About a month ago, Jordan Peterson and Sam Harris had a series of 4 discussions focusing on the nature of truth and facts, the basis of morality, and the role (or lack of a role) of religion in the modern world. I have great respect for both of these men, and regardless of one's views on the subject, I think it's a fascinating series of discussions. This series follows a couple of extended podcasts/debates between the two regarding the nature of "Truth", which was interesting in some ways but remained unresolved. These discussions are sort of a continuation of those debates but with a greater emphasis on addressing common problems and positing solutions. The first two discussions are moderated by Brett Weinstein, and the last two are moderated by Douglas Murray. Although heated at times, the discussions are especially interesting as the two "steel man" (as opposed to straw man) each others' arguments and find common ground in many surprising areas.
To (badly) summarize the discussions...
Jordan Peterson (who I've talked about before) makes the case for religion as an evolved guiding principle, as a meta-narrative distilled from thousands of years of human experience and wisdom. that religion is necessary to provide meaning in an otherwise nihilistic world, and that meaningful purpose cannot be derived from facts alone. and also that absence of religion is a void that is inevitably filled with worse alternatives.
Sam Harris, one of the Four Horsemen of Atheism, makes the case that revelation and its derivations are arbitrary at best and incredibly harmful at worst. that morality can be derived from humanistic principles, and that morality based in facts is preferable to anything posited via (supposed) revelation. His major concern is that even acknowledging the utility of religion, in any sense, opens the door to dogmatism and radical interpretations.
The full series is about 8 hours long. If you are interested at all in moral philosophy, it is well worth a watch.
The last 45 minutes or so of each discussion was reserved for Q&A. To give you an idea of how engaging the discussions were, for each of the 4 discussions, the crowd cheered for the two to continue their discussions instead of going to Q&A.
1:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-Z9EZE8kpoPost too long. Click here to view the full text.
