Atheist Debates Cliffe Knechtle and It Backfires!

Añadido: 2026-06-03

[00:00:00]You're saying that oh, well, it must have happened for a reason. No, think of how many plans they'll never see life for any number of reasons that we just couldn't even fathom.

[00:00:10]You know you know what's really sad about you?

[00:00:13]>> to reject him. I feel I have no valid reason to accept him or follow any of his teaching. Good.

[00:00:18]Good. When there is other ways to decide what is right and wrong in the world.

[00:00:23]When there is other ways to look at things.

[00:00:26]>> Very good.

[00:00:27]>> Outside of the Bible. Absolutely.

[00:00:29]>> And I have studied other religions and I have studied some philosophies.

[00:00:34]>> Uh-huh. And a lot of those people say the Ten Commandments are great.

[00:00:39]Some of those commandments have nothing to do with morality. They have everything to do with insulting a god.

[00:01:55]>> Some of those commandments have nothing to do with morality. They have everything to do with insulting a god.

[00:02:01]And if you're within that thought frame following that deity, Mhm. then it makes perfect sense. Yes, don't use the Lord's name in vain. Okay, that makes sense.

[00:02:12]Yes, don't do things on the Passover.

[00:02:14]Yes, that makes sense. And I know Jesus took that one back basically later saying you can save people whatever. But my point is this is only moral. Some of those are only moral within the context of the Bible. And outside of it, I don't see the immorality of working on the Passover ever. I don't see the immorality of taking any deity's name in vain. Okay. Because I don't see any proof of any deity. That's a whole 'nother argument.

[00:02:37]>> Amen.

[00:02:39]Okay, so what is the philosophy that you have embraced?

[00:02:43]And what's the evidence that that philosophy or that individual is reliable?

[00:02:48]As far as an overarching philosophy that would be contained by any one belief system, I don't fully embrace any one belief system. Almost all belief systems have at least minimal issues with them.

[00:03:00]Right.

[00:03:00]>> I would say that some of them are better than others. But to take any one wholeheartedly without fully analyzing and looking at the issues behind it is foolish.

[00:03:09]>> Right. And so I don't subscribe to Buddhism, Hinduism, the Quran. I don't subscribe to Kantian thought or any of those other ones. I find things that they have said, things that these great thinkers have thought.

[00:03:22]>> Yeah. And parts of them have different things. I love when Jesus says the golden rule essentially, do unto others as you would expect them to do unto you.

[00:03:30]It is beautiful. It is concise. And it is excellent no matter what culture you come from. Mhm. And I would say I fully embrace that. But Jesus wasn't the only one to say it either. That's for sure.

[00:03:41]So, Good. So, what I hear you saying is I decide what is true, what is false.

[00:03:50]I have put my faith ultimately in myself.

[00:03:53]I pick and choose. I go to s- I go to the Smorgasbord room, right? I take Jesus, some of his stuff. I take Buddha, some of his stuff. I take the avatars of Hinduism. I take Adam Smith. I take Kant or Nietzsche or Camus or Sartre or whoever, and I pick and choose and I sort of follow whatever I want to. And so I think it's real clear, isn't it, that your faith is ultimately in yourself.

[00:04:16]You're the arbitrator of truth.

[00:04:19]Right?

[00:04:20]>> Aren't we for all our lives? Doesn't everyone decide what they consider to be true, to be false, to be good? And it's all heavily influenced by the society you grew up in, the religion you grew up in, and it can affect your thought, but that doesn't mean you can't change the way you view the world. And that doesn't mean you can't change the way you see right and wrong. Cuz people do it all the time. If you're in prison for something stupid and you're suffering, you might decide murder is an acceptable option. And honestly, I would say that I wouldn't be one to necessarily say you can't in certain circumstances. And so I believe that on some level, morality isn't always constant as it would have to be for the Bible to hold truth. And it would have to have to be ultimately good and ultimately bad. And I don't see ultimately good and ultimately bad, right?

[00:05:08]You and I are very fickle, very inconsistent human beings. You have chosen to put your faith ultimately in in yourself in spite of all the evidence that you are incredibly fickle, incredibly finite, and you at times do what you know is wrong.

[00:05:24]>> But I also But you're still choosing to put your faith ultimately in yourself.

[00:05:28]>> to understand others. I am saying it is very wise, based on the evidence of his credibility, his trustworthiness, his lifestyle, his teachings, his death, and his resurrection, to put your faith in Jesus Christ because the evidence is he's more reliable than I am, and he's more reliable than you are, sir. But those are just vague concepts that you're taking out of the Bible, which you said earlier to the him about his Quran. If it's just from the Quran and you're saying it's just truth just because it's from the Quran, then that doesn't have much meaning. Well, you're saying, "Oh, Jesus died. He was nailed to a cross. He suffered. He died. He resurrected." Okay, your Bible says that. Who else says that?

[00:06:06]tons of people Who else who was from that time period who could be considered a first-person eyewitness?

[00:06:11]>> studied Jesus. Those are the same people who actually speak on him. Those people were Jewish.

[00:06:17]So, can I say Sir, you have put your faith in yourself. I respect your right to do that.

[00:06:22]For me to put my faith in myself the way you're putting your faith in yourself would be idiocy.

[00:06:26]Because the overwhelming evidence is I sin, I do wrong, I experience guilt.

[00:06:31]I make irrational blunders and mistakes.

[00:06:34]I do the irrational at times.

[00:06:36]I get sick. I have a date with death.

[00:06:38]I'm a very finite, weak human being.

[00:06:42]Yeah.

[00:06:42]Jesus Christ lived a sinless life. The type of life that in my best moments I try to live, but I fail miserably.

[00:06:49]Jesus Christ >> amazing ethical teachings.

[00:06:51]>> Please, your Bible. According to your scripture >> to the historical record. I never once have said the Bible's the word of God.

[00:06:58]I'm not asking you to accept it as the word of God.

[00:07:00]>> the historical record that Jesus lived a sinless life?

[00:07:03]>> Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. That is the Bible. Those are gospels. Not the word of God. Historical record.

[00:07:09]Historical record. Historical record by the people who believed in it.

[00:07:14]And it's been And generally understood that they actually copied each other.

[00:07:19]So, it could have all come from only one, maybe two sources at best. No, sir.

[00:07:26]Totally false. No evidence supports that. I have studied under a doctor in of religions who discussed with us the origins of those four gospels. And he said they did copy each other in some cases, whereas there was one that didn't copy the others cuz it includes certain parts of the story.

[00:07:44]So, they all obviously had notes, a Q source. You probably had to study the Q source, right?

[00:07:50]So, they all had notes. Guess what? In light of the fact that they wrote between the mid and end of the 1st century, 20 to 60 years after Christ, I'm really glad they had notes.

[00:08:00]Very important to have notes when you're writing an historical document. 20 to 60 years after the fact. Pardon? Which document was 20 to 60? All of them.

[00:08:08]Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John were written in the 1st century.

[00:08:12]And probably Mark was written around 55, 60, 65, 70 AD.

[00:08:18]And then Matthew, Luke, and John were written probably after that.

[00:08:22]So, 20 to 60 years after Jesus they were written.

[00:08:28]You see, sir, you've put your faith ultimately in yourself.

[00:08:33]And yet you're acting like the reason you couldn't put your faith in Christ, the reason you had to walk away from him is cuz of lack of evidence. I don't Sure, there's far less evidence that you are reliable than that Jesus is reliable. Far less evidence.

[00:08:47]See, you keep saying I put my faith in myself. And yes, to a certain point, but I put my faith in humanity. I put my faith >> What does that mean? in people.

[00:08:54]>> What does that mean? In multiple people, multiple minds all working together.

[00:08:58]And the same concept is going behind inventing that camera to work together to make the weave of your shirt can also be used, that concept of taking multiple ideas and putting them together to make a good, strong idea is what I believe in. I believe that multiple people all throughout history and even living now have had great ideas that everyone should know and everyone should use to help judge what is moral, what is right, what they should do, what they should pursue with their lives. And I don't believe I'm the ultimate source of truth. I believe I'm pretty ignorant. I believe I really don't know that much.

[00:09:33]I'm in college not cuz I want a degree or cuz I want a good job, it's cuz I want truth. God is true. I want to know what is true. And I want to know from people who have spent their entire lives like me looking for something deeper.

[00:09:49]Good.

[00:09:50]Bravo.

[00:09:52]Then how on earth can you conclude that putting your faith ultimately in yourself is a wise move?

[00:09:59]Cuz I see no evidence to do it in any single other person or deity. You don't see no You just think about this rational mind that you have.

[00:10:08]If your world view is correct, your rational mind comes from the non-rational.

[00:10:15]You really can believe that? Elaborate.

[00:10:18]If there is no God, your rational mind comes from the non-rational, from matter, energy, chance. And it's a freaking miracle.

[00:10:29]Good.

[00:10:30]Not >> Then with you, if you understand that it's a miracle, does not a miracle demand a miracle worker?

[00:10:37]No.

[00:10:38]Fine. Then how do you get a miracle?

[00:10:40]Think of this way. Okay, let's see say today I walk out into traffic, I get hit by a car. I'm dead. Okay, that really sucks. Another guy walks out into traffic, he doesn't get hit by a car.

[00:10:50]And he sits there and he goes, "Holy I was almost hit by a car." Well, how many people that day either got hit by a car or didn't even come close to getting hit by a car, and then he was the one person who almost got hit and he goes, "It's a miracle I was saved." No, odds dictate if there's so many millions of people crossing the street every day, some of them are going to get hit by cars, some of them are going to hit and miraculously survive for any number of infinitely detailed reasons, and there's going to be one guy who just goes around going, "Oh, you know, God saved me. It was a miracle." And that can be shown on multiple levels. There's so many of us on this earth, of course things that would look miraculous would occur. It's odds. Someone's got to win the lottery.

[00:11:33]Is that a miracle? No, that's just the odds. It doesn't necessarily It does not necessitate a miracle. That necessitates you having been that person who happened to be in the right place at the right time doing the right thing for whatever reason because there's a whole bunch of other people who got screwed and you just happen to be one of the lucky ones.

[00:11:53]Yep.

[00:11:56]Well, I am in awe of your gullibility and your blind faith.

[00:12:02]Cuz I can promise you if I'm playing poker with somebody and he's dealing and if he gives five he deals five perfect hands to himself and he tells me that's just the luck of the draw I'm going to be really incredulous.

[00:12:21]That is nothing, sir, compared to the complexity of your eye and my eye.

[00:12:27]Your body and my body.

[00:12:29]And if you can just believe in the luck of the draw that way and say, "Well, out of all the millions of opportunities that could have happened, we've arrived here on planet Earth as human beings living in a universe that is that is supporting us. Evolution was self-driven by the organisms that evolved. It was not just luck. If there is no God, sir, luck is a big part of it.

[00:12:53]Lucky us.

[00:12:55]My point is that's ridiculous thinking. That's irrational.

[00:12:58]Cuz I have to work so hard to get a ball to go through a metal hoop 10 ft off the ground.

[00:13:06]And I know it doesn't usually go in just cuz of luck.

[00:13:09]I have to work real hard at it.

[00:13:11]And I think you have to work real hard to get an A on your exam here.

[00:13:15]And I think it's luck that you get the right answer.

[00:13:18]And my life doesn't Everything in my experience contradicts that idea.

[00:13:22]I get order and design. I get an education. I succeed at sports because I have worked hard to bring order out of chaos.

[00:13:32]And this idea that we just got lucky that's incredible. I mean, I could never have that kind of blind faith, never.

[00:13:42]Cuz you're going to get ripped off in life. If you have that kind of gullibility in life man, I'll sell you the Brooklyn Bridge.

[00:13:48]I mean, it's incredible. You'll You'll believe anything.

[00:13:51]What's incredible is how easily you jump from topic to topic, changing it from oh, direct individual to over an entire concept or theory to over the entire world, completely negating the fact that this isn't a closed system, that this is part of a solar system, which is part of a galaxy, which is part of a universe.

[00:14:11]And within all those planets, there's billions of planets that never had the luck to exist. And you're saying that just because we happen to have that luck you're saying that oh, well, it must have happened for a reason. No, think of how many planets that'll never see life for any number of reasons that we just couldn't even fathom.

[00:14:30]Sir, you know you know what's really sad about you? just once again, it happened because it had to happen somewhere essentially.

[00:14:36]>> What's really sad about you is I respect your desire to think.

[00:14:41]But your intellectual hypocrisy is off the charts. Sir, it's not me who lives in a closed universe, it's you who lived in a closed universe.

[00:14:48]You're not open to God, a creator of a universe. You have You have closed the universe down to matter and energy.

[00:14:55]What does being open to God mean? It means that you realize there's a lot more to reality than just matter and energy.

[00:15:00]Okay. You have shut that option out and you've said no. All the universe is is matter and energy.

[00:15:07]>> of a god. I just said your god ain't real. Oh, oh, so oh, so you believe that there's a god? No, I said there's a possibility. And what is god? Is it an alien force? Is it a far evolved species? Is it pandimensional beings?

[00:15:22]There's a possibility of god-like beings, but you got to define God for me first, man. No, no, no, no. If you tell me that you believe in some type of God, you got to tell me the God you believe in. I'll tell you the God I believe in.

[00:15:34]I don't have any evidence for a God, and I wouldn't tout it for nothing.

[00:15:37]>> Yeah, I got it. Okay. So, don't give me this pitch that you believe in God.

[00:15:41]You don't. Let's be honest. No, I'm saying there's a possibility for God.

[00:15:45]Yeah, right. And there's a possibility that you're going to win the lottery tonight. And there's a possibility that you and I are martians, okay? Come on, man. Be real.

[00:15:52]Do you believe that God exists or not?

[00:15:55]No. Okay, thank you. No.

[00:15:58]So, don't flip into, "Oh, no, I think there's a possibility." No, you've closed the universe. You've shut the universe down to just include matter and energy. That's all there is.

[00:16:08]Let's be honest. Come on.

[00:16:10]You're the one with a closed universe, not me.

[00:16:14]So, why do I believe that you've made a mistake in closing the universe down and not including God?

[00:16:21]Because one out of a time out of 100, life comes from life in my observation.

[00:16:27]Life never comes from non-life. But because you've kicked God out of the equation, you believe that life comes from non-life. I can't believe that.

[00:16:35]Plant life comes from plant life. Animal life comes from animal life. Human life comes from human life. I have never observed life come from non-life.

[00:16:43]But you've kicked God out of the equation, an eternal living being. So, you've got a real problem here.

[00:16:49]You've got life coming from non-life.

[00:16:51]That's irrational.

[00:16:53]Secondly, you've got right and wrong, good and evil, that you act as if they're real values, but then you admit that you're the arbiter. You're the one who defines what's right and wrong. There's no God out there who defines right and wrong.

[00:17:09]It's all relative. You can't have it both ways, sir. If there is no God, justice does not exist as a objective It's simply something you create in your head, I create it in my head, it's all relative.

[00:17:23]And yet you insist upon saying oh no, no, no, being kind is really important. Well, according to you, Hitler had his own way of doing it.

[00:17:32]Jeffrey Dahmer had his own way. You're not right, they're not wrong if there is no God.

[00:17:37]Ethics are just created in the human mind, so it's all relative.

[00:17:43]You see, you're not being consistent.

[00:17:44]You're not living out what you believe.

[00:17:47]You say there is no God, but then you act as if reason is really valuable, as if life is really significant, as if right and wrong are real.

[00:17:55]Come on, study Nietzsche, Camus, Sartre. They pointed out, no God, life is meaningless. No God, morality's relative.

[00:18:03]Doesn't matter whether you shoot your mother or feed her dinner.

[00:18:07]Choose.

[00:18:09]And your choice is legit.

[00:18:11]That's your worldview, sir. See what a closed system you've got?

[00:18:17]Be open.

[00:18:18]Be open to wow, morality, there might not be many absolutes, but there are a few. Slaughtering innocent children is never right.

[00:18:26]That means there's got to be some real value of justice. Oh gosh, how can there be a real objective value of justice?

[00:18:32]Only one way.

[00:18:34]Is if there is some type of creator, moral lawgiver, who creates that value.

[00:18:39]But you've closed the universe, sir, to the point where values don't exist except in our minds.

[00:18:44]Cuz your universe is matter and energy, no God.

[00:18:48]You do it to yourself, and then you tell me that the reason you can't follow Jesus is cuz of lack of evidence.

[00:18:55]That's intellectual hypocrisy in light of the way you're trying to live your life.

[00:19:00]Did that make any sense?

[00:19:02]See, my main issue is most of your arguments seem to flip from place to place, and you can't seem to stay within one vein of argument. And honestly, I'm not prepared to argue what the cause of universe, what caused life, what is right and wrong on a high philosoph- uh philosophical scale.

[00:19:23]Cuz honestly, there gets to be a point where you look at things and especially within philosophy and you go, "Okay, well, these people have really good ideas and these people have really good ideas." And most people just end up choosing what works for them.

[00:19:37]And that is true. And I'm not saying I am ultimately morally correct. I'm not saying I ultimately know what's going on. What I am saying is that I've seen insufficient evidence to follow a god.

[00:19:50]The historical evidence is Jesus lived a sinless life, he taught amazing ethical teachings, he died forgiving his enemies, and he rose from the dead. I promise you, sir, if you die and rise from the dead, I will listen very carefully to everything you have to say.

[00:20:06]Cuz it's evidence you're reliable.

[00:20:08]You're trustworthy.