Ayaan Hirsi Ali: Why I Am a Christian

In conversation with Richard Dawkins June 3, 2024

Eric Lee

Nov 15, 2024

“G.K Chesterton was right.” — Ayaan Hirsi Ali

So, what took her so long?

“Tradition means giving votes to the most obscure of all classes — our ancestors. It is the democracy of the dead. Tradition refuses to submit to the small and arrogant oligarchy of those who merely happen to be walking around.” — G.K. Chesterton 1874–1936 CE, author, philosopher, Christian apologist, and literary and art critic
“Without a gentle contempt for education no man’s education is complete.” — G.K. Chesterton
“Do not be so open-minded that your brains fall out.” ― G.K. Chesterton
“Poets have been mysteriously silent on the subject of cheese.” ― G.K. Chesterton
“Without education, we are in a horrible and deadly danger of taking educated people seriously.” ― G.K. Chesterton
“Fallacies do not cease to be fallacies because they become fashions.” ― G.K. Chesterton
“There are two ways of getting home; and one of them is to stay there.” — G.K. Chesterton
“The man who lives in a small community lives in a much larger world. He knows much more of the fierce variety and uncompromising divergences of men… In a large community, we can choose our companions. In a small community, our companions are chosen for us.” — G.K. Chesterton
“To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it.” ― G.K. Chesterton
“Angels can fly because they take themselves lightly.” — G.K. Chesterton
“We are perishing for want of wonder, not for want of wonders.” — G.K. Chesterton
“It isn’t that they can’t see the solution. It is that they can’t see the problem.” — G.K. Chesterton
“Fairy tales do not tell children the dragons exist. Children already know that dragons exist. Fairy tales tell children the dragons can be killed.” — G.K. Chesterton
“Among the rich you will never find a really generous man even by accident… they are egotistic, secretive, dry as old bones. To be smart enough to get all that money you must be dull enough to want it.” — G.K. Chesterton
“All men are ordinary men; the extraordinary men are those who know it.” — G.K. Chesterton
“We do not need to get good laws to restrain bad people. We need to get good people to restrain us from bad laws.” — G.K. Chesterton
“It is an act of faith to assert that our thoughts have any relation to reality at all.” — G.K. Chesterton
“One sees great things from the valley; only small things from the peak.” — G.K. Chesterton
“The true soldier fights not because he hates what is in front of him, but because he loves what is behind him.” ― G.K. Chesterton
“I am not absentminded. It is the presence of mind that makes me unaware of everything else.” ― G.K. Chesterton
“There are no uninteresting things, only uninterested people.” ― G.K. Chesterton
“There is the great lesson of ‘Beauty and the Beast,’ that a thing must be loved before it is lovable.” ― G.K. Chesterton
“To love means loving the unlovable. To forgive means pardoning the unpardonable. Faith means believing the unbelievable. Hope means hoping when everything seems hopeless.” ― G.K. Chesterton
“It [feminism] is mixed up with a muddled idea that women are free when they serve their employers but slaves when they help their husbands.” ― G.K. Chesterton
“The traveler sees what he sees. The tourist sees what he has come to see.” ― G.K. Chesterton
“There are two ways to get enough. One is to continue to accumulate more and more. The other is to desire less.” ― G.K. Chesterton
“Religious liberty might be supposed to mean that everybody is free to discuss religion. In practice it means that hardly anybody is allowed to mention it.” ― G.K. Chesterton
“If there were no God, there would be no atheists.” ― G.K. Chesterton

Oh, but G.K. was also wrong. I hate when that happens.

AI Summary

Richard Dawkins vs Ayaan Hirsi Ali The God Debate

Ayaan Hirsi Ali, a former Muslim and prominent atheist, revealed her conversion to Christianity after a decade of severe depression and anxiety. She attributed her transformation to a spiritual awakening and a sense of connection to a higher power. Richard Dawkins, a renowned atheist, expressed skepticism about her claims, emphasizing the irrationality of Christian tenets. The debate highlighted the clash between Christianity and Islam, with Hirsi Ali arguing that Christianity offers a moral framework essential for Western civilization, while Dawkins stressed the importance of rationality and secular humanism. Both agreed on the threat posed by radical Islam and the need for a counter-narrative.

Action Items

[ ] Explore the differences between the holy books and core teachings of Christianity and Islam in more depth.
[ ] Develop a stronger counter-message and organized effort from secular humanists and atheists to provide moral and spiritual guidance to young people.
[ ] Follow up on the observation that the decline of Christianity has created a moral vacuum that is being filled by concerning ideologies, and consider ways to address this.

Outline

Introduction and Background of Participants

Moderator introduces Ayaan Hirsi Ali, highlighting her extraordinary life story, including her escape from Somalia and rise to prominence in the Netherlands.
Moderator mentions Ayaan’s bestselling book “Infidel” and her association with the new Atheism movement.
Ayaan announces her recent conversion to Christianity, which was widely covered in the media.
Moderator introduces Richard Dawkins, noting his significant contributions to the atheist movement and his bestselling books.
Richard Dawkins wrote an open letter to Ayaan expressing disbelief at her conversion to Christianity.

Ayaan’s Personal Journey to Christianity

Ayaan shares her personal crisis, including intense depression, anxiety, and self-loathing that led her to seek help from a therapist.
She describes her experience of “spiritual bankruptcy” and how praying during a low point in her life led to a profound transformation.
Ayaan explains that her conversion was not accompanied by dramatic experiences but rather a deep connection to something higher.
She emphasizes the humility and subjective nature of her newfound faith, which has brought a sense of purpose and joy back into her life.

Richard Dawkins’ Reaction and Philosophical Differences

Richard Dawkins questions Ayaan’s acceptance of Christian teachings, including the literal belief in Jesus as the Son of God and his resurrection.
Ayaan responds by explaining that her belief is a personal choice and that she finds the teachings of Jesus to be a powerful story of redemption and rebirth.
Richard expresses skepticism about the literal truth of Christian beliefs but acknowledges the emotional impact of certain religious stories.
Ayaan argues that Christianity offers a moral and cultural framework that has contributed to the flourishing of Western civilization.

Debate on the Role of Religion and Morality

Dawkins criticizes Christianity for its focus on sin and original sin, but Ayaan counters that Christianity also teaches love and redemption.
Ayaan shares her experiences of being protected by armed men due to her criticisms of Islam, contrasting this with the non-violent responses of Christians.
Richard acknowledges the cultural and moral differences between Christianity and Islam, but he remains skeptical of the literal truth of religious beliefs.
Ayaan emphasizes the importance of faith in providing meaning and purpose, especially in the face of human suffering and existential questions.

The Impact of Religion on Society and Culture

Ayaan argues that the demonization of Christianity in modern society has left a moral vacuum that is being filled by other ideologies.
Richard acknowledges the cultural and societal impact of religion but remains committed to the idea that rationality and science should guide moral decisions.
Ayaan criticizes the secular humanism promoted by atheists for not providing a coherent moral framework, leading to a generation that is morally lost.
Richard admits to regretting his role in the new Atheism movement and acknowledges the need for a counter message to the ideologies that are gaining ground.

The Clash of Civilizations and the Role of Religion

Ayaan warns of the growing influence of radical Islam and wokism in Western societies, which she sees as a threat to Western values and freedoms.
Richard acknowledges the moral crisis but remains skeptical of the need for a religious solution, emphasizing the importance of rationality and enlightenment values.
Ayaan calls for a counter-activism to combat the ideologies that are gaining ground, suggesting that a strong faith can provide a bulwark against these forces.
Richard agrees that there is a moral crisis but remains committed to the idea that rationality and science should guide moral decisions, not religious beliefs.

The Final Word and Conclusion

Ayaan emphasizes the importance of standing up for one’s beliefs and defending the values of Western civilization against the ideologies that threaten it.
Richard acknowledges the moral crisis but remains committed to the idea that rationality and science should guide moral decisions, not religious beliefs.
The conversation ends with a call for a more nuanced approach to addressing the moral and cultural challenges facing society today.
Both participants agree on the need for a counter message to the ideologies that are gaining ground, but they differ on the role of religion in providing that message.

Transcript

Moderator 0:01
There can be no more fitting end to these incredible two days than to bring together these two people, both of whom I and I think many of us here admire greatly and who have a real, very significant topic to discuss. It’s hard to think of a more significant one. In fact.

Moderator 0:26
Ayaan Hirsi, Ali, for those people who are not familiar, has had an extraordinary life story. She was born and raised in Somalia, at which point she was enthusiastic member of the Muslim Brotherhood. She then escaped and became a refugee into the Netherlands, where she rose to become a top ranking politician and a best selling author. Her book Infidel has sold many, many millions of copies over the decades, and during that time and in the years since she became synonymous with the new Atheism movement. She renounced her Islamic past. And if you actually look up new Atheism, there are the four horsemen as they are known, and then straight after that is Ayanna Hirsi Ali. So she has been absolutely integral to that movement. Last autumn, some months ago, on Unherd In fact, she announced that she had become a Christian, and the world reacted. It was covered in all of the newspapers, and it was seen rightly as an incredibly significant story in the world of ideas. Richard Dawkins, who needs no further introduction, but I must, is perhaps the most famous atheist in the world.

Moderator 1:55
He his books The God Delusion The Selfish Gene, are some of the biggest selling non fiction books of all time. He has been active making the argument for the atheistic cause for decades, and when his close friend and fellow new atheist announced that she had become a Christian, he wrote an open letter to her saying, and I quote, “seriously, Ayaan, you a Christian? You are no more a Christian than I am.” We’re bringing them together for the first time to have that out and have that conversation. So please, to begin with, welcome to the stage. Richard Dawkins. And just behind that curtain, I hope is none other than Ayaan. Welcome Ayaan Hirsi Ali.

Moderator 3:28
Great to see you, Ayaan. Welcome.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali 3:30
Thank you.

Moderator 3:31
I think we have to start with the extraordinary few months you’ve just had. And for those people who haven’t been following up, just tell us the story how such a famous atheist, someone who had rejected religion, came to call herself a Christian.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali 3:50
Oh, so I want to say that I didn’t, like many people who come to faith, I didn’t see big banging lights, and I didn’t have any of those spectacular experiences that some people share. I wish I did, but I didn’t. I had a personal crisis. I lived for about a decade with intense depression and anxiety, self loathing. I hit rock bottom. I went to a place where I actually didn’t want to live anymore, but wasn’t brave enough to take my own life, and so I was self medicating. I had, over a long period of time, seen psychiatrists, other doctors. I was trying to understand my condition and trying to treat it with the help of pure evidence based science. And in January, February of last year [2023], I saw one therapist who said, perhaps it’s something else that you have, and she described it as spiritual bankruptcy, and that resonated with me. And having reached a place where I had absolutely nothing to lose, I prayed, and I prayed desperately, and for me, that was a turning point, and what happened after that is a miracle in its own right, I feel connected to something higher and greater than myself. I feel my zest for life is back, and that experience has filled me with the humility I have to say, and it is something that’s very subjective. It’s extremely difficult to explain. I’m trying to work, you know, get into the details, the granular details of how I got there in a book, but that is a short, that’s, you know, the shortest story then I can tell.

Moderator 6:38
Let’s go to to Richard Dawkins reaction, because….

Richard Dawkins 6:42
That’s a moving personal story, but to call herself a Christian is a bit different. I mean, a Christian has to believe in something, and I mean any, well, you go to church now, and you listen to the vicar, and do you kind of notice what a lot of nonsense he talks?

Richard Dawkins 7:12
I mean, do you really take it seriously that Jesus is the Son of God? Jesus rose from the dead. Jesus was born of a virgin, and that’s part of Christianity.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali 7:24
So, I think because you, and I know you very well, we’ve been friends for a long time, and in fact, in some ways, I think of you as a mentor. I would say you’re coming at this from a place of there is nothing. And what has happened to me is, I think I have accepted there is something. And when you accept that there is something, there is a powerful entity for me, the God that that turned me around. I think what the vicar is saying no longer sounds nonsensical. It makes a great deal of sense. And not only does it make a great deal of sense, it’s also layered with the wisdom of millennia. And so, like you, I did mock faith in general, and probably Christianity in particular. But I don’t do that anymore. And again, that is where the humility comes into it is it doesn’t seem in 2024 after I went through that experience, it doesn’t seem nonsensical to me, and it doesn’t. I don’t mock it. I think I’ve been I’ve come down to my knees to say, perhaps those people who’ve always had faith have something that we who lost faith don’t have. And people who have faith also like the woman who told me, Well, you’ve reached, you’ve tried everything, and you’ve lost hope, you’ve lost faith, try it, pray. I think just in that one word, there is so much wisdom and that it. I am suffering and I’m staggering to say, I’m just trying to say, no, it’s not stupid. It’s, in fact, it’s clever and it’s wise.

Richard Dawkins 9:33
So you believe in some kind of higher power which is comforting you and you react. You obviously reacting from an Islamic past and and I know that from what you’ve written, that part of what you feel is Christianity is a bulwark against Islam, which is the quite separate thing from what you’ve been now saying. But you stand by that. I mean, you, that’s part of what you’re saying, and I accept that, and I support that. That’s why I’ve called you a political Christian. But from what you’ve just said, it sounds you are more than just a political Christian. I mean, it sounds like you actually believe it.

Moderator 10:18
What is your response to those specific questions of Richard, when the vicar is saying that Jesus is the Son of God, literally, not figuratively, how do you square that with your highly trained rational mind?

Ayaan Hirsi Ali 10:34
Well, it is again different planes of perception. So I choose to accept Jesus Christ, the teachings of Jesus Christ, the story of Jesus Christ, I choose to accept that. So on the personal level, the rewards I get, very subjective again, but mine and through choice, which is separate from where I think that aside from my personal experience, the history of Western civilization is mainly Christian, and that the external forces, for instance, the spread of Islam, nonviolently or violently, and the challenge of Islam and the message of Islam to Western civilization can be counted and should be counted with the message of Western civilization, which is essentially Christian. And in that sense, I think there are more people who agree with me, but that is on the societal level, and then on the civilizational level, I think that every moral, you’ve used yourself, Richard, the phrase lately that there is moral Christianity and there is cultural Christianity. And when moral and cultural Christianity collides with moral and cultural Islam or moral and cultural Confucianism or cultural authoritarianism. I think then perhaps we’re on the same page about that might be a way of countering it, but on the personal level, yes, I choose to believe in God. And I think there we might say, Let’s agree to disagree.

Richard Dawkins 12:22
Could I didn’t hear that.

Moderator 12:25
She’s saying, let’s agree to disagree on the details. I mean,

Richard Dawkins 12:29
More than just details. I mean, okay, I want to say two different things. Let’s take the moral thing first. Islam is a nasty religion. I think we agree about that, but Christianity is not all that nice, either. And when you think about Christianity, Christianity is obsessed with sin. St Augustine said that we are all, we all inherit the sin of Adam, well, because he didn’t exist. But so we inherit Original Sin. Original Sin came down in the semen. Jesus was not conceived with semen. That’s why he’s clear of sin. His mother, Mary, had to be clear of sin as well, so she had to have an immaculate conception. This is all obvious nonsense. This is all theological bullshit, and the idea that humanity is born in sin and has to be cured of sin by Jesus being crucified, Jesus being punished for all our sins, that is a morally very unpleasant idea. I’m sure you must agree about that.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali 13:59
I find that Christianity is actually obsessed with love, and that the figure the teachings of, the teaching of Christ, as I see it, and again, I’m a brand new Christian. But what I am finding out, which is the opposite of growing up as a Muslim, the message of Islam, but the message of Christianity I get is that it’s a message of love, it’s a message of redemption, and it’s a story of renewal and rebirth, and so Jesus dying and rising again for me symbolizes that story. And in a small way, I felt like I had died and I was reborn. And that story of redemption and rebirth, I think, makes Christianity actually a very, very powerful story for the human condition and human existence and the pain of suffering, but also our internal, the recognition of what you call sin, but perhaps the character defects that both good and evil are there, but that both good and evil are in us. I think those teachings in Christianity are far more powerful and have led to, I think, the flourishing of Western civilization compared to, say, growing up as a Muslim, when I was taught that really the only way for you to be faithful is to fear, naked fear, and to have these sets of obligations which you basically obey. And that was very much about power, about it was centered around Hell fire and all of these other things. And so Christianity, as I experienced, I’ll give you an example, when I was an atheist, and I was going all over both the United States and all over Europe, mocking Christians, making fun of them, making fun of faith, as you’re doing now, dear Richard, I was walking with six to seven men at any given time protecting me, armed from things that I said that were offensive to Muslims. Of Muslims thought were offensive to them, Christians were writing me letters saying, you know, we’re going to pray for you. You’re misguided. And I think that alone defines, for me, the distinction between Christianity in general, main, mainstream Christianity, and mainstream Islam.

Richard Dawkins 16:48
Well, I must say, I’ve never met a vicar that I didn’t like. I mean, they’re always very, very nice people, yeah, but, but nevertheless, the stuff they believe is obvious nonsense, and you have to take the whole package, because when you talked about Jesus rising from the dead, you don’t believe Jesus rose from the dead. Surely,

Ayaan Hirsi Ali 17:11
I choose to believe that Jesus rose from the dead.

Richard Dawkins 17:13
You choose to believe it.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali 17:14
Yes, and that is a matter of choice, and it’s a matter, it’s, I think we it has to go back to, is there something or is there nothing? And I think you start with there is nothing. And yes, for years I agreed with you, there’s nothing. But if you come round to the idea that there might be something much more powerful than we are, something that caused everything else, then something like Jesus rising out of the dead, or these other miracles, Jesus being born out of a virgin for that higher power is not a big deal. But again, it’s a matter of choice, and it is just different planes of perception. And I think here on this plane of perception, having been a former atheist, I don’t think this is something we’re going to resolve tonight or agree on right now, and so that is where I think it’s perhaps more interesting, even if you choose not to believe, to say, let’s at least Talk about the value of Christianity for today, for I look at these universities, the most illustrious universities of the West, and you’ve all shared with me images of young women draped in kefirs, the symbol of Hamas, performing The Muslim prayer and tell me if those kids are not morally and utterly lost and Queers for Palestine.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali 18:53
So while you and I and Steven Pinker and all of those wonderful people were locked up in our ivory towers, let’s ask ourselves what was happening on the ground, because in the last six decades, we pretty much demonized Christianity and the teachings of Christianity out of the public space, out of school, out of universities, and a vacuum occurred, and that vacuum is now being filled, As G.K. Chesterton said, not because people have come to reason, but because now they’ll believe in anything. There are very awful forces today out there that are claiming the hearts and minds and souls of these young students. And when you say there is nothing, you offer them, nothing.

Moderator 19:37
We’re getting into the bigger political, cultural question, I just feel it’s worth pressing one more time on this. What you said, agree to disagree, and I understand, having read Richard’s letter to you, that that literal belief is the bit that he can’t get past. Are you saying that you don’t literally believe those things? Do? You talked about planes of reality. Is it that you see a beauty in those things and choose to suspend your rational judgment? Or do you literally believe?

Speaker 1 20:07
Yeah, I mean, I think there is something subjective and there’s a choice. There are things that you see and perceive that a different person cannot perceive, art, music. In fact, I think you do enjoy a great deal of Christian art and music. I will look at a painting by Pollack, and I will think my six year old must have spilled all the paint on the canvas and run around. And people are crazy enough to pay millions of dollars and hang it on walls, but I’ve actually seen people be moved to tears staring at a Pollock that is a plane of perception that is real, but that’s also very, very difficult to measure, and it’s the same the way you’re moved by certain pieces of music. So the fact that I have faith, and I choose to have faith because of what I’ve experienced is just as real for me as it is for the millions of people who believe. But for me, what is even more real is, it’s the story itself, and the wisdom in that story, the morality that has come out that has evolved out of that story, the internal debates of millennia long, and everything that we inherited from it, it’s just too casual to cast that aside. And when we’ve done it, I think we have caused ourselves a great deal of damage.

Moderator 21:38
Richard having heard that story, that moving story from Ayan of clearly how her conversion has helped her, and also she’s explained in beautiful words the mode in which she believes it. Do you still say you are not a Christian?

Speaker 2 21:54
No, not at all. I came here prepared to persuade you, Ayaan, you’re not a Christian. I think you are a Christian. And I think Christianity is nonsense. You have to be. I mean, you are. You appear to be a theist. You appear to believe in some kind of higher power. Now, I think that the hypothesis of theism is the most exciting scientific hypothesis they could possibly hold in the idea that the universe was actually created by a supernatural intelligence is a dramatic, important idea. If it were true, it would completely change everything we know. We’d be living in a totally different, different different universe. Now that’s a big thing. It’s, I’m sorry, but it’s bigger than personal comfort and nice stories and things. The idea that the universe has lurking beneath it, an intelligence, a supernatural intelligence, that invented the laws of physics that invented mathematics in that is a stupendous idea, if it’s true. And to me, that simply dwarfs all talk of nobility and morality and comfort and that sort of thing.

Moderator 23:18
So, would you have preferred for your erstwhile new atheist colleague, Ayaan not to have converted having heard her story. Would you rather?

Richard Dawkins 23:27
No, no, I wouldn’t. I wouldn’t say that. I’m just saying that that it that religious belief is bigger than what gives you comfort, or it’s bigger than morality. It’s bigger than what gives you comfort. It’s bigger than than what gives you a bulwark against Islam. It’s something huge. It’s something terrific, and it’s false.

Moderator 23:51
Are you not moved at all to she mentioned planes of reality? Is it for you entirely black and white? Whether those kind of stories are true or not. It feels like Ayan is saying that she chooses to believe them because she accesses some kind of great truth via them and is less interested in the details. You’re not softened at all on that.

Speaker 2 24:15
Well, I’m softened by a personal story, and I’m softened by beautiful music. I mean, I, you know, I’m just often by St. Matthew Passion. And not Not, not just the music itself, but the story behind it. It’s a, it’s a, it’s a very moving story. And I’m moved by it in the same way as I’m moved by great fiction. It is, it is fiction and and one, of course, can be moved by fiction. I think Ayaan has described me as as the most Christian person she knows. And…

Ayaan Hirsi Ali 24:47
Yes.

Richard Dawkins 24:53
…and that may be true in certain senses, in a cultural sense. And I certainly when you when you say, excuse me, when you say, Christianity is a religion of love. Jesus, I think, was a very, very great character, a very loving character. The bad things about Christianity actually stem mostly from what came afterwards, St Paul and the other Christian apologists who came up after him.

Moderator 25:30
So you cannot allow the possibility that Ayaan has accessed a truth that you yourself have not seen.

Richard Dawkins 25:42
It is a scientific hypothesis that there is a supernatural creator, and I don’t see how you can get to that from feelings of personal comfort or feelings of political necessity, you have to get to that from from thinking,

Ayaan Hirsi Ali 26:07
And that brings us to consciousness. So first of all, the hypothesis itself, which, even if you don’t allow for self religion aside, the hypothesis of, where did all this come from, and how did it begin again? There is no consensus on that. There is no consensus on what consciousness is and what all that entails. But I think that it is on an academic level, very interesting and very rewarding to look into and explore all of these different things separately. On an academic level. On a non academic level, I think that it’s very useful, now, I hate to go back to utility, but to have all of these things connected, where, as human beings, we are material, yes, but we also are more than material. We have a sense of consciousness, and we have a range of needs. And some of these needs reason can answer, and pure science can answer, but some of these needs cannot be answered by that. And I think faith in a higher power, in God and in the story that makes sense of it all gives it meaning. Is very, very important for human beings. And the danger lies in trying to conflate these different planes and then casting aside as useful, this false. It’s useful, it’s useless, it’s unnecessary. And now we have, you know, the range of human suffering, where, as an atheist, you don’t really offer an answer, you don’t offer a prescription for this is, this is a way of life. This is the path to happiness. This is how you can deal with the challenges of existence. And atheism is an attitude. It basically says, As of now, there is no evidence to show that God exists or that an higher power exists, full stop, and you figure the rest of it out. And it’s very, very difficult to figure the rest of it out, starting from scratch. And I think faith then gives meaning and purpose. And yes, if you’re afraid of the dark, and if you’re afraid of whatever it is that’s causing you anxiety, or whatever is causing you self doubt, relationships between other human beings. I think Christianity does offer a recipe, and perhaps, in my view, the best recipe for not only how to live with yourself and connect to the universe, but also how to connect with fellow human beings and then bring about a civilization like this one.

Richard Dawkins 29:29
Suppose it were true that atheism doesn’t offer anything. Suppose it doesn’t offer anything. So what? Why should it offer anything? Why should the universe offer you anything?

Moderator 29:46
What is the scientific explanation for you being moved to tears by St. Matthew’s passion?

Richard Dawkins 29:53
Well, it’s neurology. Let me ask Ayaan…

Ayaan Hirsi Ali 29:57
I think the question you ask now is very interesting. Why should atheism offer you anything? There is no reason why atheism should offer anything but something else, Faith, offers something, something valuable and tangible and yes, so why should atheism mock that and knock it down?

Richard Dawkins 30:18
I don’t want to knock it…

Ayaan Hirsi Ali 30:18
Is it not possible to have this coexistence, where there is a place for reason and there is a place for faith and for subjectivity, just like we agree to have a separation between religion and politics, I think it is absolutely possible to have and Christianity allows for that, a separation of science and you know, the material world, the temporal world versus the world of faith. And these things when, when they complement each other, I think, lead to a much more powerful outcome than when you again, I find, I find the differences between us a little cosmetic and a little artificial, because there are so many things I agree with that you are saying. It’s just that the the attitude that atheists take, that if you do not see the world the way they see it. And if you don’t live according to reason, you must be an idiot, you must be unintelligent.

Richard Dawkins 31:28
No, no, no…

Ayaan Hirsi Ali 31:28
You must be I think that that is the bit that just smacks of..,

Richard Dawkins 31:34
Okay, yeah, okay, let’s not, let’s not go there. I don’t want to say that. What I do want to say is this, Faith offers you something, obviously, that’s very, very, very clear, but it doesn’t make it true. It doesn’t make the existence claims of Christianity true. There is a difference from saying that that being in a certain psychological place is consoling and comforting, and offers you a meaningful life of meaning of life and and gives you a purpose in life. All those things which which are wonderful, and I have them too. They’re a bit different, but I too have a purpose in life. I have a meaning in life. But just simply because something gives you a meaning and a purpose in life. It doesn’t make the existential claims true. And Christianity, like any other religion, makes claims about the world, about the universe, which are either true or not true. And I may be wrong, and you may be right, they may they may be true, but the mere fact that they’re comforting doesn’t make them true. That’s an important point,

Ayaan Hirsi Ali 32:43
But I agree with you on that point. The mere fact that they are comforting doesn’t make them true. Makes them true, but the hypothesis that there is something other than nothing is something you can’t disprove as much as I can’t prove, materially, that Jesus was born out of a virgin.

Richard Dawkins 33:07
Yes…

Ayaan Hirsi Ali 33:07
I think it’s some of these areas where I think it’s a very, very important debate that occurred. But 200 years ago.

Richard Dawkins 33:19
We can have that debate, and that’s an important debate, and that’s the one I would like to have, rather than the one that’s comforting. I mean, for example, I would like to know whether you think that we survive our bodily death, when our when our brain dies. I when I asked you that when we had dinner together, and you said, no. Have you changed your mind about that?

Ayaan Hirsi Ali 33:19
I’m sorry. Please repeat. What have I changed?

Richard Dawkins 33:48
Okay, about life after death, about about survive our bodily I said, Do you think we survive our own death? And you said, No.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali 33:57
I said, Yes, bodily, no, I do not. I don’t survive death. I don’t think you will survive death. I said that when Bertrand Russell said, when we die, we shall rot. That, yes, that is true. But then what happens to the soul, consciousness, etc, that again, I don’t know.

Richard Dawkins 34:19
So you think there is a soul that survives death?

Ayaan Hirsi Ali 34:22
Well, there is something that, again, like I said, I did feel a connection, and that wasn’t, it wasn’t a bodily connection. It was a connection through consciousness and mind, and if that’s going to outlast me or not, I don’t know, I don’t know about that, but Richard, I do know where you stand on this debate. And that is…,

Moderator 34:49
We could spend the next hour going through different theological points and seeing whether Ayan agrees with or not. But there is this bigger cultural, societal impact point that you’ve really been in the middle of Richard, you came out as a cultural Christian.

Richard Dawkins 35:08
I’ve been a cultural Christian all along, and I’ve never said anything else I am.

Moderator 35:13
There was a lot of social media excitement recently that you had decided, you had confirmed that you were a cultural Christian. This, and this is, I suppose, the political Christianity point that Ayaan has also been making, if you accept that there is utility to faith at an individual level and at a societal level, how do you feel about what you have done and your fellow New Atheists for the past few decades in so enthusiastically dismantling it,

Speaker 2 35:47
I am so much more wedded to the importance of truth that I don’t regret anything. I do. I do. I do. Think that if, for example, in Africa, there are missionaries, Christian missionaries and Muslim missionaries fighting for people’s loyalty. And I’m on Team Christianity where that’s concerned. And so politically, if you, if you have to have a religion…,

Moderator 36:22
Explain, explain that to us a little bit more.

Richard Dawkins 36:25
If you have to have, if you have to I don’t believe you have to have a religion. I think it’s patronizing to suggest that people do need a religion, but if they do need to eat a religion, then I’d rather it was Christianity than anything else.

Moderator 36:36
So the dream world, according to Dawkins, would be nobody having a religion, in second place, Christianity, and then Islam comes last.

Richard Dawkins 36:46
Yes.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali 36:51
Okay, I think that’s fantastic. And I also want to say you don’t have to go as far as Africa to see this confrontation between Team Christianity and Team Islam, and Team Christianity versus Team Wokeism. It’s right here. There is a great deal of Islamic missionary work that has been very successful in Britain and in the US, in the US and in other parts of Europe, and I think Team Christianity, or Team Christian is is less confident here in The world of Christian civilization than, say, in Africa. And I want to go one step further and call upon Team Christianity to counter this message, because it’s a very powerful message. And even if you and I disagree on whether you know there is God and whether there’s creation, I respect your view. I know you respect mine. But…

Moderator 38:08
are you inviting Richard Dawkins to join Team Christianity?

Ayaan Hirsi Ali 38:13
Richard Dawkins is on Team Christianity.

Moderator 38:17
Do you accept that? Richard Dawkins, are you on Team Christianity?

Richard Dawkins 38:21
If it’s a choice.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali 38:27
Richard Dawkins just said that, but I think, and I really mean this in a serious way, I look at those young people in their 20s, in their teens, in their 30s, and right now, they’re being offered these messages of moral frameworks that they’re embracing, that are cultish, that are based on fear, that are nihilistic and that are dead end. And so if you say you’re on Team Christianity, then I would encourage those who are so inclined as to advance Christianity, not to worry about Africa, but to stand here, stand up to those people in Columbia, Harvard, and Penn U….

Moderator 39:12
Problem. What are you against here, that the young people have been susceptible to other ideologies.

Richard Dawkins 39:23
What are we speaking of there?

Ayaan Hirsi Ali 39:27
Well, there are mosques and Islamic centers that have convinced young people here in America and in Britain and elsewhere that Christianity is, is dead, has nothing to offer, that Western civilization is a moral vacuum, and that they’re here to fill it. And to my astonishment, it seems as if they’re making an impact. Look at all these so called Pro Palestine protests, which are not really pro Palestine. These are, in my view, clearly, in many ways, you know, they’re adopting the religious frameworks of offered by Islamists. And what I see is not what you saw in the 1960s, that’s a different story. What you’re seeing now is a moral vacuum that is being filled, model vacuum left behind, left, you know, untended by.

Moderator 40:41
And what is your answer to that? Your answer, are you hoping for some kind of Christian revival? Then are you now the having been a famous new atheist, would you now be a Christian evangelist?

Speaker 1 40:54
I think I don’t know if you should put it that way. The way I would like to put it is you have this amazing civilization. You have these amazing societies. And it is pretty frightening to see that the best and the brightest are converting to the mind virus of Wokeism and the mind virus of Islamism, and that as atheists, no one even seems to have woken up to the idea there is a condemnation of wokeism, which you do? Which you condemn the woke and the mind virus of the woke. You condemn radical Islam. But I think what do we then have to offer to these young people who are seeking something.

Richard Dawkins 41:42
Rational, secular humanism, enlightenment, enlightenment values.

Moderator 41:51
Do you share Ayaan’s diagnosis, the mind virus of wokism, as she puts it, of Islamism. Return to parts of the West and enlightenment humanism doesn’t seem to have resisted that advance very successfully.

Richard Dawkins 42:14
Well, let’s press it harder then.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali 42:21
Rational, secular humanism is itself an outcome of Christianity and

Richard Dawkins 42:27
Well, I don’t buy that.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali 42:32
It starts with the admission that rational secular humanism, the enlightenment, was able to take place within that Christian context, and it is a product of Christian civilization. It didn’t happen in China, it didn’t happen in the Middle East, it didn’t happen anywhere else. It happened in these disputes between Christians. And I think part of that story, and that whole history, is one that needs to be celebrated and told and given to these young minds. And I think where, where you, where you have a vacuum, something is going to fill it. And aside from the personal rewards that I reap from Christianity and that you reap from Christianity, I think there is the societal and the civilizational context where this thing is going through the cracks and without a counter message, a spiritual counter message. I think we’re in very, very bad and very, very serious.

Richard Dawkins 43:35
It may be true historically that rational, secular humanism grew out of Christianity in the sense that historically, that’s where it came from, but because there’s a reaction against Christianity, rather than having being in concert with with Christianity.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali 43:52
But even even as a reaction against Christianity, the things that the advances that we have made are rooted in that story and my objection to throwing the baby out with the bath water is that if you create this disconnect so that young people do not, they don’t, they haven’t been told of those debates they’re reading works that tell them that everything that the white male Christian left behind is exploitative. It’s destructive. It has to be replaced with something else. It’s settler, colonial, whatever. It’s being cut off from the roots of that civilization. And I think part of the reason why that vacuum came about and it was possible was because of this casting aside of Christianity and this attitude within atheism, that if you say reason, everybody will suddenly start becoming, you know, reasonable and think reasonably, and in that sense, that’s been a mistake.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali 44:49
G.K. Chesterton was right.

Moderator 44:51
Do you, do you regret having been part of the new Atheism movement, having preached. Atheism from that pulpit.

Speaker 1 45:02
I do regret doing that, and I want to say that when I realized the damage that I was doing, and I was doing a great deal of damage by equating Islam with Christianity, first of all, it is false. We were talking about truth and falsehood and not all religions are the same. Religions are different because they are. They come out of different cultures and grow out of different contexts. So Christianity is not the same as Islam, and I’m guilty of having said, well, all faiths, all perceptions of God are the same, and they’re equally damaging. So I come back from that, and I also have come to regret the damage that I’ve done, and I want to see I want to make my friends like Richard and Sam Harris and Daniel Dennett [who died April 2024] and all the others. I want you to see what I see, and what I see is where you have a moral vacuum, something is going to fill it. I want you to see that the teachings of Christianity, just like you said, if there is a competition between Team Christian and Team Islam, you would be on Team Christian, that what you value in Christianity is something that really is absolutely necessary to pass on to the next generation. And we have failed the next generation by taking away from them that moral framework and telling them it’s nonsense and false, but also not protecting them, then, from the external forces that come in for their hearts, their minds and their souls.

Richard Dawkins 46:45
I think you’re wrong to say, I think that you’re wrong to just to differentiate Christianity from Islam in that sense. I mean, they, they, they all these Abrahamic religions, Judaism, Christianity and and Islam, they they shed, they have the same holy book. They believe in hell. They believe in a dictatorial God. They believe in so much that’s similar. The problem with Islam is that is that it’s 700 years out of date [more like 1400 years], and Christianity has has moved on, thank goodness, and mainly because most Christians don’t actually believe it anymore. I mean, they don’t take it seriously. Problem with Islam is that they take it seriously. They believe in in their religion. They actually will fight to the death of that of their religion in the way that crusaders used to. Thank goodness they no longer do. Christianity has grown up, has grown out of that.

Moderator 47:44
But how do you respond to, Ayaan, charge there? It feels like quite a grave charge that that atheism movement, that dismantling has left a whole generation inadequately equipped to deal with the forces that are coming at them.

Richard Dawkins 48:02
We have, we have secular humanism, we have rationality, we have moral philosophy. Moral philosophy is how we is how we decide which bits of Christianity we like and which bits we don’t, which bits of the Bible we take as being moral, and which ones we don’t. We cherry pick. And the basis for our cherry picking is modern, secular moral philosophy, which is a well established philosophical discipline. And it’s on that basis that that we decide what is moral and what is not. We decide in favor of feminism, of all the things that we value today which do not come from Christianity, they come in spite of Christianity, in spite of all religions.

Moderator 48:54
What is your diagnosis for? Why that has come about? Why so many people do seem to be so lost during this secular age. If it’s not the fault of receding religion, what? Why hasn’t…

Richard Dawkins 49:08
Well, I’m not quite sure what we’re talking about when we say this moral vacuum. I mean, it’s, it’s, we’re talking about wokeism, are we all but first,

Ayaan Hirsi Ali 49:16
I really do want to object to Richard, the statement you made about the holy books of Christianity and Islam being the same is absolutely untrue. And in fact, maybe a follow up to this discussion would be to actually read these books to see what’s in them and how different they are. And another mega, mega difference is the characters of Jesus and the characters of Muhammad are absolutely radically different. I totally agree with that, yeah, but that, and that is why the holy books are not the same. The story is absolutely not the same. They are different. And yes, each one of them makes a claim to being an Abrahamic religion. And there I do have to do a little bit of reading up on Abraham. I have to do a little bit of reading on the Old Testament. But as far as I can tell now, from where I am in the New Testament, it couldn’t be more different from the Quran.

Richard Dawkins 50:17
Okay, I’ve got a lot of reading up of it, the Old Testament is a very, very nasty book indeed, and the New Testament, on the face of it, is better, but the aspect of it, which I which I mentioned before, the idea of God, couldn’t think of a better way to forgive the sins of humanity than to have this son crucified. That is a disgusting idea.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali 50:45
God gave us free will. God gave us free will. But again, I don’t want us to go back to where we have agreed, you know, to disagree, but in terms of, you know you asked, What do you mean by a moral vacuum, and what can we fill that moral vacuum with. The conception or the perception of the difference between right and wrong is, I think, something human beings have been trying to answer for millennia, and we have different human beings, and different categories of human beings have reached different answers. And I think that if you take the history and the story of the moral, the moral story of this civilization, if you say, well, it’s useless, let’s let’s mock it. Let’s cast it aside. What emerges is a generation of young people growing up who haven’t been, A, provided with their Christian or their Judeo Christian moral framework. And they also, for some reason, haven’t been given what you are saying you’re offering now, which is a moral humanism, or I haven’t seen any kind of organized in the way religions are organized, temples of reason and people dedicated to delivering a message of morality to young people. What you have…

Moderator 52:33
Richard, just to…

Richard Dawkins 52:34
Well, in that case, if that were true, then we need to work harder, but, but we don’t. We don’t, what we don’t need is to, is to saddle our morality with a lot of supernatural nonsense.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali 52:46
Well, what I think the assumption was that universities and schools would provide that, and that universities and schools, again, separated from their Christian underpinnings, started to say, we are neutral grounds, and we are going to adopt a moral neutrality towards religion and faith. And there exactly that’s where the vacuum emerged, young people looking for moral direction, not getting it from their own civilization and other forces coming in and filling that out. And that is the crisis that you are witnessing now. And I think it is very I’m not evangelizing. I’m not imposing a new or an old form of morality, but I am saying that we are having a very, very serious moral crisis. And it is, I hope, that this is just a fast conversation, but for those of us, I am coming out and saying, when I was advancing atheism and saying that Christianity is nonsense and it is just as nonsensical and as dangerous as Islam, I was absolutely wrong, and I contributed to this moral vacuum. And I step back.

Richard Dawkins 53:56
Christianity, the largest Christian Church at the moment is the Roman Catholic Church, and they are the people who’ve got the organization going. They’ve got the whole of South America. They’ve got an enormous number of people, and what then they stand for, total opposition to abortion, contraception. This this is not a good organization for morality.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali 54:27
I think the challenge to you is if you say the Catholic Church or the Anglican Church, or any of the other Christian churches are either in terms of your words, either nonsensical or immoral or useless, or regardless of however you characterize them, if you don’t have an alternative and I. Think from the last at least the last five or so decades, we see that no alternative has been established. Again, the assumption was reason and enlightenment in humanism is simply going to emerge from education. The higher your level of education, the more reasonable you are. Now, what we see on display in our universities is the very opposite, that is a moral crisis.

Moderator 55:26
Do you accept that?

Richard Dawkins 55:27
Well, you seem to be saying that the organization isn’t there. I mean, we need a church of humanism or something like that. I’ve never been in favor of that kind of thing. But…

Moderator 55:40
Do you have set the observation that Ayaan is making? Do you think that’s true, that having expected enlightened humanism to take the space, if religion receded, that didn’t happen.

Richard Dawkins 55:51
I never, I was never that optimistic. I mean, I never thought we were going to have a sort of brave new world of enlightened humanism. I just, I was just interested in the truth and the idea that somehow we were on, we were on a mission to found a new church, or something like that. We just never were…

Moderator 56:12
So you didn’t think about what would happen afterwards.

Richard Dawkins 56:17
No, I mean, I can’t speak for my colleagues, but, but for as far as I was concerned, what I was interested in is what is true, and it’s and I believe that all religions are false, and I’m interested in what is scientifically true.

Moderator 56:36
There’s been we have a short run of time left, and before we conclude, I feel we should touch on this question of Islam, because it actually seems, I think most people watching will be surprised by some of the language and the intensity of your agreement on this issue. You describe it as a nasty religion, that’s strong terms. What do you mean by that?

Richard Dawkins 57:01
I don’t mean that individuals are now see. I mean that the ideas of things like the penalty for apostasy is death. I mean, what kind of a religion is it that has to penalize people who leave it by killing them? Yeah, that is a revolting idea. And I…

Moderator 57:25
Are you like Ayaan? Are you anxious by the the protests, did you watch what’s happening in the news with anxiety? In that respect that she seemed to be saying earlier that Islamist ideas are in assent, are growing.

Richard Dawkins 57:45
I wasn’t aware of that. I mean, the protests that are going on in American University at the moment look to me a lot more like anti Jewish, antisemitism…

Ayaan Hirsi Ali 57:58
And the anti, the vector for this anti, virulent anti semitism, is Islam. It’s radical Islam. On every university, there is a Muslim Student Association, there are Islamic centers, there are mosques, there are websites, and they propagate and sometimes in the most sinister ways, the faith and the antipathies and the antipathy that radical Islamists hold against Jews have had like they’re running amok in our universities and our schools. So if from one day to the next, we wake up, the seventh of October last year, that horrible event happened where 1200 Israelis were killed, many of them young people, many of them actually on the left, in kibbutzims and many, many women raped and people mutilated. And you would think that in making that moral reckoning that students here or anywhere, even fellow Muslims have said, this is absolutely heinous and it has to be condemned all the way, that is not what we are seeing. What we are seeing is the investment that radical Muslims made here on our soil, those young people completely brainwashed into coming out and blaming the victim, draping themselves in kefirs, shouting genocidal slogans and chants on our campuses and thinking that they are replicating 1968 and see themselves as anti war patrons. There is something that is going on. There is the mind virus of wokeism, there is the mind virus of radical Islam, and atheism is, atheism is not the answer. I cannot go with all conscience to these young people and say there is nothing to believe in, because the more we say there is nothing to believe in, there is nothing, then someone else comes and fills that nothing with something and I don’t like what I’m seeing.

Moderator 1:00:21
Are you? Are you anxious? I mean, some of the language you’ve used this evening, I’m not sure if you said clash of civilizations, but it it was moving in that direction. Will be anxious making to people. I mean, you are now a Christian. Are you really hoping to go back to the days where Christians take up intellectual arms against Muslims. And we have a kind of civilizational conflict, it will be very anxious making for people to hear that

Ayaan Hirsi Ali 1:00:49
I’m not going there. I’m going to Chapel Hill, North Carolina. And you look at some of those frat students, and please just take a look at how they responded. Where there is an existing faith that is strong, it is very difficult for all of these other mind viruses to encroach upon and take over. That is as far as I’m going. I’m not saying, let’s start the Crusades again. I’m just saying, let’s stand for what we have. Let’s embrace it and let’s defend it, and to defend it, you have to have a counter message. There is a great deal of activism knocking on young people’s doors telling them, do you want to know the difference between right and wrong? Do you want to know the difference between truth and false? And I don’t see any counter activism coming from humanists or coming from atheists, I see you and my fellow friends just as bewildered as anyone else when you look at this. So the people who are in charge of universities, people who are in charge of educating and developing young minds, are looking on and thinking, What the heck is going on here? And that is not the right attitude, and it never has been the right attitude. There’s a great deal of denial. Yes, there’s a clash of civilization. And this clash of civilizations has been going on at least since 1989 and the attitude of Western leaders, political leaders, academic leaders, media leaders, has been to hide in denial, it’s been to deny it, and the more you deny it, the more those adversaries who are clashing with us benefit from it. And right now, I don’t think atheist humanism is offering any answers. I challenge you to come up with an elaborate message to fight these people.

Moderator 1:02:39
What is your message to your Muslim or formerly Muslim followers. I mean, you have many, many people who see you as a beacon of someone who has left their Islamic faith behind and has found success and flourished in a secular Western society. What do you say to them now that.

Speaker 1 1:02:57
I have, so again, there’s Muslims. There are billions, and some Muslims, and there are Muslims who are peace loving, who hate the Islamists, who hate the message of hatred and blowing people up and closing the minds and threatening people that if you leave Islam you’re going to be killed, which is absolutely revolting. So right now, I have more genuine Muslim friends than I ever had before, because the same individuals who reject, they still identify as Muslim, but they reject the idea of forcing faith on other people. And so a lot of them, my Muslim friends, are scratching their heads and wondering why Western civilization is committing suicide, why they are allowing this in the name of freedoms, in the name of freedom of speech, freedom of association and freedom of religion, we have allowed a Cult of Power, Islamism, a political totalitarian ideology, to seed itself here, deepen and broaden and grow, and we have nothing in return to say. And it is. It’s a cult that wants to destroy the very freedoms that it uses to advance its agenda.

Moderator 1:04:14
So what is your invitation to your Muslim, or formerly Muslim, followers? Is it become a Christian?

Speaker 1 1:04:22
I’m not evangelical. I’m not telling people to become Christian. All I have done is explain why I have become a Christian. I’m not saying to fel…. I did say at one point in 2010 you know, leave, you’re a good person, leave Islam and told the Catholic Church, why don’t you wear hearts and minds that way? That is not what I am saying today, but I am saying to those fellows, I’m in a club with the clarity conference. It’s Muslim reform, is ex Muslims, people with a background like mine, and what we do is, if nothing else, just make you aware, if the world is ruled according to Sharia, if the people who are advancing this cult get what they want, we are going to see women caged up. We are going to see beheadings. We are going to see civilization go down the drain. They’ve demonstrated it over and over again. Al Qaeda has done it. ISIS has done it. Hamas is doing it today. I think that we need to come out of denial and see as plain as daylight and as plain as they hold. They keep showing us all the time. If they prevail, this is what they are going to do, ask the citizens of Iran, ask the citizens of Saudi Arabia, Ask Ed Mali, Nigeria, Bucha under Boko Haram Al Shabab. That is what they when they win, they are going to subject us to the same barbaric, barbaric and heinous crimes that they subject to those whom they prevail over.

Moderator 1:05:59
I’m going to, we are out of time. We could talk for many hours. I want to give the final word to you, Richard, what has this evening’s conversation made you think?

Richard Dawkins 1:06:09
We have two epidemiological theories here, we have a vicious mind virus. We agree about that, and we agree about your prognostications about that. The question is, do we combat it by vaccination with a mild form of the virus? Or do we say no viruses at all and go for enlightened rationality.

Moderator 1:06:44
You’re a religious anti Vaxxer. Ladies and gentlemen, please join me in thanking both Richard Dawkins and Ayaan Hirsi Ali.

The End

Note: Both Richard and Ayaan would do well to read (or reread) Martin Gardner’s book, The Whys of a Philosophical Scrivener. Anyone who reads Martin is at risk of having their intelligence clarified wonderfully. Keyword: fideism.

And I would note that both are equally innocent of any concerns that modern humans are a non-viable metastatic form of human.

Conjecture: 75k years of selection for William James’ “need to believe” may mean a significant percentage of modern humans (e.g. 20% to 100%) have genes that, if activated during development (e.g. imprinting in ducks), lead to Eric Hoffer’s condition of being a “true believer”. Per Jesuit experience, a child exposed to a strongly ideological upbringing (to a mind virus) prior to age seven, will have a need to believe (in Ayaan’s “something” which can become anything).

Martin Gardner and Ayaan were so exposed. Richard and I were not. In a culture not of-for-and-by a strong focus on ideological acculturation, in a social context of no necessary primacy of belief in the human enterprise, then if no child is exposed to ideological mind viruses, believing minds will not be the outcome of acculturation.

Ayaan’s story of choosing to believe does not ring true. For over a decade she gave being an abeliever her best shot, an effort that was well supported, but her need to believe did not go away (Martin never tried to live in denial), she was failing unto death, and to persist had to accept her need for there to be a “something,” which in her social milieu had to include Jesus.

After reading Martin Gardner, I realized I too had a need to believe that I could not choose to deny. I need to believe that some day there will be a form of human (again) on the planet that understands it and can live with it properly so as to persist as an evolvable non-metastatic form of K-selected human. The probability of success is less than 5%, per my best guess.

I could be wrong. Extinction of all humans within the next 50 to 50k years could be determinately locked in, i.e. we are a dead clade walking on two legs for a time. But I don’t know that there is a zero probability of posterity mutating back into a viable form of animal and learning to live properly with the Gaian system. And Richard doesn’t either.

“Eventually we’ll have a human on the planet that really does understand it and can live with it properly. That’s the source of my optimism.” — James Lovelock, fideist

Something like true believing could be adaptive (selected for). On a seemingly fine early spring morning I lead my band of trusting others to a new camp in another valley. On the way, late in the day, near the pass to the other valley, we are hit by an unforeseen blizzard of fierce winds and snow. I know of one hollow tree that one person could take shelter in and perhaps survive the night, but then what?

In the open, no fire could be kindled, and the one shelter within which a fire could be built and all survive the night is a cave inhabited by a cave bear. I had killed a cave bear while it hibernated, but I am no match for one now. Ug, the other hunter in the band, will join me. We may have a one in twenty chance of driving it away from its cave. I merely say, “we go to the cave of the bear,” and Ug understands everything. We have a life-driven purpose and know what needs to be done — we must shelter in the cave. We pick up branches to wave while yelling fiercely as we go into the cave.

We have ‘faith’ that there could be a viable for all outcome, but no belief that there will be. Our worldview is not the world, what we believe will not determine the future of we who have no better claim to the cave than the bear and her cubs. Perhaps the bear I killed in hibernation was her mate.

I motion Ug to wait at the mouth of the cave and decide to go in alone, quietly, calmly, trustingly, just far enough to ask for permission and see if the bear will attack. Perhaps there will be room enough for both our families.

We all huddled together without a fire in one corner of the cave and survived the night. I never killed another bear, but I failed to get other hunters to not kill them when they could so easily be killed. I could foresee that the cave bears would become extinct before their time. When I die, my sons will join the hunt. Perhaps the bear should have killed me.

If stories about the world could be mis-taken for the world, then hundreds of men, strangers to each other before obeying the call to duty, could be given an ideological purpose by the Head Storyteller that would drive them to cooperate unto death to kill hundreds of other men, also strangers to them, because they wore the wrong color feathers in their hair, a condition all agreed was an abomination that must be corrected. Modern humans would thereby have come into being, all living purpose-driven lives in service of their necessarily shared worldview (ideology) that was the world.