what do you think I'll start streaming now yeah yeah you can I mean I'm ready I'm just I'm doing my own you're good I'm just emailing or messaging this link to somebody okay so you might be able to find the stream because we are live I'm here with Ryan Ryan how you doing good how are you sorry live we're live you can find the stream even now uh if you want to find it and share it or whatever you want it to do oh I share I shared that with them um yeah so let's find it I'm not sure how to point you to it just go to my channel and see if you can find it there it is okay it came up I just had to refresh oh perfect perfect perfect oh man that is that is cropped man my webcam sucks I hope I can get a new one anyway someone will send you one I'm sure hopefully so I like to uh I like to start just by asking the guests uh to tell a little bit about background so how are you raised do you have any religion in your life as a child absolutely so just just talk about the voyage up until today you said you're 29 years old so that's a lot of ground to cover but just give the highlights yeah so born and raised in Ohio nothing too exciting I um I was raised uh Christian I want to say if I remember the exact denomination Lutheran I believe it was a Lutheran Church um my grandma was hyper religious um I literally have five boxes of Bibles from her all written in with her own notes and things hidden inside and all kinds of stuff so very very religious background but I was kicked out of Sunday school at six years old and then eventually kicked out of the church we went to mostly for kind of being a smart alec I'm not sure if I can cuss on here at all but I'll try not to um and also for asking too many questions and then yeah and I would I wouldn't say I've I wouldn't even now call myself atheist um I'm not saying that I believe there is a God I'm also not saying I believe there isn't I just it in my world view it doesn't really matter um I've always been under the premise that if there is a God or if the universe is God or whatever it doesn't affect me I mean it's it's you know it's there or it isn't I'm gonna live my life either way and now if a religion is true that could obviously affect things but that's a whole other topic I don't conform to any one religion um I I'm not religious at all and yeah I'm just uh just kind of a regular dude we gotta I'm engaged got a kid climb cell towers for a living oh do you uh installing Hardware um anything from repairing installing building Towers taking them down just depends is there any truth to the 5G conspiracy theories well I can tell you this I spend an enormous amount of time right next to them and I'm perfectly fine well other than being an idiot but that's unrelated um no there's not it's the thing is the amount of power they give out is so minimal you can literally hug them while they're turned on and nothing's going to happen now there are microwave radios dishes whatever you want to call it up there that yes technically if you were to sit in front of one it you can kind of feel some warmth there is like there is things that will happen but at the end of the day it's just light that's all it is it's not when people say radiation that is technically true but it's not radiation as in like a nuclear power plant or an atomic bomb it's not the same thing it's just light it's just a form of light that we can't see that carries a signal there it's no different you have 5G if you have Wi-Fi you have it in your house at a much higher level and more directed and yeah it doesn't affect you just like the towers up and won't affect you either I grew up like in the 70s 80s and I remember accidentally putting some metal in the microwave and it would spark and I had to shut the microwave off today I don't know what happened but now I put metal bowls stainless steel Bowls in the microwave I put all kinds of metal in the microwave it doesn't it doesn't have any adverse effects do you know anything about what happened like was did they change the technology or so microwaves today are not as I wouldn't say not as powerful but they're built with a lot more safe precautions on them now if you take up bald tin foil or aluminum foil and put it in there you will still get that spark a stainless steel bowl is different it depends on the type of metal it depends on where it can Arc from there are things that will still Arcana sharp surfaces but at the end of the day a microwave literally all it does is agitate water molecules that's it it doesn't it doesn't it doesn't throw radiation at things it's just it makes water molecules go like this and Shake really fast and that's what heats up things and you'll obviously have water molecules in your body so if you were near that microwave you would feel the heat or potentially worse you know I always felt a little bit weird because all the conspiracy theorists say that it's not good to eat microwaved food but I I just love it I love the heat from the microwave food like I I blast the hell out of it and it's just my favorite thing with food and drink is that it's hot I like when it's hot so your friend Ian Chen official said hi oh what's up man wow you really jumped in quick I thought that's who I sent the link to Okay cool so uh would you be comfortable calling yourself a non-theist is that a good way of saying it yeah I mean I always to put a label on it is difficult for me I I try to I guess say I'm agnostic yeah because I always I just fall back to I have no idea I really don't but I also don't care that much I mean it's just I love talking about religion and God and everything I find it fascinating but at the end of the day as I said it just doesn't affect me it doesn't if there's a God out there it doesn't it's not gonna change how I view the world I care about me and mine and that's about it now like I said if there's a religion that's true then that's different that obviously could affect me yeah yeah I think everyone knows that I believe in God and that I believe there's one True Religion it's Catholicism so I don't need really need to say that it's just sort of like hey I'm saying more for the sake of God's you know just so I don't insult God by letting that slide past without sort of uh pointing out that I do believe in God and I do believe that there's one True Religion but um you know I was atheist for 25 years in my adult life and uh we're all on a journey and uh you know I don't judge anyone like you just deal you just deal with the facts that you have and you think about things in your own way in the middle of your busy life with your three-year-old child and your fiance so you're gonna you know to the extent that you love the truth and you seek the truth I think you'll find the truth would you say that you love the truth uh yeah but again I would say that you and I are to be more less specific I would say uh me and people who fall under you know a specific religion we find but truth means different things to us like when people say they find the truth in religion I get that I do but the problem is for me truth needs some kind of evidence it needs preferably proof but if not proof a great scientific theory and evidence will do just as well to where you know to me a book it just doesn't do it I mean a lot of people claim you know so just say the Bible not even going after one religion here just obviously that's going to be the most common thing we both understand it's supposed to be the word of God but it's at the end of the day it was written by people it's not I mean they you can they can claim that it was that they heard God or he told him or showed him whatever but it was still just written by dudes like you and me yeah I did a whole episode recently on the Bible how we don't have the Bible no one's ever seen the Bible because we don't have the autographs we don't have the actual writings of the the human authors um but nonetheless uh you know because I'm not a Bible I'm not a Bible Alone Christian I'm a Catholic so in the Catholic Church we're a little bit different from the other Christian communities because we have the authority we have God Almighty who you know in the Trinity the second person of the uh Holy Trinity incarnated took on flesh and came and he's part of history and he's fully godfully man and he had founded the Catholic Church instituted it and so uh his he gave authority to his church and so it's that infallibility that was imparted a partial infallibility that was imparted to the church that enables us to define the Canon of scripture and so on and so forth so it's quite a different take on religion that we have as Catholics over against uh all the different Christian communities because is we have that Authority we claim that infallibility whereas the other ones they'll just have individual members that say yes I have the Holy Spirit and the holy spirit's guiding me to interpret the Bible but um they wouldn't even have the Bible without the Catholic church and how are how are they interpreting infallibly with the Holy Spirit when they're disagreeing with their fellow Christians who also claim to be guided by the holy spirit in their infallible interpretation so it just doesn't make any sense and for me if Catholicism is false and it might be if Catholicism is false then all of Christianity is off the table for me I'm just I'm just gonna scrap the whole thing because the only the only religion that's philosophically tenable is Catholicism and all of the other forms of Christianity although they're very nice and they participate to some degree more or less in the truths of Catholicism they're missing essential parts so that's my perspective I just thought I'd share it with you since you don't really know me no and I dig that and also I got to give credit where credits do that just the fact that you're willing to say if it's false and it might be I mean that's that right there is a huge step for most the people I deal with I mean obviously I you know I deal with people like Ken hovind or Ken Ham or you know one of the a bunch of other I wouldn't call them I struggle to just say Christians because obviously most Christians don't hold the same values or views that they do most Christians don't fall under the taking the Bible literally but even if they do regardless a lot of people will not you know concede to that that it might be false and that's that's impressive I gotta give it to you uh did you talk with canham no no I have not talked with Ken Ham I have I've debated Kent Hoven twice um but no I've just covered Ken Ham and some videos okay okay yeah I know I'm just joking with him he should reach out to him might be fun um I have not honestly I didn't I not that I don't want to I would for sure I just didn't I I didn't think he's he does that kind of thing okay yeah probably not he's got a very different demeanor different energy I happen to like Kent hovind I think he's sort of a pain in the neck and he's just like I like him for the same reason I like Trump like he's just a yeah I I I he said that I find that interesting too like so where do you fall so obviously as you said you you fall under that you know young Earth creation belief yeah now how does it differ if it does from Kent hoban's belief I mean are you guys because obviously he's Christian I don't know what denomination he's Christian you're Catholic is there differences like do you guys disagree on anything oh yeah yeah if you listen to the commentary I did a commentary video on his interview and I go through some outlining and highlighting some of the differences he's a King James only God yes and he thinks that uh that's the perfect translation or whatever and it's uh it's just as I said in my recent video it's just impossible to know what the original writings actually are so the Protestant communities are in a quandary because they can't even Define the Canon without the Catholic Church Must much less say this is the perfect complete translation of of God's word so he's he and all Protestants are in a real quandary without the authority of the Catholic church but that's the most fundamental difference between myself and Kent hovind um but in terms of young Earth creationism I don't know exactly where we differ um probably I would be a little bit more skeptical than he is like he probably would be very confident saying this or that about the scientific uh record the fossil record and these sorts of things and carbon dating and all those sorts of things he probably has strong opinions whereas I don't I studied physics I worked in quantum physics and astrophysics and I really yeah so I know I know science I've worked in hard science um but I don't have the same approach that Kent Hoven has where he's excited about science I'm not excited about science I'm excited about philosophy that's why I went into physics thinking that I would learn about the nature of things in Ultimate Reality but it turned out to just be sort of uh the fast train to working in industry and technology which didn't excite me um so now I've been working in it and I ended up working in a construction company but um doing I.T in a construction company but um yeah when it comes to the Natural Sciences I see a hierarchy in The Sciences generally and the Natural Sciences play a pretty low uh ranking role in the hierarchy of the scientists I've got God number one God is knowledge God is wisdom God is that capital S science and then you've got theology uh and then you've got philosophy and the Natural Sciences underneath that and if you look at if you look at the Natural Sciences they start with axiomatic philosophical claims which cannot be tested they cannot be tested in the laboratory they cannot be tested they just have to be taken as axiomatic they're just assumptions that are reasonable and uh they're self-evident and so there are these philosophical underpinnings of the Natural Sciences and that's actually how I came to believe in God because I was an atheist for 25 years as an adult and through my study of uh physics and philosophy I came to understand that uh I am not God and that necessarily there is one and only one subsistent being and this necessary being is what everyone calls God so I don't want to bore you with my story but you can you can prod me no no it's not opportunities if you want to yeah I I am curious about well a few things but no it's definitely not boring I find it fascinating honestly like this mindset I find fascinating so let me first um so what do you just to try to find some common ground do you believe the universe is expanding as we observe it I don't really have an opinion I take your word for it if that's what the consensus is whatever sure well I mean at just to go back to where we discovered it kind of Edwin Hubble in 1927 you know seen that the stars and galaxies are getting farther away now if it's not expanding I guess I what what do you think is happening well you know I've seen I've I like I told you I'm not terribly interested in the science but I did look at both sides of the cosmological model that's predominating today uh and there are there is actually a Wolfgang Smith I think his name is he's a Catholic scientist and philosopher and he uh Works in astrophysics cosmology in particular and he's got um a different model than the mainstream model and uh you know I because I'm not terribly interested in the science the Natural Science side I can't really give a convincing argument or really take a firm stand one way or the other my usual answer is I just don't really care that much I don't care that much I'm not that interested in because my experience with natural science is that technology works like the technology we're using for this conversation it works and the science behind it is repeatable it's predictable and so I always laugh at the atheists who come at me about quantum physics being some magical mystical realm because it's not it's it's just science I mean it's 100 predictable and there are no violations to the principle of sufficient reason there's always a sufficient reason for everything that happens on the large scale the human scale and on the quantum scale it's always 100 reliable that's how that's how these devices work with quantum physics right so is the like just saying the universe expansion the expanding of the Universe um is it is it not reliable then is it not something that we can observe every day I don't know I honestly I haven't I haven't looked into it and I if that's not if that's the mainstream consensus I'm happy to accept that whatever uh you know redshift and all that sort of stuff in every direction you look you see the same redshifts therefore it's just expanding like uh the analogy that you usually used is like raisin bread loaf of raisin bread as the bread expands each raisin will see the same expansion from any perspective in any pick any reason and they'll all see the same expansion so that that is the uh the model that I grew up with uh that's the model that I learned at school uh at University and that's I think that's the the consensus essentially it's just it's just interesting because so we we know for sure I mean I and I would assume that you also I mean I know you're not that interested in it but would this would fall under that light has a speed limit essentially the speed of light is consistent within the universe that's coming under question now that is yeah well it it kind of is but at the same time it's it's not light I mean Light Within the vacuum of space moves at a there's a maximum speed to it and now there are we can view things that expand faster than light but that space itself expanding that's kind of where it goes back to the expansion but I guess I I get it though I I do I sympathize with not being that interested in it so let me what I would say just what I would say to sort of um comfort you is that I do love the Natural Sciences and I do love truth and everything that's true in the Natural Sciences I'm I'm excited and happy that scientists are doing that hard painful meticulous work and I've worked in the Natural Sciences it's very boring I find it very incredibly boring okay so I'm fair I'm happy that people are out there doing the grind and they're they're Gathering the data and drawing their conclusions and you know I'm very excited for the natural scientists to do their work but I'm just personally not that excited about but I do value the work and I do think people are seeking the truth and they're finding the truth and we're obviously improving with uh with things like technology and stuff like that but that's kind of the point I was making is that when it comes to technology that's where the rubber meets the road and uh we we know that we're making improvements uh and that we're using science to help technology get better but when it comes to things like Evolution Theory or cosmology and certainly multiverses and all this sort of thing there's a real overlap of uh philosophy and natural science which goes undetected by the by the sort of layman who's not a professional scientist you wouldn't necessarily notice where the philosophy comes in and it's sort of uh masquerading As Natural Science so what I often say is if you pick up a popular book on the new physics you're going to be all excited reading about it but you won't realize maybe that the percentage of Natural Science in that book is very low and it's mostly speculation it's mostly story time you know for adults that's basically what it is especially with Evolution evolution is one of the most philosophically untenable uh theories if you want to use that word that I've ever encountered it's now see I do and I I will I understand I do and I understand why people think that way the issue is so for me at least where it comes down to is we do have evidence for evolution we can stick with Evolution it's it's I mean there's I mean well for one you and I are amazing evidence for evolution for especially from where we started out our species and then go back to the species we originally came from I know we don't agree with that but the thing is like when it comes to religion and I guess even philosophy in a way we we don't have evidence I mean uh there's there's no there is no evidence for to for example to use just a general one that everyone will understand for you know Noah's flood that there's no evidence for that there's no evidence that a built a wooden ship could even be built that big and survive that kind of cataclysmic condition of a worldwide flood and there and I know the fossil record is zippy for people that believe that in this young Earth mindset which I understand but the thing is it's it's not I mean if there was a worldwide flood and of all the animals dinosaurs included and prehistoric you know pre-dinosaurs like single cell organisms they wouldn't there wouldn't be these layers that we find from what we consider oldest to newest or youngest and then they're also there wouldn't be you know bones and and remains of animals fossilized that have clearly been eaten and chewed on not on I mean there's there's just a lot of it that I struggle with yeah one thing I want to say is uh you know a lot of atheist and agnostics are obsessed with the evidence the mountains of evidence that seem to support evolution from their point of view okay but what you might not understand about me and my journey to God from atheism to theism monotheism and then from monotheism into Catholicism is a different story in and of itself okay but chapter one is going from atheism which included a lot of agnosticism into monotheism generic monotheism it's a philosophical journey and it has it actually does involve evidence but it's the negation of all the evidence it's the negation the philosophical negation of all the evidence what do I mean by that what I mean by that is the radical doubt applied to your sense perceptions your alleged sense apparatus how do you know that the real world is real how do you know that I am a separate being from you you don't have any scientific way of testing that much less proving that so this is where the philosophical journey to God began for me is doubting the other and the actual physical universe I was a hard solipsist I believed I was I was the god of Buddhism the one mind of Buddha I was a disembodied mind and the only mind and it was a very lonely place to be but that's hard solipsism that's where I was uh along the Journey of my philosophical studies that's where I ended up and then I because I had dismissed all of the evidence right like all the the fossil record and all that was completely off the table because I had no basis whatsoever uh scientifically or even philosophically to justify belief in my own sense perception so maybe uh respond to that how where are you on that journey of uh sense perception and reality now that that is fascinating because in a way I kind of will maybe not agree because I don't know exactly how you feel about it but that we are essentially all connected and part of one another I mean we all are made of the same thing that stars are made out of we're all made out of the same thing that everything is made out of essentially but how do you know there are other things how do you know there are other beings how do you know there's a material Universe how do you know that this hand of yours your hand is not just a figment of your imagination and and that's that is a fascinating thing to talk about it is now first before I go into it I am curious are you a fan of Alan Watts well it's a huge fan huge fan okay I figured as much because you you have the talking points are kind of the same in that not saying that you're you're like copying him or anything it's just he he falls under that same mindset in a way you know that that that questioning you know what is real and what's not real and I get that and I guess I can't I technically myself cannot you know prove to myself that me or you are real that you're a different being for me because I can't just like and before I say this please anyone watching please understand I am not a flat earther but the only thing I will concede the only point I believe they have is that if you have not been to space yourself fair enough you haven't seen the world for yourself you technically can't prove that it is one way or another yourself but obviously we can use all the evidence around and the actual pictures of the earth and everything and yes you could say oh it could be fake could be CGI whatever blah blah that doesn't matter so I do can see that I understand what you're saying that technically myself I cannot prove for example you're real other than I can prove that other people at least in my life are real and now I can't say I'm not imagining them I can't say that I'm not in some padded cell right now you know out of my mind on all the best of psychiatric drugs but what I you know just like anyone else I can use the evidence around me and what I assume is a physical world and and and I and I do I get that with that's that's I guess where the philosophical side of things do come in but that's that's also why I do have not an issue with philosophy it's just an issue with trying to tie philosophy in what you call Natural Science together because at the end of the day any any philosophy is basically just asking questions and doubting what you know we think we know which is fair you should you should doubt what you think we know you should question things but there does have to be a point at which questioning things is going to be more detrimental to the progression of humanity well have you ever have you ever have you ever played chess or you ever played any logic games or puzzles or anything like that where you use pure reason right it's like you can be laying in bed in a dark room and working on a chest problem or you could be working on an enigma or a you know one of these tricky puzzles uh in your head in your mind using your mind's eye to solve a logical problem you can do that a lot of people do that okay so uh this is called Pure reason and we have the light of reason and we can do reduction to absurdity tests where we eliminate all the possibilities but one and that one remaining option is necessarily true if our thinking is correct if our premises are correct and if our reasoning is proper in the conclusion follows then we can we can advance in knowledge and this is a large part of theoretical uh physics and other other Natural Sciences where they use pure reason without going into a laboratory there's lots there are lots and lots of examples of that my favorite example of that uh is actually proving that the acceleration due to gravity is constant you can use that you don't need a laboratory you can do it all with thought experiments okay so I want to um caution you against dismissing reason as being less valuable than the laboratory reason is I would argue more important because we can we can't do natural science and observational empirical science without the foundations provided by pure reason so I do have rationalistic Tendencies and it is Rene Descartes that brought me to God I have to admit he brought me out of my heart solipsism but um so I'm aware of my bias my bias is towards rationalism reason pure reason and I was actually an atheistic Satanist before my conversion to God and atheistic Satanism is a rationalistic religion it's a rationalistic view where reason is King and reason is God and not not to cut you off but I am curious how how could you be atheist and Satanist because atheistic Satanism is denies existence of both God and Satan and all that uh alleged fairy tale stuff and uh it focuses on the self self will self-determination and the elevation of reason so things like Natural Science are elevated in that in that worldview and uh things like uh it has sort of an existential component to it where you make your own reality you make your own meaning in life so it I don't know if you know about existential philosophy but that's basically the the Kohl's notes version of it like there is no meaning there is no value so we will import or create meaning and value just by the choices we make and the way we live our lives okay I just haven't heard that I was just I didn't for me it sounded like you you know you were you believed in Satan but that's why I was confused I understand no yeah yeah yeah it's a popular form it's very very popular uh world view today atheistic Satanism if you've heard about Anton LaVey or Aleister Crowley um these are Big names uh in atheistic Satanism probably Crowley may have actually come to believe in God and Satan I think later in life I'm not sure about that I would need to look into it but um yeah it's uh it's the elevation of uh one's own will and I want to ask you actually if you believe in Free Will and you believe in reason because this is what characterizes a human free will yeah you don't believe there's no such thing okay no no and don't let don't don't like I do have to give that a caveat of course it's I'm not saying that the universe is on a determined path or anything like that because the universe is basically chaos what I'm saying is people people assume that they have much more free will than you actually do your brain overrides a lot of your choices it and it your subconscious determines a lot of your decision making people think they make decisions and you you do kind of but really it's your subconscious doing it consciously there's no real free will I mean I'm not saying we can't make decisions I'm not even saying that you can't go against your subconscious or your instinct or whatever you can but for the most part your subconscious will determine a lot of what you do before you ever do I mean I think we have very little free will but it's significant it's significant it's significant it's very significant in my world view because it it basically tells you if you're going to go to heaven or hell like based on the choices you make even though there aren't that many that are that are truly free there are always constraints they're always restrictions but I want to ask you about your world view like your agnostic and whatever but is there any possibility of a difference between the best case scenario and the worst case scenario for you given the example that I've just given you about heaven and hell those are drastically after I die yeah just the outcome whatever that whatever that might be like what you might believe in multiverses and reincarnation I don't know what you believe but is there any difference when all the dust settles and you as an individual person and I as an individual person we can end up in different places how different are the different outcomes the possible differences between those outcomes is it a drastic One Like Heaven and Hell or is it just we're all going to be food for the worms and it's a complete it's exactly the same outcome for every person well exactly the same it's going to depend on how you die of course but no your energy the energy of your body essentially will transfer but your actual physical being won't now that being said of course I I don't know obviously I don't know if there's something after this I lean more towards there isn't just because I haven't seen any kind of reasonable evidence for the contrary um that being said if somebody was to show me some it still wouldn't change most likely how I live life it depends exactly if if there's 100 percent definite you know Catholicism is real heaven and hell 100 real then yeah maybe I'll try to be I guess better than I try to be now but at the same time I don't try to be good or bad based on what I think will happen after I die I mean like most people even religious people I try to be do good or bad depending on what is the moment at hand I mean my all my biggest thing is not living for you know a tomorrow you don't know will exist or not you know you live for right now because that's what matters is right now this conversation's real this is what matters anything beyond that that's just guessing mm-hmm yeah so um I have a question it's a little bit off topic but I'm wondering like because I always say to the atheist um easy and real quick feel free to I guess treat me I guess as an atheist because even though I do claim de facto even though I do claim I don't know if I had to choose if I had to pick theism or atheism I would definitely go for atheism just because I see no evidence for theism but beyond that I still stick in the middle but either way feel free definitely you're you're 100 definitely a de facto atheist okay or what we call a practical atheist and if you become a monotheist you're going to be shouting it from the roof rooftops and everyone's gonna know and you're going to be annoying the hell out of everyone because you're gonna be so happy to be a monotheist um that that that's always the case um there are people that go through that experience by the way and then they go back to their atheism I don't know how that happens but uh there's one guy he's got a popular YouTube channel um Nathan Ormond I had him on as a Christian and then he went back to being an atheist Nathan Ormond Ormond what's his name of he doesn't his handle is something catchy uh something philosophical or something anyway you can look him up um but I wanted to ask you about your identity because you know you probably see yourself and me and everything around us as different configurations of this matter energy stuff in this universe and so I'm just wondering what makes you you what makes me me from your perspective if we're just uh a configuration of matter energy and space time basically and how does your identity persist even though you started out as a single cell zygote in your mother's womb hopefully I hope that's how you started and you'll end up old and gray hopefully you know there are no you don't know if tomorrow is going to be given to you but like you said but hopefully you'll get old and gray if that's God's will for you um but how do you maintain your Eunice or your identity in this whole big Journey from single cell up until today you've got like trillions of cells right yeah um well for one no I was actually created in a test tube very unique and I'll probably die within 10 years if all goes to plan but anyway um so the identity thing I feel most people put a lot of stock into being unique or being themselves and the thing is like you don't have a choice no but as much as we are the same as much as we are all human beings all created from the same basic you know materials if you will were vastly different for many different reasons I mean we have of course our you know upbringing or our you know surroundings that change us and then we have our minds which are the most important differentiators between us it's your the brains are Beyond complicated I mean they're essentially just an entanglement of connections that one little thing out of place or put into a different way can lead to a change that is unmeasurable essentially but at the same time even though I say that there are people that will have vastly different upbringings and obviously different bodies but are still very similar and there are people that'll have very similar upbringings twins if you will that are you know they're raised in the same home raised by the same people brought up essentially the same even down to the DNA level almost the same but they're very different I mean that's the thing that I just don't it's not that I don't think it's important it's just it's a it's a topic of trying to how do I put it in a more I guess easier to explain way it's it's like trying to determine the difference between you know have you ever watched the office oh yeah I love it all right so you know that scene where uh Pam gives two identical pictures to Creed and says you know corporate wants you to find the differences between these pictures those pictures are obviously the same but they're not the same technically they're two different pieces of paper just that one being printed in the next one means that second one has ever so slightly less ink than the first one potentially depending on how the printer is and the technology behind it but that's not the point it's that thing that even though we can look at ourselves as as same as you want or as different as we want it it doesn't matter because we all are different and we all are very similar it's it's kind of it's just it's tomato Tomatoes I mean it's there's no there are endless differences between us and there's endless similarities between us right but let's pretend you're the only being in the universe and you always have been it's still the case that you are changing your your configurational matter energy and space time is constantly changing so it brings to mind the philosophical conundrum of the ship you take a wooden ship and you replace one plank of wood and then it's still the same ship and then you replace the next plank of wood and it's still the same ship and you keep going until every single scrap of wood in this boat has been replaced and it's still the same ship that's you okay that's what you are you're just constantly changing so what is the Eunice what is it that makes you why are you still you even though you keep changing you keep swapping out all your your matter energy if if that's all you are is a certain con set of configurations of matter energy and space time then I mean you would have to concede you would have to admit that I can make another you just by making that Arrangement no absolutely not because that's that's that was my kind of point there that even though that part is true you're that part's not that's not all we are we are our upbringing we are our environment and we also more importantly are our mind and our minds are an endless entanglement of just information and to say that you could carbon copy me you might be able to physically but you could never carbon copy me and then bring it up in the same exact way that I was brought up it's not possible anymore because I'm here now if I look at you right now we take a snapshot of you right now if we had the technology to get the exact configuration of matter energy including all the spin up spin downspin of every Quirk and everything else all your neurons how they're firing how they're in the middle of firing or about to fire or just fired or whatever we have all of that and we just reproduce it would you admit that that's you with and that is you with all your current background in history and that's where that's where I disagree is that you couldn't have me with my background is there some non-tangible thing or is it all just configuration yeah well the untangible part of it is your environment your upbringing that's that's your life experiences today how is that stored it's stored in your brain it it is okay so I reproduced that when I reproduce your brain I reproduce that you can reproduce you can reproduce what's in my brain but you can't reproduce the experiences that a brain went through you can reproduce why not the memories but again you have to remember that memories are also nonsense I mean they're all interpreted and they change as life goes on but you can't you can't take something today and bring it up with the same experiences that I've had in the past because the past has already happened I know but your state right now your state your state of mind you the state of your brain that is containing all your life experience all your memories right and you're claiming I think falsely and erroneously foolishly that that's just a material configuration about our energy and space time and you call it a brain and a nervous system and a memory memory banks and all these sorts of things but you know you seem to want to hold on to some mystical magical non-physical realm or component of your being uh Which flies in the face of or contradicts at least your simultaneous claim that you are nothing but a particular configuration of matter energy and space-time it I I unders I do understand what you're getting at I do I I'm more being you know difficult a little pedantic but no I do get it it's just I don't think it's mystical or magical it's just experiences a non-physical thing that you can't necessarily reproduce I do compre I do understand that it is all stored in the brain but it's just it's the thing is the brain okay I and I I don't why wouldn't you just admit that you have a soul and immaterial soul as my religion teaches wouldn't it just be we'll see that I can't admit because I have no evidence for it at all you do your memories your experiences are irreproducible and you continue to be you even though you were started as a single cell and you went through baby and child well even even though memories and experiences are in my opinion you're not reproducible it's it's the thing that I don't consider that necessarily being a soul it's just that's I mean that's time that's something that's happened in the past and you can't recreate something that's happened in the past because it was in the past but I mean I get what you're saying if if we had the technology to perfectly carbon copy every single memory and life experience I've had then technically yes you would I guess have a carbon copy of me now what what I say it's different to me I would still say that yes it's different than me simply because the moment it comes to existence our life experiences are on different paths now I mean even if you keep them as parallel and similar as possible they're still different and so that that will change and we might now in that very moment yes we might be exactly the same but there's I still don't I cannot concede to a soul without you know some kind of evidence of one well if I were to just go with a thought experiment if I were to hit pause on time so time stops and I replace each and every elementary particle that's part of your body each and every one is gets replaced with an identical one but a different one so an electron is an electron is an electron maybe you're not particularly attached to your electrons right can we swap them out or is it going to change who you are like this is the this is the basic idea so I'm not going to clone you I'm just going to hit pause and I'm going to replace each and every material part of you with the exact same component but a one from over here not from and I'm going to swap it out so do you think that would change you well I mean for one I think it would for sure because you can't you know recreate every little part of little little particle I mean the moment you create a new one it's automatically different I mean it's not but at the same time just you know with the thought experience yes if you were to recreate everything perfectly you know if that was even feasible then technically we would be you know the same we would be two identical copies of myself I mean that that I will concede I the thing is like that I guess that's I don't know see the soul thing bugs me because now well let me ask first do you believe humans are the only living creatures with Souls no or okay so animals then have souls too yeah now where does that stop do insects have souls yes insects are animals no and that's fair that's why I'm just wondering plants yeah yeah of course okay so plants have souls so now what I'm curious about do you believe we're the only form of life in the universe of course not you just know you just mentioned animals and insects and plants they're all alive the difference no I know but I mean other than planet Earth the the difference I just want to specify the difference with the human what makes the human a unique animal is that we are endowed with Free Will and reasons where reason whereas the beasts don't have free will and reason okay that's the Catholic teaching and that's the philosophical understanding what are the beasts non-human animals so okay so humans are animals though like you do that's fine okay thank you as not everyone believes that I mean in terms of uh life in our space I don't believe in that there's any life on other planets no really so no life on any other planet so now for a thought experiment sure if we do find life on other planets does it have a soul yeah of course of course so then why then wouldn't that how does that not kind of I guess contradict what the Bible teaches hold on no I I misunderstood your question so I will qualify my answer by saying there might be life out there but not human life that's we won't find well that's and we won't find rational and free animals like AKA humans on other planets are there plants on other planets out there sure why not are there like beasts or whatever non-human animals out there maybe well no and that's fine but again we were going I just want to stick with the soul part of it because you did say animals do have souls yeah so that's so these other beings regardless of how intelligent or unintelligent or Advanced they are yeah I mean not saying they're humans or whatever even human-like if they want to be or just a simple piece of grass yeah so wouldn't the existence of that being out there and that having a soul like how does that not go against what the Bible teaches that's what I don't understand because you to Merit heaven or hell you need to have a rational Soul that's endowed with free will to be able to have morality to have responsibility we need to have free will we need to be able to choose freely at least sometimes right and see that's interesting to me too is the morality part yeah is is your claim and I know this is going off topic but I just I I do find that super fascinating is your claim that morality cannot exist without religion no of course not I mean you have morality because you live in a universe from my perspective that is a religious Universe it's a Godly Universe it's a religion it's a it's a universe made by God and sustained by so do animals have morality no the Beast no so then why do why do animals especially something Advanced somewhat Advanced like say you know ape like animals chimpanzees whatever why do they have social structures why do they have you know clear visible signs of guilt and well they have Instinct they have Instinct and like you said and we agreed early on in this interview we both agreed that we don't have a lot of free will you think it's zero I think it's non-zero but I don't think it's zero no no I was just saying like I like I said I believe we can override our instinct or subconscious but I also believe that animals can as well yeah because there's Instinct versus free will like there's an instinct that humans have I'm sure you've witnessed it I'm sure you've witnessed it in yourself and Instinct and you mentioned it actually psychologically when they've done those studies when you think consciously you think you've made a choice but it was made before you were conscious of the choice so uh I'm sure you're aware of these instincts that we have and the animals have that and it's very touching and beautiful to watch because God is the author of all creation including a puppy dog or a kitten or a giraffe or whatever and these are beautiful creatures and they they show us the beauty of God and they care for their young and they like food and they like sex and they like all the things we like but as humans we need to rise above the beastly pleasure seeking and reflect on life and reflect on our creator and that's what makes us different from the animals but the animals are beautiful and they have souls but they don't Merit heaven or hell I mean they'll all be in heaven heaven if that's what God wants so if you have a pet and you're worried about not seeing it in heaven don't worry God can put it there no problem because it can't hell definitely not worried about that um um but what I was what I guess I was curious about now is so take a dog for example sure now the claim that a dog you know doesn't see a God is fair no no no no I think the the animals are aware of God they're aware of God yeah but not in a self-reflective way there's uh there are many passages in the Bible that talks about all of creation being aware of God including the rocks and the trees and the the animals the lower animals the Rocks yeah what do you mean the rocks there's it's part of God's creation so there's there there's not an awareness like you and I have an awareness but there's I mean this may be poetic language in the Bible when it talks about the everything in creation acknowledging God and to a certain extent uh giving glory to God and so it it may well be poetic language but I'm sure I'm sure that the relationship between for example a domestic animal like a dog and God I'm sure there's a relationship there I'm sure there's a relationship there because God um cares like it says in the Bible in the New Testament that God cares about the little bird that drops dead from the sky and if he cares about the little bird obviously he cares about humans who are infinitely more valuable than a bird right but God does love why why are humans more valuable than a bird or more Godlike we have free will and reason we're made in the image and likeness of God which means that we have free will and reason that's what it means to be made in the image and likeness of God see that's I mean that's definitely somewhere where something we're going to differ on is I do not consider humans above any other life form on the planet of course I mean simply because for one I mean look at what we've done to the planet but not even that I mean we wouldn't exist without the other life forms our ecosystem would collapse completely yeah so I can't say we're more important if anything we're very detrimental to the planet but even if we aren't even if we figure out a way to not kill off the planet as we're trying to it seems we're still we need the other life forms of course they're very important of course anything if anything if anything more important I mean like I said without them our our Endeavor to kill off this planet would happen even faster yeah that's why there's a Christian ecology uh where we have stewardship over God's creation and we're not supposed to obviously pollute and we we want clean water clean air we want to we don't want to be poisoning the village down the river right that's not Christian so there's a Christian ecology which is not being respected by I would say 99.99 of big business period And if you interview the CEO and they say yes I'm Christian I go to church every week okay well you got some improvements to make right because well I would say I would I would caveat caveat that with just by 99.99 of people I mean all of us we we don't respect or care for the world or the life that's in it yeah yeah that's true I mean just the simple fact that we're having a conversation on these computers is great evidence of that but what I I guess I I'm a little more I want to kind of jump over a little bit to it pertains to Life Is So as a young Earth creationist you believe that Noah's flood happened about 4 000 years ago yes something like that so how does that how does that work because I mean I asked coven and he just you know he'd get scallops around and avoids questions but you answer questions and I truly appreciate this because this is fascinating to me I mean it really is and feel free to always if I ever ask something I mean interrupt and go to another question if you need to I don't care and even in the after an explanation but like so how do we have life forms plants trees um that are older than that that doesn't make sense to me I don't know I mean uh you would need to convince me first of all of the you know the secular mainstream scientific point of view like hey this tree is 10 000 years old like I believe the whole universe is less than ten thousand years old so uh if you wanted to show me like scientific evidence that this tree is 20 000 years old or whatever this turtle is I don't know how I don't know what's the oldest living thing we have like maybe it's a tree well there's there are trees that are you know definitely over 4 000 years old um and that that was because I mean if it was under a worldwide flood it would not be alive anymore and there's there's definitely civilizations older than 10 000 years um and not only that if we want to go to space there's you know stars that are farther than ten thousand light years away yeah which I haven't I haven't been convinced of any civilization older than uh seven thousand years I'm not convinced of that and well doesn't that already doesn't that in itself disprove it I mean because the world's only supposed to be 6 000 years old no no I it's I don't know six seven thousand whatever it is I mean whatever it is I don't I don't have evidence of civilizations older than six or seven thousand years old I don't I don't I have not been convinced and I've seen a lot of Pop presentations about this I'm not it's not my wheelhouse so I don't really no I haven't looked into it too deeply if you have like really astonishing evidence of old civilizations you can certainly send it to me and I'll take a look at it I am open-minded but um you know I've seen a lot of the stupid History Channel nonsense about uh ancient civilizations and all this sort of thing and they always stop short uh you know six thousand seven thousand years it's always around that ballpark that's as far back as they go and then there's speculation about earlier stuff but [Music] um yeah in terms of the Starlight or whatever doesn't bother me like just like Adam was created full grown and the wine at Cana like Jesus turned the water into wine the wine looked like it had matured like the grapes grew up and then they were fermented and there was that process that took time right but no it was created right there and then by God Almighty the God man Jesus Christ and it just looked like it had a history so uh it's interesting there were six jugs of wine to to reflect the six days of creation see I guess that's where I struggle with it too is that anytime I have to go or you have to go into the past and invoke some kind of Miracle such as you know creating wine or creating a human fully formed that's that's where I completely lose it it's just there's there's no science there at all I mean it's just not just the science well what I mean this is the problem with the the naturalist point of view is like why is there something rather than nothing where did everything come from like if you believe in the big bang for example which I don't obviously if you believe in the Big Bang and that is coming under scrutiny now too um in the mainstream Community if you believe in the big bang you would have to ask yourself scientific explanation for the singularity right well yes and we try to you know figure that out but we don't know exactly there's a there is a scientific theory behind it that you know everything did come from a singularity but as a as Carl Sagan pointed out what if it didn't what if everything was just here already yeah it wouldn't change what we see and observe today there is the problem there is that little problem of entropy right the second law of Thermodynamics like you we know there's well that's the thing though I mean under under your world view that wouldn't matter yeah under my worldview none of the science really matters at all none of it matters see and that that's that's where I just I do struggle because it's like it's we use science to figure out the world and to me see I guess I've always followed Fallen under this that we obviously we don't know exactly yeah you know what the big bang was or is or even if it is a thing we have a lot of evidence we have a lot of theories scientific theories to explain it but we don't know 100 and we definitely have basically no idea what was before the Big Bang we you know once again theories of course and so for me if there is a God or a god-like being it would make way more sense that he or it simply kick-started the Big Bang it kick-started the universe and then let everything happen yeah naturalistically if you will because the problem is once you invoke these Miracles then all of science crumbles and we have no way to explain how we're here today or where we came from or no no but go create anything God created nature to be natural and he was not frustrated in his desire but he didn't he definitely didn't under your world view because if if he created to be natural then the world would not be 6 000 years old all animal because as at least as far as we understand natural that that's not that's none of that's true then that's where I struggle you know you know a lot of uh Catholics especially believe in the Big Bang and God just kicked it off and he made Evolution happen and all this sort of thing it's completely philosophically untenable it's a it's a real compromise that these Catholics have made to the secular scientific Community because they want to fit in they don't want to be like looked at like they're Kook right they don't they want to fit in they want to be normal they want to be like well see fit in I I struggle with that word because in my opinion it's the fact that they're willing to admit that their interpretation or literal interpretation of the Bible was wrong and that's the biggest thing that and science they do that they're happy to be wrong being wrong is celebrated to whereas a fundamentalist like a literal interpreter of the Bible not only doesn't want to be wrong they essentially think they can't be well for the most part and that's that's where I struggle with because being wrong is great I mean that's how we learn yeah my Christianity is a faith-based set of beliefs so there's a whole bunch of beliefs that are faith-based I could be wrong okay but my monotheism is what you need to understand my monotheism is not faith-based it's based on reason and uh philosophically you can be a philosophical monotheist which I was after my conversion uh because I hated Christianity so I didn't want to be a Christian and it took me a while to come around um but my conversion was a philosophical conversion and I had uh used applied radical doubt to absolutely everything all the evidence that you keep talking about all of that evidence was thrown out because I could not trust my sense perceptions I had no basis for trusting my son's perceptions until I found uh that I'm not God that God is God so once I had uh established monotheism then of course I was able to accept God's creation and all the science and science is good as I said earlier in this interview science is very good and science does matter uh to the extent that it glorifies God and that we use it in a Godly way but science doesn't matter uh nearly as much right in the same way as the Godless scientists think it matters because what's first and foremost obviously is uh to know God to love God and to serve God in this life so we can be happy with him in in the next life but science just like everything else in life is important ironing your clothes is important brushing your teeth is important all these things are important you know drinking enough water like all these things everything about life this natural life that we live here is important but we have to realize there's a supernatural component to our life as well I hope you'll come back I hate to end the conversation I really do hate it but as I told you about the Soiree that's hooked up and it's um a bunch of anti-vaxxers we get together once in a while so we're gonna go complain about the government fair enough so it was definitely interesting will you come back and talk to me and we'll uh dig deeper into philosophy metaphysics and uh yeah just uh you know shoot me name all anytime I'm pretty much always free so excellent I really appreciate it and very nice to meet you I do apologize for uh ending no no it's okay I had a great time it was interesting and we have now you know me a little bit better you can think of some questions uh to dig a little bit deeper next time we talk and uh maybe uh during the Christmas holidays or something like that I've got two weeks off so my schedule is more open so uh we'll see how it goes but please take care and it's a real pleasure to meet you you're a very nice uh young man and uh as I mentioned you look like a famous actor what was his name Nicholas Cage so I really appreciate meeting you and it was a pleasure talking with you and we'll do it it was a pleasure as well thank you for having me on take good care my friend you too bye