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Aristotle versus Religion
Episode 101 • 21st August 2025 • The Secular Foxhole • Blair Schofield and Martin Lindeskog
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Today, we had a lengthy, articulate discussion with Andrew Bernstein about his latest book, Aristotle vs Religion and Other Essays. We covered the title essay, and several others, focusing on the philosophical aspects.

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Episode 101 (63 minutes) was recorded at 2200 Central European Time, on August 17, 2025, with Alitu's recording feature. Martin did the editing and post-production with the podcast maker, Alitu. The transcript is generated by Alitu.

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Transcripts

Andrew:

Foreign.

Blair:

Here we are again, the Secular Foxhole podcast today.

Blair:

Our guest is Andrew Bernstein, philosopher and writer and author.

Blair:

And we're here to discuss his latest non fiction work,

Blair:

a series of essays.

Blair:

The title essay is Aristotle versus Religion, which is also on the COVID of his wonderful

Blair:

book.

Blair:

How are you, Andrew?

Andrew:

I'm good, Blair and Martin, and thanks for having me back on.

Andrew:

It's always great to be in the foxhole with you guys.

Blair:

Yeah, thank you.

Blair:

Thank you for that.

Martin:

I did a screenshot of when you're showing your book there, also the COVID art.

Martin:

And that was interesting how you picked the one and which one you liked and got responses

Martin:

from potential buyers and readers.

Martin:

So I like that.

Martin:

Could you, could you tell a little about that

Martin:

before Blair is continue with your question?

Blair:

Yeah.

Andrew:

Cover image.

Andrew:

Yeah, sure.

Andrew:

I'll put it, put it back up here.

Blair:

Yeah, please.

Andrew:

Yeah, I went to.

Andrew:

This is.

Andrew:

There's this design company guys called 100

Andrew:

covers.

Andrew:

Yeah.

Andrew:

And I like them a lot.

Andrew:

They,

Andrew:

they did a good job on volume one of the Tony Just saga.

Andrew:

And I went back to them and told them what I wanted and they sent me three possibilities.

Andrew:

There's three, three possible covers, all of which I like.

Andrew:

I thought they were all really good and so I put them up on Facebook and asked,

Andrew:

you know, my, my got some, I got some market feedback from my, you know, my friends,

Andrew:

potential customers and they, they basically agreed with me that all three covers were,

Andrew:

were really good.

Andrew:

I think the majority of them liked what of the other coffers, but, but I, but I preferred

Andrew:

this one.

Andrew:

So I went with, I went with my own,

Andrew:

my own taste and a number, a number of my friends, like, you know, like this one the

Andrew:

best also.

Andrew:

But they were, they were all really good and

Andrew:

I, I think I could, could not have gone wrong with any of them.

Andrew:

But, but I like the eyes,

Andrew:

you know, Aristotle's eye.

Blair:

Yeah.

Andrew:

He was the great empirical philosopher, in contrast to Plato, who was,

Andrew:

you know, was,

Andrew:

who was concerned more with the ideal world transcended to this one.

Andrew:

Aristotle was the great biologist, he was the great empiricist.

Andrew:

And so his eyes looking out at the world, observing whatever errors Aristotle made.

Andrew:

Nevertheless, he was observing.

Andrew:

He was trying to tie principles to observable

Andrew:

facts.

Andrew:

And so the eyes of Aristotle observing the

Andrew:

world, that's what I really loved about this code.

Andrew:

Plus, I like the gold.

Andrew:

I like the gold and the black, you know, know, background.

Blair:

Yeah. Yeah, it's a great, it's a great cover with a great.

Blair:

For a great book.

Andrew:

Thank you.

Blair:

Great book.

Blair:

Speaking for myself, I I love the Greeks.

Blair:

I, I,

Blair:

I just constantly,

Blair:

I pay homage to them for all the, the gifts they gave the west and, well, to the world,

Blair:

not just the west,

Blair:

whoever decides to pick them up.

Blair:

But I'd say maybe you agree that philosophy is the Greek's greatest gift to the West.

Blair:

What do you think?

Andrew:

Well, philosophy certainly originates in Greece.

Andrew:

Thales is the first great philosopher we know of.

Andrew:

And one of the essays in here is Heroes and Villains in Western Philosophy.

Andrew:

And I go through the whole history of philosophy showing it as an attempt to

Andrew:

establish an objective method of gaining knowledge.

Andrew:

And Thales is the first hero because he's not giving mythical explanations of natural

Andrew:

phenomena.

Andrew:

He's trying to give empirical based claims,

Andrew:

even though his specific claims were wrong, like all things are water, but he's trying to

Andrew:

give observation based claims.

Andrew:

So I think he was the first great hero of

Andrew:

philosophy.

Andrew:

So philosophy is a great gift to the human race.

Andrew:

From the Greeks.

Andrew:

Was it the greatest?

Andrew:

Perhaps.

Andrew:

They did so many great things.

Andrew:

I, I mean, their contributions to literature and the arts and, and,

Andrew:

you know, and to science and mathematics.

Andrew:

But rational philosophy or, you know,

Andrew:

philosophy.

Andrew:

Well, there's faith based, that's the whole question.

Andrew:

Is, is are these faith based beliefs really philosophy?

Andrew:

I mean, they attempt to answer the questions of philosophy, but by faith rather than

Andrew:

reason.

Andrew:

So if we just say philosophy is a rational attempt to answer these fundamental questions

Andrew:

that it definitely comes from the Greeks.

Andrew:

And then.

Andrew:

Yeah, yeah, I think we have to agree with you, Blair.

Andrew:

Although all these other contributions, like in the arts, are also magnificent.

Andrew:

Yeah,

Andrew:

true philosophy,

Andrew:

I think, is the most fundamental.

Blair:

Now you again, you, you just mentioned the contribution of observable facts.

Blair:

I know that science, the scientific method and science in general today is under attack

Blair:

probably because it's racist.

Andrew:

Didn't you know that?

Blair:

No, tell me.

Andrew:

Scientific method is racist.

Andrew:

Oh,

Andrew:

yo, grammar is racist.

Andrew:

This is the critical race theorists and critical whiteness studies people like Robin

Andrew:

d' Angelo and their real.

Andrew:

I'm sorry, it's very irrational.

Andrew:

I just, I brought it in as a, as a joke.

Blair:

That's quite all right.

Blair:

That's quite, it's true though.

Blair:

I mean, it's, they're, they're out there.

Andrew:

Oh yeah.

Andrew:

And they control the universities,

Andrew:

unfortunately.

Blair:

So, I mean.

Andrew:

But you were talking about the scientific method.

Blair:

Yes,

Blair:

Yeah, I want to.

Blair:

Is there a certain.

Blair:

Maybe you know more about this than I do.

Blair:

But, but what is a scientific method?

Blair:

It's observable facts.

Blair:

You, you test something and then you observe

Blair:

the results and then you go,

Blair:

is it cause and effect?

Blair:

What, what what? Is it all part of the same thing or do you

Blair:

know more than I do probably?

Andrew:

Well, I, I'm not an expert on that.

Andrew:

I'm not a scientist.

Andrew:

I'm just a writer and a philosopher.

Andrew:

But, but I could take an educated guess,

Andrew:

you know at this that a scientific method needs to be oriented in, in observational

Andrew:

facts that you know and, and, and, and, and, and and you know I think it's very similar to

Andrew:

philosophy in that both,

Andrew:

both of them are rational fields meaning mythology or faith based beliefs as, as a

Andrew:

starting point of cognition in the, in and, and I think a scientific method and rational

Andrew:

philosophy or just, just philosophy begins you know, you know where religion starts with the

Andrew:

revealed text.

Andrew:

It starts the Jew, the Jews and the Christians with different parts of the Bible,

Andrew:

the Muslims with the Quran and you know, and so on.

Andrew:

Religion starts with a revealed text that was held to be used know, written by men.

Andrew:

Divinely inspired.

Andrew:

Science and philosophy don't start with a text.

Andrew:

They, I'm looking out the window here in my, my apartment.

Andrew:

They start with observation of nature.

Andrew:

Nature is the text.

Andrew:

And look,

Andrew:

yes, I'm looking at the grass.

Andrew:

I mean it's August while we're doing this,

Andrew:

right.

Andrew:

So it's high summer.

Blair:

Sure.

Andrew:

And I'm looking at the grass and the bushes and the trees and everything's in

Andrew:

bloom, everything's green.

Andrew:

And there's the downside.

Andrew:

There's all kinds of insects flying around,

Andrew:

you know, yo and stuff.

Andrew:

But, but you know the scientific method starts

Andrew:

that's, I think this is critical.

Andrew:

You start with the observation of facts.

Andrew:

You don't bring some preconceived notion to it.

Andrew:

God created it or, or, or whatever.

Andrew:

You don't bring any preconceived notions to

Andrew:

it.

Andrew:

You just wouldn't.

Andrew:

You know what was Newton's famous line who was, who was a devout Christian said I make no

Andrew:

hypotheses.

Andrew:

I think he, you know, he said when, when, when I'm dealing with scientific questions, I start

Andrew:

with the facts.

Andrew:

I, you know, I, I start with observation.

Andrew:

And then you need a theory that explains you know, some principle that, that, that explains

Andrew:

the facts.

Andrew:

And I think what little I know about the history of science,

Andrew:

you know the development of an experimental method is, is a renaissance development, right

Andrew:

with people like Francis Bacon,

Andrew:

you know, Francis Bacon, Galileo, people like that where you, you, you form a hypothesis,

Andrew:

you know,

Andrew:

a set of rational principles that explains the observed facts.

Andrew:

And then you test,

Andrew:

you, you know, you test hypothesis in the, in the laboratory.

Andrew:

And I think and, and the results are observable So I think what a scientific method

Andrew:

does is it kind of shuttles back and forth from observed facts to hypothesis which is

Andrew:

tested, you know, and then, and then the, the hypothesis is validated or,

Andrew:

or, or undermined by the observed facts of, you know, of, of the experiment.

Andrew:

So it's like a shuttling back and forth between observation, observation to theory and

Andrew:

then, and then back to, back to the facts, to the facts that are the result of the

Andrew:

experiment.

Andrew:

So I think it's always linked to observation, you know, to the facts of observation and

Andrew:

always attempt to develop a rational theory rather than, you know, faith based or

Andrew:

mythological one that, that, that explains,

Andrew:

that explains the facts.

Andrew:

So I think that's, that's a scientific method

Andrew:

at least as I, that's great.

Blair:

No, I appreciate that.

Blair:

I clearly understood that and I appreciate

Blair:

that.

Blair:

Thank you.

Andrew:

Let me, let me, let me give you an example.

Andrew:

I always, I always use in class because I think one of the, I think Aristotle's greatest

Andrew:

achievements.

Andrew:

Now he made many errors we know in physics,

Andrew:

for example,

Andrew:

understandable in the fourth century B.C.

Andrew:

but he made a lot of tremendous strides in the field of biology.

Andrew:

That's really where he shines as a scientist is in the field of biology.

Andrew:

But you know, a great philosopher, nobody ever doubted what a great philosopher was.

Andrew:

And I think Aristotle's greatest achievement is, is that he,

Andrew:

and I'm not an Aristotle scholar, you know, I don't read ancient Greek or anything.

Andrew:

I just read Aristotle in English translations.

Andrew:

So I'm not a scholar.

Andrew:

You know, my good friend Professor Carrion Biondi is an Aristotle scholar.

Andrew:

She, you know, she's fluent in ancient Greek and you know, and everything and she knows

Andrew:

much more on Aristotle than I do.

Andrew:

But just as a generalist in the field of

Andrew:

philosophy,

Andrew:

I think Aristotle's greatest contribution to humanity and I think I would argue the

Andrew:

greatest contribution anybody ever made to humanity in history is that he more than

Andrew:

anybody taught the human race how to think.

Andrew:

Because one,

Andrew:

he formulated the laws of logic, you know, he, you know, he developed the, the, you

Andrew:

formulated the rules of proper reasoning, identified the main errors or the fallacies,

Andrew:

you know, of reasoning.

Andrew:

And two,

Andrew:

he linked that, he married it to his observation based method to his empirical,

Andrew:

his empirical method.

Andrew:

And so that knowledge is gained for Aristotle

Andrew:

by logical,

Andrew:

non contradictory thinking about observed facts.

Andrew:

And that not, not by faith, not by mythology, not by going by our feelings,

Andrew:

but knowledge is gained by logical, non contradictory thinking about observed facts.

Andrew:

This is a tremendous advance.

Andrew:

And one example of this is,

Andrew:

I mean Aristotle was well aware of Greek mythology.

Andrew:

You remember in the myths palace, Athena springs fully developed from Zeus's head.

Andrew:

Now I hate it when that happens.

Andrew:

That hurts.

Andrew:

But I mean,

Andrew:

so yeah, I have.

Blair:

Several holes in my head.

Andrew:

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Andrew:

So I'm glad my daughter didn't come into the world that way, you know.

Andrew:

But according to the mythology, that's the way Athena came into, you know, she was, she was

Andrew:

born.

Andrew:

Now notice what follows from that.

Andrew:

Zeus,

Andrew:

who was running around with many different females,

Andrew:

goddesses, women, you know, human females,

Andrew:

had God knows how many children.

Andrew:

You know, they call him the father of the human race.

Andrew:

In his case it was literal.

Andrew:

He had all of these children,

Andrew:

but in all the other cases he had to share them with their mother.

Andrew:

But Athena was his.

Andrew:

Athena doesn't have a mother, she was his,

Andrew:

100% his.

Andrew:

And he doted on her.

Andrew:

And so it makes sense that if a child has one parent but a loving one,

Andrew:

that that child will love that parent and their bond will be very close.

Andrew:

And so according to the mythology,

Andrew:

Athena was the only one Zeus trusted to hold, you know, the most powerful weapon in the

Andrew:

universe, Zeus's thunderbolt.

Andrew:

If it wasn't in his hands, it was in Athena's

Andrew:

hands because he could trust her.

Andrew:

Now all of that's very logical.

Andrew:

There's nothing contradictory about that.

Andrew:

You have a child has one parent, but a loving

Andrew:

one.

Andrew:

So their bond is very, is very close.

Andrew:

She's loyal to her father, he could trust her.

Andrew:

So she's, you know, it's all very logical,

Andrew:

there's no contradictions there.

Andrew:

But the starting point is anything but observational fact.

Andrew:

The starting point is bizarre mythology.

Andrew:

You know, somebody developed out of, come right out of our father's head.

Andrew:

Nairistal was one, a father and two, a biologist.

Andrew:

And he knows that's not the way, you know, offspring come into the world.

Andrew:

And so that's mythology.

Andrew:

Even though, even though what follows from the

Andrew:

starting point is very logical, it's not good enough just to be, that's rationalistic, you

Andrew:

know, to be very logical but based on a non empirical starting point.

Andrew:

That's not knowledge.

Andrew:

You know,

Andrew:

knowledge is gained by logical, non contradictory thinking about observed facts,

Andrew:

not about myths or faith based beliefs or emotions.

Andrew:

That's Aristotle's tremendous contribution to the human race.

Andrew:

I think.

Blair:

It'S all been forgotten sadly.

Blair:

I think also.

Blair:

But I wanna, I'm gonna jump around a little bit because I, I just,

Blair:

I've been, while I'm listening to you, I've been formulating the next question because I

Blair:

have several nieces and nephews and they're all.

Andrew:

They didn't come from the right.

Andrew:

Out of their father's head, I'm guessing.

Andrew:

Well, mom probably had to bring them into the world.

Andrew:

Right?

Blair:

That's right.

Blair:

That's right.

Andrew:

Go through.

Andrew:

Go through the pain, the pains of childbirth.

Blair:

Yes.

Andrew:

Women are tough, man.

Andrew:

I don't know how they go through that, but.

Andrew:

But they do.

Blair:

Yeah. Yeah, they.

Blair:

They certainly do.

Blair:

And that's certainly a great contribution to the human race.

Andrew:

It's a superpower.

Andrew:

You know, the leftists don't want it.

Andrew:

The leftist feminists don't want to hear this, but this is really a superpower that.

Andrew:

That women have.

Andrew:

A woman's body has the power to create human

Andrew:

life.

Andrew:

I mean, they need a little help from their friends, obviously.

Blair:

Yes.

Andrew:

To initiate the process.

Andrew:

But once.

Andrew:

Once. Once she conceives her body, I mean, just creates human life.

Andrew:

That is a superpower.

Andrew:

And I'm not saying women shouldn't get an education to have careers, too, if they want.

Andrew:

But.

Andrew:

But nevertheless, it is a. It is a superpower,

Andrew:

the capacity to create human life.

Andrew:

It's amazing.

Blair:

I will agree.

Andrew:

I will agree.

Blair:

But what I'm afraid of for them, and I've seen this come to fruition with some of

Blair:

them, not all of them to their credit,

Blair:

but some of them,

Blair:

from preschool to graduate school, they've been plastered.

Blair:

They've been bombarded with environmentalism,

Blair:

climate change,

Blair:

catastrophe,

Blair:

doom.

Blair:

The world will end in 12 years.

Andrew:

You know, the Ice Age is coming, by Ben Thunberg.

Blair:

Yeah, the ice age is coming by 1970.

Blair:

There'll be an Oreo shortage by 1983.

Blair:

You know, things.

Andrew:

An oreo shortage, Is that what you said?

Blair:

No, an oil shorty.

Andrew:

I said, God, we don't want to run out of Oreos.

Andrew:

You don't want to run out of Oreos, that's for sure.

Blair:

Now, that would be a trash.

Andrew:

Yeah, absolutely.

Blair:

Now contrast this to.

Blair:

Again, I want to bring it back to Aristotle.

Blair:

Is it Eudaimonia? Flourishing?

Andrew:

Oh, I do, yeah.

Blair:

Daimonia.

Blair:

Thank you.

Blair:

Yeah. Contrast, you know, this doom and gloom with Daimonia to human flourishing, human

Blair:

progress, human.

Blair:

So that's.

Blair:

Again, that's.

Blair:

That there's this war of ideas right in that area.

Andrew:

Yeah,

Andrew:

yeah.

Andrew:

Now, you know, it's.

Andrew:

It's when I was in graduate school, this goes

Andrew:

way back.

Andrew:

This.

Andrew:

This is 50, 50 years ago, 1970s,

Andrew:

roughly.

Andrew:

But eudaimonia back then, you know, Aristotle

Andrew:

was famous for advocating Eudaimonia,

Andrew:

and that was generally translated into English as happiness back then.

Blair:

Right. Yeah, I thought.

Blair:

Yeah, yeah.

Andrew:

But Aristotle scholarship has come, you know, a long way since then.

Andrew:

I mean Aristotle.

Andrew:

Here we can.

Andrew:

What little I know about the history of this Aristotle scholarship really took off in the

Andrew:

19th century.

Andrew:

I think.

Andrew:

You know, the mod, the modern analysis of Aristotle and amongst the German philosophers

Andrew:

you got to give you, you know, I'm always haranguing against German philosophy, against

Andrew:

Kant, Hagel and Marx,

Andrew:

the, the unholy triumvirate as I call them.

Andrew:

And you know, and you know, and for good

Andrew:

reason but, but you know, people like Werner Jaeger and there, and there were German

Andrew:

Aristotle scholars who really kicked off the modern, you know, the realisation of how

Andrew:

important Aristotle is.

Andrew:

And, and English scholar, English speaking scholars in, you know, both sides of the pond

Andrew:

in Great Britain and in the United States picked it up in the, in the 20th century.

Andrew:

So Aristotle scholarship has become, you know, huge in the, in the modern academy, in

Andrew:

philosophy departments, which is, which is one of the real good signs.

Andrew:

And Aristotle scholars today assure us that eudaimonia really means flourishing.

Andrew:

Like you said Blair, flourishing life,

Andrew:

which really makes sense because it integrates with Aristotle's biology, you know, and what a

Andrew:

great biologist he was.

Andrew:

And you know, the flourishing life.

Andrew:

I mean the, the, the imagery that comes to my

Andrew:

mind is, you know, you see,

Andrew:

you see the forest looks like on a beautiful day in June,

Andrew:

70 degrees Fahrenheit.

Andrew:

It's not too hot, it's not cold.

Andrew:

There's a breeze blowing the evergreens and all the trees, other trees in bloom and the

Andrew:

grass is green and there's a lake down below and the sun is shining and the birds, birds

Andrew:

are chirping the trees and of course the insects are buzzing around,

Andrew:

you know,

Andrew:

all those annoying,

Andrew:

annoying living creatures.

Andrew:

But flourishing like you see the flourishing.

Andrew:

And of course Aristotle's talking about human life, flourishing as a human being, which

Andrew:

means life.

Andrew:

And as he puts it, I think it's in the

Andrew:

Niconachean ethics, life in accordance with a rational principle.

Andrew:

This is where, this is where the famous claim made that Aristotle, Aristotle says man is the

Andrew:

rational being.

Andrew:

That you know, that to achieve a fully human life means life in accordance with a, with a

Andrew:

rational principle.

Andrew:

Which I think you know, close enough that you

Andrew:

know, man is the rational animal and as a rational.

Andrew:

So we achieve today in the modern world.

Andrew:

I, I think Aristotle couldn't have conceived of this in the 4th century BC but I think you

Andrew:

logically argued that this is in congruent with Aristotle.

Andrew:

Because human flourishing, you could prove logically I think requires,

Andrew:

you know, that we grow crops and we cure Diseases, which Aristotle certainly would

Andrew:

approve of as a biologist.

Andrew:

But you build homes and cities, you know,

Andrew:

where culture flourishes in the, in the cities and industry.

Andrew:

This is all part of human flourishing.

Andrew:

You know, we, we can't flourish as cave

Andrew:

dwellers.

Andrew:

Here's where human flourishing comes into

Andrew:

conflict with environmentalism because,

Andrew:

you know, they want a pristine nature.

Andrew:

You know, nature has intrinsic value in and of itself, right,

Andrew:

Regardless of any utilitarian value for man.

Andrew:

But human flourishing requires that we, we remake nature.

Andrew:

We cut down trees to, you know, for farms and go to grow crops and build towns and cities

Andrew:

and, and everything.

Andrew:

So,

Andrew:

so the, the environmentalists are certainly opposed to human flourishing as there's,

Andrew:

there's, there's one conflict, but another point I wanted to make an answer to your

Andrew:

question, Blair,

Andrew:

regards knowledge.

Andrew:

That knowledge consists of logical,

Andrew:

non contradictory thinking about observed facts.

Andrew:

So you mentioned climate change and various other environmentalist scares in the 1970s

Andrew:

that you're, you're right, you mentioned it.

Andrew:

There was the Ice Age, the Great Ice Age,

Andrew:

because,

Andrew:

you know, the Earth had cooled roughly from 1940 to 1975.

Andrew:

It was in a cooling period.

Andrew:

And the scientists were talking and all the

Andrew:

news magazines were talking about the coming Ice Age and everything because they blame man,

Andrew:

because they blame human beings for it.

Andrew:

But,

Andrew:

but here's where Aristotle's method is so important is are human beings impacting the

Andrew:

climate?

Andrew:

Let's eliminate the hysteria and look at the data.

Andrew:

And I've written an essay,

Andrew:

a booklet on this issue,

Andrew:

the Truth About Climate Change.

Andrew:

And I would just point out there's a lot of facts that need to be adduced here.

Andrew:

But the one that gets overlooked by all the alarmists and even, and very often even by the

Andrew:

sceptics of agw, you know, anthropogenic global warming or man made woman,

Andrew:

is to point out the undeniable fact of a natural.

Andrew:

There's a natural climate process.

Andrew:

We're in the modern war period.

Andrew:

Now.

Andrew:

Prior to that was what they called the Little Ice Age,

Andrew:

you know, when it was colder,

Andrew:

1300-1800, roughly.

Andrew:

Prior to that was the mediaeval warm period, 900 A.D. to 1300 A.D. roughly when, when the

Andrew:

Vikings were able to settle Greenland, grow crops there.

Andrew:

He even thought to name it Greenland because they could grow crops.

Andrew:

It was warmer.

Andrew:

Prior to that was the, was the, was what they

Andrew:

call the Dark Age cold period.

Andrew:

And prior to that was the Roman one period.

Andrew:

And prior to that was an unnamed cold period.

Andrew:

You know, I Forget the date, 600 B.C. to 200 B.C. something like that.

Andrew:

I named it I took it upon myself to dub it the Biblical Cold period.

Andrew:

And I said in the booklet, if scientists don't like the reference to religion, let them give

Andrew:

it a name.

Andrew:

I was outraged by the period not having a

Andrew:

name.

Andrew:

But guys, prior to that was the Minoan Warm Period, you know, roughly 1500 BC to a

Andrew:

thousand BC, which was significantly warmer by several degrees warmer than it is today.

Andrew:

All the proxy data indicates that many years, many centuries before industrialization, which

Andrew:

is a late 18th century British development.

Andrew:

So when you plug the Maya one period into this ongoing natural climate cycle, never mind

Andrew:

going back millions and millions and million years, the ice ages and the end of ice ages,

Andrew:

long before man's earliest ancestors even appear in the fossil record.

Andrew:

When you plug in, you know, Wein Rand taught us to see the big picture,

Andrew:

integrate, go as wide as far as you can.

Andrew:

When you plug the modern Warm period into this

Andrew:

vast climate history, the earth has 4.6 billion years of climate history, constant

Andrew:

climate cycling.

Andrew:

The modern Warm Period.

Andrew:

The modern Warm period is just a relatively

Andrew:

minor blip, you know, it's a relatively minor warming, which is good anyway.

Andrew:

When you do that, you see the big picture.

Andrew:

You use Aristotle's method and you reason logically about all the facts, not just some

Andrew:

of the facts.

Andrew:

You realise this is hysteria, guys,

Andrew:

this, this is unwanted hysteria.

Andrew:

Not to mention the fact that, well, no, here's

Andrew:

another fact I'll throw in.

Andrew:

Warming is beneficial.

Andrew:

You know, the extends, the growing seasons,

Andrew:

we, we grow more crops.

Andrew:

It's the colder periods that are harmful, always have been.

Andrew:

The growing seasons are shorter, it's harder to grow crops.

Andrew:

Northern Europe suffered horribly during the Little Ice Age.

Andrew:

The famine in Finland wiped out like a third of the population.

Andrew:

1690s,

Andrew:

lean years in Scotland, the 1690s, thousands of people died of starvation.

Andrew:

In the colder periods, it's harder to grow crops.

Andrew:

The further north you go, the harder it gets.

Andrew:

So the warm periods are beneficial, not to

Andrew:

mention natural.

Andrew:

So Aristotle's method here is critical.

Andrew:

So advocate human flourishing as opposed to

Andrew:

doom and gloom like you said,

Andrew:

but also base it in reason.

Andrew:

Examine the data.

Andrew:

Is there a looming ice age?

Andrew:

Is warming man made? Is warming harmful to life?

Andrew:

The Aristotle's method is ideal for that.

Andrew:

And I think the IPCC,

Andrew:

Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and their shills in the leftist media,

Andrew:

they don't employ it, they're engaged in hysteria, they don't employ reason on this.

Andrew:

So it's your thumbs down, thumbs down for those guys.

Blair:

Very good, sir, very good.

Blair:

Now I want to jump around some of the essays

Blair:

in your book, if we could.

Blair:

But we'll keep with the philosophic theme, if you don't mind.

Andrew:

Well, that is my field.

Blair:

Yes.

Andrew:

By the way, let me point something out here.

Andrew:

Going back.

Andrew:

Can I go back to climate change for one

Andrew:

minute?

Blair:

Yeah, go for it.

Andrew:

I'm not a scientist, but I have buddies with scientists and I'm a bookworm.

Andrew:

And fortunately, scientists write books.

Andrew:

I've read a tonne of books on climate

Andrew:

scientists and geologists, you know, and, and you know, and so on.

Andrew:

Astrophysicists who study the, the sun, climate connection.

Andrew:

And I think two things I could add to this once I have all the data from the scientists

Andrew:

because I, you know, as a philosopher, I don't know the data, but I read the scientists their

Andrew:

books.

Andrew:

I get the data.

Andrew:

But as a philosopher, one thing I could add is

Andrew:

one, what I learned from my rant.

Andrew:

See the big picture.

Andrew:

Don't just focus on the last 150 years, guys.

Andrew:

The IPC focuses on the last 150 years, you know, of, of a warming trend.

Andrew:

See the big picture.

Andrew:

Plug it into the ongoing natural process of

Andrew:

climate change.

Andrew:

It goes on for millions of years.

Andrew:

And then two,

Andrew:

my knowledge of logic.

Andrew:

I've taught logic for four, 40 years.

Andrew:

I know how to present evidence in support of a conclusion.

Andrew:

What counts as evidence, what doesn't.

Andrew:

And I spoke with the friends of mine who were

Andrew:

scientists and objectivists and they, they always tell me scientists too often don't know

Andrew:

enough logic.

Andrew:

They don't.

Andrew:

That's part of philosophy.

Andrew:

It's Aristotle's contribution, by the way.

Andrew:

Logic teaches us how to establish the truth of a conclusion.

Andrew:

What counts as evidence, what doesn't count as evidence?

Andrew:

How much evidence is necessary? How do we avoid fallacies, you know, you know,

Andrew:

in the presenting of evidence.

Andrew:

I know logic better than they do.

Andrew:

And that's why I think they're often guilty of this half truth fallacy.

Andrew:

They'll show us the facts from the last 150 years,

Andrew:

but it's only part of the truth.

Andrew:

They're overlooking thousands and thousands

Andrew:

and thousands, even millions of years of, of evidence here.

Andrew:

So as a philosopher, I think one leftist woman said to noise well, why should I listen to

Andrew:

what a philosopher has to say about climate change?

Andrew:

This is a fair enough question.

Andrew:

And I said, well, I know as much about climate change as Greta Thunberg does,

Andrew:

you know,

Andrew:

or Al Gore,

Andrew:

but, but the real answer is, you know, I did the research and what the scientists have to

Andrew:

say.

Andrew:

And as a philosopher, I have something to

Andrew:

contribute that they don't have.

Blair:

Yeah. Now my.

Blair:

Let me throw this out.

Andrew:

Then. The last.

Blair:

They use the last 150 years because they want to attack the industrial revolution,

Blair:

I think,

Blair:

and blame man again, that's their Blame progress and blame man.

Blair:

So.

Blair:

But you have a great chapter in here called Great Islamic Thinkers versus Islam.

Blair:

You want to touch on that for a minute in keeping with the philosophic theme.

Andrew:

Oh, yeah, yeah, that's.

Andrew:

There's.

Andrew:

I think that's an important essay that I'm

Andrew:

very proud of because it's about the Golden Age of Islam, you know, roughly 800 A.D.

Andrew:

to 1200 A.D.

Andrew:

and a lot of people in the west,

Andrew:

you know,

Andrew:

in the modern world,

Andrew:

when they discuss the Golden Age of Islam,

Andrew:

either they also often take one of two alternatives.

Andrew:

They either poo poo or they minimise it.

Andrew:

Oriana Falachi, who I admired in many ways because she spoke out,

Andrew:

you know, against the dangers of Islam.

Andrew:

In fact, I think she was.

Andrew:

Well, she was going to be incarcerated in Italy, wasn't she?

Andrew:

For, for speaking out against.

Andrew:

Against.

Blair:

I know, I know the name, but I haven't seen her name lately, you know.

Andrew:

Well, she died of, she died of cancer, I think.

Andrew:

She died.

Andrew:

That's right.

Andrew:

In the United States.

Andrew:

She couldn't go back to her native Italy

Andrew:

because they were going to imprison her for,

Andrew:

for what she said, not for any crime she committed, but, but because her criticism of

Andrew:

Islam.

Andrew:

And, you know, I had a lot of respect for her courage in that way.

Andrew:

But one of her books, I don't remember the name of it offhand, it was shortly after 9 11,

Andrew:

and it was written in a white heat,

Andrew:

written by a righteously angry woman.

Andrew:

She said, oh, the Golden Age visa wasn't really that great.

Andrew:

And, and I think there's a lot of, you know, people in, in the west who, you know,

Andrew:

they'll minim.

Andrew:

They'll try to minimise it or the other

Andrew:

alternative is they'll say, see,

Andrew:

Islam is compatible with advanced culture, you know, you know, that the olden age was real

Andrew:

and it's compatible with, you know, with high culture.

Andrew:

And the truth is both of those interpretations are false.

Andrew:

The golden eggs of Islam was real,

Andrew:

that's for sure.

Andrew:

But it was Islam that destroyed it.

Andrew:

And, and, and I think the history shows that very clearly.

Andrew:

So the Muslim, Muslim warriors conquered the Middle east, you know, after,

Andrew:

during and after Muhammad's lifetime.

Andrew:

When he died.

Andrew:

Muhammad was what, 570 to 632 AD, 7th century AD that, you know, they conquered parts of the

Andrew:

Byzantine Empire.

Andrew:

Which was Greek and Christian had kept alive a lot of the Greek writings.

Andrew:

And Muslim scholars were fascinated by what the Greeks had said.

Andrew:

And this, this was Islam is fundamentalist Islam or just Islam All Islam is false.

Andrew:

Fundamentalist Islam didn't strangle the culture yet at that time like it, like it does

Andrew:

today or for the last 800 years.

Andrew:

And these scholars were free to read the Greeks especially Aristotle who they

Andrew:

enormously admired.

Andrew:

11 Caliph in Baghdad, you know Aristotle appeared to him in a dream and you know one of

Andrew:

them, one of the, you know one of them established a house of wisdom in Baghdad where

Andrew:

they trained intellectuals and you know and,

Andrew:

and you know in, in high intellectual studies and there was a,

Andrew:

a very active translation movement that translated the Greeks and especially Aristotle

Andrew:

from Greek into Arabic.

Andrew:

And for, for centuries the, the,

Andrew:

the Islamic world whether Arab or Persian and whether in the Middle east or in Spain because

Andrew:

remember the Arab warriors conquered Spain in the, in 711 A.D. and and held it for

Andrew:

centuries.

Andrew:

But but in both Spain and in the Middle east both Arab and Persian in present day Iran

Andrew:

Persian scholars,

Andrew:

all of whom were Muslim at least nominally not, not all of them were were practising

Andrew:

Islam but some of some of them were based on their study of Al Farabi I think it was was

Andrew:

called the second teacher,

Andrew:

Aristotle being the first.

Andrew:

Avicenna was a great Aristotle scholar as well as a great physician.

Andrew:

Averroes was a great Aristotle scholar.

Andrew:

Thomas Aquinas considered him the greatest of

Andrew:

the Aristotle scholars as well as a great physician.

Andrew:

And Arab intellectuals,

Andrew:

Arab and Persian but Muslim intellectuals made great great advances in mathematics, in

Andrew:

astronomy, in, in medicine.

Andrew:

Some magnet much magnificent poetry, you know written by Muslim writers back to like I said,

Andrew:

they were all nominal Muslim at least some of them practising some, some not.

Andrew:

But for 400 years roughly from 800 to 1200 A.D.

Andrew:

the Middle east and Spain the, the, the Arab Islamic world led the world in intellectual

Andrew:

development.

Andrew:

And that's that is true what happened?

Andrew:

Islam, I mean Islam was was always there and there was always some tension between these

Andrew:

great intellectuals and you know, and the, the faith based mentality.

Andrew:

But Al Ghazali who's considered was the 11th century,

Andrew:

who's considered today and for centuries in the past second in importance in the history

Andrew:

of Islam, second only to Muhammad Al Ghazali harangued against what was his famous work the

Andrew:

incoherence of the philosophers, the incoherence of philosophy argued that

Andrew:

philosophy could not explain the world,

Andrew:

that it led to these inevitable contradictions, that only faith in the Quran,

Andrew:

faith Based beliefs in the, in the Quran.

Andrew:

You have to give up philosophy and give up

Andrew:

reason,

Andrew:

you know, and just have, have faith in the,

Andrew:

you know, fundamental fundamentalism, faith in the literal truth of the Quran.

Andrew:

Al Ghazali was enormously influential.

Andrew:

Other theologians as well.

Andrew:

They, you know, they, they built on the Islamic foundation, foundation of the, of, of

Andrew:

the culture.

Andrew:

And their influence unfortunately was tremendous.

Andrew:

And you start to see the caliphs and the political authority started to burn the books

Andrew:

of the philosophers, including of Averroes.

Andrew:

And here's the one great historical point.

Andrew:

Thomas aquinas in the 13th century,

Andrew:

1225-1274, his dates.

Andrew:

Averroes book survives enough that Thomas Aquinas was able to,

Andrew:

you know, to procure copies.

Andrew:

He considered Averroes the greatest

Andrew:

commentator on Aristotle and Cat.

Andrew:

You know,

Andrew:

Catholic Spaniards had fought against the Muslims for centuries,

Andrew:

you know, and they, they eventually they reconquered Spain, right?

Andrew:

La reconquista.

Andrew:

And by 1492, when Ferdinand and Isabella, two

Andrew:

Catholic fanatics marry and they want an entirely Catholic Spain.

Andrew:

So they expel all Muslims, some of whose families had lived there for like 700 years.

Andrew:

They expelled the Muslim and let's kick out, let's kick out the Jews while we're at it.

Andrew:

Expel the Jews also and get special dispensation from the Pope to establish, you

Andrew:

know, an inquisition in Spain, the infamous Spanish Inquisition, to make sure nobody was

Andrew:

secretly practising Islam or Judaism.

Andrew:

Catholic scholars, I mean, Catholic warriors retake Spain over, over the centuries, 12th,

Andrew:

13th century, they, the Islamic world, Andalusia, Islamic Spain was vastly advanced.

Andrew:

You know, the, the, remember in Lawrence of Arabia, Alex,

Andrew:

as, as Faisal says, I. I dream was.

Andrew:

I dream about the lighted streets of Cordoba,

Andrew:

you know, or something.

Andrew:

They had street lights, they had street lights

Andrew:

In Cordova, like 1200, you know, they had sewers and universities and libraries.

Andrew:

It was much more advanced.

Andrew:

And the Catholic scholars got access to all the works of the Greeks which had been lost in

Andrew:

the West.

Andrew:

And what's his name, Archbishop Raymond the first of Toledo initiated a second great

Andrew:

translation movement, whether the Catholic, Jewish or Muslim scholars to translate the

Andrew:

great works of the Greeks, including Aristotle, especially Aristotle, from Arabic

Andrew:

into Latin,

Andrew:

the language of European scholars.

Andrew:

And then you start to see Aristotle being

Andrew:

studied again and other Greeks being studied again.

Andrew:

University of Paris, for example, became a hotbed with Albertus Magnus.

Andrew:

Thomas Aquinas a hotbed of Aristotelians.

Andrew:

The Church opposed it,

Andrew:

but some people got burned at stake.

Andrew:

But this time Aristotle,

Andrew:

Aristotle survived, the Greek approach survived.

Andrew:

And the Church wasn't able to squash it.

Andrew:

So the Golden Age of Islam was real.

Andrew:

In summary, it was destroyed by Islam,

Andrew:

but it helped revive Aristotle and Greek scholarship in the west in what became known

Andrew:

as the Mediaeval Renaissance in the, the 13th century with people like Albertus Magnus and

Andrew:

Thomas Aquinas and the revival of Aristotelianism, which leads directly into the

Andrew:

Italian Renaissance.

Andrew:

So the, the golden age of Islam had a positive impact in Europe as it in fact brought Europe

Andrew:

back its, its Greek legacy back to the west.

Andrew:

Even though in the Arab Islamic world For the

Andrew:

last 800 years it's been squashed.

Andrew:

And, and the Arab Islamic world's been in a dark age for the hundred years because of

Andrew:

Islam.

Andrew:

So yeah, the golden age was real, but it's not compatible with Islam.

Andrew:

Islam was its death.

Blair:

Sure, sure, all right, sir, I know.

Andrew:

And by the way, some of, some of those great thinkers from the golden age of Islam

Andrew:

were openly sceptical of religion.

Andrew:

Al Razi, one of the great medical men during that period,

Andrew:

who's a, an Arab I believe, but also, what's his name, Omar Khayyam, who's,

Andrew:

who's mostly known in the west for his poetry.

Andrew:

Oma Kam was, was a, was a great mathematician, a brilliant mathematician and was openly

Andrew:

sceptical of, I don't know how he didn't get,

Andrew:

you know, beheaded or you have his books burned because he was, he was openly sceptical

Andrew:

of religious.

Andrew:

So some of those,

Andrew:

some of those Muslim thinkers, you know, who, who were so were great geniuses were nominally

Andrew:

Muslim but they weren't religious.

Andrew:

Some of them were openly critical of religion.

Blair:

Okay, very good, very good.

Blair:

Well, let's jump forward to another philosophical essay and in your literature

Blair:

section you, you have a chapter on objectivism versus Kantianism in the Fountainhead.

Blair:

Now do you want to jump, do you want to do a little contrast there real quick?

Blair:

Yeah,

Blair:

the first handedness, second handedness, I guess or.

Andrew:

Yeah,

Andrew:

you know, now we're talking about my, you know, my, my favourite all time favourite

Andrew:

book,

Andrew:

fiction, non fiction novel, drama, whatever.

Andrew:

I mean I think Atlas Shrugs the, is

Andrew:

objectively by the, the principles of literature, the greatest novel ever written.

Andrew:

But the Fountain is my per, my Fountainhead's my personal favourite because you know, in

Andrew:

the, put it simply because Howard Rock dominates the action and he's seen in Atlas

Andrew:

Shrugged,

Andrew:

John Galt dominates the action, but you don't see him for the first 2/3 of the novel, which

Andrew:

is a tour de force of plot development by Ayn Rand.

Blair:

Yes, exactly, yes.

Andrew:

You know, you have a character Dominates the story.

Andrew:

You don't even see him for two thirds of the story.

Andrew:

That's extraordinary.

Blair:

That's right.

Blair:

I, again, the Fountainhead was what introduced

Blair:

me to Ms. Rand.

Blair:

So I, I do have a special place in my heart

Blair:

for it too.

Blair:

Yes.

Martin:

Amen.

Andrew:

I'm a hero worshipper.

Andrew:

And you know,

Andrew:

Atlas Shrugged is sui generis.

Andrew:

You know, I think we'll leave that aside for.

Andrew:

Because the plot structure is so extraordinary.

Andrew:

There's nothing like it in, in world literature that I know.

Andrew:

But the Fountainhead is more conventional in the sense that the hero's right there from

Andrew:

page one.

Andrew:

And you still, he's, he's, he's, he's observable, you know, he's,

Andrew:

you know, the facts are right there.

Andrew:

Observable for the readers.

Andrew:

Howard Rook dominates the story from,

Andrew:

from start to finish.

Andrew:

And so as a hero worshipper, I think Howard Rourke in that regard, in, in these more

Andrew:

conventional stories where you, you, you, you, where the hero is observationally apparent

Andrew:

right from the, right from the start.

Andrew:

Howard Rock to me is the greatest hero in world literature.

Andrew:

And I think I'll write an essay on that one day.

Andrew:

But the Kantianism, that's a good question, right?

Andrew:

It's like, what do you, what do you mean?

Andrew:

You know, Dr. Bernstein,

Andrew:

where's Kantianism in the, in the Fountainhead?

Andrew:

Well,

Andrew:

you know, as I, as, as I pointed out, you know, in the modern world and now, and

Andrew:

nowadays there's an awful lot of second handers.

Andrew:

I mean, Peter Keating,

Andrew:

the, the conformist.

Andrew:

There's a lot of people who recognise Peter.

Andrew:

You know, I taught, I taught the Fountainhead, you know, to my business ethics, you know,

Andrew:

classes at Marymount College for many years.

Andrew:

It was a woman's school and it was, it was weekend college.

Andrew:

So adults and, you know, so the, so one of the, one of the women comes running into class

Andrew:

one day, you know, I don't, she's maybe in her 30s, you know,

Andrew:

working in corporate America, swinging a copy of the fountain and she sings out, my boss is

Andrew:

Peter Keating.

Andrew:

You know,

Andrew:

there's a lot of, that's a very, he's a very recognisable type of, you know, conformist and

Andrew:

a kiss up.

Andrew:

So why are there so many people in the modern

Andrew:

world?

Andrew:

I raised the question,

Andrew:

was it, was it always this way in, you know, in the,

Andrew:

in the history, in the history of the Republic, going back to the American

Andrew:

Revolution, there were a lot of Americans, not all, but a lot of Americans who said no to the

Andrew:

British crown.

Andrew:

They didn't, they didn't kiss up to authority.

Andrew:

They didn't, they didn't just go along with

Andrew:

what the king or parliament said.

Andrew:

You know, a lot of them were pioneers, were

Andrew:

rugged individualists, went out, you know, went out into the wilderness in a virgin

Andrew:

wilderness trying to build a farm,

Andrew:

having to fight off hostile, hostile Indian tribes at, at times and so on.

Andrew:

You know, they seem to be a lot more individualistic types who willing to go by

Andrew:

their own judgement and didn't want a powerful government.

Andrew:

Right.

Andrew:

There's a lot of opposition ratifying the US

Andrew:

Constitution because they said we just fought a war to fight off a powerful government.

Andrew:

We don't want to establish a powerful federal government now where we have to listen to

Andrew:

whatever the government says.

Andrew:

You know, they wanted to go by, you know, live by their own judgement.

Andrew:

So I, I don't know if there was as many, you know, second handers in the, in the American,

Andrew:

you know, back then, in America back then as you would say.

Andrew:

Well if so what happened?

Andrew:

Well, I think you know, Kantian,

Andrew:

Hegelian, Marxist philosophy is,

Andrew:

is what happened.

Andrew:

And I, you know, I traced that in the story

Andrew:

that Kant's philosophy is basically,

Andrew:

you know, truth is, is, is decided by human beings.

Andrew:

I mean I, you know, it's not based on our ideas don't have to conform to outer facts.

Andrew:

Right? That, that truth is, is basically the

Andrew:

collective subjective.

Andrew:

It's the, it's the will of the, you know, vox populi, vox day, right?

Andrew:

The will, the voice of the people is, is the voice of God that you know.

Andrew:

And if you trace it through German philosophy,

Andrew:

Hegel, you know, inherits that from Kant and, and argues that well,

Andrew:

truth varies from society to society.

Andrew:

Truth is what the people say,

Andrew:

but it varies from era to era and from society to society and so on.

Andrew:

And Marx adds that even within society there's warring subgroups which he defines in economic

Andrew:

terms the rich versus the poor, the owning class versus the working class.

Andrew:

And truth is a group oriented concept.

Andrew:

You know, the working class has a different

Andrew:

truth than the owning class does.

Andrew:

You know,

Andrew:

in Hegel, you know, the German people have a different truth than the non German, you know,

Andrew:

people, you know, and, and so on.

Andrew:

So truth is, truth is social.

Andrew:

It's, it's established,

Andrew:

it's established by the, by the group.

Andrew:

And so then what's an individual to do in the face of this?

Andrew:

Well, you, there's three possibilities, right? You could conform,

Andrew:

you can rebel or you can seek to rule.

Andrew:

You conform against the, you can conform to

Andrew:

the group, you could rebel against the group or you can seek to rule the group.

Andrew:

And in the Fountainhead, Ayn Rand shows all three of these brilliantly.

Andrew:

Peter Keating,

Andrew:

you know, he just, he,

Andrew:

the power of the group.

Andrew:

He wants adulation, he wants admiration, he wants respect, he wants people to look up to

Andrew:

it.

Andrew:

He doesn't want to be a great architect, he

Andrew:

wants people to think he's a great architect.

Andrew:

You know, the power of the group is dominant in his life.

Andrew:

He'll kiss up, you know, to, to gain,

Andrew:

to gain the adulation,

Andrew:

you know, from the group that, that, that he creates.

Andrew:

He's like a drug addict.

Andrew:

Lois Cook, on the other hand,

Andrew:

you know, you know, the non conform, she poo, she's spicy,

Andrew:

she spends her life defying and she's really a colourful character.

Andrew:

I like Lois Cook, you know, foam dome in the mouth.

Andrew:

Yo, she's writing word salad,

Andrew:

you know, telling the, telling the,

Andrew:

the, the establishment to kiss off, that you, yo, you admire, you know, Dostoyevsky or

Andrew:

Tolstoy or Shakespeare or all these brilliant writers.

Andrew:

Well, I'm gonna spit in their face and I'm just gonna throw you word salad.

Andrew:

You know, like James Joyce in real life does in the Infinity Wake, where he just throws

Andrew:

letters together.

Andrew:

You know,

Andrew:

they're not words in any, any language.

Andrew:

You know, she's spitting in the face of the literary establishment and of all, and of all

Andrew:

of literary history that admires these great, these great writers who use words to,

Andrew:

brilliantly to, you know, convey meaning and everything.

Andrew:

And she tells Keating, we're going to build on the Bowery, she said,

Andrew:

which is New York City.

Andrew:

Skid row.

Andrew:

It's where all the alcoholics end up, you know, the drunken bums.

Andrew:

And we're going to build.

Andrew:

She had, she's made money.

Andrew:

She could build a house in the most exclusive neighbourhoods of New York City, but she

Andrew:

chooses skid row, you know, the Bowery.

Andrew:

And she says, Keating, I want the ugliest

Andrew:

house.

Andrew:

And we're going to build the ugliest house and no electricity.

Andrew:

Who the hell is Thomas Edison anyway? You know, she says,

Andrew:

you know, Keating goes the ugliest house.

Andrew:

You know, Keating can't, can't quite get himself to do that because he wants

Andrew:

admiration.

Andrew:

But Lois Cook wants to, in fact, he wants to spit.

Andrew:

She says, in so many words.

Andrew:

They all strive for beauty and for elegance

Andrew:

and for good looks.

Andrew:

Let's spit in all their faces.

Andrew:

Let's be gods, let's be ugly.

Andrew:

And she wants to, you know, stick it to the bourgeoisie.

Andrew:

She wants to, she, you know, the conformist finds out what other People want or think in

Andrew:

order to go along with them.

Andrew:

The non conformist finds out what other people want or think in order to spit in their face.

Andrew:

But both of their lives are dominated by the group.

Andrew:

You know,

Andrew:

want to obey one, to rebel.

Andrew:

Unlike Howard Rourke,

Andrew:

who doesn't care what the group thinks.

Andrew:

He's looking at nature.

Andrew:

He's not looking at society for truth or what people believe.

Andrew:

He's looking at nature for facts.

Andrew:

He's on an Aristotelian method.

Andrew:

And then there's Tui.

Andrew:

Well, if the group has all his power,

Andrew:

you know, then the idea will be get control of the group,

Andrew:

rule the group,

Andrew:

gain power over the group.

Andrew:

And there's Tui, the power lustre.

Andrew:

And he says to Keating, remember this confession speech at the end?

Andrew:

He says, peter, he says,

Andrew:

he says, I'm more, I'm, I'm less independent than you or I'm more dependent, you know, than

Andrew:

you are.

Andrew:

Because in ruling the group I have.

Andrew:

What, what do I need to do?

Andrew:

Well, to get your obedience, I have to, you know,

Andrew:

tell.

Andrew:

I have to, you know, tell you.

Andrew:

Oh, Peter, you're such a great architect.

Andrew:

I gotta, you know,

Andrew:

roll over, Peter, I'll scratch your belly, you know.

Andrew:

I have to.

Andrew:

You'll have to.

Andrew:

I have to keep you satisfied.

Andrew:

To get control of your girlfriend Katie

Andrew:

Halsey.

Andrew:

I have to constantly give her altruistic pep

Andrew:

talks.

Andrew:

I have to constantly, you know, cajole the

Andrew:

group and tell, you know, build them up in their own minds and tell them, organise, let

Andrew:

us organise.

Andrew:

Let us organise.

Andrew:

I have to, I have to, you know,

Andrew:

I have to build them up.

Andrew:

I have to give them strokes.

Andrew:

I have to constantly,

Andrew:

you know,

Andrew:

trying.

Andrew:

I have to keep them satisfied in order to gain

Andrew:

their obedience.

Andrew:

I'm more of a kiss up to the group than you are.

Andrew:

And he's right.

Andrew:

And, and iron Ran Ayn Rand shows the, the only three logical possibilities once the Kantian,

Andrew:

Hegelian,

Andrew:

Marxist philosophy is, is dominant.

Andrew:

If that's, if you hold that philosophy, that,

Andrew:

that the group is all powerful, the group is God.

Andrew:

On her society has gone on earth.

Andrew:

Society sets the term.

Andrew:

And most people believe that.

Andrew:

I ask my students,

Andrew:

where do moral laws come from? Few of them say God.

Andrew:

Few of them are religious.

Andrew:

Most of them are secular.

Andrew:

They'll say from society,

Andrew:

you know, they'll never say.

Andrew:

Nobody says from nature, you know, and, and the requirements of human nature and human

Andrew:

life.

Andrew:

They, most of them say from the state, from society.

Andrew:

And that's what the modern world, that Kantian, Hegelian,

Andrew:

Marxist philosophy is very Prevalent.

Andrew:

And if you hold that philosophy, then there's only three possibilities for what an

Andrew:

individual can.

Andrew:

Can do.

Andrew:

Confronted by the power of the people, the power of society.

Andrew:

You can obey, you can rebel, or you can seek to rule.

Andrew:

And iron man.

Andrew:

There's Kant.

Andrew:

There's the Kantianism in the found.

Andrew:

Howard Rook.

Andrew:

Howard Rook.

Andrew:

Howard Rook is the Aristotelian Objectivism.

Andrew:

Just push aside that whole construct.

Andrew:

Society doesn't have that kind of power.

Andrew:

Truth comes from nature.

Andrew:

Looking at 1, 1 exam, 1 example of many.

Andrew:

He walks out of the.

Andrew:

That meeting with the dean and he's thinking

Andrew:

about the.

Andrew:

You know, he's 21.

Andrew:

He's thinking about the principal behind the dean.

Andrew:

He knows it's important.

Andrew:

He's got to figure it out.

Andrew:

And then he gets outside and he sees the sunlight striking the stones,

Andrew:

you know,

Andrew:

outside the.

Andrew:

On the outside of the building.

Andrew:

And he forgets about the dean and society and

Andrew:

all the irrationality of many members of society.

Andrew:

And he just thinks of how beautiful the sunlight is on the stone and what he could

Andrew:

build with that.

Andrew:

9 Man showing us the mind of an Aristotelian, the mind of an Objectivist.

Andrew:

He's not primarily concerned with society.

Andrew:

He knows he's got to figure this out because

Andrew:

he's got to live with people.

Andrew:

But his fundamental orientation is not towards society, it's toward nature.

Andrew:

That's the source of truth, the.

Andrew:

The observations of nature.

Andrew:

And that's the way Rock's mind works.

Andrew:

There's the.

Andrew:

He's.

Andrew:

He's the.

Andrew:

That's.

Andrew:

That's the source of his firsthand in this.

Andrew:

It's his mind and nature,

Andrew:

not his mind.

Andrew:

Looking at society and trying to, you know, and granting to society this kind of power and

Andrew:

figure.

Andrew:

Well, what do I do when the society has this

Andrew:

kind of power?

Andrew:

There's the,

Andrew:

There's. What I think makes that essay fascinating is the Kantianism versus the

Andrew:

Aristotelian Objectivism in the conflict of the story.

Blair:

Very good, sir.

Blair:

Very good.

Blair:

I do have to wrap this up here very shortly, but I want to go back to one more.

Blair:

I want to make a comment.

Blair:

Speaking for myself,

Blair:

for me, and it's been this way for a long time.

Blair:

I would call Plato, Kant, Hegel, Marx.

Blair:

I've called them the four horsemen of the Apocalypse,

Blair:

if you will.

Blair:

I see them in black hoods,

Blair:

skeletal hands on the reins of this,

Blair:

you know,

Blair:

horrible beast, writing,

Blair:

you know, writing roughshod over civilization and that.

Blair:

Yeah. I'm going to go back to our.

Blair:

One of your earlier essays, and then I'll have

Blair:

to wrap it up, sadly.

Blair:

But,

Blair:

well, we can always have a.

Andrew:

Follow up show if you guys want.

Martin:

Yes, we have to do it.

Blair:

Several more I want to talk about.

Blair:

Believe me, there's several more.

Blair:

But for this episode I want to go back to Religion versus Morality.

Blair:

And for me, I'll say this again, speaking for myself,

Blair:

I've come to the conclusion that religion is death worship.

Blair:

Now, I'm sorry if that offends people, but that's the way it is.

Blair:

Can you extrapolate on that essay for us, Addie?

Blair:

And then, then we'll have to wrap it up.

Andrew:

Religion versus Morality.

Andrew:

Yeah, that was a talk I gave for many years

Andrew:

when I was working for the Ayn Rand Institute.

Andrew:

And yeah, and then I, you know, I, I converted

Andrew:

it into an essay for the objective standard and then,

Andrew:

and, and then for this book.

Andrew:

And what it shows is that every, every

Andrew:

religion opposes every major moral principle that, that human life,

Andrew:

human life depends on.

Andrew:

You look at the, the rational principles that Ayn Rand established.

Andrew:

That human life is the standard, is the, is the standard of moral value for one,

Andrew:

two,

Andrew:

that egoism.

Andrew:

Every, every living being, and including every

Andrew:

human being must seek to fulfil its, fulfil itself,

Andrew:

to seek flourishing life in, you know, in, in Aristotelian terms, you know, seek to gain the

Andrew:

values that its life depends.

Andrew:

Every individual organism,

Andrew:

especially, you know, human beings who must do it deliciously, you know, by choice, must,

Andrew:

must seek to gain the values that their life depends on.

Andrew:

And then that rationality is man's fundamental means of survival.

Andrew:

These are the three key moral principles that human life depends on.

Andrew:

And religion opposes every one of them.

Andrew:

So if followed religiously,

Andrew:

you know, it makes human life impossible.

Andrew:

So take them one at a time.

Andrew:

Man's life has the standard of value.

Andrew:

No,

Andrew:

God's will is the standard of value.

Andrew:

Whatever God says goes.

Andrew:

Now this is most, you know, how this opposes human life is most clear in Islam.

Andrew:

Islam is the most, you know, Christianity.

Andrew:

We can, we'll leave Judaism aside, you know,

Andrew:

because it's a tiny little religion and, and a great deal of its influence has been on, on

Andrew:

the development of Christianity, which Christianity is, you know, gigantically

Andrew:

important.

Andrew:

The Christianity has been,

Andrew:

you know, like I told Dinesh d' Souza when we debated this topic years ago,

Andrew:

Christianity has been emasculated.

Andrew:

You know, it's been defanged.

Blair:

I think it was right.

Andrew:

Yes, yeah, it was defanged by the rational principles of the alignment.

Andrew:

But real Christianity, which you see in the Middle Ages and the, and the, and the Dark

Andrew:

Ages,

Andrew:

and you know, Christianity has been defect.

Andrew:

Islam is not defect.

Andrew:

Islam is un unreconstituted religion.

Andrew:

It makes the claim the clearest example of how

Andrew:

religion is anti life.

Andrew:

But a thousand years ago, Christianity would

Andrew:

have been a very good example of, of this too.

Andrew:

Maybe not as virulent as Islam, but you know, that's damning it with faint praise.

Andrew:

So God, God very often didn't care about, you know, innocent human, innocent human life.

Blair:

You know, I mean it's more dangerous today because of the nuclear weapons, frankly.

Blair:

Yeah.

Andrew:

And that's why I know applauded President Trump and taking out the, hopefully

Andrew:

took out the Iranian nuclear facilities or set it back by, by years of development because

Andrew:

that regime can't be trusted, you know, in any way, shape or form.

Andrew:

But anyhow,

Andrew:

look at some of the biblical stories that the religionists,

Andrew:

you know, salute Moses.

Andrew:

Moses descends from Sinai with the ten

Andrew:

Commandments.

Andrew:

He's been gone for a while.

Andrew:

So the Hebrews, God's chosen people,

Andrew:

a worshipping, a golden molten calf.

Andrew:

And if I remember the story correctly, Moses and the children of Levi slay like 3000 of

Andrew:

God's own people for, for flouting a commandment that they haven't yet received.

Andrew:

Right.

Andrew:

The first,

Andrew:

the first commandment states that, you know, I am the Lord thy God, thou shalt have no other

Andrew:

gods before me.

Andrew:

They haven't even received it yet,

Andrew:

but they're over.

Andrew:

They're killed.

Andrew:

Thousands of them are killed, you know, for violating a commandment they haven't received,

Andrew:

you know, and so on.

Andrew:

God requires Abraham.

Andrew:

Why is Abraham's submission to murder his son Isaac?

Andrew:

Now God backs off on this and he spares Isaac, but only after Abraham shows he'll do it.

Andrew:

Abraham will do it.

Andrew:

He will.

Andrew:

God's will comes first before the life of his

Andrew:

son.

Andrew:

Once, once Abraham is willing to do it, God

Andrew:

relents.

Andrew:

But he did require Abraham's willingness to

Andrew:

kill his son.

Andrew:

So we can go on and on with these kinds of biblical stories.

Andrew:

God's will is the basis of morality, not the requirements of human life.

Andrew:

So there's one major opposition, egoism.

Andrew:

Well, I mean that's easy to show that religion

Andrew:

opposes that.

Andrew:

You know,

Andrew:

it's over and over again we're enjoying to God comes first and other people come second.

Andrew:

You're not, you're not supposed to be concerned with yourself.

Andrew:

You sacrifice you for one for God,

Andrew:

you know,

Andrew:

and two for other people.

Andrew:

And it's easier, it's easier for camel, you know, to pass through the eye of a needle and

Andrew:

for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.

Andrew:

Jesus says he doesn't, he doesn't distinguish how the rich man became rich.

Andrew:

The rich man might have been very hard work, very productive and earned as well.

Andrew:

Doesn't matter.

Andrew:

He's rich.

Andrew:

He's not going to enter the kingdom of God.

Andrew:

Right.

Andrew:

The last shall be first,

Andrew:

Jesus says.

Andrew:

So we're constantly enjoying to, to sacrifice

Andrew:

ourselves,

Andrew:

whether to serve God or, Or serve, but with Mother.

Andrew:

Mother Teresa said very famously,

Andrew:

and I don't think she coined this term, I think the Christians said it before,

Andrew:

but she said, you know, you have to give till it hurts.

Andrew:

He said, give till it hurts.

Andrew:

You know, how about, you know, we give to other human beings because we want to give to

Andrew:

them, because it makes us joyous, it makes us happy to give to my child, to give to my wife

Andrew:

or my husband or my closest friends or even to strangers who I assume are good people because

Andrew:

I don't have any knowledge that they aren't.

Andrew:

You know, it's joyous to, to give to good people.

Andrew:

No,

Andrew:

that's not,

Andrew:

that's not what Mother Teresa said.

Andrew:

You got to give till it hurts.

Andrew:

Well,

Andrew:

that speaks for itself.

Andrew:

You know, what's the old legal expression?

Andrew:

The thing speaks for itself.

Andrew:

You don't have to say anything else about that

Andrew:

except kiss off.

Andrew:

I'm not giving till it hurts.

Andrew:

I'm giving the people because it makes me happy.

Andrew:

Like to teach my students.

Andrew:

It makes me happy to do it.

Andrew:

Doesn't hurt.

Andrew:

Right,

Andrew:

but the last point, of course, is reason as man's instrument of survival, which Iron man

Andrew:

shows brilliantly.

Andrew:

And that was shrugged.

Andrew:

No, religion enjoins us to have go by faith, not by reason,

Andrew:

and has burnt many rational people at the stake for rationally criticising the faith.

Andrew:

So all three major moral principles that human life the.

Andrew:

Depends on or opposed by religion.

Blair:

All right, so this.

Blair:

My battery just went dead on my laptop or it's

Blair:

fading very, very fast.

Blair:

So,

Blair:

yeah, I have to, I have to end this.

Blair:

Martin, do you want to wrap up real quick?

Martin:

Yes, I will, I will do that.

Martin:

And we have to have a backup plan, but for

Martin:

next time and, and we'll talk more about your work with your book.

Martin:

And also you could end with saying where could they.

Martin:

The listener could find it.

Andrew:

Oh, thank you.

Andrew:

Thank you, Martin.

Andrew:

This is the book Amazon.

Andrew:

Maybe you guys could put, put the Amazon link

Andrew:

to the Amazon page.

Blair:

Absolutely, yeah.

Andrew:

You can certainly find it on, on Amazon.

Andrew:

Title Aristotle vs Religion and other Essays.

Andrew:

And as for me, you know, my, my website is

Andrew:

andrewbernstein.net.

Andrew:

you could andrewbernstein.net you can find my

Andrew:

books on on Amazon if you're interested in where is it my hard boiled detective series

Andrew:

Tony the Tony just series his Red Beat Village again you can find that on Amazon and The

Andrew:

website is tonyjust.net again.

Blair:

All right.

Blair:

All right.

Andrew:

So I'm not you can find me on the, you know, Facebook and Twitter and everything.

Andrew:

So I'm not hard to find.

Martin:

Great.

Blair:

Very good.

Blair:

Well, ladies and gentlemen, we've had the the

Blair:

great pleasure of handy of having Andrew Bernstein on is our guest today.

Blair:

Andy, as always, thanks for manning the.

Andrew:

Foxhole with us,

Andrew:

Martin and Blair.

Andrew:

It's always great to be in the foxhole with

Andrew:

you guys.

Andrew:

So thanks again for having me on.

Andrew:

I look forward to being on with you guys again.

Martin:

Yes, thanks.

Blair:

All right.

Martin:

Talk soon.

Martin:

Bye for now.

Blair:

All right, bye.

Andrew:

Bye guys.

Andrew:

Sam, sa.

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