Video of an Atheist/Christian Dialogue

24:00 – It was very interesting that the Christian said that he can’t think of a single event that their church does where they don’t evangelize. That’s kinda sad.

13:40 – The youth leader really vocalizes the ignorance of many in the christian community of what atheists are about. It is a refreshingly honest admission of the vilification of us that begins at an early age. Good for him! Not that I’m comparing him to an alcoholic, but Zach is successful in the campaign by getting people to start off by admitting they have a problem.

16:22 – Zach lays out the history of the misconceptions about atheists.

24:05 – “If I’m going to give you a coat, you’re going to hear about my god… I don’t even know how to separate the two.” Which is exactly the problem most people have with religion, but seems particularly prevalent in the USA. While this guy is being good and educating his flock, I’m starting to wonder what is his motivation since he admits every good deed comes with a hitch (of judgment).

26:41 – What, are they raising chickens in the next room? (LOL…just a lighthearted thought that keeps coming up!)
36:20 – Thank you, Zach for laying out the ground for why some of us non-believers participate in the holidays. I didn’t know “Thursday” is supposed to be “Thor’s Day”. I’d love to look more into that.
40:45 – “A person in search of the truth” and “I’m always ready to revise that” are two pretty good sentences to sum up my atheistic creed.
43:27 – I like how poetically Zach puts together his feelings about relying on himself and awe in the universe. A better way to put the way I feel about relying on myself for the first time as a non-christian is a way the audience could understand better: “When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things.” – 1 Corinthians 13. Or maybe some Carl Sagan?
48:45 – “He’s either a liar and lunatic or he’s lord.” What always bothered me about this C.S. Lewis postulate is that it is supposed to be a “gotcha” towards non-believers, but it is equally supporting to both sides. Zach handles it really well with pointing out problems with slavery in the new testament.
51:20 – I don’t think the woman asking the question was really asking a question. She’s reiterating a stereotype that atheists are not for improving the country. Thank you Zach for bringing up Doctors without Borders and “Good without God” campaigns.

That was really interesting to watch. The question period was interesting. One in particular was a response to him explaining morality by giving en example of parenting. If you have two kids and one steals from the other you explain to the kid that stealing is wrong, because “how would you like it if someone stole from you”.

The response from the person in the audience was something along the lines of “You shouldn’t steal your brothers things because I said so.

Rapid fire things at the end that he didn’t get a chance to answer that were infuriating “Society has shown when we don’t have God we fall apart” “What if your wrong”

The prayer at the end is exactly what atheists hate. Basically asking God to turn him into a Christian.

I don’t think any congratulations are in order when the point of the dialog is only to convert, or to interrogate.

Also, I don’t think a gift with a price tag attached is really a gift. It’s really just an icebreaker at that point, because of the expectation of an evangelization moment.

1:08:00 “At the core we are terrible as humans”

And reason #1 why I hate Calvinists.

@theG on Thor’s day.

In English all the weekday names derive ultimately from the seven known ‘planets’ (including the Sun and the Moon) of older days which were usually associated with gods and then some equating by the Romans of their gods with the gods of other people.

Sunday – Sun’s day
Monday – Moon’s day
Tuesday – Tiw (or Tyr)’s day (Roman Mars)
Wednesday – Woden’s day (Roman Mercury)
Thursday – Thor’s day (Roman Jupiter)
Friday – Freya (or Frigga)’s day (Roman Venus)
Saturday – Saturn’s day
(French and Spanish tend to keep the Roman gods’ names in the days of the week)

The early Quakers recognizing the connection used first day, second day, … instead of the standard English names (Quakers still generally say they are going to ‘first day meeting’ instead of ‘Sunday church’).

That was pretty cool. It should be a model for all such interactions.

I also think it’s great how the “leaders” or “spokespersons” of atheism generally behave better than the leaders of religions.

Wow, that was a really good session. Zach nailed every question I thought.

I think my jaw dropped when the lady said that she read a book about how we should teach kids not to harm others only because the parent said so and not because its wrong. Really?

I live in the Dallas-Ft. Worth area, and after listening to this, am feeling extraordinarly pleased to know that there is someone this eloquent out there. Thanks Zack for all you are doing, and thanks to you folks here for posting the video. I can only hope I can be half as well spoken as he was if I am ever in such a position.

You know what impressed me the most? HEATH LET ZACH TALK WITHOUT INTERRUPTION! Wow. How refreshing was that?

Oh, and 39:48 is brilliant! Great line!

I hope this ends up on Youtube. 30min or so in and an optical mouse jump-click and it’s gone.

That woman working on her child’s obedience is teaching how to tell right from wrong via the “give a kid a fish” method, rather than the “teach a kid to fish” method.

@Rich Wilson – I picked up on that as well. What 18 religions did they look at? I was actually thinking Mormon, Baptist, Catholic, Lutheran…

Unless they are counting “he might have been a historical figure – don’t care, he isn’t relevant to our religion” as “believe in Jesus.”

The guy at around 1:09:30 cites history, but doesn’t seem to know any. Society, in fact,has become more humane and less barbaric over time.

For the record (not that anybody is keeping it) I am pleasantly surprised by the result of this meeting.

For those that are interested, my sense of the audience was that about 50% were ambivalent about me being there, 25% were really thrilled to hear what I had to say, 10% really loved what I said, 10% really hated what I said, and 5% really understood what I was saying.

“5% really understood what you said.” Got that sense from the feeling in the room. Also from the standpoint of education, they can’t let their kids go to Cincy for college cause everyone that goes there ended up like you, I’m sure. The level of entrenched, restricted, linear thinking going on in this church (and I’m sure many others) is just kind of sad to see. Good talk though, for those that weren’t hostile, I’m sure you did a lot of good.

It’s no surprise that the Q & A slightly devolved into them asking questions that were merely meant to Evangelize to you.
Like Heath said, “I can’t hand you a coat without telling you about my God.” And that’s to a stranger on the street. Here you are, an incarnate refutation to their worldview, of course their gonna get a little knives out in their proselytizing after listening to you for a full hour.

Following on Erp’s explanation of day names, i’m attaching the Spanish names and meanings:

Sunday – Sun’s day
Monday – Moon’s day
Tuesday – Tiw (or Tyr)’s day (Roman Mars)
Wednesday – Woden’s day (Roman Mercury)
Thursday – Thor’s day (Roman Jupiter)
Friday – Freya (or Frigga)’s day (Roman Venus)
Saturday – Saturn’s day
(French and Spanish tend to keep the Roman gods’ names in the days of the week)

Sunday – Domingo: from dominus, the Lord’s day (ugh!) Yes, they suplanted the Sun
Monday – Lunes, from Luna (the moon)
Tuesday – Martes, from Marte, (Roman Mars)
Wednesday – Miércoles, derived from Mercurio (Roman Mercury)
Thursday – Jueves, from Jovi, which refers to Jupiter(Roman Jupiter)
Friday – Viernes which refers to Venus (Roman Venus)
Saturday – Sábado, refers to the Shabbath (another steal from judaic religions)

Cheers from the Hippo

Zach — I’m curious did you say you left Orthodox Christianity? is that orthodoxy with a capital ‘O’?

Andrew

@Andrew- No, orthodox in the general sense.

Best,

-Z

When believers ask about logic and reason, I tend to give an intro on skepticism and of course, suggest the SGU. Double win.

I found the questions about sin interesting. I think that it may have helped to also point out that atheists simply don’t find many so called sinful things wrong. As a married woman I don’t mind that my husband looks at pornography, I don’t think that sex outside of marriage it a detriment to society, etc. In fact I think that many sinful things only become problematic when they are forbidden and it becomes necessary to hide them. Addictions almost always have a deeper psychological connections and I would argue that the repressiveness inherent in Christianity contributes to them. Many Christians have issues surrounding sex that I think can be traced directly to the unhealthy view that the church has on nearly anything sexual.

If you look back to the Anti-Atheist Bingo card, BINGO! It’s the middle row: They told him how god loves him (when they prayed for him); the without-morality-we’d-all-go-killing talk came out; Pascal’s Wager just made it in time (in a nice Texan drawl too!); heaven and hell and the afterlife were discussed; and the last one is a bit of a stretch but they did ask about his reasons for life (not explicitly but quite clearly implicitly).

I really expected the Hitler square to get checked off. After they apologize for slavery and challenge your opinions on raising children, I considered the field wide open and was eagerly awaiting the zingers (but they didn’t come … well Pascal’s Wager counts a little). I would have had a rather difficult time restraining myself from inflicting venomous ridicule at such crass idiocy. Kudos to Zach.

You could tell that he was holding back. ‘the bible is a historical text’, ‘the bible was written by those who witnessed jesus’ life’, ‘I always evangelize during charity’, ‘we are all terrible people’, ‘slavery wasn’t so bad’, etc. They are all so easy to respond to; but to do so would sour the conversation, so he did well.

Thanks for that Steven Pinker link. It reminds me of when Senator Colburn (R.) said that we are less free than 30 years ago. Senator Amy Klobuchar asked him how many female Supreme Court Judges or Senators there were (0) and how that was more free. The Bingo card might include a square for “mythic moral past” to go with “deny slavery or misogyny”.

I am emboldened by the 5% that care. It really redeems the whole effort. I wish there were more.

Zach, first of all, I think you did a kick a** job here 🙂 And I think that only good can come from such discussions (as opposed to some of the Christian/Atheist debates most of us have seen and left us feeling like it was just a waste of time). So, thanks so much for being an incredibly thoughtful, calm and ‘measured’ rep for the atheist community 🙂

Rich Wilson wrote:

@Lizzy raises something that kind of sat at the back of my mind too. That whole bit about “up from 2-6 spending money on porn” (or whatever it was) was really two issues. 1) porn (whether or not that’s bad) and 2) an addiction taking time and money away from your family. I’m not aware that the bible actually addresses 2)

So is it a ‘sin’ to stay up all night playing video games, with the effect that you then don’t have as much time/energy for your family?

I had a very similar reaction to that particular point Rich ~ negative repurcussions of behaviour make themselves pretty evident…if a spouse is spending excess money and time on almost any ‘outside addiction’, potential damage will be done to a relationship. No need for a god or ancient text to tell us that.

When it comes to marriage, every individual relationship is its own thing. Every couple works out (or sure as hell should work out) what their collective ‘boundaries’ are. If one couple decides that having a sexually ‘open’ relationship ‘works’ for them, and it’s mutually agreed upon, then where’s the justification to call it ‘sinful’?

That, right there, demonstrates one of the primary failings of having such a black&white moral outlook….

It doesn’t acknowledge the very real human reality of grey ~ and it doesn’t respect specific, individual human lives. Just because thinking in black and white may feel more satisfying doesn’t mean that it’s the best way to approach human relationships and morality.

After getting to the end of the video, I really have to comment on why I think Zach’s ‘performance’ here is outstanding……

– He never showed any degree of hostility or annoyance or mocking
– He listened and showed respect for those he was interacting with by offering responsive replies to their specific questions
– And he was honest without pulling any punches

In short, by doing the above, he dictated the discussion and kept the focus on the points at hand….

When there’s no anger or vitriol or smugness, you don’t give them any opportunity to hang their hats on that….which forces them to ONLY deal with the points at hand.

and there’s almost nothing more ‘disarming’ than that.

I love the look he gave the camera while they were praying for his soul. 🙂

I was waiting for a sheepish grin but it never came. In the times Ive found myself being prayed for in my presence I can never help almost giggling at the silliness of it.

Robert W,

Lets compare the deaths of the 20th century with those before it. You rate the 20th century as producing 100 million deaths.

The genocide of the North American Indians also produced 100 million deaths (over 200 years). US presidents have said “the only good indian is a dead indian”. The genocide of certain South American Indians as well as the destruction of their empires produced millions more. The Aborigines of Australia are almost gone too. At least 6 million Africans didn’t arrive in America as slaves. Colonialism had a darker side.

When was the last outbreak of Influenza? It was 1918 and killed 20 million (some estimates go as high as 100 million). We have only tracked influenza pandemics since the 16th century and they occurred multiple times each century killing millions each time. The last influenza “pandemic” was last year’s H1N1 with 18,000 deaths. We have known about the flu for almost 3,000 years and for most of that time it ravaged humanity, but no longer.

Ever had polio, or smallpox? They used to kill millions and now they barely exist. The black death killed 1/4 to 1/3 of Europe.

1 of every 2 children used to die before reaching adulthood and now it is around 1 in 100.

1 of every 10 mothers used to die in child birth and now it is closer to 1 in 10000 (in the worst cases).

Back to war specifically. In the 20th century we had WWI and WWII, but these world wars didn’t actually cover the world, they covered as much land as the Napoleonic Wars or the Pax Romana.

Back in antiquity the Trojan war killed 100,000 as did the Persian Invasion (after Thermopylae). 1 million people lived in Rome before it fell and it was one of the largest cities on the planet.

Alexander the Great conquered more territory than Napoleon. The Arabs beat even that in the 8th and 9th centuries. And Genghis Khan still holds the record for land area.

The Dark Ages were so called because of the constant war, death, famine, and plague. Colonialism was about world conquest and not in a peaceful way.

For your 100 million number, I would remind you that 40 million of Stalin’s 50 million and around 20 million of Mao died of starvation because communism is the most idiotic method to feed the masses. While starvation has killed millions throughout history, only in the 20th century did Norman Borlaug single handedly feed 1 billion people.

The earth has a history of war that stretches back thousands of years. Do you really think that WWII trumps all of that? The only real difference between WWII and all of the rest is the invention of the camera.

Mike,

Let’s compare apples to apples. Violence and crime is different from disease which of course has been helped through modern medicine.

The genocide of the North American Indians also produced 100 million deaths (over 200 years).

Do you have a source for this? My understanding is that we really have little idea how many native Americans there were here when Columbus arrived in 1500. Though it is true that there were far fewer as of 1900 alot of that was disease, not violence.

One estimate of the total killed in war and as the result of war in the 20th century is actually closer to 180 million is over 165 different wars, conflicts and genocides. That is an awful lot of casualties in a very short period of time.

Plus, the atrocities of slavery and exploitation is still continuing. We may not have plantations here anymore, but the slave trade is alive and well. In addition, we have a whole new scourge on our society through the drug trade and the violence that comes with that.

I understand that some people like to selectively choose some statistics and say we are living in a less violent time, but I think that is just the arrogance of our alleged advancement.

Religion really does teach people to ignore anything they don’t want to see, interpret results to suit their predefined conclusions and selectively quote from their chosen books. And as always, irony is completely lost on the Christian. Disgusting doesn’t even begin to describe it.

@AxeGrrl
Also don’t forgot the rapid increase in the world’s population in the last 200 years. There are simply more people about around to kill these days.

Which makes instances of wars, killings or disease outbreaks that killed tens of millions of people before the 18th or 19th century a lot worse.

It doesn’t matter if 10 million or 100 million Indians died due to diseases. What’s important is that by any estimation it was about 80-90% of the population.

Robert W,

Look at the link that Steve provided. The genocide of the Native Americans is in there. Google it, go to a library, the information is out there.

The slave trade is not alive and well. It no longer has Papal law to support it nor do any nations officially support it. And if you think that the exploitation of women and children is still on par with historical levels, I don’t know what to tell you.

There have been thousands of wars in human history, most of which occurred before there were over 1 billion people. 100 million out of 1 billion (that grew to 6 billion) over a century is quite a dent, but we recovered. Keep in mind that the entire indigenous populations of North America and Australia were effectively annihilated.

You are correct to say that many of the Native Americans died from disease (measles usually). Many of the Jews died from diseases too and from starvation, yet we still count them among the 6 million. If Europe had not invaded America, all 10 million of the natives would have lived normal lives as would their descendants.

In 1500 there were about 10 million Americans and about 50 million Europeans. By 1900 there were less than 1 million Native Americans and 75 million new Americans and 325 million Europeans.

Do the math.

I asked:

do you think that if the people who committed all of the violence/killings pre-20th century had 20th century technology, the numbers of those killed would have been the same or higher?

Robert W replied:

Clearly we have more deadly weapons today then we did in past centuries and what is even scarier is that we never seem to stop striving to make them even more deadly. Just look at the development of the weapons in the past century if you want to see how much more brutal we have become. If our overall collective mindset was to become less brutal and less violent would we have seen the ever progression of deadly technology such that we can now kill the entire world population many times over? And why are we fighting to prevent some from getting this technology if there was no real fear that they would do just that?

Robert, thanks for writing an entire paragraph that completely avoided answering my very simple question to you.

Could you read my question again and actually reply to it?

Amazing restraint from Zach, and excellent job being open and positive. I would say that he did pull some punches that could have easily been thrown, but would have turned many people off and left them with a bad impression.

As to the violence discussion, we have done a great job of reducing and in some cases nearly eliminating many systemic types of violence and death. I would classify the World Wars as outliers in a trend, not as definitive evidence that life is worse for the average person in the modern age, because I don’t think there’s any doubt that life is generally safer and more stable. I’m kind of stunned that Robert W would claim, “Neither the percentages of people killed in a battle nor the efficiency of the weapons is what is important.” Actually, the percentage is the ONLY way to fairly compare violence in different times. If there were only 10 people on earth at one point, and 9 were killed in feuds, then the rate of violence at that time was far worse than at a time when only 9 out of 100 million were killed in feuds, even though in both cases only 9 people died. Is that not obvious?

Robert W. you keep bringing up how as a creature we are violent. I do agree part of humankind turns to violence first before they try other solutions. I don’t think pointing out how violent we can be is doing much good and instead we should be looking at why some of us turn to violence so quickly. We also need to look at which nations are the most violent and which are the least violent. I am betting most of us already know which nations will be on top of the list as the most violent and which will be near the bottom of the list. Why is there such a huge divide between the most and least? If you can answer that you will find where to start to ending the violence.

I think some people have found an answer to those questions and they have been able to implement these methods without turning to violence.

Baconsbud,

I agree with you. I think this is a cause for alot of violence in our world.

Mike,

I will be happy to study it more. Don’t get me wrong, what happened to the Native Americans was horrible but I think that the numbers are enhanced by natural diseases and not all through violence.

Mike,

If Native Americans died from disease simply because they were exposed to other people from a different part of the world and had no immunity, I would count that different then those in the holocaust that died from catching disease from being in prison under harsh conditions and starved and worked to death. Native Americans who died under similar conditions from disease I would count as a violent death.

I hope you see the distinction.