I think he approached this in the most appropriate way, being both sensetive to religion but honest in his disapproval of it, by making sure to emphasize the difference in ethics and logic between the old and new testament, and furthermore by explaining evolution in a way that appeals more to common interest, by saying "isn't this wonderful" rather than "this is correct; deal with it," as you would typically hear from outspoken atheists like Dawkins.
All jokes aside I honestly think that is the most beautiful and meaningful philosophy that I have ever heard of. He just summed up all of my doubts about religion and pretty much defined how to be a happy atheist. This man has had so much effect on my life and outlook, and I'm so glad that I found out about him. (If the verbs should be past tense don't tell me. Idon't want to know.)
Evolution is a lie, all humans were created as they are today. They've never changed and they never will.
Eeexcept for the whole thing with pigmentation change in different locations through generations, how family traits pass on and how people in certain areas continue to nurture a certain feature.
Also, what's up with the appendix? Seems a bit sloppy to put something like that in there if it's useless.
**NOTICE**
Read all of it before you complain about the first line.
Hey Prachett: does science and evolution teach you that carbon dating, the basis of evolution, is absolutely fallible? o, if carbon dating is wrong, what then?
@goodkidz That's why everything is considered a theory in science. Who knows when something will come along to debunk what was considered popular science and you'll be back at square one trying to think of something else. If carbon dating is wrong, then so what? Something else will come up. It usually always does.
@dubldeka You are absolutely correct, I apologize...However, I will restate my hypothetical argument that the carbon dating method may at least cast a healthy DOUBT on evolution...Yes?
@goodkidz Evolution is defined as a change in frequency of inherited traits within a population over generations. That's the definition of evolution. As organisms reproduce, their genetic material is shuffled, mutations occur, and change is observed.
Carbon dating only provides information on samples less than ~62,000 years old. The Earth is about 4.54 billion years old, so stuff like dinosaur bones are not dated with Carbon-14 analysis, they use other sorts of radiometric dating.
"carbon dating, the basis of evolution" - Um, no, it doesn't, as it is not really related, but apparently you airing your ignorance on youTube shows just how absurd and fallable your reasoning is.
Nice one Sir Terry - Cosmos ought to be a must-watch for young and old.
I'll give him a nod to the concept of consciousness as a way for the Universe to understand itself and he nicely expands on Feynman's idea of beauty and awe
"tiny little brown ones" - sums up many religious sources (in the opinion of this streetlamp-making monkey)
You can make sense of any of it the same way some people can make sense of anything in a Star Wars movie - because it's fiction, and all you have to do to explain something away is make up something. After all, the nasty things in the OT were done by people, not God... right. And some of it is quite violent and graphic and this is because it's about real life, which is violent and graphic. The fiction falls apart on one point. You can't judge someone for being the way you created them to be.
Poor old Tel. He is systematic of the post Christian era. Only relying on human knowledge to justify his comments on things he obviously knows nothing about. Just because he writes good stories doesn't make him an expert on everything under the sun.
For all our arguments for and against the existence God, we all have to die and only then will we know for sure.
@1hiltonball Very interesting. What other kind of knowledge is available to humans? Naming him a "systematic of the post Christian era" proves nothing of course. And,on the contrary, there 'are' ways to test the god hypothesis. For a more complete critic check "The God Delusion". The book also addresses the "knowledge" argument thorougly. Of course the implied threat of death is the best Christians can manage these days...
The philosophers in our society have found a very good way of getting their points across without being forced to drink hemlock and things: they've learned to make people laugh.
Every worthwhile philosopher thinks that love others as you love yourself is the golden rule, apparently. I think I've heard this specific rant a few times before, drunk on the balcony at 3 am.
"I find it elevating.. and exhilarating...to discover that we live in a universe, which permits the evolution of molecular machines, as intricate and subtle.. as we."
Darwinian evolution is not a story. It's an anti-story. It's not a creation myth, any more than Genesis is a theory of the origin of the world. (I am more or less a Darwinian, by the way.) That's why so many atheists have to distort it into a story. (I am definitely an atheist, by the way.) It's hard to tell between Sir Pterry's playing the cheap seats and the effects of the wine, but it sound as though he is a Spencerist, not a Darwinist, like many people whose religion is evolution.
This comment has received too many negative votesshow
This is sad.... I've been reading Terry's books for years and now he alienates me because I'm a Christian! Good job I only ever stole his books and never paid for them! I used to feel guilty... not now! :D
I appreciate that you are a Christian and feel righteously angry about his mocking of our religion but you don't give Christianity a good name by stealing and then being glad that you did just because this man is misled. I agree that he has alienated a large population by his pompousness but as Christians we should pray for him and not steal from him. Let God deal with him in his own way.
I feel offended that he doesn't believe in the Tooth Fairy but I am sure the Tooth Fairy will deal with him. (Besides I have bought most of his books which makes the plea for the Tooth Fairy's existence sound, doesn't it?).
By the way the large righteous angry (but unfortunately not adequately alienated) population used to burn demonic books and people (such as doctors/physicists) once.I am sure they felt their god was busy at the time.
@emperor0013 You have a very good point.... how dare I call myself a Christian knowing that I have stolen from shops....! The difference is that as a Christian I have recognized that what I was doing in my drugged up undiagnosed bi-polar state was wrong...! Now... I know athiests who stole his books and have NEVER felt any guilt but at least I did! Now... if PT is right... why the f**k should I feel any more guilty than they do, which is to say - not at all... but I did?! Why?
@BloodOfRayne I never atrributed it to athiesm... way to twist my words! My point was that if atheism is true then why should I feel any guilt at all when atheist friends I know who stole his books simply said... fuck it... he doesn't need the money anyway?! At least I questioned it and felt wrong about it... they didn't!
Really though, if you study what the Old testament actually means, it's not like that. And the two trees he mentions in the garden of eden were mentioned in the Bible because they were relevent, not because they were the only ones.
Terry Pratchett, I agree, is a genius, but you'll notice that while he satirizes everything and it's mother, Christianity he only mocks. And like so many others, I'm willing to bet he was innoculated to christianity not by christianity but by something close to it.
I always think of sport when I read Small Gods. I.e., when you stop caring, it no longer matters- sport relies on the blind tenacity of its followers, much like religion. If the people realised the illusory nature of it: that if you stop watching the matches, your emotions won't be messed up by a number of people on varying shapes of field, the sport will whither away, and become Small Gods.
We all know somewhat how Terrys brian works. He has graced us with that. A mind like his would be impossible to stonewall into a classical religious system of belief. I do imagine that he struggles with this topic more than he lets on.
Thanks alot for this upload. I wouldnt have had seen it otherwise.
You may find yourself thinking along these same lines if you take the time to actually think for yourself instead of thinking the way your told to think by others.
But sadly, it is less difficult to think the way you're told to think than to think for yourself.
a little bit arrogant, but interesting all the same :)
MARMOTEER1423 4 days ago
I think he approached this in the most appropriate way, being both sensetive to religion but honest in his disapproval of it, by making sure to emphasize the difference in ethics and logic between the old and new testament, and furthermore by explaining evolution in a way that appeals more to common interest, by saying "isn't this wonderful" rather than "this is correct; deal with it," as you would typically hear from outspoken atheists like Dawkins.
energysage 2 weeks ago
It makes me proud to think that Terry Pratchett and me are members of the same species.
Fosterpython 1 month ago
"In my religion, the building of a telescope is the building of a cathedral." T. Prachett
skb0rzn 1 month ago 3
"--like Einstein, aaand, me."
*laughter*
"I can't help it. It's just a list, right?
"Stephan Hawking.."
All jokes aside I honestly think that is the most beautiful and meaningful philosophy that I have ever heard of. He just summed up all of my doubts about religion and pretty much defined how to be a happy atheist. This man has had so much effect on my life and outlook, and I'm so glad that I found out about him. (If the verbs should be past tense don't tell me. Idon't want to know.)
AmSpazz 1 month ago 4
That's funny, "falling angels or rising apes?", "well rising apes looks like a far better story"...
I mean this "Great A'Tuin"-Thing seems also quite credible... ;)
lambongxyz 1 month ago
Evolution is a lie, all humans were created as they are today. They've never changed and they never will.
Eeexcept for the whole thing with pigmentation change in different locations through generations, how family traits pass on and how people in certain areas continue to nurture a certain feature.
Also, what's up with the appendix? Seems a bit sloppy to put something like that in there if it's useless.
**NOTICE**
Read all of it before you complain about the first line.
LRAJ88 1 month ago
Hey Prachett: does science and evolution teach you that carbon dating, the basis of evolution, is absolutely fallible? o, if carbon dating is wrong, what then?
goodkidz 2 months ago
@goodkidz That's why everything is considered a theory in science. Who knows when something will come along to debunk what was considered popular science and you'll be back at square one trying to think of something else. If carbon dating is wrong, then so what? Something else will come up. It usually always does.
Nerdicaful 2 months ago
@goodkidz Carbon Dating is not the basis of evolution.
The origin of species was published a hundred years before Willard Libby developed radio carbon dating.
dubldeka 2 months ago
@dubldeka You are absolutely correct, I apologize...However, I will restate my hypothetical argument that the carbon dating method may at least cast a healthy DOUBT on evolution...Yes?
goodkidz 2 months ago
@goodkidz Carbon dating only works on things containing organic matter.
Fossilised bones are mineralised and no longer contain the original carbon.
You can't carbon date a stone.
or a stone that was once a bone.
But Carbon dating has nothing to do with evolution.
Evolution just means change adaptation and development.
Like the evolution of computers or aircraft.
dubldeka 2 months ago
@goodkidz Evolution is defined as a change in frequency of inherited traits within a population over generations. That's the definition of evolution. As organisms reproduce, their genetic material is shuffled, mutations occur, and change is observed.
Carbon dating only provides information on samples less than ~62,000 years old. The Earth is about 4.54 billion years old, so stuff like dinosaur bones are not dated with Carbon-14 analysis, they use other sorts of radiometric dating.
BigMikeMcBastard 1 month ago
@goodkidz
"carbon dating, the basis of evolution" - Um, no, it doesn't, as it is not really related, but apparently you airing your ignorance on youTube shows just how absurd and fallable your reasoning is.
wwwWOCKYme 1 month ago
old wizard
goodkidz 2 months ago
Humans need fantasy to *be* human. To be the place where the falling angel meets the rising ape.
glensloth 2 months ago 2
Nice one Sir Terry - Cosmos ought to be a must-watch for young and old.
I'll give him a nod to the concept of consciousness as a way for the Universe to understand itself and he nicely expands on Feynman's idea of beauty and awe
"tiny little brown ones" - sums up many religious sources (in the opinion of this streetlamp-making monkey)
jrcgarry 3 months ago
We have defenitly evolved. Now we can sit and throw shit at something on the other side of the world through cyberspace.
Chibbox 3 months ago
I love the nod to late great Carl Sagan.
SpidermanInLondon 3 months ago 2
what a genius
MigratoryEagle 3 months ago
You can make sense of any of it the same way some people can make sense of anything in a Star Wars movie - because it's fiction, and all you have to do to explain something away is make up something. After all, the nasty things in the OT were done by people, not God... right. And some of it is quite violent and graphic and this is because it's about real life, which is violent and graphic. The fiction falls apart on one point. You can't judge someone for being the way you created them to be.
ion010101 3 months ago
Poor old Tel. He is systematic of the post Christian era. Only relying on human knowledge to justify his comments on things he obviously knows nothing about. Just because he writes good stories doesn't make him an expert on everything under the sun.
For all our arguments for and against the existence God, we all have to die and only then will we know for sure.
1hiltonball 3 months ago
@1hiltonball Fine and dandy. In the meantime, throw away your guns and stop voting.
'Only human knowledge'
I stand amazed at your casual ignorance and the arrogance masking as humility
Eldritchfan 3 months ago
@1hiltonball Very interesting. What other kind of knowledge is available to humans? Naming him a "systematic of the post Christian era" proves nothing of course. And,on the contrary, there 'are' ways to test the god hypothesis. For a more complete critic check "The God Delusion". The book also addresses the "knowledge" argument thorougly. Of course the implied threat of death is the best Christians can manage these days...
zechordlord 1 month ago
Terry, really thank your just for being!
GodGodless 3 months ago 2
The philosophers in our society have found a very good way of getting their points across without being forced to drink hemlock and things: they've learned to make people laugh.
GenaTrius 4 months ago
perhaps 1 man who didnt like it - Terry himself?
"Oh dear god, now i would say it much more better, what a crap"
Nozgh 4 months ago
Pratchett is a god^^.But he has a strong speech impediment.Not all gods are perfect
MrAnonym6 4 months ago
Every worthwhile philosopher thinks that love others as you love yourself is the golden rule, apparently. I think I've heard this specific rant a few times before, drunk on the balcony at 3 am.
herozygous 4 months ago
"I find it elevating.. and exhilarating...to discover that we live in a universe, which permits the evolution of molecular machines, as intricate and subtle.. as we."
-Carl Sagan
volound 4 months ago 3
Darwinian evolution is not a story. It's an anti-story. It's not a creation myth, any more than Genesis is a theory of the origin of the world. (I am more or less a Darwinian, by the way.) That's why so many atheists have to distort it into a story. (I am definitely an atheist, by the way.) It's hard to tell between Sir Pterry's playing the cheap seats and the effects of the wine, but it sound as though he is a Spencerist, not a Darwinist, like many people whose religion is evolution.
OldDunc 4 months ago
The greatest thinker of our era
lordmakarix 4 months ago
youtube.com/watch?v=6NbM0faHptk
ra2006ra 4 months ago
God is very tolerant when it comes to money...
timdnwd 5 months ago
This comment has received too many negative votes show
This is sad.... I've been reading Terry's books for years and now he alienates me because I'm a Christian! Good job I only ever stole his books and never paid for them! I used to feel guilty... not now! :D
BloodOfRayne 6 months ago
@BloodOfRayne
I appreciate that you are a Christian and feel righteously angry about his mocking of our religion but you don't give Christianity a good name by stealing and then being glad that you did just because this man is misled. I agree that he has alienated a large population by his pompousness but as Christians we should pray for him and not steal from him. Let God deal with him in his own way.
1111Elizabeth1111 5 months ago
I feel offended that he doesn't believe in the Tooth Fairy but I am sure the Tooth Fairy will deal with him. (Besides I have bought most of his books which makes the plea for the Tooth Fairy's existence sound, doesn't it?).
By the way the large righteous angry (but unfortunately not adequately alienated) population used to burn demonic books and people (such as doctors/physicists) once.I am sure they felt their god was busy at the time.
Just how tangled is the religious mind?
zechordlord 2 months ago
@1111Elizabeth1111 I don't think that he would have alienated many Christians with these few wine relaxed statements.
His stories are not condemned by Christians like the Harry Potter books are
And even with the most pious book burning the Potter books are still popular.
I can't recall any anti religious statements in his stories, in fact they are full of mysterious kindly forces helping the hero.
Polytheistic perhaps.
dubldeka 2 months ago
@BloodOfRayne Thow shalt not steal... Idiot.
MCCoburnicus 5 months ago
@BloodOfRayne How christlike of you. Once again, the religious prove themselves to be enormous hypocrites.
emperor0013 5 months ago 2
@emperor0013 You have a very good point.... how dare I call myself a Christian knowing that I have stolen from shops....! The difference is that as a Christian I have recognized that what I was doing in my drugged up undiagnosed bi-polar state was wrong...! Now... I know athiests who stole his books and have NEVER felt any guilt but at least I did! Now... if PT is right... why the f**k should I feel any more guilty than they do, which is to say - not at all... but I did?! Why?
BloodOfRayne 5 months ago
@BloodOfRayne Listen to yourself. "I stole but its okay because look how the atheists steal too!"
"I stole but its okay because the guy I stole from doesn't agree with my superstitious beliefs!"
"I stole but its okay because I felt kinda bad but the atheists never did" (love how you decide how they feel and then attribute it to atheism.)
emperor0013 5 months ago 3
@BloodOfRayne I never atrributed it to athiesm... way to twist my words! My point was that if atheism is true then why should I feel any guilt at all when atheist friends I know who stole his books simply said... fuck it... he doesn't need the money anyway?! At least I questioned it and felt wrong about it... they didn't!
BloodOfRayne 3 months ago
@BloodOfRayne It's called empathy. Nothing mystical or magical about it. Why you have to attribute 'guilt' as proof of a god is fucking beyond me...
wolverine005 3 weeks ago
@BloodOfRayne I hope you go to your make believe heaven soon.
Eldritchfan 3 months ago
@Eldritchfan Make believe or not, it's gotta be better than this shit hole, right?
BloodOfRayne 3 months ago
@Eldritchfan Well... unlike you at least I won't be all dressed up with nowhere to go, eh? ; )
BloodOfRayne 3 months ago
He is, of course, my favorite author. He is an incredibly gifted man. I look up to him in writing and humour.
StarwalkMedia 6 months ago 2
Really though, if you study what the Old testament actually means, it's not like that. And the two trees he mentions in the garden of eden were mentioned in the Bible because they were relevent, not because they were the only ones.
Terry Pratchett, I agree, is a genius, but you'll notice that while he satirizes everything and it's mother, Christianity he only mocks. And like so many others, I'm willing to bet he was innoculated to christianity not by christianity but by something close to it.
StarwalkMedia 6 months ago
i love the bit about about street lamp
Daleksaresupreme1 6 months ago
I always think of sport when I read Small Gods. I.e., when you stop caring, it no longer matters- sport relies on the blind tenacity of its followers, much like religion. If the people realised the illusory nature of it: that if you stop watching the matches, your emotions won't be messed up by a number of people on varying shapes of field, the sport will whither away, and become Small Gods.
leincrediblehulk 6 months ago
"The building of a telescope is the building of a cathedral." Brilliant.
LizardSF 7 months ago 2
"I'd much rather be a rising ape than a fallen angel", "God help me if I ever become a christian!". THIS MAN IS A GENIOUS!
Tora0dead 8 months ago 5
This man needs to go on tour and just talk
shadowsnight72 10 months ago 2
We all know somewhat how Terrys brian works. He has graced us with that. A mind like his would be impossible to stonewall into a classical religious system of belief. I do imagine that he struggles with this topic more than he lets on.
Thanks alot for this upload. I wouldnt have had seen it otherwise.
xUbastardx 1 year ago 4
@xUbastardx
What's a brian? A cousin of the Igor?
leincrediblehulk 6 months ago
@leincrediblehulk Aaaaaahhhh....oops. 8P Apparently my fingers and my bri--...brain are not working in unison.
xUbastardx 6 months ago
You may find yourself thinking along these same lines if you take the time to actually think for yourself instead of thinking the way your told to think by others.
But sadly, it is less difficult to think the way you're told to think than to think for yourself.
Anthraxicus 1 year ago 3
Is there a religion called "Pratchettism"? Because I want to follow it. :) This guy is amazing.
UselessRambling 1 year ago 5
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People who believe so much in self can't believe in God
mtmama777 1 year ago
you'd get arrested if you tried to "love others as you love your self"
255ad 1 year ago 7
@255ad ahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha haaaaaahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha
shukka667 9 months ago
@shukka667 thanks
255ad 9 months ago
i just remembered why i love this guy.
he isn´t talking about how true a story is but about how amazing it is.
rising ape... so true
Didaktylos7 1 year ago 3
what a genius...
camachinha 1 year ago 52
Thank you for sharing this wholly simple, but beautiful peace of poetic philosophy.
Losloth 1 year ago 39