Talk Heathen

Latest Episodes:

Talk Heathen 06.37 09-11-2022 with Johnny P Angel and Secular Rarity Sep 11, 2022

Show notes

In today’s episode of Talk Heathen Johnny Angel is joined by Secular Rarity who will draw strength from callers who give us their prophecies and reasons why Biblical prophecies are fulfilled.
First caller is Patrick in FL who feels that being agnostic is the default position, with Taoism and Pantheism being plausible options. What makes one god more plausible than another? As limited beings there has not been enough evidence to convince us of any god, flying camels, or pixies. Currently there is too much junk to get through before we can even accept god claims. We are not making the claim that no evidence exists, we just have not observed it. Not accepting a claim could be a hard or soft stance.
Rick from Canada is next, who argues Biblical prophecies are being fulfilled. He uses the example of Jesus quoting Psalm 22 when he was on the cross and the last supper. Did the gospel writers have access to Jewish tradition when these things were written? It is not until we go towards the future that it is a prophecy. Look for scholars that cover the same material of interest that have different perspectives. Is there a prophecy that is not self-referenced in the Bible? Has god’s word reached all corners of the earth and will the end times be a rapid roll out as a result?
Xeno in South Korea argues that god is an abstract entity instead of the folklore of a bearded man, and asks if it is possible to be outside of an infinite regress that was created. Do you believe in something that you can’t define the properties of? There is a big difference between dark matter, an actual thing, and an all knowing god that makes decisions and cares who you have sex with. If you do not have a way of defining the god entity, then how do you know it is true? If we used the word “unicorns” instead of god, how would that change things? When is it time to believe something is true?
Vivian in ND would like to know how to talk with her friend, a believer who is progressive. When asking the “why” question, get specific. Showing fallacies may not go over particularly well, but having some rivalry might. Respectfully push back with curiosity in your conversations.
Thank you for tuning in and remember to support our essential workers! Be respectful to the people out there who must be exposed.
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Talk Heathen 06.36 09-04-2022 with Student Doctor Ben and Katy Montgomerie Sep 04, 2022

Show notes

In today’s episode of Talk Heathen, Student Doctor Ben is joined by Katy Mongomerie who will challenge creationists to refute crab facts and evolution, talk about trans brains, energy, and hateful atheists.
First up is Humanist Reformation in OR who is going to use the bible to disprove the bible. God made some predictions and prophecies that never came true. Look at Matthew 23 and think through what, “this generation” means. If your religion has room for interpretation, how do you know that your version is the correct one?
Eli in VA describes a link between the brain chemistry of trans people and the affirmed gender. He asks how this translates into cultures that don’t hold the strict views of gender that we have here in the U.S. Gender identity is something that develops as a part of the brain or person very much the same way that left handedness does. Trans people are largely composed of nature parts, and it is more complicated than the binary brain model. Some of it is sexual bimorphism. With some parts of the brain you will find that trans men and women are like cis of the affirmed gender. We know that conversion therapy does not work even through torture and that the overlap between male and female brains is so tight that there is very little difference. This is still only 1% of what the hosts wanted to say.
Rick from Canada defines energy as something that is all around us, comes in many different forms, is eternal, created the big bang, and that the only thing certain in the beginning was energy. We don’t know if energy has always existed or was created by a divine being. An afterlife is a separate claim. Why should this concern us? Just because that energy exists, does not mean that there is awareness. Energy is the capacity to do work, not consciousness. We can detect energy, but how can we measure a soul? If energy cannot be created or destroyed, and if souls are energy, then where do the new souls come from? Why do we need to take the Bible's word for what a soul or energy is?
Hayley in DE observed atheists being loud and hateful when she was growing up (particularly one person) and now views them as the cause of all sorts of discourse and rancor throughout history. Have you encountered enough atheists to know this? It is very easy to draw conclusions from patterns that we perceive to be there. Were these atheists already not nice people, or is it the atheism that caused them to be less kind? Sometimes you can see these same patterns in politics, sports, and other examples in our society. Try and make friends with an atheist, find common ground, and you will find that some of them are okay.
Thank you for tuning in this week! Remember to check out our other shows and stay safe!
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Talk Heathen 06.35 08-28-2022 with Johnny P. Angel and Student Doctor Ben Aug 28, 2022

Show notes

In today’s live studio episode of Talk Heathen, Johnny Angel is joined by Student Dr. Ben to take both audience questions and calls!
Jasmine in Canada is the first caller who mentions a case of a doctor refusing to use a proper pronoun for people based on a scripture. Doctors need to set aside their imaginary beliefs and focus on the patients. We trust doctors with our lives and it is not their place to bring religion into the conversation.
Michael, in the audience, asks: Is it legal for a judge to hand out a lenient sentence on someone because the church and Jesus forgave the person for stealing?
Rick is our next caller from Canada who is a human and since he is a human, he is an expert on the human body. He wants us to produce evidence that the body is NOT intelligently designed. Do you really think just by having a body that you can determine everything that is going on with it? How do you think the kidneys work? How do we determine that the body is intelligently designed objectively? The body doing cool things and an argument from incredulity does not necessitate design. Who is the intelligent designer? Why do you believe that a god exists? You can convert tens of thousands of people right now if you can prove your god did this.
An audience member comments on the call by mentioning knee pain and glasses. Johnny reminds us that god brings us to our knees! Student Doctor Ben educates us about the human body being an engineering nightmare.
Gabriel, our third Canada caller, wants to know why Muslims are not criticized as heavily as Christians by atheists. We have more conversations with Christians and understand their arguments. We don’t run into as many Muslims in the U.S. as we do Christians. Who do you think is taking over our country right now?
Rao from WY wonders about a connection between simulation hypothesis and fibromyalgia and designing survey questions with a control group to determine who has this condition. How would these questions be set up and with what controls? We are not the best judge of what is happening with us. How would the responses prove a connection? What are the variables you can think of that might skew these numbers?
Katherine in the USA asks how as an atheist she could volunteer for a theistic group. Does this organization provide meaningful and tangible resources and services? It depends on the nature of the group and if they are doing these services as a shared sense of humanity. Is there a way to talk with their clients to see what is going on? Are they doing a lot of evangelizing and pushing their agenda on the clients?
Our last caller, Chris from the UK, has a thought of Noah's flood possibly being a mythological archetype. There are a lot of flood myths all over the world; we live and die by these cycles of nature as these events work their way into our stories and culture. How would you test for a global flood?
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Talk Heathen 06.34 08-21-2022 with ObjectivelyDan and Cynthia McDonald Aug 21, 2022

Show notes

Is Christian Nationalism inherently racist? In today’s episode of Talk Heathen, ObjectivelyDan, and the wonderful Cynthia McDonald from our flagship show, The Non-Prophets, tackle the answers to this question and others.
First caller is Phoebe from the UK who is looking for ideas on how to push back against pushy clients, particularly Jehovah Witnesses, at work. Cynthia shares a personal story of how she dealt with this when asked why she was not a Christian, and how important it is to remind colleagues to focus on work, and not these types of discussions. Dan also shares a helpful story on how to handle this.
Charles from Canada calls with a position that Christianity is good for society. He argues that the abolition of women and slaves came from Jesus, and that can be humane to own a human being. Cynthia calmly gives a history lesson including the Baptist preachers that would use the Bible to justify slavery. Even when the civil rights movement was happening, preachers used Christian principles to uphold segregation. How many times did Jesus mention not using slaves? We will give you a hint, it was none. What did Paul say about slaves being obedient? If Jesus did not say certain things about slavery, how do you rectify the specific instructions in the Bible about how to own slaves? Jesus talked about all kinds of things but why did he never say it is not cool to own slaves?
Steve from AZ is freaked out about the recent SCOTUS decision. He started watching a popular show that seems like a playbook for the Christian Nationalists. Cynthia describes Operation Blitz, which is an actual playbook these people use by installing theocratic law on the local and state level to influence federal law. We can see how harmful the state laws have become since this recent SCOTUS decision. It is all about power, not pleasing Jesus or the good of the people. We hope that people wake up and take action against the propaganda which is strong.
Patrick in FL has a question about a supernatural god vs a natural god being falsifiable. How do we know for sure if something is supernatural or just advanced using the laws of nature? We would first have to know what is meant by natural god. There is nothing that we can point to and describe as supernatural. Things that we have thought were supernatural in the past, now are understood to have natural explanations.
Sam, a physics major from CA, wants to know how miracles are explained. She gives an example of a pastor who was stung by a scorpion, almost died, and then is doing okay now. We can’t verify this claim because it is a call in show, but it does boil down what a lot of claims are: stories. A lot of these stories in the medical world can be attributed to treatment. When these claims are tested, they happen to not be miracles. When we can’t find out why someone survived after we think all other possibilities have been ruled out, we have a god of the gaps fallacy.
Thank you for watching the show! We will see you next week! Remain skeptical, ask a lot of questions, and try to seek out the truth.
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Talk Heathen 06.33 08-14-2022 with Secular Rarity and Captain Dadpool Aug 14, 2022

Show notes

In today’s episode of Talk Heathen, Secular Rarity is joined by Captain Dadpool who will take on several different topics from excellent callers!
First up is Dave from The South who has proof of Orchestrated Objective Reduction (ORC) theory which is consciousness arising at the quantum level. An electron in a vacuum falls out of its location on its own and this is consciousness. There is no god involved or supernatural anything. This sounds mostly like our brain is still working in conjunction with everything. Maybe we now have a better hypothesis about consciousness and the reasonable conclusions are that it is still biotic material. We need to keep looking more into how the brain works because that is where we will find a lot of answers.
Cameron in MN wants to know how to talk with people who think that the Bible is historically correct. You can tell them things like, even if an ark is discovered, it is not evidence of Noah’s flood. It is just proof that someone built a boat. It depends on what your conversation is and what your goal is for that discussion. The method that you grasp on to the most, is not necessarily the most effective for all people.
Jamie in TX is seeking a good response to the problem of evil. There are not a lot of places to go in conversations with devout believers about this because of “god's mysterious ways”. Why are you making the claim that you understand this if you admit that there is no way to understand god? Belief in god and agreeing with the actions of god are completely different things. Why are cancer, natural disasters, and extinctions necessary to get to god’s mysterious ways? The world is a lot more interesting when you get out of the two dimensional box.
Xeno in South Korea asks if we come from something or if we are contingent on something, and that we can switch out the word god for “a reason”. If everything breaks down, doesn’t that mess with the cause and effect stuff? Do you feel like you are getting to god by default? We don’t have the capability of ruling out all other options. Why call it god?
Alok in CA would like to see most atheists not believing in god to also not believe in other supernatural things. There is a need in humans to have answers for stuff. Many atheists happen to also be skeptic. Laying out an atheist worldview is problematic because there are already so many things they disagree on, such as the definitions. We are not born believing in god and that is our default setting. It is worth having these discussions internally to better our community. There is too much in-fighting and we tend to yell at each other too much about these definitions.
Bitter Truth in IL has views that religions are a curse on humanity because of innocent people being killed. Religions are spreading hate and terrorism. Captain Dadpool agrees that religion is a poison and we would be much better off without it. What can we do to make some of these things better? The more we step away from religion, the better our lives will be as a whole.
Thank you for having fun with us today! Thank you so much to the essential workers for putting yourself out there day in and day out. We keep making progress if we keep doing these simple things.
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Talk Heathen 06.32 08-07-2022 with Secular Rarity and Nate Smith Aug 07, 2022

Show notes

For today’s Talk Heathen, we have Secular Rarity joined by Nate Smith and Jason Sherwood who will take calls in search of the answers for the big questions in life.
Patrick in FL is first and wants to talk about the difference between a panpsychism and a panprotopsychism. There seems to be a problem when we try to put a nice little neat circle around consciousness and then extrapolate that for all living beings. Response to stimuli does not necessarily mean that something is conscious. How do we determine the difference between responding to outside stimuli and a self aware being? How do you make the leap to all consciousness being connected in the universe? What is the value of thinking this?
Xeno from South Korea would like to pose the ontological argument for god. The hosts asked several times, “Xeno, what do you mean by ontology? “ The caller was unable to provide a definition.
Jason in TN has religious friends that are uncomfortable with the struggle of trans people going through transition. The Bible does not really talk about trans people but the bigots like to take the opportunity to lump everything together. We need to stop gatekeeping who is and is not accepted in that community, and tear down the barriers of tribalism that have poisoned us for so long.
Jason in FL says that Jediism started as a myth and has turned into reality, and that we can do amazing things with the mind. It is a physical and mental art of disciplining oneself. There have been many religions that have been used as the philosophy of Jediism. Do you believe in The Force and have the ability to lift stuff up with your mind? This sounds more like a philosophical practice rather than a woo woo religion. If you get more out of movies than art and entertainment, then more power to you. Just be careful if you feel like these things are literally talking to you.
Thank you for tuning in! Thank you to the essential workers!
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Talk Heathen 06.31 07-31-2022 with ObjectivelyDan and Jim Barrows Jul 31, 2022

Show notes

Welcome back to Talk Heathen everyone! Today, here to kick off our first episode back in the studio are your hosts, ObjectivelyDan and Jim Barrows!
First up is Elizabeth from the UK who has been blacklisted for finding housing by a fundamentalist social worker for being an out atheist.
Next up is Nate from CA who believes that you cannot be an atheist to a deist god. The Atheist position exists in accordance with the claim that a God exists, the specific characteristics of which are irrelevant.
Next up is Alok from CA is an Atheist who is struggling with the question of what kickstarted the universe. The caller understands that inserting God doesn’t further our understanding of the subject, but wants to know if humans will ever actually find out a definitive answer.
Ryan from Utah recently watched a debate, and was caught off guard by the theist perspective that humans cannot ground logic & reason without the Christian God? What did people do before Judaism or Christianity?
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Talk Heathen 06.30 07-24-2022 with Secular Rarity and Kenneth Leonard Jul 24, 2022

Show notes

In today’s episode of Talk Heathen, Secular Rarity hosts a fun show with Kenneth Leonard and are in search of callers who will either present the existence of god, or prove that it is not true that a shapeshifting dragon named Steve formed itself into Kenneth’s chair.
Marco in NV is our first caller and has had a personal revelation from god. He started noticing coincidences after smoking lots of weed. What does an experience tell us about the cause and nature of the experience? How did you rule out that you weren’t being pranked by a mischievous wizard? How do you know this was supernatural? Do you have a solid way to demonstrate the truth of your claim?
Barry from Europe wants some input about going through deconversion and coming out to spouses. There are people who can help with Recovering from Religion. When going through something like this, ask yourself what your goals are. Explore the best methods to determine true things with your spouse and focus on shared agreements. Talk with other people about it in the Facebook groups.
Stephen in the USA has evidence of god! This evidence is a passage in the Old Testament that is talking about piercing hands. What is the reason you think this verse is talking about the Messiah? How does any verse in the Bible prove god? How do we know what Jesus said about anything? How do we know the Gospels are true? Is it a problem that multiple manuscripts have contradictory statements? Is it possible that the writers of the gospels were familiar with these prior writings?
Icon from Canada had a message from god and has verified that nothing could have caused it other than chemicals. He has been unable to replicate the experience with more chemicals. What does it say to you that you did not get the same results from the first time? It is a beautiful thing when the honest answer is admitting that we just don’t know. There is some wacky brain stuff that happens! Is the original experience that you had actually connected to the real world?
Frank in GA wants the atheists to know they go to this place of outer darkness after death. There is this giant snake that circles the earth and we can hear the screams of atheists when the snake is opened. Why should anyone believe this is a real place? Why do we think that any part of the body survives death?
Zack in TX has proof of god which is the earth itself. How can we know the earth is a creation? Just because something is here, does not mean that it was created. How can we tell the difference between something that was created and something that was formed naturally? What is the criteria for one thing being designed and one thing not?
Evan in TX knows that semen to birth proves god. What would you say if you saw evidence that the earth is billions of years old? If your beliefs are immune to evidence, do you care about whether they are true? Is there a better way to determine if our beliefs are true than following the evidence?
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Talk Heathen 06.29 07-17-2022 with Johnny P. Angel and Katy Montgomerie Jul 17, 2022

Show notes

In today’s episode of Talk Heathen we have Johnny P. Angel joined by the one and only Katy Montgomerie who will ask callers questions to make them think in addition to giving us some fun facts about the animal kingdom.
Our first caller is Kyle in IL who argues that if there is no religion, we can end up having bad ideas, and productivity goes down. This is because his son made up a religion and has abandoned Christianity, and can’t make money doing that. What is the difference between a 15 year old making up a religion and anyone else doing so? How do you determine which religion is the right one? We are not convinced that religion has anything to do with productivity. Is it necessary for a society to have a supernatural goal in order to succeed?
Next is Ulrich in Mexico that wants to know how evolution results in being transgender.. Katy fires away with some examples in nature including an amazing crab fact. Often in meerkats, in order for the best survival of the genes, they need to work together. There are examples within the animal kingdom where the genes are not necessary to be passed on for survival. Gender identity is something that lots of animals have where the males and females act differently around each other. Some species often change sex such as clown fish. When this happens, the behavior changes happen first. 90% of all the sex that bonobos have is lesbian sex and this builds social bonds making them less likely to fight.
Patrick in Fl asks why pantheism is laughable. He is exploring the possibility that the universe could be considered conscious and that it comes down to faith. He claims that atheists state that god does not exist. Just because we agree that the universe may have come from something, it does not mean that we believe in your god. Is there another reason we should believe other than faith? If a god exists, that god would know what it takes to convince us of that god’s existence. If your god is a natural god, then you should be able to use science to prove it. Why do you believe that the universe is god if we do not have evidence for it?
Joe from PA claims that the earth did not just come out of nowhere and there has to be a god. We could have three possible world views, one is god created the earth, another is that a spell was cast a day before you were born by a wizard named Gary, and a third is that planets collided. Of these possibilities, how do you go about determining the right one? Why does a child being born make you think that god exists? Why did god create humans where we need air to breathe?
Last caller is Alok from CA that wants to know if being LGBTQ is a choice. All human behavior is a mixture of nature and nurture. In this case it is largely nature. There is evidence in every culture and all throughout history. We have evidence that conversion therapy does not work. If it was a choice, then they should be allowed to choose that.
That is all for today heathens, thank you for tuning in and always stay safe!
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Talk Heathen 06.28 07-10-2022 with ObjectivelyDan and Johnny P. Angel Jul 10, 2022

Show notes

Today we have ObjectivelyDan joined by Johnny P. Angel who will work through topics of ontology, AI, binary systems, and 911 conspiracies.
First caller is Noah in OK wants to know what the world would be like without religion and how to create change to prevent theocracy. We would have different kinds of magical thinking but we would not have dogmatic religious branded thinking. People would not be able to tell fairy tale stories that justify not liking other people. Get out there, vote, call representatives, vote with your dollar, get engaged, search what you can do to push back, give your creativity and get moving in a constructive way.
Xeno in South Korea is next who wants to talk about ontology where an entity has to depend on another entity and therefore everything is divisible and has an origin point which is god. This is an oversimplification of what we know of the universe. When you use the word, “god” as the origin, you are sneaking in other qualities that are not within the definition. Why can’t this be called physics? Why would there not be a bigger origin point than god? If god has things that make him contingent on something else, then he is not the origin.
Dean in CA is next, who is a creator of AI and argues that religion could be a factor in the creation of Artificial Intelligence(AI) and that some AIs have religious views now. Advanced chatbots will just say what you want to hear while religious algorithms can end up pushing people in certain directions. If we design an AI, do we program it with assumptions that god is not real? Think about what choices you make when programming and why.
Alok in CA does not agree with the binary system of being convinced, and would rather attribute a percentage to his level of belief. If you are not sure, the classic label is agnostic. Some use belief scales to determine the strength of the belief. Just because we are not convinced that Thor exists, does not mean that Thor does not exist. Discovering the reason behind this belief is much more important than the label. Rather than alienating people who are not hardcore anti-theists we need to find the common goals we have in common.
Marcia in NC is a 911 Truther and is questioning why certain key people were out of touch or new to the job when this happened. It is not an unnatural inclination to be skeptical of the events that occurred that day, however many of these claims are truly bananas. That does not mean there were no mistakes made within the chain of command. This is an excellent call for Truth Wanted.
Gabe in KY is the final caller who argues that if we just snapped our fingers and got rid of religion, we would eventually be seeing the same problems. We agree, and human beings want to find ways to have magical thinking. If we teach people how to teach skeptically, religion will start to evaporate. Religion is a front of where social war is taking place.
Thank you for tuning in! Please thank essential workers in all areas. We will see you next week!
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