Great interview. Great man. So brave in the face of death... and didn't need the comfort blanket of an afterlife. He still had such a sharp mind right to the end. It is such a pity the human body is so temporary.
I don't agree with the poster's campaign to get him knighted though... Hitchens hated the monarchy and knighting him after death when he can't even comment on it seems odd.
one of the greatest conversations ever these two men are both extremely intelligent and both british! we have lost a great man with Christopher hitchens and I don't think enough praise is given to paxman he is still outspoken and one of the only men who holds mps to account for the careless or stupid actions, long live these two thank you for uploading this video
I don't know why this programme was introduce as Peter Hitchens. However, Paxman was genuinly enamoured by Christopher Hitchens. This is the first time I have seen Paxman totally responsive to the replies. Hitchens gives all: is honest, clever, and genuine. What a wonderful character we have lost. What a great mind we cannot use anymore. Very sad.
Perhaps the announcer thought Peter was the better of the two brothers: he is right. Peter is much more intellectually honest and more like Orwell than Christopher. Sr is far too enamoured of his own voice whereas Peter is humble, stolid, stoic and a far more astute, incisive and insightful commentator.
I now await the slamming I will inevitably receive from the Christopher Hitchens drones who ironically have created a religion around him, making him omniscient, omnipresent and omnipotent.
@Bastiat90 Peter by all accounts is a well respected columnist and author and has had a great career. I dont however share his views on many things such as abortion and I remember him being against Kosovo, and even worse he writes for the Mail on Sunday! Lol.
Chris for me is the verbal gladiator. I find him insightful, and share alot of his views in comparison. I know what you mean about the religion around him, but Atheism has few leaders, its only natural that these people will defend him.
Peter is far more like Orwell than Christopher ever was. Most of Christopher's writings were ephemeral: have you read his books on Orwell, Jefferson or Paine? They were written just for the sake of a more impressive looking bibliography and the 'intellectual' kudos he hoped would accrue to him. Peter has written less, but his writings are far more substantial. Hitchens C was good at ad hominem, and used that talent to hide his lack of a substantial argument.
00:09: Dear BBC announcer, I think the person Jeremy Paxman was talking to was *Christopher* Hitchens, not Peter Hitchens.
Also I actually don't think a knighthood would be something Hitch would have wanted given that he was a fairly stalwart Republican. I don't think he would have been willing to kneel before the Queen to receive this "honour."
@relarerfhjk oh and ten points for Gryfindor if you can tell the class why fish don't have fins because they need them for the water, without using google.
this argument is still fun, @relarerfhjk, you are dumb buddy. I don't want to antagonise you too much, or insult you.. but you have the aggressive certainty of a bigoted fool, yet to grow up, or learn to read. keep it in your pants. never pro-create. please? the design argument is so weak it defies, well.. belief! To borrow from the Hitch, you have put the horse before the cart, fish don't have fins because they need them for the water. Read Hitchen's my friend, just do it.
I tend to read academics, which is why i don't read Hitchens (a pop-culture polemicist with zero academic credibility"
Evolution (e.g fish/fins etc) has nothing to do with the argument that the Universe was designed for life, since this wasnt the product of evolution, and was necessary for evolution to occurr in the first place!
William Lane Craig stomped all over Hitchens....Hitch couldn't cope when he met a real academic
@relarerfhjk 'Universe was designed for life'. The universe is also fine tuned for the particular gas clouds to exist on Jupiter and the fact that Venus' atmospheric composition is 96.5% CO2. If the constants were tweaked by one part in whatever million etc, the 96.5% would not be 96.5%. Why do christians continually boast about being humble? This unbelievably solipsistic. The entire argument is predicated on a completely unjustified notion that life has intrinsic value.
@relarerfhjk 'If you don't believe conscious, interactive moral agents have intrinsic value, then we should legalise murder,since its no worse than damaging a rock!'. A red herring. Completely irrelevant. Instead appealing to the heartstrings perhaps you should give me a logical argument.
The range of 96.5% CO2 on Venus' atmosphere permitting values for each of the fundamental constants are infinitely narrower than the range of 96.5% CO2 on Venus' atmosphere PROHIBITING values.
@relarerfhjk And where on earth do you get these probabilities from. If somebody tossed a coin and it lands heads and I said 'amazing, it must have fixed, its incredibly unlikely.' Why? 'well there are an infinite number of things it could have done - it could have landed on its side, it could have gone off to space.' You have simply plucked the probabilities out of thin air. The only source of empirical evidence we have for assigning one likelihood rather than another is repeated trials.
I had assumed you at least understood junior physics: all 30 fundamental physical constants have to simultaneously and indepndently fall within a vanishingly small range of values from the very inception of the Universe to get conditions for intelligent life to exist.
This isn't in dispute, dude 9except by idiots on youtube) its accepted by most physicists read Astronomer Royal Sir Martin Rees book Just Six Numbers
@relarerfhjk ' all 30 fundamental physical constants have to simultaneously and indepndently fall within a vanishingly small range of values from the very inception of the Universe to get conditions for intelligent life to exist.'
Your statement can be rephrased: all 30 fundamental physical constants have to simultaneously and indepndently fall within a vanishingly small range of values from the very inception of the Universe for there to be Venus' atmosphere to be 96.5% CO2.
I have explained to you why thats false; fine-tuning for intelligent life is not in dispute among physicists. Do you actually want to learn the science?
Then, with open mind, try reading Just Six Numbers by the Astronomer Royal Martin Rees, one of the best physicists alive and one of the pioneers in discovering the astonishing precision of fine-tuning for complex, intelligent, interactive life
Or, if you have a closed mind, dont read it. And dont learn.
@relarerfhjk The one with the closed mind is you. You really are 'a man of one book'
"I have explained to you why thats false". Really? Perhaps you should put on your spectacles and have a look at your previous comments. Appeals to authority in no way constitutes an 'explanation'. Nor have you in any way defended your anthropocentrism in your baseless assumption that carbon based life has any more intrinsic value than the particular clouds on jupiter or Venus' atmosphere being 96.5% CO2.
Its false because of the principle of a "tidy explanation"... an explanation which, in explaining some phenomenon, reveals that there is something to be explained!
Say Bob(,born Aug 23, 1982) gets a birthday car with license plate BOB 82382.Intelligent dsign is a "tidy explanation" of this plate number....Since its Bob's birthday being celebrated,its not "Bob chauvinistic" to pick out his name/birth date as a significant pattern crying out for explanation!
@relarerfhjk It seems to me that the question is begged again. Justify your comparison of life to 'Bob(born 8/23/82 geting a bday car with license plate BOB 82382' without using probability as a defense because I have pointed out that there are many things that are as improbable or more improbable than your proposition.I could use your analogy for Venus.
If you are looking for a scientific explanation of how life arose you should be referring to evolution not ID (which is not science)
The comparison re Bob is the presence of a "tidy explanation" of the initial conditions of the universe similarly justify us focusing on the conditions needed for life as a phenomenon crying out for explanation!
I'm refering to the SPECIFIED IMPROBABILITY of a life-permitting Universe;like having 1000000 black balls and 1 white ball; any ball is equally improbable but its FAR more probable whichever ball you pick will be black, than that it will be white!!
@relarerfhjk Again you haven't advanced your argument one iota.
'I'm refering to the SPECIFIED IMPROBABILITY of a life-permitting Universe;like having 1000000 black balls and 1 white ball; any ball is equally improbable but its FAR more probable whichever ball you pick will be black, than that it will be white!!'
Justify that life is the 'white ball'. If you are simply going to presuppose, I will reciprocate and presuppose that Jupiter is the 'white ball'.
@relarerfhjk 'conditions needed for life as a phenomenon crying out for explanation!'
That can be rephrased: conditions needed for Venus' atmosphere being 96.5% CO2 is a phenomenon crying out for an explanation. If the initial conditions of the universe were altered one part in whatever billion, Venus' atmosphere would no longer be 96.5% CO2.
FUCK YOU...... THAT IS MY 'ACADEMIC' RESPONSE TO THOSE WHO QUESTION THE MECHANICS OF THIS OUTSTANDING MAN. SHAME ON YOU FOR DOING SO..... DONT FORGET TO SAY A PRAYER BEFORE BED!
He is incomprehensibly more intelligent than you! He has multiple PHD's in philosophy, has published over 200 articles in peer-reviewed philosophy journals and been praised by the world's greatest living atheist philsoopher Quentim Smith as having come up with the most successful 9and hotly-debated) argument for theism of the past century!
You, on the other hand, are just a Youtube clown. Craig would demolish you in about half a second
Because the BBC is sycophantic to its favourite luvvies. Why is all this attention devoted to a bloated journalist who never had an original thought of his own. He was no Orwell or an HL Mencken. He could turn a shapely phrase; so could Trotsky, a mass murderer of precise quality. Most of his journalism is ephemeral. He may have adopted the mantle of Orwell, but Orwell would prefer his more honest and talented brother Peter; coincidentally a much better human
@Bastiat90 Even if he was adopting Orwells or whoever else's ideas ... It is quite clear he genuinely believes this view and to be honest supports his claims expertly unlike yourself.
Hitchens is very contradictory of himself. In his last interview he says the totalitarian is his enemy, and yet he still called himself a Trotskyist to his dying days, and he professed support for Vladimir Lenin; because he was secular. Trotsky was a totalitarian murderer who ordered the deaths of the Krondstadt mutineers because they thought Soviet communism deserved more political parties other than the Bolsheviks. Hitchens was a charlatan.
@Bastiat90 Well, here's the thing...why don't you get yourself published in Vanity Fair, sell millions of books and draw crowds of thousands wherever you appear? I mean, clearly, of the two of you, YOU are the better, cleverer man, right? Right? Or maybe you just feel happier leaving pointless, uninteresting comments that few people are interested in on YouTube. Jealousy is a terribly sad thing. Hope you recover soon.
I have no interest in practicing journalism; I'm happy to be a partial observer of the profession. I have never written a book, as I am still only 21 and have yet to discover much of the world, but perhaps I will one day.
I have no doubt Hitchens was smarter than I, but I'm smarter than you. Am I the better man? That is for others to judge. I'm merely doing to Hitchens what he did to Mother Teresa and Bill Clinton. I'm attempting to puncture an inflated reputation.
I assume you praise Hitchens for his polemical attacks on consensus heroes. Why do you call it jealousy if I do the same? Was Hitchens jealous of Mother Teresa, of Clinton, Kissinger, Reagan, Carter etc. My comments can't be that uninteresting if you choose to respond to them. Either that reveals my interesting nature, or your desire for banality; I imagine you struggle with proper debates.
Hahahahaha! That has to be the funniest attempt to give anyone academic credibility I've ever seen!
William Lane Craig has been published in hundreds of peer-reviewed journals of philosophy and has multiple PHD's what the FUCK has Hitchens ever achieved?
He's just a journo, a pop-culture polemicist scribbler for a consumerised magazine full of adverts
Hitch was never an academic: as was painfully obvious when Craig demolished him
@relarerfhjk What the fuck has Hitchens ever acheived? Talk to God with that mouth, do you? Sorry, I'm not playing "my dad's bigger than your dad". It's beneath me. I will say that WLC is a professional debater, nothing more, touring the circuit spouting the same tired nonsense time after time. His death will be met with shrugs, I can guarantee it won't make headlines around the world.
@Ellie8969 "WLC is a professional debater nothing more"
Thats a Youtube myth that reveals you to be another clueless nobody who knows fuck all about academia.
In reality (if you had a clue) Craig was a renowned philosopher,frequently published in top journals, with over 30 books,long before he did any debates. great philosophers like Quentin Smith and Oxford Uni's Daniel Came have praised him as one of the best of the last century! His ideas will be matter long after Hitchens
But Trotsky was a murderer. He took lives in the name of a political ideology. Albert Camus once wrote that 'responsibility to history absolves one of responsibility towards the human race.'
Those who support Trotsky and Lenin, despite the reams of evidence that damns them, need to examine their conscience. If one of my intellectual influences had committed murder, I would withdraw my support for their ideas because they relinquished their morality. Yours is a pathetic excuse
For all his intelligence and being known as a man of good reading, he was really stupid where 911 and health are concerned. He seems to have been a prolific researcher on subjects such as history and philosophy, but paid no attention to anything that was considered 'conspiracy' or 'new age'. There is no doubt that had he followed 'new age' remedies on cancer treatment that he would be alive today, but I suspect the guy never said sorry in his life to friends or opponents.
I'm sorry people. I understand the sentiment but how can you tell one of the worlds leading atheists to 'rest in peace?' Rest where exactly? That's just the sort of muddled thinking he spent so much of his life trying to dispel.
@m00nshine2004 surely the fact that the atoms he was made up of(and that we are all made up of), will go on eventually into everyone and everything around us. I am an atheist however I believe my loved ones and everyone's loved one's will 'live' on, not in the religious sense but on a level of mass and what we are made up of, nothing is destroyed only changed. So really saying RIP is only a statement, an obvious statement at that, but it still can have meaning to atheists.
I'm surprised at how few people have viewed this. The last 10 minutes in which he talks about Pascal's Gambit and why he wouldn't go down that road is brilliant. To paraphrase. If I am shocked to find a judge on the other side then he's bound to think more of me for sticking to my guns than by pretending to believe in him.
Lets hope in 100 years time, high schools are quoting Hitch and not a represtentative of some global Ischristiaic Papiphate. I for one will deeply miss his insights.
Wow, he was brave as fuck. Well done good sir, one of the few people I am aware of who continues to kick arse beyond the grave. I shall drink to you. RIP
It's rather ironic and silly to try and get Hitchens posthumously knighted, as it's an "honour" he would likely have rejected and repudiated in life. Hitchens was a life-long republican and anti-monarchist. He was a socialist who was keenly aware of and opposed to Britain's class system. Don't support his knighthood.
@VersaMusic Agreed. I also find this trend of honouring dead people who you loathed when they lived to be extremely distasteful. You don't win brownie points for being nice to dead people when you were dicks to them when they were alive!
Besides, if anything he should be voted the 1st and only President of the United Kingdom.
I hope he came to know Christ in his final hours as William Lane Craig said, after easily defeating him in debate on the existence of God, it was clear he had no rational grounds for his atheism his objections to God's existence were entirely emotional.
On the contrary, he had no intelligent arguments against theism whatsoever. He veered between misinterpretations of the New Testament, equivocations between God and North Korea, rehashed versions of the old "who designed the designer" fallacy, and woeful misunderstanding of science.
the Christian academic William Lane Craig tore him to shreds when they met in debate: Hitch got so badly battered he declined to give a closing speech
@relarerfhjk Christian academic William Lane Craig? HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA! The man is a total moron who trots out the same tired and entirely refuted arguments at again and again and again. He's an embarrassment mate - and, btw, who DID design the designer? Just because you're too stupid to be able to answer that does not make it a fallacy. Now go away...I found your initial remark about Hitchens beneath contempt.
@Ellie8969 "who DID design the designer" You (and Hitchens, fellow purveyor of that failed argument)need to learn the basics:like the difference between a contingent being (which requires a cause) and a necessary being (which doesn't)
Time itself began to exist with the Universe so the cause is timeless
"entirely refuted arguments" Keep dreaming, they have never been "refuted" you clown.He's trashed atheist physicsts in debate (watch Lawrence Krauss getting steamrollered against him)
@relarerfhjk OK...now prove with reasoned evidence, please, that there is any such thing as a "contingent being" and that he/she/it had anything to do with the birth of the universe. Actually, it would be helpful if you could also demonstrate that the universe needed any kind of "cause". That you are too stupid to understand how it could exist without one is not evidence, just so you know.
@Ellie8969 "prove there is any such thing" Thats trivially easy, a contingent being is simply anything that does not have to exist. The Universe (and human beings) obviously do not have to exist since there are many scenarios in which we would not have existed
The Universe needs a cause because anything that begins to exist needs a cause unless you believe planets and Universes just pop into being out of non-being without cause
@relarerfhjk Ah, the old "Kalam" fallacy, eh? Oh dear. If you weren't such an unpleasant little turd, I might almost feel sorry for you. Let me say this slowly....quantum mechanics has shown that NOT everything that begins to exist requires a cause. So your *argument* falls at the first post. That the best you've got? But keep the ad hominems coming...they're quite funny!
@Ellie8969 "quantum mechanics has shown not everything that begins to exist requires a cause"
WRONG! You have just proved your ignorance again, you pathetic retard! Try reading some science! There are at least FIVE interpretations of quantum mechanics which are deterministic and say there IS a cause!
And the quantum vacuum (which produces virtual particles) is NOT nothing...its a rich sea of energy. So it aint an example of non-existence producing existence!
@relarerfhjk Well, you're wrong I'm afraid. You've clearly cut and paste something that you don't really understand, so my efforts at explaining would be wasted and I have better things to so. But try to get this through your head, you ignorant moron, science does not support your childish beliefs AT ALL. I think you know this deep down - your infantile anger and insults proves how embarrassed you are. Grow up.
Wow, what a wonderful rebuttal! Did you need time to think of that? You didn't learn the science, so you got humiliated.
Quantum vacuums producing virtual particles do NOT defeat the premise of Kalam that something cannot come from nothing, because empty space,(or the quantum vacuum) ,far from being "nothing", is actually a rich sea of energy with physical structure.
@relarerfhjk Hold on....one minute you're claiming that "all the experts agree with me that the universe came from nothing" and the next that "....Quantum vacuums producing virtual particles do NOT defeat the premise of Kalam that something cannot come from nothing"
In fact, YOU have rebutted Kalam!
So, what is your argument? Did the universe come from nothing...or not?
If you don't understand your own claims, what is the point of me even attempting to discuss this with you????????????
Erm, nope. Because if the Universe came from God (as Kalam argues) then it didnt come "from nothing". You didnt even know the difference between a material cause (i.e the wood that forms the table) and an efficient cause (i.e the carpenter)?? Its only if God does NOT exist (as atheists argue) that the natural world must have come from nothing without cause.
Which obviously couldnt happen, since non-being cant produce being.
@relarerfhjk You said that all the experts agreed with you that the universe came from nothing. That's what you said, I'm afraid. Lying about it now will not help your cause.
"Its only if God does NOT exist (as atheists argue) that the natural world must have come from nothing without cause." Really? Who told you that? If the universe was *caused* (and that has NOT been established) why have you decided that the cause is a) a god and more specifically b) the god that you believe in?
Experts say nothing IN THE NATURAL WORLD existed beyond the Universe.... which shows the cause must be supernatural! Precisely as Kalam argues.Where's the lie?
"that has NOT been established"it is established unless you think everything needs a cause except the whole Unverse itself!
The cause of time/matter must be timeless, immaterial, powerful (to "cause a Universe) and personal (as abstract timeless/spaceless objects like numbers cant "cause" anything)
@relarerfhjk Oh, and btw, yes time began with the universe. No time existed until then...there was no "before". A cause comes before an event...both "cause" and "before" require the existence of time to have any meaning...but time did not exist. Therefore, to claim a "cause" is illogical. Should you really be trying to discuss things you clearly don't understand? I'm afraid you're just embarrassing yourself. Not for the first time, I suspect, given your childish beliefs ;-)
@Ellie8969 As an aside, there could possible be a 'before' the Universe. There's just no current way of knowing. All we know is that time appeared to begin at the formation of the Universe. There may have been something before, or there may have been no before, and the Universe simply became.
Though I dislike that idea personally. I find the ideal of a Universe rebirthing and redying over and over again. Seems more functional and logical.
@andromidius Yes, agreed. There *may* have been a before, some other kind of time we know nothing about. But the point is that it is foolish to claim that there *must* have been a before/cause...we simply do not have enough understanding to make a claim like that. But trying to explain that to the faith befuddled moron above is not easy.
WRONG! This is the greatest fallacy in the book. A cause can be simultaneous with an effect...centuries ago Kant showed this with the example of the log permanently submerged in water which displaces the water, or a heavy ball eternally resting on a cushion which causes a depression in the cushion: the "effect" (the depression in the cushion) is simultaneous with the "cause" ( the ball resting permanently resting in the cushion)
@relarerfhjk "You dumb fuck". My...this Christian love thing is so precious. How proud Jesus would be! A cause can be simultaneous with an effect? Ok...I'll bite. Prove this is how the universe came into existence, and you'll be on to something. Oh, and probably earn yourself a Nobel Prize into the bargain. Amazing how many physicists (you know, the EXPERTS) appear to know less about this subject than some sad little loser posting on YouTube. LOL :)
@Ellie8969 "prove this is how the Universe came into existence"
Its already proved by the fact time came into being with the Universe, so the Univers's coming into being was obviously simultaneous with the cause of its coming into being.
"EXPERTS" Erm, the experts all agree with what I'm saying: the fact the Universe came from nothing, the fact causes can be simultaneous with effects, and the fact the Universe is fine-tuned for life are all facts supported by modern physics
@relarerfhjk "so the Univers's coming into being was obviously simultaneous with the cause of its coming into being" Erm...nope. And no expert agrees wth you, and you know it. There exists in science no explanation for how the universe came into existence. You know better? Write a paper, get published, stun the world and win the Nobel Prize.
@Ellie8969 "so the Universes coming into being was obviously simultaneous with the cause...erm...nope"
Well nothing begins to exist without cause,time began to exist with the Universe.... so whatever caused it to come into being did so, simultaneously with its coming into being! Its pretty simple even you can work it out!
"no expert agrees with you" All the experts agree with me on the facts i described; the Universe came from nothing etc:theism is the best explanation of those facts!
@relarerfhjk Here you go again..."the universe came from nothing". Are you so stupid that you cannot understand that if you are going to claim that your god made the universe, then you cannot also claim it came from "nothing". Your god is nothing? Well, I agree with that.
"Well, nothing begins to exist without cause..." Again, not true. Not even slightly true, I'm afraid.
@Ellie8969 "if your going to claim God created universe you cant say it came from nothing" it came from nothing IN THE NATURAL WORLD......which is just another way of saying everything in the natural world had a beginning (so the cause of the natural world must be SUPERNATURAL) precisely what Kalam argues! Are you totally thick?
"not even slightly true" its not only true its the principle that underpins science,you tried to refute it with quantum mechanics and got embarassed.
@Ellie8969 Thats your only answer to getting humiliated/ Notice you have wandered off-topic somewhat: the topic you humiliated yourself discussing ( in case readers of this forum need reminding) was whether a cause must come "before an event", as you claimed.
In fact, almost any efficient cause is simultaneous with an effect, and, from Kant's ball-on-chusion, or log-underwater example, we can show how causes can be simultaneous with effects.
@Ellie8969 So you lost the argument on causality (you thought a cause must precede an effect) you lost the argument on quantum mechanics (there's no consensus that virtual particles are uncaused and the quantum vacuum is not "nothing" therefore doesn't refute Kalam) you lost the argument on fine-tuning, since its a life-permitting Universe, not a life-prohibiting one, that is astonishingly improbable, given the necessary range of values!
@Ellie8969 "The only person claiming this" Claiming a cause can be simultaneous with an effect? Erm, Kant was the first who showed it, its universally accepted ever since. You prick
@relarerfhjk Basically your argument is 'it doesn't count when I say it doesn't.'
That's very poor and lazy thinking. Sorry, but it is. You're so narrow minded and stubborn, and you're so deep in the crap you left under you that you're never going to get back out of it again. You're too embaressed to admit when your logic has failed.
And your mistake was simple - you could have stuck to 'I just believe'. Trying to bring in proof was your downfall.
@relarerfhjk 'Don't try to debate me or I'll embarass you'.
At least arrogant atheists aren't so hypocritical as to come out with a statement like that and yet proclaim that their belief system is based on humility.
@relarerfhjk And apparently neither do you. "science" (incidently i love how you treat it like its all one discipline) has not "proved" there was nothing prior to the big bang, we still have no idea. And your own argument that something cannot come from nothing invalidates your stance that a god is the ultimate creator. If something cannot come from nothing with out a creator than god needed one too, so if im going to worship it'll the thing that was powerful enough to make your god
The Bord-Guth-Villenkin theorem of 2003 confirmed, once and for all, that ANY expanding Universe must have an absolute beginning 9which means time and space themselves had an absolute beginning)
"God needed a creator too"
Wrong again: something cannot BEGIN to exist from nothing but God, as a necessary being (not a contingent being) does not begin to exist he brought time itself into being (as Big Bang cosmology shows)
@relarerfhjk Yup they had an absolute beginning. Knowing that however does not equal knowledge what existed or didnt exist before that point.
And your claim that God did not require a creator invalidates your whole arguement. You say because something cannot come from nothing, there must be a god. But if god did not require a creator then clearly something can come from nothing, therefore god is surplus to requirement as he proves something can come from nothing.
@Spiderpope And if you still maintain something cannot come from nothing then god requires a creator, so thats what i will worship. And he told me that he thinks god is a dick, and anyone who believes he is the supreme being is going to Uberhell. Sorry.
@Spiderpope "knowledge of what existed before that point"
There was no "before" as time itself came into being with the Universe. We can use deductive logic to work out what existed outside the Universe, based on the two premises that a) the Universe began to exist and b) nothing begins to exist without cause
"invalidates your argument"
No it doesnt because God never BEGAN to exist, whereas the Universe did! Something cannot COME INTO BEING from nothing: God didint come into being.
@relarerfhjk No amount of deductive logic will result in God exists from those two premises. There is nothing at all to suggest the cause of the universe was a god. Even if you disprove every known theory of universal beginnings the end result still does not equal a god.
"god didnt come into being"
So you agree then, he doesnt exist. Something cannot just exist. Every fundamental aspect of reality shows that. So either your god is outside reality, therefore by definition not real, or he began
@Spiderpope to which i say, Ubergod made him, Ubergod really dislikes you and he's sending you to Uberhell when you die. Apparently they use cake based torture there.
@relarerfhjk You also have a woeful lack of knowledge of Archaeology, Geology, Palaeontology and Egyptology if you think for one second the evidence for christianity is powerful.
The Bible is demonstrably incorrect about a multitude of events, it borrows wholesale from Egyptian mythology and preaches that slavery, rape, genocide and child killing are all acceptable. I think it is you good sir who should be be embarrassed by your claims.
@Ellie8969 You just proved you know absolutely fuck all about anything by saying that Craig is just "a professional debater nothing more" when, in reality, he's a great professional philosopher with over 200 articles on his contributions to philosophy of time, ethics and philosophy of science published in peer-reviewed journals of philosophy.
He's co-authored books with some of the best philosophers of the last century and great atheist philosophers like Quentin Smith praise him
@relarerfhjk I'm laughing as I type this. did you see the same debate I did. Do you really think that on his deathbed a thinker with the intellect of would subscribe to a religion which offers nothing in evidense for its validity than the content of its self prescribed book?. (of very dubious origins, channeled spirits, iron age superstition)
Yes, I also saw the same debate which the great atheist blog CommonSenseAthesm described thus "Truthfully, Craig spanked Hitchens like a foolish child"
There is strong evidence of the validity of Christian theism, Craig presented 5 such lines of evidence in the debate, and poor old Hitchens couldn't refute one of them
@relarerfhjk Its been a while since I saw it, but if memory serves he had a rebuttal to all but the parabel of the five talents. Hence I asked my qualified theologian ally to explain that parabel in-particular.
@relarerfhjk Show me any 'strong evidence of the validity of christian theism' that doesn't come quoted 'chapter and verse' from the very book you claim to be the source of your religion, or based on ideas of 'faith' in that self same book and I will take your argument seriously.
Christian: Our book contains the word of God and the truth of mans realtionship with his creator.
@NeoLeaver "strong evidence that doesnt come quoted from the book" Do you know anything about this subject? Did you not know that there was no "book" the Gospels, the Acts and Paul's letters were among a collection of 2000 historical documents which were only included in the Bible when the NT was created two centuries later?
And the evidence includes the fine-tuning of the Universe for life, the creation of the Universe out of nothing and the existence of objective moral values
@relarerfhjk Do you understand the concept of a book? Its a compliation of chapters, edited together into a single work. Do you understand how the Bible being aknowledged as such shows how its not the 'Word of God'?
Oh, and the universe isn't fine tuned for life. The Universe wasn't created out of nothing. Morale values are subjective, not objective. Deal with it.
They wern't "chapters" written for a book they were records of historical events.
The Universe is fine-tuned for life; read atheist Astronomer Royal Sir Martin Rees's latest book Just Six Numbers in which he writes "Everywhere we see more examples of this extraordinarily exquisite fine-tuning"
The Universe was created from nothing as proven by the Bord-Guth-Villenkin theorem 2003
Was the Holocaust wrong even if the Nazis thought it right? then objective values exist
@Ellie8969 I quoted Rees because he is an atheist, who nonetheless accepts the Universe is fine-tuned for life with astonishing precision (see his book Just Six Numbers) and that atheism/naturalism has no explanation for this fine-tuning.
He admits its cant be due to physical necessity in his book, and admits a multiverse hypotheses (no matter how ridiculously improbable that is) is the only hope of an atheistic explanation.
@relarerfhjk "Sadly Craig has shown why the multiverse is false" HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!!!!!! He has done no such thing. Man, you really are deluded, aren't you! So, what evidence did WLC produce then? He's a poxy "philosopher" (a dead subject) yet he's managed a discovery that has defied every physicist on earth?????
And congratulations on misunderstanding every word Rees said about "fine-tuning"...or are you doing it deliberately?
On the contrary, every one of the New Atheists, from Dawkins to Stenger to Harris are spouting rehashed old philosophical arguments against God (its just that theyre such dreadful amateurish arguments that these guys try to disguise them by simultaneously deriding philosophy)
"defied every physicist on earth"
There's no "discovery" necessary since there was never a shred of evidence for a Muliverse(we cant observe any Universe outside our own)
Intro said peter... Jack ass
wilkja02 1 day ago
Great interview. Great man. So brave in the face of death... and didn't need the comfort blanket of an afterlife. He still had such a sharp mind right to the end. It is such a pity the human body is so temporary.
I don't agree with the poster's campaign to get him knighted though... Hitchens hated the monarchy and knighting him after death when he can't even comment on it seems odd.
maxw12345 2 days ago
666 likes, 6 dislikes.... wtf :s
Brengmathew 6 days ago
totally mesmerising.
freqeist 1 week ago 2
one of the greatest conversations ever these two men are both extremely intelligent and both british! we have lost a great man with Christopher hitchens and I don't think enough praise is given to paxman he is still outspoken and one of the only men who holds mps to account for the careless or stupid actions, long live these two thank you for uploading this video
Goger1 2 weeks ago
thanks for posting this video. Is it possible to edit the title ? It seems to me that RIP is in the wrong place
thermalCat 2 weeks ago
A life well lived I for one would have to say yes
millingtonjp 2 weeks ago 7
"Human nature is actually incompatible with dictatorship and slavery". Thank god (metaphorically speaking of course) for Portsmouth's finest son
Irishenglish83 3 weeks ago
amazing track at the end, anyone know what the song is?
Veloesque 3 weeks ago
@Veloesque I would also like to know the name of the track. Thanks!
olivejoyful 3 weeks ago
I don't know why this programme was introduce as Peter Hitchens. However, Paxman was genuinly enamoured by Christopher Hitchens. This is the first time I have seen Paxman totally responsive to the replies. Hitchens gives all: is honest, clever, and genuine. What a wonderful character we have lost. What a great mind we cannot use anymore. Very sad.
577666 3 weeks ago 15
Perhaps the announcer thought Peter was the better of the two brothers: he is right. Peter is much more intellectually honest and more like Orwell than Christopher. Sr is far too enamoured of his own voice whereas Peter is humble, stolid, stoic and a far more astute, incisive and insightful commentator.
I now await the slamming I will inevitably receive from the Christopher Hitchens drones who ironically have created a religion around him, making him omniscient, omnipresent and omnipotent.
Bastiat90 3 weeks ago
@Bastiat90 A slamming you so deeply deserve.
rfranklinw1 3 weeks ago
@Bastiat90 Peter by all accounts is a well respected columnist and author and has had a great career. I dont however share his views on many things such as abortion and I remember him being against Kosovo, and even worse he writes for the Mail on Sunday! Lol.
Chris for me is the verbal gladiator. I find him insightful, and share alot of his views in comparison. I know what you mean about the religion around him, but Atheism has few leaders, its only natural that these people will defend him.
moonsugar1 2 weeks ago
Peter is far more like Orwell than Christopher ever was. Most of Christopher's writings were ephemeral: have you read his books on Orwell, Jefferson or Paine? They were written just for the sake of a more impressive looking bibliography and the 'intellectual' kudos he hoped would accrue to him. Peter has written less, but his writings are far more substantial. Hitchens C was good at ad hominem, and used that talent to hide his lack of a substantial argument.
Bastiat90 2 weeks ago
@577666 I only wish i could vote up your comment more than once. Christopher Hitchens was a credit to the human race.
Spiderpope 2 weeks ago
Comment removed
dfcvda 3 days ago
when did this interview happen?
IAMLS360 1 month ago
00:09: Dear BBC announcer, I think the person Jeremy Paxman was talking to was *Christopher* Hitchens, not Peter Hitchens.
Also I actually don't think a knighthood would be something Hitch would have wanted given that he was a fairly stalwart Republican. I don't think he would have been willing to kneel before the Queen to receive this "honour."
Gazzar 1 month ago
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MrMJNicholls 1 month ago
In the absence of reason,you have "Faith"
alanvt1 1 month ago
Was a mite choked at the end there. RIP Hitch.
paulmadill 1 month ago
@relarerfhjk oh and ten points for Gryfindor if you can tell the class why fish don't have fins because they need them for the water, without using google.
tiltmodeflier 1 month ago
this argument is still fun, @relarerfhjk, you are dumb buddy. I don't want to antagonise you too much, or insult you.. but you have the aggressive certainty of a bigoted fool, yet to grow up, or learn to read. keep it in your pants. never pro-create. please? the design argument is so weak it defies, well.. belief! To borrow from the Hitch, you have put the horse before the cart, fish don't have fins because they need them for the water. Read Hitchen's my friend, just do it.
tiltmodeflier 1 month ago
@tiltmodeflier "Read Hitchens my friend"
I tend to read academics, which is why i don't read Hitchens (a pop-culture polemicist with zero academic credibility"
Evolution (e.g fish/fins etc) has nothing to do with the argument that the Universe was designed for life, since this wasnt the product of evolution, and was necessary for evolution to occurr in the first place!
William Lane Craig stomped all over Hitchens....Hitch couldn't cope when he met a real academic
relarerfhjk 4 weeks ago
@relarerfhjk 'Universe was designed for life'. The universe is also fine tuned for the particular gas clouds to exist on Jupiter and the fact that Venus' atmospheric composition is 96.5% CO2. If the constants were tweaked by one part in whatever million etc, the 96.5% would not be 96.5%. Why do christians continually boast about being humble? This unbelievably solipsistic. The entire argument is predicated on a completely unjustified notion that life has intrinsic value.
FryderykFChopin 3 weeks ago
@FryderykFChopin "a completely unjustified notion that life has intrinsic value"
If you don't believe conscious, interactive moral agents have intrinsic value, then we should legalise murder,since its no worse than damaging a rock!
The range of life-permitting values for each of the fundamental constants are infinitely narrower than the range of life-PROHIBITING values.
As one physicist observed,what is extraordinary is that we can observe the very Universe that produced us
relarerfhjk 3 weeks ago
@relarerfhjk 'If you don't believe conscious, interactive moral agents have intrinsic value, then we should legalise murder,since its no worse than damaging a rock!'. A red herring. Completely irrelevant. Instead appealing to the heartstrings perhaps you should give me a logical argument.
The range of 96.5% CO2 on Venus' atmosphere permitting values for each of the fundamental constants are infinitely narrower than the range of 96.5% CO2 on Venus' atmosphere PROHIBITING values.
FryderykFChopin 3 weeks ago
This has been flagged as spam show
@relarerfhjk And where on earth do you get these probabilities from. If somebody tossed a coin and it lands heads and I said 'amazing, it must have fixed, its incredibly unlikely.' Why? 'well there are an infinite number of things it could have done - it could have landed on its side, it could have gone off to space.' You have simply plucked the probabilities out of thin air. The only source of empirical evidence we have for assigning one likelihood rather than another is repeated trials.
FryderykFChopin 3 weeks ago
@FryderykFChopin "where do you get these probabilities from"
I had assumed you at least understood junior physics: all 30 fundamental physical constants have to simultaneously and indepndently fall within a vanishingly small range of values from the very inception of the Universe to get conditions for intelligent life to exist.
This isn't in dispute, dude 9except by idiots on youtube) its accepted by most physicists read Astronomer Royal Sir Martin Rees book Just Six Numbers
relarerfhjk 2 weeks ago
@relarerfhjk ' all 30 fundamental physical constants have to simultaneously and indepndently fall within a vanishingly small range of values from the very inception of the Universe to get conditions for intelligent life to exist.'
Your statement can be rephrased: all 30 fundamental physical constants have to simultaneously and indepndently fall within a vanishingly small range of values from the very inception of the Universe for there to be Venus' atmosphere to be 96.5% CO2.
FryderykFChopin 2 weeks ago
@FryderykFChopin
I have explained to you why thats false; fine-tuning for intelligent life is not in dispute among physicists. Do you actually want to learn the science?
Then, with open mind, try reading Just Six Numbers by the Astronomer Royal Martin Rees, one of the best physicists alive and one of the pioneers in discovering the astonishing precision of fine-tuning for complex, intelligent, interactive life
Or, if you have a closed mind, dont read it. And dont learn.
relarerfhjk 1 week ago
@relarerfhjk The one with the closed mind is you. You really are 'a man of one book'
"I have explained to you why thats false". Really? Perhaps you should put on your spectacles and have a look at your previous comments. Appeals to authority in no way constitutes an 'explanation'. Nor have you in any way defended your anthropocentrism in your baseless assumption that carbon based life has any more intrinsic value than the particular clouds on jupiter or Venus' atmosphere being 96.5% CO2.
FryderykFChopin 1 week ago
@FryderykFChopin
Its false because of the principle of a "tidy explanation"... an explanation which, in explaining some phenomenon, reveals that there is something to be explained!
Say Bob(,born Aug 23, 1982) gets a birthday car with license plate BOB 82382.Intelligent dsign is a "tidy explanation" of this plate number....Since its Bob's birthday being celebrated,its not "Bob chauvinistic" to pick out his name/birth date as a significant pattern crying out for explanation!
relarerfhjk 6 days ago
This has been flagged as spam show
@relarerfhjk It seems to me that the question is begged again. Justify your comparison of life to 'Bob(born 8/23/82 geting a bday car with license plate BOB 82382' without using probability as a defense because I have pointed out that there are many things that are as improbable or more improbable than your proposition.I could use your analogy for Venus.
If you are looking for a scientific explanation of how life arose you should be referring to evolution not ID (which is not science)
FryderykFChopin 6 days ago
@FryderykFChopin
The comparison re Bob is the presence of a "tidy explanation" of the initial conditions of the universe similarly justify us focusing on the conditions needed for life as a phenomenon crying out for explanation!
I'm refering to the SPECIFIED IMPROBABILITY of a life-permitting Universe;like having 1000000 black balls and 1 white ball; any ball is equally improbable but its FAR more probable whichever ball you pick will be black, than that it will be white!!
relarerfhjk 2 days ago
This has been flagged as spam show
@relarerfhjk Again you haven't advanced your argument one iota.
'I'm refering to the SPECIFIED IMPROBABILITY of a life-permitting Universe;like having 1000000 black balls and 1 white ball; any ball is equally improbable but its FAR more probable whichever ball you pick will be black, than that it will be white!!'
Justify that life is the 'white ball'. If you are simply going to presuppose, I will reciprocate and presuppose that Jupiter is the 'white ball'.
FryderykFChopin 2 days ago
@relarerfhjk 'conditions needed for life as a phenomenon crying out for explanation!'
That can be rephrased: conditions needed for Venus' atmosphere being 96.5% CO2 is a phenomenon crying out for an explanation. If the initial conditions of the universe were altered one part in whatever billion, Venus' atmosphere would no longer be 96.5% CO2.
FryderykFChopin 2 days ago
this argument is fun, can you have it somewhere else? love you hitchy, telling it straight
tiltmodeflier 1 month ago
wtf--it's not peter hitchens you tool!
baughskeet 1 month ago
FUCK YOU...... THAT IS MY 'ACADEMIC' RESPONSE TO THOSE WHO QUESTION THE MECHANICS OF THIS OUTSTANDING MAN. SHAME ON YOU FOR DOING SO..... DONT FORGET TO SAY A PRAYER BEFORE BED!
blueguru666 1 month ago
I notice that the poster of that idiot Lane Craig's videos has blocked me now. Afraid of the truth.
MrsZambezi 1 month ago
@MrsZambezi That idiot Lane Craig???
He is incomprehensibly more intelligent than you! He has multiple PHD's in philosophy, has published over 200 articles in peer-reviewed philosophy journals and been praised by the world's greatest living atheist philsoopher Quentim Smith as having come up with the most successful 9and hotly-debated) argument for theism of the past century!
You, on the other hand, are just a Youtube clown. Craig would demolish you in about half a second
Lane
relarerfhjk 1 month ago
wHO THe FAcK is PETER HITCHENS?
lianghaochen 1 month ago
@lianghaochen Christopher's brother....a conservative Christian who writes for the Daily Mail. A deeply unpleasant little man, imo.
Ellie8969 1 month ago
@lianghaochen Christopher's arsehole brother
angrywhenroused 1 month ago
@deimis98UK Yea i recently found out after watching christopher go to town on Shirley Williams on question time, with his brother on the show.
JAMESEPARROTT 1 month ago
Such an admirable man.
plickaplicka7 1 month ago
"full 30 minute interview" - 29:07
ಠ_ಠ
stratman06 1 month ago
Nice to see Paxman almost quite attentive and respectful - for once! :O)
Tj930 1 month ago 2
"They should see my ass now!"
That line always makes me laugh then get really sad.
rcarass1 1 month ago
GOOD FOR YOU CHRISTOPHER HITCHEN'S!-WELL DONE.
BRAVELY SPOKEN!
EARTHLING'S SAD LOSS.HONOUR WAS YOUR'S SINCE 1949.
Mrs P.M.A. JUDGE.
pmajudge 1 month ago
Look at Paxmans face throughout the interview ... Pure respect and admiration rarely seen from the man.
Quitethenoob 1 month ago
@Quitethenoob A hint of pain too. Kind of sad, its almost like he's seeing a friend die in front of him.
andromidius 1 month ago
Talks to Peter Hitchens? Christopher.
Quitethenoob 1 month ago
Wow, what an amazing bloke! All credit to you, sir.
lasgirasoles 1 month ago
think this is the most respectful I've ever seen paxman in an interview, one wonders why...
Dommo1992 1 month ago
Because the BBC is sycophantic to its favourite luvvies. Why is all this attention devoted to a bloated journalist who never had an original thought of his own. He was no Orwell or an HL Mencken. He could turn a shapely phrase; so could Trotsky, a mass murderer of precise quality. Most of his journalism is ephemeral. He may have adopted the mantle of Orwell, but Orwell would prefer his more honest and talented brother Peter; coincidentally a much better human
Bastiat90 1 month ago
@Bastiat90 Even if he was adopting Orwells or whoever else's ideas ... It is quite clear he genuinely believes this view and to be honest supports his claims expertly unlike yourself.
Quitethenoob 1 month ago
Hitchens is very contradictory of himself. In his last interview he says the totalitarian is his enemy, and yet he still called himself a Trotskyist to his dying days, and he professed support for Vladimir Lenin; because he was secular. Trotsky was a totalitarian murderer who ordered the deaths of the Krondstadt mutineers because they thought Soviet communism deserved more political parties other than the Bolsheviks. Hitchens was a charlatan.
Bastiat90 1 month ago
@Bastiat90 Well, here's the thing...why don't you get yourself published in Vanity Fair, sell millions of books and draw crowds of thousands wherever you appear? I mean, clearly, of the two of you, YOU are the better, cleverer man, right? Right? Or maybe you just feel happier leaving pointless, uninteresting comments that few people are interested in on YouTube. Jealousy is a terribly sad thing. Hope you recover soon.
Ellie8969 1 month ago
I have no interest in practicing journalism; I'm happy to be a partial observer of the profession. I have never written a book, as I am still only 21 and have yet to discover much of the world, but perhaps I will one day.
I have no doubt Hitchens was smarter than I, but I'm smarter than you. Am I the better man? That is for others to judge. I'm merely doing to Hitchens what he did to Mother Teresa and Bill Clinton. I'm attempting to puncture an inflated reputation.
Bastiat90 1 month ago
I assume you praise Hitchens for his polemical attacks on consensus heroes. Why do you call it jealousy if I do the same? Was Hitchens jealous of Mother Teresa, of Clinton, Kissinger, Reagan, Carter etc. My comments can't be that uninteresting if you choose to respond to them. Either that reveals my interesting nature, or your desire for banality; I imagine you struggle with proper debates.
Bastiat90 1 month ago
@Ellie8969 "get published in Vanity Fair"
Hahahahaha! That has to be the funniest attempt to give anyone academic credibility I've ever seen!
William Lane Craig has been published in hundreds of peer-reviewed journals of philosophy and has multiple PHD's what the FUCK has Hitchens ever achieved?
He's just a journo, a pop-culture polemicist scribbler for a consumerised magazine full of adverts
Hitch was never an academic: as was painfully obvious when Craig demolished him
relarerfhjk 1 month ago
@relarerfhjk What the fuck has Hitchens ever acheived? Talk to God with that mouth, do you? Sorry, I'm not playing "my dad's bigger than your dad". It's beneath me. I will say that WLC is a professional debater, nothing more, touring the circuit spouting the same tired nonsense time after time. His death will be met with shrugs, I can guarantee it won't make headlines around the world.
Ellie8969 1 month ago
@Ellie8969 "WLC is a professional debater nothing more"
Thats a Youtube myth that reveals you to be another clueless nobody who knows fuck all about academia.
In reality (if you had a clue) Craig was a renowned philosopher,frequently published in top journals, with over 30 books,long before he did any debates. great philosophers like Quentin Smith and Oxford Uni's Daniel Came have praised him as one of the best of the last century! His ideas will be matter long after Hitchens
relarerfhjk 1 month ago
@Bastiat90 You can support someone, and not agree with all their actions.
He believed in the socialist ideal. Not the mess that it became.
andromidius 1 month ago
But Trotsky was a murderer. He took lives in the name of a political ideology. Albert Camus once wrote that 'responsibility to history absolves one of responsibility towards the human race.'
Those who support Trotsky and Lenin, despite the reams of evidence that damns them, need to examine their conscience. If one of my intellectual influences had committed murder, I would withdraw my support for their ideas because they relinquished their morality. Yours is a pathetic excuse
Bastiat90 1 month ago
@Dommo1992 Respect.
Quitethenoob 1 month ago
What a brave man
unafredattic 1 month ago
Your frankness, common sense and honesty - I'll miss it. Glad I was around at the same time.
six8bunny 1 month ago 3
For all his intelligence and being known as a man of good reading, he was really stupid where 911 and health are concerned. He seems to have been a prolific researcher on subjects such as history and philosophy, but paid no attention to anything that was considered 'conspiracy' or 'new age'. There is no doubt that had he followed 'new age' remedies on cancer treatment that he would be alive today, but I suspect the guy never said sorry in his life to friends or opponents.
attabut1963 1 month ago
@attabut1963 what the heck are you on about eh?! ya drunk aren't ya lol
happycake3 1 month ago
did the guy introduce him as peter hitchens?
JAMESEPARROTT 1 month ago 12
@JAMESEPARROTT yeah he did. what a poo face
kinkyplunk 1 month ago
@JAMESEPARROTT Yep! The guy at the beginning did indeed introduce him as Peter Hitchens, who is infact Christopher's brother.
AxCUNNINGxSTUNT 1 month ago
@JAMESEPARROTT Peter Hitchens is Christopher Hitchens' brother, and another well respected author and journalist.
deimos93UK 1 month ago
@JAMESEPARROTT I've actually seen it happen several times before. Crazyness
WesleyDieson77 1 month ago
@JAMESEPARROTT Yes, this is his brother, Christopher Hitchens.
MegaGayjesus 1 month ago
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euroman32589 1 month ago
if freedom of thought defines one as an athiest then i am proud and thankfull to be free
andrewlewis963 1 month ago
smoke weeeeed man
ppetrovdotnet 1 month ago
...or thought myself to be well...
shoops77 1 month ago
"Jeremy Paxman talks to Peter Hitchins about his life"?
acrossley123 1 month ago
You can't be knighted post-humously apparently.
shoops77 1 month ago
This comment has received too many negative votes show
Rest in PISS Hitchens, you motherfucker Zionist
Salahuddin2009a 1 month ago
@Salahuddin2009a Zionist??? Are you crazy?
Meskiagkasher 1 month ago
I'm sorry people. I understand the sentiment but how can you tell one of the worlds leading atheists to 'rest in peace?' Rest where exactly? That's just the sort of muddled thinking he spent so much of his life trying to dispel.
m00nshine2004 1 month ago 2
@m00nshine2004 surely the fact that the atoms he was made up of(and that we are all made up of), will go on eventually into everyone and everything around us. I am an atheist however I believe my loved ones and everyone's loved one's will 'live' on, not in the religious sense but on a level of mass and what we are made up of, nothing is destroyed only changed. So really saying RIP is only a statement, an obvious statement at that, but it still can have meaning to atheists.
TheCwest1991 1 month ago
@m00nshine2004 ..totally agree. spot on.
euroman32589 1 month ago
2 Gods
clcartlidge 1 month ago
Rest In Peace Hitch. Forever loved and remembered.
SOS763 1 month ago
Felt pretty happy to hear that he lived to see Osama Bin Laden die
kly45 1 month ago
I'm surprised at how few people have viewed this. The last 10 minutes in which he talks about Pascal's Gambit and why he wouldn't go down that road is brilliant. To paraphrase. If I am shocked to find a judge on the other side then he's bound to think more of me for sticking to my guns than by pretending to believe in him.
BRIDGES102 1 month ago
Lets hope in 100 years time, high schools are quoting Hitch and not a represtentative of some global Ischristiaic Papiphate. I for one will deeply miss his insights.
NeoLeaver 1 month ago 2
Wow, he was brave as fuck. Well done good sir, one of the few people I am aware of who continues to kick arse beyond the grave. I shall drink to you. RIP
wiggaroo 1 month ago
saddest interview in the world
jmburkow 1 month ago
It's rather ironic and silly to try and get Hitchens posthumously knighted, as it's an "honour" he would likely have rejected and repudiated in life. Hitchens was a life-long republican and anti-monarchist. He was a socialist who was keenly aware of and opposed to Britain's class system. Don't support his knighthood.
VersaMusic 1 month ago 30
@VersaMusic Totally agree.
Ellie8969 1 month ago
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ilovemornings 1 month ago
@VersaMusic Quite right.
NeoLeaver 1 month ago
@VersaMusic Agreed. I also find this trend of honouring dead people who you loathed when they lived to be extremely distasteful. You don't win brownie points for being nice to dead people when you were dicks to them when they were alive!
Besides, if anything he should be voted the 1st and only President of the United Kingdom.
andromidius 1 month ago
The title implies that it is Paxman who is dead...
DrSpooglemon 1 month ago
I'm really glad he lived long enough to see Bin Laden dead--shame not to see him trialled.
VayDooble 1 month ago
he wouldnt want 2 be knighted, he hates the royal family .
wigisnotaname 2 months ago
I hope he came to know Christ in his final hours as William Lane Craig said, after easily defeating him in debate on the existence of God, it was clear he had no rational grounds for his atheism his objections to God's existence were entirely emotional.
relarerfhjk 2 months ago
@relarerfhjk CH remained far, far too intelligent right up to the end to start believing in infantile fairytales. Sorry about that.
Ellie8969 1 month ago 3
@Ellie8969 "far, far too intelligent"
On the contrary, he had no intelligent arguments against theism whatsoever. He veered between misinterpretations of the New Testament, equivocations between God and North Korea, rehashed versions of the old "who designed the designer" fallacy, and woeful misunderstanding of science.
the Christian academic William Lane Craig tore him to shreds when they met in debate: Hitch got so badly battered he declined to give a closing speech
relarerfhjk 1 month ago
@relarerfhjk Christian academic William Lane Craig? HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA! The man is a total moron who trots out the same tired and entirely refuted arguments at again and again and again. He's an embarrassment mate - and, btw, who DID design the designer? Just because you're too stupid to be able to answer that does not make it a fallacy. Now go away...I found your initial remark about Hitchens beneath contempt.
Ellie8969 1 month ago
@Ellie8969 "who DID design the designer" You (and Hitchens, fellow purveyor of that failed argument)need to learn the basics:like the difference between a contingent being (which requires a cause) and a necessary being (which doesn't)
Time itself began to exist with the Universe so the cause is timeless
"entirely refuted arguments" Keep dreaming, they have never been "refuted" you clown.He's trashed atheist physicsts in debate (watch Lawrence Krauss getting steamrollered against him)
relarerfhjk 1 month ago
@relarerfhjk OK...now prove with reasoned evidence, please, that there is any such thing as a "contingent being" and that he/she/it had anything to do with the birth of the universe. Actually, it would be helpful if you could also demonstrate that the universe needed any kind of "cause". That you are too stupid to understand how it could exist without one is not evidence, just so you know.
Ellie8969 1 month ago
@Ellie8969 "prove there is any such thing" Thats trivially easy, a contingent being is simply anything that does not have to exist. The Universe (and human beings) obviously do not have to exist since there are many scenarios in which we would not have existed
The Universe needs a cause because anything that begins to exist needs a cause unless you believe planets and Universes just pop into being out of non-being without cause
Which would make you as stupid as you sound
relarerfhjk 1 month ago
@relarerfhjk Ah, the old "Kalam" fallacy, eh? Oh dear. If you weren't such an unpleasant little turd, I might almost feel sorry for you. Let me say this slowly....quantum mechanics has shown that NOT everything that begins to exist requires a cause. So your *argument* falls at the first post. That the best you've got? But keep the ad hominems coming...they're quite funny!
Ellie8969 1 month ago
@Ellie8969 "quantum mechanics has shown not everything that begins to exist requires a cause"
WRONG! You have just proved your ignorance again, you pathetic retard! Try reading some science! There are at least FIVE interpretations of quantum mechanics which are deterministic and say there IS a cause!
And the quantum vacuum (which produces virtual particles) is NOT nothing...its a rich sea of energy. So it aint an example of non-existence producing existence!
You lose again.
relarerfhjk 1 month ago
@relarerfhjk Well, you're wrong I'm afraid. You've clearly cut and paste something that you don't really understand, so my efforts at explaining would be wasted and I have better things to so. But try to get this through your head, you ignorant moron, science does not support your childish beliefs AT ALL. I think you know this deep down - your infantile anger and insults proves how embarrassed you are. Grow up.
Ellie8969 1 month ago
@Ellie8969 "well, your wrong I'm afraid"
Wow, what a wonderful rebuttal! Did you need time to think of that? You didn't learn the science, so you got humiliated.
Quantum vacuums producing virtual particles do NOT defeat the premise of Kalam that something cannot come from nothing, because empty space,(or the quantum vacuum) ,far from being "nothing", is actually a rich sea of energy with physical structure.
You tried to rebut Kalam, and failed.
Come again?
relarerfhjk 1 month ago
@relarerfhjk Hold on....one minute you're claiming that "all the experts agree with me that the universe came from nothing" and the next that "....Quantum vacuums producing virtual particles do NOT defeat the premise of Kalam that something cannot come from nothing"
In fact, YOU have rebutted Kalam!
So, what is your argument? Did the universe come from nothing...or not?
If you don't understand your own claims, what is the point of me even attempting to discuss this with you????????????
Ellie8969 1 month ago
@Ellie8969 "YOU have rebutted Kalam"
Erm, nope. Because if the Universe came from God (as Kalam argues) then it didnt come "from nothing". You didnt even know the difference between a material cause (i.e the wood that forms the table) and an efficient cause (i.e the carpenter)?? Its only if God does NOT exist (as atheists argue) that the natural world must have come from nothing without cause.
Which obviously couldnt happen, since non-being cant produce being.
Care to try again??
relarerfhjk 1 month ago
@relarerfhjk You said that all the experts agreed with you that the universe came from nothing. That's what you said, I'm afraid. Lying about it now will not help your cause.
"Its only if God does NOT exist (as atheists argue) that the natural world must have come from nothing without cause." Really? Who told you that? If the universe was *caused* (and that has NOT been established) why have you decided that the cause is a) a god and more specifically b) the god that you believe in?
Ellie8969 1 month ago
@Ellie8969 "Lying about it"
Experts say nothing IN THE NATURAL WORLD existed beyond the Universe.... which shows the cause must be supernatural! Precisely as Kalam argues.Where's the lie?
"that has NOT been established"it is established unless you think everything needs a cause except the whole Unverse itself!
The cause of time/matter must be timeless, immaterial, powerful (to "cause a Universe) and personal (as abstract timeless/spaceless objects like numbers cant "cause" anything)
relarerfhjk 1 month ago
@relarerfhjk Oh, and btw, yes time began with the universe. No time existed until then...there was no "before". A cause comes before an event...both "cause" and "before" require the existence of time to have any meaning...but time did not exist. Therefore, to claim a "cause" is illogical. Should you really be trying to discuss things you clearly don't understand? I'm afraid you're just embarrassing yourself. Not for the first time, I suspect, given your childish beliefs ;-)
Ellie8969 1 month ago
@Ellie8969 As an aside, there could possible be a 'before' the Universe. There's just no current way of knowing. All we know is that time appeared to begin at the formation of the Universe. There may have been something before, or there may have been no before, and the Universe simply became.
Though I dislike that idea personally. I find the ideal of a Universe rebirthing and redying over and over again. Seems more functional and logical.
andromidius 1 month ago
@andromidius *I find the ideal of a unvierse rebirthing and redying over and over again to be fitting.
andromidius 1 month ago
@andromidius *idea >_<
andromidius 1 month ago
@andromidius Yes, agreed. There *may* have been a before, some other kind of time we know nothing about. But the point is that it is foolish to claim that there *must* have been a before/cause...we simply do not have enough understanding to make a claim like that. But trying to explain that to the faith befuddled moron above is not easy.
Ellie8969 1 month ago
@Ellie8969 "A cause comes before an event"
WRONG! This is the greatest fallacy in the book. A cause can be simultaneous with an effect...centuries ago Kant showed this with the example of the log permanently submerged in water which displaces the water, or a heavy ball eternally resting on a cushion which causes a depression in the cushion: the "effect" (the depression in the cushion) is simultaneous with the "cause" ( the ball resting permanently resting in the cushion)
You dumb fuck
relarerfhjk 1 month ago
@relarerfhjk "You dumb fuck". My...this Christian love thing is so precious. How proud Jesus would be! A cause can be simultaneous with an effect? Ok...I'll bite. Prove this is how the universe came into existence, and you'll be on to something. Oh, and probably earn yourself a Nobel Prize into the bargain. Amazing how many physicists (you know, the EXPERTS) appear to know less about this subject than some sad little loser posting on YouTube. LOL :)
Ellie8969 1 month ago
@Ellie8969 "prove this is how the Universe came into existence"
Its already proved by the fact time came into being with the Universe, so the Univers's coming into being was obviously simultaneous with the cause of its coming into being.
"EXPERTS" Erm, the experts all agree with what I'm saying: the fact the Universe came from nothing, the fact causes can be simultaneous with effects, and the fact the Universe is fine-tuned for life are all facts supported by modern physics
relarerfhjk 1 month ago
@relarerfhjk "so the Univers's coming into being was obviously simultaneous with the cause of its coming into being" Erm...nope. And no expert agrees wth you, and you know it. There exists in science no explanation for how the universe came into existence. You know better? Write a paper, get published, stun the world and win the Nobel Prize.
Ellie8969 1 month ago
@Ellie8969 "so the Universes coming into being was obviously simultaneous with the cause...erm...nope"
Well nothing begins to exist without cause,time began to exist with the Universe.... so whatever caused it to come into being did so, simultaneously with its coming into being! Its pretty simple even you can work it out!
"no expert agrees with you" All the experts agree with me on the facts i described; the Universe came from nothing etc:theism is the best explanation of those facts!
relarerfhjk 1 month ago
@relarerfhjk Here you go again..."the universe came from nothing". Are you so stupid that you cannot understand that if you are going to claim that your god made the universe, then you cannot also claim it came from "nothing". Your god is nothing? Well, I agree with that.
"Well, nothing begins to exist without cause..." Again, not true. Not even slightly true, I'm afraid.
Ellie8969 1 month ago
@Ellie8969 "if your going to claim God created universe you cant say it came from nothing" it came from nothing IN THE NATURAL WORLD......which is just another way of saying everything in the natural world had a beginning (so the cause of the natural world must be SUPERNATURAL) precisely what Kalam argues! Are you totally thick?
"not even slightly true" its not only true its the principle that underpins science,you tried to refute it with quantum mechanics and got embarassed.
relarerfhjk 1 month ago
@Ellie8969 "A cause comes before an event"
You got fucking embarassed on this one! Its well-known and established that a cause can be simultaneous with an effect.
You absolute retard. You got slapped in the face again
relarerfhjk 1 month ago
@relarerfhjk "YOU FUCKING RETARD"
"You absolute retard. You got slapped in the face again".
Christian love?
Grow up.
Ellie8969 1 month ago
@Ellie8969 Thats your only answer to getting humiliated/ Notice you have wandered off-topic somewhat: the topic you humiliated yourself discussing ( in case readers of this forum need reminding) was whether a cause must come "before an event", as you claimed.
In fact, almost any efficient cause is simultaneous with an effect, and, from Kant's ball-on-chusion, or log-underwater example, we can show how causes can be simultaneous with effects.
You made a stupid claim that was wrong
relarerfhjk 4 weeks ago
@relarerfhjk At this stage I am wondering if you might actually be mentally ill - I can almost feel you shaking with anger.
You lost the argument...go cry to Jesus, maybe he gives a shit. I don't.
Ellie8969 1 month ago
@Ellie8969 So you lost the argument on causality (you thought a cause must precede an effect) you lost the argument on quantum mechanics (there's no consensus that virtual particles are uncaused and the quantum vacuum is not "nothing" therefore doesn't refute Kalam) you lost the argument on fine-tuning, since its a life-permitting Universe, not a life-prohibiting one, that is astonishingly improbable, given the necessary range of values!
You lost on every issue.
Keep trying? Retard
relarerfhjk 4 weeks ago
@relarerfhjk Actually, a google search shows me that the only person claiming this is WLC! A non-scientist. Just like you.
Ellie8969 1 month ago
@Ellie8969 "The only person claiming this" Claiming a cause can be simultaneous with an effect? Erm, Kant was the first who showed it, its universally accepted ever since. You prick
relarerfhjk 4 weeks ago
@relarerfhjk Basically your argument is 'it doesn't count when I say it doesn't.'
That's very poor and lazy thinking. Sorry, but it is. You're so narrow minded and stubborn, and you're so deep in the crap you left under you that you're never going to get back out of it again. You're too embaressed to admit when your logic has failed.
And your mistake was simple - you could have stuck to 'I just believe'. Trying to bring in proof was your downfall.
andromidius 1 month ago
@andromidius You dont understand the arguments or the science. Don't try and debate me or I'll embarass you.
I believe...because the evidence for Christianity is so powerful.
relarerfhjk 3 weeks ago
@relarerfhjk 'Don't try to debate me or I'll embarass you'.
At least arrogant atheists aren't so hypocritical as to come out with a statement like that and yet proclaim that their belief system is based on humility.
Believe whatever you like. Leave me out of it.
slickred01 2 weeks ago
@relarerfhjk And apparently neither do you. "science" (incidently i love how you treat it like its all one discipline) has not "proved" there was nothing prior to the big bang, we still have no idea. And your own argument that something cannot come from nothing invalidates your stance that a god is the ultimate creator. If something cannot come from nothing with out a creator than god needed one too, so if im going to worship it'll the thing that was powerful enough to make your god
Spiderpope 2 weeks ago
@Spiderpope "we still have no idea" WRONG!
The Bord-Guth-Villenkin theorem of 2003 confirmed, once and for all, that ANY expanding Universe must have an absolute beginning 9which means time and space themselves had an absolute beginning)
"God needed a creator too"
Wrong again: something cannot BEGIN to exist from nothing but God, as a necessary being (not a contingent being) does not begin to exist he brought time itself into being (as Big Bang cosmology shows)
relarerfhjk 2 weeks ago
@relarerfhjk Yup they had an absolute beginning. Knowing that however does not equal knowledge what existed or didnt exist before that point.
And your claim that God did not require a creator invalidates your whole arguement. You say because something cannot come from nothing, there must be a god. But if god did not require a creator then clearly something can come from nothing, therefore god is surplus to requirement as he proves something can come from nothing.
Spiderpope 2 weeks ago
@Spiderpope And if you still maintain something cannot come from nothing then god requires a creator, so thats what i will worship. And he told me that he thinks god is a dick, and anyone who believes he is the supreme being is going to Uberhell. Sorry.
Spiderpope 2 weeks ago
@Spiderpope "knowledge of what existed before that point"
There was no "before" as time itself came into being with the Universe. We can use deductive logic to work out what existed outside the Universe, based on the two premises that a) the Universe began to exist and b) nothing begins to exist without cause
"invalidates your argument"
No it doesnt because God never BEGAN to exist, whereas the Universe did! Something cannot COME INTO BEING from nothing: God didint come into being.
relarerfhjk 1 week ago
@relarerfhjk No amount of deductive logic will result in God exists from those two premises. There is nothing at all to suggest the cause of the universe was a god. Even if you disprove every known theory of universal beginnings the end result still does not equal a god.
"god didnt come into being"
So you agree then, he doesnt exist. Something cannot just exist. Every fundamental aspect of reality shows that. So either your god is outside reality, therefore by definition not real, or he began
Spiderpope 1 week ago
@Spiderpope to which i say, Ubergod made him, Ubergod really dislikes you and he's sending you to Uberhell when you die. Apparently they use cake based torture there.
Spiderpope 1 week ago
@relarerfhjk You also have a woeful lack of knowledge of Archaeology, Geology, Palaeontology and Egyptology if you think for one second the evidence for christianity is powerful.
The Bible is demonstrably incorrect about a multitude of events, it borrows wholesale from Egyptian mythology and preaches that slavery, rape, genocide and child killing are all acceptable. I think it is you good sir who should be be embarrassed by your claims.
Spiderpope 2 weeks ago
@Ellie8969 You just proved you know absolutely fuck all about anything by saying that Craig is just "a professional debater nothing more" when, in reality, he's a great professional philosopher with over 200 articles on his contributions to philosophy of time, ethics and philosophy of science published in peer-reviewed journals of philosophy.
He's co-authored books with some of the best philosophers of the last century and great atheist philosophers like Quentin Smith praise him
relarerfhjk 1 month ago
@relarerfhjk I'm laughing as I type this. did you see the same debate I did. Do you really think that on his deathbed a thinker with the intellect of would subscribe to a religion which offers nothing in evidense for its validity than the content of its self prescribed book?. (of very dubious origins, channeled spirits, iron age superstition)
NeoLeaver 1 month ago
@NeoLeaver "did you see the same debate I did"
Yes, I also saw the same debate which the great atheist blog CommonSenseAthesm described thus "Truthfully, Craig spanked Hitchens like a foolish child"
There is strong evidence of the validity of Christian theism, Craig presented 5 such lines of evidence in the debate, and poor old Hitchens couldn't refute one of them
relarerfhjk 1 month ago
@relarerfhjk Why don't you read a book that isn't called 'The Bible'?
pant1979 1 month ago
@relarerfhjk Its been a while since I saw it, but if memory serves he had a rebuttal to all but the parabel of the five talents. Hence I asked my qualified theologian ally to explain that parabel in-particular.
temporaldisplacement 1 month ago
@relarerfhjk Show me any 'strong evidence of the validity of christian theism' that doesn't come quoted 'chapter and verse' from the very book you claim to be the source of your religion, or based on ideas of 'faith' in that self same book and I will take your argument seriously.
Christian: Our book contains the word of God and the truth of mans realtionship with his creator.
Free thinker: Really how do you know?
Christain: Because it says so in our book.
I rest my case.
NeoLeaver 1 month ago
@NeoLeaver "strong evidence that doesnt come quoted from the book" Do you know anything about this subject? Did you not know that there was no "book" the Gospels, the Acts and Paul's letters were among a collection of 2000 historical documents which were only included in the Bible when the NT was created two centuries later?
And the evidence includes the fine-tuning of the Universe for life, the creation of the Universe out of nothing and the existence of objective moral values
relarerfhjk 1 month ago
@relarerfhjk Do you understand the concept of a book? Its a compliation of chapters, edited together into a single work. Do you understand how the Bible being aknowledged as such shows how its not the 'Word of God'?
Oh, and the universe isn't fine tuned for life. The Universe wasn't created out of nothing. Morale values are subjective, not objective. Deal with it.
andromidius 1 month ago
@andromidius
They wern't "chapters" written for a book they were records of historical events.
The Universe is fine-tuned for life; read atheist Astronomer Royal Sir Martin Rees's latest book Just Six Numbers in which he writes "Everywhere we see more examples of this extraordinarily exquisite fine-tuning"
The Universe was created from nothing as proven by the Bord-Guth-Villenkin theorem 2003
Was the Holocaust wrong even if the Nazis thought it right? then objective values exist
relarerfhjk 1 month ago
@relarerfhjk Martin Rees, of course, being an atheist. Methinks you should stop reading books you don't understand.
Ellie8969 1 month ago
@Ellie8969 I quoted Rees because he is an atheist, who nonetheless accepts the Universe is fine-tuned for life with astonishing precision (see his book Just Six Numbers) and that atheism/naturalism has no explanation for this fine-tuning.
He admits its cant be due to physical necessity in his book, and admits a multiverse hypotheses (no matter how ridiculously improbable that is) is the only hope of an atheistic explanation.
Sadly Craig has shown why the multiverse is false
relarerfhjk 1 month ago
@relarerfhjk "Sadly Craig has shown why the multiverse is false" HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!!!!!! He has done no such thing. Man, you really are deluded, aren't you! So, what evidence did WLC produce then? He's a poxy "philosopher" (a dead subject) yet he's managed a discovery that has defied every physicist on earth?????
And congratulations on misunderstanding every word Rees said about "fine-tuning"...or are you doing it deliberately?
Ellie8969 1 month ago
@Ellie8969 "philosopher...a dead subject"
On the contrary, every one of the New Atheists, from Dawkins to Stenger to Harris are spouting rehashed old philosophical arguments against God (its just that theyre such dreadful amateurish arguments that these guys try to disguise them by simultaneously deriding philosophy)
"defied every physicist on earth"
There's no "discovery" necessary since there was never a shred of evidence for a Muliverse(we cant observe any Universe outside our own)
relarerfhjk 1 month ago