Dear Russel Brand.......... Please listen first and THEN respond! You fuck up the whole flow of the discussion when you interrupt the whole time. As you mentioned...Take a tip from how Joe Rogan does it..
If Brand actually engaged honestly with what Sam was saying his entire ‘weltanschauung’ would pop, that’s why he desperately bats it away whenever the pin gets too close to his ideological balloon.
This is a hilarious take, particularly based on how many people approve of it. Sam was given plenty of time to talk and any time Russell tries to speak, he feels a need to interject before allowing Russell to finish his thought. Unsurprisingly, Sam Harris fans see victimhood where it doesn't exist because, frankly, they aren't even listening to the critique. I'm going to watch this entire video but, as I suspected, it doesn't seem like it's going to produce any thaws in the ice with respect to how we have this conversation. Because none of you are listening to the critiques about contextualizing religious violence and separating it from all the peaceful religious folks.
And, by the way, I've been agnostic for almost two decades. We really do need a non-believer that can speak intelligibly about religion without conflating it with its worst aspects. First, discuss why religion exists. Then look at the text and explore how people and cultures interact with the text. And accept that, at least in the short-term, religion isn't going anywhere. So how do we promote the best expression of religion?
No that’s completely wrong. Sam was anchored by truth and reason, while Brand only had obfuscation. Sam fully acknowledges peaceful religious people, but their existence doesn’t detract from all those that kill and brutalise, and to try and deflect by pointing to the obvious peaceful faction only hinders efforts to end religious violence. Stop helping ISIS.
We need to work with reformers to create a new, peaceful Islam, then bug the mosques and deport from the West anyone preaching a hateful interpretation, as well as ACTUALLY applying the law and cracking down on FGM, Sharia creep, Rape Gangs, Honour Killings, deliberate attempts to outbreed the host population (aided by the Left), Halal creep, govt and school corruption, and 1st cousin marriages leading to tragically handicapped children - and all of the other horrors that Islam brings with it. Leftists like Brand who endlessly pander to Islam and constantly deflect efforts to deal with this stuff only condemn more people to the misery brought by Islam, most of them Muslims.
Incredibly rude interviewing and really frustrating to listen to. This felt like watching Bill O'Reilly interviewing someone. Constantly interrupting Sam, never letting him get to his point, ignoring facts, acting superior while admitting not knowing what he is talking about. Zero humility. I lost a lot of respect for Russell after this.
hk78901 I like Russell Brand and Sam Harris. But let's be honest. 70% of the podcast was almost unbearable because of the way Russell behaved. If you invite someone on your podcast, a minimum requirement is to not cut of your guest before he even gets to the point. Sam doesn't speak in short sound bites and he doesn't go for quick laughs. Anyone who has heard him speak before, knows that. He weighs his words very carefully and lays out meticulously thought out, long arguments to make sure his point comes across as accurately as possible so that he doesn't get misrepresented. When you cut him off in the middle of every argument and drown him out with fancy, condescending word dribble, you're a bad listener and an unprofessional host. It was also very clear that Russell had done almost zero research beforehand, which he admitted to.
Indiegaze: _"This felt like watching Bill O'Reilly interviewing someone."_ Ha! Try Judge Jeanine Pirro, someone, incidentally, Brand used to criticize for her hectoring style of interviewing. It would seem that he saw something of himself in her.
Trollop 7 The reason I mentioned Bill O'Reilly, is because Russell mocked and criticized him a lot when he was doing the Trews news. I can't stand Bill O'Reilly.....but Russell used a lot of the same interview tactics that Bill used, in this interview. How is it anything less than disappointing to hear a person use the same tactics as the person he used to make fun of? As I mentioned previously; I like Russell, and I think he has a lot of good thoughts and ideas. But he just really fell short in this podcast episode. I just hope he learns something from it.
Things we learned from this conversation: 1. Russell Brand is out of his depth (although this interview wasn't required for that assessment) 2. Russell Brand doesn't listen and/or understand 3. Russell Brand follows the Deepak Chopra school of argumentation - using a flowery, cavalcade of multi-syllabic words in order to say absolutely nothing. 4. Russel Brand argues for specific, liberal interpretations of books he hasn't even read, and does so on the grounds that he spoke to some Muslims at some point prior, who weren't Jihadists... He needs to learn to listen and respond appropriately. There were a few points in this where some reasonable conversation was developing, and whenever it gets to the sharp end, where Sam is about to expose the problem, Russell diverts to red-herrings, wishy-washy universal conscious love preaching, and starts adding variables to obfuscate. The fact he was unwilling to make any kind of value judgement on the well-being and moral treatment of women in Taliban-ruled areas, is a symptom of the sloppy moral relativism which pervades the far-left. The really annoying thing, is that if Russell would actually engage on that, shut up and listen charitably for 5 minutes and go down the rabbit hole, he'd actually learn something. He'd be shown that his position is in fundamental contradiction with itself, and is a bigotry of low expectation.
Point four is spot on. I mean this guy is literally starting from a conclusion he wants, backing into his premises, and then outright stating that facts must exist to support those premises. Its painful.
Harris is completely out of his dept. When he discusses Islam, he's desperately performing mental gymnastics trying to avoid contradicting all the crap he spouted when he went though his adolescent new atheist phase.
Its interesting to see that Russel has become a way better interviewer since this one. Letting people talk and all that. It would be lovely to see Russell have a new and polished up talk with sam in the near future
Russell's podcasting technique is incredibly annoying. He is constantly pushing his agenda and makes snide remarks or uses the "closed minded" card whenever anyone disagrees with his stance on any topic. He is obviously very articulate and has an above average vocabulary, but I can't help but think this is a veneer which is cloaking his lack of coherent reasoning or argument....I don't dislike him, but he's way too self centred (self professed ego addict, I know) to be a podcast host, it's clear that he wants to be the centre of attention at all times, which makes listening to his podcast so unfulfilling.
18:07 But you can get bully/groupthink on any playground ('what was in the kids textbooks?')... So you could see it as the fanatics felt the school threaten their power structures, in the same way the death squads felt the churches (with "liberation theology") threaten them in Latin America... The conservatives will always oppose change to their order because they have the power, and nobody is aloud to "rock their boat" 58:28 ironically the maximum-prison thought experiment is a great. Since we have supported "open-air prisons" around the world (Gaza,..etc.) and in that context the burka would make sense to you too (even in prisons the men and women are separated). 1:40:29 Harris is correct that "dogma is blind" on a individual level, but the dogma is also manufactured and adapted for political ends (conquer and divide); if it wasn't "the sacred zygote" it would have been something else manufactured (like southern strategy, guns...etc.) so you are just playing "wack a mole" with dogmas instead of changing the power structure 1:22:33 can someone explain how a computer can suffer without pain receptors? 1:44:30 iPhones are not made from "mere capitalism", all/most of the research is done in universities (state subsidized) and even the cities with the factories and housing in China, where the iPhones are assembled, are constructed by the Chinese government (state subsidized again). 1:51:00 When we toppled Saddam (after Hans Blix told us they didn't have WMDs), toppled Qaddafi after he cooperated with the west and now "knocking on" Iran's door after Obama signed a treaty, no wonder North Korea wants to deter external assault (like the Israeli "Samson option"). But to Harris the Iraq war wasn't terrorism, so why are they scared??? Will they feel "euphoria" if they blow?
He's actually not very articulate. He uses a lot of words incorrectly. For example, he said "what does that infer" when referring to a trend in consumerism when he meant "what does that imply". There are several such examples when he spews out his word salad in a blur of giddiness. The vocabulary he uses is not yet his.
LankyAlpaca That is simply false. Even when debating religious ideologues he gives them the time of day to make their point and refutes them with dignity and logic.
Let not put Mr Brand in the category of an intellectual. He is no brighter than I. He simply has a large vocabulary and principles/ideology that he sticks to. And yes that is post modernism
Spot on. It would be much better to listen to if Russ didn't just try to semantic acrobatics without even engaging properly his talking partner. Russ might get away with this often, but sometimes, the art is not using the most complex language to express one's ideas - but expressing the in a simple manner.. In my Humble opinion.
18:07 But you can get bully/groupthink on any playground ('what was in the kids textbooks?')... So you could see it as the fanatics felt the school threaten their power structures, in the same way the death squads felt the churches (with "liberation theology") threaten them in Latin America... The conservatives will always oppose change to their order because they have the power, and nobody is aloud to "rock their boat" 58:28 ironically the maximum-prison thought experiment is a great. Since we have supported "open-air prisons" around the world (Gaza,..etc.) and in that context the burka would make sense to you too (even in prisons the men and women are separated). 1:40:29 Harris is correct that "dogma is blind" on a individual level, but the dogma is also manufactured and adapted for political ends (conquer and divide); if it wasn't "the sacred zygote" it would have been something else manufactured (like southern strategy, guns...etc.) so you are just playing "wack a mole" with dogmas instead of changing the power structure 1:22:33 can someone explain how a computer can suffer without pain receptors? 1:44:30 iPhones are not made from "mere capitalism", all/most of the research is done in universities (state subsidized) and even the cities with the factories and housing in China, where the iPhones are assembled, are constructed by the Chinese government (state subsidized again). 1:51:00 When we toppled Saddam (after Hans Blix told us they didn't have WMDs), toppled Qaddafi after he cooperated with the west and now "knocking on" Iran's door after Obama signed a treaty, no wonder North Korea wants to deter external assault (like the Israeli "Samson option"). But to Harris the Iraq war wasn't terrorism, so why are they scared??? Will they feel "euphoria" if they blow?
Thomas Fraser: _"I'm really not interested in engaging ad hominem attacks"_ Then you shouldn't have engaged in one in the first instance. I can't help but feel that you're gravely letting down your moral and intellectual kin by stooping to our levels of debasement before giving us so much as a chance to get stuck in. I have my doubts that you even thought to run your initial snide remark past your local spiritual ethics committee prior to loosing its bitter toxicity onto an unsuspecting world of near-intolerable suffering - a world that's already frothing over the rim with precisely this kind of bile. Just what were you thinking? This realm is screaming out for nothing more than compassion, and you just spat in its eye. You've set the cause back decades, and I just can't believe what I'm seeing now. You don't deserve to breathe the same air as the Guru.
Thomas Fraser Yes, well I'm sure Harris would have come over more convincingly in an archly-angled fedora. I'll start a petition. Are you French by any chance?
Thomas Fraser So you're not French? That's something I'd like to discuss with you. Please don't dismiss it as lacking substance. It's important to me. And that's my truth.
The interviewer doesn't seem to be capable to hear anything outside his ideologically welded belief system. He would not listen. Perhaps he just could not listen, due to anything that my threaten his own hermetically sealed stance. Very frustrating. I think an interviewer needs to be skilled at listening and letting who he is interviewing fully express his or her perspective, and not constantly interrupting the person he is interviewing, so that we only hear fully what the interviewer's ideas are, fully articulated.
Agreed. That's the point of any conversation really. But whenever there is a debate, you have to play by the rules of engagement. If you don't, there's no point in debating. I will never converse, debate, argue with anyone who will not let me speak. If they want that same respect in return. You HAVE to be able to listen to what the other person is saying and they have to listen to you.
He’s a recovering addict and has used spirituality to a large degree to help with that process. So he feels very threatened and scared by Sam’s rational and compelling argument against the worlds biggest religion. Although you could argue that Islam was more an authoritarian political movement than a religion 🤔
Yes, things did devolve after a point. But, in Russell's defence this guy seems to repeatedly respond to Russell by stating Russell's comment is irrational, a bad version, "it's not just a matter of...," "you're doing too narrow of a reading...," etc. He portrays Russells comments as trite or approaching stupid. By the time we are one third into the video he is practically attacking Russell. That would make me act out, too., a lot. Also, Sam contradicts himself. A lot. First he says there isn't crazy killers, then he lists all these kinds of crazy, he just doesn't call it crazy until much into his delineation. This is important because it shows He could have agreed with Russell. He just didn't want to for some reason. He puts down Russell over and over. How Russell's ideas are not the most important interpretation, etc.... What I see is two people who approach life from very opposing perspectives. Russell is grounded in a Humanities approach. Sam is oriented from a Science/Math approach. Or you could call it left brain versus right brain. But I see Sam as being just as rude as some of you are saying Russell is. He is incapable of entertaining people may have a different approach to life just as valid as his. Not once does Russell tell him he is wrong. Whereas Sam does a few times. He is so sure his view is the right one. Ugh! I can't tolerate people like that. Check out Russell's interviews with Jordan Peterson. Over and over comments rave at how respectful, genuine, honest their talk is. I would so not be happy to be Sam's daughter. I am a poet with degrees in Sociocultural Anthropology and English. He'd hound me how worthless they are. How they don't draw on data in thought experiments. Blah.
WTF everytime Brand is confronted with arguments /truths Brand starts addressing his guest by his name as to belittle him and/or cut him of, unbelievable that Sam Harris can keep his cool as he is not allowed to finish expressing his thoughts on these matters.
This is basically what happens to Sam in every interview. His honesty riles people's emotions and they try to belittle him in self defense. He's used to dealing with cretins.
@@frakramsey I'm Muslim and I'm well acquainted with my religion.. So I can see the gaps you may not be able to see. Also he hasn't any idea about foreign policy or the outside world, his analysis of the state of the world is totally ahistorical and obviously he's just acting as a limb and extension of US foreign policy. I watched an episode about Trump that I was cringing at the whole way through.. He says Trump has done irreparable damage to US Global standing because he says rude things.. Meanwhile Bush created Wahabism and Obama created ISIS.. Sam has absolutely no clue about anything to do with the State of the World or Global politics.. He things this entire thing is ideological 😂 He is ridiculous.
I like some of his works on subjective experience and its significance.. But when he talks about religion and politics everything out of his mouth is nonsense..
Sam Harris has an almost singular ability to speak clearly, sensibly without emotion or ambiguity and yet is one of the most consistently misunderstood voices of our times.
chrisrwright Thought experiment.... Sam Harris had moral authority over humanity and made dick cheny a starbucks ceo. He then remembered carl sagan's agenda on nuclear proliferation after the cold war and before the nuclear arms race, but then remembered u cannot dictate morality without nukes. Keep the Samson option on the table. Divide , distract, mind fuck, and conquer. Said Harris.
A quick summary of this debate: Sam: "you don't think it's unlucky to be born a girl in Afghanistan 5 years ago?" Russell: "I think that these kinds of theoretical tableaux are used to create a false hierarchy and a moral superiority by a dominant culture that subsequently uses thinking of this nature to underwrite the modern-day colonization and subjugation of these people these people on a massive scale"
Tom Armstrong To be clear. I agree Sam is the sane one in this conversation, but he doesn’t just give facts, and feelings aren’t invaluable. It’s what we feel about the relevant facts that forms our worldview.
"Of course you can have an opinion about Islam without having read the Qur'an. You don't have to read Mein Kampf to have an opinion about Nazism." - Richard Dawkins
No, you just made that up (just like Muhammad made up the stories in the Koran). Sam Harris has stated on record that he has read it many times, as would become obvious if you read his first book, 'The End of Faith'. I have also read the Koran from cover to cover so know he is telling the truth about Islam.
Erik Henze: _"I don't think he's used to being nailed down to a point without trying to slip out from under it."_ Agreed. He should take his Christ Complex a lot more seriously.
Exactly. He likes to play enlightened intellectual until his lack of real knowledge is called out, then he morphs into the backpedaling eccentric comedian.
no, not really, its actually opposite in this case; did you really listen and understood this interview or you are as narrow and as shallow as Sammy boy (self claimed wannabe intellectual with backpack filled with his old linear logic packages which are sold only to individuals like you and similar, really ignorant, plebs).
"stop sticking girls in bags" is a derisory statement? FFS, Russell. If it's at all derisory it's by the way it diminishes the lifetime of suffocation and suffering, ... but you find the problem in the implication that the derision is aimed at the religion? You have so little perspective on all of this.
Russell is just a useless twat in this conversation, spouting bullshit words to sound intelligent and "spiritual" without actually contributing to any of the points. Russell- " why is your focus on this" Sam- " it isn't it's all important" Russel - "we're in the tumble dryer of love Sam" FUCK ME shut the fuck up 🙄🙄🙄
I understand why he is jumping in on Sam though,,, it is the same rhetoric that Sam can bang on about for ages that should be nipped in the bud really, for Sam does think well, but is totally confused about control systems, not "seeing" that they are based in boundaries of illusion.
@@steghuman9063 Right on. Thank you for your comment. It is good to know there are Others reading and listening to the same stuff that interests me! But my beef with Russell in this episode is that He, Russ, is the host and should not jump all over his guest. In the end, they do come to detente. Also, I happen to agree that Religion is too narrow and does not need Russell's good hearted pampering!
This is because Sam is incorrect in his myopic analogies and he too focused on unspecific minutia that is completely unreliable to the world we currently live in. Sam argues points like he is arguing some priest in his old debates and he has not evolved his debate skills the way Ruseell has. Russell is brining Sam back on track instead of hyperbolic thought games that Sam keeps perpetuating that may happen in only .00000001% of any human endeavor. Sam's analogies are so myopic and so minuscule then he tries to make them out to be this broad spectrum of belief and they are NOT. Russell is being a good host to keep the conversation on the correct track too.
Wow, Brand is actually pretty stupid, even I got Sam's first point about the doctrines of religion. Russle began talking about something irrelevant and off point and used too many fancy words that made me cringe.
18:07 But you can get bully/groupthink on any playground ('what was in the kids textbooks?')... So you could see it as the fanatics felt the school threaten their power structures, in the same way the death squads felt the churches (with "liberation theology") threaten them in Latin America... The conservatives will always oppose change to their order because they have the power, and nobody is aloud to "rock their boat" 58:28 ironically the maximum-prison thought experiment is a great. Since we have supported "open-air prisons" around the world (Gaza,..etc.) and in that context the burka would make sense to you too (even in prisons the men and women are separated). 1:40:29 Harris is correct that "dogma is blind" on a individual level, but the dogma is also manufactured and adapted for political ends (conquer and divide); if it wasn't "the sacred zygote" it would have been something else manufactured (like southern strategy, guns...etc.) so you are just playing "wack a mole" with dogmas instead of changing the power structure 1:22:33 can someone explain how a computer can suffer without pain receptors? 1:44:30 iPhones are not made from "mere capitalism", all/most of the research is done in universities (state subsidized) and even the cities with the factories and housing in China, where the iPhones are assembled, are constructed by the Chinese government (state subsidized again). 1:51:00 When we toppled Saddam (after Hans Blix told us they didn't have WMDs), toppled Qaddafi after he cooperated with the west and now "knocking on" Iran's door after Obama signed a treaty, no wonder North Korea wants to deter external assault (like the Israeli "Samson option"). But to Harris the Iraq war wasn't terrorism, so why are they scared??? Will they feel "euphoria" if they blow?
distatic I would say there are conscious states of suffering that do not involve pain receptors. Emotional or psychological pain. Stress, anxiety. Sam raises the possibility of creating a conscious mind that could manifest, be substrate independent and us being completely unaware that we have created it. It could potentially suffer in ways we are unable to imagine.
Are you for real.... The breaking of bread in Catholic religion is an example of the literalism that has infected religious practice. Sam you are not winning the argument by saying if Jesus had not said to do this we would not be doing it!!! We dont choose to do all that man ever told us to do, some rituals stay around because they take hold, they touch our hearts! saying cheers doesn't necessarily bring cheers anymore than wishing a happy birthday brings happiness.... Unless it does!!! Rituals are still around after time because they make our hearts sing... Evil/insane man whose hearts never sing are fueled by there own desire to live in fear and may try to posses and corrupt our rituals..... Sam are you doing just that?
Sam "Have you read the Koran?" Russell "Of course I bloodywell haven't, I've bearly gotten through my notes" proceeds to give in-depth opinion on book he's never read! Wtf?
That's what we are dealing with these days. The liberal left has it's own religion and it is 100% right, it does not need to look any further, it has seen the light.
Will Delaneyjr Nope. The old testament is violent and I won't try to defend it, but the new testament, the one that modern Christians follow is largely a book of forgiveness and doesn't even compare to the violence within the Quran. If you are talking about the binding of Isaac, where God asked Abraham to kill his son, God stops Abraham... So I don't think you actually read them!
Sam Harris is Intellectually on a different level, his points are clear and sound, unfortunately Russell Brand's constant interruption made for a very frustrating podcast to listen to.
The one who is Intellectually on a different level, whose points are clear and sound, whilst Russell Brand is the one making constant interruptions that make for a very frustrating podcast to listen to.
Sam Harris is the fascist that keeps trying to say we should force the wests superficial culture on the rest of the planet without actually saying it, he’s the guy that hates suicide bombers but accepts that every now and again government do need to bomb hospitals with women and children in.
Are you referring to the Red Cross hospital in Afghanistan that ISAF accidentally bombed? That was not a purposeful act, no government accepted it was a needed or required attack. I doubt the pilots ever flew again, or if they did, their careers will certainly be impacted in a significant way.
@@ashwaqahmed9656 His point is that Russell is clearly too emotional. Anyone who needs to bring up " I have friends that are X" during a conversation about religious beliefs and ideological foundations isn't arguing honestly.
@@michaelmarini4627 reading the Quran is not a strong argument either. In addition to neglecting imperialism, capitalism and globalization shows that his argument can work as justification and tool for them.
@@ashwaqahmed9656 the Quran is the holy text for Islam. Reading it or listening to it as a book on tape is fundamental to understand and debate Islam instead of just going by what other people say.
AdiEdits I completely disagree. Sam just refuses to give him an inch philosophically so he does the same spiritually. "Those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music.' A purely scientific world view isn't all it's cracked up to be; and JUST MAYBE, some truths must be experienced to be understood.
Depends what you mean by a purely "scientific world" because by definition, a scientific idea is an idea backed by logic, reason, and empirical evidence. If empirical evidence is not what it is cracked up to be than what is superior to that? As for truths being experienced to be understood - maybe. I have no idea about the truth just as the next guy. I just don't believe that experience > science/philosophy.
AdiEdits By Purely Scientific World View I am talking about what is often referred to as "Scientism" by philosophers. Of which I believe the New Atheists, like Dawkins, Dennett, Hitchens RIP, Richard Carrier, and especially Harris to be dogmatic proponents. "Scientism is a matter of putting too high a value on natural science in comparison with other branches of learning or culture." -Tom Serell Basically, a belief in the universal applicability of the scientific method and approach, also that empirical science constitutes the most authoritative worldview or the most valuable part of human learning-to the exclusion of other viewpoints. One consequence of this world view is the Appeal to Scientific Authority which I assume we can both agree can be a regressive force in society. For example, the idea of man traveling by flying seemed impossible to most everyone 200 years ago, the most revered scientists of the day scoffed at the Wright brothers. Today flying on an Air Bus is taken for granted. I worry we will lose the desire to explore and challenge popular thought as a people. We are more divided, more stupid as studies show, and less capable of survival without our tech than any generation is history as well. We have become a society of children. Finally, when Russell ask him if he feels that the "relegation of spiritual values" could be partly responsible for our current set of societal problems, I thought that was a very fair question, that should be debated. "Observe for yourselves the decay of the sense of sin, the growth of innocence and irresponsibility, the strange modifications of the reproductive instinct with a tendency to become bi-sexual or epicene, the childlike confidence in progress combined with nightmare fear of catastrophe, against which we are yet half unwilling to take precautions." -Crowley "The civilized man has built a coach, but has lost the use of his feet. He is supported on crutches, but lacks so much support of the muscle. He has got a fine Geneva watch, but he has lost the skill to tell the hour by the sun. A Greenwich nautical almanac he has, and so being sure of the information when he wants it, the man in the street does not know a star in the sky. The solstice he does not observe; the equinox he knows as little; and the whole bright calendar of the year is without a dial in his mind. His notebooks impair his memory; his libraries overload his wit. - Self-Reliance, Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1841 ps I would say that Experience + Meditation = Philosophy and that Curiosity + Inquiry = Science. I hope you actually read this, you asked me to articulate an idea that can be a bitch to unpack as Sam would say.
Russell’s Sam Harris Debate Tactics Checklist 1) Challenge Sam on a subject 2) As soon as it looks like Sam is proving his point throw in some Whataboutery to move him onto another subject. 3) REPEAT
Omg, those were my thoughts exactly. I was wondering whether someone would comment on Brand's incessant use of whataboutism and I'm glad you picked up on it.
It's really hard not to dislike Brand outright after this. It was back and forth of Sam trying to explain a cogent point and Brand responding with pedantic word salad.
I agree with Sam here, but I give Russel points for allowing him to talk without rephrasing everything Sam said in a negative way right immediately after. I think they both looked good considering Sam is a neuroscientist/author and Russel is a zany comedian/entertainer.
This level of cultural and moral relativism is infuriating. I don't get it....Why is it so hard to say: "they way the Taliban treats women is wrong PERIOD."?? It's not that fucking difficult.
Russell carpet bombs Sam with his shitty arguments. And when Sam destroys one argument, Russell simply refuses to acknowledge this and instead moves on to the next argument. Did he go to the William Lane Craig school of debating?
18:07 But you can get bully/groupthink on any playground ('what was in the kids textbooks?')... So you could see it as the fanatics felt the school threaten their power structures, in the same way the death squads felt the churches (with "liberation theology") threaten them in Latin America... The conservatives will always oppose change to their order because they have the power, and nobody is aloud to "rock their boat" 58:28 ironically the maximum-prison thought experiment is a great. Since we have supported "open-air prisons" around the world (Gaza,..etc.) and in that context the burka would make sense to you too (even in prisons the men and women are separated). 1:40:29 Harris is correct that "dogma is blind" on a individual level, but the dogma is also manufactured and adapted for political ends (conquer and divide); if it wasn't "the sacred zygote" it would have been something else manufactured (like southern strategy, guns...etc.) so you are just playing "wack a mole" with dogmas instead of changing the power structure 1:22:33 can someone explain how a computer can suffer without pain receptors? 1:44:30 iPhones are not made from "mere capitalism", all/most of the research is done in universities (state subsidized) and even the cities with the factories and housing in China, where the iPhones are assembled, are constructed by the Chinese government (state subsidized again). 1:51:00 When we toppled Saddam (after Hans Blix told us they didn't have WMDs), toppled Qaddafi after he cooperated with the west and now "knocking on" Iran's door after Obama signed a treaty, no wonder North Korea wants to deter external assault (like the Israeli "Samson option"). But to Harris the Iraq war wasn't terrorism, so why are they scared??? Will they feel "euphoria" if they blow?
Russels superficial stances, all vanity and virtue signalling with no real depth. I too found it odd that instead of debating further or acknowleding points well made he just immediately changed subjects, I think this might be a sign of cognitive dissonance. Its kind of a more polite way of putting your fingers in your ears and going "NA NA I CANT HEAR YOU, DIDNT HEAR A WORD". Just like he wont read the Quran because he knows what it will contain, and he just doesnt want to know.
If I were Sam Harris, I would have stopped and glared at Brand every time I was interrupted. When Brand quieted, I would wait a few more seconds before continuing. If Brand interrupted again a moment or two later, I'd stop again. Eventually I might just stand up and leave after one of the interruptions. I think the reasons why would be both obvious, and justified.
Actually I would do that if I were Brand; not sure if we watch same interview, 70% of this is linear logic masturbation of Sammy boy trying to repeat some of his same and very old shallow and narrow "insights";
Nothing like watching two dudes I actually enjoy normally just talk over each other. Mostly Russell rattling off incoherent, far too broad, rhetoric and fails to actually dissect the issues. This would be like Joe Rogan trying to spar with an intellectual. I'm glad he doesn't try to.
When all your arguments are failing and you decide to impugn your opponent's motives, here's a tip; don't pick anger as the motive when your opponent is Sam Harris. You just look foolish.
Sam: People are not crazy they just sometime hold bad beliefs Sam: There are not so much evil people causing needless suffering as much as misaligned incentive structures. Russel: Terrorism is crazy people, and the system is maintained by evil people. Russel: Sam, would you say you are a pessimist about humans?
"Jump into the tumble dryer of truth.. I bet it hurts your ears." - Christopher Bollyn. "Who am i to judge the doctrine of 911? My judgment stops at the burka". - soulsnatcher sam Harris
Russel brand is the typical pseudo - intellectual. He will couch his lack of knowledge in flowery language which ultimately evaporates when you realise he is saying nothing of value.
Crysus Bu Crysus Bu Yeah, that’s the common reductive narrative of ‘oppressor versus oppressed’ social justice dogma. It’s clear he hasn’t actually thought these issues out or he wouldn’t be implying idiotic and murderous ideas like collective guilt and white privilege while being an apologist for the worst crimes of Islam.
Crysus Bu That is increasingly the common narrative and the only one I hear him returning to repeatedly here. It’s oppressor vs oppressed, everything is a power struggle, sprinkled with relativism. He sounds like every new grad that just got a degree based in any critical theory influenced program or even any tumblrite that grew up reading intersectionality activist posts.
That is really interesting. I don´t like non of them actually I belive both are manipulative and marionettes for the Deep state. BUT Russel is telling you same really impotant things, but he does it in the blink of an Eye and in a style like this that I say is not important.
Kevin Pineda The reason i have such passion for criticizing the bad ideas of the 911 doctrine, is because i see the baby in the bath water that everyone is affraid of loosing. And i see it doesn't require any decisive bs to be saved. You dont have to lie to yourself to believe the lies in the 911 doctrine.
Sam Harris is not a white supremacist. He hates white people just as much as he hates muslims. For him it's not a racial issue, but rather, he hates all forms of stupidity and has not patience for bad ideas.
Russell - I love Under the Skin so much, I’ve either watched all of them on UA-cam and/or listened to them on the podcast - but please....let your guests finish their points before you interject - at the very minimum half of the time. It will help the rest of us understand the arguments being made on both sides, which would be a hell of a lot more valuable x
Agree Nadelia. Russell, pay your guest the respect of listening, especially a mighty intellect like Sam Harris! I cannot play more than 30 minutes of this before I tire of your rambling and interjecting.
omg, I was just going to come on here and type this exact sentiment. I love Russell, but this was one of the first podcasts that his interview style really hindered the conversational tone in an overall negative way.
Disagree. His involvement and ‘interruptions’ added to the show. All I saw was Brand getting Harris to work harder to justify his genocidal tendencies.
"Some people can read War and Peace and come away thinking it's a simple adventure story. Others can read the ingredients on a chewing gum wrapper and unlock the secrets of the universe."
It's incredible how deeply ideologically possessed Russell Brand is. He really must step outside his ideological bubble. Watching him interview Sam Harris is like watching a 2 year old try to comprehend rudimentary economics.
Id like to hear sam Harris do a debate with Christopher Bollyn, that guy is spreading such illogical shit like a 2 year old. I would love to see sam shit all over him
StripperTipper-405 but Christopher Bollyn is a apologist of unprecedented levels, sam Harris really needs to address some of the shit that come out of his mouth. Have u heard it? Its gross, he apologized for islam!
And Harris is guilty of using a straw man argument, i.e., sending your daughter to spend the summer with the Taliban. This isn't a reasonable analogy. It's like asking Harris if he'd let his daughter go live at the Warren Jeffs Mormon sect, or with the KKK. No sane person would want their kid to live in a war zone with a terrorist organization. Using the Taliban as a typical Islamic organization is clearly misguided. Now that is disappointing, unless you listen to Harris for tips on how to be a great Sophist.
This is getting embarrassing for Russell his points are just opinions based on what he wants not facts,he is trying to shut Sam down hoping he won't have to address the facts.
All Sam talks about us either statistics, evidence,or common sense, Russell seems to have this strange idea that we are all the same and deep down all want the same things.
I'm not saying Sam us always right;but imagine a world where all Brands ideas are implemented, now do the same with Sams, and realistically and honestly which might actually work.
I totally agree with his point - violence driven by religious beliefs or political beliefs or the belief that you've been abused, bullied, or excluded from society - the difference is a construct, all are irrational acts
Word salad might convince some that Russell is smarter than he thinks he is but I'm not fooled by his verbal trickery in place of actual intellectual substance.
That's definitely one issue, another is the constant unstated premise I personally feel lay at the heart of people like Russell and all those who argue his side it seems...and that unstated premise is ' no matter how much damage it does, how many people it kills and even how much someone can tell you to your fucking face why they did what they did...its NEVER Islam fault or PRIMARY cause and shame on you for suggesting otherwise!' Well maybe, just maybe...it is Islam's fault and shame on you for refusing to see otherwise. (not referring to you personally of course)
Word salad might convince some that Harris is smarter than he thinks he is but I'm not fooled by his verbal trickery in place of actual intellectual substance.
A Moment In Time You are doing the same by calling a genuine intent to understand as word salad with no accuracy or nuance in why you would call it that, is in fact more word salad by you. Makes you worse actually.
@@mat_j False, he was both clear, and cogent and displayed both substance and intellect, with restraint and patience. I adore Russel, but this was not one of his better showings. Indeed, these scary bright people do highlight our insecurities especially when we disagree, but lack the ability to express ourselves with the same degree of eloquence.
Ironically, Sam has the patience of a saint! Russell has some interesting things to say but his intellectual dishonesty about the Taliban is astounding.
I've only just come across this video and I was going to be much more harsh in my criticism until I realised I have seen you in much greater form than during this interaction. It comes across as if you would let Sam actually finish a point you might lose the string which your spirituality is dangling on. I respect you greatly but I just had to say that you talking over Sam was so very hard to listen to and I have seen you give more respect to insane homophobic church groups. Maybe you could give Sam another shot if he would agree of course as there is a chance he would not care to subject himself to the same treatment.
He's the worlds oldest 16 year old. Even though he's 40+ years old! & in the wise words of Dr Evil "There's nothing more pathetic. Then an ageing Hipster"
I've disagreed with Russel for a while now but jeez, I've lost the last ounce of respect for him after this. Rip. His view that ethics is completely relative is bullshit. He's also straight up snide and rude to Sam in this one. Oh and also white privilege.
Andrew Kullar Some things are objectively good and bad in regards to ethics, for example some cultures stone people to death for adultery. If you can't defend that being ethical then you have to agree with me.
Adam Lea Speaking for myself, I certainly can't defend that as ethical, but who's to say the people doing the stoning don't consider it the ethical thing to do? Seems insane to me, but I can buy that people have ethics in line with their religion or whatever. No different to morals really, and I definitely think those are subjective.
Chris Richardson, sure they think that stoning is ethical but so what? That doesn't make it relative. Kids in school make errors in algebra constantly, that doesn't make the truth of 2+2=4 subjective. It is as true and observable that Switzerland has better ideas on how to create a successful society than Afghanistan.
It's not about withholding judgement. That's not his point. His point is tempering the judgement with an understanding that it comes with an outsiders biases and perspective. That's much different than saying don't have it. I know westerners can't stand the idea of their judgements and opinions not being completely validated and front and center, but sad day, that's not the case. It's not entirely invalid, but it also needs approached with a level of humility and an awareness that it doesn't carry primary validity. A tempering of opinion westerners are not accustomed to.
18:07 But you can get bully/groupthink on any playground ('what was in the kids textbooks?')... So you could see it as the fanatics felt the school threaten their power structures, in the same way the death squads felt the churches (with "liberation theology") threaten them in Latin America... The conservatives will always oppose change to their order because they have the power, and nobody is aloud to "rock their boat" 58:28 ironically the maximum-prison thought experiment is a great. Since we have supported "open-air prisons" around the world (Gaza,..etc.) and in that context the burka would make sense to you too (even in prisons the men and women are separated). 1:40:29 Harris is correct that "dogma is blind" on a individual level, but the dogma is also manufactured and adapted for political ends (conquer and divide); if it wasn't "the sacred zygote" it would have been something else manufactured (like southern strategy, guns...etc.) so you are just playing "wack a mole" with dogmas instead of changing the power structure 1:22:33 can someone explain how a computer can suffer without pain receptors? 1:44:30 iPhones are not made from "mere capitalism", all/most of the research is done in universities (state subsidized) and even the cities with the factories and housing in China, where the iPhones are assembled, are constructed by the Chinese government (state subsidized again). 1:51:00 When we toppled Saddam (after Hans Blix told us they didn't have WMDs), toppled Qaddafi after he cooperated with the west and now "knocking on" Iran's door after Obama signed a treaty, no wonder North Korea wants to deter external assault (like the Israeli "Samson option"). But to Harris the Iraq war wasn't terrorism, so why are they scared??? Will they feel "euphoria" if they blow?
Better yet, simply listen to him talk with someone who isn't enamoured by their own giddy blur of a word salad and rather have a genuine interest at getting to the crux of ideas.
Guest Informant Russell is far too much of a narcissist to let someone have the majority of the mic for 2 hours, his impulse to retaliatory regurgitate rambunctious word salad is too overpowering ha.
Thank you, couldn't finish this because Russel never listens. He wants to throw around 15 synonyms and obscure words to sound smart and he falls flat on his face because of it...
Usually, I would rebuke these comments and defend Russel. But somehow this discussion acted as an exposure of Russel's weaknesses and dishonesty. I could listen to Russel spew synonyms all day and be entertained, but this exchange revealed and highlighted how he lacks academic bolstering for much of his worldview, and borders on woowoo at times.
How can somebody say so little with so many words? Brand, like depak chopra, is a master of semantic illusion. When you bypass the impressive vocabulary, you find nothing but woo woo, deepedies and pointless drivel.
Thought experiments are an effective way to illustrate a point, Harris was trying to use them to illustrate the flaws in Brand's logic. Every time Harris tries to engage with him on moral thought experiments, Brand deliberately interrupts, shifts the goal posts and ultimately mocks him for it at 40:56 This is because Brand doesn't have an answer to these questions, hypothetical or not. This was incredibly frustrating to endure.
Except his thought experiments are dogshite and could only possibly appeal to idiots or semi-intelligent people who think they're smarter than they are...
Sam Harris is the most calculated speaker on earth, he chooses his word very carefully and I find all his points are undeniable if you objectively and honestly absorb them.
It's not the first time. Omer Aziz was almost hostile when speaking with Sam. The only people who fiercely object to Sam are those that infer their own interpretations from Sam's statements coloured by as much pessimism and negativity as they can conjure. Why is it that people like Omer Aziz arrive at the conclusion that Sam defends the bombing of innocents? Because he's talking past Sam and putting emotions ahead of reasoning. That is why Sam is going to win every discussion or debate where he isn't met with clear, hard reason. Of course, if the listeners and viewers don't care about reason they'll give in to superficial traits, tribalism, cult worship etc.
Brand, I generally like you but this is just pathetic. Your only response to all of Sam's points is just to witter on about absolutely nothing. That's if you actually let him get to the point... Check your ego at the door if you want to actually have a worthwhile conversation.
+hoopydx I broadly agree but it wasn't about nothing. In fact, quite annoyingly, Brands few points about what he was concerned with, (real power now & the problems of the secular now that make it vulnerable to the things Harris is concerned with), sounded quite interesting but he threw away the chance to talk with Harris about them because he preferred to play the critic of Harris and have him defend his positions. A great shame I think. Had Brand said up front, 'we agree on many things and disagree on some others but you have a brilliant systematic mind please help me organise and clearly express my concerns and hopefully we have time to address them in relationship to yours', then it would have been more fascinating than frustrating and futile -because after all what progress was made here?
GodsOwnPrototype They acknowledged several times that they were jumping around a lot. I don't have much experience with Russel Brand's podcast but it seems like that's just how he prefers to have conversations.
Hard disagree. Just my opinion, but Russell actually was doing a very good job at pointing out many unconsidered points in Sam's personal version of rationalism. I agree that Russell interrupted Sam many times while he was painting his picture, but again Sam's evidence and analysis is biased and unsubstantial.
Which is the biggest threat to freedom, islam or the 911 commission report? One of these doctrines justified the patriot act, nsa, tsa, the repeal of habeas corpus, 8 flase wars aka the balkanization of the middle east, 20 trillion of debt, drones, torture, gbay, ect.... Can u guess which doctrine full of lies justified these things? Hint, its not the doctrine of islam. - deepak chopra
Russell’s language salad to make up for lazy thinking is hilarious to watch. Sam has always inspired me to think very deeply about issues and convey them in the simplest language possible
Ah, "lazy thinking", Kelly. You're clearly adding great insight with simple language (I allude it's the same "lazy thinking" that enables one to even listen to g-eazy and subscribe to Keeping up with the kardashians, huh?). Does your vocabulary lack the verbosity and eloquence of a true wordsmith because you have to think "deeply" to ingest any form of literary homiletics from thought leaders with illustrious cognitive flexibility? Sad actually. You can stand for Harris' work and leave the ad hominem engagement, but due to you setting that rule with your comment, I'd be more than happy to return the rule. All the best with your simple language and lazy thinking, darling. ;)
@@watdinkjydoenjy I think you have missed the point. Russel often uses over-the-top and unnecessary language to either explain a simple point or to sound intelligent without actually making a coherent point (much like yourself). If you can make your point in the most succinct way possible, it shows you truly understand the point.
@@watdinkjydoenjy The hilarious part is that it took you a paragraph to say “actually I think simple language is more reflective of lazy thinking than complex language is.” (And I’m giving you more credit than you’re due because you never actually delivered much of a point anywhere). You said the same thing she said but flipped on it’s head and with no more insight than her, and it took you an entire paragraph. And you used words that didn’t quite fit their context, presumably for the simple fact that they’re big and make you appear verbose. Too funny 😂
AMEEN T Hammas’s charter calls for genocide on all Jews, the destruction, and the eternal prevention, of any Jewish state. There is clear uncontested evidence of Hammas using schools, hospitals, and non-combatant housing to base their terrorist operations in, including the firing of indiscriminately-fired rockets into Israel. Israel has been the victim of countless terrorist attacks and several wars from its neighbors. Israel has offered huge swaths of land to the PLO so that they may establish a Palestinian state several times and have been ignored, rejected immediately, or served as precursors to surprise wars.
Joe, If you think that you are dumber then you realize. He has not said a singly racist thing is his life. He attacks bad ideologies and ideas, not people. You lefty morons need to start learning the difference.
Joe unfortunately you fall into the category of people who have no idea of what the word racist actually means and like to use it frequently to try and shame people whom you have no intellectual or factual rebuttal to their point of view.
Well, I'm half way through now and the whole thing is turning into a horror show. Sam has the look of someone who wishes he was somewhere - anywhere - else. The bearded prophet is babbling like a drunken 60s hippie and failing at every turn to grasp the meaning of what Sam Harris is valiantly trying to say. This was always going to be an unfair contest and it's painful to watch.
This was no debate. Juvenile, hysterical, egocentric logorrhoea on one side and persevering, patient, painstaking but ultimately pointless reasoning on the other. It was thoroughly depressing. Sam Harris should never have agreed to talk to such a squawking peacock.
I think SH conducted him self very well. It was obvious some times that he might be a bit put off, but he was gracious and I dont think he really felt that uncomfortable - he knows well that the way the two conduct themselves will be judged by the masses afterwards.
I am an atheist and I have been influenced by Sam when I was young, but on this I agree with Russel. You can't use your own hierarchy of beliefs and superimpose on others. Even if you think that's oppression and I agree, it's their fight, don't use these to meet your political and financial objectives.
OK, so hypothetically if there's a country that breaks the left arm of every woman. Is it wrong to use your hierarchy of belief to say, hey they should stop doing it?
@@thekrazyasian Yes, even then, it might seem harsh, but that's the best decision. Because, you not having any clue about their culture and languages can't understand them and cannot make the right decisions for them, you might make it worse which they always do, you can't find one country where they went to liberate and they're better off for it. It is always their inner battle, they know what's best for them. You cannot decide for them and should not decide for them. I'm not against helping undeveloped countries with financial aid, helping them with setting up schools, hospitals and basic infra, if they want it. You can help them with the choices they have made if they align with your sense of right and wrong, but you can't choose for them. That's the colonial mindset, thinking you know what's better for the "savages" (that's the kind of language that is used to control people).
@thekrazyasian That's an extremely unreasonable and unrealistic example. But even then, the solution is to argue it out. Not drop explosives or place sanctions or propagandize in the name of "freedom" and "democracy" which the West has a good track record of doing. And this track record is precisely part of the reason why people from a lot of countries think that the West is no position to get on its moral high horse.
@@thekrazyasian Say what you want, the point is to not interfere... In many African countries, homosexuality is punishable by death but the majority of Africans agree with this. We can say it's wrong but at the end of the day, it's their culture. We often ignore the fact that our (the Wests) interference causes more suffering than it does Good and we set other nations back decades in terms of societal growth. In Barack Obamas First term, he was against gay marriage and then he changed his stance in his second term. A country needs to at least have the basics down (e.g. unemployment AND NOT GETTING BOMBED TO SMITHEREENS) before it can look to tackle societal issues...
@@Symbiot7 not interfere? If we “didn’t interfere” and maintained the same energy you possess of moral relativism/cultural relativism to nazi’s, you’d have to (according to your own views) just throw your arms up in the air because it’s the “german nazi culture and, hey, who are we to judge their culture of exterminating jewish people!” That’s essentially what you are defending when you say that there arent right or wrong ways a society ought to be living, and that every culture is as equal as the next. And, hey like you said, who are we to judge nazi’s killing jews, or muslims mutilating little girls genitalia? Come on
Yup , Sam is a Jedi.......no doubt left about it after watching this podcast. Amazing. Is anybody out there paying more attention to the way Sam is handling situations rather than what he is saying?
I guess it's all of the meditation he has done. Compare that to how Laurence Krauss shouted down the apologist WLC. Krauss was right of course, but he wasn't very fair to WLC and presented his points angrily.
Taxtro completely agree. There were three of those debates and in each of them Laurence came across as impatient and angry. Not what is expected from a scientist in a civilized discourse. The worst part was that there were audience members who were cheering up that behavior. I have learnt so so much from Sam Harris just by watching his debates and especially how he handles the ad hominem attacks . amazing. I have tried to bring about change in my behavior by asking myself OK I'm in this situation how would Sam Harris handle it. More often than not it has worked. Try it. Tc . wish you well. Sorry for the late reply. Came back to this podcast and saw your msg.
yes he is calm , throwing hypothetical arguments, playing lose with definitions, staying away from considering other's perspectives. He sounds like a crafty monk.
Thanks jag. That’s an important observation. Sam does an incredible job of keeping the discussion focussed while not being condescending at all. Yes, Brand can be unnecessarily verbose but his ideas are not always disjointed fluff. Sam uncovered a lot of common objections to his own ideas, expressed however noisily by Brand. Sam walks the walk of Medidation - he genuinely listens and tries to understand what Brand is actually saying. Notice that he gradually calms Brand down by gaining his trust through thoughtful consideration of his ideas. I nearly walked away from this interview but ultimately found it interesting. Thanks to both guys for their efforts and for all the thoughtful comments from the public.
Russell keeps insisting, "who is to say" and is wrong immediately there and then. "Who is to say" is an identity argument that has no place in philosophy or actual debate ... a form of the ad hominem fallacy
if u notice, the academics are becoming new priests .. that kinda power can tempt even the most proper of scientist styled minds.. itll be the abandonment of all their decency and honesty and so on for the glory of being able to say anything is anything and have anyone be any.. well maybe thats a bit far but... basically, whats what and why... that power, is up for grabs until the public is smart as fuck but we're idiots.
RabbitHunterX obviously there is no real answer to "who is to say?" What kind of question is that, you think he is really looking for a name of someone? No idiot, he is looking to prove a point by saying that and it failed miserably every time
you've got to be one ofthe dumbest bitches around here lol "obviously there is no real answer!!" if there was then you couldn't paint russel out as you're doing ALSO : CRUCICALLY :: you'd have to do some fucking thinking wouldn't u? and even have to demolish a position you hold and feel comfy with eh? dumbass bitchboi xD
brb Ill calm the fuck down ;p ps I yell at russel for his reliturdness ALL THE TIME.. but he's still important and brings crucial counterweight to the most critical muscleproject in the history of mankind... get it?... v powerful yo... xD
RabbitHunterX There is no real answer because it's a rhetorical question genius. He is making a point with the phrase, "who is to say?" and keeps repeatedly insisting on that point... not hard to comprehend
Russell Brand, and all your needless lovely long words... Sam Harris made a few points you completely misunderstood, which is understandable, however you then failed to allow him to return and explain. Stop over-talking and stop talking over.
I'm not convinced that Dick Cheney's magic kingdom would be so benevolent. To assume so requires that we forget, as Harris does, the whole point of the Iraq War escapade: to develop U.S. ability to extract Middle East oil at our pleasure and preferred price. Brand is right to argue that when discussing religious doctrine, there is always more to the story than religious doctrine. I think Harris' critique of Islam lacks credibility without his discussing Wahhabism and that movement's political roots.
Yeah, forty-two, I need you to explain. What's the problem with using that example, of how radical Islam treats girls? It's one of the best illustrations of religion causing suffering, one which unequivocally connects with the subjugation of half the population, which inevitably leads to the detriment of the culture as a whole. How does that offend your love of decency?
I've heard him speak over many conversations and he is not making straw man arguments against Islam. He cites facts and compares Islam to other religions citing the fundamental differences between them. His argument against Islam is rational.
Yes it's perfectly rational to condemn a religion with 1.7 billion followers as intrinsically evil? Does that mean that there are 1.7 billion terrorists just waiting to blow the selves up because they can't stand Western 'freedom'?
Yup. I like Russell, but from someone who has defended 'Islam' (or the version of which he is familiar) robustly, I'd have expected him to at least have read it in part.
Indeed and as i know from personal experience a couple of lines gives you the ability to talk for half an hour without actually saying anything which is basically Russell's whole career in a nutshell
“The societal pre-requisites and undulating overcurrents of the violence of the true individuals and narratives and global political circumstances, I want to follow my own spiritual optimistic centrally positive view upon the holistic pathways of doctrines and the.......” Brand is on coke.
Not entirely. Just because Jordan B Peterson has come up with some exciting new labels doesn't mean that you can just paste them all over the first ignoramus you come across. He's certainly Post Modernist, he's certainly a Moral Relativist... but he hasn't got a Marxist thought in head. Neo or otherwise.
Ronnie James I'm afraid you are completely wrong. Russell has spoken of Marx's ideas in his talks in the past and revels in socialist ideals. Oh and Jordan Peterson didn't come up with the labels, he simply brought them to prominence as he saw them being implemented within institutions all across the western world. ua-cam.com/video/RyO_0v0umLk/v-deo.html ua-cam.com/video/EL7zEVhPHQU/v-deo.html ua-cam.com/video/3b3OD0jLY-o/v-deo.html
Good God, it was embarrassing to watch Russel here..."Real power operates and has been done probably since British Colonialism" - yeah, can't imagine humans subjugating other humans before that...
Don't strawman Russel. He said since that time it was mainly based on Economy, while he might be wrong about that, he never said there was no subjugation before that. BTW I am with Sam in this debate for the most part but no need to strawman Russel.
Russell we love you but wow you invite sam to have interview to heard his perspective and yet you only want to heard your own voice. Thankful for Sam`s patients and grace, it shows real maturity.
One person has lung cancer and another has a bruised knee so they both have health problems. According to Russell's logic (moral failing) who can say who has it worst?
In America a girls dad might be disappointed and yell when she says she's a lesbian In ANY muslim nation the same girl can get murdered for that by a cheering mob in public and no one goes to jail, if she's not killed by her own family, they're in the mob watching it WHo has it worse? In the west you tell your parents you're an atheist they roll their eyes and go to church without you or give you a speech. In muslim nations they KILL YOU. Who has it worse?
Lanky: So do you think domestic abuse and the other things you named are actually ethically bad? If so: Can we call a culture, that has a lot more of domestic abuse etc. than another one, an ethically worse culture for women?
no fan of christianity, but islam is a far bigger threat right now and far more oppressive to women and children. every muslim country is a human rights black hole.
He is only a black belt because those who are impressed by him has little or no knowedge of discurvie nature of islsmic science or indepth knoweldge of Quran or tradition. He projects his relative reductive experience and conflates with multple socio political issue and presents it as Islam. He taljs of women rights, whats the crme rate against women in USA or the objectfying cilture that relegates women as nothing more then an object. Some may argue this ix their rights frzmed by a cultural experience so is the choice of some women dawing on a burqa. one is only free if likes of sam harris say so.
Russel fails because he does not want to go deeper into subjects. He is afraid to offend, and that is why his points did not convice me, as i am sure many others will also be in the s ame position. the debate was lost by Russel here.
Lol I’d like to see what Russell’s response to a man punching a woman in the face would be. Would he intervene or spend 15 minutes talking about why he doesn’t have the right to judge the situation because he was raised in a culture where hitting women is wrong but because he doesn’t understand who’s at the top making it a rule that men shouldn’t beat women his recourse is allowance?
Because his views are incoherent, inconsistent and contradictory. For instance, he thinks democratic states are totalitarian yet reveres actual totalitarian systems such as communism as if they are liberating. He admittedly has not read the Quran yet defends Islamic doctrines assuming they are mostly good. He also does not realize his own bigotry towards Muslims as he blames colonialism to be responsible for Jihad, assuming that Muslims don't have agency. As if they are not capable of acting of their own volition or belief, as if they are powerless and can only react to Western oppression. He also disregards Islamic oppresion of women and minorities of other religions.
Russell makes perfect sense, and such good points! The true meaning of a moral upright and noble human being in these times of intolerance and hate against anyone daring to think differently from the mainstream western worldview. Anyone with a bit of common sense and even a small amount of humane values and empathy would agree with him. Sam Harris is completely biased against Islam and just calmly spews the most arrogant smug self serving assumptions about Islam and muslim women. Just so many complete lies in each sentence, that it amazes me. I'm sooooo glad Russell invited him so that he could challenge his hate ideology, which his loyal followers never could, since they'd be watching him and similar hate preachers in their echo chambers. Well done Russell Grant, for daring to disagree and challenge the hate and intolerance spewed by Sam Harris! May God bless you!
It’s been a year, have you learned or experienced anything more about Islam? Most Muslim Women are not considered equals and in most places have few rights. Do you know what Sharia law is? Do you know what FGM is? Honor killings? Child brides? Throwing gays off buildings? These are Muslim religious practices. Not all Muslims do this but we need to call it out just like we called out spousal abuse in the 70s and 80s in the US. It’s harmful, violent behavior and not everyone does it but Islam promotes and supports this type of cruelty and unethical behavior. It’s not lies, it’s Sharia law.
Invoking moral relativism is a self-refuting argument here: how can you say colonialism, imperialism, etc are "bad"? Whose place is it to judge, after all?
No one is really a moral relativist. It is merely the last defense of a failed ideology. Liberalism is so obviously superior to collectivism that Marxists have to pretend like there was nothing to be gained to begin with.
53:26 Russell asks Sam "Why are you not more concerned of the continual objectification of women..." This part really annoys me because he speaks over Sam's response and becomes all giddy so as to drive the conversation away from this topic, only to re-arise at it and ask more questions of the same nature. From Sam's perspective, he is worried about objectification of women and other problems of Western society; but from an outlook of "bad ideas" Sam claims that Islam is one of the worst and that the results/consequences of such ideology are far more worse than his daughter sleeping with a douchebag. It really annoys me that Russell can't let Sam finish and jump on the same thought-train as Sam - Russell's just constantly trying to listen only to argue, only to dispute, rather than to acknowledge and understand. Just jump into the thought experiments - stop trying to fight it! An argument is far more interesting when one follows one's "spin" and responds appropriately, instead of trying to adjust the "spin" or misinterpret such "spin", as it seems Russell seems to constantly do.
i think this is a personal fail for Russell. I do like him but couldn't get through the interview. It's not on par with Kathy Newman but the determination to skew the conversation is evident. You said you wanted to learn from him Russel, why didn't you at least give yourself a moment to understand what he was saying.
Being in the habit of making humble sounding noises and actually being humble are not the same thing. When guys like this say they want to "learn from" someone like Harris that's often their way of saying "I want to figure out why you aren't buying into my noble-sounding tripe."
I'm not sure about that but he is certainly capable of being less obtuse than this. I watched both his interviews with Jordan Peterson and he was good in both of those. He made good points, seemed to understand Jordan's and for the most part let him speak. This interview with Harris he was just annoying through out and even went as far as to literally refuse to participate in a thought experiment that Sam was trying to employ to help him explain.
After he said "you don't have to explain all this to me, I'm not 9 years old" then proceeded to interrupt Sam with "Sam, Darling" I had to turn it off. Virtue signalling and unwillingness to share different ideas in a respectful manner defies the purpose of a progressive conversation
Anyone who identifies with Russell Brand as a moral authority is delusional and should seek therapy and stop doing drugs or repent for doing too many drugs to ever comprehend common sense.
Islam has never told me to stay in my home or threatened to charge me for leaving it, Islam has never put me out of work or caused people their businesses, Islam never called me a racist, biggot, masogonist or anything else simply because I have a difference of opinion of what's right for me.
What! I am shocked that Russell Brand refuses to condemn or judge immoral Islamic practices eg throwing homosexuals off buildings or the mass murder of girls that dare to attend school. He says he can’t cast moral judgement because (1) he grew up with a western perspective and “who is he to judge” (2) for fear that even acknowledging these horrors inevitably justify western acts of war. This makes Russell morally bankrupt and extremely selfish. He sees Muslims as “others” not worthy of empathy, justice or a free life. Instead it is more important that westerners view him as non judgmental and loving of all. He knocks the rich because that is popular but he won’t defend the plebs especially if they are foreign.
DarkBungleX that's not islamic practices that cultural practices. If it's islamic please site where in the religion. It says anything of the throwing a gay or killing girls???? Your talking shit
Yes he needs to get over that and field his objections a queries without that baggage. The question of why drone-strikes are relatively OK to people compared to the Suicide Bombings etc is an interesting avenue of discussion. No need to shit in the threshold and invite someone in & no suprise when the conversation goes elsewhere.
Bart Ehrman Have you ever read the Quran in ancient hebrew or even Greek? Sam Of course not! Not that i think it!s anything to defend in the Quran, but how many people do you know who have?I think you!d find actual Islamic scholars thinking the same of Sam in his understanding. But Sam doesn't do historic political context. Fancy taking something out of context! Sam should hate that.
@@cajoz Sam Harris has read the Quran, at minimum, in its entirety, in English, and lists scores of quotations in his book The End of Faith that speak to doctrinal motivations or condonations of some terrible acts and, in its extreme invocations, blatantly, racist, fascistic, apocalyptic tribalistic beliefs. If splitting hairs over translations are required to defend the merits of any religious beliefs and their application then the apologist is defending an utterly untenable position. If God (Abrahamic monotheism; polytheism deserves it's own thread/analysis) has gifted us a text by which to think and live, linguistics/semantics would not be required to defend its holiness or be the aegis against its refutation, particularly so if he dictated it verbatim to an (according to Muslim scholars) illiterate prophet, pbuh. To this extent it is quite paradoxical/self-contadictory that many Muslim scholars invoke this as evidence of the book's divinity. In fact, it does the opposite. Further, but not requisite for the argument, it is both odd and damning that its positive encouragements would survive translation but not the negative ones. It is clear, however, that most Muslims are very good people, and in the Quran there is likely more than enough goodness and inspiration for living a good life, being good neighbours, good wives, good husbands and good children (obviously cuteness, brattiness, and asking "Are we there yet?" are ubiquitous amongst kids) in it, too. Yet, the Golden Rule dates to ancient Egypt and India, Sri Lanka, and ancient Greece, and other fundamental, innate, synergetic human behaviours far predate the Quran. People have not required dogmatic books to develop positive, beneficial relationships with these characteristics, and if we did need such books to do so we would be in troubled (certainly far more trouble than we are in now, if one were inclined to suggest we are). Would love to hear what you think about this. If there are things you disagree with please don't take offence, I am very open to changing my outlook and for learning from those whom I disagree with. Slàinte math!inteSlah
...to crystallize my point about the Golden Rule, etc., Muslims do not require the Quran or be amazing people. They are simply amazing people who have religious beliefs, texts, that reinforce their natural inclinations to being the good people they were born to be, for the most part, with the exclusion of for example the long list of evil condonations found therein, and bad eggs who are found everywhere, again with no connection to religion whatsoever.
@@chrysology Your outlook and understanding of religion and especially Islam appears to be one dimensional as with most people including muslims themselves. You argue that a book gifted by God as a guide to life should be simplistic and not require 'splitting hairs'. Yet you do not consider that the book is believed to be a guide for mankind in general. Not for people living 1400 years ago, but people living in all ages. That means the text is limited to the capacity of society at a given time and hence its interpretation and understanding will evolve as the societies evolve. How complex must a text be if it has instructions on about every aspect of a human life summed up in 604 pages? This is where the arabic language is suitable because of its complexity and how a single word can easily have completely different meanings depending on the context it is used in. And also why supporting texts a i.e. the hadith are necessary to understand many parts of the book but even those are limited to the listeners and their understanding of what was being said in the time they were living in. The Quran (and all the holy books in their original text) are multilayered. Depending on who you are and what you are looking for, 'splitting hairs' or 'mental gymnastics' as ppl like to put it, will most certainly will be necessary in many cases. Hence why the Prophet PBUH told the people to travel to China (the land of knowledge) in order to understand ('the deeper layers') Quran. It's one thing knowing where babies come from, but completely another explaining how its formed in the womb. Try explaining that to people thousands of years ago with their limited knowledge. You can't. Let me just put it this way, throughout history of science we have proposed many theories that were proven to be false later on. Did that mean science was invalid and unreliable for attaining objective knowledge? or that the scientists were the ones mistaken and wrongly interpreted data? Do we have scientists that refute climate change and vaccines and use the scientific method to prove their point? Is it fair to use these scientists as the poster boys for science? The problem with muslims and believers is that they're born into the religion and they can't apply critical thinking. They blindly follow all the interpretations of a scholar/priest/imam. Because practically speaking that's what religion essentially is. It's the interpretation of a book believed to be sent by God. And you certainly don't need a book to practice good character at the very basic level because society teaches it to you to be the norm but the golden rule definitely wouldn't be the norm without the influence of religion. “We will show them Our Signs in the universe, and in their own selves, until it becomes manifest to them that this (the Quran) is the truth” [41:53]
It's ok. He's too stupid to even understand that he was drowning. Judging by about 10 percent of the comments, he's hardly alone. These people get to vote. Try to sleep on that.
yip 35 minutes in was enough, russell should have thrown the towel in, problem is his ego will see him continue drowning in self delusion. this has to be the most cringy interveiw ever.
Sorry but you misunderstand me...a doctorate does not make you an intellectual,many of the people that writes books and guide society through deep study of human nature don't have a PhD in literature/philosophy but they are still considered intellectuals and no...writing a book doesn't make you one either if you still can't get it.
From the ”nuclear terrorism“ bit on, it‘s just a cringeworthy display really on Brand‘s part. He even has to physically hold on to the wall to somehow stay with it, because I suspect he senses it too. I don‘t think I‘ll be watching this much longer.
I came down to the comments at about this point to see whether the rest is worth watching. I didn't think so after hearing him say he hasn't read the Quran and doesn't know who the leader of ISIS is.
Russell is a leftist idiot! His "hi there 5 million wonders" won't do the trick for long with such myopic way of thinking! He is the type of person who is the least tolerant. I just can't comprehend how could someone be so deluded!!
Dear Russel Brand.......... Please listen first and THEN respond! You fuck up the whole flow of the discussion when you interrupt the whole time. As you mentioned...Take a tip from how Joe Rogan does it..
If Brand actually engaged honestly with what Sam was saying his entire ‘weltanschauung’ would pop, that’s why he desperately bats it away whenever the pin gets too close to his ideological balloon.
This is a hilarious take, particularly based on how many people approve of it. Sam was given plenty of time to talk and any time Russell tries to speak, he feels a need to interject before allowing Russell to finish his thought. Unsurprisingly, Sam Harris fans see victimhood where it doesn't exist because, frankly, they aren't even listening to the critique. I'm going to watch this entire video but, as I suspected, it doesn't seem like it's going to produce any thaws in the ice with respect to how we have this conversation. Because none of you are listening to the critiques about contextualizing religious violence and separating it from all the peaceful religious folks.
And, by the way, I've been agnostic for almost two decades. We really do need a non-believer that can speak intelligibly about religion without conflating it with its worst aspects. First, discuss why religion exists. Then look at the text and explore how people and cultures interact with the text. And accept that, at least in the short-term, religion isn't going anywhere. So how do we promote the best expression of religion?
No that’s completely wrong. Sam was anchored by truth and reason, while Brand only had obfuscation. Sam fully acknowledges peaceful religious people, but their existence doesn’t detract from all those that kill and brutalise, and to try and deflect by pointing to the obvious peaceful faction only hinders efforts to end religious violence. Stop helping ISIS.
We need to work with reformers to create a new, peaceful Islam, then bug the mosques and deport from the West anyone preaching a hateful interpretation, as well as ACTUALLY applying the law and cracking down on FGM, Sharia creep, Rape Gangs, Honour Killings, deliberate attempts to outbreed the host population (aided by the Left), Halal creep, govt and school corruption, and 1st cousin marriages leading to tragically handicapped children - and all of the other horrors that Islam brings with it.
Leftists like Brand who endlessly pander to Islam and constantly deflect efforts to deal with this stuff only condemn more people to the misery brought by Islam, most of them Muslims.
Incredibly rude interviewing and really frustrating to listen to. This felt like watching Bill O'Reilly interviewing someone. Constantly interrupting Sam, never letting him get to his point, ignoring facts, acting superior while admitting not knowing what he is talking about. Zero humility. I lost a lot of respect for Russell after this.
MY POOR SAAAAM
You people are insufferable.
hk78901 I like Russell Brand and Sam Harris. But let's be honest. 70% of the podcast was almost unbearable because of the way Russell behaved. If you invite someone on your podcast, a minimum requirement is to not cut of your guest before he even gets to the point. Sam doesn't speak in short sound bites and he doesn't go for quick laughs. Anyone who has heard him speak before, knows that. He weighs his words very carefully and lays out meticulously thought out, long arguments to make sure his point comes across as accurately as possible so that he doesn't get misrepresented. When you cut him off in the middle of every argument and drown him out with fancy, condescending word dribble, you're a bad listener and an unprofessional host. It was also very clear that Russell had done almost zero research beforehand, which he admitted to.
Indiegaze: _"This felt like watching Bill O'Reilly interviewing someone."_
Ha! Try Judge Jeanine Pirro, someone, incidentally, Brand used to criticize for her hectoring style of interviewing.
It would seem that he saw something of himself in her.
Trollop 7 The reason I mentioned Bill O'Reilly, is because Russell mocked and criticized him a lot when he was doing the Trews news. I can't stand Bill O'Reilly.....but Russell used a lot of the same interview tactics that Bill used, in this interview. How is it anything less than disappointing to hear a person use the same tactics as the person he used to make fun of? As I mentioned previously; I like Russell, and I think he has a lot of good thoughts and ideas. But he just really fell short in this podcast episode. I just hope he learns something from it.
Indiegaze, you lost respect for Russel Brand?! Im only surprised it took you this long!
Things we learned from this conversation:
1. Russell Brand is out of his depth (although this interview wasn't required for that assessment)
2. Russell Brand doesn't listen and/or understand
3. Russell Brand follows the Deepak Chopra school of argumentation - using a flowery, cavalcade of multi-syllabic words in order to say absolutely nothing.
4. Russel Brand argues for specific, liberal interpretations of books he hasn't even read, and does so on the grounds that he spoke to some Muslims at some point prior, who weren't Jihadists...
He needs to learn to listen and respond appropriately. There were a few points in this where some reasonable conversation was developing, and whenever it gets to the sharp end, where Sam is about to expose the problem, Russell diverts to red-herrings, wishy-washy universal conscious love preaching, and starts adding variables to obfuscate. The fact he was unwilling to make any kind of value judgement on the well-being and moral treatment of women in Taliban-ruled areas, is a symptom of the sloppy moral relativism which pervades the far-left. The really annoying thing, is that if Russell would actually engage on that, shut up and listen charitably for 5 minutes and go down the rabbit hole, he'd actually learn something. He'd be shown that his position is in fundamental contradiction with itself, and is a bigotry of low expectation.
Point four is spot on. I mean this guy is literally starting from a conclusion he wants, backing into his premises, and then outright stating that facts must exist to support those premises. Its painful.
Savage!
Hector Persephone Harris comes up with abstract thought experiments to discuss realities that don't or barely exist.
Harris is completely out of his dept. When he discusses Islam, he's desperately performing mental gymnastics trying to avoid contradicting all the crap he spouted when he went though his adolescent new atheist phase.
@Knight So what you are saying is, Sam Harris is a failure and he should just give up?
Its interesting to see that Russel has become a way better interviewer since this one. Letting people talk and all that. It would be lovely to see Russell have a new and polished up talk with sam in the near future
He most certainly has, I thought that too
He’s having one today!
Russell's podcasting technique is incredibly annoying. He is constantly pushing his agenda and makes snide remarks or uses the "closed minded" card whenever anyone disagrees with his stance on any topic. He is obviously very articulate and has an above average vocabulary, but I can't help but think this is a veneer which is cloaking his lack of coherent reasoning or argument....I don't dislike him, but he's way too self centred (self professed ego addict, I know) to be a podcast host, it's clear that he wants to be the centre of attention at all times, which makes listening to his podcast so unfulfilling.
He invited Sam on so that Sam could interview him.
18:07 But you can get bully/groupthink on any playground ('what was in the kids textbooks?')... So you could see it as the fanatics felt the school threaten their power structures, in the same way the death squads felt the churches (with "liberation theology") threaten them in Latin America... The conservatives will always oppose change to their order because they have the power, and nobody is aloud to "rock their boat"
58:28 ironically the maximum-prison thought experiment is a great. Since we have supported "open-air prisons" around the world (Gaza,..etc.) and in that context the burka would make sense to you too (even in prisons the men and women are separated).
1:40:29 Harris is correct that "dogma is blind" on a individual level, but the dogma is also manufactured and adapted for political ends (conquer and divide); if it wasn't "the sacred zygote" it would have been something else manufactured (like southern strategy, guns...etc.) so you are just playing "wack a mole" with dogmas instead of changing the power structure
1:22:33 can someone explain how a computer can suffer without pain receptors?
1:44:30 iPhones are not made from "mere capitalism", all/most of the research is done in universities (state subsidized) and even the cities with the factories and housing in China, where the iPhones are assembled, are constructed by the Chinese government (state subsidized again).
1:51:00 When we toppled Saddam (after Hans Blix told us they didn't have WMDs), toppled Qaddafi after he cooperated with the west and now "knocking on" Iran's door after Obama signed a treaty, no wonder North Korea wants to deter external assault (like the Israeli "Samson option"). But to Harris the Iraq war wasn't terrorism, so why are they scared??? Will they feel "euphoria" if they blow?
He's actually not very articulate. He uses a lot of words incorrectly. For example, he said "what does that infer" when referring to a trend in consumerism when he meant "what does that imply". There are several such examples when he spews out his word salad in a blur of giddiness. The vocabulary he uses is not yet his.
LankyAlpaca That is simply false. Even when debating religious ideologues he gives them the time of day to make their point and refutes them with dignity and logic.
you must be fun at parties
I love you Russ but you needed to listen more here and stop tripping out on your own verbosity.
There's more to being an intellectual than swallowing a dictionary and waving your arms around mysteriously.
Let not put Mr Brand in the category of an intellectual. He is no brighter than I. He simply has a large vocabulary and principles/ideology that he sticks to. And yes that is post modernism
H FIVE
I had him down as an improv-comedian up until recently.
I get the impression that he's transitioning to full-blown pseud.
Spot on. It would be much better to listen to if Russ didn't just try to semantic acrobatics without even engaging properly his talking partner. Russ might get away with this often, but sometimes, the art is not using the most complex language to express one's ideas - but expressing the in a simple manner.. In my Humble opinion.
18:07 But you can get bully/groupthink on any playground ('what was in the kids textbooks?')... So you could see it as the fanatics felt the school threaten their power structures, in the same way the death squads felt the churches (with "liberation theology") threaten them in Latin America... The conservatives will always oppose change to their order because they have the power, and nobody is aloud to "rock their boat"
58:28 ironically the maximum-prison thought experiment is a great. Since we have supported "open-air prisons" around the world (Gaza,..etc.) and in that context the burka would make sense to you too (even in prisons the men and women are separated).
1:40:29 Harris is correct that "dogma is blind" on a individual level, but the dogma is also manufactured and adapted for political ends (conquer and divide); if it wasn't "the sacred zygote" it would have been something else manufactured (like southern strategy, guns...etc.) so you are just playing "wack a mole" with dogmas instead of changing the power structure
1:22:33 can someone explain how a computer can suffer without pain receptors?
1:44:30 iPhones are not made from "mere capitalism", all/most of the research is done in universities (state subsidized) and even the cities with the factories and housing in China, where the iPhones are assembled, are constructed by the Chinese government (state subsidized again).
1:51:00 When we toppled Saddam (after Hans Blix told us they didn't have WMDs), toppled Qaddafi after he cooperated with the west and now "knocking on" Iran's door after Obama signed a treaty, no wonder North Korea wants to deter external assault (like the Israeli "Samson option"). But to Harris the Iraq war wasn't terrorism, so why are they scared??? Will they feel "euphoria" if they blow?
Every time Sam attempts to make a point, Brand talks over him. Almost unwatchable.
Thomas Fraser
Then perhaps your pea-brained thought-leader shouldn't have hosted him.
I imagine the click allure had nothing to do with it.
Thomas Fraser: _"I'm really not interested in engaging ad hominem attacks"_
Then you shouldn't have engaged in one in the first instance. I can't help but feel that you're gravely letting down your moral and intellectual kin by stooping to our levels of debasement before giving us so much as a chance to get stuck in. I have my doubts that you even thought to run your initial snide remark past your local spiritual ethics committee prior to loosing its bitter toxicity onto an unsuspecting world of near-intolerable suffering - a world that's already frothing over the rim with precisely this kind of bile. Just what were you thinking? This realm is screaming out for nothing more than compassion, and you just spat in its eye.
You've set the cause back decades, and I just can't believe what I'm seeing now. You don't deserve to breathe the same air as the Guru.
Thomas Fraser
Yes, well I'm sure Harris would have come over more convincingly in an archly-angled fedora. I'll start a petition. Are you French by any chance?
Thomas Fraser
So you're not French? That's something I'd like to discuss with you. Please don't dismiss it as lacking substance. It's important to me. And that's my truth.
Feels versus reals
2 esoteric points of observation:
- Russell has a soft chair
- Sam has a hard chair
Why? Why? Why?
Sam is a hard ass.
A hard chair is better for posture. Soft chairs are good for wankers like Brand.
I noticed that
Scrolling through the comments I stopped and died laughing here
The interviewer doesn't seem to be capable to hear anything outside his ideologically welded belief system. He would not listen. Perhaps he just could not listen, due to anything that my threaten his own hermetically sealed stance. Very frustrating. I think an interviewer needs to be skilled at listening and letting who he is interviewing fully express his or her perspective, and not constantly interrupting the person he is interviewing, so that we only hear fully what the interviewer's ideas are, fully articulated.
Agreed. That's the point of any conversation really. But whenever there is a debate, you have to play by the rules of engagement. If you don't, there's no point in debating. I will never converse, debate, argue with anyone who will not let me speak. If they want that same respect in return. You HAVE to be able to listen to what the other person is saying and they have to listen to you.
That is very true.
He’s a recovering addict and has used spirituality to a large degree to help with that process. So he feels very threatened and scared by Sam’s rational and compelling argument against the worlds biggest religion. Although you could argue that Islam was more an authoritarian political movement than a religion 🤔
Yes, things did devolve after a point. But, in Russell's defence this guy seems to repeatedly respond to Russell by stating Russell's comment is irrational, a bad version, "it's not just a matter of...," "you're doing too narrow of a reading...," etc. He portrays Russells comments as trite or approaching stupid. By the time we are one third into the video he is practically attacking Russell. That would make me act out, too., a lot. Also, Sam contradicts himself. A lot. First he says there isn't crazy killers, then he lists all these kinds of crazy, he just doesn't call it crazy until much into his delineation. This is important because it shows He could have agreed with Russell. He just didn't want to for some reason. He puts down Russell over and over. How Russell's ideas are not the most important interpretation, etc.... What I see is two people who approach life from very opposing perspectives. Russell is grounded in a Humanities approach. Sam is oriented from a Science/Math approach. Or you could call it left brain versus right brain. But I see Sam as being just as rude as some of you are saying Russell is. He is incapable of entertaining people may have a different approach to life just as valid as his. Not once does Russell tell him he is wrong. Whereas Sam does a few times. He is so sure his view is the right one. Ugh! I can't tolerate people like that. Check out Russell's interviews with Jordan Peterson. Over and over comments rave at how respectful, genuine, honest their talk is.
I would so not be happy to be Sam's daughter. I am a poet with degrees in Sociocultural Anthropology and English. He'd hound me how worthless they are. How they don't draw on data in thought experiments. Blah.
this is like listening to a father talk to his son who has just got back off his gap year.
😂😂😂
I’ve been grappling for an analogy for this conversation and you have nailed it
top notch old boy
perfect analogy hahaha
HAHAHAH PERFECT
WTF everytime Brand is confronted with arguments /truths Brand starts addressing his guest by his name as to belittle him and/or cut him of, unbelievable that Sam Harris can keep his cool as he is not allowed to finish expressing his thoughts on these matters.
Gene Hendrix
I think Sam is use to That, he is so detached from his own arguments.
Until he is really challenged lol
This is basically what happens to Sam in every interview. His honesty riles people's emotions and they try to belittle him in self defense. He's used to dealing with cretins.
Typical left wing authoritarian tactic to patronise their opponent
AC MC Sam Harris is left wing as well... lol
Josh Clyde he is not an authoritarian though . that is the crucial element to acknowledge
*Spends most of his time being passive aggressive and disguises with poetic, joking affluent language*
"Sam you seem angry"
Lol
Hes not passive aggressive at all Sam is an idiot
@@malikialgeriankabyleswag4200 could you explain why? Also, we’re you watching the same video?
@@frakramsey I'm Muslim and I'm well acquainted with my religion.. So I can see the gaps you may not be able to see. Also he hasn't any idea about foreign policy or the outside world, his analysis of the state of the world is totally ahistorical and obviously he's just acting as a limb and extension of US foreign policy. I watched an episode about Trump that I was cringing at the whole way through.. He says Trump has done irreparable damage to US Global standing because he says rude things.. Meanwhile Bush created Wahabism and Obama created ISIS.. Sam has absolutely no clue about anything to do with the State of the World or Global politics.. He things this entire thing is ideological 😂 He is ridiculous.
I like some of his works on subjective experience and its significance.. But when he talks about religion and politics everything out of his mouth is nonsense..
@@malikialgeriankabyleswag4200 how is it nonsense?
Sam Harris has an almost singular ability to speak clearly, sensibly without emotion or ambiguity and yet is one of the most consistently misunderstood voices of our times.
Poor Sam, if only his critics were smart enough to understand him 😢
chrisrwright Thought experiment.... Sam Harris had moral authority over humanity and made dick cheny a starbucks ceo. He then remembered carl sagan's agenda on nuclear proliferation after the cold war and before the nuclear arms race, but then remembered u cannot dictate morality without nukes. Keep the Samson option on the table. Divide , distract, mind fuck, and conquer. Said Harris.
Yeah, his fanboys can’t understand what a piece of shit he is
We'll be talking about Harris long after he's gone.
Give it some decades.
A quick summary of this debate:
Sam: "you don't think it's unlucky to be born a girl in Afghanistan 5 years ago?"
Russell: "I think that these kinds of theoretical tableaux are used to create a false hierarchy and a moral superiority by a dominant culture that subsequently uses thinking of this nature to underwrite the modern-day colonization and subjugation of these people these people on a massive scale"
(this user posted an actual quote by the way people, not a funny parody of Russell's speaking style like I originally thought)
lol
*crickets chirping*
PERFECT!
Makes sense to me
I don't know whether to like this because of Sam Harris or dislike it because of Russell Brand
Like because of Sam. The rest of Russell's videos will get plenty of dislikes.
Dislike this one, like Sam Harris' upload
Thats how tribalists think.
Dislike it because it's Russel's channel and he's more wrong than ever.
How difficult for you.
Sam - "Facts".
Russel - "Feelings"
Sam - "More facts"
Russel - "MY FEELINGS!"
Tom Armstrong there are no objective facts
@@GoddessHabits Yes there are. I take it you're an avid postmodernist then, with that outlook? What a preposterous position.
Tom Armstrong Tom Armstrong - “Vague insult”
Tom Armstrong To be clear. I agree Sam is the sane one in this conversation, but he doesn’t just give facts, and feelings aren’t invaluable. It’s what we feel about the relevant facts that forms our worldview.
Feelings + dogma
"I've never read it, but the Koran is... " - Brand. Lost me right there. What is the use of an opinion based on a cursory glance?
Neither has Sam read the Qur'an but he is the first to present his unqualified opinion on Islam.
"Of course you can have an opinion about Islam without having read the Qur'an. You don't have to read Mein Kampf to have an opinion about Nazism." - Richard Dawkins
Could he not have said no, and been honest ?
No, you just made that up (just like Muhammad made up the stories in the Koran). Sam Harris has stated on record that he has read it many times, as would become obvious if you read his first book, 'The End of Faith'. I have also read the Koran from cover to cover so know he is telling the truth about Islam.
Neither has Sam, he has cherry picked passages without understanding the context to prove a point.
This is sad for Russell...I don't think he's used to being nailed down to a point without trying to slip out from under it.
Well, to be fair (as if it isn't obvious) degree is in drama.
Erik Henze: _"I don't think he's used to being nailed down to a point without trying to slip out from under it."_
Agreed. He should take his Christ Complex a lot more seriously.
Exactly. He likes to play enlightened intellectual until his lack of real knowledge is called out, then he morphs into the backpedaling eccentric comedian.
SweatyTurtle
You nailed it. I think this tells us that he's not willing to listen or learn during this encounter. Way too much ego.
no, not really, its actually opposite in this case;
did you really listen and understood this interview or you are as narrow and as shallow as Sammy boy (self claimed wannabe intellectual with backpack filled with his old linear logic packages which are sold only to individuals like you and similar, really ignorant, plebs).
"stop sticking girls in bags" is a derisory statement? FFS, Russell. If it's at all derisory it's by the way it diminishes the lifetime of suffocation and suffering, ... but you find the problem in the implication that the derision is aimed at the religion? You have so little perspective on all of this.
Ron Murphy that was the low point of the cast for sure, but the last half wasn't too bad as they moved on.
Cultural Relativism is the hill on which many a well meaning liberal has died on.
Russell is just a useless twat in this conversation, spouting bullshit words to sound intelligent and "spiritual" without actually contributing to any of the points. Russell- " why is your focus on this" Sam- " it isn't it's all important" Russel - "we're in the tumble dryer of love Sam"
FUCK ME shut the fuck up 🙄🙄🙄
Russel, Let the man speak. I have never heard you so aggressively interested in your own agenda than with Sam!
I understand why he is jumping in on Sam though,,, it is the same rhetoric that Sam can bang on about for ages that should be nipped in the bud really, for Sam does think well, but is totally confused about control systems, not "seeing" that they are based in boundaries of illusion.
@@steghuman9063 Right on. Thank you for your comment. It is good to know there are Others reading and listening to the same stuff that interests me!
But my beef with Russell in this episode is that He, Russ, is the host and should not jump all over his guest. In the end, they do come to detente. Also, I happen to agree that Religion is too narrow and does not need Russell's good hearted pampering!
This is because Sam is incorrect in his myopic analogies and he too focused on unspecific minutia that is completely unreliable to the world we currently live in. Sam argues points like he is arguing some priest in his old debates and he has not evolved his debate skills the way Ruseell has. Russell is brining Sam back on track instead of hyperbolic thought games that Sam keeps perpetuating that may happen in only .00000001% of any human endeavor. Sam's analogies are so myopic and so minuscule then he tries to make them out to be this broad spectrum of belief and they are NOT. Russell is being a good host to keep the conversation on the correct track too.
@@passionfly1 exactly what I was thinking...
Wow, Brand is actually pretty stupid, even I got Sam's first point about the doctrines of religion. Russle began talking about something irrelevant and off point and used too many fancy words that made me cringe.
18:07 But you can get bully/groupthink on any playground ('what was in the kids textbooks?')... So you could see it as the fanatics felt the school threaten their power structures, in the same way the death squads felt the churches (with "liberation theology") threaten them in Latin America... The conservatives will always oppose change to their order because they have the power, and nobody is aloud to "rock their boat"
58:28 ironically the maximum-prison thought experiment is a great. Since we have supported "open-air prisons" around the world (Gaza,..etc.) and in that context the burka would make sense to you too (even in prisons the men and women are separated).
1:40:29 Harris is correct that "dogma is blind" on a individual level, but the dogma is also manufactured and adapted for political ends (conquer and divide); if it wasn't "the sacred zygote" it would have been something else manufactured (like southern strategy, guns...etc.) so you are just playing "wack a mole" with dogmas instead of changing the power structure
1:22:33 can someone explain how a computer can suffer without pain receptors?
1:44:30 iPhones are not made from "mere capitalism", all/most of the research is done in universities (state subsidized) and even the cities with the factories and housing in China, where the iPhones are assembled, are constructed by the Chinese government (state subsidized again).
1:51:00 When we toppled Saddam (after Hans Blix told us they didn't have WMDs), toppled Qaddafi after he cooperated with the west and now "knocking on" Iran's door after Obama signed a treaty, no wonder North Korea wants to deter external assault (like the Israeli "Samson option"). But to Harris the Iraq war wasn't terrorism, so why are they scared??? Will they feel "euphoria" if they blow?
I don't know what the wow is. And the pretty is unnecessary
I didn’t realize how ignorant Russell was until I listened to this one...
distatic I would say there are conscious states of suffering that do not involve pain receptors. Emotional or psychological pain. Stress, anxiety. Sam raises the possibility of creating a conscious mind that could manifest, be substrate independent and us being completely unaware that we have created it. It could potentially suffer in ways we are unable to imagine.
Are you for real.... The breaking of bread in Catholic religion is an example of the literalism that has infected religious practice. Sam you are not winning the argument by saying if Jesus had not said to do this we would not be doing it!!! We dont choose to do all that man ever told us to do, some rituals stay around because they take hold, they touch our hearts! saying cheers doesn't necessarily bring cheers anymore than wishing a happy birthday brings happiness.... Unless it does!!! Rituals are still around after time because they make our hearts sing... Evil/insane man whose hearts never sing are fueled by there own desire to live in fear and may try to posses and corrupt our rituals..... Sam are you doing just that?
Sam "Have you read the Koran?"
Russell "Of course I bloodywell haven't, I've bearly gotten through my notes" proceeds to give in-depth opinion on book he's never read!
Wtf?
3 ft
😂😂😂😂👏👏
That's what we are dealing with these days. The liberal left has it's own religion and it is 100% right, it does not need to look any further, it has seen the light.
Ya i found that a little weird
3 ft I've read both. The bible is way more violent. God asked a man to murder his own son
Will Delaneyjr Nope. The old testament is violent and I won't try to defend it, but the new testament, the one that modern Christians follow is largely a book of forgiveness and doesn't even compare to the violence within the Quran. If you are talking about the binding of Isaac, where God asked Abraham to kill his son, God stops Abraham... So I don't think you actually read them!
Sam Harris is Intellectually on a different level, his points are clear and sound, unfortunately Russell Brand's constant interruption made for a very frustrating podcast to listen to.
Which one is Sam Harris?
The one who is Intellectually on a different level, whose points are clear and sound, whilst Russell Brand is the one making constant interruptions that make for a very frustrating podcast to listen to.
Sam Harris is the fascist that keeps trying to say we should force the wests superficial culture on the rest of the planet without actually saying it, he’s the guy that hates suicide bombers but accepts that every now and again government do need to bomb hospitals with women and children in.
joe bradley
Never heard him imply anything of the sort, your accusations are baseless.
Are you referring to the Red Cross hospital in Afghanistan that ISAF accidentally bombed?
That was not a purposeful act, no government accepted it was a needed or required attack. I doubt the pilots ever flew again, or if they did, their careers will certainly be impacted in a significant way.
Sam: now I've read the Quran and I'm doing this analysis of every-
Russel: but I know like three Muslims and they're just great
Your point is?
@@ashwaqahmed9656 His point is that Russell is clearly too emotional.
Anyone who needs to bring up " I have friends that are X" during a conversation about religious beliefs and ideological foundations isn't arguing honestly.
@@michaelmarini4627 reading the Quran is not a strong argument either. In addition to neglecting imperialism, capitalism and globalization shows that his argument can work as justification and tool for them.
@@ashwaqahmed9656 the Quran is the holy text for Islam. Reading it or listening to it as a book on tape is fundamental to understand and debate Islam instead of just going by what other people say.
@@proudatheist2042 and someone later will come and neglects the debate that will be created.
Russell wasn't even interested in the conversation, he just kept blurting out relativist nonsense
And generally irrelevant relativist nonsense, at that.
AdiEdits I completely disagree.
Sam just refuses to give him an inch philosophically so he does the same spiritually. "Those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music.'
A purely scientific world view isn't all it's cracked up to be; and JUST MAYBE, some truths must be experienced to be understood.
Depends what you mean by a purely "scientific world" because by definition, a scientific idea is an idea backed by logic, reason, and empirical evidence. If empirical evidence is not what it is cracked up to be than what is superior to that? As for truths being experienced to be understood - maybe. I have no idea about the truth just as the next guy. I just don't believe that experience > science/philosophy.
He keeps moving the goal posts, and really suffered from moral equivalence fallacy in this interview. It was extremely frustrating.
AdiEdits By Purely Scientific World View I am talking about what is often referred to as "Scientism" by philosophers. Of which I believe the New Atheists, like Dawkins, Dennett, Hitchens RIP, Richard Carrier, and especially Harris to be dogmatic proponents. "Scientism is a matter of putting too high a value on natural science in comparison with other branches of learning or culture."
-Tom Serell
Basically, a belief in the universal applicability of the scientific method and approach, also that empirical science constitutes the most authoritative worldview or the most valuable part of human learning-to the exclusion of other viewpoints. One consequence of this world view is the Appeal to Scientific Authority which I assume we can both agree can be a regressive force in society.
For example, the idea of man traveling by flying seemed impossible to most everyone 200 years ago, the most revered scientists of the day scoffed at the Wright brothers. Today flying on an Air Bus is taken for granted. I worry we will lose the desire to explore and challenge popular thought as a people.
We are more divided, more stupid as studies show, and less capable of survival without our tech than any generation is history as well. We have become a society of children.
Finally, when Russell ask him if he feels that the "relegation of spiritual values" could be partly responsible for our current set of societal problems, I thought that was a very fair question, that should be debated. "Observe for yourselves the decay of the sense of sin, the growth of innocence and irresponsibility, the strange modifications of the reproductive instinct with a tendency to become bi-sexual or epicene, the childlike confidence in progress combined with nightmare fear of catastrophe, against which we are yet half unwilling to take precautions." -Crowley
"The civilized man has built a coach, but has lost the use of his feet. He is supported on crutches, but lacks so much support of the muscle. He has got a fine Geneva watch, but he has lost the skill to tell the hour by the sun. A Greenwich nautical almanac he has, and so being sure of the information when he wants it, the man in the street does not know a star in the sky. The solstice he does not observe; the equinox he knows as little; and the whole bright calendar of the year is without a dial in his mind. His notebooks impair his memory; his libraries overload his wit.
- Self-Reliance, Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1841
ps I would say that Experience + Meditation = Philosophy and that Curiosity + Inquiry = Science. I hope you actually read this, you asked me to articulate an idea that can be a bitch to unpack as Sam would say.
Russell’s Sam Harris Debate Tactics Checklist
1) Challenge Sam on a subject
2) As soon as it looks like Sam is proving his point throw in some Whataboutery to move him onto another subject.
3) REPEAT
Omg, those were my thoughts exactly. I was wondering whether someone would comment on Brand's incessant use of whataboutism and I'm glad you picked up on it.
Brilliant.
I thought the same thing. I'm glad he's doing these talks though considering who his audience mostly is.
Sam Harris vs. Christopher Bollyn. Double dare a debate.
100% correct
It's really hard not to dislike Brand outright after this. It was back and forth of Sam trying to explain a cogent point and Brand responding with pedantic word salad.
Gollum Sméagol
Thanx Gollum
Wow, yes this. You have managed to describe exactly how I am thinking after watching that shit-show.
I agree with Sam here, but I give Russel points for allowing him to talk without rephrasing everything Sam said in a negative way right immediately after. I think they both looked good considering Sam is a neuroscientist/author and Russel is a zany comedian/entertainer.
Drugs are bad, mkaaaaay?
Russell went full sjw, don't criticise the talaban, who are we to judge, I'm just a white guy. Omfg painful
This level of cultural and moral relativism is infuriating. I don't get it....Why is it so hard to say: "they way the Taliban treats women is wrong PERIOD."??
It's not that fucking difficult.
Russell carpet bombs Sam with his shitty arguments. And when Sam destroys one argument, Russell simply refuses to acknowledge this and instead moves on to the next argument. Did he go to the William Lane Craig school of debating?
18:07 But you can get bully/groupthink on any playground ('what was in the kids textbooks?')... So you could see it as the fanatics felt the school threaten their power structures, in the same way the death squads felt the churches (with "liberation theology") threaten them in Latin America... The conservatives will always oppose change to their order because they have the power, and nobody is aloud to "rock their boat"
58:28 ironically the maximum-prison thought experiment is a great. Since we have supported "open-air prisons" around the world (Gaza,..etc.) and in that context the burka would make sense to you too (even in prisons the men and women are separated).
1:40:29 Harris is correct that "dogma is blind" on a individual level, but the dogma is also manufactured and adapted for political ends (conquer and divide); if it wasn't "the sacred zygote" it would have been something else manufactured (like southern strategy, guns...etc.) so you are just playing "wack a mole" with dogmas instead of changing the power structure
1:22:33 can someone explain how a computer can suffer without pain receptors?
1:44:30 iPhones are not made from "mere capitalism", all/most of the research is done in universities (state subsidized) and even the cities with the factories and housing in China, where the iPhones are assembled, are constructed by the Chinese government (state subsidized again).
1:51:00 When we toppled Saddam (after Hans Blix told us they didn't have WMDs), toppled Qaddafi after he cooperated with the west and now "knocking on" Iran's door after Obama signed a treaty, no wonder North Korea wants to deter external assault (like the Israeli "Samson option"). But to Harris the Iraq war wasn't terrorism, so why are they scared??? Will they feel "euphoria" if they blow?
Russels superficial stances, all vanity and virtue signalling with no real depth. I too found it odd that instead of debating further or acknowleding points well made he just immediately changed subjects, I think this might be a sign of cognitive dissonance. Its kind of a more polite way of putting your fingers in your ears and going "NA NA I CANT HEAR YOU, DIDNT HEAR A WORD". Just like he wont read the Quran because he knows what it will contain, and he just doesnt want to know.
LankyAlpaca Ok. Have they? I wouldnt know, im not a follower.
No, otherwise, he would conclude that god exists every two minutes.
Exactly.
Sam Harris is most patient man who ever existed.
If I were Sam Harris, I would have stopped and glared at Brand every time I was interrupted. When Brand quieted, I would wait a few more seconds before continuing. If Brand interrupted again a moment or two later, I'd stop again. Eventually I might just stand up and leave after one of the interruptions. I think the reasons why would be both obvious, and justified.
That’s some serious meditation and mindfulness Sam is practised in.
Anthony Marabito, Jordan Peterson gave even Sam some stiff competition in the Cathy Newman interv--inquisition.
Yeh patiently deceive you to push an agenda. He is a Zionist.
Actually I would do that if I were Brand;
not sure if we watch same interview, 70% of this is linear logic masturbation of Sammy boy trying to repeat some of his same and very old shallow and narrow "insights";
Nothing like watching two dudes I actually enjoy normally just talk over each other. Mostly Russell rattling off incoherent, far too broad, rhetoric and fails to actually dissect the issues. This would be like Joe Rogan trying to spar with an intellectual. I'm glad he doesn't try to.
Russell Brand strikes me as someone who is way too sure about things no one should be sure of, if that makes any sense.
He is an ultra ultracrepidarian!
Makes perfect sense. Don't doubt yourself; I do that too. (Harris is marvelous.)
@@dr797-w2b you should always doubt yourself, i'm fairly sure harris would agree
Especially on a subject where it is essential to have studied the world's major religious texts.
When all your arguments are failing and you decide to impugn your opponent's motives, here's a tip; don't pick anger as the motive when your opponent is Sam Harris. You just look foolish.
Sam: People are not crazy they just sometime hold bad beliefs
Sam: There are not so much evil people causing needless suffering as much as misaligned incentive structures.
Russel: Terrorism is crazy people, and the system is maintained by evil people.
Russel: Sam, would you say you are a pessimist about humans?
Ah, the "U Mad Bro?" method of dialectic. Favored by ten year olds on xbox live.
Id like to hear sam Harris do a moral analysis of Christopher Bollyn's research. Sam Harris would make that guy regret his observations.
"Jump into the tumble dryer of truth.. I bet it hurts your ears." - Christopher Bollyn. "Who am i to judge the doctrine of 911? My judgment stops at the burka". - soulsnatcher sam Harris
Russel brand is the typical pseudo - intellectual. He will couch his lack of knowledge in flowery language which ultimately evaporates when you realise he is saying nothing of value.
Crysus Bu Crysus Bu Yeah, that’s the common reductive narrative of ‘oppressor versus oppressed’ social justice dogma. It’s clear he hasn’t actually thought these issues out or he wouldn’t be implying idiotic and murderous ideas like collective guilt and white privilege while being an apologist for the worst crimes of Islam.
Crysus Bu That is increasingly the common narrative and the only one I hear him returning to repeatedly here. It’s oppressor vs oppressed, everything is a power struggle, sprinkled with relativism. He sounds like every new grad that just got a degree based in any critical theory influenced program or even any tumblrite that grew up reading intersectionality activist posts.
@@possumfriend2335 its essentially Marxism via the back door, developed by the Frankfurt school after fleeing Germany
That is really interesting. I don´t like non of them actually I belive both are manipulative and marionettes for the Deep state. BUT Russel is telling you same really impotant things, but he does it in the blink of an Eye and in a style like this that I say is not important.
Sam Harris can clearly meditate as he's having a conversation
Syl JoLy He is truly gifted!
Kevin Pineda The reason i have such passion for criticizing the bad ideas of the 911 doctrine, is because i see the baby in the bath water that everyone is affraid of loosing. And i see it doesn't require any decisive bs to be saved. You dont have to lie to yourself to believe the lies in the 911 doctrine.
I thought this too, very zen like, his voice hardly changes in tone.
Syl JoLy No, meditation is an empty mind, not of thought compelled to speak.
Sam Harris is not a white supremacist. He hates white people just as much as he hates muslims. For him it's not a racial issue, but rather, he hates all forms of stupidity and has not patience for bad ideas.
I feel like Russell often starts sentences without fully knowing where it’s going...
The mark of someone high in trait openness.
@@woundedchildstory3172
Ya true
haha watch Sam Harris's new video on Trump he's saying the exact same thing on trump.. maybe got inspired by this comment
At least he wasn't selling his book every 2 minutes...like the 2nd JP interview. JP thought he was on to promote _his_ book not Russell's.
True lol & The Exact opposite is true for Sam Harris
Russell - I love Under the Skin so much, I’ve either watched all of them on UA-cam and/or listened to them on the podcast - but please....let your guests finish their points before you interject - at the very minimum half of the time. It will help the rest of us understand the arguments being made on both sides, which would be a hell of a lot more valuable x
Hitting your thumb with a hammer is more valuable than listening to Brand
Agree Nadelia. Russell, pay your guest the respect of listening, especially a mighty intellect like Sam Harris! I cannot play more than 30 minutes of this before I tire of your rambling and interjecting.
omg, I was just going to come on here and type this exact sentiment. I love Russell, but this was one of the first podcasts that his interview style really hindered the conversational tone in an overall negative way.
Disagree. His involvement and ‘interruptions’ added to the show. All I saw was Brand getting Harris to work harder to justify his genocidal tendencies.
What genocidal tendencies ?
Russell is like a child with a thesaurus.
stgodd that’s so fucking funny
Hahahahah
Lol
Spot on
he's like Joey from Friends when he writes his résumé using a thesaurus. Probably signs his cheques "Russle Proprietary Name"
russell really needs to be a better listener.
He needs to read Rule 9 from Jordan Peterson
That’s a fucken understatement!
Russell is punching way above his weight intellectually and it shows.
He has the capacity but his ego gets in the way.
Dan K better listener ? Lol he gave him 10 full minutes of non interruption 2 or 3 times throughout this interview.
"Some people can read War and Peace and come away thinking it's a simple adventure story. Others can read the ingredients on a chewing gum wrapper and unlock the secrets of the universe."
Superman fan spotted!
Exactly. Nothing needs to be added and it explains this whole podcast very well.
It's incredible how deeply ideologically possessed Russell Brand is. He really must step outside his ideological bubble. Watching him interview Sam Harris is like watching a 2 year old try to comprehend rudimentary economics.
Just like Sam Harris?
Id like to hear sam Harris do a debate with Christopher Bollyn, that guy is spreading such illogical shit like a 2 year old. I would love to see sam shit all over him
StripperTipper-405 but Christopher Bollyn is a apologist of unprecedented levels, sam Harris really needs to address some of the shit that come out of his mouth. Have u heard it? Its gross, he apologized for islam!
Russell never managed to step out of his own ego bubble 🫧 and in 2023 has gone full retard
Relativism and Whataboutism by Russel. Thoroughly dissapointing.
Summed up perfectly.
To a man with a hammer, everything is a nail.
Rabbit Hunter -
What about "slwoing dwon" when you type so your words don't add more confusion to your babbling and ad hominem attacks?
tricky2014 * disappointing
And Harris is guilty of using a straw man argument, i.e., sending your daughter to spend the summer with the Taliban. This isn't a reasonable analogy. It's like asking Harris if he'd let his daughter go live at the Warren Jeffs Mormon sect, or with the KKK.
No sane person would want their kid to live in a war zone with a terrorist organization. Using the Taliban as a typical Islamic organization is clearly misguided.
Now that is disappointing, unless you listen to Harris for tips on how to be a great Sophist.
This is getting embarrassing for Russell his points are just opinions based on what he wants not facts,he is trying to shut Sam down hoping he won't have to address the facts.
All Sam talks about us either statistics, evidence,or common sense, Russell seems to have this strange idea that we are all the same and deep down all want the same things.
I'm not saying Sam us always right;but imagine a world where all Brands ideas are implemented, now do the same with Sams, and realistically and honestly which might actually work.
They are not "opinions" they are "beliefs". Russell is not sophisticated enough to have real opinions
I totally agree with his point - violence driven by religious beliefs or political beliefs or the belief that you've been abused, bullied, or excluded from society - the difference is a construct, all are irrational acts
Yeah study American history. 220 years of war.
Or maybe its not a belief but reality?
BRAND has reached new heights in his regressivism
Troll Hunter lol
Troll Hunter Sam is a regressive if he thinks the US cares about fighting terrorism.ISIS is a creation of the CIA, Saudi Arabia,Israel, Turkey..
Prometheus Rising Are you telling me that Isis doesn't believe what they claim to believe?
Troll Hunter they do they just don't know who's controlling them. Useful idiots.
No mate, you're the moron!
Word salad might convince some that Russell is smarter than he thinks he is but I'm not fooled by his verbal trickery in place of actual intellectual substance.
That's definitely one issue, another is the constant unstated premise I personally feel lay at the heart of people like Russell and all those who argue his side it seems...and that unstated premise is ' no matter how much damage it does, how many people it kills and even how much someone can tell you to your fucking face why they did what they did...its NEVER Islam fault or PRIMARY cause and shame on you for suggesting otherwise!'
Well maybe, just maybe...it is Islam's fault and shame on you for refusing to see otherwise. (not referring to you personally of course)
Word salad might convince some that Harris is smarter than he thinks he is but I'm not fooled by his verbal trickery in place of actual intellectual substance.
"smarter than he thinks he is"? As smart works better I think, or just plain smart. Either way, Brand didn't look good in this one.
A Moment In Time You are doing the same by calling a genuine intent to understand as word salad with no accuracy or nuance in why you would call it that, is in fact more word salad by you. Makes you worse actually.
@@mat_j False, he was both clear, and cogent and displayed both substance and intellect, with restraint and patience. I adore Russel, but this was not one of his better showings. Indeed, these scary bright people do highlight our insecurities especially when we disagree, but lack the ability to express ourselves with the same degree of eloquence.
Ironically, Sam has the patience of a saint! Russell has some interesting things to say but his intellectual dishonesty about the Taliban is astounding.
Peruvian Tree Productions Sam got good practice from when Cenk interviewed him.
Why do you think people do that? It's not uncommon on the left. Is it virtue signalling or something deeper?
I've only just come across this video and I was going to be much more harsh in my criticism until I realised I have seen you in much greater form than during this interaction. It comes across as if you would let Sam actually finish a point you might lose the string which your spirituality is dangling on. I respect you greatly but I just had to say that you talking over Sam was so very hard to listen to and I have seen you give more respect to insane homophobic church groups. Maybe you could give Sam another shot if he would agree of course as there is a chance he would not care to subject himself to the same treatment.
I can’t believe I used to think Russell brand made sense
Chris Me - So you're the one 😉
Sam Harris has that effect on one's perception of those in the same room with him.
Chris Me You live and you learn my friend.
Chris Me haha me too, i was convinced. But it all makes sense now.
He's the worlds oldest 16 year old. Even though he's 40+ years old! & in the wise words of Dr Evil
"There's nothing more pathetic. Then an ageing Hipster"
I've disagreed with Russel for a while now but jeez, I've lost the last ounce of respect for him after this. Rip. His view that ethics is completely relative is bullshit. He's also straight up snide and rude to Sam in this one. Oh and also white privilege.
Yep
Andrew Kullar Some things are objectively good and bad in regards to ethics, for example some cultures stone people to death for adultery. If you can't defend that being ethical then you have to agree with me.
Adam Lea Speaking for myself, I certainly can't defend that as ethical, but who's to say the people doing the stoning don't consider it the ethical thing to do? Seems insane to me, but I can buy that people have ethics in line with their religion or whatever. No different to morals really, and I definitely think those are subjective.
Chris Richardson, sure they think that stoning is ethical but so what? That doesn't make it relative. Kids in school make errors in algebra constantly, that doesn't make the truth of 2+2=4 subjective.
It is as true and observable that Switzerland has better ideas on how to create a successful society than Afghanistan.
It's not about withholding judgement. That's not his point. His point is tempering the judgement with an understanding that it comes with an outsiders biases and perspective. That's much different than saying don't have it. I know westerners can't stand the idea of their judgements and opinions not being completely validated and front and center, but sad day, that's not the case. It's not entirely invalid, but it also needs approached with a level of humility and an awareness that it doesn't carry primary validity. A tempering of opinion westerners are not accustomed to.
"...or was it your brother, Dan?" He really did some quality research for this interview. : D
"...or was it your brother, Ben?"
@@nicolasbascunan4013 😆😆😆
@@proudatheist2042 I don't remember the joke :(
"The low hanging fruit for bad epistemology" lol I love Sam harris
Love listening to Sam Harris. Less a fan of listening to Sam Harris interrupted.
18:07 But you can get bully/groupthink on any playground ('what was in the kids textbooks?')... So you could see it as the fanatics felt the school threaten their power structures, in the same way the death squads felt the churches (with "liberation theology") threaten them in Latin America... The conservatives will always oppose change to their order because they have the power, and nobody is aloud to "rock their boat"
58:28 ironically the maximum-prison thought experiment is a great. Since we have supported "open-air prisons" around the world (Gaza,..etc.) and in that context the burka would make sense to you too (even in prisons the men and women are separated).
1:40:29 Harris is correct that "dogma is blind" on a individual level, but the dogma is also manufactured and adapted for political ends (conquer and divide); if it wasn't "the sacred zygote" it would have been something else manufactured (like southern strategy, guns...etc.) so you are just playing "wack a mole" with dogmas instead of changing the power structure
1:22:33 can someone explain how a computer can suffer without pain receptors?
1:44:30 iPhones are not made from "mere capitalism", all/most of the research is done in universities (state subsidized) and even the cities with the factories and housing in China, where the iPhones are assembled, are constructed by the Chinese government (state subsidized again).
1:51:00 When we toppled Saddam (after Hans Blix told us they didn't have WMDs), toppled Qaddafi after he cooperated with the west and now "knocking on" Iran's door after Obama signed a treaty, no wonder North Korea wants to deter external assault (like the Israeli "Samson option"). But to Harris the Iraq war wasn't terrorism, so why are they scared??? Will they feel "euphoria" if they blow?
Better yet, simply listen to him talk with someone who isn't enamoured by their own giddy blur of a word salad and rather have a genuine interest at getting to the crux of ideas.
That's how conservative talk radio show hosts and Fox News wins arguments. Interruptions.
Sean Michaels That’s true, but what has that to do with Brand?
+Robert
You forgot "gross".
Russell. Listen. We're all orbiting Joe Rogan because Joe Rogan _listens_
Guest Informant Russell is far too much of a narcissist to let someone have the majority of the mic for 2 hours, his impulse to retaliatory regurgitate rambunctious word salad is too overpowering ha.
haha good point.
Thank you, couldn't finish this because Russel never listens. He wants to throw around 15 synonyms and obscure words to sound smart and he falls flat on his face because of it...
Usually, I would rebuke these comments and defend Russel. But somehow this discussion acted as an exposure of Russel's weaknesses and dishonesty. I could listen to Russel spew synonyms all day and be entertained, but this exchange revealed and highlighted how he lacks academic bolstering for much of his worldview, and borders on woowoo at times.
i would bet sam prefers being on russel's show for the different intellectual level of the conversation that can be had
How can somebody say so little with so many words? Brand, like depak chopra, is a master of semantic illusion. When you bypass the impressive vocabulary, you find nothing but woo woo, deepedies and pointless drivel.
Thought experiments are an effective way to illustrate a point, Harris was trying to use them to illustrate the flaws in Brand's logic. Every time Harris tries to engage with him on moral thought experiments, Brand deliberately interrupts, shifts the goal posts and ultimately mocks him for it at 40:56 This is because Brand doesn't have an answer to these questions, hypothetical or not. This was incredibly frustrating to endure.
It was bad.
It made him look insincere.
Except his thought experiments are dogshite and could only possibly appeal to idiots or semi-intelligent people who think they're smarter than they are...
Ben Stiller is pretty smart.
John Ny dryer than usual
Sam Harris is the most calculated speaker on earth, he chooses his word very carefully and I find all his points are undeniable if you objectively and honestly absorb them.
And apparently masochist as well to have interview with bubbling idiot
It's not the first time. Omer Aziz was almost hostile when speaking with Sam. The only people who fiercely object to Sam are those that infer their own interpretations from Sam's statements coloured by as much pessimism and negativity as they can conjure. Why is it that people like Omer Aziz arrive at the conclusion that Sam defends the bombing of innocents? Because he's talking past Sam and putting emotions ahead of reasoning. That is why Sam is going to win every discussion or debate where he isn't met with clear, hard reason.
Of course, if the listeners and viewers don't care about reason they'll give in to superficial traits, tribalism, cult worship etc.
Aeonized I think that's the only discussion where I've heard Sam emotional.
Brand, I generally like you but this is just pathetic. Your only response to all of Sam's points is just to witter on about absolutely nothing. That's if you actually let him get to the point... Check your ego at the door if you want to actually have a worthwhile conversation.
+hoopydx
I broadly agree but it wasn't about nothing. In fact, quite annoyingly, Brands few points about what he was concerned with, (real power now & the problems of the secular now that make it vulnerable to the things Harris is concerned with), sounded quite interesting but he threw away the chance to talk with Harris about them because he preferred to play the critic of Harris and have him defend his positions.
A great shame I think. Had Brand said up front, 'we agree on many things and disagree on some others but you have a brilliant systematic mind please help me organise and clearly express my concerns and hopefully we have time to address them in relationship to yours', then it would have been more fascinating than frustrating and futile -because after all what progress was made here?
GodsOwnPrototype They acknowledged several times that they were jumping around a lot. I don't have much experience with Russel Brand's podcast but it seems like that's just how he prefers to have conversations.
russell brand seems like a pseudo intellectual douche bag here
Hard disagree. Just my opinion, but Russell actually was doing a very good job at pointing out many unconsidered points in Sam's personal version of rationalism. I agree that Russell interrupted Sam many times while he was painting his picture, but again Sam's evidence and analysis is biased and unsubstantial.
Russell Brand is starting to sound a lot like Deepak Chopra
Julian Jacobs
/Willy Wonka
Julian Jacobs "woo-woo" is more fun to say pretending to be an old stream engine
I totally agree and have mentioned this before
Which is the biggest threat to freedom, islam or the 911 commission report? One of these doctrines justified the patriot act, nsa, tsa, the repeal of habeas corpus, 8 flase wars aka the balkanization of the middle east, 20 trillion of debt, drones, torture, gbay, ect.... Can u guess which doctrine full of lies justified these things? Hint, its not the doctrine of islam. - deepak chopra
Russell’s language salad to make up for lazy thinking is hilarious to watch. Sam has always inspired me to think very deeply about issues and convey them in the simplest language possible
Sam Harris yes in simpler language, Sam Harris was destroyed in this interview for the dog shit he is
Ah, "lazy thinking", Kelly. You're clearly adding great insight with simple language (I allude it's the same "lazy thinking" that enables one to even listen to g-eazy and subscribe to Keeping up with the kardashians, huh?). Does your vocabulary lack the verbosity and eloquence of a true wordsmith because you have to think "deeply" to ingest any form of literary homiletics from thought leaders with illustrious cognitive flexibility? Sad actually. You can stand for Harris' work and leave the ad hominem engagement, but due to you setting that rule with your comment, I'd be more than happy to return the rule. All the best with your simple language and lazy thinking, darling. ;)
Or maybe you're just simple-minded?
@@watdinkjydoenjy I think you have missed the point. Russel often uses over-the-top and unnecessary language to either explain a simple point or to sound intelligent without actually making a coherent point (much like yourself). If you can make your point in the most succinct way possible, it shows you truly understand the point.
@@watdinkjydoenjy The hilarious part is that it took you a paragraph to say “actually I think simple language is more reflective of lazy thinking than complex language is.” (And I’m giving you more credit than you’re due because you never actually delivered much of a point anywhere). You said the same thing she said but flipped on it’s head and with no more insight than her, and it took you an entire paragraph. And you used words that didn’t quite fit their context, presumably for the simple fact that they’re big and make you appear verbose. Too funny 😂
Jesus Christ Russel that was painful to listen to
Hugh Jones Whoa pal, take it easy. Haha!!
Sam Harris is a Bigot. He is clearly islamophobic who justifies apartheid Israel just because of Islam! Bigot! 😂😂
AMEEN T Hammas’s charter calls for genocide on all Jews, the destruction, and the eternal prevention, of any Jewish state. There is clear uncontested evidence of Hammas using schools, hospitals, and non-combatant housing to base their terrorist operations in, including the firing of indiscriminately-fired rockets into Israel. Israel has been the victim of countless terrorist attacks and several wars from its neighbors. Israel has offered huge swaths of land to the PLO so that they may establish a Palestinian state several times and have been ignored, rejected immediately, or served as precursors to surprise wars.
Let the man speak, Russel! Jesus, man... you need to learn how to listen...
Vegan gangsta Sam Harris for president!
Sam Harris sounds like ignorant racist
Joe, If you think that you are dumber then you realize. He has not said a singly racist thing is his life. He attacks bad ideologies and ideas, not people. You lefty morons need to start learning the difference.
Joe unfortunately you fall into the category of people who have no idea of what the word racist actually means and like to use it frequently to try and shame people whom you have no intellectual or factual rebuttal to their point of view.
Star He does it what ever show he is on. He has always talked over others irrespective of what the show is about.
Well, I'm half way through now and the whole thing is turning into a horror show. Sam has the look of someone who wishes he was somewhere - anywhere - else. The bearded prophet is babbling like a drunken 60s hippie and failing at every turn to grasp the meaning of what Sam Harris is valiantly trying to say. This was always going to be an unfair contest and it's painful to watch.
SocialWorrier I'm not so sure about Sam wants to be somewhere else. He is a philosopher and this is what philosophers love...to debate.
This was no debate. Juvenile, hysterical, egocentric logorrhoea on one side and persevering, patient, painstaking but ultimately pointless reasoning on the other. It was thoroughly depressing. Sam Harris should never have agreed to talk to such a squawking peacock.
I think SH conducted him self very well. It was obvious some times that he might be a bit put off, but he was gracious and I dont think he really felt that uncomfortable - he knows well that the way the two conduct themselves will be judged by the masses afterwards.
I am an atheist and I have been influenced by Sam when I was young, but on this I agree with Russel. You can't use your own hierarchy of beliefs and superimpose on others. Even if you think that's oppression and I agree, it's their fight, don't use these to meet your political and financial objectives.
OK, so hypothetically if there's a country that breaks the left arm of every woman. Is it wrong to use your hierarchy of belief to say, hey they should stop doing it?
@@thekrazyasian Yes, even then, it might seem harsh, but that's the best decision. Because, you not having any clue about their culture and languages can't understand them and cannot make the right decisions for them, you might make it worse which they always do, you can't find one country where they went to liberate and they're better off for it. It is always their inner battle, they know what's best for them. You cannot decide for them and should not decide for them. I'm not against helping undeveloped countries with financial aid, helping them with setting up schools, hospitals and basic infra, if they want it. You can help them with the choices they have made if they align with your sense of right and wrong, but you can't choose for them. That's the colonial mindset, thinking you know what's better for the "savages" (that's the kind of language that is used to control people).
@thekrazyasian That's an extremely unreasonable and unrealistic example. But even then, the solution is to argue it out. Not drop explosives or place sanctions or propagandize in the name of "freedom" and "democracy" which the West has a good track record of doing. And this track record is precisely part of the reason why people from a lot of countries think that the West is no position to get on its moral high horse.
@@thekrazyasian Say what you want, the point is to not interfere... In many African countries, homosexuality is punishable by death but the majority of Africans agree with this. We can say it's wrong but at the end of the day, it's their culture. We often ignore the fact that our (the Wests) interference causes more suffering than it does Good and we set other nations back decades in terms of societal growth. In Barack Obamas First term, he was against gay marriage and then he changed his stance in his second term. A country needs to at least have the basics down (e.g. unemployment AND NOT GETTING BOMBED TO SMITHEREENS) before it can look to tackle societal issues...
@@Symbiot7 not interfere? If we “didn’t interfere” and maintained the same energy you possess of moral relativism/cultural relativism to nazi’s, you’d have to (according to your own views) just throw your arms up in the air because it’s the “german nazi culture and, hey, who are we to judge their culture of exterminating jewish people!” That’s essentially what you are defending when you say that there arent right or wrong ways a society ought to be living, and that every culture is as equal as the next. And, hey like you said, who are we to judge nazi’s killing jews, or muslims mutilating little girls genitalia? Come on
Yup , Sam is a Jedi.......no doubt left about it after watching this podcast.
Amazing. Is anybody out there paying more attention to the way Sam is handling situations rather than what he is saying?
I guess it's all of the meditation he has done. Compare that to how Laurence Krauss shouted down the apologist WLC. Krauss was right of course, but he wasn't very fair to WLC and presented his points angrily.
Spot. On.
Taxtro completely agree. There were three of those debates and in each of them Laurence came across as impatient and angry. Not what is expected from a scientist in a civilized discourse. The worst part was that there were audience members who were cheering up that behavior. I have learnt so so much from Sam Harris just by watching his debates and especially how he handles the ad hominem attacks . amazing. I have tried to bring about change in my behavior by asking myself OK I'm in this situation how would Sam Harris handle it. More often than not it has worked. Try it. Tc . wish you well. Sorry for the late reply. Came back to this podcast and saw your msg.
yes he is calm , throwing hypothetical arguments, playing lose with definitions, staying away from considering other's perspectives. He sounds like a crafty monk.
Thanks jag. That’s an important observation. Sam does an incredible job of keeping the discussion focussed while not being condescending at all. Yes, Brand can be unnecessarily verbose but his ideas are not always disjointed fluff. Sam uncovered a lot of common objections to his own ideas, expressed however noisily by Brand. Sam walks the walk of Medidation - he genuinely listens and tries to understand what Brand is actually saying. Notice that he gradually calms Brand down by gaining his trust through thoughtful consideration of his ideas. I nearly walked away from this interview but ultimately found it interesting. Thanks to both guys for their efforts and for all the thoughtful comments from the public.
Russell keeps insisting, "who is to say" and is wrong immediately there and then. "Who is to say" is an identity argument that has no place in philosophy or actual debate ... a form of the ad hominem fallacy
if u notice, the academics are becoming new priests .. that kinda power can tempt even the most proper of scientist styled minds..
itll be the abandonment of all their decency and honesty and so on for the glory of being able to say anything is anything and have anyone be any.. well maybe thats a bit far but...
basically, whats what and why... that power, is up for grabs until the public is smart as fuck
but we're idiots.
RabbitHunterX obviously there is no real answer to "who is to say?" What kind of question is that, you think he is really looking for a name of someone? No idiot, he is looking to prove a point by saying that and it failed miserably every time
you've got to be one ofthe dumbest bitches around here lol
"obviously there is no real answer!!"
if there was then you couldn't paint russel out as you're doing ALSO : CRUCICALLY :: you'd have to do some fucking thinking wouldn't u?
and even have to demolish a position you hold and feel comfy with eh?
dumbass bitchboi xD
brb Ill calm the fuck down ;p
ps I yell at russel for his reliturdness ALL THE TIME.. but he's still important and brings crucial counterweight to the most critical muscleproject in the history of mankind... get it?... v powerful yo... xD
RabbitHunterX There is no real answer because it's a rhetorical question genius. He is making a point with the phrase, "who is to say?" and keeps repeatedly insisting on that point... not hard to comprehend
Russell Brand, and all your needless lovely long words... Sam Harris made a few points you completely misunderstood, which is understandable, however you then failed to allow him to return and explain. Stop over-talking and stop talking over.
I'm not convinced that Dick Cheney's magic kingdom would be so benevolent. To assume so requires that we forget, as Harris does, the whole point of the Iraq War escapade: to develop U.S. ability to extract Middle East oil at our pleasure and preferred price. Brand is right to argue that when discussing religious doctrine, there is always more to the story than religious doctrine. I think Harris' critique of Islam lacks credibility without his discussing Wahhabism and that movement's political roots.
Russell needs to actually listen to what Sam is saying
Yeah, forty-two, I need you to explain. What's the problem with using that example, of how radical Islam treats girls? It's one of the best illustrations of religion causing suffering, one which unequivocally connects with the subjugation of half the population, which inevitably leads to the detriment of the culture as a whole. How does that offend your love of decency?
I was about to post the very same comment as I was watching this. Russell needs to actually listen with at least a fraction more interest.
I've heard him speak over many conversations and he is not making straw man arguments against Islam. He cites facts and compares Islam to other religions citing the fundamental differences between them. His argument against Islam is rational.
Yes it's perfectly rational to condemn a religion with 1.7 billion followers as intrinsically evil? Does that mean that there are 1.7 billion terrorists just waiting to blow the selves up because they can't stand Western 'freedom'?
nobody needs to listen to what Sam is saying. Do your own research.
My face has gone into spasms from cringing so hard every time Russell goes off on one
Benjamin, are you sure it wasn’t a bit of wind?
hamza abid scam how exactly?
@King Log that probably sounded clever while you were typing,..read it again when you're a grown up.
@Jstewify like Beavis/Butthead philosophy degrees.
Fix your face
RB: That Koran is full of love of peace...'
SH: Have you read the Koran?
RB: 'Course I bloody haven't
SH:...um....
Yup. I like Russell, but from someone who has defended 'Islam' (or the version of which he is familiar) robustly, I'd have expected him to at least have read it in part.
he says he HAS read the koran.....
Pat H of course he bloody hasn't.
well probably not in arabic but the english version a very short and badly written book, ive read most of it. russel sure has.
hmm. why i not surprised a ginger read the koran.
Russell Brand is what happens when you cut your cocaine with shredded and ground-up pages of a thesaurus.
Indeed and as i know from personal experience a couple of lines gives you the ability to talk for half an hour without actually saying anything which is basically Russell's whole career in a nutshell
“The societal pre-requisites and undulating overcurrents of the violence of the true individuals and narratives and global political circumstances, I want to follow my own spiritual optimistic centrally positive view upon the holistic pathways of doctrines and the.......”
Brand is on coke.
pseudo-intellectual meets intellectual.. painfully beautiful
Intellect and morals are not synonymous , thats what Russel was emphasizing
If that were true they would have agreed and the video would be a lot shorter. That is a simple fact.
Not when dealing with a textbook narcissist. More airtime the better.
Brand was simply amplifying the mismatch.
Russell Brand comprehensively exposing himself as relativist, postmodernist, neomarxist.
And?
....and they are authoritarian and utterly repugnant positions.
Not entirely. Just because Jordan B Peterson has come up with some exciting new labels doesn't mean that you can just paste them all over the first ignoramus you come across. He's certainly Post Modernist, he's certainly a Moral Relativist... but he hasn't got a Marxist thought in head. Neo or otherwise.
Ronnie James I'm afraid you are completely wrong. Russell has spoken of Marx's ideas in his talks in the past and revels in socialist ideals. Oh and Jordan Peterson didn't come up with the labels, he simply brought them to prominence as he saw them being implemented within institutions all across the western world.
ua-cam.com/video/RyO_0v0umLk/v-deo.html
ua-cam.com/video/EL7zEVhPHQU/v-deo.html
ua-cam.com/video/3b3OD0jLY-o/v-deo.html
He may have made those labels more prominent for some people but he misrepresents the positions.
Good God, it was embarrassing to watch Russel here..."Real power operates and has been done probably since British Colonialism" - yeah, can't imagine humans subjugating other humans before that...
LankyAlpaca ah, like a micro Cathy Newman moment, beautiful, thank you:)
Don't strawman Russel. He said since that time it was mainly based on Economy, while he might be wrong about that, he never said there was no subjugation before that. BTW I am with Sam in this debate for the most part but no need to strawman Russel.
Russell we love you but wow you invite sam to have interview to heard his perspective and yet you only want to heard your own voice.
Thankful for Sam`s patients and grace, it shows real maturity.
omg russell doesn't think we're in a position to judge how women are treated in afghanistan
His point being the way women are objectified in the west
One person has lung cancer and another has a bruised knee so they both have health problems. According to Russell's logic (moral failing) who can say who has it worst?
In America a girls dad might be disappointed and yell when she says she's a lesbian
In ANY muslim nation the same girl can get murdered for that by a cheering mob in public and no one goes to jail, if she's not killed by her own family, they're in the mob watching it
WHo has it worse?
In the west you tell your parents you're an atheist they roll their eyes and go to church without you or give you a speech.
In muslim nations they KILL YOU.
Who has it worse?
Lanky: So do you think domestic abuse and the other things you named are actually ethically bad?
If so: Can we call a culture, that has a lot more of domestic abuse etc. than another one, an ethically worse culture for women?
no fan of christianity, but islam is a far bigger threat right now and far more oppressive to women and children. every muslim country is a human rights black hole.
Joe Rogan put it best: Sam is an intellectual black belt.
Russell Brand's performance speaks for itself.
Russell, by comparison, is one of those #legitasfuck kungfu/aikido masters Joe likes posting videos of.
you grown up yet.
He is only a black belt because those who are impressed by him has little or no knowedge of discurvie nature of islsmic science or indepth knoweldge of Quran or tradition. He projects his relative reductive experience and conflates with multple socio political issue and presents it as Islam. He taljs of women rights, whats the crme rate against women in USA or the objectfying cilture that relegates women as nothing more then an object. Some may argue this ix their rights frzmed by a cultural experience so is the choice of some women dawing on a burqa. one is only free if likes of sam harris say so.
Russel fails because he does not want to go deeper into subjects. He is afraid to offend, and that is why his points did not convice me, as i am sure many others will also be in the s ame position. the debate was lost by Russel here.
Lol I’d like to see what Russell’s response to a man punching a woman in the face would be. Would he intervene or spend 15 minutes talking about why he doesn’t have the right to judge the situation because he was raised in a culture where hitting women is wrong but because he doesn’t understand who’s at the top making it a rule that men shouldn’t beat women his recourse is allowance?
Ha 😂 very good point 👉
When a celebrity, elevated far beyond the capacity of his meagre intellect, meets an intellectual God. Poor Russel, what a ego-drip he is.
LankyAlpaca There you go again. You really are an angry person.
Wonderfully put!
shadowsaber3 muscum always bring up Jews.
Your prophet was a rapist pedophile and you accuse me of being obessed with it. Lol muscum logic.
LankyAlpaca yeah he seems like one. Those islamophobic hate mongering maniacs are the most cancerous beings on this planet
Russell Brand is a child.
Why coz you don’t understand the perspective his coming from.
Because his views are incoherent, inconsistent and contradictory. For instance, he thinks democratic states are totalitarian yet reveres actual totalitarian systems such as communism as if they are liberating. He admittedly has not read the Quran yet defends Islamic doctrines assuming they are mostly good.
He also does not realize his own bigotry towards Muslims as he blames colonialism to be responsible for Jihad, assuming that Muslims don't have agency. As if they are not capable of acting of their own volition or belief, as if they are powerless and can only react to Western oppression. He also disregards Islamic oppresion of women and minorities of other religions.
Truth Seeking Freedom Fighter
Controversial.
You are
Rafat Islam
What you've described there is an idiot, so I agree with everything you've said there apart from 'because'.
I got 30 minutes into this and had to turn it off, Brand just keeps interrupting Sam whenever he tries to make a point and it is just so frustrating.
Around 1:10:00 it does calm down a bit but it was certainly very frustrating at times.
He's just being an utter apologist for for islamist tyranny. Why doesn't he just move to Afghanistan and have done with it.
Russell makes perfect sense, and such good points! The true meaning of a moral upright and noble human being in these times of intolerance and hate against anyone daring to think differently from the mainstream western worldview. Anyone with a bit of common sense and even a small amount of humane values and empathy would agree with him. Sam Harris is completely biased against Islam and just calmly spews the most arrogant smug self serving assumptions about Islam and muslim women. Just so many complete lies in each sentence, that it amazes me. I'm sooooo glad Russell invited him so that he could challenge his hate ideology, which his loyal followers never could, since they'd be watching him and similar hate preachers in their echo chambers. Well done Russell Grant, for daring to disagree and challenge the hate and intolerance spewed by Sam Harris! May God bless you!
Agreed
It’s been a year, have you learned or experienced anything more about Islam? Most Muslim Women are not considered equals and in most places have few rights. Do you know what Sharia law is? Do you know what FGM is? Honor killings? Child brides? Throwing gays off buildings? These are Muslim religious practices. Not all Muslims do this but we need to call it out just like we called out spousal abuse in the 70s and 80s in the US. It’s harmful, violent behavior and not everyone does it but Islam promotes and supports this type of cruelty and unethical behavior. It’s not lies, it’s Sharia law.
Invoking moral relativism is a self-refuting argument here: how can you say colonialism, imperialism, etc are "bad"? Whose place is it to judge, after all?
No one is really a moral relativist. It is merely the last defense of a failed ideology. Liberalism is so obviously superior to collectivism that Marxists have to pretend like there was nothing to be gained to begin with.
53:26 Russell asks Sam "Why are you not more concerned of the continual objectification of women..."
This part really annoys me because he speaks over Sam's response and becomes all giddy so as to drive the conversation away from this topic, only to re-arise at it and ask more questions of the same nature.
From Sam's perspective, he is worried about objectification of women and other problems of Western society; but from an outlook of "bad ideas" Sam claims that Islam is one of the worst and that the results/consequences of such ideology are far more worse than his daughter sleeping with a douchebag.
It really annoys me that Russell can't let Sam finish and jump on the same thought-train as Sam - Russell's just constantly trying to listen only to argue, only to dispute, rather than to acknowledge and understand. Just jump into the thought experiments - stop trying to fight it!
An argument is far more interesting when one follows one's "spin" and responds appropriately, instead of trying to adjust the "spin" or misinterpret such "spin", as it seems Russell seems to constantly do.
i think this is a personal fail for Russell. I do like him but couldn't get through the interview. It's not on par with Kathy Newman but the determination to skew the conversation is evident. You said you wanted to learn from him Russel, why didn't you at least give yourself a moment to understand what he was saying.
Being in the habit of making humble sounding noises and actually being humble are not the same thing. When guys like this say they want to "learn from" someone like Harris that's often their way of saying "I want to figure out why you aren't buying into my noble-sounding tripe."
Word Salad vs Rational Thoughts
Russell has grown a lot since this interview, and I'd like to see them both chat again soon
Really he has? Like how?
@@linkypoo Just go watch Russel's podcast
lol...
I'm not sure about that but he is certainly capable of being less obtuse than this. I watched both his interviews with Jordan Peterson and he was good in both of those. He made good points, seemed to understand Jordan's and for the most part let him speak.
This interview with Harris he was just annoying through out and even went as far as to literally refuse to participate in a thought experiment that Sam was trying to employ to help him explain.
That's great to hear, because this is torture.
I thought I enjoyed Russell Brand until I had to endure this facade of a conversation with Sam Harris
After he said "you don't have to explain all this to me, I'm not 9 years old" then proceeded to interrupt Sam with "Sam, Darling" I had to turn it off. Virtue signalling and unwillingness to share different ideas in a respectful manner defies the purpose of a progressive conversation
Anyone who identifies with Russell Brand as a moral authority is delusional and should seek therapy and stop doing drugs or repent for doing too many drugs to ever comprehend common sense.
@@campsitez2355 3 yrs on now - how do you feel about RB's journey now, looking back? Have your opinions changed?
Russell is approaching a Trudeau-esque level of moral relativism.
Dj13e36 ouch
Islam has never told me to stay in my home or threatened to charge me for leaving it, Islam has never put me out of work or caused people their businesses, Islam never called me a racist, biggot, masogonist or anything else simply because I have a difference of opinion of what's right for me.
Russell......Listen to what he has to say. Actually listen.
Please expand 'hogwash'.
What! I am shocked that Russell Brand refuses to condemn or judge immoral Islamic practices
eg throwing homosexuals off buildings or the mass murder of girls that dare to attend school.
He says he can’t cast moral judgement because
(1) he grew up with a western perspective and “who is he to judge”
(2) for fear that even acknowledging these horrors inevitably justify western acts of war.
This makes Russell morally bankrupt and extremely selfish. He sees Muslims as “others” not worthy of empathy, justice or a free life. Instead it is more important that westerners view him as non judgmental and loving of all. He knocks the rich because that is popular but he won’t defend the plebs especially if they are foreign.
DarkBungleX that's not islamic practices that cultural practices. If it's islamic please site where in the religion. It says anything of the throwing a gay or killing girls???? Your talking shit
and then he goes on to claim that he is not a postmodernist.
38:30 Mr. Brand demonstrates the final form of post-modern/neo-marxism(with flashy words!)
Brand argues for ethical relativism - complete BULLSHIT.
Yes he needs to get over that and field his objections a queries without that baggage.
The question of why drone-strikes are relatively OK to people compared to the Suicide Bombings etc is an interesting avenue of discussion.
No need to shit in the threshold and invite someone in & no suprise when the conversation goes elsewhere.
Sam: ‘Have you read the Quran?’
Russell: ‘Oh course not! 🤣’ 🤦🏻♂️🤦🏻♂️🤦🏻♂️
Bart Ehrman Have you ever read the Quran in ancient hebrew or even Greek? Sam Of course not! Not that i think it!s anything to defend in the Quran, but how many people do you know who have?I think you!d find actual Islamic scholars thinking the same of Sam in his understanding. But Sam doesn't do historic political context. Fancy taking something out of context! Sam should hate that.
ukwoodcarver My God how can he defend and quote a book he has never read....
@@cajoz Sam Harris has read the Quran, at minimum, in its entirety, in English, and lists scores of quotations in his book The End of Faith that speak to doctrinal motivations or condonations of some terrible acts and, in its extreme invocations, blatantly, racist, fascistic, apocalyptic tribalistic beliefs. If splitting hairs over translations are required to defend the merits of any religious beliefs and their application then the apologist is defending an utterly untenable position. If God (Abrahamic monotheism; polytheism deserves it's own thread/analysis) has gifted us a text by which to think and live, linguistics/semantics would not be required to defend its holiness or be the aegis against its refutation, particularly so if he dictated it verbatim to an (according to Muslim scholars) illiterate prophet, pbuh. To this extent it is quite paradoxical/self-contadictory that many Muslim scholars invoke this as evidence of the book's divinity. In fact, it does the opposite. Further, but not requisite for the argument, it is both odd and damning that its positive encouragements would survive translation but not the negative ones. It is clear, however, that most Muslims are very good people, and in the Quran there is likely more than enough goodness and inspiration for living a good life, being good neighbours, good wives, good husbands and good children (obviously cuteness, brattiness, and asking "Are we there yet?" are ubiquitous amongst kids) in it, too. Yet, the Golden Rule dates to ancient Egypt and India, Sri Lanka, and ancient Greece, and other fundamental, innate, synergetic human behaviours far predate the Quran. People have not required dogmatic books to develop positive, beneficial relationships with these characteristics, and if we did need such books to do so we would be in troubled (certainly far more trouble than we are in now, if one were inclined to suggest we are). Would love to hear what you think about this. If there are things you disagree with please don't take offence, I am very open to changing my outlook and for learning from those whom I disagree with. Slàinte math!inteSlah
...to crystallize my point about the Golden Rule, etc., Muslims do not require the Quran or be amazing people. They are simply amazing people who have religious beliefs, texts, that reinforce their natural inclinations to being the good people they were born to be, for the most part, with the exclusion of for example the long list of evil condonations found therein, and bad eggs who are found everywhere, again with no connection to religion whatsoever.
@@chrysology Your outlook and understanding of religion and especially Islam appears to be one dimensional as with most people including muslims themselves. You argue that a book gifted by God as a guide to life should be simplistic and not require 'splitting hairs'. Yet you do not consider that the book is believed to be a guide for mankind in general. Not for people living 1400 years ago, but people living in all ages. That means the text is limited to the capacity of society at a given time and hence its interpretation and understanding will evolve as the societies evolve. How complex must a text be if it has instructions on about every aspect of a human life summed up in 604 pages? This is where the arabic language is suitable because of its complexity and how a single word can easily have completely different meanings depending on the context it is used in. And also why supporting texts a i.e. the hadith are necessary to understand many parts of the book but even those are limited to the listeners and their understanding of what was being said in the time they were living in. The Quran (and all the holy books in their original text) are multilayered. Depending on who you are and what you are looking for, 'splitting hairs' or 'mental gymnastics' as ppl like to put it, will most certainly will be necessary in many cases. Hence why the Prophet PBUH told the people to travel to China (the land of knowledge) in order to understand ('the deeper layers') Quran. It's one thing knowing where babies come from, but completely another explaining how its formed in the womb. Try explaining that to people thousands of years ago with their limited knowledge. You can't. Let me just put it this way, throughout history of science we have proposed many theories that were proven to be false later on. Did that mean science was invalid and unreliable for attaining objective knowledge? or that the scientists were the ones mistaken and wrongly interpreted data? Do we have scientists that refute climate change and vaccines and use the scientific method to prove their point? Is it fair to use these scientists as the poster boys for science? The problem with muslims and believers is that they're born into the religion and they can't apply critical thinking. They blindly follow all the interpretations of a scholar/priest/imam. Because practically speaking that's what religion essentially is. It's the interpretation of a book believed to be sent by God. And you certainly don't need a book to practice good character at the very basic level because society teaches it to you to be the norm but the golden rule definitely wouldn't be the norm without the influence of religion.
“We will show them Our Signs in the universe, and in their own selves, until it becomes manifest to them that this (the Quran) is the truth” [41:53]
Couldn't watch anymore. It was too painful listening to Russell drowning
It's ok. He's too stupid to even understand that he was drowning. Judging by about 10 percent of the comments, he's hardly alone.
These people get to vote. Try to sleep on that.
I've paused it so I could read and respond without listening to Russell
yip 35 minutes in was enough, russell should have thrown the towel in, problem is his ego will see him continue drowning in self delusion. this has to be the most cringy interveiw ever.
This is what a discussion between a toddler and an intellectual looks like...
loled at intellectual. When did Sam Harris become an intellectual? LMAO
Wolfenhowl Gaming, well said. Make that "a toddler who thinks he's a genius."
Sam Harris has not done a single scientific study in his entire life. He bought his PhD with the money of his rich parents. Fact.
Sorry but you misunderstand me...a doctorate does not make you an intellectual,many of the people that writes books and guide society through deep study of human nature don't have a PhD in literature/philosophy but they are still considered intellectuals and no...writing a book doesn't make you one either if you still can't get it.
Wolfenhowl Gaming
But he claims to be a neuro scientist. That's blatant lying?
From the ”nuclear terrorism“ bit on, it‘s just a cringeworthy display really on Brand‘s part. He even has to physically hold on to the wall to somehow stay with it, because I suspect he senses it too.
I don‘t think I‘ll be watching this much longer.
I came down to the comments at about this point to see whether the rest is worth watching. I didn't think so after hearing him say he hasn't read the Quran and doesn't know who the leader of ISIS is.
My goal of 2020 is to be as calm as Sam Harris when he talks to people, especially some people like Brand
True. I may disagree with Sam on some issues, but I'll always admire him for his incredible patience and articulation.
Russell is a leftist idiot! His "hi there 5 million wonders" won't do the trick for long with such myopic way of thinking!
He is the type of person who is the least tolerant. I just can't comprehend how could someone be so deluded!!