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I went on a date with a Christian woman who couldn’t defend the pro-life view

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I’ve been thinking lately about how to measure how committed and capable a person is on issues of interest to conservatives. For example, on abortion, most conservatives will say, “I vote pro-life”. But I think a higher level of conviction and commitment is shown when a person can show WHY they are pro-life. And I’m not looking for feelings, here. I’m looking for handling scientific evidence.

So, when it comes to the abortion issue, the first step is to answer the question “what is the unborn?” And again, I’m not looking for an opinion here. I’m not looking for feelings. I’m not looking for what your parents, or your pastor, or your church choir says. I’m interested in whether a person can cite some scientific evidence.

Fortunately, we have first class scientists who have collected the relevant information for us, like Dr. Maureen Condic, She’s an Associate Professor of Neurobiology and Adjunct Associate Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Utah School of Medicine, and recently served on the National Science Board. She earned her Ph.D. from University of California, Berkeley, and has published papers in peer-reviewed journals.

One of her publications (PDF) explains what science tells us about the unborn. The title is “When Does Human Life Begin? The Scientific Evidence and Terminology Revisited”. A good paper to have available, especially if your opponent has nothing but purple hair, tattoos and nose piercings. But if you want something easy, you can just use quotations from a variety of embryology textbooks (PDF).

Like this one:

“Human development begins at fertilization, when a sperm fuses with an oocyte to form a single cell, the zygote. This highly specialized, totipotent cell (capable of giving rise to any cell type) marks the beginning of each of us as a unique individual.”

Source: Keith L. Moore, The Developing Human: Clinically Oriented Embryology, 10th edition. Philadelphia, PA: Saunders, 2016. p. 11

Don’t just use one quotation, use lots.

Also useful to know is what the unborn baby can do during the process of developing.

Here’s an article from the famous Cleveland Clinic that explains:

At the moment of fertilization, your baby’s genetic make-up is complete, including its sex. The gender of your baby depends on what sperm fertilizes the egg at the moment of conception.

And a bit further along:

Month 1 (weeks 1 through 4)

In these first few weeks, a primitive face will take form with large dark circles for eyes. The mouth, lower jaw and throat are developing. Blood cells are taking shape, and circulation will begin. The tiny “heart” tube will beat 65 times a minute by the end of the fourth week.

And a bit further along:

Month 2 (weeks 5 through 8)

Facial features continue to develop. Each ear begins as a little fold of skin at the side of the head. Tiny buds that eventually grow into arms and legs are forming. Fingers, toes and eyes are also forming.

The neural tube (brain, spinal cord and other neural tissue of the central nervous system) is well formed now. The digestive tract and sensory organs begin to develop too. Bone starts to replace cartilage.

The head is large in proportion to the rest of the body at this point. At about 6 weeks, a heartbeat can usually be detected.

Most abortions happen in the first trimester, and that’s why pro-lifers say “abortion stops a beating heart”. It’s definitely human, and it’s definitely killed in an abortion.

So, what’s the point of this post? I’m saying that if you are a conservative, then you have to be familiar with enough evidence to be persuasive to others who do not share your views. Not just on the issue you like, but on EVERY issue – social issues, foreign policy issues, fiscal issues.

It’s not enough for you to be happy that you have the right opinion about one issue. It’s not enough that the people around you like you because they agree with your “right answer”. You have to be able to make a case that crushes your opponent with evidence. Being a conservative isn’t about you or your feelings. It’s about the world out there – can you make a difference by being convincing to other people?

Of course if doesn’t feel good to have to learn how to talk about issues using scientific evidence. It’s work. And of course it doesn’t feel good to disagree with people about controversial issues. But you have to get used to not being ignorant and not being liked. I know a lot of feelings-based Christians who know a lot about sports, fiction, music, essential oils, and other nonsense. They want me to be satisfied that they have the right answer to questions like “Does God exist?”, “does military preparedness deter aggression?” and “does the free market system make people more prosperous than socialism?” But if I am out on a date with you, and I ask you these questions, I’m looking for more than the right answer. I want you to show your work. I want to see you demonstrate your ability to persuade people on the other side, either in your writings or in your discussions.

Don’t cry to me about how you can’t find a husband when you can’t do anything that a husband needs you to do. There is no path to impressing a conservative man that allows you to be lazy, ignorant and cowardly. I expect performance. If you are smart enough to get a college education and a job in the competitive private sector providing value to paying customers, (not a public school teacher or anything disconnected from reality, like that), then you are smart enough to be able to explain your views on moral issues and public policy.

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Study: belief in free will linked to ability to behave morally and to help others

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A while back I finished reading “God’s Crime Scene”, the new book by J. Warner Wallace. I wanted to post something about some studies he mentioned in Chapter 6, on free will. This is one of the places where he found evidence in a surprising area.

Wallace says that free will makes more sense if theism is true, because we have non-material souls that interact with our bodies, but are not causally determined by them. On atheism, only matter exists, and you can’t get free will (or consciousness) from matter. So atheists like Sam Harris and Alex Rosenberg, for example, deny free will, because they are materialists and atheists.

Anyway, here’s what he writes on p. 256:

In 2008, researchers from the University of Minnesota and the University of British Columbia conducted experiments highlighting the relationship between a belief in determinism and immoral behavior. They found students who were exposed to deterministic literature prior to taking a test were more likely to cheat on the test than students who were not exposed to literature advocating determinism. The researchers concluded those who deny free will are more inclined to believe their efforts to act morally are futile and are, therefore, less likely to do so.

In addition, a study conducted by researchers from Florida State University and the University of Kentucky found participants who were exposed to deterministic literature were more likely to act aggressively and less likely to be helpful toward others.” Even determinist Michael Gazzaniga conceded: “It seems that not only do we believe we control our actions, but it is good for everyone to believe it.”” The existence of free will is a common characteristic of our experience, and when we deny we have this sort of free agency, there are detrimental consequences.

I decided to look up these studies.

Here’s the abstract for first study: (2008)

Does moral behavior draw on a belief in free will? Two experiments examined whether inducing participants to believe that human behavior is predetermined would encourage cheating. In Experiment 1, participants read either text that encouraged a belief in determinism (i.e., that portrayed behavior as the consequence of environmental and genetic factors) or neutral text. Exposure to the deterministic message increased cheating on a task in which participants could passively allow a flawed computer program to reveal answers to mathematical problems that they had been instructed to solve themselves. Moreover, increased cheating behavior was mediated by decreased belief in free will. In Experiment 2, participants who read deterministic statements cheated by overpaying themselves for performance on a cognitive task; participants who read statements endorsing free will did not. These findings suggest that the debate over free will has societal, as well as scientific and theoretical, implications.

And the abstract for the second study: (2009)

Laypersons’ belief in free will may foster a sense of thoughtful reflection and willingness to exert energy, thereby promoting helpfulness and reducing aggression, and so disbelief in free will may make behavior more reliant on selfish, automatic impulses and therefore less socially desirable. Three studies tested the hypothesis that disbelief in free will would be linked with decreased helping and increased aggression. In Experiment 1, induced disbelief in free will reduced willingness to help others. Experiment 2 showed that chronic disbelief in free will was associated with reduced helping behavior. In Experiment 3, participants induced disbelief in free will caused participants to act more aggressively than others. Although the findings do not speak to the existence of free will, the current results suggest that disbelief in free will reduces helping and increases aggression.

So what to make of this?

If you’re an atheist, then you are a physical object. And like every other physical object in the universe, your behavior is determined by genetic programming (if you’re alive) and external inputs. Material objects do not have the ability to make free choices, including moral choices.

Here’s prominent atheist Jerry Coyne’s editorial in USA Today to explain why atheists can’t ground free will.

Excerpt:

And that’s what neurobiology is telling us: Our brains are simply meat computers that, like real computers, are programmed by our genes and experiences to convert an array of inputs into a predetermined output. Recent experiments involving brain scans show that when a subject “decides” to push a button on the left or right side of a computer, the choice can be predicted by brain activity at least seven seconds before the subject is consciously aware of having made it. (These studies use crude imaging techniques based on blood flow, and I suspect that future understanding of the brain will allow us to predict many of our decisions far earlier than seven seconds in advance.) “Decisions” made like that aren’t conscious ones. And if our choices are unconscious, with some determined well before the moment we think we’ve made them, then we don’t have free will in any meaningful sense.

Atheist William Provine says atheists have no free will, no moral accountability and no moral significance:

Let me summarize my views on what modern evolutionary biology tells us loud and clear — and these are basically Darwin’s views. There are no gods, no purposes, and no goal-directed forces of any kind. There is no life after death. When I die, I am absolutely certain that I am going to be dead. That’s the end of me. There is no ultimate foundation for ethics, no ultimate meaning in life, and no free will for humans, either.

(Source)

If you don’t have free will, then you can’t make moral choices, and you can’t be held morally responsible. No free will means no morality. Can you imagine trying to get into any sort of enterprise with someone who has this view of moral choices? A marriage, or a business arrangement, etc? It would be crazy to expect them to behave morally, when they don’t even think that moral choices is possible. It just excuses all sorts of bad behavior, because no one is responsible for choosing to do the right thing.

Believers in materialism are going to struggle with prescriptive morality, including self-sacrificial care and concern for others. Their worldview undermines the rationality of the moral point of view. You might find atheists acting morally for their own purposes, but their worldview doesn’t rationally ground it. This is a big problem for people who can see objective morality woven into the universe – and themselves – because they have the awareness of objective right and wrong.

Choosing to do the right thing

I think what atheists like to say is “I can be moral, too”. That’s not interesting. What is interesting is whether it is rational for you to be moral when doing the right thing sets you back. When I look at the adultery of Dawkins, the polyamory of Carrier, the divorces of Shermer and Atkins, etc. I am not seeing anything that really wows me about their ability to do the right thing when it was hard for them to do it. They all deny free will of course, and think that trying to resist temptation is a waste of time.

Wallace explains how the awareness of free will and moral choices caused him to turn away from atheism, in this blog post.

He writes:

As an atheist, I chose to cling to naturalism, in spite of the fact that I lived each day as though I was capable of using my mind to make moral choices based on more than my own opinion. In addition, I sought meaning and purpose beyond my own hedonistic preferences, as though meaning was to be discovered, rather than created. I called myself a naturalist while embracing three characteristics of reality that simply cannot be explained by naturalism. As a Christian, I’m now able to acknowledge the “grounding” for these features of reality. My philosophical worldview is consistent with my practical experience of the world.

I think atheists who want to be honest about their own experience of first-person consciousness, free will, moral realism, etc. will do well to just accept that theism rationally grounds all of these things, and so you should accept theism. Theism is real. If you like morality, and want to be a virtuous person, then you should accept theism.

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Conservative Party leader tries to teach economics to voters – and they like it!

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The leader of the Conservative Party of Canada is leading in the polls. He’s leading by so much that he would form a majority government if a national election were held today. You might have seen him on American TV news channels, fighting with far-left journalists while munching on an apple in a field. But his new plan is to teach Canadian voters economics. How is that working?

Answer: they love it, and they want more.

Here’s the latest, reported by National Post – one of Canada’s two national newspapers.

Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre released a 15-minute video Saturday morning that more closely resembles a PBS Frontline documentary than the short, slogan-heavy ads Canadians are used to.

[…]The video, released in both French and English, is a slick, graphics-heavy adaptation of the stump speeches that Poilievre has been delivering as he tours the country. Poilievre announced on Friday via X (formerly Twitter) that he’d be releasing “a groundbreaking documentary on Canada’s housing hell.”

It spells out, using dozens of graphics and charts, a step-by-step case for why the Conservatives believe government spending and borrowing under the Trudeau Liberals has fuelled inflation along with the unprecedented rise in housing costs, pricing hundreds of thousands of families and millions of younger Canadians out of the housing market.

[…]In an almost-academic breakdown of housing prices, Poilievre’s documentary uses a series of economic explanations — from relative population density to quantitative easing — to make the case that soaring housing prices are largely the fault of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s policies. Poilievre traces most problems back to 2015, the year the Liberals were elected.

He also highlights an inability to build houses for the problem. He blames municipal governments for blocking development, but associates that with economic incentives created by the federal government. By adding up all the inputs in a house, like labour, lumber and land, and then subtracting it from the final sale price, Poilievre calculates what he calls the “gatekeeper gap,” or the premium that government red tape and other bureaucracy adds to the cost of homes.

“Consider this: In 1972, Canada’s population was 22 million, and we built about 230,000 homes. In 2022, Canada’s population was 39 million, and we built about 220,000 homes,” he says. “In other words, far more people and far less home-building.”

I found the video on YouTube. It’s over 417,000 views in TWO WEEKS since it was released:

Canadians are experiencing two major problems right now. First, their government-run healthcare system is failing catastrophically. I blogged about that with the latest think tank numbers earlier in the week. But the second big problem is inflation. Higher prices on everything from electricity, gas, groceries and especially housing. The Liberal Party has been causing these problems with massive government spending, regulations on energy production and home construction, and mass importation of unskilled people.

The video directly addresses the housing problem:

That is substantiated by nationwide polling. A survey conducted by Ipsos last month found that 73 per cent of Canadians think owning a home in Canada is now only for the rich. Sixty-six percent of Canadians who don’t own a house said they have given up on ever being able to afford a home. Perhaps unsurprisingly, these trends have coincided with polls showing the Conservatives thoroughly dominating in support among young voters, with the governing Liberals a distant third behind the NDP.

And more recently, Canadians have started telling pollsters they think the country’s high levels of immigration are worsening the housing crisis.

Under Liberal Prime Minister Trudeau, Canada has been mass-importing millions and millions of unskilled immigrants and refugees. They can’t speak the languages and they have no marketable skills. They can’t get jobs. They can’t pay their own way. But they need places to live. Hence the shortage of housing.

If you watch the video, he explains how government spending causes inflation. He explains clearly how prices are set in a market economy (supply and demand). He links higher population (caused by the Liberal Party’s open borders immigration policy) to higher demand of housing and lower supply. He explains how housing regulations cut off the supply of new homes.

Watching this video reminded me a lot of reading Thomas Sowell’s “The Housing Boom and Bust”. I hope you guys are keeping up with your Thomas Sowell reading, because if you don’t then Pierre will have to come down here and teach Americans, too! Canadian readers, if you want to know why Americans are so conservative, you have to understand that most Republicans learn economics from Thomas Sowell, a black economist with a long list of prestigious publications. You cannot read just one of his books. You read one, and then you keep reading them. He’s pure gold.

It’s nice to see Canadians taking time to learn economics. They want to learn more about economics. They’ve tried voting based on feelings. They’ve tried voting for nice hair. They’ve tried voting for follow your heart. They’ve tried voting for being generous with other people’s money. They’ve tried everything that their teachers and government told them to try. None of it worked. And now they are going to try to understand economics. And they have a very good teacher.