everyone
from the Archbishop of Canterbury to
even lower people you name me the
ethical and moral actual statement that
a believer can make in an unbeliever
cannot that there's a price and I'll
tell you that about it later now there's
a second question
think of something wicked that only a
believer would be likely to do or
something wicked that only a believer
would be likely to say you've already
thought of it the suicide bombing
community is entirely religious the
genital mutilation community is entirely
religious I wouldn't say that the child
abuse community is entirely religious I
wouldn't but it's bidding to be entirely
religious it operates on the old latin
slogan no childs behind left
how dare anybody how dare anyone who
speaks for religion a say of us the
secular and the non-believers that we
are the immoral ones it is itself a
wicked thing to say itself an absolutely
indefensible thing to say no the
decapitation on the bus is going to be
done by someone who thinks God is
telling him to do it Smerdyakov is
actually the stupidest character in
Dostoyevsky's novel he's the one who
makes this proposition everyone has to
understand everyone has to understand
that it is those who feel that the
divine is prompting them who feel
they're permitted anything and
everything and it is those who are the
leading most salient most violent most
vicious opponents of the values and
civilization that Thomas Jefferson stood
for and promulgated just on the question
of fine tuning I have a number of
reports we have to postpone some of the
the naturalistic questions for later
what I know they'll come up again
you mentioned Edwin Hubble and the way
that he saw the red light shift and saw
that the universe was not just expanding
but that the but expanding very fast
away from itself that the Big Bang had
not stopped Lawrence Krauss great
physicists probably the next Nobel Prize
winner if it has noticed that most
people's assumption was wrong that
though this expansion was taking place
it was thought the rate of speed of the
expansion must surely be declining
people still think in Newtonian terms in
this way no says Krauss he's pointed it
out and now it's agreed by all no the
Hubble rate of red light shift is
increasing the universe is dissipating
itself at high speed and the speed is
getting greater what does this mean well
it answers the question of why is there
something instead of nothing because now
we have something we're all here because
there's something and nothing is coming
right for us very soon the physicist
wouldn't be able to tell the Big Bang
had ever taken place so far sprung apart
will the whole system be and meanwhile
look in the sky at night and you can see
the Andromeda galaxy headed straight for
on a direct collision course who
designed that who made it certain that
every other planet in our solar system
is either too hot or too cold to support
life as is most of our own planet and
that in just one tiny irrelevant solar
system already condemned to heat death
and implosion some design wouldn't you
say but these are just the poll Turing
minor objections that I have to the
theistic worldview the main one is the
one with which I began religion fears
I'm not dear some fearsome and I
underline theism says that all our
manifold problems what is the good how
shall we live it how shall we know it
how to explain suffering how to how to
confront the possibility of our own
perhaps molecular irrelevance all these
questions that must disturb and detain
us all can be solved by referring them
upward to a totalitarian judgment to an
absolutist monarchy the other thing that
the Virginia statute on religious
freedom was supposed to rebut repudiated
disown it yes I promise you those things
there is no totalitarian solution to
these problems
there is no Big Brother in the sky it is
a horrible idea that there is somebody
who owns us who makes us who supervises
us waking and sleeping who knows our
thoughts who can convict us of thought
crime who can just for what we think who
can judge us while we sleep for things
that might occur to us in our dreams who
can create us sick as apparently we are
and then order us on pain of eternal
torture to be well again to demand this
to wish this to be true is to wish to
live as an abject slave it is a
wonderful thing it is a wonderful thing
in my submission that we now have enough
information enough intelligence and I
hope enough intellectual and moral
courage to say that this ghastly
proposition
is founded on a lie and to celebrate
that fact and I invite you to join me in
doing so thank you
Thank You mr. Hitchens we now have five
minutes of rebuttal from dr. Turek
fairness to Christopher that statement
obviously was his opening statement was
not meant to rebut my statement but now
my statement is to rebut his and I want
to point out that most of what
Christopher just said there is pretty
much complaints about religion and
religious people and has no impact on
whether or not God exists
religious people can be the worst people
that ever lived that says nothing about
whether or not God exists people can do
evil that doesn't mean the parents don't
exist children can do evil doesn't mean
the parents don't exist my kids do evil
but I'm still here
I do evil my dad's still here in fact
he's sitting right there what does that
prove about whether or not God exists
let me try and go down some of the
things Christopher said yes I am an
atheist when it comes to Zeus but Zeus
is not spaceless timeless immaterial
powerful moral personal intelligent
creator that I hopefully at least I
thought I gave evidence for and maybe
Christopher will come back to my
statements on that later I don't believe
in Zeus because I don't think there's
any evidence for Zeus but I think
there's evidence for the theistic God
deism I didn't make the direct shift to
theism I probably should have been more
explicit
I think it's obvious there's a theistic
God because life came several billion
years after the creation that is not a
deistic concept that is a theistic
concept I didn't say anything about
Christianity
even though I am a Christian I don't
have time to defend Christianity here
I'd love to debate Christopher on the
issue of Christianity in the future and
I'll publicly offer that right now if he
wants to debate whether or not the New
Testament documents are reliable and
tell us really what happened about what
Jesus came and said and did I'd be happy
to do it but when I mentioned before I
have a couple arguments in on the bench
I've got almost a full baseball team of
arguments here I've got a couple
arguments on the bench it's the
resurrection is one of them and I don't
have time to get to that here so I'm not
backing up the Christian God here I'm
backing up a theistic God even though
personally I do believe in a Christian
God
he claimed Darwin was the greater man
dissipater and that he went on to talk
about atrocities and i think he again
missed my point as I said before I'm not
saying atheists can't be moral
Christopher what he says in his book
again much of it is true religious
people have done awful things in fact
Christianity predicts we'll be
hypocrites that's what the church is
it's full of hypocrites whenever
somebody says I don't want to go to
church there's too many hypocrites down
there I always say come on down pal we
got room for one more that's what the
church is we're all fallen we're all
sinners that's why we need a Savior
because we can't do it and Christopher
said well how can you command somebody
to be well when they have no capacity to
be well well we were well in the
beginning and I'm going into Christian
theology here I understand I'll just try
and answer the point we were well in the
beginning but then we messed up and so
God the Great Physician came back to
save us that's Christian theology as
again I don't have time to support it
I'm just pointing out that is the
theology now Christopher talked about
atrocities but again on the atheistic
worldview here's the main point how do
you define what an atrocity is who
defines it who has the authority to find
what atrocity is the carbon atom the
benzene molecule I'm not saying you have
to believe in God to be moral I'm not
saying that only religious people are
moral I'm not saying atheist can't be
moral I'm not saying atheists don't know
morality I'm saying there's no way to
justify what is right and what is wrong
unless there's some Authority that
provides it what is the authority in a
materialistic worldview there is no
authority the carbon atom has no moral
authority over you and it seems that
Christopher goes on and on about how he
does not want to be under any some kind
of divine totalitarianism that is a
moral rejection of God where does he
come up with this immoral
totalitarianism his worldview does not
afford immorality because his worldview
does not afford morality he has to
borrow from the Christian worldview in
order to argue against it in fact he has
to sit in God's lap to slap his face
where does he get morality from where
does he get reason from where does he
get mathematics from where does he get
consciousness from where does the
universe he said there are explanations
for where the universe came from
atheistic I'd love to hear them I
haven't heard one yet how does something
come from nothing with extreme
fine-tuning what is the explanation for
that he said there are arguments for the
beginning of life that are naturalistic
not according to the people who are
studying the matter how about Francis
Crick if I can find his quote here
Francis Crick said every time I write a
paper on the origin of life I swear I'll
never write another one because there's
too much speculation running after too
few facts Marc Kirschner of Harvard and
John Seager Hart of Berkeley said
everything about evolution before the
bacteria like life-forms is sheer
conjecture biochemists Klaus dose admits
that after more than 30 years of
research into the origin of life has led
to quote a better perception of the
immensity of the problem of the origin
of life on Earth rather than its
solution at present all discussions on
the principle theories and experiments
in the field either end in stalemate or
in confession of ignorance now I'm not
saying that this is a default position
that must be God I'm not saying that I
just lack a natural explanation for the
origin of life I'm saying that specified
complexity information the DNA structure
that we all have is evidence for an
intelligent being because information
only comes from Minds the laws of ink
and paper did not create is a God is not
great
there was a mind behind it that brought
it into existence and there's a mind
behind DNA what is the ACA theistic
explanation for DNA what is the
atheistic explanation for information
what is the ACA theistic information for
all of these nine things I mentioned how
much time glad I have not
survey says sit down yes sir
well I think I'll just invite dr. Tori
to do the following and make available
to us in on a sheet of paper which
actually has the thesaurus of quotations
that he's found from this and that
scientists and physicists and Natural
Sciences and so forth and you will find
when you read them when you look at them
I was writing them down as you went
through them all of these are statements
of uncertainty all of them they're
statements of all we know is how little
we know that's been for many years my
definition of an educated person someone
who knows enough to know how ignorant
they are it's actually is the only it's
not my own original definition it comes
from the Greek but it's the only
definition that works and no one working
at toiling in the field of science could
it possibly say anything less or more of
themselves especially at a time like
this but there you have it right away
the theistic and the deistic explanation
has to be based on a certainty that
there is a supervising and if you want
to be a theist a caring and intervening
creator who manages these matters and
there hasn't been a single sentence so
far from doctorate in a support of that
proposition let me give you an example
if you do the event horizon of Stephen
Hawking that I just mentioned God take a
cosmological one to begin with the event
horizon is the lip of the black hole
it's it's the suppose you could travel
towards a black hole and see it and see
the lip of it and notice it before you
went in and over and down that's what's
known as the event horizon the
physicists Hawking had a gravely ill
colleague in Cambridge who said if he
knew he was definitely going to die
that's the way he'd like to go befallen
into the event horizon lip of the black
hole because in theory you'd be able to
see the past and the future and time
except you wouldn't have quite enough
time to do so but there would be a grand
way to check out if you were physicist
turn away from this says the turn away
from that these incredible majestic or
inspiring thoughts say the theists think
about the burning bush instead think
about the trivial miracles witnessed by
sheep herding peasants in Bronze Age
Palestine and think about the jet that
they they feel that we should incur for
their sins it was stated by dr. Jory
that the sins of these people the
transgressions of these people and the
debt they owe their Creator bind all of
us as sinners what a shame we're not
perfect what a shame there's nothing we
can do about it what a shame we are
created already in prison and have to
earn our emancipation I tell you again
this is civility to the ultimate power
now there are people in this audience
much better equipped than I to say that
there is so far nothing in our natural
world to move away from the cosmological
there is nothing in our natural world
globe we live on that cannot be
explained by random mutation combined
with evolution by natural selection
nothing works without that assumption
everything works with it there are lots
of things that remain to be decided but
it's not a theory or not just one it
does work it is operational it doesn't
require a prime mover Occam's razor says
we should dispose of unnecessary
needless assumptions that's what I
propose we do in this case I'll put it
another way how long would you say Homo
sapiens has been on the planet from
Francis not Crick excuse me the author
of human the supervisors of Human Genome
Project Collins Franklin my new best
friend and occasional debating enemy
thinks well not more than half a million
years Richard Dawkins thinks it could be
not just 3/4 million I can sync the
number actually if you like we know that
the we left the species left Africa
about 75,000 years
having probably shrunk down to about two
or three thousand people as a result of
a terrible climatic disturbance probably
from Indonesia probably from a
predecessor of Krakatoa which meant that
we were this close to joining the ninety
nine point eight percent of all species
ever living on the surface of this plant
who became extinct some design by the
way profuse creation of millions and
millions and millions of life forms all
to be wiped out with not even anyone
left to testify to their previous
existence we really joined that long
match get out of it just in time let's
call it I don't want Francis's million
Orem half a million all Richard Dawkins
is seventy five thousand whichever way
right just give me that the just give me
that amount of time suppose we've only
been around for 75,000 years
monotheism Christianity Judaism Islam
shows up what four or five thousand
years ago the most so if you give me my
most microscopically small assumption of
human existence for at least seventy
thousand years heaven watches as the
human species is born dies usually of
its teeth usually at about twenty
usually which infants having about a
nine ten to two percent chance of living
build you can I don't have enjoy your
picture watch is this within difference
thousands and thousands of generations
were miserable illiterate starving
hungry to say nothing of the wars
they'll fight with each other to say
nothing of the cruel tease they will
inflict as well as the ones they will
suffer just from existence and only
three or four perhaps five thousand
years ago heaven decides us enough of
that it's time for an intervention and
the best way to do it would be in the
most primitive part of the Middle East
not in China where people can read and
said have looked at telescopes you know
in the most primitive part of the Middle
East
basically by offering human sacrifice to
them
this is a doctrine that cannot be
believed by anyone who studied anything
scientific anything historical anything
archaeological anything highly illogical
and think biologic not company believe
item can be only believed by someone who
wants to be a plaything and a slave of a
pitiless totalitarian how how glad we
should be that the evidence for this
ghastly entity is nil good Thanks
I'm gonna style away and let them ask
questions of each other and the way that
we've scheduled is a minute to ask and
five to answer and we'll try to stay to
that so that's very generous if you dr.
Turk would like to go first
since you had already posed some
questions to mr. how many times do we do
that three times so you get three apiece
wouldn't could I just proposed unless
you really have three that you're dying
to I don't have three I'm trying to duck
but that seems a long time for the
audience stuff to wait it seems to me
could we do it to maybe get to their
questions I have six I'm your I'm your
witness then so three was right dr. Turk
okay Christopher what is your
explanation for the beginning of time
space and matter out of nothing
well we don't know
I remember being asked by one of my
children once that I said well what what
was there at the big bag and I said well
you have to imagine this is this shows
how poverty-stricken our own vocabulary
is and I suspect how poverty-stricken
our own a capacity is in other words I
think there are some things not that we
don't understand or know but that we
cannot so we would use to sort of
primitive images but I said suppose you
could picture all of the matter the
whole of matter condensed into I got
this from Hawking I think one of his
colleagues condensed into something like
a very small dense black suitcase of the
kind you see people carrying money in in
crime for us and it's about to fly up
that's what you have to be able and that
everything that's ever going to be is
inside that that was the best I could do
and I don't think many people could do
if I say it myself and that much better
but I was completely unforced because
the kids said well what was outside the
city and I thought well I can't like
can do that and I don't know anyone who
can and that in a way would be my whole
point I don't have to know you do you're
the one who says you know not me
the theists of the deist say oh come on
we know this is only possible with an
author is very possible with a creator
so the Apostle with a master and
commander it's only possible with a
dictator you're welcome I don't need
five minutes is it is it fair to say
though that if the creation was out of
nothing and that's the common view today
that the beam had brought it into
existence the cause whatever it was it's
a big as what we ground you have a so
being because to go from a state of
non-existence to a state of existence
you need to make a choice you don't you
don't have how does something what are
you getting this choice from the choice
how does a first of all there was no
nature there was nothing so if there was
nothing how do you get something from
nothing without a cause how do you get I
can ask the same question and the way I
did before how do you get so much
nothing from something look into the
night sky if you're in say the Carmel
Peninsula you can't do it from many
parts of Virginia now but if you are
certain parts of California as I was
recently you can look on the night sky
and see universe is blowing up and
bursting into flame every night of the
week several times they had something
and it's all nothing now who's the
author of that who mandated that who's
the creator of that who's the dictator
who demands that sacrifice you're making
a rod for your own back here the fact
that things go out of existence
Christopher doesn't mean that they're
not designed the typewriter is out of
existence right now thankfully but the
typewriters designed so the fact that
the universe is going to heat death
doesn't mean that it didn't have a
designer at the beginning and of course
religious people believe that somebody's
going to intervene to stop it before it
does go anything they do even if it
doesn't
no office or even if nobody intervened
you can go traditionally knows to eat
death excuse me did the religious among
you ladies and gentlemen to understand I
did not that there will be an
intervention to make an exception in our
case that this will not happen to our
cosmos the God will prevent that he does
that's the Christian view and as I had
no idea and don't have seen new earth
would be created Genesis is Paradise
Lost revelation is paradise resort
island away have you it sounds thatcher
us to me yeah how do you get used to do
you I am not the one who has to answer
the question
excuse me you're the one who has to
answer but you you're the one who claims
to know you say there was a creation
moment and a creator I want to know why
you're changing the subject it seems to
me how do i how do I not know this when
you're the one where's all the
information I also want to know I also
want now I also want to know this I want
to know what sources you have that are
not available to me how do you know that
an intervention worker to prevent the
entropy an implosion and destruction of
our services do you want to go to our
second debate I'll I'll provide that but
but what would I say it is let's say
there's no inner inch let's say there's
no intervention we go to heat depth does
that mean in the universe was not
created and not designed it doesn't
entail that belief no but it makes it
actually what makes it seem a very
capricious designer shall we say rather
as I said it's an old verse of full
grevilles created sick commanded to be
well why would why would people be told
okay I can create you but I'm going to
create you with original sin misery
shame death of children disease and so
on just to see if you can pass a test
the mean I might not send you to hell I
don't say that that didn't happen I say
that I'm very glad that the evidence for
it is very scanty and I accuse those of
who believe who do believe it and I
can't have been showing this understood
on this point of having
harboring a very sinister desire to live
in a church a latarian system if I
sister
let's get let's design to be safe
masochism I think I regard masochism
your ego masochism name beyond I'll say
that I think masochism is a sinister and
creepy impulse here mr. Hitchens
question for our doctor jerk alright I
won't take a minute to ask in the eye I
don't just support and try and help out
the those who descent from the
ridiculous
belief Christianity the horrible idea of
vicarious redemption in other words of
the idea that by watching another person
suffer an innocent person suffer that
you could be free not just from your
debts or your sins but your
responsibilities you could cast your
sins on escape
I don't just oppose that disgusting
belief I oppose the Judaism from which
it's plagiarized and the Islam that
plagiarizes from it and I give a
publicity and exposure whenever I can to
those who were brave enough in old times
to oppose this this nightmarish belief
and one of the great opponents of the
Islamic totalitarianism in ancient
Persia was the great Omar Khayyam
perhaps the greatest poet of Persian
whose Rubaiyat I'm sure is known at
least to some of you and my favorite
verse of this comes from the Robert
legaly and translation and it takes the
form of a question
the quatrain is in the form of question
it says and do you think that onto such
as you a maggot minded starved fanatic
crew God gave a secret and denied it me
well well what matters it believe that
to to this magnificent astronomer and
scientists and physician and humanists
of Persia who opposed the cruel sadistic
verminous ignorant mullahs of his day I
borrow the question what is your
authority for saying that you know
something that I don't Chris Wragge
probability are
as you said before you can't disprove
the existence of God and you can't prove
beyond any doubt that there's a God I'm
giving probability I'm giving
cosmological teleological moral
consciousness reason mathematics all of
those things I listed before it's open
the evidence is open to everybody and
this is related to your 70 thousand
years a point that you've just made
there from a Christian perspective God
has always had a revelation even before
Christ it talks about the fact that God
has always had a witness there's three
witnesses there's creation everyone has
creation there's conscience
everyone has conscience and there's
Christ now Christ's true only came 2,000
years ago but his sacrifice how some
published on again excuse me his
sacrifice of atonement is retroactive to
everybody that lived before him so he's
always that awareness it is quite
convenient and that is the very nature
of God you're absolutely correct
well I got him to say it
you see if we were if we were only
discussing ontological questions that
would be all very well and it could be
quite amusing I could say that you
require a higher degree of standard of
proof for your proposition than I
perhaps do for mine and you probably
accept that and so forth and we could go
back and forth we'd be pull Turing the
gain with the essence of the matter
which is this the difference between the
theist and the deist is as follows the
deer says may not make sense without
some kind of designer the theist says
when I tell you what to do Christopher I
have God on my side you're the deer says
he can tell what God wants of me what
lengths I should shave off the end of my
penis if I'm boy I'll have a male child
or off the clitoris if it's a female
child he knows through the exactitude
what the proportions of that should be
what the diet should be what the dietary
laws ought to be who I should sleep with
and in what position and various I think
you can and since God doesn't ever
directly appear and say do it this way
it's done for him this is really
convenient by human representatives who
claim to act in his name so that's why I
think your standard of proof should be a
great deal higher because if you you're
you know the reason this point is
important to you is because it would
mean real power in the only world that
actually exists which is the material
world of you over me and you wonder why
I'm not keen okay the the material world
is all that exists that thought that you
just mentioned Christopher the material
world that all that exists is that
thought material and if it is why is it
true that sounds like has mystery to me
but I mean I think that that everything
that I am a capable of thinking saying
feeling and so forth does depend on my
continued existence as a what should we
say mass of molecules or yeah I should
shoot me in the head and I go I can't go
on like this
and I won't be coming back to bother you
either question sure nor am i going
anywhere after that Sam Chris I don't
wish it otherwise by the way I don't
wish it
God gives you what you desire would that
that were the case I have a bear with me
a relatively long question here after
admitting that an unborn child is a
human being you write on page 221 and I
thankfully you you say in the book that
it's nonsense that an unborn child is
not a human being
you admit that the unborn child is you
say this and I quote there may be
circumstances in which it is not
desirable to carry a fetus to full-term
you then go on to advocate termination
of pregnancy if birth control fails
here's my question why is it that
according to you when God plays God by
taking a life prematurely in the Old
Testament for example it is a moral
outrage but when you play God by taking
a life prematurely through abortion it
is a moral right well it's a false
distinction I mean I don't that's not
what I say I mean I say that the the
great abortifacient is I would say
nature I don't say god of course
God does not decide so many pregnancies
are not character full-term nature knows
in the case of our species as with every
other mammal and primate that some
fetuses are not going to make it and
flushes them out that that's just a
brute fact we wouldn't be here if that
wasn't the case because we're as you
know adapted biologically to a to an
environment we've abandoned the savanna
that's why we have appendices that is
designed for grass eaters and you know
will this see it's all very well
knowable you can't be having a brood of
sickly half-baked children and get away
from the Predators I mean so nature is
the great abortifacient I certainly
don't blame God for it I do as a
humanist believe that the concept unborn
child is a real one and I think the
concept is underlined by all the recent
findings of embryology that
by the early viability of the
well-conceived a human baby the one that
isn't going to be critically deformed or
even some that are will be able to
survive outside the womb earlier and
earlier and earlier and I see that date
only being pushed pushed back and I feel
a responsibility to consider the
occupant of the of the womb as a
candidate member of society in the
future and thus to say that it cannot be
only the responsibility of the woman to
decide upon it that it's a social
question and an ethical and moral one
and I say this as someone who has no
supernatural belief so your question
ought to have been this how do I have
any ethical opinions since I don't
believe that I'm created and I don't
believe I'm going to heaven I prefer to
first question if you don't right but
okay but I mean it just isn't this
entailed but I've have i well I appeal
to the audience have I not answered the
question about the termination of
pregnancy which bit of I had not
answered you better prompt me that I'll
read it again why is it that according
to you when God plays God by taking a
life prima luckily it isn't according to
me God I don't say God does that you
measured in your book which is right
over here you have an entire chapter
about the atrocities in the Old
Testament yes and the atrocities have to
do with God commanding genocide and
those things and and and you obviously
have a problem with that as many people
should so my question again is why
according to you when God plays God by
taking a life prematurely in the Old
Testament is it a moral outrage but when
you play God by taking a life
prematurely through an abortion it is a
moral right once again I'm sorry if my
work is so obscure but I don't say that
I have a moral right to terminate
pregnancy I have given all the reasons
that I think hedged that question
ethically and morally very sternly there
stringently and in any case it's not
like saying that every living child of
the Amalekites should be destroyed and
an injunction by God to Moses to say
he's been too merciful he spared too
many children and enslaved to a few
women
didn't make the genocide complete I I'm
sorry I've never been accused of and I
expect not to be if I'm lucky in a my
life of any such thing and the the idea
there's a moral equivalence between the
two or handling the really difficult
question of a a non-viable fetus in what
should be done about it isn't a moral
equivalence at all so do you want to say
that all unborn life is like you say in
the book is a human being and therefore
you should not kill it is that what you
want to say to get out of this dilemma
or what you want to know but I think no
but I think the presumption that I've
long said that the presumption is that
the unborn entity has a right on its
side and that every effort should be
made to see if it can be preserved and I
think that's I think that's an ethical
imperative is what I do say in the books
I think the Roman Catholic Church makes
this argument immoral when it could be a
moral one by saying that contraception
is not to be allowed by saying the
contraception is the moral equivalent of
abortion in other words to say the
contraception is also murder which is a
nonsensical and disproportionate
position I quote some serious Catholics
in my book William F Buckley the late is
one Clare Boothe Luce is another by
saying if the church says the
contraception abortion are morally the
same it degrades the opposition to
abortion why and by making absurd
arguments as it has in the past Aquinas
believed that every single sperm
contained a micro embryo inside it and
thus that if you like I hope hope don't
offend anyone handjobs our genocide as
for blowjobs don't start that electric
pregnancy Adele was a direct threat to
the life of the mother fallopian tube
pregnancy is instead of a direct threat
to the life of the mother and an obvious
no starter for a human embryo because
that's going anyway is someone who
should be allowed to vote this is
nonsense
it's casuistry it's immoral it's
superstition it prevents people from
thinking seriously about
matters that humanism can decide for
itself for heaven's sake without any
supernatural intervention your question
sir oh well since I probably answered
the your last question with a question
of my own I'll make it my question to
you I'm very keen to know how it is that
you in a sense that you dare to say that
without a belief in religion I would
have no source for ethical or moral now
what I'm saying
you seem to hint at it now did he not oh
I'm not saying you don't know morality
Christopher I'm saying you can't justify
morality without a being beyond yourself
so that just if I okay good so that if I
say that for me it's enough to be
willing to love my fellow man and
perhaps hope that my fellow man and
woman will give me some of the same
consideration in return and that after
all the the Samaritan of whom we've all
heard was the only one to help after the
priests and the Levites had passed by
Anderson Arjun also though he's talked
off by Jesus can't have been a Christian
because he appears in a story told by
Jesus so there can't be any Christianity
before that somehow he knew the moral
thing to do is to help his fellow person
without your religious instruction yes
that's actually the whole point of the
parable though it's not the way it's
usually told and that's what
Christianity teaches you know morality
it's written on your heart you don't
need the scripture to know right from
wrong and this was only available to us
2,000 years good no no you've known it
from the beginning of time conscience
has been on humanity from F forever
you'll have to let me press you a little
bit on that I mean William Gladstone
spent a huge amount of his life and he
was great scorer of Latin and Greek
showing that every one of the Greek
Socratic and other moral precepts all
they were were just pre figurations of
Christianity these are the best the
Greeks could do before Jesus arrived
we didn't face the idea that these
solidarities and moralities and
understandings are in asian people and
don't require divine permission I just
have to ask you if you could do it
plainly which side do you come down on
do you think we need divine permission
to act humanely to each other no it has
nothing to do with permission it has to
do with the ontological category known
as morality where does morality come
from does it come from the benzene
molecule the carbon molecule the oxygen
molecule in your world here where does
it come from suppose that we were having
this discussion before the existence of
molecules was understood it's a relevant
name it's not because the the discussion
about where does the good come from was
being conducted before Lucretius
developed the atomic theory before um
Democritus and Epicurus I should better
say understood that the whole world was
made up of atoms and molecules before
that was known people were arguing why
do we behave one way to our fellows and
we call it good and another way and we
call it work it because it's written
like that you can't I don't think you
can build in a molecular distraction
that's it I don't have the molecular
problem you do it's your materialist I'm
trying to ask you where does morality
come from in a materialistic worldview
well did I not just acquit myself of
that charge and say that the argument
precedes the knowledge of the atomic and
molecular structure no it doesn't no not
that I think by the way that the atomic
and molecular structure is irrelevant
and it could be that we might find out
that there are who knows pheromones or
this other phenomena that do have an
influence on our moral conditioning this
still wouldn't to a morally normal
person relieve them of the
responsibility leg that I I feel I know
what's right I feel that some things my
children don't need to be told they
already know let me let me let me
interject here and just ask a question
another way you are asked to tell a
child you you go to this church which
means you'll go to heaven but your
little playmates don't go to that church
and therefore will go to hell
seems to me to be an unpleasant thing to
be saying but bless that is maybe I
in a minority that that could be an
unpleasant thing but how do you
dimension evil the--what's calling me
risks aren't only a religious person
would dream of saying let's call it evil
where does evil come from religion
and Maru our actual CEO next question
morality comes from humanism and is
stolen by religion for its own purpose
humanism cording to who Hitler Mussolini
Stalin who you saying that Hitler was
the humanist just Hitchens
I've lived to hear it said Hitchens had
been in Virginia Hitler was a Catholic
you men are you know as a Catholic so
Hitler was a Catholic says muscle in it
give me a how how does morality exists
my opinion you know official border with
the Protestant Catholic churches both of
them wanted the worship of themselves as
well as of God so I suppose no evil
coming later and their third main ally
Hirohito the Emperor of Japan not
content just to be theocratic was
himself a god so anyone who says the
fascism and Nazism was secular
he's an ignoramus why is it not gigantic
scale I'm asking it ontological question
I know as being older Hitler right
because I'm a humanist I'm not asking a
sociological arrestin all right let me
ask a question another way this is my
last question if God does not exist why
do all people have a fixed moral
obligation to love and not murder
how do molecules in motion have any
authority to tell you how to behave
when you do something wrong whose
standard are you breaking who are you
displeasing the carbon atom the benzene
benzene molecule who this question has
been asked at the Socrates answered it
like this when he was on trial for his
life accused of blasphemy by the way he
said that he had an inner game on the
way he put it not demon the demon a
spirit a an inner critic a conscience
would be one way for him and that he he
knew enough to know even when he was
making the best speech of his life that
if he was making a point that was
somehow dishonest or incomplete or shady
the Damon whatever yeah that was clever
but you shouldn't have tried it he knew
any any person of average moral
equipment has the same knowledge I hope
you'll if you don't I'm very sorry for
you Adam Smith are called it the
internal witness who we all have to have
a conversation with all the time it's
been CS Lewis decided to call it
conscience and to attribute it to the to
the divine but he didn't improve on what
Adam Smith said in Theory of Moral
Sentiments or what Socrates said went on
when standing trial for his own for his
own life it's something sometimes
colloquially defined as why do people
behave well when nobody is looking I
don't believe there's anyone in this
Hall who doesn't know what I mean by
that why when it won't do you any good
will you decide I could have kept that
wallet I found on the back of the cab
see but I'm not going to I'm going to
turn it in I'm going to see if find find
its real possessive there are people to
whom that those thoughts do not occur
who are deaf to that idea who only think
of themselves who wouldn't worry about
the internal game on or censor or Oh
companion and there are of course people
who only get pleasure from being
unpleasant to other people in inflicting
cruelty on them the first group we call
the sociopathic in the second group we
call the psychopathic my only plan they
occur in nature and in society my only
problem is with those who think that
they're all made in the image of God the
one explanation that absolutely doesn't
work at all that gets you nowhere
that explains nothing Christopher it's
your turn to ask oh really yes sir
well my question is this would anyone in
the audience like to join this
conversation we actually have we have
questions if you're ready to move along
yeah I am there are a couple of
questions a lot with several similar
questions the board onto a couple of
questions for each of you and then one
that I'll end with that I think is an
important one to address to both of you
since you gave your turn away mr.
Hitchens I'll ask you first if the
questioner asks if God does not exist
what then is the purpose of life well
I can only answer for myself what cheers
me up
I suppose mainly gloating over the
misfortunes of other people I guess then
and you say evil come from religion
master I guess that has to be I think
you're mainly crowing over the miseries
of others it doesn't always work but it
never completely fails and then and then
there's irony there's irony and which is
the gin in the Campari the cream in the
coffee sex can have diminishing returns
but it's amazing ah no that's pretty
much it there is a clear run to the
grave
dr. Turek yes do i you want me to answer
that or not somebody else if
Christianity is true then why aren't the
differences that Jesus makes in the
lives of Christians more powerful or
evident than the impact other religions
make on their adherents I don't know if
I accept the premise of the question
well the the questioner adds Gandhi was
every bit as influential as any
Christian yeah that's true and that's
one of the problems with Christianity
the biggest problem with Christianity's
Christians I admit it but the question
tonight but the question is asking a
more central question which is if this
is the truth yes why then doesn't that
truth by the weight of its infinite
being cause its adherence to behave in a
way that we can all notice well I think
you can notice it several Christians I
think Christians for years have been the
ones that have built hospitals and cared
for the poor and cared for the weak and
the sick so I think it does make a
difference my problem which is part of
the problem that the questioner is
asking is why doesn't it have this
effect on everyone
and I'll throw a little Christian
theology in here the problem is isn't
that we don't have all the whole court
if we don't have all the Holy Spirit we
do we just don't allow all the Holy
Spirit to do what it should do it's our
problem we are fallen human beings and
that's why Christ had to come because we
are fallen human beings and has to come
again because he didn't get it right the
first time I agree I agree with you that
the grammar the question is wrong but
for different reason I don't see what's
moral about Christian preaching for
example apart from the horrible idea of
vicarious Redemption
I'll say again in case I missed you the
first time what I mean by that I could
pay your debt even if I didn't know you
if I was a friend you're in debt I'll
pay in extreme cases people to be known
to sale serve your sentence in prison I
could do that for you what I cannot do
is relieve you of your responsibility I
can't say throw your sins on me they'll
melt away immoral people not allowed to
be you know entitled to be relieved with
their responsibilities and the vicarious
Redemption by human sacrifice is a very
primitive and horrible scape
urging idea that belongs to the barbaric
period of human history
so all pardons are immoral so no knodel
pardons I didn't say that I said
vicarious Redemption is an immoral
doctor it's also immoral of the Nazarene
to say take no thought for the morrow
not to clothe not to eat not to invest
leave your family leave your children
leave everything give up the world no
investment no thrift no thought for the
future
just follow me I think that's only moral
if if you are sure believer in the idea
the world is about to come to an end
which was the case with this apocalyptic
I guess you never read the power of the
talents he said the the prophecy is that
the world is coming to an end real soon
there's no point in caring about
anything else that's not a moral
preaching to me at all there are many
other ways in which I fail to see how
any bad behavior can ever be described
as unchristian and of course it's
completely laughable to say Christians
build hospitals they've just many
Christians have bombed hospitals have
built them and as many Muslims have
built hospitals as Christians have and
as many Babylonians have built great
buildings as Christians have if that's
the best you can do that's the best you
can do one of the questioners repeats a
a point from dr. Turks opening statement
to that apparently here she feels you
did not address mr. Hitchens about the
irreducible complexity of DNA and is it
possible for such structures to have
formed by chance well though - I have
two responses to that one is what would
she have said before she knew about DNA
what does that have to do with anything
we're just existed prior to anyone
knowing about them yes
it's gravity existed before we knew
about it that's true you need an
explanation right and Christianity
thought it could explain everything and
then it fell not everything's wait this
very simple same as your point about
molecules that I said these arguments
predate Epicurus Lucretius and the
atomic theory christianity used to say
can explain everything it is all you
need to know is there's no powerful or
loving or intervening all-knowing
omniscient God
okay well then wait wouldn't DNA explain
more ah well that only shows that God's
even cleverer than we thought so it's an
infinitely expanding tautology
there are many of the some Christians
who accept in fact it was actually a
catholic physicist at the University of
Leuven in Belgium who first came up with
the idea of what we now call the Big
Bang and most Pope's not all most Pope's
have accepted it someone thought of it
as a challenge to Christianity the Pope
Leo who he went to the I can't remember
the scientists name for a second maybe
someone here can help me he went to the
Pope said look that looks like this is
how things started the Pope said if you
like I'll make it a dogma that every
Catholic has to believe it said that
would be slightly missing the point your
holiness as for what it is they do with
the origin to be ended well because the
it is true to say that religion as
Stephen Jay Gould said the religion and
science belonged to non-overlapping
magisteria I think these magisteria are
in many ways incompatible and in many
ways irreconcilable but it is no more
true to say that the existence of the
complexity of DNA shows that God was
more ingenious than we thought than it
is to say that it necessarily shows by
its self revealing ingenuity that we
don't need the hypothesis of God both of
these positions would be in my opinion
somewhat reductionist though I would
have to say that I think the second one
is more persuasive and more elegant
now Gould is wrong will that do
Christians or religious people religion
is trying to find out what how the
universe began it's always science
they're not no religion says it does no
excuse me it's try it drives can also
process of scientific and
religion is an affirmation of faith it
says a radius person Christopher says it
always be evidence to try and point out
that the universe exploded into being
out of nothing and you have scientific
evidence for the view that an
intervention will occur to prevent the
implosion and don't forget that ah let's
start at the beginning I can't forget it
let's start at the beginning there may
be anything you've said all evening I'm
going to remember Joe that's for debate
- no no I mean don't say you what here
do yourself do yourself your faith the
honor of saying it's faith generally no
Lance Bass the argument you get away
with it
look the argument would be Christopher
is that if the universe exploded into
being out of nothing then miracles are
possible because the greatest miracle of
all has already occurred the question is
have miracles occurred in the first
century mirror that requires another
debate whereby we have to look at the
historical evidence and see and if it is
true that the that Jesus really did come
and say and do the things that the New
Testament writers said he did then
whatever he teaches is true because if
he rose from the dead he was God if he
taught that there will be an
intervention then there will be that's
the argument enough time to support it
you'll need it
it's fallen off if I a sentence or two
from David Hume would correct what you
sow a miracle is defined not as a part
of the natural order but as a suspension
of the natural no an interval you can't
say I'll say of a of the Big Bang which
is the foundation of a natural order
that it's a suspension of what it starts
you may not do that however if you meet
someone in the street who you yesterday
saw executed you can say either that an
extraordinary miracle has occurred or
that you are under a very grave
misapprehension and David Humes logic on
this I think is quite irrefutable he
says what is more likely that the laws
of nature have been suspended in your
favor and in a way that you approve all
that you've made a mistake and in each
case you must especially if you didn't
see it yourself and you're hearing it
from someone who says that they did I
would go further and say the following
I'll grant you that it would be possible
to track the pregnancy of the woman Mary
who's mentioned about three times in the
Bible and - sure there was no male
intervention in her life at all but yet
she delivered herself of a healthy baby
boy
with I can say I don't say that's
impossible
parthenogenesis is not completely
unthinkable but it does not prove that
his paternity is divine and it wouldn't
prove that any of his moral teachings
were thereby correct nor if I was to see
him executed one day and see him walking
the streets the next would that show
that he's father was God or his mother
was a virgin all that his teachings were
true especially given the commonplace
nature of Resurrection at that time in
place after all Lazarus was raised never
said a word about it the Daughter of
Jairus was raised didn't say a thing
about what she'd been through and the
Gospels tell us that at the time of the
crucifixion all the graves in Jerusalem
opened and their occupants wandered
around the streets to greet so the
resurrection was a something of a banal
at the time not all not all of those
people clearly were divinely conceived
so I'll give you all the miracles and
you'll still be left exactly where you
are now holding an empty sack no
Christopher you have to look at each
miracle in light of the evidence and the
context um was wrong because his premise
that was wrong was the one that said the
evidence for the regular is always
greater than that for the rare it's not
from Yume's own worldview if you were
you if you were here today he wouldn't
even believe in the Big Bang because it
only happened once it's not a regular
event it happened once he wouldn't
believe in the spontaneous generation of
life which is what a materialist must
believe because it only happened once he
wouldn't believe in his own birth
because it only happened once in fact he
wouldn't be able to believe in the whole
history of our solar system because it
only happened once you don't need
regular events to know whether or not
something happened singular events
happen all the time this debate will
never happen again
yet you're here to witness it there's a
there's a I mean I'm just going to put
my repose my trust in the audience here
there's a there's an obvious difference
between a singularity and a miracle and
I I mean I think it would be
embarrassing to try and explain it will
be patronizing to dr. Turek why a member
of the audience takes issue with your
claim that objective morality
necessarily relies in an absolute deity
asking instead what about empathy for
which there are significant apparent
biological basis right in here that
empathy for which there are fairly
well-established apologies he's a very
human emotion cannot empathy lead to
morality is it right to be empathetic
that's the question I'm not saying
there's no chemical connection between
morality and or for morality I should
say I'm there certainly when we think
they're chemicals going on the question
is what is the standard that makes
empathy or love right what is the
chemical composition of love what is the
what how much does justice way well
these are all things that make no sense
in a materialistic world
but that's not entirely true let's say
for example that neurocognitive
neuroscientists are able to determine
with scientific levels of precision that
in fact certain neuro chemical and
cognitive events always essentially
always co-occur with the experience of
empathy but that wouldn't mean that
empathy is right see there may be
chemical compositions that cause that
guy to chop that guy's head off on the
Canadian bus that wouldn't make it right
the question is what makes something
right in a materialist
worldview there's nothing that can make
something right or wrong as David Hume
has said you cannot get an author from
it is well happy to agree with that I
mean I think I think that's true but um
but I have to add only that there are
we've all song has to be lucky enough to
see it or meet people who've done it and
all of us it's read about there are
people who will when they when a grenade
is lobbed through the window throw
themselves on it before it can blow up
it does happen there are people who who
died under torture without giving away
the whereabouts of their comrades there
are people who go do bomb disposal
working defusing huge device they know a
minute
it does happen it's always happened it's
common to every known human society it's
a part of every heroic narrative of
every known Society there's ever been
those who do it are honored
they are sung as we say and the times
when there was no literate no literal
record and it doesn't require divine
sanction or permission it is we're proud
to say if not innate in us we would be
too humble to say that it's in Asian our
species is something we can all aspire
here yes you know we do not we do not
get it from Big Brother if we did that
would degrade it it would mean it wasn't
heroic
it wasn't brave it wasn't individual it
wasn't exemplar why are these things
of anything what I would because it
would be in the hope either of a reward
from Big Brother or for fear of
punishment from it it would have
robotics morality weiss Troy's ethics it
means it means the end it means the it
means the individual example is dust
Christopher you've already abolished
validated by your materialistic
worldview there's no such thing as
morality if you're just a bunch of
chemicals weight Sigma it's okay I
already know some people will clap
anything I do you need to say do you
mean to say that the human that the body
of a mammal the primate is not the
chemical composition no it is oh good
I'm questioning why do you why do you
why do you act as if this has only just
been discovered and as if it's a
theological point because you apparently
have I say that although I I would
rather say in spite of the fact that I
am a primate or not
notwithstanding perhaps I'd better say
that I am Brahman nonetheless I'm
capable of thinking about heroism
self-sacrifice example and so forth why
are all those things turn to me and say
how did you say that and be a primate
why I go I'm eight
I can't also the fact that I'm a primate
I can concede it better than some people
that's the best I can do why your ear I
made as well you'll have to agree with
both of us that it shows okay let me
let's finish with this which is the
fundamental question and I think
deserves serious answer the writer says
gentlemen I'd venture to say that no one
no one is two words by the way
no one came into this room without
already deciding who he or she agrees
with and no one will leave with a
different mindset what would it take for
each of you what evidence would you need
about what basis would you make a
decision to change your mind
fundamentally about the question that we
gathered here to discuss this evening
great question
well Christianity would be refuted by
somehow discovering the body of Christ
theism might be I don't know how you
could refute these and if all the
scientific evidence somehow changed if I
don't know how you deal with the
morality issue if the fine-tuning didn't
occur if we could find the universe is
eternal it would need a cause but all
the scientific evidence seems to suggest
universe is eternal so it needs a cause
and the cause must be immaterial
spaceless timeless but if all that
changed that might be at least get me to
doubt theism sir you know most of the
debate I wish I'd thought of this this
evening
sorry much too laid-back in most of the
debates I've taken apart and I wish I
thought of doing it this evening too we
took a vote before the debate including
registering the undecided and then at
1:00 at the end to basically see where
the undersides had gone so and I was
always surprised by how many people had
come or at least willing to consider
themselves as having come with an open
mind I my view is this very few people
have that much difficulty thinking of
themselves as objects of a divine plan
the great advantage religion has is our
own solipsism it's the same as people
who don't really believe in astrology
but they'll take a quick peek to see
what's happening to Taurus today and if
it says well might be a good time for a
flutter on the stock exchange not to
think hang on the planets don't really
move to determine my investments but
maybe you know it's not it's not
impossible it could all be about me I
think about it quite a lot actually
because I have the same birthday as
Thomas Jefferson in April the 13th
except that I don't because he was born
under the old calendar and I think his
though it says on his tomb he was born
on 13th table he was actually born on
something like the 25th of April under
the Ocala I've often wondered how the
horoscope people managed the transition
the time when everyone had to change
which star sign they were I just say it
got done easily enough religion works
for most people because if to have
people in a sense horribly do want it to
be true that they are supervised that
God looks out for them that they might
be rewarded or they might be punished it
has this terrible surveill advantage
that's why I consider it to be morally
superior to be an atheist to say I would
rather live without that ghastly
master/slave and their mentality and no
evidence or no event that could change
your commitment to that belief I can
only say that if there was I'm very
relieved to find having studied what I
think of as the
best evidence in arguments physicists
biologists paleontologists students of
mythology history archaeologists are
very relieved to find there's no
evidence for it at all if if I thought
it was true I would consider myself
condemned to live under attorney and
I've spent my entire life repudiating
that idea and helping I hope others to
think the same but there is not a chance
of course it's not it isn't a single
chance that anyone will find that hey
after all we can definitely know that a
virgin conceived or that a condemned
felon walked gain and it's quite absurd
for anyone to argue in scientific terms
as if any of that is even thinkable what
I don't understand I suppose I should
close both is why anybody should be so
contemptuous I suppose is the word also
insecure about their own faith as not to
call it that did you hear him say at any
point the city this is my faith I
believe it in spite of the evidence to
the contrary I lay my life on it
I believe I'm redeemed by it I think I
will live eternally because no he has no
confidence to say anything like that
instead he tries to mix it up in an area
scientific inquiry where he is no more
competent than hey even I am and that
was where he made his big mistake thanks
gentlemen
what are we sighs five minutes to a
close uh since dr. Turk went first in
the opening would you mind going first
now I thought I'd just wrap oh you can
call it a wrap unless you'd like five
more minutes
when asked when I think of the most
erotic words in the language I sometimes
think German relayed back now when asked
what I think of the most erotic words in
the language I sometimes think slowly
captive audience um no you know what
if I haven't made my case by now
brothers and sisters I don't think I
will make it in the next five I ask you
to excuse me if anyone thinks that
there's a question having who's heard me
who thinks is a question I answered
poorly or inadequately or badly or
failed to answer at all I would like to
challenge me I'd happily give them five
minutes but I've I have to say shot my
belt otherwise it is there anyone who
would like to charge me yes please if
there is no God why don't you spend your
whole life try to convince people that
there isn't why don't you just stay off
was the repeat that was the cost yeah
the question is if there if there is no
god why spend your life and career
trying to refute that why not just leave
it alone and stay home fair enough well
it's it's not my it isn't my whole
career for one thing it's become a major
preoccupation of my life though in the
last eight or nine years especially
since September 11th 2001 to try and
help generate an opposition to theocracy
and its depredations internationally
that that that is now probably my main
political preoccupation to help people
in Afghanistan in Somalia in Iraq in
Lebanon in Israel to resist those who
sincerely want to encompass the
destruction of civilization and
sincerely believe they have God on their
side in wanting to do so the thing maybe
I will take a few minutes just to say
something that I find repulsive about
especially monotheistic messianic
religion in it with a large
part of itself it quite clearly wants us
all to die it wants this world to come
to an end you can tell the yearning for
things to be over whenever you read any
of its real texts or listen to any of
its real authentic spokesmen not the
sort of the pathetic apologist who
sometimes masquerade for it those who
talk there was a famous spokesman for
this in Virginia until recently about
the rapture say that those of us who
have chosen rightly will be gathered to
the arms of Jesus leaving all the rest
of you behind if we're in a car
it's your lookout that car won't have a
driver anymore if we're if we're a pilot
that's your lookout that plane will
crash we will be with Jesus and the rest
of you can go straight to hell the the
eschatological element that is
inseparable from Christianity if you
don't believe that there is to be an
apocalypse there is going to be an end a
separation of the sheep and the goats a
condemnation a final one then you're not
really I believe it and the contempt for
the things of this world shows through
all of them it's well put in an old
rhyme from a an English exclusive
brethren sect
says that we are the pure and chosen few
and all the rest are damned
there's ruin up in hell for you we don't
want heaven crammed you can tell it when
you see the extreme Muslims talk they
cannot wait they cannot wait for death
and destruction to overtake and
overwhelm the world they can't wait for
for a what I would call without
ambiguity a final solution when you look
at the Israeli settlers paid for often
by American tax dollars to sign if they
can steal enough land from other people
and get all the Jews into the Promised
Land and all the non-jews out of it then
finally the Jewish people will be worthy
of the return of the Messiah and there
are Christians in this country you
consider it their job to help this
happen so that Armageddon can occur so
the painful business of living as humans
and studying civilization and trying to
acquire learning and
knowledge and health and medicine and to
push that can all be scrapped and and
the cult of death can take over that to
me is a hideous thing in eschatological
terms in end times terms on its own
hateful idea hateful practice and a
hateful theory but very much to be
opposed in our daily lives where there
are people who sincerely mean it who
want who want to ruin the good relations
that could exist between different
peoples nations racist countries tribes
ethnicities who say who openly say they
love death more than we love life and
who are betting that with God on their
side they're right about that so when I
say is the subtitle of my book that I
think religion poisons everything I'm
not just doing what publishers like and
coming up with the provocative subtitle
I mean to say it infects us in the you
know our most basic integrity it says we
can't be moral without Big Brother
without a totalitarian permission means
we can't be good to one another means we
can't leave without this we must be
afraid we must also be forced to love
someone who we fear the essence of
sadomasochism at the essence of
abjection the essence of the Masters
slave relationship and that knows that
death is coming and can't wait to bring
it on I say this is evil and though I do
some nights stay home I enjoy more the
nights when I go out and fight against
this ultimate wickedness and ultimate
stupidity thank you
dr. Tarek your clothes first of all I
want to thank everyone I know it's been
a long night and I enjoy listening to
Christopher even if I don't agree with
them and I want to thank Christopher for
being here and putting so much effort
into this debate let me just clean up a
few things that I wasn't able to respond
to before and that is this issue of
design where Christopher seems to say
because things are going to oblivion it
wasn't designed well first of all a
design in a world constrained by
physical constraints can only be optimal
if you know the purpose of the designer
just even Jay Gould had a book years ago
called pandas thumb where he complained
that the pandas thumb was not as good as
our thumb it only seemed to enable the
Panda to strip bamboo well maybe that's
all the Panda was supposed to do is
strip bamboo you can't say it's
suboptimal Design unless you know what
the purpose of the designer was my car
is not designed perfectly but it's still
designed so just because you find faults
in design doesn't mean there is no
design and you wouldn't be able to find
a fault unless you knew what the purpose
of the designer was let me now summarize
Christopher's book and if as I read
Christopher's book it seems to me he's
making two statements the first
statement is there is no God and I hate
him
after all Christopher defines himself as
an anti-theist not an atheist but an
anti theist and that's why he couldn't
even respond to the question what might
change your mind nothing is going to
change Christopher's mind his mind is
made up
the second is narrow-minded yes the
second the second major point he makes
is since religious people do evil things
God doesn't exist that is a non sequitur
in logic we all do evil things that
doesn't mean our parents don't exist
just because E people do evil things
doesn't mean that all religion is false
and Christopher bunches all religions
together and makes no distinctions that
need to be made I am with you
Christopher on your opposition of
radical Islam I am with you I am with
you politically on more things than you
will know because I think many religions
are false and there are many false
beliefs in fact many religious people
here's here's the points Christopher
makes and he's right about many of these
things many religious people have
behaved terribly many religious beliefs
are false and can't be justified you
don't need to believe in God to know
right from wrong you don't need the
Bible or any other religious book to
know basic right and wrong morality
predates Scripture I agree with all that
and that in fact is the Christian view
as well and unless someone outside of
the universe intervenes or the laws of
nature change this incredibly fine-tuned
universe will go to oblivion I agree
with all that but none of these things
are arguments against the existence of
God God could still exist even if all of
Christopher's assertions and complaints
are true
let me also point out that religion does
not poison everything everything poisons
religion I poison religion regrettably I
poison religion because I don't live up
to the pure words of Christ and that's
why Christ had to come because none of
us live up to it but we know what the
standards are because there's a standard
beyond ourselves Christopher has
identified how religious people poison
religion how they act immorally
you know that's what Jesus and the
prophets did and why Jesus came
Christopher is so charming and he is so
persuasive he is like an Old Testament
prophet he is and he is calling the
church to morality he can't define what
that is but he's calling them to it he's
not calling them to the Christian
morality necessarily he's calling them
to his own morality but what he points
out are some of the very things Jesus
point out many people in the church are
following tradition rather than the
words of Christ many people in the
church are doing evil things Jesus
condemned the people who were the most
religious because they were the furthest
away from God and Christopher's to be
commended for that because many of them
are
but unlike Jesus who appealed to God's
standard of morality Christopher's
atheism affords him no objective moral
standard by which to judge anything
wrong including all the sins of
religious people circumcision sexual
restrictions suicide bombing etc he has
to borrow objective morality from the
theistic worldview in order to argue
against it he has to soon God in order
to deny him he has to sit in God's lap
in order to slap his face he also has to
borrow aspects of the theistic worldview
in order to even get his worldview off
the ground he has to borrow the universe
which is a pretty big issue he has to
borrow fine-tuning life reason math
human freedom and consciousness notice
he never to dressed any of those things
where do those come from in an atheistic
worldview Christopher in the last
chapter of his book talks about we need
to get away from all this religious
stuff and we need to go to enlightenment
values what are enlightenment values
well here are is what Christopher says
on the last page of his book quote very
importantly the divorce between the
sexual life and fear the sexual life and
disease and the sexual life and tyranny
can now at last be tempted on the sole
condition that we banish all religions
from the discourse it appears that
Christopher is rebelling against the
church lady here he doesn't like the
restrictions on sexuality is it true
that if Jesus said sleep with anybody
you want Christopher would be Christian
I don't know but that is what he's
rebelling against now he talks about the
divine dictatorship he says that he
rebelled as he just pointed out against
the divine dictatorship because he's an
anti theist but let me ask this question
why must everyone submit to his
dictatorship the dictatorship of
Christopher Hitchens he's telling
everyone to live up or to give up their
sacred texts and to live according to
renewed enlightenment values values that
apparently he gets to choose Christopher
in effect wants to replace God he wants
his values he wants you he wants you to
adopt enlightenment values
Christopher never answered the questions
and the evidence that I brought up I
think this is a theistic universe
because all time all space and all
matter exploded into being out of
nothing
number two it did so with incredible
precision and extreme fine-tuning we saw
that life seems to be the result of
intelligence for we saw that their
objective immaterial moral values out
there and Christopher is big on
immorality I'm with them on that number
five we saw that in material reality
such as reason in the laws of logic
exist and have no way to be explained
there's no way to explain those by
materialism that the laws of mathematics
number six exists and they help us
investigate and measure this orderly
universe number seven that people are
not mere chemicals but are free to make
choices and number eight and finally
that we are conscious beings and we
cannot explain ourselves by mere
chemicals we're something beyond
chemicals but atheism only has a
worldview that says all that exists or
chemicals because Christopher does a see
atheist friends have not been able to
explain any of these realities from an
atheistic perspective they have instead
relied on speculation in faith I don't
have enough faith to be an atheist as
one more other point Christopher may
think that there is no God and he hates
him but God thinks there is a
Christopher Hitchens and God loves him
well then I think let's first certainly
thank our debaters for a lively and
stimulating evening
good evening thank you again for coming