hey there welcome to the atheist experience uh your name is david is that correct yeah it's david from montreal i called in in 2017 so it's been a while oh yeah certainly has all right i'll just go ahead and put canada all right and uh david how do you consider yourself to be a believer or an atheist believer i'm uh catholic and last time i was on the show in 2017 i asked permission and i got permission to host the uh call on my actual youtube channel and my website and everything and you were kind enough to do that so can i do that again if i record the call can i put it on my thing like i did last time uh now let me go ahead and ask that real quick thank you all right you are getting the go ahead thank you very much that is fine i'm okay before we move on can i get your uh preferred pronouns he she oh sorry sorry uh i'm sorry i'm a guy so uh he him or whatever i don't know just all right yeah i was gonna find that a little surprising the old-fashioned just treat me like an old-fashioned guy and you'll be all right works for me uh little notes i got here the principle of causality reduction out absurd improve the existence of the uncascaded first cause god yeah the unconscious yes sorry about that um all right any other thoughts you want to add to that uh yeah i i don't want to talk about any of my faith-based beliefs i only want to talk philosophy and principle of causality uncaused first cause we don't even need to mention god but last time i called i talked about the principle of sufficient reason and he started saying yeah but what about the virgin birth and what about the you know incarnation and i'm like i don't want to talk about that i want to talk about philosophical principles so i hope we can stick to philosophy this time yeah well you know matt's not on the show this week right oh you're kidding who is it it is secular rarity and apostate profit okay i don't know them but i i mean i don't know anything i haven't watched your show regularly or anything so uh those are two guys well we both know that's not true but okay do you do you watch the show all the time no i don't watch the show i called in once in 2017 and i haven't watched it since um okay we'll go if you want to why would you do that why would you doubt that because i've screened your calls many times anyway you think i'm canadian catholic that's a different guy i've had him on my podcast oh yeah i had him on my podcast my name is david ross i live in montreal canadian catholic lives in ontario i think okay um and i don't sound anything like him my voice is completely different i actually do sound a little bit like him but um all right well anyway i'm gonna go ahead and put you into the call q and uh hopefully you get on the show and have a good time okay thank you very much appreciate it we have uh david he him from canada once who wants to talk about the principle of uh causality uh hello david how are you doing hey nice to uh nice to hear your voice i can't see you but nice to meet you nice to meet you too so what is it that you want to talk about well uh first of all do you believe in the uncaused first cause have you understood that that is necessary so i mean if you're if you're going if you're going to this whole necessary contingent facts uh type argument right um which the principle of causality i mean i'll just be honest is not something that i've spent a whole bunch of time in um but the idea of the idea of a necessary being you know that there was something that started it all i'm not really i i don't really find that to be super valuable when talking about uh god and stuff because it just kind of seems like it's something that we can never really demonstrate right um we do have some valid arguments well hang on hang on david i was i was in the middle of a sentence and it is terribly rude to cut people off it's okay uh but the the the point is that i i don't know that we can ever get past the the um soundness aspect of that stuff right we can show that logically speaking sure we can get some some well-structured arguments but when it comes to actually giving us a demonstration that that we can point to you know um to show that it is true in reality i i don't i don't know that it's terribly valuable i know that there are a handful of people that like it though so yeah i would very much uh agree with parts of that and also say um i mean i mean you could go and argue for um you know the you can argue that there is a necessary being from which all um you know contingent beings uh you know come for come forth or upon which they depend but it is um it takes a lot of speculation and discussion to go into what exactly that is uh if there's if there's just more than one if there is uh you know if there is a if there is a line or a chain of uh such beings and where it leads and all that and it will all rely on um further factors in order for you to point at a god who is that ultimate necessary being it always depends on the person and what they want to argue how where they are going to go with this with this argument but uh david go ahead yeah so i want to use a reduction to absurdity proof um basically we'll assume that there's not an uncaused first cause and the whole question of god and all his pure perfections that's that's a stage two okay we won't even cover that today but i just want to establish that we can know with certainty that there is one and only one uncaused first cause and i'll use a reduction to absurdity proof to do that so we'll assume there is no uncaused first call and you can interrupt me at any time okay um well just real quick and real quick then david because to be honest i think kind of one of the things that ap and i were just saying a second ago was that um let's just give you let's just give you the ball game man okay you won there's an uncaused first cause let's go to the actually showing that it's a god and your specific one we have non-religious arguments that accept the idea of a necessary being and it never takes us to god and we have ones that are religious it sounds like you have a religious one and you have a specific god so let's just say for the sake of the call like ap and i accept it there's a necessary being there's an uncaused first cause yeah how do we get to god from there i think that's what's interesting let's grant that there is another thing and okay great that was easy so uh is that necessary is that necessary being that uncaused first cause is it natural or not i'm asking you i don't even know what that means yeah i don't know is it natural is it natural i don't know anything i don't know anything that is not natural i i would just simply say we don't have a reason to accept anything other than the concept of natural things okay i don't know what non-natural things are right you don't want me to prove you don't want me to prove there's none cause first cause you just want to grant it for the sake of argument okay so do you want to grant this first call or not huh what david here here's the thing you're asking us questions in order to you know find um you know find your introduction to absurdity it's a reduction i can do both cases there are only two cases either they're natural or that's not naturally that's not necessarily the uh that's not necessarily how the reduction of absurdity uh is is necessarily formed you haven't even heard my argument what we're doing is what we are doing i understand that what we are doing here is we are granting that there might be a necessary being depending on how you want to define it or find it now please go ahead and uh you know i'm doing now i'm doing a reduction to absurdity now that you're taking it now that you've granted that there is a first cause an uncaused first cause i'm going to do another a different reduction to absurdity so let's say that you for whatever reason want to say that it might be natural so let's consider that case because there are only two cases either it's natural or not the ex the principle of the excluded middle tells us there's no third option so it's either natural or not so let's take the case where it's natural that if it's natural then it is space geotemporal right you agree with that only if we're saying only if we're saying that the sum total of what we mean by natural necessarily implies space and time and that may not be the case right it may be the case that there are other there are other types of existences out there than the local presentation of our universe exactly we don't we don't have anything concrete to accept that over the natural explanation that we already have um but but just categorically ruling ruling out other possibilities doesn't it doesn't seem warranted to me i'm not that makes sense i'm not forcing your hand here we can explore both avenues there are only two avenues right either it's natural or it's supernatural i'm presuming assuming perhaps well it's not natural or supernatural it'd be natural or not natural right that was it that was the true dichotomy you set up the second true dichotomy natural or not natural and what i'm saying is that the supernatural is not natural and it's above super super means above it's above the natural meaning that the uncaused first cause the necessary being is necessarily not natural and it is the source of the natural therefore we say it's above the natural you could also say it's beneath or more fundamental than the natural it doesn't really matter what the point is it's logically prior to the natural not temporarily prior it's logically prior to the natural and that's uh so we can we can go down this rabbit hole with the natural vision what that there is a is that there is a necessary being an originator from which everything originates so uh everything is a product of that the entire discussion about natural or unnatural can be reduced into that and it's completely pointless so if you want to go ahead with that please go ahead yeah well i don't understand what's pointless about trying to determine because either there's a first cause or not and either it's natural or not and with these two reduction to absurdity proofs we can know that there is one and only one supernatural or as you would say not natural that's fine by me not natural first cause and that's what everyone calls god so uh if you want to grant both of you i just think by establishing don't you think that by granting a necessary being as you want to define it we have already solved that problem long ago why are we still going through this yeah and you can just take us to your particular version of god that this proves because i i've had this exact same discussion with um muslim apologists with into apologists so well i mean you say that but they would disagree with you so they would be hardcore against whatever god you're you're positing i'm almost confident yet everyone everyone got everyone who believes in the uncaused first cause agrees 100 that we worship the one and the same god every all of us agree really every single one of you agree on that when you guys communicate that's a fascinating group chat i have to admit five no no uh look again i i think david david hang on hang on david i think what ap and i are trying to do what we're trying to say with this argument is that okay i guess we could argue forever on what that you know you know go back and forth on is there a necessary being first cause on cause yada hoda blah we could but for us it seems more interesting to actually try to get to the god and and so far we haven't we don't have any reason to go from okay there was a first cause to that first cause as god give us that connecting piece there that we're missing yeah i mean i don't want to burn in hell forever i i absolutely don't i am sure ap doesn't either uh please help us so that we we don't suffer that faith i appreciate you your humility there you're not far from the kingdom as jesus said so um oh good thing unless you're just being sarcastic when you said you don't want to go to hell but it is a horrible place you want me to talk about uh why the uncaused first god uh excuse me the uncaused first cause is god you want me to talk about that how i know that it's god yeah well have you heard of the principle of proportionate causality you ever heard about that no explain it to us give us give us uh give us a talk to me like i'm five moments and talk to us like we're five and explain it to us and show us how you know what i find so tiring about these conversations david it it looks like it always goes by a specific uh script that wants to uh you know spend so much time on so many abstract things instead of just making a point do you feel like always i feel like both secular rarity and i apostate profit as we are uh known i think both of us we just want to sit here and listen to the argument why do you believe that this necessary being is god instead of going through a very long script off do you know this do you know that and there's always so there's there are very few principles they're very few axiomatic principles of the natural sciences do you boys like natural science it's a yeah honestly whatever gets you to whatever gets you to show enough of god quicker the natural sciences you boys probably think science science science trusts the science right so the natural sciences are built on axiomatic metaphysical principles such as the principle of causality the principle of proportionate causality which says you can't give what you don't have everything every perfection that's in the effect is more perfectly in the cause okay and there are other principles like the principle of sufficient reason the reason i called today i thought uh matt would be the matt dillahunty because i phoned him in 2017 and we discussed the principle of sufficient reason i thought it was time to give them a call back but i didn't know it wasn't going to be there but uh maybe that's why you're not uh as prepared for the philosophical principles but these are axiomatic underlying that underlie the natural sciences we can't do natural science without these hands just a handful of principles david to me it sounds like in the time that that myself and ap were so generously giving to you yeah to try and get us to understand your god it sounds like you didn't give us anything and instead you just said that we we didn't know enough about philosophy which i'll gladly admit i'm i'm no philosopher david please i want to do one thing i want to give you one minute to explain to us why your necessary being is the one god that you believe in if we don't have it in one minute then what will happen the uncaused first cause is the next the only necessary being the one and only necessary being and he is necessarily the source of every perfection that we see in the natural material world right if we see any beauty any health any justice any goodness any truth it comes from necessarily comes from that one and only one source so it is the source of everything that you value love justice beauty goodness truth everything so it cannot be any other way you cannot sit you cannot grant me that there is one and only one uncaused first cause and say oh but justice doesn't come from that source or health doesn't come from that source or beauty doesn't come from that source or unity doesn't come from that source everything you're admitting that everything comes from that source you're admitting it for the sake of argument i'll grant you that but you're admitting it for the sake of argument so you have to see that every perfection that we have in this world is coming from that one source and that's why we worship it as god all right one minute is over i will give my response to this uh very quickly everything that you have said within those one minutes boils down to god is the necessary being because god is the source of everything because he's perfect because it can't be anything else and you can't answer this question in any other way now as said i am a complete idiot probably in terms of whatever you whatever philosophical level you expect from me but this is basically what i understand from those uh one minutes god is the necessary being because god is the perfect source of everything because it can't be anything else that my friend is complete nonsense you're relying on the assumption that that this god does exist and that he must be the source of everything that he is the only god that may be perfect and so on on many different factors that render this whole argument that you are making completely unnecessary because you will first have to go and uh that's addiction to us that this gods that's ridiculous i'm sorry can i defend myself i've used i gotta say i i think that uh that summary was basically it what i heard you say basically david was god is all the things all the all the good stuff in the world god's the necessary being that's what i heard i didn't i didn't hear the connection between us granting you that there's a necessary being and then why that thing is god how we know that that thing is god um again yeah maybe i do just need to read another uh a philosophical treaty out there maybe there's a maybe there's a book or or a youtube video i haven't uh come across yet but uh yeah much more than that can i say one thing for 30 seconds then i'll sign off okay we can use the natural light of reason without recourse to faith to prove using a reduction absurdity to proof that there is one and only one uncaused first cause and a second reduction to absurdity test to prove with equal certainty that that first cause is not natural and boom there you go you've got your source of every perfection that we see in this world they're not pure perfections in this world but they're they're perfection reflections of that true infinite perfection of god and we can know with certainty by the light of natural reason without recourse to faith so i thank you for giving me the opportunity to talk to you boys today and i hope you have a good sunday that was very nice thank you too thank you so much bye