 So you're asking me what just quick overview like what you were you were part of our session as well Oh, okay, so we just did some s.c. Yeah role play. Yeah, what do you thought about that? What's like the hardest part for someone who just did s.c. I'm at for the first time. Um, I mean I've been aware of it And so I've tried to incorporate this idea of approaching conversations and a more level-headed You know, what would change your mind? What is the reason? What's the foundational? Yeah, and so jumping right into it. I would say I felt That kind of shock of oh shit, I have to actually do this now and then that panic Kind of kind of blacked out. Hmm. In my case the guy was interviewing It was two of us and we had our referee our third guy who just kind of wanted to observe Sure And I we started and I choked up and then he jumped right in and he kind of took over and it was it was Okay, I was glad to get him to participate Let me tell you this, do you know the names of any of those people? Yeah Yeah, it was me and then the other James from the Sunday assembly here and we were talking to Tyler Who I also think he lives here. Okay. Yeah, all Remembering names is like the biggest deal and I found like typically people have mnemonic devices that help them remember Like what's what when you have a name and a belief closely associated with them Yeah, you'd be surprised the number of people you start to remember on just like it like a daily basis like There's a guy named Mike. He's with American Atheist. He has a terrible wallet It's made a duct tape and he believes that philosophy is like one of the truest things possible morality There's need of God to believe in it and I hadn't seen him since June. So when I saw him worldwide I'm like Mike. I know all these things about him It's like you want to come down sit and have another conversation for a second for it like the last Seven months and it's just like let's pick up where we left off. It's weird. It's really weird That's really cool. Yeah But what do you think you could have done better? I? Had a hard time the I recognize your goal was to kind of Give everybody a head start by starting with faith and we screwed that up and we just started from the top How do I get us to faith and then the buzzer came up before like we got down a little bit But some of those key questions like if the example he gave was As he was role-playing was I've seen prayers where I've had prayers and those came true when I grew up in the church And I believe that based on faith and oh, we did because because yeah, yeah We just we completely sabotage the entire thing for ourselves. Okay, it was our It's always your product you can in your prerogative You could just say do you value faith as a means to come to it like true conclusions? And that also speeds things up a lot Okay, I've gone to churches and just started with that and if they said no and you be surprised how many people say no in a church You'll be like, okay, so then what is it's like? I like evidence. It's like, okay So would you say you're god-bliss based on faith to be honest with you? I'm not like I'm just here for my wife or like Yeah, but I would still if you gave me evidence I'd want that more than faith So like it actually opens up it doesn't like bias the conversation too much Just be like do you value faith as a decision-making process to come to something true? Okay Let's see. What do you think we could have done better to like show you how to do this? Like if we wanted to improve this workshop, well, it'd be a good way. Mm-hmm. Yeah, I think in that case It was just the human error on our part. Did you want more role-play? Maybe I think I Was glad that this had the most time I think I feel like he's had to do this, but yeah, absolutely getting to do more role-play and I liked Where you know Anthony was able to come over and you know where I was starting to lock up and Give me that next step and kind of get the ball. Give me the nudge. Yeah to get things rolling again. So I think Doing it and the way we did we're having more role-play time and having that assistance Was was a good way. Okay What's your name? William. Would you like to get on the camera? I can do I wasn't part of the workshop, but I've seen a lot of epists treat epistemology mostly in things Epistemology videos. I'm pretty familiar with would you be comfortable being recorded? I would yeah, please get in here. Get in here Let me uh, move this just a little bit closer. I'll scoot back Swapping on no, no, you're both sitting there. Yeah, I'll just do both I don't want you to go to the corner and say you're too happy with that. I highly value you. Manifest destiny Okay, okay, okay good as both. So Here here's the question then let's get straight into it then. That's that's great feedback So we can try to average more time to That's probably work it got really that that's that's where it becomes real That's where it becomes From a passive listening. Yeah versus trying to apply and I think I Feel like after went once once you've tried to do something then You'll listen even more intently after that. Oh Because because that because you're like, oh, yeah, yeah this this you know Yeah, that's totally like this seems super easy and then you do it Yes, and then you crash and then you're like, oh, this is actually difficult And now you're like, how can I do better because this was embarrassing and then you're like really I feel like Okay, then what I'm gonna do is Bring that up and if we do this again I'm not definitely put more time to roll play because I felt like most people got more out of that than anything else Yeah, also, I feel like it was probably the funnest part. Yeah. Yeah Yeah, I mean the fact that it had such a hard time getting people to stop. Yeah, like exactly I was just to say like I'm saying okay guys and no one's no it's not like a math test I'm done with math. Yeah, everyone was like, I want to keep talking. Yeah, I'm almost at the gold. Yeah Guys was about to become an atheist because Back to go into reality. So all right James. What was your name? Well, I don't only introduce myself each time James I want you to think about something that you know, you can't be wrong about is that cool? William I want you to know think about something that you know, you can't be wrong about it's all right It's different things we're gonna all work on this together and I thought something that I think I'm not wrong about to and we'll go around let's just say The certainty thing that I can't be wrong about I would like a hundred like it's something You know, you can't be wrong about is what I would call like a hundred percent sir You're like, you know for a fact that you can't be wrong about it like that what's more certain than that Like you don't even want to ask any more questions about it. Like it's just so obvious so true It's it is it is or whatever you want to say like we're all on top of that. Is there anything like that for you? The thing that at least most confident about even if there's nothing like that, let's see I would say the Pretty much the foundational thing I would kind of get to something like the laws of logic are reliable The laws of logic are 100% reliable. Yes. I would go I would I would venture to make that claim Okay James, what do you got? I mean, yeah, if I if I was forced to pick something that had that high of a degree of certainty One of the things we did in my when we swamped for that very last role-play And I was doing essay on the other guy. He said I I believe in the science like science like science or the scientific method to 100% So like like that the scientific method is the most reliable way to like discover truths about reality. Is that your position? I don't know what you believe. I think I would agree with that. Yeah to 100% Certainly the scientific method is the most reliable method. Sure known or period No No Because again, I try not to believe anything to 100% like third you should always be open to changing your mind You always be yes a hundred percent certain on that. Huh? Are you 100%? We're getting too fast into it. Yeah, I was I was thinking about Like a liar's paradox type of thing something like I'm 100% certain that this statement is true Yeah, so you know we can we can get into that. That's pretty fun concerning the logic I understand you can it's sort of mathematical and the realm of mathematics is that you can declare truths because you have very well-defined Aspects so like I can say to yeah in real life. I can't bring you to of anything There's always gonna be slightly more of one than the other or you have two cameras here But they have different atoms maybe they might have true But like so I have grease on it Where does the camera begin where's the camera and is one has less battery charge than the other like there's There's aspects that make them different and if they're different, they can't be the same So how do I really have a thing? Um, does that make sense? Mm-hmm? So it's ill-defined what a camera is but to the number Boom we both agree with two is base 10 Yeah, we know exactly what two is yeah, and I can say two plus two equals four and I agree with that And we can prove it to be true. Yes, you can do the proof for it. Yes, but for like Abstract stuff that's not mathematical. That's hard logic. Well, no, well the What mathematics proof is the abstract stuff? Yeah, I Yeah, you have it. Yeah, you have an abstract concept and you can say things about that But it's well-defined. Yeah, those are well-defined like if this if this this this conditioner met then so that's my boring preamble That's my boring problem. Now. Let's get back to the assie. So So what do you mean by logic and laws laws of logic? What do you mean by laws of logic? Um, I think typically I refer to like the three kind of Identity non-contradiction exclude excluded middle. Okay Are you saying that the by laws? Even if we you know, we make laws human beings make laws Yes, so even if humans didn't make those laws you would still say that they were true, right? Even if you say they're not true I'm just wondering let's see even if humans didn't make I would say yes, because I don't think humans Humans did not make the we coined them into laws. Uh, yeah We do we've we discovered more or less and described. Yeah, like as far as a more like laws or something that like humans say hey This is a yes, like it like a scientific law. Yeah, it's so reliable. Yeah, this is a description of Repeated observations. I would say the laws of logic works similarly. Okay. Um, you know, we've Really don't have we don't have a single count or example That that you know something that is is itself all that stuff. Do you know what he's talking about? I'm I'm I've heard I Can break down. Let's go say I've heard the identity Non-contradiction and yeah exclude middle, but I have not looked into that to know what each of those particularly So if I had a car I have a car in parking lot right now Every car in that parking lot is either my car or not my car. Would that make sense? Okay? Is that identity? Well, I mean does that at least make sense? Yes, would you agree with me either own it or you do not? Yeah, either car is either my car or not my car every car in national is either my car or not my car Yes, everything on earth is either my car or not my car Mm-hmm. Every you're with me so yes everything in the universe is either my car or not my car I can have two sets of it's my car or it's not my car as long as I will define what my car is I could say is X or is not X. Yeah, that explains all three modes of that because there's no middle ground My car is my car and what's not my car is not my car. Yeah, okay. I'm fine with that The thing is how do we prove it not to be true the case? How do we how do you falsify that because we have to assume that it's true to even try to falsify it I? Mean, but I think that in of itself Would be the evidence right is it so if we can we falsify it? Can we falsify it? I mean we would have to is not falsifying something proof that it's true Is it a posh show it? Wait wait wait It's not falsifying something. Yeah, it's the fact that we can't falsify it proof that it's true. No Okay, so it seems like it's not so much that It's not so much that I don't have a lot of confidence that it's true It's just that I'm always open door like show me a good way to falsify it and I'll be like, okay, cool But right now I'm like that's why that's for me one of the things I'm most confident about Yeah, I'm like as nines down to the Down to prove it on beyond but I would never be a hundred percent until I know how to falsify something Even if I couldn't falsify I just like it's unknown, but I'm there's nothing else. I'm probably more confident than that What do you think about that? Let's see. So I think I'm trying to remember this so everything you just said so You would believe in these Laws more if only you if you were able to falsify them Yeah, I love things that I know where my not hits are yeah as well as my hits Yes, and if I don't know where my non hits are yes, how can I be 100% confident that I got it? So, I mean this is a this is a similar thing to how would I falsify like? Newton's second law so in the sense of In the event let's pretend I did it. I don't know is a perfectly fine answer. Yeah, and I'm Measuring my confidence on based on what I can demonstrate And I think that's a reasonable position. Yeah Well, so I mean for instance if I were to try to do an experiment that would demonstrate Newton's second law And I were to get something maybe like mass equals or force equals mass times philosophy Instead of mass times acceleration so and that obtains well Hey, well now I have an observation. Yeah that contradicts now, but the problem is will that ever happen? It hasn't happened yet. Well, here's now I could do something with a lot of logic correct and all I'm saying is 99.9999999 Represents an open-mindedness that I could be wrong about yeah, which is always more reliable or more rational position then I'm so confident that I don't even ask questions about it. Oh, yes And when I say like hey third second law of thermodynamics. Yeah Here now sure, but when the universe is being formed, you know, is what the rules work And yeah near heat death. Yeah, who knows what the rules will be then these might be an F We might seeing we might be seeing a spectrum of change with these Equations that change slightly over time and percentable to our short lifetimes. Yeah, I'm open to being wrong. Yes That's all that means that I think that's no rational position Yes, I definitely I would definitely agree if there were to be some sort of demonstration or otherwise Evidence that laws of logic were not reliable. Yes Then of course I would change and the way how I see it is someone who's so confident that they aren't gonna change Your mind even if they were presented that kind of evidence would be more confident than you So you couldn't be at a hundred percent I could not be at a hundred percent Then I guess so this was I would say the closest to a hundred percent that I could have given you nice I'm right. I'm right there with you. Yeah, I mean I mean this bump it. Yeah, absolutely. Oh I mean I'm not bad. I mean honestly, I mean I guess I came in there wasn't a This is close to a hundred percent. There's some other things. I feel like sure like I mean I don't think infinity war is a good movie period. I probably I would a hundred percent Not taking the bait good and ain't good and we could talk about it's not good. It's not good. It's half a movie and I Want to do yours. Thanks first man. In fact, I even said mine. I mean said mine. I could say infinity war You want a good movie what spider-verse sorry? Oh, I watched it there. Oh, wasn't it good fantastic After that I was watching it with a friend and after that movie I just turn her I just well that was a perfect movie It was a perfect I was in the movie theater and I was like I had so much hype going into this and then I left I was like It was even better than the comic book that it was based on that almost could have been a better claim Spider spider versus was perfect movie a hundred percent If you want to do another round we try to What you got that might be a good one for me to go new okay scientific method is the most reliable one That we know about. Yes. I suppose like I mean The and what I ran up when I did with the other guys mean The scientific method is is that's the foundation of kind of knowledge and learning things What do you mean by the scientific method on the the process of you see how it's always just what do you mean by that? And then is that reliable? That's all that's yeah, that's the game. Yeah by a scientific method the process of Having out with it. It's what you know you observe a phenomenon you hypothesize What is the cause of that you try to isolate the variables and change one of them? Okay, and then see how that affects the outcome Can I repeat that back to you just so you make an observation you form a hypothesis and you do a Methodological approach to determine whether your hypothesis was true or not true And not both right now. Is that fair sure? Is that the best way to determine? Everything Or there's some things that you can't determine through observation Making a hypothesis and that that all methodological testing but still arrive at the true conclusion That we know about like is there another process that could be good like is there's things where scientific method is limited? Like I'm wondering generally Yeah I mean like is there anything that we can't observe but still learn more things from I'm trying to think the first thing that would come to mind would be something more less like Precise as more like psych psychological or emotional Yeah, or feelings and stuff like that, but even then I mean the field of psychology is still There are still kind of ways to try to quantify and try to test things and try to isolate variables so it's not completely removed and you know it the scientific method of Test things and see what happens is still kind of the foundation for that What do you mean by reliable lawyer? You say it's the most reliable method that we have what do you mean by reliable? By reliable that would mean It yields the most consistent results a result a positive a useful result Meaning meaning that you have gained knowledge that is actionable in some way that you you can do something with that knowledge Reliable in the sense that it will lead you astray Less than Faith or or or feelings or or leave you astray less. Yes So just to summarize and more than I'd love to get your input on this So you have the scientific method, which is just observation hypothesis and testing You think it's the most reliable method that we know based on it yielding useful data and being less Likely to lead you astray based on other methods that have been proposed so far. Sure William, what do you think about that? And you're how confident are you? To a high degree, that's fine. Do you think you could be wrong? Huh? To the extent that yes, I could be wrong about anything but I have not been presented evidence or Nothing comes to mind at the moment that would necessarily persuade me fair enough I have some ideas, but I'd love to hear where you would go. I think I have a couple ideas where That might be good, but I think the one I'll go with is okay. So what about things that may something that may not be a observable To us for instance, let's say a fourth-dimensional object How how would we go about studying something like that? So so we have I mean we have our three spatial dimensions. I'll say we have a four spatial dimension object How do we go about studying that and drawing conclusions about some of its properties even beginning to define what it is. Yeah, I well Two things one the only context in which I'm familiar with more than the three spatial dimensions would be the nine plus two Whatever for string theory In which case then you're you're doing math. It's just a higher-dimensional math. I want you to involve yourself in this Yeah, so this would be so this would be something like definitely abstraction of the real world we live in so something like mathematics could possibly Investigate this object, but how will we could we use science to investigate this object if? To say that there is an unknown fourth-dimensional object Which is only in this fourth dimension, which we have no way of Confirming that it's there or testing it with if you you can't test with science then that means it evidently does not manifest If it does not have any effect on the world in which we actually exist Then I Don't know how I could be certain that it was actually there again That's where I think it falls into the world of math. Well, yeah, and so like I Mean if so, maybe this is Incorrect paraphrase if we're using science to investigate their own and draw conclusions about the things Would you would you agree that that would be a good summer summarization of sure method, okay, okay, so something of something like Four-dimensional objects, which wouldn't work in our our three-dimensional world that we live in How could we use a scientific method to draw conclusions about this this thing if if it manifests is science-limited is what he's asking Yeah, yeah, and with regard to what it can study I suppose yes and Yeah, okay. I'm going ahead because because what if you answer his question Concisely and honestly and just trust in the method. Yeah, you can see where he's going with his steps But I think he's just asking so you're saying science is great And it's the best thing we know and you're asking is science limited if you say yes to that you might get to his next question Rather than trying to like yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm just I'm trying to play what don't play him Just yeah, so yeah, it's the flow of the cover I'm not necessarily saying that this Because I'm arguing against Carl Sagan's imaginary dragon fourth-dimensional dragon in your garage, so he's saying it's limited so what yeah It's science is limited It's still the best one we know okay based on him sure Okay, so if that's the case if that's the best one we know Let's say something like mathematics could give us an idea of how to explore a four-dimensional object Let's say if we were presented with a four-dimensional object We would have now have the you know through mathematical abstractions have the tools to figure out its volume sure to figure out Ways to transform it things like that However so but are you would you be saying that those sort of methods and those sort of conclusions are less reliable or less accurate Than the scientific method I think it it's still Would it still be considered part of the scientific method if you're I? Feel like my initial thought is that math is an arm of science And and so it's incomplete without testing. Yeah. Yeah to do When you're doing SE You typically aren't trying to sell another idea. Oh, okay only focused on his Method, okay, not his conclusion. So he just he likes science, but you don't even care He could say I like blank. Okay, the question is why do you like blank? What do you mean by blank because you're not trying to dismiss science because that's a hard thing to do Yeah, yeah logical absolutes. That's hard. Yeah dismiss. You're trying to Investigate whether or not the methodology that he's using to get to that conclusion is reliable or not Okay, if it's not hundred percent reliable like how we determine you need to falsify those then maybe you shouldn't be a hundred percent reliable Okay, just confident about the conclusion. Yeah, that's something. Yeah If all the humans died on earth would science still be the best known method Can there be a known method without minds without humans? Yeah, there's still other animals. Yeah, I Mean is it necessary for humans to be around for there to be for science to be the best humans around now It could be other animals. Huh? Sure. So it's a possibility Oh, is there a possibility that there's other animals or aliens that have a better method than what we've determined? I believe that To the to the best of my knowledge Not saying it's the case But it's a possibility like in all the planets that we have that there's maybe an intelligent life That's tremendous better than we have That their version of science that they might call a different thing is much better than what we would call to Is that even a possibility and then the end of? Point of keeping an open mind that yes That I'm convinced of that position that there is in fact or that I'm swayed in that and I'm not saying yeah But if that was if they were able to present that to you would that reduce your confidence that science If there was if if there was demonstrated something, mm-hmm, which again, it's it's such a foreign concept So you know you know a UFO just yeah right above us like here you go. How yeah It's like something with testing this is like you would be surprised. It's gonna blow your mind Yeah, it's just like bleep bleep bleep, but you understand it anyway You're just like I was impressive and he shows it to you in a PowerPoint. You're like, oh Yeah, well dang Would that reduce your confidence sure if you have something that will make you change your mind? Would you really say you're a hundred percent confident, but you didn't say you're a hundred? Yes, I said I said I said I'm to a high degree But you are willing to change your mind on that right, but sure At least now we have a more well-defined Way to change your mind. I know it's a little extraordinary But you're starting with nothing before which is pretty extraordinary and now you at least have something sure you would recognize Beyond that. I always wonder like In the future, huh? there might be a Epiphany of new means of testing things that rely more on math or Extraordinary means of testing that makes what we do Completely like irrelevant like if you go back for it five thousand years. What was science back then? Hey guys fire? Check this out now. We have like ships that take off and land themselves. I would argue that it's still fundamentally the same like like Like while it might have not been refined to recognize what the steps were it's 5,000 years for something to evolve is very short But if you stand at like 50,000 five million years even what we've been doing the same thing anymore Like are we still gonna call that the same thing? I think I think the the way in which you know a tyrannosaurus rex tests different Methodologies, I have to capture I think so like something about if we quit existing Animals still use some sort of maybe rudimentary version of scientific method. They are still investigating the world They're figuring out what works and Generally, they do figure out what doesn't work because they die or their School of fish will now know to avoid this type of other fish Or now we know that the school fish needs to latch on to this whale and yeah Yeah, so they're still testing things and that's an investigation figure out what works and doesn't so here's this thing Something in science that is like the goal mind the end of science is the one equation that solves it Are you familiar with that? Yeah, right now we have a series of two sets of equations that explain big things Yeah, big and forces and small forces. Yeah, but if we had one equation explain everything like cool perfectly Yeah, we wouldn't need to make a hypothesis and test it. We just know it from the equations Okay, plug it into the formula and you'll get your answer Honestly, but how do we figure out what that that formula is in fact? It's a one-to-one model We already know it's perfect. We already did the test and we know that model is perfect now We don't need a test anymore. Yeah, we're gonna have to make a hypothesis You're possibly maybe skipping through that first part really really quickly As a method to do something, okay, I wouldn't need to observe make a hypothesis and test it I just plug it into that. I'd have a calculator that would tell me what the right answer is interesting Interesting. I'm not technically doing math. I'm just plunking out if you have a completely accurate simulation calculator is doing This is this is interesting this philosophical. There you go Are you saying a calculator is doing math or is it just doing its core functions as a program piece in machinery? Because that's why I'm seeing it like a machine that will tell you the right answer You just plug in the variables and tell you what the right answer is That's what I'm saying like when we have that one equation. It won't be mind's doing it It'll probably be like some I have no idea that'll be like some weird thing that you just like 42 And there you go It's just like just build this or the answer is that or that person's gonna win the election let's not even waste time The box said so. Mm-hmm. Yeah, like that's the better method than science I can't believe we've been doing science for ages things exploding left and right Use the box Yeah, I'm tempted to I know this is like an idealized situation Would that be a better method maybe if you have it'd be more powerful Would you you well it explains everything you're doing a semi you're doing basically you're it's the one-to-one model Yeah, what it's the true one-to-one and that model is just simply simulating and by running the model perfectly to run the model A test in and of itself, but it knows every facet of every possible interaction sure it's and the way it knows that is by running a simulation It like no by doing the math it it does its function like a calculator does binary Yeah for it to do its function to do the math I would say is the test so you'd say the box is doing the scientific method to get the answer that you wanted Yes, it's like like it's it's it's Essentially running a simulation of of instead of dropping the ball and seeing how much Newtons of energy the sensor is reading it just knows how much the ball weighs and knows how much gravity and mass and is Spitting at the number like I'm not doubting that it's scientific, but I don't even know I would I'm not a computer programmer But I would say that The way how a machine that's sophisticated is that would probably work Could be such that it doesn't work like how computers work today where it runs a simulation It could just be like Like no, there's one perfect answer for every per every perfectly formatted words where it's and it's just an analog There you go. It's almost like a matrix that is so yeah doing the math for it Just knows it'd be an assumption on my end that it would be using the scientific method But it's one of those situations again where it's like aliens coming in or a perfect machine that just works in another way That I understand it Maybe there could be in the future a better means of method, but we don't know that yet Yes, but at least now we know things that would change your mind from sure nothing would change my mind And you already said you'd be willing to change my name Yeah, yeah, and that's a fun kind of conversation to have in an seweb because now we're both working towards like Yeah, this is very interesting. Yeah. Yeah, okay Yeah And that's it so like again the whole point of this isn't to show like you're wrong I'm going to show you why you're wrong in like five minutes and like It's for both of us to be like let's at least be more reasonable by the end of the conversation And by knowing grounds where we'd be going willing to change your mind or at least identify what it take for a speed wrong We're falsified. That's great Because it just makes us a little more rational Plus it's fun to kind of talk about yeah infinity war is the worst movie or is spider-verse the most perfect movie They are different universes Have you seen infinity war? I haven't seen any of the Marvel movies. You don't see any of the Marvel movies. Where's your Secretly German or something. Let me see your papers. Yeah, yeah, let me see Okay, so then if I could summarize I can summarize