The AK47 Podcast Season 2: Episode 16

Aaron and Kyle come together to discuss Hollywood, whether or not we should be financially supporting Hollywood, the Unplanned movie about Abby Johnson, and abortion in general. 

Listen to the episode here.

To learn how to support our podcast, click here.

The AK47 Podcast Season 2: Episode 11

I am doing a new series of interviews interviewing people who are Christian apologists, but not academics.  My purpose in these interviews is to encourage Christians who want to do apologetics, have apologetics ministries, or implement apologetics into their discussions with skeptics, but don't want to spend thousands of dollars of their money and years of their time on formal degrees in apologetics or other related fields.

Kyle continues his series on becoming an apologist without getting an advanced degree by interviewing Clinton Wilcox.  Clinton is a Christian, but he mostly engages in pro-life speaking and debate.  He has defended the pro-life position in both written and verbal form for years and he has done this without getting an advanced degree.  Despite this, he is very intelligent and informed on the topic.  In this interview, I ask him how he got into pro-life apologetics and how people can prepare themselves to intellectually defend the unborn without having to spend thousands of dollars and years of time getting a degree.

Listen to the episode here.

To learn how to support our podcast, click here.

Be sure to check out Aaron and Kyle's previous interview with Clinton Wilcox on pro-life arguments.

Follow Clinton on Twitter.

Find his writings and other resources at Life Training Institute and Secular Pro-Life.

Books Mentioned in the Show
1. Pro-Life Books
 - The Case for Life by Scott Klusendorf
 - Persuasive Pro-Life by Trent Horn
 - Defending Life by Francis Beckwith
 - The Ethics of Abortion by Christopher Kaczor

2. Pro-Choice Books
 - A Defense of Abortion by David Boonin
 - Arguments about Abortion by Kate Greasley
 - Abortion and Infanticide by Michael Tooley

Other Episodes in the Series

1. Sam Harper (Philochristos)

2. Evan Minton (Cerebral Faith)

3. Cameron Bertuzzi (Capturing Christianity)

4. Richard Porter

The AK47 Podcast Season 1: Episode 41

Aaron and I are going to focus on less politically, socially, and philosophically heavy things in the rest of the episodes this year.  It's break time, so we want to take it easy.  That doesn't mean those topics won't come out of our mouths though.

Aaron and I are all over the place in this episode.  We talk about the Aquaman movie, which Aaron recently watched, superhero movies in general, the Gospel, some apologetics, our thoughts on Ben Shapiro's interview with John MacArthur, stuff about the spiritual vs. the psychological, and more.

Listen to the episode here.

If you are interested in supporting our show, find out how here.

The AK47 Podcast Season 1: Episode 40

This is the first in a line of episodes that we are calling BS episodes.  In this episode, Aaron and I start with a brief update on our lives and then get self-indulgent and talk for almost 3 hours about our favorite hobby: video games.  We talk a little bit about the ethics of video game playing and some of the issues with playing a lot of video games, but we mostly talk about our favorite video games, video game news, some strange Bible-based video games that exist, and video game recommendations.

Listen to the episode here.

Some (but not all) of the games mentioned in the episode

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild

The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time and Majora's Mask

Chrono Trigger

Shenmue

Super Metroid

Hollow Knight

Metal Gear Solid series

Bloodborne

Dark Souls

Some weird Bible games

Warframe

And many more!

The AK47 Podcast Season 1: Episode 33

Aaron and Kyle discuss some logical, apologetic, and epistemological issues that are brought up by the Kavanaugh case.  The reliability of eyewitness testimony and memory, how that applies to the Gospels, thoughts on "believe all women," and more are discussed.

Listen to the episode here.

If you want to support our show, click here to learn how.

The AK47 Podcast Season 1: Episode 32

Aaron and Kyle talk about some recent controversies surrounding the famous preacher and apologist, Ravi Zacharias, and his academic credentials and experiences.

Listen to the episode here.

Click here for the article by Randal Rauser.

To learn how to support our show, click here.

The AK47 Podcast Season 1: Episode 31

In today's episode, Timothy Hsiao (Ph.D candidate in philosophy at the University of Reading) returns for a third interview.  This time, we talk about the ethics of immigration.  Why is illegal immigration impermissible?  What laws should change?  What about compassion and love?

Listen to the episode here.

Listen to my other interviews with Hsiao: Episodes 25 and 26.

For more from Hsiao, including his articles, go to his website.

To learn how to support our show, click here.

The AK47 Podcast Season 1: Episode 29

Kyle interviews Neal Hardin on Assembly Bill 2943 in California and sexual orientation change therapy.  This is a bill being passed around in California, but listeners who are not citizens of California should care about this topic because of the freedoms it could affect.  We talk about what the bill says, Neal's concerns with the bill, and the nuances of orientation change therapy.

Listen to the episode here.

For more from Neal Hardin, check out his website.

To learn how to support the show, click here.

Apologist Recommendation: Edward Feser

In this series, I will recommend certain scholars and apologists to our readers and listeners.  These are people that I believe are worth listening to because they are informed and give good arguments and insights into the subjects that they study, which helps intellectually equip Christians so that they can grow in their own faith and their outreach towards non-Christians.  I am not claiming that these scholars and apologists have everything correct, but I think they are intellectual powerhouses that we can learn much from.

Edward Feser

Dr. Feser is a Catholic philosopher who teaches at Pasadena City College.  Being a Catholic, his metaphysics is heavily influenced by Aquinas, which may make his philosophy slightly different from other well-known Christian apologists like William Lane Craig, but his material is still valuable.  A lot of his material is academic, but he has a lot of more popular-level materials that offer great arguments and insights.  Here are some of his works.

His Blog

Feser regularly writes on his blog, where you can find his thoughts on everything philosophy, theology, Catholicism, and apologetics.  This is a good place to go to introduce yourself to his material.

Atheism

Dr. Feser has a lot of scathing and often hilarious critiques of the "New Atheism" and particular atheist writers.  In book form, he wrote The Last Supertition, which is a critique of the new atheism.  His criticisms of Jerry Coyne are all entertaining to read.  He has a review of Coyne's book, Faith Versus Fact, on First Things.  You can also find his blog posts and articles critiquing Coyne here and here.  Feser also critiques Lawrence Krauss, a physicist and atheist, here.  He has a lot more material on atheism and responses to atheist apologists, so look them up.

Existence of God

Dr. Feser has also written on the arguments for the existence of God.  His new book, Five Proofs of the Existence of God, is pretty self-explanatory.  Feser is also interviewed here, where he responds to Dawkins' critiques of the arguments for God's existence in his book, The God Delusion.

Misc.

I recommend just looking through his blog for more materials.  He has a lot of articles on philosophy of mind, ethical issues like sexual ethics, abortion, and capital punishment, explanations of Catholic docrines, and much, much more.  I hope you learn a lot from his resources.

The AK47 Podcast Season 1: Episode 26

Timothy Hsiao, a philosophy teacher at Grantham University and Ph.D candidate in philosophy at the University of Reading, returns to talk about gun rights.  Hsiao argues for a more permissive view of gun rights and ownership and criticizes arguments for more gun restrictions.

Listen to the episode here.

For Hsiao's papers on the subject of guns, check out his website.

For my first interview with him, click here.

The AK47 Podcast Season 1: Episode 25

In this episode, I interviewed Tim Hsiao, professor of philosophy at Grantham University and Ph.D candidate at the University of Reading, on the natural law theory of ethics.  What is natural law theory?  What are the arguments for and against it?  What does natural law theory say about the ethics of sex, lying, drug use, and other things?  How is God involved in natural law theory?  Check it out.

Listen to the episode here.

The AK47 Podcast Season 1: Episode 22

Aaron and I, prompted by an article on Quillette, talk about transgenderism and philosophy of mind issues.  This is part 1 of this topic.  We will get more into the metaphysics of mind in part 2.

Listen to the episode here.

The AK47 Podcast Season 1: Episode 21

I interview Dennis Bray, a Ph.D candidate in analytic theology at the University of St. Andrews, on the metaphysics of beauty.  Is beauty objective?  Why think it is?  How does the topic of beauty relate to the topic of goodness and morality?  What is God's connection to beauty and its objectivity?  What is an argument for God's existence from beauty?  All that and more here.

Listen to the episode here.

The AK47 Podcast Season 1: Episode 16

Aaron and I discuss whether or not a sin like adultery should automatically mean that someone is not fit to be a leader of the country, why we named our podcast AK47, and some updates on future interviews.  Aaron also does a Woody Allen voice.

Listen to the episode here.

The AK47 Podcast Season 1: Episode 13

Aaron and I talk about sports, what defines a sport, whether or not sports are immoral, and I tell a cringy story and mess around.

Listen to the episode here.

The AK47 Podcast Season 1: Episode 11

Aaron and I interview Clinton Wilcox on abortion.  What are the arguments for the pro-life position?  Why should we listen to a man's opinion?  Do abortion laws affect abortion rates?  Are pro-lifers just pro-birth?  Does a woman's bodily autonomy justify abortion in some cases?  Listen to find out.

Listen to the interview here.

For more from Clinton Wilcox, check out his blog, his Twitter, and check out the Life Training Institute for more pro-life apologetics.

Abortion and the Death Penalty

This article was originally featured on ResistanceTV.

I recently published a post on Twitter and Facebook that went something like this:

People often claim that pro-lifers are being inconsistent for being against abortion, but supportive of the death penalty.  Not everyone who is against abortion is for the death penalty, of course, but some are.  It is not clear to me, however, what the inconsistency is, because people usually don't explain what it is.  Here is my best attempt at two propositions that anti-abortion, pro-death penalty people believe:

1. It is never justified to take the life of a human being that is innocent of any wrongdoing.

2. It is sometimes justified to take the life of a human being that is guilty of wrongdoing. 

What, exactly, is inconsistent about believing these two propositions?  Keep in mind that I'm not asking if (1) or (2) are true, I'm asking what is inconsistent about believing them both.

I posted this because I frequently see people accuse pro-lifers of being inconsistent in being against abortion, but in favor of the death penalty.  This objection can come from pro-choice people who want to criticize pro-lifers for being hypocrites and it can come from pro-lifers who believe that the “pro-life” label can only apply to people who are against both abortion and the death penalty.

It is not clear to me what the inconsistency is, so I posted this tweet to see what people would say.  I was not asking if the anti-abortion or pro-death penalty viewpoints were right or true.  I was asking if a person is being intellectually inconsistent by being anti-abortion and pro-death penalty.  I am also aware that not all people who are anti-abortion are pro-death penalty.  The question is whether or not those who are both anti-abortion and pro-death penalty are being intellectually inconsistent .  I didn’t get any conversation going on Twitter (I still have a very small following), but I got a lot of interaction on Facebook.  There was a big discussion, but the best answer came from a Catholic philosopher named Ron Belgau, who writes for a blog called Spiritual Friendship.  With his permission, I decided to share his response here.

Are pro-lifers who support the death penalty morally inconsistent? In order to answer this question, it’s important to consider alternate ways of understanding the right to life and the nature of personhood.

A. Regarding life:

1. One view would be that the life of a human person is always sacred, and that it is always wrong to intentionally kill a person.

2. Another view would be that it is always wrong to intentionally kill an innocent human person, but that in certain circumstances–war, or the punishment for very serious crimes, for example–a person forfeits their right to life, and may be killed in order to protect the right to life of other innocent human persons.

B. Regarding persons:

1. One view would be that every human being is a human person from the moment of conception; that is, that they are a person simply because they are a human being.

2. The other view would be that personhood requires something more–a certain kind of self-consciousness that is typical of normally functioning adult human beings. On this view, certain human beings are not human persons, or are only “marginal persons,” and so are not protected by either version of the principle about the sanctity of human life.

A person who holds both A1 and B1 would oppose abortion and the death penalty. Holding A1 and B2 would entail opposition to the death penalty but could permit abortion; and holding A2 and B1 would entail opposition to abortion but could permit the death penalty. Holding both A2 and B2 could permit both. In other words, B1 is the essential conviction for pro-lifers, while A1 is the essential conviction for those who oppose the death penalty. In order for it to be logically inconsistent for pro-lifers to support the death penalty, it would have to be logically inconsistent to accept B1 and also accept A2. Or, to put it another way, accepting B1 would have to logically entail accepting A1. I do not see why it would be logically inconsistent for someone who supports B1 to accept A2; but at the very least, if opponents of the death penalty want to argue that pro-lifers are logically inconsistent, they need to show why the belief that life begins at conception is logically inconsistent with the belief that societies can kill in extreme circumstances to protect themselves from those who are a serious threat to the lives of others

Side Note: When I say that A2 could permit capital punishment, and B2 could permit abortion, I do not mean that they must do so. Consider A2 and the death penalty. To say that people may be killed to protect society against war or murder is not to say that they must be killed. It only means that if there is no other way to defend life except to kill those who threaten it, then killing them is permitted. But if there are non-lethal methods of protecting society from war or murder, these are preferable. In a society with a relatively low level of social development, it may be a serious burden to keep criminals locked up, and may be difficult to establish jails secure enough to protect against escape. So I think such a society could be justified in executing murderers after a serious effort at verifying guilt. But in an advanced society like the United States, it may be possible to adequately protect society without putting murderers to death. In which case, A2 may not provide an adequate justification for the death penalty. Nevertheless, if an unborn child is a person (B1), then A2 provides a much stronger reason for opposing abortion than for opposing the death penalty, because the child is innocent and is not threatening anyone; therefore, killing it cannot be self-defense in the same way that killing can protect society from war and murder. (This principle might be used to authorize abortion in cases where continuing the pregnancy directly threatens the life of the mother.)

I hope Ron’s response helps everyone think through the logic or this issue.