We Are There Yet

[0:00] Matt: It comes like a fleeting memory. Whatever you grab just turns to dust. Like eye contact with strangers. All right.

[0:23] Michael: We live.

[0:23] Matt: We are live. Nice.

[0:25] Michael: I love being alive.

[0:28] Matt: It is good to be alive.

[0:29] Michael: It is. Even though, like, I think both you and I are kind of getting our asses kicked right now.

[0:34] Matt: Yeah. I guess sometimes it can be good to get your ass kicked.

[0:38] Michael: It is. That's the truth.

[0:40] Matt: Well, let's go there.

[0:41] Michael: Let's do it. To the shores.

[0:42] Matt: To the shores. It really is such a strange thing to be alive, which is a strange thing to say because, like, what. What can you compare it to? Yeah, nothing. But it is strange. So many paradoxical elements to it, you know, get your ass kicked and sometimes that feels like you're alive.

[1:08] Michael: Yeah. Yeah. It's like. It's funny because there's a certain part of me, and also just in society that I see that, like, trying to eat, reach some sort of equilibrium where everything is okay. And it's funny because we were talking about this with the. With the coffee shops. Kind of like when we become a manager for the first time, it's like, like, oh, man, everything' broken. It's like, no, not everything is broken. It's like. But you know what? There's always going to be something broken.

[1:37] Matt: Things are constantly breaking. Yeah. Yeah.

[1:39] Michael: And it's like, there's no. You might have a good week or two, or maybe even a month where just things are humming along.

[1:44] Matt: Yeah.

[1:45] Michael: But that's just not life. You're gonna have someone who is having a hard time or doesn't show up for work or, you know, the grinder breaks or, you know, it's like any number of things.

[1:55] Matt: Yeah.

[1:56] Michael: And it's like, that's more of the state of things than, oh, wow, everything's okay.

[2:06] Matt: In the semi recent past, in the past couple of years, I went through a season where I kept sort of asking, are we there yet? I felt like a child in the backseat of the car. It's like, are we there yet? Imagining that there's some place that we're going to arrive in which the trouble will cease and the problems will be worked out. And I kept asking and asking and I think I finally realized, like, we are there. We are there yet. This is it. It's the car ride and shit's gonna go wrong and things are gonna break and you're gonna get a flat tire and you're gonna show up to where you thought you were going. And it turns out they're closed on Monday. Why didn't you look that up? Before we left. And, you know, that's just. That's life. It's that great. I love this clip from Theo Vaughn on Instagram where he's talking about life and he's like, that's the thing with life. Life's like, you want some more life, buddy? And just keeps coming and coming and coming. You just keep waking up every day.

[3:11] Michael: Yeah.

[3:11] Matt: And there it is. More life.

[3:14] Michael: Yeah. You take the corner and you come across a vista that's like, whoa, what is that?

[3:18] Matt: Yeah.

[3:20] Michael: The saying in golf is like, you know, you have 110 bad shots, but you have these three really great shots, and it keeps you coming back. I kind of think that's like, with life, it's like you're going to have a lot more probably hard times and easy times, but it's those. Those little gems that just keep you coming back.

[3:40] Matt: A friend of mine sent me. I can pull it up real quick. Or maybe I can't. It doesn't matter. I've been seeing this go around. These basically stats on the success rate of Michael Jordan, Tiger Woods, Pablo Picasso, other artists you think of as masters. And it's like their success rate is 7%, something super low when you compare it to everything that they did in their entire life. I think Pablo Picasso painted something like 150,000 paintings.

[4:17] Michael: Wow.

[4:18] Matt: But it's only like, relative to that, only a handful that anybody knows. And if you compare shots made by Michael Jordan versus how many shots he attempted, it's not like he was in that context. It looks bad, but it's just the persistence to keep going and keep trying and keep shooting and keep showing up that gets you into legendary status.

[4:52] Michael: It's like Wayne Gretzky. He's like, you miss 100% of the shots you don't take. That is kind of wild. I mean, you kind of see this with all business leaders, too. A lot of times we just see business leaders or entrepreneurs and they're. And there's moments of success, but there's probably 99% more failure in their life than that 1%. Something we've kind of dwelled on quite a bit.

[5:23] Matt: Well, so we were talking about this very famous verse in James where he starts by saying, consider it pure joy. My brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, you read that and you're kind of like, what are you on about? Pure joy. And maybe another lens for that is something that I really think I first kind of started digesting when Lex Friedman interviewed Chamath Palihapitiya. He was talking about how failure is learning. And if you just look at, like, small business statistics, it's like 1 out of 10 survives. So if you want to start a small business that survives, you're going to have to start 10, nine are going to have to fail. That's a lot of failure. And maybe that's something that James understood. It's like, when you experience these trials, consider it pure joy, because you are moving toward a victory. You are learning what you need to know in order to get to that 10% chance opportunity.

[6:32] Michael: Yeah, it does seem like a completely different orientation or just even where you're putting your attention at, because it seems antithetical. It's like, no, I don't want to have trials or troubles or I want my business to just succeed.

[6:51] Matt: Just work.

[6:51] Michael: Just work. Um, but there is something in that that you don't know all that you need to know. And it's. And that's always the case, and it's never not going to be the case. I think that's just like a. A reality. So what do you do with that reality? It's like, okay, well, welcome it. Yeah, consider a pure joy. Because there's like, there's a fruit that comes from that, you know, whether it be working out or investing in a relationship or, you know, whatever it is. It's like, none of that's easy. It's something about that and I think moving your attention to. Okay, cool. Like the obon says, life. More life, baby.

[7:39] Matt: I mean, that's hard, though. It's very hard for me, I think, to be going through trials of many kinds, of which I have been through, especially lately, to say, pure joy, baby.

[7:52] Michael: I'm loving this.

[7:53] Matt: I'm a little bit more predisposed to say what the actual. You know, I'm living a country song here. Can I get some relief? Can something work for once?

[8:09] Michael: Which is interesting too, because I was just. As you were saying that I was starting. But okay, what is it? If you don't believe in God, like, what does that even. What does this even mean for you? It's like, because I feel like it's true whether you believe in God or not, that it's like that you're going to face trials or tribulation or hardship. It's like, that's not something you can avoid if you're going to be even somewhat of a participant in the world. Even if you try to hide away and become a hermit, you know, there's still that. But anytime you try to make a difference or be active in the world. It's like, you're going to have difficulties. It's like, why would you do that? What's the point of it? And so maybe one aspect of this is where people would say, well, that's where you find meaning, is by participating in these trials and with the idea and the fruit that does come from that is deepening of relationships or more understanding. I mean, the whole question always is, and then for what? So I can be a more complete human being. It's like, okay, what does it mean to be a complete human being? Why is that important?

[9:22] Matt: Why would you want to be complete anyway?

[9:24] Michael: Yeah.

[9:25] Matt: By whose definition of complete? Whose definition of complete would you accept?

[9:30] Michael: Yeah, or even, like, you know what? I don't want to have trials. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to be the instigator of trials for everyone else, and therefore I protect myself by pushing all those things onto other people. Like, it's not my fault, it's your fault. It's, you know, I'm just going to have the government take your money from you to give to me so I can live a comfortable life. That was a little bit too of a shot across the bow. That would be the.

[10:05] Matt: I think it was. Margaret Thatcher said, the problem with communism is eventually you run out of other people's money. So it's like, that doesn't work very long.

[10:13] Michael: But at the same time, it's like, well, I don't care, just as long as it works long enough for me. You know, there's that sort of, like, idea of, well, if I can just squeeze enough out. I mean, I've got another, you know, 40, 50 years left in me. It's like, that's somebody else's problem.

[10:28] Matt: Well, all of that sounds like malignant narcissism. It's like I'm gonna. I'm going to instigate trials for others in order to insulate myself from them. And as long as that works long enough for me, then so be it. I'm not even sure if that's narcissism. That sounds like sociopathy.

[10:45] Michael: Yeah. I don't know which it is, but that's kind of like. I mean, it makes me think of, like, why. Why participate in this? It's. It's. It doesn't really make sense. Yeah.

[11:01] Matt: I was listening to this debate between Richard Dawkins and John Lennox, and Dawkins is obviously one of the most famous atheists around right now, and John Lennox is. I didn't know who John Lennox was. Just very recently, but he's kind of all over the place now, at least in my algo. And Dawkins was basically saying because Linux was taking the line of basically is justice a thing? Do you believe that there is such a thing as justice? And Dawkins says yeah, it's very important, sort of man made social construct. And then Linux kind of leads him down this road of well, okay, is the world, is, is the world the universe? Is it just, or is it unjust and which one should it be? And Dawkins point is there's no God and we obviously live in an unjust universe. There's clearly injustice. And his point was kind of like, well so what? Who are you to complain about it? That seems to me like a very much like well why would you participate in anything then? Why would you come to bait somebody? Why would you care about scientific inquiry? Why would you write books? Why would you do any of this? Why are you sitting there wearing a suit right now? You know, what is that? If, if there, if the world is clearly unjust and there's no meaning to be made of that, then why would you participate?

[12:33] Michael: Yeah, well I think this is kind of an area where you kind of smuggle meaning in is like, well I find meaning in the participation. You know, it's like when I don't participate in the world and in the, the troubles and the hardships, it's like I find that there's, there's not a lot of meaning. So like you know, walking through life with you and you know, I get to experience your hardships, there's something meaningful about that. And I also like even our questions that we have, the struggles that we have, you know, just intellectually too and there's something that, that meaning sort of like sort of manifests itself out of that. So you'd be like, oh, okay, cool. So like, you know, if I, if I participate in this sort of trials and tribulations, it's like meaning sort of manifests itself.

[13:23] Matt: What do you think is a good working definition for meaning? What is meaning even?

[13:28] Michael: That's a really good question. I don't know what meaning means. Well, it's like, I mean, let me just kind of throw some stuff out here. They'll just kind of go with that gives you purpose, direction, helps you know where to put your attention towards. So if something's meaningful then you fix your gaze or give attention to that because there's something of value there.

[14:02] Matt: In the context of this conversation I would say it almost has something to do with justice. You Experience justice that feels meaningful. And I don't mean justice in a legal sense, but I mean it in sort of like what we were talking about last week about, I think it was last week, logic and reason. That there is an order to things, and to pursue the truth is to conform yourself to reality, conform yourself to that order, conform yourself to that logic. And it's almost like, why do people do puzzles? You know, because there's an extraordinary satisfaction in finding the piece that fits, finding the piece that conforms to the design. And I think when you experience justice, that is sort of a signal that something is in its right place and that feels right. It feels meaningful. And when you experience injustice, you say, no, this isn't right. Something is off here. Somebody should do something. We've got to do something. We have to intervene. And I think it's. There's a similar version of that in a meaningful conversation. It's like, what is it that you and I are doing here every week? Why is it that we say, and I think rightfully so, that it is meaningful? Because we are pursuing something that we know there is an order to or an answer to. There's something to be discovered. There is a mystery to be enjoyed in that discovery. And as we move toward it, we get ever more sort of excited. And we're doing that together. We're co experiencing it. And almost every week, the end of this discussion that you and I have, we stop recording and we go, that was awesome.

[15:58] Michael: Totally. Yeah. There's something about that, like, moving forward and discovering and that sort of like, meaning is created. But it's interesting too, because in the language that you're using, it's something outside of ourselves. Like, we're not saying that it's inherent in us, that we're moving towards something. Which is fascinating too, because like, even whether you're an atheist or not is like, that's. That's kind of what you're doing with science. You're moving towards objective reality. And so it's something outside of yourself. Something outside of yourself is communicating something to you that you're moving towards.

[16:35] Matt: Yeah.

[16:36] Michael: And, you know, so already, it's like just in the discipline of science has to already recognize that there's something outside of myself that is objectively true, whether I believe in it or not, you know, so I think that's something that you find in relationships. And I probably wouldn't. I mean, I think justice works too, but love is probably like, maybe the word I would use is sort of, you know, like whenever you pursue something I think, and find it. It's like there's this. It's like the love of learning, the love of relationship. It's like there's something that kind of manifests or even like the love of, oh, wow, that is good. That's just. And. And then like, oh, that's not just something there that needs to be punished or. Or held to account, you know, and there's something in that that you're. You're actually referencing something outside yourself. It's not just like saying like, oh, I think that's unjust. It's like, no, it's like, well, that doesn't really matter if you think it's unjust. But if you're saying like, no, something about what happened here goes against the fabric of the universe and it is unjust.

[17:50] Matt: It's a violation of something of a higher order.

[17:53] Michael: Totally. Yeah.

[17:59] Matt: Yeah. I mean, I think science itself presupposes God implicitly.

[18:05] Michael: Yeah.

[18:06] Matt: Because it presupposes that there is an order to things which can be. Which is intelligible to us, which we can discover. And that just doesn't work from an evolutionary standpoint. If you take evolution to be the random, the aimless progression of cause and effect, then what you might say is order, which you might say the laws of the universe are something like order is just a random consequence. And it could have been any other way, you know, and so. Well, how could that be intelligible? How could that be discoverable? I think that the order has to have a person behind it. It has to have a design behind it in order for it to be intelligible and discoverable.

[19:01] Michael: Well, I think it's interesting because, like, really, on both sides of this, you really can't prove it. It's basically comes down to. It's like, I think there is something behind this order, or I don't think there's something behind this order. And I think you're pretty much equally justified in saying either one of those. I don't think it's. I don't think it's accurate as far as, like. Because everything that I know points to some sort of, you know, intelligent design behind these things. And I don't understand how an intellectual cannot come to that conclusion. It's not random.

[19:41] Matt: I feel like I just heard you say two things. One, that it's almost an arbitrary choice to decide whether, like, there's no evidence for one or the other that there is a God or there isn't. But then you also said, how can an intellectual come to any other Conclusion than that there is a God.

[19:56] Michael: Yeah, no, that's definitely what I said. Just because it's like both are faith statements, you know, one is that there's a randomness that produced. I don't know if people would go this far, produce meaning, and we don't understand it, but out of some. Out of the randomness, something, you know, produce life and meaning and justice and love and all these things that we experience. But there's really. There's no author to those things. But. So I think it does take the same amount of faith, Although maybe I don't. I don't believe that. Just trying to kind of make the argument it's because you really can't prove that God exists. You can't prove that God doesn't exist. But the evidence, as far as, like, explanatory power, kind of like John Lennox talks about, is. But if I take the story of Jesus and the Bible and apply that to this reality, the explanatory power is so much more greater than anything else that I could place on top of this reality. So it's like the same thing of, like, you know, okay, we come up with a scientific method and it has a lot of explanatory power. And so you use it and it's actually effective in the world. But like, with science, we're always like, oh, my understanding is insufficient. You know, and so I think that's. That's even like a quality of God is like our understanding of God is always insufficient, so we're always having to discover and dig deeper so that. So to me, it's just like it fits in line with everything else where I don't know if you can make that same argument for just randomly. This universe and this consciousness and the way that we participate in this reality is random and has no meaning.

[22:03] Matt: I don't know where we're going with this. Well, let's pause for a moment and let me try to put a point on a question. Do you think it's more rational to be an atheist or to believe in God? Which of those is more rational?

[22:23] Michael: I mean, 100%. Like, it's more rational to believe in God. I mean, it just makes more sense. Like, I find it more irrational to not believe in God. And maybe that's a faith statement. I don't know. But it seems to me, rationally and logically, it makes so much more sense.

[22:43] Matt: Well, I don't think you can avoid faith.

[22:46] Michael: Yeah, totally.

[22:47] Matt: Right. I would say. Maybe. I'll put it this way. The faith required to be an atheist is different than the faith required to believe in God. And I think that's because the faith that believes in God is based on evidence. The faith that believes there is no God is based on a lack of evidence, which makes evidence based faith more rational in my mind.

[23:25] Michael: Yeah, this is the really difficult part. That's why I feel like, you know, believe in God is more rational, is like you cannot make the case on the other side for almost anything. You have to smuggle in some sort of like. Well, the randomness produced meaning, the randomness produced consciousness. Now what do we do with it? It's like, well, we find that it's more effective, efficient, effective to act in this way. Okay. Is it like it, it, it just. There's so many more things that you kind of like. Like little sticks that you have to use to keep the walls of the, of the building up.

[24:01] Matt: Yeah.

[24:02] Michael: You know where it's funny, because I feel like that's what I've always heard more about in the, in the belief of God is like you have to have like all these little sticks that keep the building up. And I'm. I kind of feel like it's. It's actually the opposite, you know?

[24:15] Matt: Right.

[24:16] Michael: Like, oh, there's a logical intelligence behind this. Oh, that makes sense because there's a logic and intelligence that I'm observing. You know, it's like, oh, look at the human life. You go from being a child and you, you have all these experiences and then you die. It's like, it's like there's a trajectory there and like, what is this thing called consciousness? Like, we are aware, we are participating in, in this reality. It's like, you know, it's a lot more logical to think that we're manifesting something of the universe in ourselves. And there's, and that's like, again, like the whole idea, like man being created in God's image. It's like. It's like, oh, no, that. That substance or the aspect of me is actually reflecting a greater reality, if that makes sense.

[25:11] Matt: Yeah, Linux was talking about this. He said. I think this was a different talk I saw him give. Somebody was asking about whether or not an atheist can be moral. And Lennox, his answer was really brilliant. He said something like, all men are created in the image of God, even the men that don't believe in God. And because all men are created in the image of God, men have morality. Because God has morality, we are created in that image. So it isn't like an atheist has no idea what is moral and Immoral. Because they don't have a God. God put that there whether they recognize it or not. I thought that was really fascinating.

[25:56] Michael: I think that's why it's, it's, it makes it easier for an atheist to be like, no, of course there's like good and bad. You know, it might be social construct.

[26:04] Matt: It's imprinted on their heart.

[26:05] Michael: Yeah, yeah.

[26:06] Matt: They just don't acknowledge who put it there.

[26:10] Michael: Yeah. Or the greater significance of what that actually means. Like, it just means. Oh, actually we're just. I'm just maybe a part of a superior intelligence that I align myself with.

[26:22] Matt: Yeah.

[26:23] Michael: And this, these, these other sub superior. Sub, sub intelligence inferior. Thank you. Inferior.

[26:30] Matt: Sub superior. Intelligence superior, but less.

[26:34] Michael: Because that's kind of what Dawkins kind of does in general. It's like, I was like, kind of like there's these inferior people that are walking around. They don't get it. But I'm superior in my intelligence and I get it. You know, even kind of come back to Nietzsche. What we do a lot is that, you know, okay, God is dead is like, what do we do? Like what?

[26:53] Matt: Yeah.

[26:55] Michael: And a lot of these atheists will be like, well, of course there's right and wrong. You just have to be smart enough to know it and understand it.

[27:05] Matt: Well, that's kind of wokeism. It's like, what's right and wrong is obvious to me because I'm smarter than you. And it looks inverted to you because you're not as smart as me, which is so fascinating. I've been thinking a lot about inversion, and we've talked about it here and there over time. We've talked about it politically, but I've been thinking about it sort of morally and recently just noticing as I read the Bible, especially the New Testament, how much Jesus comes and turns everything on its head. Everything that we, that we thought, all the ways we thought things should be, even in terms, even the people, in terms of, okay, the Messiah is here now, here's what's going to happen. Obviously, that the Messiah's here. And the exact opposite happened. You know, there were those who thought he would raise an army. He didn't ever lift a finger. As a matter of fact, he died. You know, who would have thought that the Christ is going to come and he'll die? I mean, he inverted everything. He said, the first will be last, the last will be first. And I think what he was doing is sort of countering that. That which is in us. He's riding the ship, that we actually are trying to Invert. We're trying to invert the logos of things, the order of things. We try to conform ourselves to reality and we can't do it. We can't conform ourselves to the order of things. And so we say, screw that, have reality conform itself to us. And then you end up saying things like right and wrong is obvious, but only to me because I'm smarter than you. Which is, that's Satan. That's the serpent going to Eve and saying, oh, God told you this, did he? Well, what he didn't tell you is if you eat of that tree, you will become like him. You will become a God, you will see. Isn't that Satan saying, I know better. Let me tell you the way things should be. And by that mechanism, I mean, that's the fall. I mean, I wonder if the fall is an inversion. It's turning everything inside out. And the work of the gospel, or maybe the work of the entire story of the Bible is the story of correcting that and saying, no, that's not the way it should be here in returning. Well, it's returning to the garden. That's the way it should be.

[29:58] Michael: It's like, what do you substitute that for? And I was just thinking like, there's a new series of a Brave New World out there. I haven't watched it yet, but it made me think about that sort of this pill that sort of like makes you live in bliss, but that bliss is just never satisfying because there's something, there's something more out there. And you know, communism kind of sounds good. It's like, oh, you're going to give me everything that I need, you know, but just sort of falls flat because it's like, no, it's like there's something about us taking responsibility, about discovering, you know, whether it be prices or you know, just like relationally, like, oh, I want this. Okay, well, okay, I'll go make you that. Yeah, and you know, under communism that you can't do that. It's got to be sort of dictated

[30:51] Matt: or even, I want this. Okay, I'll go make you that. And you give it to me. And I'm like, oh, well, that's not really what I wanted. I was having a conversation this week with a friend of mine and we were talking about sort of what we've come to know as sort of sex drive, as the built in program in our genetics that serves to propagate the species. I was thinking about that and I was thinking, I think I've always just sort of taken that for granted. Probably because we were raised being taught evolution and being taught these sort of aimless processes. And you do sort of observe it in yourself. You know, human beings have a really hard time not having sex.

[31:36] Michael: Totally.

[31:37] Matt: You know, and it's like any male who's gone through puberty knows that there's no such. There is absolutely no will required for you to get an inopportune erection in the middle of Spanish class, you know, or whatever. It's like, I'm not trying to do that. As a matter of fact, I would love if that would stop happening. But then I was thinking about it, and I was thinking, well, does that explain some things that I can observe? Because start thinking about other categories. Is it just our genes that drive us to do things? To like things? Just thinking, like, what happens, you know, you know, somebody who's really into cars. What happens when somebody gets really into cars? They get really specific about which cars they want to be into. They become a Beemer guy or a Mercedes guy or a classic car guy or whatever. They look down on your Honda Fit or your Toyota Prius or whatever. It's like you've got no taste. It's like, I play guitars. Been playing guitars for 30 years. What happens when you get into playing guitars? It's like you get really specific about the kinds of guitars that you want to play, the kinds of guitars that you look up to. What happens when you get into food? You get really specific. You like steak? You know, it's like our friend James.

[33:10] Michael: Oh, yeah.

[33:10] Matt: He's like, importing shit from Japan. And it seems to me, like, the more you love something, the more you reject almost everything in that category and only accept the best.

[33:23] Michael: Oh, interesting.

[33:24] Matt: And I actually see that, you know, the. What we consider sort of the main driver, which is sex, of a lot of our behavior. And I think Freud obviously spent a lot of time trying to prove this case that sex drives almost all behavior. And so you might think there's this common trope. It's like men want to spread their seed. And I think, yeah, it's true that I do find in myself a sort of generalized desire for sex. And I can understand the argument that, well, that's just my genes trying to get as many offspring into the world as possible. And I think, yeah, but that also sounds like a massive liability. And it's not actually driving me to that behavior. And actually, what I do know of sex is that almost like any other category I can think of, the more I love it, the more it drives me to reject almost all Partners and ultimately to its. If, if my love of sex, whether that's, you know, biological or spiritual, is to be brought to its perfect representation, I think it ends up not with many partners, but with one partner.

[34:38] Michael: Yeah.

[34:38] Matt: My love of cars drives me to one perfect car. My love of guitars to one perfect guitar. And this is, again, it's an inversion. It's not what you would expect. And it's funny, I was, because I was thinking you don't look at like a colony of chimpanzees and they're all just screwing who they're screwing. And you think, oh, they just really love sex. That's just their biological drive. Maybe it is more applicable there, but you don't see it. And then the stats confirm what I'm kind of saying, because the people who have the most sex are married. The people who have the most children are married. And there's common out, there's some like rare outliers, like Genghis Khan, he did the whole spread his seed thing. I don't think that worked out super well for him. Yeah, so it's just interesting. It's like it reminds me of Lewis and Chesterton. Chesterton's line, I did try to create a heresy, a little heresy of my own. And when I put my final touches on it, I discovered it was orthodoxy. I think that if you earnestly and genuinely pursue anything, you end up in this very surprising state. And it's almost like the surprising state of what happened when God became man. It ended up in a place that you wouldn't predict.

[36:03] Michael: Okay, gotcha. It is fascinating. I actually had this conversation with some people and I was like, oh, I probably should be talking to something right here, right now. Not here on this podcast, but just in where I was talking about it and I was just detailing the idea of sex. And like it was until like the 60s where contraceptive became more prevalent and you know, sex became something that had less consequence to it and so physical consequences to it, you know, maybe disease, but like even that was sort of like, sorry, have less. It's like, well, what we didn't account for is the psychological or emotional toll that that would have, you know, maybe not even on, maybe I think on the partners themselves, but then the offspring that come from those partners. You know, there's, there's, there's a, there's an effect that is have like whenever, you know, there's a lot of statistics about like children growing up outside of a two parent family home, you know, and so it's not as it's not as sexy as sort of like, you know, oh, man, I slept with all these women. It's like, okay. And it's almost like, so what? It's like, what did you get from that? It's like, well, I got pleasure. It's like. But I think if anybody that has done that knows that that's actually not pleasurable, it might be at the. For a moment, you know, the. The chase of the hunt or whatever. The chase of the hunt. Hunt of the chase, whatever. It's the same thing with, like, being a nomad. It's like, at first it's like, really romantic. It's like, oh, I'm a digital nomad. And at some point you're like, I kind of want a home, like, someplace to, like, put roots down. Because it's like there's something superficial about just jumping around from group to friend group. And then you're also around people that are also doing the same. So you might not even be around. You might be around a lot of people, but everyone's moving in and out of that circle every week.

[38:06] Matt: Right. Everything's transient.

[38:08] Michael: And so I think, I feel like our culture right now has experienced that. It's like an identity crisis. Because we've been told that it doesn't really matter. Sex doesn't really matter. Community doesn't really matter.

[38:23] Matt: Parents don't really matter.

[38:24] Michael: Parents don't really matter. Yeah. And. And I think we're going to find out more and more of, like, how much it actually does matter. And then the question starts to be like, why? Well, we've been disregarding something that is, like, inherent in the fabric of this universe, you know,

[38:42] Matt: Inherent in the order of reality.

[38:44] Michael: Yeah.

[38:48] Matt: Yeah. I mean, we're so inverted and upside down on so many things and see it in so many places. It's so wild to watch that video of the governor of Massachusetts signing this new bill surrounded by all of these women who are cheering the bill is making full term abortion legal. I was watching it just thinking, what in the world is going on here? What are they celebrating? Even in their own words, I can't imagine what someone could say to say, this is why this is a good thing. What good thing could you possibly weigh against the murder of a baby? And I'm leaving the abortion debate aside here because a full term pregnancy, that's a baby. I saw somebody make the point that it's just a matter of location. At that point, it's either inside the womb or outside the womb. It's a baby. There's no Arguing that. So what you're saying is it is legal to kill that baby and we are celebrating that. What could you possibly put on the other side of that scale that makes that a worthy trade off?

[40:10] Michael: It's almost like if I were to paint a picture of that same scene in a more acceptable way, which I don't think it's acceptable, but as is sort of like, hey, we're signing this bill into place because we have to. And. And we don't. We understand that there's consequences to that and understanding that there. This is an actual live human being. And it doesn't seem like the elation at all fits the, the situation.

[40:38] Matt: I mean. Yeah, that's a good point.

[40:40] Michael: Like, I don't want to go into like, you know, is it three weeks? Is it five weeks of assignments? Like, but like at term, like, it's like, it doesn't really. It just doesn't make any sense to me at all.

[40:48] Matt: Yeah, I mean, I think you make a good point. Even if you could justify or plausibly believe that there was something worthy of weighing against the intentional murder of a baby, you would not sign that. Sign that with elation. You would say, well, this is an awful trade off.

[41:07] Michael: Totally. Yeah.

[41:07] Matt: But we should do it because it's protecting us from potentially something far worse. Maybe.

[41:14] Michael: Yeah, it's like almost you could think of like a general sending his, his troops into war knowing that they're not going to come back. It's like if the, if the general's like, yeah, we're going to send these guys in here, they're going to die. Yeah. And it's going to be awesome. Awesome. And it's like, but we're going to win the war. You know, it's like, but like a general who actually has to send his troops into battle and they know they're going to die. It's like, it's like, I don't want to do this, but it's. It's the best thing for us. And again, that I'm not justifying that too. I think like, Rohan, you know, it's like we're going to our death. Like we talked like last week about. It's something that. No, this is somber. It's like if, if, if you really think this is like, there's something valuable in, in doing this. It's like it, the elation just doesn't correlate with the.

[42:01] Matt: Yeah, well, I guess that's why I see it as so inverted. I mean, it's inverted in many seemingly obvious ways. I Mean just the optics of it on the surface is celebrating the desires of an adult over the fate of a child. That's seriously inverted. Adults job should be to support and uplift the child. We used to say the children are our future. We didn't say the children are their future, they're our future. Which means that we should support and uplift them and not raise ourselves above them. There's something seriously off there. And it's also saying what I want is more important than another person's life. And it's for purely, what would you say, almost aesthetic reasons. I don't necessarily mean that as aesthetics, as. The visual look of things, but it's the taste of things. It's to say, well, my life is going to be hard and this and that and the other way, and it's going to prevent me from doing this, that and the other thing. That's a matter of taste. It's a matter of. I'd prefer. It's a preference. I'd prefer that my life be the way that I want it to be. And so I will take the power of life and death into my own hands and dole out the reality that I want. And that's, that's again, this inversion of, well, what is truth? To conform yourself to the order, to the logos, to the reality. And that is to say, no, we celebrate that it is now legal to demand that reality conform to me, and. So be it, that I must kill who I must kill.

[44:21] Michael: Yeah, that's. It's interesting. I mean, just the whole. There's a lot of like, inversions that. Because you just, you just. I mean, because then you kind of come back to the logic of things. It's like, what is sex like? Fundamentally, sex is to make babies. Like, that's the main purpose. That's the, that's the goal. That's the main goal is to create more humans. And. But then when you lose the purpose of the thing and it can also be enjoyable and it can also be a way to connect and get closer to somebody. But fundamentally, foundationally, it's to produce children. It's like if you lose sight of that, then you lose sight of all, everything upstream from that, like the closeness of a relationship or the, or the funness of it, you know, because then if the inconvenience of a child, child being born, you're like, oh, well, I didn't want that. And we're not, we're talking about like rape or, you know, any of that kind of stuff. We're talking about just the participation in sex itself, it's like there's not. There's a reality that we're not facing. And. And just like, what the foundations of that is, you know, we kind of like, elevate sort of pleasure over, like, function in this area. And it's not that you can't have both, but.

[45:38] Matt: Well, again, that's an inversion of control, that we have taken control of what sex is, and we have removed something that actually cannot be removed. There was this podcast by Dallas Willard. My mom sent it to the both of us. I don't know if you listened to it. He was making the point. I think he was talking about the Trinity, and he was saying, it's hard for us to imagine that there are things that are distinct and inseparable. And he made the point. His example of regret in memory. They are distinct. They're obviously different, but they're inseparable. You can't regret something without remembering it. I think there's something like that going on with sex. I don't know that I take issue with what you described, but I would say it's hard for me to concede that sex is fundamentally about propagation, because I don't know how you separate that or rank order it against all of the other obviously powerful aspects of sex in pair bonding, in intimacy. And knowing someone. I mean, it is the, in a sense, the ultimate symbolic physical instantiation of knowing someone. That's why I knew her. Is a euphemism for sex. You hear that?

[47:11] Michael: Yeah. Did this earlier.

[47:17] Matt: Stand by. Nice. Having a.

[47:22] Michael: But I think that's the problem with it is like. Like, fundamentally, like, I just. Like. No, evolutionary speaking, biologically speaking, like, however you want to look at it, like the parabolic stuff is there. It's like. But I don't see how you can get around sort of like the main purpose is child producing, because that's the whole thing about sperm and egg, you know? Well, it's like.

[47:52] Matt: But I guess here. Okay, here's the issue I would take with that.

[47:56] Michael: Maybe it will.

[47:57] Matt: Is if we say the main purpose of sex is sperm and egg. Okay. And then you optimize for the main purpose of things.

[48:07] Michael: Oh, okay.

[48:08] Matt: You end up in a world in which no one is having sex because a sperm and an egg is not sex. You put sperm and egg together in a lab. You could do that all day long. So you've removed sex by trying to optimize for what you think the purpose is.

[48:25] Michael: Well, I think that's the part. I think there's a lot of Other things that come with it. It's like, even then I think you're starting to suffer from the other side of things. It's like, okay, what is that supposed to bring you? Because I think that's the consequence of sex is sort of like you have a child. It's like, okay, what do we do with this thing? And part of the role of sex is like it allows you to have that sort of pair bonding and intimacy. And it's like it builds into. It's like everything is building into that production of the thing.

[49:00] Matt: It's true. And having a child, meaning like that child existing in your life is a continuation of that pair bonding and intimacy. It's like it's one thing to be pair bonded and intimate and in sexual intercourse, I mean, it's another thing to be pair bonded and intimate when you're cleaning up vomit and diarrhea and one person is consoling the screaming child while the other cleans up the kitchen. Something like this, you know that the unit that that creates is an extension of that. I just want to go back to this idea that, that once we think we understand the purpose of the thing, if you optimize for that purpose, you end up annihilating the thing itself. This is a crazy thought. And C.S. lewis in the Abolition of Man does a great job in exploring it. And his main thesis in that book is essentially, if you go about trying to optimize man, he's talking about transhumanism. Essentially, if you go about optimizing man, the final touch you put on your optimization will be the abolition of man. And he uses the example, I think, of sort of the classic idea of somebody who sells their soul to the devil. The fiddle player at the crossroads sells his soul to the devil to become the best fiddle player in the world. It's symbolic. But I think we all sort of understand what that means. We all understand that there is some sacrifice that I can make to get what I want. And there's a positive version of that with God, but there's also a negative version of that. And the interesting thing is it was like, what do you have to give to the devil in order to get what you want? Your soul. What good are you now without a soul? You're not a person anymore. What are you going to do with that fiddle? Nothing. You can't. You. You sold who you are to something which will consume it completely. Which is, I see that in this idea of, well, if you optimize for the purpose of sperm and egg coming together, you end up in the perfect optimization of that in a world in which no one has sex at all. So you have, you have thrown away the entire thing and you end up with nothing.

[51:29] Michael: Well, it's interesting because I'm kind of liking this where you're going with this, like the optimizing, like even just if you're optimizing for pleasure, it's like the very thing that you optimize for will no longer be pleasurable.

[51:40] Matt: Totally.

[51:40] Michael: It's like, even like if you. Well, if you do like the sperm and egg thing, you know, I think there's even an aspect that you have to. Oh God, there's too many variables in that one. Where I was going with that was just like, you know,

[52:04] Matt: let's go with the pleasure one for a second because I think there's a couple good examples of this. Pornography is a good one. I take it for granted. I think, and I think I've seen evidence that this is true, that what tends to happen when people engage in pornography, particularly men, because they're so visual, is that they get into, over time, increasingly more extreme versions of pornography. Because if you're optimizing for pleasure, you exhaust dopamine receptors. And what used to be pleasurable is not as pleasurable as it was. And so you have to turn up the dial. This is the same with drugs, this is the same with alcohol. This is the same with all kinds of things that give you that hit of something that you're after. And the next time you come back you need a little bit more and a little bit more and a little bit more. And you suddenly end up in a place where I cannot find porn that pleases me. And even worse, when I do have sex with a woman, she's not willing to do anything that pleases me, not even the stuff I used to be into because I've become so extreme. Yeah, this is the hypothetical sort of argument I'm making based upon what I've read. The same I think is true of drugs and alcohol. If you optimize for the pleasure of it, you end up a shell of a human who is not capable of experiencing any pleasure at all. And you see this, you see this in people living on the street. Do they look like they're having fun? No. The alcoholic that maybe, you know, in your life, does it look like they're having fun? It's like maybe for that 30 minute window when they were in the right place at 9:30 on that one day. But every moment preceding and every moment after is misery. So Optimize for pleasure, ultimately get ultimate misery. And so it's like, I think we have to take things. We have to approach things from a position of humility. Like, we have to say, I don't really know what sex is exactly about. I know that it has something to do with children. I know that it has something to do with love. I know that it has something to do with pleasure. And as I experience those things, they're all surprising to me. I didn't know that sex could be this way. I didn't know that having children could be this way. I didn't know that I could be as intimate as I was with you, as we just were. Especially after this long, long. And maybe it's the same with other pursuits of pleasure. It's like, maybe this is what it means to say, what is it? Work out your faith with fear and trembling. It's like, I don't know. What I do know is that as soon as I claim to know or, and I logically play that out, it goes the exact opposite place that I want to go.

[55:38] Michael: I don't know where to go with all that. Yeah, there's just so many rabbit trails on this one. Because, you know, if you've been in a relationship, a physical relationship with any partner for any period of time, at some point you're going to come to a. Sex does not solve your problems. You know, if it ever did. Some. Some people don't have, like, you know, that. That was never the case, but. And, well, the whole thing is like, well, I just go find another partner because now sex is not enjoyable with this person. And I think that's the part where,

[56:27] Matt: yeah, I find that to be a major flaw in the logic of polyamory. I follow this girl Aella. You familiar with her? She's really fascinating because she's. She's basically in porn. She's an only fans girl. She's also like really smart and an intellectual.

[56:50] Michael: That's hilarious.

[56:51] Matt: Well, I mean, this is the world we live in, right? And partly I follow her because she's been on all the podcasts that I like and she's a fascinating person to listen to and runs a lot of really interesting social experiments. She's very into data and very into statistics, I think, you know, but so I follow her on Twitter and she's talking all the time. She's poly in her life and she talks about how she just can't imagine being a block to the pleasure of someone that she loves. She's saying, you know, I have a Boyfriend, I love him. I would never prevent him from experiencing pleasure. And I think. And her point is, stopping him or preventing him from having sex with another woman would be preventing him from pleasure that he otherwise could have if she didn't deny that. As if there's a lack that there is pleasure to be had. But I abstain from it means that I don't get that pleasure. As if that's the end of the analysis. And this is not a critique of her at all. Or I think it's just my observation about polyamory, which is that I think that that's not the whole story. I think that we abstain from pleasure, from certain pleasures for very good reason, because that abstinence increases something else. It increases some other pleasure. I mean, it's going back to this. This idea of specificity. You know, I laid out a couple examples earlier, but let's, like, go with coffee. You know, it's like, you're into coffee. If I said, hey, you know, we're on a road trip, and it's like, hey, Michael, can we just stop into the 711 and let's get some coffee. It's like, you're probably gonna go actually, like, I brought stuff in the back of the car, so you can go get the 711 coffee. But I'm going to make actually good coffee. Right. You're not abstaining from the possible pleasure of 711 coffee. You're actually. You're denying that because there's something so much better. It's like if you love someone, you know, if I love. If you love your wife, you're not abstaining from sex in other. Relate with other women out of a lack. It's not like I'm not doing that and I'm missing out. It's like, no, I'm not doing that because it doesn't fucking compare. And I don't want anything but the best. And this is the best. And how do you know? How do you know if you haven't tried all the coffee?

[59:46] Michael: Well, I think that's the part too, because at that point, you're also not just talking about sex. You're talking about something so much more and deeper.

[59:53] Matt: Yeah.

[59:54] Michael: Than just having sex. Like, so it's like having sex would actually, like, in some way have a negative impact on that relationship. And I think that's one. The one lie that in polyamory that is told is sort of like, oh, by them having sex with other people, that it doesn't affect our relationship. And I think that's just an outright lie.

[60:17] Matt: Well, I think that's probably because polyamory presupposes that a relationship is about pleasure, and experiencing more pleasure can't affect pleasure, something like that. But what it isn't, what it's doing is, I think, the opposite of what we were talking about earlier with distinction, without separation. Once you try to separate it, you lose the whole thing. So if you try to say that a relationship is about pleasure and it's about sex and it's about intimacy, and that's all that it's about, what is it that you're throwing out and ultimately going to lose the whole thing over? It's like you're throwing out. To love someone is to will the good of the other, if I'm willing the good of you. And I say the ultimate good is the most pleasure you can receive. It's almost murderous, as we've established. I think if you optimize for pleasure, you end up in misery. So if I optimize my position toward you to optimize your pleasure, of course the whole thing is going to die. If I will your actual good, your ultimate good. It means at times I'm going to have to tell you things you don't want to hear. I'm going to show you things you don't want to see, and you're going to do that for me, too. And that's going to be tumultuous. It's going to involve periods of abstinence, whether that's from sex or conversation or all kinds of things. It's like, you know, why do we give a kid a timeout? It's like there's times when we need to sit and think and consider. And I think that that's true in a relationship. You know, I've. Or fasting and culture fasting. Yeah, totally. I have realized that there are times in my relationships when it's like, I've recognized that the thing that I'm trying to do to desperately improve that relationship, I need to stop doing that because it isn't working. And it's baffling to me because I'm like, well, what am I supposed to do then? It's the one thing I know that should work, and it's not working. It's like, maybe you need a timeout. You need to stop doing it and think about it. Maybe you're right, but they're not ready to receive it. Maybe you're arrogant and you're wrong and you need to figure that out. Yeah, maybe it's a matter of execution. Maybe it's a matter of style. Who knows what it is? But the worst thing that you can do is keep doing something that's obviously making it worse, even if your intention is to make it better. And so all of that is in the relationship. So you're going to throw all. I think that's what polyamory does. It's like, let's throw all of that out. I don't need all of that nonsense. I just need sex, the pleasure. Right. And if I'm not available, well, you find someone else who is. And if you're not available, I'll find someone else who is. Like, what's wrong with that? Well, I think the thing that's wrong with that is your misunderstanding and failing to humble yourself to your misunderstanding of what it is that you're engaging in. And I don't want to, like, not necessarily going against polyamory here. I think we all do this in all kinds of aspects of our life all the time, and we think we understand something. The logic of it makes sense. Why can't it work?

[64:11] Michael: Well, it kind of comes back to what we were talking about before is just the whole, like, consider it pure joy of others. We face trials of many kinds of. Is in some regards, like, you know, a trial of not being, like, pleasured or fulfilled in one area. It might actually. Might be a signal that there's something bigger that you need to look at. And if you keep pursuing, like, I mean, you see this with money all the time, where it's like, oh, if I just had more money, then my problems would be solved. And it just doesn't. It doesn't work that way.

[64:53] Matt: It's like, yeah, well, because the mistake is thinking that your problems are about money.

[64:58] Michael: Yeah. Or sex or everybody.

[65:00] Matt: Yeah. Well, man, that leaves us in kind of a difficult spot. Right. We sort of. We've played ourselves into a losing hand here, in a sense. It's like, if you think you understand the source of your problems, then everything's going to get much worse. So what is it you're supposed to do?

[65:24] Michael: Well, to me, that's what makes so much more sense, is once you start playing that out, all these other things just bring an illusion of fulfillment. And we've kind of had that marketed to us, whether it be, like, sex and movies or, you know, I'm so free, I can do anything, anytime, anywhere. It's like, oh, wow, that's so amazing. And the idea of responsibility and. And taking responsibility and. And, you know, committing to a relationship, like, that's. That Seem as more of like slavery or you're, you're not going to be fully yourself. So I think that's, I think this is something that's been. Just market it to us and. But the other side just, it just makes so much sense to me where, you know, you know, in a perfect world or whatever, it's like, I think that's something we've moved to over the, you know, thousands and thousands of years. You know, tens of thousands of years is sort of like we've seen that pair bonding is actually best for child rearing. And there's something about the attention of two parents who are genetically involved, you know, that have stock in their. Yeah, in their kid is like, is so much more valuable. Even if the parents are not that great, it's still better than not having any parents at all.

[66:48] Matt: Did I send you this video of a young girl, maybe four, watching the video of her parents get married? I tell you about this. So there's a short little video. The parents are showing their four year old daughter the video of them getting married. When they got married, the girl didn't exist. She wasn't in the video. She didn't exist at that time. And the girl starts crying and starts hugging and kissing her parents. It's beautiful. And somebody reposted this. And I guess there's, there's been some studies on this. Children respond this way when their father, when they see their father loving their mother, they feel loved.

[67:43] Michael: Oh, interesting.

[67:44] Matt: When they see their mother loving their father, they feel loved. And apparently it does not work that way with step parents.

[67:52] Michael: Interesting.

[67:56] Matt: And I was thinking, yeah, this little girl is having this visceral emotional response to something that she had nothing to do with in some weird sense and yet everything to do with in some other sense. I remember when I was little, anytime my parents hugged, like little, you know, head around their knees, that height, anytime they hugged, I would go squeeze myself in between their legs. And I felt like that's where I should be in the middle of that love. I can't imagine my parents were together until my dad died. 41 years, I believe, 42 years. If at some point, if my dad had died when I was younger and my mom was remarried to some other man, I can't imagine feeling drawn to squeeze in between their legs. This is some other man. And that's not an intellectual point. It's like that's a spiritual point. It's like I don't think I would have felt drawn to that. I don't think that this four year Old girl would be crying watching her mom marry a stepdad.

[69:16] Michael: Yeah.

[69:17] Matt: There is something in the sinew of the fabric of reality in which children respond to their biological parents in that way.

[69:26] Michael: Yeah, I think there's some exceptions, but that's too complex to get into. But you also think about children who are not raised by their biological parents. One or the other. It's like, who was my dad? Who was my mom? Like, I want to know where I came from. It's like, was it sufficient enough that we raised you? It's like, you might be like, no, thank you so much for doing that, but I still want to know who my biological mother and father were or whatever. Either one. It's like, there's something just so inherent in that. And it's like. But we've kind of lost that perspective from the. From the starting point. You know, it's like, you know, if you're. If you're sharing three. Fam. Three. Or, you know, if there's like, five people involved and you're just like, okay, well, which. Which two made me. Yeah, okay. Those are the two I'm connected with. And obviously there. There can be exceptions. And I. And I. I think. But I think, again, those are exceptions supposed to. Or as, like, connecting with other human beings.

[70:33] Matt: But I have this really close family friend. I consider him an uncle, essentially. He's not a biological member of my family, but he was adopted at two and a half. He's my dad's age and did not until very recently, so into his 60s, know who his biological father was. And with the advent of 23andMe, he was able to, through genetics, find some biological relatives. And it's like, Even in his 60s, he was very motivated to go find out who these people are. Who was this person? Because this person is me. I am him. He is me. This is the. Of course I want to know who this person is.

[71:16] Michael: Which makes the slavery thing so impactful, is like, here you've ripped a certain population from their ancestry. Like, where do. Where. Where am I from? Who's my ancestors?

[71:28] Matt: Wait, I'm struggling to figure out how you got to slavery.

[71:31] Michael: Well, just like, you know, just when

[71:33] Matt: you remove people from.

[71:34] Michael: Yeah. It doesn't have to be. It's not just us slavery, but just in general. Like, slavery all over the world is like, when you ripped families apart and you. They're in another place. It's like, like, where did I come from? Like, that's just. That's just a natural inclination to, like, want to understand is like, where did I come from.

[71:55] Matt: Isn't that interesting? It's like, what's. What's a basic boilerplate question you might ask someone you don't know. Where are you from?

[72:03] Michael: Where are you from? Yeah.

[72:08] Matt: You know, at a data and analytics kind of level. It's like, what exactly is that telling us? But it's telling us a lot.

[72:19] Michael: Oh, that's interesting, too. That kind of almost goes into a spiritual aspect of too. Where did I come from? That's something we've asked is like, you know. And, you know, the Christian answer is like. It's like, well, you. You came from God. Like, God created you in his image. Now, there's a whole process in that, but it's like. But there's. You're an image bearer, and there's something. When you connect with that, that there's something that's. That something really real manifests itself. It's like when you. Even if you connect with a history, like in the natural world that is maybe not so pretty, it's still. You're connecting with something that's real, you know, something that happened to those people who made you, you know, physically.

[73:02] Matt: Yeah. Fascinating.

[73:09] Michael: Yeah.

[73:09] Matt: Should we leave it there?

[73:10] Michael: Yeah, I think so.

[73:12] Matt: Could keep going. But

[73:16] Michael: I think for me, it's just. It's. It's just really interesting. Like, I find a story or a rhythm that. That. That starts to come underneath all these things as far as, like, optimizing for pleasure or, you know, oh, it's just a seed and an egg. It's like. It's like. No, it's like. It's so much more. It's like. It's relational. It's connection. It's physical. It's biological, it's genetic. It's. It. There's all these levels that once you start ignoring one or putting one above the other, like, it starts to unravel. I think that's something that's interesting, but I think it's easier to. To make things into a simple more because you feel like you can. If you make it super simple. It's like you can kind of avoid the. Or think you can avoid the. The trials and tribulations, like, if I just make it really simple, like, sex is just. Just about pleasure. Okay, good. I don't have to. Like, I don't have to think about anything else. Yeah, just like, pleasure. Pleasure. Pleasure.

[74:19] Matt: Well, maybe go rewatch Wedding Crashers and see how that goes for everyone.

[74:24] Michael: That's great. All right. Love you guys.

[74:26] Matt: Love you out there.

[74:27] Michael: See y'.

[74:27] Matt: All. Thanks for being with us. Sam.