 Dear respected viewers, thank you for joining me once more on Vishu's show. We are not live from Karbala at the moment, but we are at least recording from Karbala. We are having technical issues and therefore we are no longer streaming live, although insha'Allah ta'ala you should be watching these views being broadcast live for the first time. So what I said is nonetheless correct. Insha'Allah ta'ala I am your host Yahya Seymour and you are back on your show Back to the Basics in which we are discussing some of our key differences with others in life. Those differences that we as youth will be experiencing on a daily basis when we come across others who disbelieve in what we believe and believe in other things. Of course these differences range from minor differences, they can even exist internally within our own school of thought. But nonetheless we are continuing with our analysis of world views. Although since last night's episode I have taken a brief pause and the reason for that is I have been sent some of the correspondence forwarded to the management of Imam Hussain TV but nonetheless directed towards me or at the very least directed towards my show. And I was continuing with the letters sent in by an atheist from the city of New Jersey. So what I apologize, I did actually concede my ignorance in yesterday's episode. I'm not sure if New Jersey is a city or a state and I have not had time to check that since. So continuing with where we were insha'Allah ta'ala. I'm reading directly from my friend's letter and I pray that he's able to watch this and well if he is able to watch this I pray even more that he's able to benefit or find what I say at the very least makes rational sense if not finds it convincing insha'Allah ta'ala. He stated and I did have issue reading this particular question in last night's episode but I think I've come to understand what he means slightly more. I did not hear you provide any positive truth for God's existence on the live shows. You are no discussing Christianity, Buddhism and Judaism. I believe he's meant to state you are now as in I think he wanted to say that you have moved on to the concept of God. You finished with the concept of a worldview of atheism. Can I take that as a concession that you possess no positive proof for your assertion? So okay, it's a very good question. Insha'Allah ta'ala dear brother, I did pose and I did put forward some arguments for a positive case about God's existence. But nonetheless, I still think that even if I were not to have done so, which I did by the way and you may specifically return to the last few episodes in which I covered the concept of atheism. I believe that even if I did not pose any positive evidence, then my argument still stands. My whole argument throughout analyzing the worldview of atheism is that in order for us to even think coherently and understand things rationally, we must concede the existence of three basic logical laws. They are of course the law of non-contradiction, the law of excluded middle. The law of non-contradiction meaning that something cannot be a book and not a book at the same time. The law of excluded middle would mean that this is either a book or it's not a book. There is no middle option and the law of identity to say that a book is a book. I grounded that we must believe in these three laws as transcendental rational laws. And I argued that basically utilizing this understanding, the second principle, the law of non-excluded middle would judge upon this issue that there is either a god or there is no god. Now if the conclusion that there is no god is an absurd conclusion just based upon the molasmat or the necessary outcomes of atheism, then I believe that the existence of god is by definition proven by the fact that it is contrary to the impossible. And what is contrary to the impossible is necessity. So if that's the case, I believe that that itself should suffice as a positive argument. But nonetheless, I do believe that I posed other positive arguments to suggest the existence of god as well. You thereafter stated, your generic theistic arguments demonstrate the abstract philosophical god and not the personal deity of Islam. Well, I do like this one. I like this question because it means that I as a host on a show which is talking about varying worldviews can hopefully as a Muslim host convince you to stay tuned and continue watching beyond our analysis of atheism. And the reason for that is you've stated something very interesting. And I don't fault you because this is generally what is considered common knowledge amongst the masses. You've stated your general theistic arguments demonstrate the existence of the abstract philosophical god and not the personal deity of Islam. I agree that they've presented the concept of a god. I don't believe that they've presented the concept of the general abstract philosophical god because the general abstract philosophical gods would be more akin to the god of deism. And I believe I've already demonstrated why that god is absolutely and blatantly false. But it's the next line that interests me. You've stated not the personal deity of Islam. If by the personal deity of Islam you mean the anthropomorphic image. And I don't mean that to belittle any particular sect, but I mean the more anthropomorphic god. Similar to the god found within the Judeo-Christian scriptures. Then that's not the god I'm advocating on this show. And inshallah ta'ala I pray that you're able to bear with me as I continue to analyze the concept of god. And I absolutely refute the concept of a personalized very personic is the word I would use deity. So I'm not intending to demonstrate the concept of a personic deity if that's what you mean. And if that's not what you mean, then inshallah ta'ala send me in a clarification and I'll address your question as it stands. Your next question would be given your concession that you do not come from a scientific background or a science background to be very precise in quoting you. Have you considered the possibility that you could be mistaken? Okay, so this one's a bit of a loaded question and what I will do on that is I'll assume two possibilities about your question. You could be talking about the possibility of the fine-tuning constants which I've stated, but I doubt you are because if you felt that that's what I was doing, you would have viewed that as a positive argument for God's existence and you wouldn't have asked that previous question. Now if you're asking about the consequences of science, that's one of the reasons why I essentially left the arguments to those who are qualified scientists and who are atheists. And nonetheless, an ignorance about the experimentation that goes on or the chemical properties of those experiments and what have you is absolutely irrelevant to the philosophical argumentation and rationalization behind the experiments. So I would argue that science is still subject to the philosophy of science. Science itself is merely a physical endeavor which presupposes several things which it itself cannot demonstrate. Number one, it presupposes that we can trust our minds, hence why my focus on the fact that if you do believe in atheism, you can't trust your mind. Number two, it presupposes that there are physical constants and that we can trust what we call induction. I again have argued that upon atheism you have no good reason to trust what we call induction because in a chaotic universe there's no good reason to believe that things will be as they once were. Number three, it presupposes that you're not a brain in a vat. And number four, it presupposes that there is an external world around you. These are all things that science itself could never demonstrate. And so the very fact that we engage in science requires reason. I might not be from a science background, but insha'Allah ta'ala, I certainly believe that much of my undergraduate training was in the intellectual sciences or what we call in the Islamic world, the ability to train up your rationality. But I believe that even the arguments I've put forward don't require the training of one's rationality. I believe they just require one to focus and they would understand that they know these things to be true by default. Then you stated, would you be willing to accept a debate over the phone with one of my friends who is an expert at debating Muslims on God's existence? Brackets, although he also mainly debates Christians. Okay, I'm surprised I didn't notice this question earlier on. I would have given it slightly more thought. The honest truth is I am not interested in allowing my show to be hijacked as a debate platform. If your friend would like to at some point pose some questions about certain arguments I have presented, if your friend would like to at some point write in, give me some of his reservations, that's absolutely fine. But the honest truth is I think that your friend, being an expert at debating, probably just goes to show that he's what I would call a... Now this word normally has religious connotations but he's an apologist. And I have no interest in apologists. I have no interest in being an apologist. I have an interest in finding the truth. Now if your friend is equally as concerned with finding the truth, then inshallah ta'ala he can always write to me. He can always write to the management of this channel that I'm appearing on, just as you have. And I would much prefer that we get into a civilized one-on-one discussion. But at the end of the day, I don't claim by any means that atheism is my specialty. I don't claim by any means that anything necessarily is my specialty. I believe that I have given enough time and effort to look into atheism, to know that it's absolutely, with all due respect to you sir, false. But that is not to say that I'm not interested in trying to guide someone that's sincere. I myself can understand that there's an attraction to just throwing everything in the bin because you can't see which religion would be true and that you see there's too many in front of you to even judge. I fully understand the atheist mentality. But I'm more interested when someone's willing to meet me halfway and say that look, I'm more of an agnostic. I don't know in which direction I'm heading. Because at the end of the day, I think that we have seen fairly rationally, fairly plausibly, that upon atheism there's no good justification for objective morality. There's no good justification for trusting your mind if the external world is the world that atheism posits. There's no such thing as thought. There's no such thing as free will. And therefore you couldn't even get upset with me because we would just say my decision not to discuss with you was predetermined as well. Now that's not to be rude. I'm not trying to have a quick jab. But these are my answers for now. Thank you so much for your letter once more and I have done with all your questions. But I'm going to go for a very short break and I'll address you slightly more afterwards. Wassalamu alaikum warahmatullahi wabarakatuh. Dear respected viewers and hopefully if you're watching this, I address you again directly. Dear respectable atheists from New Jersey. Particularly the one that wrote me this letter starting off with Dear Mr. Yahya Seymour. You have been very respectful in this letter and I am certainly not deserving of a praise you have given me. And one seeks refuge with word I. If we could conclude with your letter and I'm sorry if it feels like I've abruptly concluded halfway through the show but I am going to get to other letters of other people. Unfortunately some not as nice as yourself. I'm not willing to engage in a public debate of the type you're talking about. Certainly not on this show. And to be honest with you I do agree with the advice of the alama. The scholars of Islam that is to say that debating hardens the heart. And as I've said I am more comfortable discussing with an atheist that at the very least has been able to reach that halfway point of acknowledging that atheism and particularly naturalism have these nasty consequences as opposed to someone that just wants to sit back and shoot holes at what I believe. So that's what I have to say. I do thank you for this letter and I'll certainly be praying for you and I'll be praying for your guidance inshallah ta'ala. Thank you once more and I hope that doesn't sound patronizing when I say that. I know that some atheists do find it sounds patronizing. So moving on to our other letters. We have a very interesting one and I'm going to go for a shorter one. My name is equally as polite and I'm not sure if we could define this person as an atheist but nonetheless it's an interesting letter. It states hi. My name is Jasper. Well hi Jasper. I have deliberately not cited your surname although you didn't mention it but it is in your email. I'm a Persian living in Holland. Well okay thank you for that Jasper. I hope you're doing well and I hope that the weather is not too cold in Holland at the moment. I wanted to ask is Sheikh Yahya Afghani because he speaks English very articulately and his thoughts are quite rational for an Akhund and a Muslim person. Okay. I'm not Afghani. My eyes might be deceptive. I'm half Filipino. I speak English very well articulately. Not at all. Not at all. I've still got this nasty Scottish accent looming somewhere in the background even though it's kind of disappeared a lot and by that I don't really mean nasty. I'm being sarcastic. I'm a big fan of the Scottish accent actually. And his thoughts are quite rational for an Akhund and a Muslim person. I seek refuge with God from the word I. And brother I don't think it's necessarily the right thing to do to stereotype and typecast every Akhund. By Akhund I think you mean clergymen and by Muslim person. It's really not fair to say that Muslims are not rational or that Akhunds are not rational and that my thoughts are quite rational for an Akhund or a Muslim person. I appreciate that you're praising me but at the same time it's not nice to start off with such a massive dismissal of such a large percent of the population. And it's really, you know, if someone said this about a particular race then we'd be quite worried, you know, it would come across as slightly racist. So I do hope that you consider maybe changing how you said it and that way of addressing people in general. And I'm not sure if Jasper is ever going to watch this show again but I will send him an email as a follow-up as well. But I have a big problem with his claim that the truth must be absolute. Has he ever found that truth is filled in paradox before in his life? Okay, I'll come back to that claim. He also makes one of the roomy analogy of the elephant but fails to explain why it is a problem. We also know that the truth is beautiful and yet Islam is bullying people in my country and in other countries so is it therefore truth? Can Aga Yahya explain why he converted to Shi'ism and how he can only believe that the Quran is literally the word of God? Does God speak Arabic only? God's bless, I believe God is a strong energy which gives us all strength. Okay, so there are several points here. Inshallah to Allah I will address them one by one. I'm not Afghani, I've addressed that already. You have a big problem with the claim that I made that truth is and must be absolute. Has he never found that truth is steeped in paradox before in his life? No, I've never found that truth is steeped in paradox and I have a problem when we bring the concept of a paradox. For the viewers who are not familiar with the word paradox it's where something seems one way and it's another way. It's generally a phenomenon that is similar to a contradiction in the real world. Now the brother asks is the truth not steeped in paradox or deep in paradox? This would only be true if we save it the natural world can sometimes seem paradoxical. So for example, many of the people that utilize this concept of paradox and how nothing is truly rational and things can be as they are not they would invoke what we call quantum mechanics or quantum physics and they would say look quantum physics we can't understand it and atom is here and it's there at the same time. Sure, our current models of understanding quantum mechanics and quantum physics are incapable of expanding it away. There are other models where if we would just apply them some scientists are saying that they make much more sense now. And for anyone that's interested in this they can read Thomas Kuhn's book which is about the revolutions of I forget it's exact name but it's about paradigm shifts in the philosophy of science where things which are unexplainable according to one scientific model would become explainable according to another. Now the reason I mention this is because some Christians often demonstrate a reason to believe in a trinity despite its internal contradiction as being based upon the fact that there are paradoxes and that this is a paradox but we know that many decent Christian theologians who have rejected the trinity would state that a paradox is where we have something in the natural world it actually exists and we are incapable of explaining it according to our current knowledge. So a paradox is something that we have to explain away because we see it in front of us. Whereas to come up with a paradox in theology is absurd because when you do theology a particularly rational theology you are looking for the best explanation of everything. Now the best explanation can never be steeped in paradox because why would you create a paradox yourself? A paradox is merely something in the natural world which seems to contradict our current knowledge of science and we pray that we're able to understand it with the development of new paradigms a paradigm is a way of understanding things a way of explaining a way certain natural laws and hopefully as we change our paradigm we would be able to explain and understand that natural phenomenon slightly better so I don't believe that the truth is found in paradox. He makes one of a roomy analogy of the elephant but fails to explain why it is a problem. Well the reason it's a problem is because it's always used to argue that there's no such thing as absolute truth and that those who claim absolute truth are talking about a matter of perspective but then the whole analogy itself makes an absolute truth claim and therefore it's problematic. He states we know that the truth is beautiful and yet Islam is bullying people in my country and in other countries so is it therefore truth. So his argument is the truth is beautiful Islam is bullying people in my country therefore Islam is not truth because bullying people is not beautiful. I don't know what it's like in Holland you're a Persian living in Holland I don't know what it's like in Holland I don't know how Islam is bullying people there but the behavior of Muslims isn't an extension of Islam my dear brother. Dear brother Jasper I'm not sure of you're Muslim I doubt you are from the way you speak but I'll continue with your letter in tomorrow's episode. Dear viewers thank you so much for tuning in and I apologize if we have taken a brief pause but it's important for us to discuss the views and concerns of some of the dear viewers of this show.