 between Iran and Andrew and I'd like to exploit those differences now a little bit And I think really if we're being honest with each other that the real difference comes down to The issue of reason and revelation and the attempt I Think Andrew you want to marry reason and revelation or Athens and Jerusalem And Iran on the other hand, I think you you want to move away from revelation and Jerusalem towards something towards reason and A secular based form of ethics. So can I can I get the two of you to now sort of Just explain to us Why why you think reason revelation? Must go together and why you think that they can't Marriage is too strong a word Because they represent two very different sources of authority and of information and One is revelation inexplicable comes to you and the other is reason which is inductive and The truth is that humans need both That we need our reason to navigate the world, but we're also aware In our world that we can't know everything and that there are things that happen to us Life events deaths illnesses and in the past so many more Completely unpredictable events that could upturn or overturn your lives, but you also need meaning You need a structure for your life to understand Why are we bored here and then die? What is the point of this impermanence? What is the point of this? this fragility Now Pascal had a beautiful expression Pascal as you may know was probably one of the most brilliant mathematicians in history An unbelievably brilliant brain Regarded as one of the highest peaks of in his time of science who converted to Christianity Overnight and wrote this really amazing little book. We didn't really write a book He just jotted down little things and thoughts he had and put them together and never compiled them But they were put together posthumously into a little book called the Ponce thoughts and in it He just simply says the following phrase In French, it's l'usage et soumission de la raison which is the use and submission of reason That we use reason to figure out as much as we can figure out But then there are things we will never figure out and That's when we surrender to mystery That's when we surrender the fact that humans are fallible That our brains are not as big as we'd like them to be that we don't know as much as we think we know That a certain humility in the face of the world and of death is the is the sanest point of view and that Ultimately that is what matters Reason is what gets you through the day and the reason is what gets you to see and the reason why they're related is because They're both and have to be both about truth What is true and The West is very Very interested in this. What is true? You don't have to believe that you could just say who has power Which is what many people on the far right and the far left argue, which is it's all power There's nothing to do with the reason and there's no God. It's just human beings controlling other human beings Well, the West has sort of said And I when I say I mean this is massive Generalization I'm talking through the years that the logic has run. No, no Reason can figure stuff out reason can show us things. It can't give us meaning But it can give us a way to live and solve the immediate problems But there is something about that Every human life we have a problem We try and figure it out. We solve it But guess what as soon as you've solved it another problem comes up think about it. So there is no end To this practical reasoning. It is it is what a philosopher. I studied called the deadliness of doing That's reason. It's it's deadly in the end and what you want at some point is an ability to transcend that spiritually Psychologically emotionally and that's why all the great religions have always existed and that's the contribution that Buddhism can make and the Christianity can make a Judaism can make and Islam can make to to making our lives Worth something that was too long and I know I'm doing my best. No perfect so so I agree that it's all about truth is all about finding the truth and discovering truth and Truth can only be discovered by reason There is no truth through revelation revelation is completely arbitrary and subjective and this is why The Jews and the Christians and the Muslims and the Buddhists all disagree on what that truth happens to be and and are quite willing to slaughter each other on occasion in the name of that truth because indeed There's no way for them to really communicate those truths because they're not linked to anything in reality They're not provable by reason. They're just my revelation is different than your revelation So the only way for me to Convince you in quotes is to use force against you and and and much of Those wars that are in really the the recognition of the disaster of war the recognition of the horror of war Really enters Western civilization After the religious wars of the of the of the 17th century, you know This is this is what motivates John Locke to to write what he writes and the enlightenment to kind of recognize that there has to be something More than these futile religious wars and there has to be a Principle by which to guide human interaction when they in a society The principle law comes up with as individual rights and I think he's right with regarding that principle But no I think indeed religion is the antithesis of reason It says there's a certain realm in which we cannot reason in which we have to accept stuff by faith Well accept stuff by faith by what standard from whom? You know if you're Catholic it's from one source if you prostrate Protestant from another if you're Jewish from another from Muslim you another and there's there's no way to arbitrate the differences between those There's no way to discover what the truth behind them is So, you know, I would even say that to a logic stand Religion has been the counter force to Western civilization Really from the beginning the enlightenment which I think is the kind of the real beginning philosophically at least of a Western civilization arising is that period in time of which religion is relegated to smaller and smaller places in human life It's taken out of politics is taken out of the public square and it's left for you in your home to do with as you will it's Diminishing religion is diminishing through this period I think that it was a healthy phenomena and a phenomena that ultimately led to more freedom more individuality But it did leave a hole and the hole is meaning because people still do need meaning they need purpose and I think that the that search for meaning is Is hard it's there's a certain simplicity to say it comes externally comes from an ancient book It comes from a certain mythology It's harder to say it's your individual responsibility to find that meaning to find that purpose in your life and Here's some principles to use your reason to use that inductive ability that you have to find purpose to find meaning But I think that's the answer at the end of the day It is up to you as an individual to find purpose and meaning in your life to use your one tool of knowing reality Your one tool of discovering truth to discover what your purpose should be in this life And I think the ultimate purpose of your life is Your own happiness, but again all of that needs to be fleshed out and thought about in terms of what is happiness and what does it mean? To achieve happiness or to pursue happiness. What does it mean to have a purposes in the individual? But the only guide for us to really be doing any of that is our mind is our ability to reason our ability to think and The more we rely on some external factor like a God like a religion like an ancient book The more we give up on our own mind The more we're likely to clump up in the kind of tribes that that I think we both agree are kind of enemies or problematic in our world Whether it's religious tribes or other tribes it is it encourages or discourages us to look for truth not just in the realm of science but in the realm of Philosophy in the realm of morality to look at what should be the guide to life To a large extent, I think the disagreement is is goes back to Greece like everything else does To the disagreement between Plato and Aristotle on certain deep philosophical grounds at the Aristotle truth was in the world And to Plato truth was in another dimension. It was in the world of forms I think I think when we look into a different dimension for truth I think civilization declines I think we saw that after the rise of Christianity would in in the Middle Ages through the Middle Ages and when The respect for science respect for reason respect for this world the respect for individual human happiness Rises that's when you get civilization. What has that civilization produced? That's as beautiful as Shatra Cathedral Well to me Shatra Cathedral is not as beautiful as it is to you in in a sense that I think what the cathedral Message of the cathedral when I walk in is how little are you how big is and and I don't I Don't find that as beautiful or as stunning or as Was spiritually meaningful a standing before David, right or standing even Falling waters standing, you know, I give Frank Lloyd Wright standing in falling waters and having that sense of weightlessness and that sense of This is a space for me This is a space I can be happy and I can't be happy in that cathedral that cathedral is a massive burden on my shoulders Trying to crush me. It's telling me how puny and insignificant. I am versus God versus the religion versus the tribe versus you you are puny and insignificant No, I'm not so am I no neither of us all we are and that's that we are ephemera and we will be forgotten What we need today what I called a new intellectual would be any man or woman who is willing to think Meaning any man or woman who knows that man's life must be guided by reason by the intellect Not by feelings wishes women's or mystic revelations Any man or woman who values his life and who does not get want to give in to today's cult of the spare cynicism and impotence and does not intend to give up the world to the dark ages and to the role of the collectivist Using the super chat and I noticed yesterday when I appealed for support for the show Many of you step forward and actually Supported the show for the first time. So I'll do it again. Maybe we'll get some more today If you like what you're hearing if you appreciate what I'm doing then I appreciate your support Those of you who don't yet support the show, please take this opportunity. Go to your own book show calm slash support or go to subscribe star calm your own book show and And and make a kind of a monthly contribution to keep this to keep this going. I'm not showing the next