Based Camp - Why Give Our Kids a Backup Religion？ & Why Judaism？

00:00:00.000 If we want to give our kids the best shot in life, you know, you want to look at religious traditions that have favorable outcomes.

00:00:07.540 It's doing something quite cruel to a kid to be putting them and raising them in a new cultural group that you have created yourself and raise them feeling like you won't appreciate them if they do anything other than this really insane, weird thing you set up for them.

00:00:23.820 And a lot of people, when we present our cultural group, they're like, why don't you just go to our group, right?

00:00:30.700 Like, this is what we constantly hear. They're like, our group is traditional. Our group has done this a long time.

00:00:36.700 And the answer is likely, and I don't mean to say this harshly, but it's probably because your group is failing.

00:00:43.380 Would you like to know more?

00:00:45.420 Hello, Simone. Today, we are going to talk about a fairly interesting and nuanced topic, which is this year, one of the things we did is,

00:00:53.820 we celebrated Hanukkah as a family for the first time.

00:00:56.880 Yeah.

00:00:58.140 And a lot of people are really surprised by the fact that we raise our kids with the option to be Jewish.

00:01:06.440 And they're like, what? Why would you do that? Like, why would you think you'd be accepted?

00:01:10.380 Like, this is a weird thing to do, especially given all of your religious beliefs.

00:01:14.820 So this requires much enumeration on our part.

00:01:19.120 Yeah.

00:01:19.260 At the end of this video, I'll play the little, you know, Manorah lighting with the kids and everything.

00:01:23.640 They were really into it this year.

00:01:25.180 Yeah, I'm sure we did it extremely wrong.

00:01:27.480 But I will say that our oldest son, Octavian, got super into it.

00:01:31.140 And we don't know how.

00:01:32.260 Like, we let them watch stuff on their iPads for, like, a little bit every night.

00:01:36.480 Well, not iPads.

00:01:37.460 Actually, really cheap Android devices.

00:01:39.200 But they don't know the difference.

00:01:40.120 We call them iPads.

00:01:41.120 They don't know the difference.

00:01:42.340 Well, no.

00:01:43.120 Torsten calls them his Hapas.

00:01:44.940 Thank you very much.

00:01:45.640 Hapas.

00:01:45.900 I think it's so cute.

00:01:46.680 Hapas.

00:01:48.420 Oh, God.

00:01:48.800 So he, uh, they're under 100.

00:01:50.320 Anyway, somehow, and we don't know how, our son, Octavian, like, found a bunch of, and

00:01:55.020 he's four years old, videos on YouTube about Hanukkah for kids.

00:01:59.840 And he just was, like, watching them on repeat.

00:02:03.060 And then each night, he was like, oh, like, let's do it.

00:02:06.700 Let's light the menorah.

00:02:08.360 And then, like, after it was over, there were, like, at least three nights of great disappointment

00:02:13.560 when there were no more candles to light.

00:02:16.940 We didn't even do presents or anything.

00:02:18.300 We just did the readings.

00:02:19.480 No, yeah, no, yeah.

00:02:20.400 Like, we, he'd always say after a reading, he'd go, mom, what does that even mean?

00:02:25.460 What is that?

00:02:26.040 Yeah, except every time I would finish, I would finish part of, like, the recital, like, both

00:02:31.240 the kids would be like, yeah.

00:02:33.340 Like, after each, you know, like, you know, so, you know, the Lord encourages us to, like,

00:02:38.960 light the menorah and the Lord performed these miracles.

00:02:41.200 And they're like, yeah, but they have no idea.

00:02:43.140 No idea what it actually meant.

00:02:44.640 But anyway, so, like, they were actually really into it.

00:02:46.940 Why are we doing this, right?

00:02:48.620 Like, like, one is, so there's, there's sort of two large strategic reasons for doing this.

00:02:55.420 We believe really heavily that one of the big problems with a lot of conservative tradition

00:03:00.200 families today is that they raise their kids believing that the, the alternative to following

00:03:07.780 the culture that they are outlining for the kids is the urban monoculture.

00:03:12.200 And this is still underrated.

00:03:13.820 The only and default alternative.

00:03:16.880 Whereas we are trying to raise our kids with a choice between two conservative extremes

00:03:24.020 where they feel that the alternative in the way that they are raised to be sort of intergenerational

00:03:30.340 in the way they think about things is going to be the Jewish community.

00:03:34.300 So one is, why do we think we'd be accepted by that community in terms of how we do this?

00:03:39.600 Well, the answer is actually pretty interesting and unique to us.

00:03:42.900 And I've mentioned this on other things is that we found out, I, well, maybe a bit before

00:03:48.340 we first met each other, but I certainly didn't know it until after we were dating is that Simone

00:03:52.740 is matrilineally Jewish.

00:03:54.020 And within conservative Jewish communities, that makes her and our kids. 0.74

00:04:01.240 So I would say technically Jewish, whereas to them, it's just fully Jewish. 0.50

00:04:05.580 Yeah.

00:04:05.600 Whenever we, we say to like, at least some Jewish people that like, oh yeah, we're technically

00:04:10.800 Jewish.

00:04:11.180 They're like, what do you mean?

00:04:12.180 And then we're like, well, yeah, our kids are matrilineally Jewish.

00:04:14.940 And they're like, no, no, no.

00:04:15.720 So they're Jewish.

00:04:16.360 And we're like, I mean, like, I don't feel like you deserve it.

00:04:19.580 It's cheating if you're from any other cultural group. 0.93

00:04:21.880 Yeah.

00:04:22.420 Also, we did not know until like maybe a couple of years ago.

00:04:27.260 No, like two years ago.

00:04:29.140 Yeah.

00:04:29.360 A couple of years ago that, that literally like that was the requirement.

00:04:32.960 We thought that they were, we heard, you know, about like, you know, people trying to convert

00:04:36.720 your, your sister tried to convert, you know, turned away multiple times, like a ton of like

00:04:42.380 studying and work.

00:04:43.840 And so we're like, well, okay.

00:04:44.720 So, I mean, to be Jewish, then you have to put in a ton of work.

00:04:48.840 And at least like, even for like non hard to convert to religions, good religions that 0.69

00:04:52.940 like, if we, you know, in 30 seconds wanted to convert, we could be welcomed with open arms.

00:04:58.440 You're still really not considered that like a part of that religion, unless you're like

00:05:02.980 leaning into it, you identify with it, you signal, you go to church, you know, or at least

00:05:08.680 you say certain things.

00:05:10.280 And we hadn't done any of that.

00:05:12.120 So it felt really weird.

00:05:13.060 And it's a very weird technicality, but it's also like an option to us.

00:05:17.020 So when we are raising kids within our weird religion and cultural framework, if we are

00:05:23.980 preventing or we are presenting one other backup for them to turn to the other than our

00:05:29.260 weird version of Christianity, you know, what is that backup going to be? 0.77

00:05:33.440 And a lot of people, when we present our cultural group, they're like, why don't you just go

00:05:38.600 to our group?

00:05:39.960 Right?

00:05:40.260 Like, this is what we constantly hear.

00:05:41.760 They're like, our group is traditional.

00:05:43.500 Well, our group has done this a long time.

00:05:46.220 And the answer is likely, and I don't mean to say this harshly, but it's probably because

00:05:51.120 your group is failing.

00:05:52.460 If I could choose what cultural group my kids go in and Jew is an option, let's just like 0.99

00:05:59.980 look at what the other alternatives are.

00:06:02.460 Now, before we go into this, it's important to remember that we are not arguing against the

00:06:06.800 truth of these religious systems.

00:06:08.600 We believe that every one of the religious systems, I mean, this is why we are considering

00:06:12.600 them, is true from the perspective of a tesseract god.

00:06:16.960 But, and this is a concept we go into in another video, where we believe that trying to fall

00:06:22.720 the conservative revelation of specific Judeo-Christian religious traditions, which are direct revelations

00:06:30.140 from God, is God's will for certain groups of people.

00:06:33.120 So, when we're choosing between these traditions, what we are choosing is the one that most realistically,

00:06:39.280 if we had as a backup for our kids, we think that kids would choose that over the urban monoculture

00:06:45.500 if they do not choose the tradition that we are raising them in.

00:06:48.600 So, that means that these are the traditions that we can most logically convince somebody

00:06:53.640 of our cultural group to join.

00:06:55.640 That said, a lot of people will look at this and they're like, oh, well, this is too analytical

00:06:58.900 a way to approach religion.

00:07:01.120 You know, can't you just approach religion with faith?

00:07:03.620 When you are choosing between religious traditions, saying just have faith doesn't work.

00:07:07.620 Just have faith only works when you are choosing between a religious tradition and no religious 0.97

00:07:13.000 tradition, or a religious tradition and a weaker, less conservative iteration of that

00:07:16.980 religious tradition.

00:07:18.080 Because you can have faith in any individual religious tradition.

00:07:21.940 And then an individual might say, well, just pray to God and have him tell you which

00:07:25.300 one is the correct answer.

00:07:26.420 And then the problem is, yeah, but people of all of these traditions have already done 0.66

00:07:30.680 that, and clearly God has returned to them that their tradition is the correct.

00:07:34.940 And if he didn't return that answer to them, then there's somebody like Joseph Smith or

00:07:38.560 something, and then everyone will say, oh, he started a cult, you know?

00:07:41.700 Which, you know, you could say that that's what we've done.

00:07:44.000 In our way, we prayed to God, said what's the correct answer, and he gave us this really

00:07:47.940 weird answer.

00:07:48.780 So, I don't think that that is effective to us either.

00:07:53.940 So, keep in mind, there is a reason why we are approaching this logically.

00:07:57.420 It is because we care for the fate of our children's soul, and we need to choose a tradition

00:08:02.920 that we think is, one, both true, but also is easy to logically argue to our kids that

00:08:09.640 they should choose if they don't choose our own. 0.67

00:08:12.040 I could go for a conservative Catholic group.

00:08:14.660 The average fertility rate in a majority Catholic country in Europe right now is 1.3.

00:08:20.180 It is desperately low.

00:08:23.000 And culturally, it just is probably the biggest mismatch with us possible, in terms of our

00:08:28.220 extremely anti-authority mindset.

00:08:30.840 And to keep in mind when we point out how distant we are, if you look at my family background,

00:08:38.020 I'm a direct descendant of Oliver Cromwell, very far from that cultural group. 1.00

00:08:43.420 Now, before I go further with this, I need to really clearly say that this is not me arguing

00:08:50.380 against Catholicism as a true representation of God within this Tesseract God framework.

00:08:55.640 I am simply going over why I personally could not get behind it, and I do not think it would

00:09:02.800 be a good system for me to raise as a backup system for my own children.

00:09:07.220 Also, logically, I have trouble with Catholicism versus other Christian traditions.

00:09:13.900 Specifically, it differentiates itself by saying, we have this system for choosing the one individual

00:09:21.580 who is the key representative of God on earth, the Pope.

00:09:26.180 However, I brought up the Cadaver Synod flippantly earlier, and I really don't take it flippantly

00:09:32.080 when I'm looking at Catholicism from a logical consistency standpoint.

00:09:36.140 In this incident, one Pope dug up the body of another dead Pope, his predecessor, put him

00:09:43.140 on trial, saying that he was both immoral and that the system had inaccurately put him in

00:09:48.380 the papacy, and then threw his body in the river.

00:09:51.680 Then, after that Pope was assassinated by his own clergy, he then had his own actions repudiated

00:09:58.840 by the next Pope.

00:10:00.260 So, this is not like me as an outsider saying by whatever outside moral standards I have

00:10:06.980 that the papacy has been a bad system at choosing God's core representative on earth.

00:10:14.640 It is God's core representative on earth as chosen by this system saying it's a bad system

00:10:21.460 for choosing God's core representative on earth.

00:10:23.720 I just can't logically get around that.

00:10:26.280 Now, of course, the standard Catholic response to this is none of this situation happened

00:10:30.640 ex cathedra.

00:10:32.120 So, ex cathedra is a special set of circumstances that's required for something a Pope says or

00:10:39.420 writes to be considered the direct word of God or directly inspired by God.

00:10:44.200 The problem I have with this counter is that ex cathedra was not a concept when this trial

00:10:50.820 was happening.

00:10:51.640 Ex cathedra as a concept was not fully delineated until almost a millennium after this trial at

00:10:57.820 the First Vatican Council.

00:10:59.480 So, when the Great Schism happened, in which the Patriarch of Rome claimed that his system

00:11:05.820 for choosing a patriarch was innately and categorically superior to the systems all of the other patriarchs,

00:11:14.180 were using, and he then excommunicated some of these other patriarchs, potentially damning

00:11:19.740 their souls to hell, he was doing that with all of the power invested in him that was invested

00:11:26.400 in the Popes during the cadaver syndrome, which was before ex cathedra had been developed.

00:11:33.380 And keep in mind, ex cathedra was developed with all of these events in mind.

00:11:37.200 This would be like saying, oh, me as an investor, my investment decisions are ordained by God.

00:11:43.100 You can see by how good they've turned out.

00:11:45.300 And then somebody comes to me and they're like, look, you've objectively lost tons of

00:11:48.180 money on the stock market.

00:11:49.240 And then I go, oh, no, no, no, no.

00:11:51.020 You see, it turns out that all of the decisions I made on Tuesdays and Wednesdays don't count.

00:11:56.300 Now, I am making this carve out after knowing that those days were my bad trading days.

00:12:03.960 That is not a compelling argument for this being a good system or for me being a good

00:12:10.980 traitor.

00:12:11.620 However, this ex cathedra argument, which again we don't think is very compelling, did not

00:12:16.580 even exist during the time of the Great Schism as a concept, where it had to differentiate

00:12:21.640 its system as being innately superior to the Orthodox system.

00:12:25.440 And this then comes to another problem, which is all of the events of the Cadaver Synod had

00:12:31.360 actually happened fairly recently before the Great Schism.

00:12:36.480 So when the Patriarch of Rome is telling all of the other patriarchs, my system is innately

00:12:41.900 superior to all of your systems, recently within their memory is the Cadaver Synod.

00:12:47.520 And I mean, look, if God actually intended us to use this system to choose his representative

00:12:53.860 on Earth, then he would not have allowed this to happen.

00:12:57.740 However, if he was trying to tell us, don't choose this system, choose another, and God

00:13:02.440 wanted to send a very loud signal to anyone who was investigating it that it is not his

00:13:07.640 voice on Earth, this seems like the way he would have signaled something like that.

00:13:12.040 In addition to that, though, and as we've talked about before, aesthetically, Catholicism

00:13:17.440 does not seem to be a representation of the true word of God as laid out in the Christian

00:13:24.700 Bible, as I understand it.

00:13:27.280 Which one is it?

00:13:28.780 You must choose.

00:13:31.200 But choose wisely.

00:13:33.300 For as the true grail will bring you life, the false grail will take it from you.

00:13:40.360 I'm not a historian.

00:13:42.040 I have no idea what it looks like.

00:13:43.880 Which one is it?

00:13:44.900 Let me choose.

00:13:47.720 Oh, yes.

00:13:55.020 It's more beautiful than I'd ever imagine.

00:13:58.120 This certainly is the cup of the king of kings.

00:14:04.060 Eternal life.

00:14:05.080 What is happening to me?

00:14:11.280 What is happening to me?

00:14:14.760 He chose...

00:14:16.280 Toilet.

00:14:22.580 It would not be made out of gold.

00:14:25.200 That's the cup of a carpenter.

00:14:26.700 Toilet.

00:14:26.780 Toilet.

00:14:26.820 Toilet.

00:14:26.860 Toilet.

00:14:26.900 Toilet.

00:14:27.340 Toilet.

00:14:27.860 Toilet.

00:14:28.860 Toilet.

00:14:28.920 Toilet.

00:14:29.860 Toilet.

00:14:30.860 Toilet.

00:14:31.860 Toilet.

00:14:32.860 Toilet.

00:14:33.860 Toilet.

00:14:34.860 You have chosen why.

00:14:44.080 So, when coming at this choice of what system would be a good backup system for my own kids,

00:14:50.420 because Solacism is the one I can easily rule out.

00:14:53.760 Like, it seems like the obviously wrong choice.

00:14:55.740 But that doesn't mean that it is the wrong choice for other people.

00:15:07.960 So, for example, Catholicism might be a uniquely good and powerful system for any family that is really moved by ritual and really moved by grandeur and really moved by authority instead of repelled by things like ritual and grandeur.

00:15:23.020 You could go with orthodox.

00:15:25.020 Orthodox.

00:15:26.100 I think that orthodox is the original Christianity.

00:15:29.460 I think the orthodox groups of Christians are the original Christianity if you're like, I want to be original OG Christian. 0.92

00:15:34.840 Like higher fidelity to the...

00:15:36.640 Higher fidelity to the original church.

00:15:38.600 And we can do another video on this because a lot of people think that's the Catholics and it really isn't the Catholics.

00:15:42.960 It's the orthodox.

00:15:43.780 But, I mean, in the early days, if you look at the early church, if you look at the church writings, it was a group of heads of various cities who would meet with each other and were broadly equals.

00:15:53.960 The idea of one person being above all the others really only came into play when Rome, like, really began to dominate the political scene.

00:16:04.560 And then, you know, after Constantine made it the Roman Empire, they were like, okay, this one city is more important than the other cities.

00:16:10.500 But that doesn't really flow as, like, the original intentionality of the church.

00:16:14.460 So, they have the most claim.

00:16:16.200 But I have no cultural connection to them.

00:16:18.720 Like, none. 0.98

00:16:19.580 It would be so fucking weird to convert to orthodox Christianity. 0.97

00:16:22.820 We have no genetic connection, no cultural connection. 0.96

00:16:25.960 Well, I mean, technically, my Jewish ancestors converted to orthodox Christianity because they were renting their upper apartment to the SS.

00:16:40.500 So, that's how they hid it?

00:16:43.040 Yeah, so we do have a family connection, but, yeah, nothing realistic.

00:16:46.860 Yeah.

00:16:47.140 We also run into the same aesthetic problem that we run into with Catholicism when we're dealing with the orthodox traditions.

00:16:54.780 For context here, Vladimir I of Kivan Rus, the guy who basically sort of founded the Russian Orthodox Church,

00:17:03.180 he chose orthodoxism over other iterations of Christianity because he was so impressed with how beautiful the Hagia Sophia was.

00:17:12.800 Or, at least that's the legend.

00:17:14.060 In the same vein, I also think I would have a hard time if I had to try to convince my kids to believe that there was any sort of theological import to things like relics.

00:17:26.420 Which, from my tradition was in Christianity and my beliefs around iconoclasm,

00:17:32.120 that's basically worshipping a corpse someone took a bedazzler to.

00:17:36.240 Introducing the bedazzler.

00:17:38.460 Transform your ordinary blue jeans into an expensive designer look.

00:17:41.840 Be the envy of your friends.

00:17:43.620 Be creative.

00:17:44.480 Bedazzle your socks, mitts and gloves, hats and scarves.

00:17:47.720 So, then the Protestant groups, right?

00:17:49.900 Like, I like the Protestant groups.

00:17:51.260 I see them as broadly right.

00:17:53.340 If you believe that the Bible is the only and total revelation,

00:17:58.360 but, you know, obviously we've talked about on other podcasts we don't believe that.

00:18:01.680 We don't even believe that the Bible really states that it notes there's going to be future revelations.

00:18:06.020 So, the advantage of things like the Orthodox tradition and the Catholic tradition is they have systems in place that allow adherence to those traditions to easily identify how God's word is elucidated upon or added to with additional prophets.

00:18:24.020 Because they have these central hierarchies which allow them to say,

00:18:27.280 this is an accurate prophet, this is an inaccurate prophet, and through that the traditions can evolve with God's continuing revelation.

00:18:36.680 And as to why we believe God has a continuing revelation is because that's what the Bible says.

00:18:41.320 Jesus says there are going to be prophets after me.

00:18:44.440 Whereas within Protestantism you have no system for doing that or within the traditional Protestant faith,

00:18:50.080 which means you're sort of frozen in time at the point when the Bible was written,

00:18:55.260 which to me seems incongruous was what I think God would want.

00:19:00.660 Like, I don't think God would have given his whole and complete revelation to an obscure group 2,000 years ago

00:19:07.740 and that that message wouldn't reach a huge portion of the world's population for like 1,000 years after it was delivered.

00:19:14.840 So, to me, I think God has always been trying to, as holistically as he can,

00:19:19.580 reveal himself in the way that every group is meant to understand him.

00:19:23.360 But that being the case, it means that we have no system,

00:19:27.960 if we go as a traditional Protestant strand, of determining these additional revelations.

00:19:33.380 And since our family's existing faith is essentially Protestant plus additional revelations,

00:19:39.520 there is no advantage to having a traditional form of Protestantism as a backup to it.

00:19:44.860 That stuff is already encompassed in what we teach our children.

00:19:48.020 Like, so, so when we're looking at things, and it offers us no advantage,

00:19:52.800 like, if you look at the Protestant cultural groups in the world today,

00:19:57.700 they are some of the most underperforming of the Christian cultural groups.

00:20:01.740 Yeah, and like, what cultural amenities are they offering?

00:20:04.000 Like, at least Mormons have like this amazing community and lifestyle and, you know, all that.

00:20:09.860 And then people will say things like, well, then why don't you go back to your ancestral tradition,

00:20:15.280 you know, the Calvinist tradition.

00:20:16.720 And that's because the Calvinist group that exists within any population today in America

00:20:20.700 is almost the antithesis of the historical Calvinist group.

00:20:26.240 You know, they're evangelical hardliners like Ayla's dad, for example,

00:20:32.040 which doesn't lead to good outcomes in today's society.

00:20:35.480 Whereas you look at the iteration of the Calvinist group that is our actual cultural group,

00:20:41.500 it's the one that Scott Alexander slash Starslate Codex wrote about

00:20:44.840 when he wrote the Puritan spotting checklist.

00:20:47.780 And we would almost appear to be an offensive stereotype of this group,

00:20:52.620 you know, for the things he gives points for.

00:20:55.020 Atheist DS Freethinker wrote a book about their heterodox religious views,

00:20:59.300 invented a new religion, invented a new Christian heresy, 1.00

00:21:02.220 obsessed with religious tolerance, founded their own school,

00:21:05.480 had really weird names, had a bunch of kids, wrote a list of virtues,

00:21:10.280 had a plan to immunitize the eshteton, social reformer,

00:21:15.000 waged a crusade against an abstract concept, ideals that were utopian yet racist.

00:21:20.740 And I don't think our views are racist, but we get accused of racism all the time.

00:21:24.500 Abolitionists, my family famously very involved in the abolition movement

00:21:27.500 and fighting for African-American rights, famously involved in philanthropy.

00:21:31.340 We were also involved in the prohibition movement.

00:21:33.720 I love it, rabidly anti-war, yet rabidly supports every specific war that happened.

00:21:39.560 So you can see that, like, this is clearly the group we're from.

00:21:43.000 We're not even acting out of line with this group's cultural traditions.

00:21:46.140 And yet they have no community for us to go back to.

00:21:49.900 And even what we're doing with the religion we're creating for our family

00:21:53.320 is very much something somebody from this group would do.

00:21:56.800 So we haven't left this group in terms of our primary religious system.

00:22:01.760 The core real choices for us to raise as an alternative for our kids are Jews and Mormons. 1.00

00:22:06.400 They both produce competent individuals.

00:22:08.580 They seem like they're going to be major players in the future of humanity.

00:22:11.320 And theologically, I think they both have a claim to being total and complete revelations from God.

00:22:17.180 Jews, because, well, pretty much every group in the Judeo-Christian tree says that Jewish texts have some real importance or weight to them,

00:22:27.580 which is not something we can say for virtually any other religious system.

00:22:31.100 In addition to that, it's a religion that seems to be able to continue evolving and continue updating itself.

00:22:37.500 And as you know, as we think, we don't think any religion that is ever frozen in time or any theological structure that's ever frozen in time

00:22:43.900 can be theologically correct, as it would be impossible for God to give a full revelation to people, you know, early, early, early in human history.

00:22:54.600 And yet it would be capricious and evil for him to give those people no revelation at all.

00:23:00.240 So when we're looking for a true religion, we're looking for an evolving religious system.

00:23:03.940 With Mormons, it's because they believe that they can continue to get revelations up to today, 0.87

00:23:09.700 and they don't really take super hard stances on almost anything in terms of a metaphysical understanding of the universe

00:23:17.340 because of this continued revelation framework, which really fits with our framework for how we think things likely actually work theologically.

00:23:25.280 So when I'm looking at those two groups, Jews just seem to have their act together a lot more right now. 1.00

00:23:30.840 Yeah, I would say they are an appreciating asset showing signs of, like, these guys are doing something right.

00:23:39.180 Well, I think that's what people need to be asking themselves.

00:23:41.500 And again, I want to emphasize how meaningful your observation is that, like, the de facto option that hardline conservative religious families are giving to their kids

00:23:53.840 are either follow our specific religion or join the progressive urban monoculture.

00:24:00.560 Like, and, like, if you really care about your children's mental well-being, thriving as humans,

00:24:09.520 like, both, like, economic, social, and mental and spiritual well-being,

00:24:14.460 do you really want their other option to be completely, like, religiously, morally, like, mentally bankrupt?

00:24:22.300 Or do you want to, like, at least give them a shot at thriving?

00:24:25.220 Yeah, well, and so an interesting thing is a lot of people will see what we're doing and they'll be like,

00:24:29.740 yeah, but even if you send them to, like, Chabad summer camps and stuff like that,

00:24:33.440 even if you do the Jewish, they're never going to be full, like, ultra-Orthodox Jews, right? 0.94

00:24:39.200 And I'm like, yeah, that's the point.

00:24:41.100 The idea here is not that if they don't like what we're doing, they convert to ultra-Orthodox Judaism.

00:24:46.480 They convert to some form of, like, modern Orthodox Judaism.

00:24:50.420 You know, they maybe follow the traditions, but they do not play in the ultra-Orthodox status games,

00:24:56.320 which are involved around, you know, having to study all the time.

00:24:59.240 Like, they really require a level of an investment that you need to be committed to 100% from birth.

00:25:04.560 And not birth, but, you know, young teens.

00:25:06.700 It would be really hard.

00:25:07.800 Yeah, it would be very, very hard for an outsider.

00:25:09.760 It's like joining the Olympics, but, like, starting to train for it when you're in late high school.

00:25:14.780 Yeah, and, like, joining a group of, like, you know, Russian Olympic gymnasts who've been, like, training since, you know.

00:25:21.540 But exposing them to that community, so long as they like that community,

00:25:25.180 then they go down the regular Orthodox pathway within Judaism, or, you know,

00:25:30.520 we would call, like, secular Orthodox Judaism, particularly the one in the U.S. or Israel,

00:25:34.740 which gives them a network of spouses, which gives them a network of business partners,

00:25:39.100 you know, people that are willing to help them and everything like that.

00:25:41.220 So, of course, we're providing them with an advantage there.

00:25:44.780 If they decide to take that path.

00:25:48.000 But what we're also trying to do, and, you know, we have our lifetimes to do this,

00:25:54.260 is to, for our own weird philosophical and religious framework that we're building up,

00:25:59.060 is to build enough of a community of disparate groups that are vaguely connected with this,

00:26:04.940 that they also, if they go that route, have a network where they can get spouses,

00:26:08.440 business connections, everything like that.

00:26:10.160 Like, we basically have our lifetimes to try to build a network that competes with Judaism for 0.99

00:26:19.060 business connection, spousal attainment, and moral, what's the word I'm looking for here?

00:26:25.620 Like, a moral spine. 0.68

00:26:26.860 And a lot of people can be like, that is a fool's errand to attempt that.

00:26:30.380 That is the sign of grandiose fantasy to think that you could do that,

00:26:35.260 and yet I think that we are well on our way.

00:26:37.520 We're not cowards.

00:26:38.480 Also, we strongly believe in the power that competition has to enable you to achieve things

00:26:45.420 you never thought you could achieve, and the power of exposure to extremely accomplished peers.

00:26:51.780 If you raise a kid surrounded by very accomplished friends and peers,

00:26:56.800 they're going to ultimately, I think, end up, even if they, like, just are lower caliber in general,

00:27:03.740 they're going to end up higher than if they were with peers of their own level, you know?

00:27:08.160 Like, we're still sharpening ourselves here.

00:27:10.380 Yeah.

00:27:10.980 No, and we've worked really hard to do this, to ensure that even at a young age,

00:27:14.280 the families that they are socializing with are the, you know, one, was in our cultural network,

00:27:19.840 and two, like, absolutely impressive and setting their expectations really, really high

00:27:25.840 in terms of what's expected of them.

00:27:28.200 And it's showing up already.

00:27:31.380 In what way?

00:27:32.780 I'm just, like, in the confidence that our kids show about their convictions and their judgments.

00:27:39.620 Well, this also comes from how we raise them in our parenting style,

00:27:41.980 this idea of stroking their will rather than breaking their will.

00:27:45.640 Everything about our parenting style is meant to increase the strength of their will.

00:27:50.700 Like, that is the core thing that we can do,

00:27:52.580 and I think that that's the core thing that we should focus on.

00:27:54.720 When they disagree with us or something like that,

00:27:56.920 the last thing I want to do is to break them like a wild horse, right?

00:28:00.400 You want to make it difficult for them.

00:28:03.160 You want to strengthen them.

00:28:04.200 You don't want them to just be able to do whatever they want like a spoiled brat. 1.00

00:28:07.060 You want them to understand the moral responsibility of being somebody who lives by their own will

00:28:11.160 while also strengthening and testing that will as much as possible to make it as strong as possible.

00:28:17.760 And that's something that we, you know, are consistently focused on within our parenting techniques.

00:28:23.380 But I also want to be clear that we may fail,

00:28:26.940 and the best backup network we see right now in the world is the Jewish community.

00:28:32.800 Like, I think pretty obviously.

00:28:34.420 And I think for a lot of people, if they were like, okay, if my kids weren't of my culture,

00:28:40.000 and I had to choose one other culture as a backup culture, and I was accepted by that culture,

00:28:45.140 who are you going to choose?

00:28:46.700 Mormons are a close second, I'd say. 1.00

00:28:48.840 Like, I really like the Mormon community.

00:28:51.380 Yeah.

00:28:52.360 But their fertility rates are falling,

00:28:55.100 and the thing that most distances me from the Mormon community is when they're overly nice.

00:29:03.280 Like, that just doesn't follow my...

00:29:05.620 No, see, that's...

00:29:06.820 My bigger problem with it, actually, is that, like,

00:29:10.020 most of the Mormon content that I get, that even makes me love the church,

00:29:14.660 is from people who have left the church and are very openly publicly salty about it.

00:29:20.940 Like, it's bad if your major, like, online brand ambassadors are your detractors.

00:29:29.960 So what we mean by this is when we want to intellectually engage with a community,

00:29:35.620 that means we want to see people from within that community, you know,

00:29:38.820 nitpick every little nuance in terms of how different groups of that community are different,

00:29:43.040 how different people in the community see things differently,

00:29:45.480 and all of the theological debates within the community,

00:29:48.460 what they don't like about the community, what they do like within the community.

00:29:51.720 Now, you can understand, this is something we get in spades within the Jewish community,

00:29:55.780 but almost not at all within the Mormon community,

00:29:58.800 which makes it very dispositionally hard for us to engage with the community,

00:30:03.200 outside of people who have left the community and are willing to, like, drop the tease.

00:30:07.980 Well, the best brand ambassadors, because I think culturally,

00:30:10.840 when somebody is raised within the Mormon community,

00:30:12.380 they're typically very good at social things.

00:30:14.260 If you look at, like, the leaders of, like, the new ACS community,

00:30:16.660 they're really disproportionately X-modes.

00:30:19.640 Yeah, and one, I think, I think maybe the problem is that there are also many practicing Mormon influencers,

00:30:25.220 but they don't, you don't realize, they're not talking about their religion.

00:30:30.360 No, I don't think that's it, it's that they don't engage with metaphysical debates

00:30:34.340 as much as I would find, like, mentally stimulating to me.

00:30:38.440 Like, to me, Mormons have a sophisticated metaphysical system, which is interesting to me,

00:30:45.920 and we've talked about this in our Mormon video,

00:30:47.920 but there is a denial within the Mormon community of the diversity of beliefs within the Mormon community,

00:30:53.700 and that denial makes interesting debate within the community,

00:30:58.120 at least from the perspective of an outsider,

00:30:59.580 much rarer than it is within the ultra-Orthodox Jewish community,

00:31:05.000 where, like, metaphysical debate is the core of the community,

00:31:09.240 like, the absolute core of the community,

00:31:11.140 which is going to engender me, like, or the next iteration of me,

00:31:15.260 probably more to that community if I'm trying to build an alternative to them.

00:31:19.100 And if you're here as an outsider thinking, like,

00:31:21.040 yeah, but you should be choosing which religion you want at the back of religion,

00:31:24.400 just based on which one is most likely to be true,

00:31:27.480 you've got to see our video on the Tesseract God concept.

00:31:31.460 We believe some, not all, but some of the Judeo-Christian tree of revelations

00:31:38.000 to be holy and complete revelations that are simultaneously 100% true.

00:31:45.000 And if you follow a conservative interpretation of those traditions,

00:31:50.260 you are following God's will for you.

00:31:53.500 And now, you know, people would be like,

00:31:55.380 yeah, but aren't you worried that your kids might be studying, like,

00:31:58.260 religious texts by studying Jewish texts that are antithetical to your belief system?

00:32:02.740 And it's like, no, because of the way we view these different religious systems,

00:32:06.480 one of our kids studying Jewish texts are studying, like, real, non-heretical information. 0.94

00:32:12.920 In the same way, I think most Christian groups would feel the same way about Jewish texts.

00:32:16.840 And the second is, is if Mormons had successfully created a desert state or a strong desert isolated community,

00:32:25.200 I would be much more, like, considering Mormonism as the alternative we raise our kids with. 0.97

00:32:31.980 But they haven't done that.

00:32:33.920 There is no Mormon Israel yet. 0.97

00:32:35.660 And I think that's very, very important.

00:32:40.020 Having these sort of isolated communities, where the world's headed,

00:32:44.180 where we're looking at this vast economic collapse and the primary asset in the future,

00:32:48.640 being high fertility, high competence, high agency groups,

00:32:53.700 you're just not seeing that the Mormons have the potential to create something like that.

00:32:57.420 Like, it's very obviously in the DNA of Mormonism to attempt to do something like that,

00:33:02.400 as that was very much how they were founded.

00:33:04.760 They just need to move back in that direction.

00:33:07.800 Maybe create a settlement somewhere else.

00:33:10.340 Maybe somewhere outside the U.S.

00:33:12.660 Catholics could as well, but they'd have to create some sort of a new exclusive order 1.00

00:33:17.860 that allowed priests to breed, and that's unlikely.

00:33:21.660 I could see Catholics creating, like, isolated communities in the U.S. that do this. 0.97

00:33:25.900 That could be very interesting.

00:33:27.660 There may already be some that we just don't know about.

00:33:30.100 Yeah, there already might be some that we just don't know about

00:33:32.080 that could be interesting to look at.

00:33:34.400 Would it not be fascinating if a Catholic group converted some of these,

00:33:38.660 you know, you increasingly see these old monasteries getting abandoned

00:33:41.740 or sold off by the church,

00:33:43.440 converted one of these into a residential child-focused community?

00:33:47.540 That would be interesting.

00:33:49.860 Same with Orthodox communities. 0.84

00:33:52.000 Although, Orthodox are just getting absolutely rammed right now.

00:33:57.360 Yeah, you don't hear about them thriving a lot right now.

00:34:01.860 I mean, they do well in the United States,

00:34:04.240 but they don't have awesome fertility rates, 0.99

00:34:07.260 and they haven't done a good job of maintaining intergenerational fidelity.

00:34:11.420 And by that, what I mean is they have a really high bleed rate.

00:34:13.560 Like, they do not keep people in their religion at high rates.

00:34:16.460 Like, after Mormons, probably the next group I would choose for our kids, 1.00

00:34:21.020 if I had to choose a group, would be some form of Anabaptists. 1.00

00:34:24.260 Mennonites.

00:34:24.580 Interesting.

00:34:25.840 Oh, okay.

00:34:26.800 Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:34:27.720 But, like, yeah.

00:34:28.660 Yeah, Mennonites. 0.94

00:34:29.380 Mennonites are super cool.

00:34:31.480 They're great.

00:34:32.360 Like, out of all of the groups,

00:34:34.440 I feel some, like, cultural distance when I engage with the Orthodox Jewish community.

00:34:39.860 I'm like, yeah, I can see that, like, we get along.

00:34:42.040 I can see, like, why my ancestors did business.

00:34:44.000 Because typically Calvinists traditionally did a lot of business with the Jewish community.

00:34:48.320 That was, even my grandfather, like, he was a big advocate for the community.

00:34:51.960 And, like, it's something that just they're known for.

00:34:55.460 You know, well, your great, great, great uncle, George Washington, you know,

00:34:58.960 when he took over the country, he did a lot of stuff with the community.

00:35:02.140 So it was a really well-known thing that they engaged really heavily with the community.

00:35:06.380 But they still feel different from me.

00:35:09.820 And Mormons still feel different from me. 1.00

00:35:11.920 Like, they're a little too kind-hearted.

00:35:16.020 Yeah, I'm all Mormon.

00:35:17.020 And not portion up in their world perspective in a way that just doesn't fit with my world.

00:35:21.140 And you'll see this in this big debate.

00:35:23.300 Well, not debate, but, like, conversation we have with, like, Carl Youngbud

00:35:25.800 and the other transhumanist Mormons.

00:35:28.200 Is there, you know, they're unwilling to see, for example, God as an uncompassionate entity.

00:35:34.380 Whereas, from our perspective, God is just so obviously not compassionate.

00:35:39.280 Like, unless you define good as the thing that God does, God is a amoral entity from the perspective of our existing humanity.

00:35:49.660 Oh, yeah, man.

00:35:50.120 I'm going through the Old Testament again.

00:35:51.580 And it's like, whoa.

00:35:53.860 I mean, like, humans aren't great either.

00:35:56.980 But, like, God made man in his own image.

00:36:01.540 Judging him by these standards.

00:36:03.060 But when you use words like compassion or love to describe God, from my perspective, you are manipulating people.

00:36:11.360 Intentionally manipulating people because you mean words differently than what humans mean when they say compassion or love.

00:36:18.780 Yes.

00:36:19.420 Yeah.

00:36:19.880 Yeah, because I think when we were speaking with.

00:36:21.800 Why are you saying, you know, like, an unknowable, unknown thing that we can't even begin to comprehend its morality or its moral core.

00:36:31.500 Well, I think Lincoln and Carl were, when we were discussing this with them, like, their Mormon definition of compassion was, oh, but God is giving humans the potential and the opportunity to achieve so much more.

00:36:45.860 And that was their definition of compassion rather than, like, look at all the suffering that God is permitting.

00:36:51.400 It was more like.

00:36:52.000 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:36:52.500 God allows us to improve through suffering.

00:36:55.160 And the cat is compassion, but we don't.

00:36:56.660 Through what is red and tooth and claw, like, through death and intergenerational improvement and horrifying, horrifying means.

00:37:05.040 Right.

00:37:05.340 You know, I look at nature.

00:37:06.920 I look at this idea of red and tooth and claw.

00:37:09.700 And I think that that is the gift that God has given us that allows us to improve, which is the ability to suffer and die and improve intergenerationally.

00:37:18.760 But that is not, like, from the perspective of the zebra that's being eaten alive by a lion or something or eaten alive by a bear.

00:37:27.600 To bears eat alive more.

00:37:29.160 Lions don't eat alive a lot.

00:37:30.520 But the deer that's being eaten alive by a bear or the human, the human child that's being eaten alive by a bear, because that has happened many times, that does not seem like what I consider compassion from a human perspective.

00:37:41.960 And I think this is where we differ most from them, because within the Calvinist framework, you're not going to be, like, God is compassionate in the way that humans use the word compassion.

00:37:49.540 Right.

00:37:52.040 But Mennonites, when I talk with Mennonites, I really get that. 0.69

00:37:55.940 Like, they just seem culturally very, very, very close to me.

00:37:59.320 I feel almost no difference between myself as Mennonites or even Amish.

00:38:03.340 And they're in our local communities and stuff like that.

00:38:06.820 I remember, you know, I was watching a video, a great video of Amish people talking about it.

00:38:12.080 And they were bitching about the money they got from the government for having additional kids. 0.99

00:38:16.460 And they were like, oh, there's these child subsidies.

00:38:18.140 And it's disgusting that the government is giving us money for this.

00:38:20.960 But, I mean, of course, we're going to take it if they're handing it to us.

00:38:23.740 And I just felt such a, I was like, yes, I really get you guys, you know.

00:38:27.780 But you feel like a disconnect between what's going on here and what's going on out there.

00:38:31.980 I would.

00:38:32.740 I would, too.

00:38:33.620 I definitely would say so.

00:38:35.140 And I'm not troubled by it.

00:38:37.660 No, it's a way of life for us.

00:38:40.620 So this last year, COVID, all the craziness that's gone on with the politics.

00:38:46.920 The worst part of it for us was the annoyance of having to wear a mask everywhere.

00:38:51.680 She travels more than I would.

00:38:54.060 I'm happy at home.

00:38:55.160 My husband is very happy at home.

00:38:57.000 He grew up on a farm.

00:38:58.380 We live on a fruit farm.

00:38:59.980 And he just likes raising fruit.

00:39:02.040 And that's what he does.

00:39:02.860 He has a really small world.

00:39:04.100 Coming out here is about his car.

00:39:05.760 He's trying to pay for it.

00:39:07.840 Give him fruit, give him pie. 0.99

00:39:09.360 Yeah, that's right.

00:39:10.140 He's good to go.

00:39:10.920 So I call your attention to a few things in these conversations that I find really interesting.

00:39:15.800 And I would suggest you go check out this guy's channel and his other stuff on Amish and Mennonite

00:39:19.100 communities if you want to experience more of what those communities are like because he

00:39:23.220 does, I think, a very good job of portraying them.

00:39:25.980 The first is how insularly focused the community is and how they status signal within the community

00:39:34.180 through their humility in terms of how they relate to each other.

00:39:39.620 The way that they are flexing is through humbleness, which is really in accord with the way that

00:39:47.540 we often try to flex.

00:39:48.620 You know, when we're talking about anime or the lower arts, we are doing that to flex how

00:39:56.340 unpretentious we are in the things that we signal liking.

00:40:00.280 The second thing that you see within these communities is while men and women have different

00:40:06.000 roles and systemically different roles based on biological gender differences, women are not 1.00

00:40:12.580 treated as lesser than men at all.

00:40:15.700 And this is really interesting, I mean, like, conversationally, ideologically.

00:40:20.660 Like, women may not have a place in the church because of what the Bible says, but in terms of how 1.00

00:40:25.300 they're treated in general conversations, there isn't, they talk over men, they share their

00:40:32.000 ideas, and their ideas are respected.

00:40:33.920 And this is something that I really notice when I'm around different groups is the way that

00:40:38.580 they relate between the two genders.

00:40:41.600 And I just find this aligns much more with my cultural heritage and the way that I would

00:40:48.180 want my kids to be treated, you know, 100 years from now, they end up going down some

00:40:52.360 different cultural pathway.

00:40:53.320 Now, what we're going to go to next is a clip of them talking about technology use, because

00:40:58.240 I think it also shows how clear-headed they are.

00:41:01.680 Well, we'll also give you an opportunity to look to see if you can notice some of the things

00:41:06.240 I was just mentioning.

00:41:07.240 So, I have a smartphone.

00:41:08.660 Yeah.

00:41:09.460 I do not have a browser on my smartphone.

00:41:13.320 So, I have a, I erased the browser, and it's intentional.

00:41:16.880 Okay.

00:41:17.180 I took the browser off.

00:41:19.180 I have a smartphone so that I can call and text.

00:41:22.000 Yep.

00:41:22.240 Otherwise, I don't have access.

00:41:24.880 I've got maps.

00:41:26.620 But I don't have access to the internet on my smartphone.

00:41:29.840 Now, you know, see what he has to say.

00:41:32.840 I talked about it.

00:41:33.720 I talked about it today.

00:41:35.380 Tell us quickly.

00:41:36.200 Okay.

00:41:36.580 So, I have a smartphone as well.

00:41:38.340 And I have a blocker on here that blocks all pornographic and all, you know, all of that

00:41:44.480 stuff.

00:41:45.120 Okay.

00:41:45.340 But, and I can customize it to what apps I can have.

00:41:49.520 Like, I would have YouTube.

00:41:50.900 Mm-hmm.

00:41:51.260 I would have that.

00:41:52.560 But then, it's just, it's up to the individual then.

00:41:56.980 And then, I have a blocker on here, and we have accountability groups in our church.

00:42:00.300 And I'm accountable to what I use on my phone to other brother from the church.

00:42:04.400 Okay.

00:42:04.760 What about you, ladies?

00:42:06.860 My phone.

00:42:07.780 I have the same thing Josh has.

00:42:10.280 Mm-hmm.

00:42:10.880 Same.

00:42:11.120 Okay.

00:42:12.940 And you're...

00:42:13.640 My phone.

00:42:14.160 I have a flip phone.

00:42:15.100 I'm actually not sure what mine is at.

00:42:16.540 And mine doesn't have any data on it.

00:42:20.320 My husband shut off all the data.

00:42:22.480 And so, what I can do with my phone is I can call.

00:42:25.020 Uh-huh.

00:42:25.420 And I can text.

00:42:26.620 But, like, I cannot receive any pictures or even group messages because all the data is

00:42:31.340 cut off.

00:42:32.200 He shut yours off.

00:42:33.300 Do you shut his off?

00:42:34.340 He did.

00:42:34.880 He shut his off, too.

00:42:35.880 Yeah.

00:42:36.260 We're on the same page.

00:42:37.720 Do you guys, like, regulate each other?

00:42:39.900 No.

00:42:40.280 We don't have any internet access on the phone.

00:42:42.460 And we actually don't have any internet at all at our house or anything.

00:42:46.540 You're offline completely.

00:42:47.560 We're offline.

00:42:48.980 By ourself, we choose to live that way because we enjoy being simple and, I don't know.

00:42:56.660 We see a lot of dangers in it.

00:42:57.680 We see a lot of dangers in having it.

00:42:59.320 So, I think that that's where I have the least cultural distance.

00:43:02.340 But the problem is, is that they're not economically productive.

00:43:05.240 And that's really, really important to me in being able to join in a high economic productivity

00:43:09.660 group if you're going to be one of the people who gets off planet.

00:43:12.220 Like, our goal for our kids, like, if you're like, what are you really aiming for

00:43:15.740 with your kids?

00:43:16.980 Yeah.

00:43:17.260 Cultural fidelity is nice, but I want them to be part of that group, part of that movement

00:43:22.120 and through how we improve them and through how we create this intergenerational improvement,

00:43:27.080 whether that means going to another cultural group or some improved iteration of our own

00:43:31.060 that is taking to the stars, that is conquering the universe.

00:43:35.620 It is creating the imperial of man, this vast human empire.

00:43:41.000 You know, future days coming up and we have these projectors on our ceilings of galaxies,

00:43:46.900 right?

00:43:47.100 And we talk about their place in the universe.

00:43:49.140 And when we point to this, we're like, you know, Simba and the, at the beginning of the

00:43:52.860 Lion King, everything you see is, is your domain.

00:43:55.580 Look, Simba, everything the light touches is our kingdom.

00:44:01.640 Wow.

00:44:03.320 A king's time as ruler rises and falls like the sun.

00:44:08.280 One day, Simba, the sun will set on my time here and will rise with you as the new king.

00:44:15.760 And this will all be mine?

00:44:17.520 Everything.

00:44:18.880 Everything the light touches.

00:44:20.620 That's what we're doing when we are engaging them with this galaxy, this galaxy that you

00:44:25.400 see, you know, and in some future days, we're going to take them, talking to Simone about

00:44:30.080 this, to the woods so they can see the stars, you know, they can see all the stars in the

00:44:34.960 sky.

00:44:35.520 The vastness of the universe.

00:44:36.960 This is for you to conquer.

00:44:38.460 This is your domain.

00:44:39.800 This is your manifest destiny.

00:44:41.420 This was given to you by God as something that, that is your duty and your responsibility to

00:44:51.080 make humanities.

00:44:52.540 And that, that is a, a deeply vast and, and should be humbling responsibility.

00:44:59.140 And, and you are starting so early, you know, we haven't even conquered one planet yet.

00:45:04.140 You know, you, we are starting so early in this cycle, but I hope that they play a role

00:45:09.740 in, in that vast future for humanity.

00:45:11.960 And if we unfortunately use Mennonites as our backup culture, very unlikely that that's 0.99

00:45:17.460 going to happen.

00:45:19.140 No.

00:45:20.000 Well, I think we're like very, very clearly too technophilic to ever really pass.

00:45:29.080 Although there could be an interesting version of like AI safety Mennonitism.

00:45:34.660 What do you mean?

00:45:36.040 Uh, well, they never developed, they basically freeze civilizational development at our current

00:45:40.180 stage instead of at another stage and they, they kill everyone else and they ensure that 0.79

00:45:45.580 we never develop AI any further.

00:45:47.200 And they're just like, right now, this is when we need to stop.

00:45:49.280 Like for them, it was buttons for Eliezer Yukowski.

00:45:52.880 It's AI.

00:45:53.680 It's one of the things that famous Douglas Adams quote, you know, the guy who wrote

00:45:57.620 Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy that was so prophetic that the moment when the average 0.88

00:46:02.100 member of the EA community turned over 30, or it wouldn't even say the average leading

00:46:06.760 member, like basically as soon as Eliezer turned over 30, the EA movement became rabidly

00:46:12.840 a Luddite cult.

00:46:14.640 And what he said is anything invented after the age of 30 for you is, is wrong and must be

00:46:19.700 destroyed, right?

00:46:20.400 Like that's how humans relate to technology.

00:46:22.660 And I'll put the full quote on the screen here because it's brilliant that he had this

00:46:26.120 insight.

00:46:26.560 He said, anything that's invented between when you're born and when you turn 30, that's,

00:46:30.780 that's like something you're going to get a job in.

00:46:32.760 That's interesting technology.

00:46:34.060 And isn't that what they were with crypto and stuff like that?

00:46:36.660 They loved all that, but then they're like, but, but anything after I'm 30 is like a,

00:46:41.740 an abomination and must be destroyed.

00:46:44.380 So, you know, you could see something like that, but no, I, I think the reality is, is that

00:46:48.340 our best shot with AI is to merge with AI to, to do what humanity has always done, which

00:46:52.720 is to be a merger of the biological and synthetic.

00:46:56.940 When I say merge, I do not be downloaded into AI.

00:46:59.420 I mean, upgrade themselves with AI and technology and continue to advance as a species until,

00:47:08.760 in the words of Wynwood Reed, we as, as humans can become something that if explained to us

00:47:14.500 today, we would not understand in the same way that if we explained electricity to the,

00:47:19.960 the savage, they would not understand that we will become you, you pure radiant beings

00:47:25.320 of which now we cannot even conceive, which is, you know, what we see as the, the agents

00:47:31.160 of Providence within our religious system.

00:47:32.900 But this is why we raise our kids partially Jewish.

00:47:34.760 It's just the one, the best bet.

00:47:37.480 And two, I think one of the most logically consistent religious frameworks.

00:47:41.340 Well, but also like healthy, if we want to give our kids the best shot in life, you know,

00:47:45.920 you want to look at religious traditions that have favorable outcomes.

00:47:50.540 And, and Christians will say things like, well, yeah, but Jews predicted a future Messiah, 0.98

00:47:56.080 which then was clearly happened.

00:47:57.420 Like they predicted a future prophet, which then clearly happened and they ignored.

00:48:01.060 And then I'd say, yes.

00:48:02.540 And if you read the Christian Bible, it also clearly predicts future prophets, which you

00:48:07.180 have ignored.

00:48:08.200 So I, you know, if I'm going to be like, let's go back to one of these systems of ignoring

00:48:12.940 future prophets, okay, we'll go to the Jewish system. 0.68

00:48:16.760 Basically, we're taking the position that the Judeo-Christian tree is almost certainly

00:48:21.660 the correct one.

00:48:22.340 And if it isn't the correct one, then why did God allow the timeline to play out as it

00:48:26.680 played out?

00:48:27.140 You know, if he's from one of the other traditions, he really messed up with this planet. 1.00

00:48:31.200 So if we take the position that Judeo-Christian tradition is the correct tradition, we can either

00:48:37.240 say, okay, we accept no additional prophets.

00:48:39.820 They're just no prophets, only the legalistic system and the community.

00:48:45.240 And the way that legalistic system and community evolve in a secular context is God's will and

00:48:51.720 God's revelation.

00:48:52.660 In which case we are Jewish, or we take all additional prophets, in which case we're in 0.66

00:48:58.040 our position.

00:48:59.020 Another huge advantage of Judaism from our perspective is it gets around the problem that

00:49:03.420 we keep mentioning of, why would God give a revelation that is meant for everyone to

00:49:09.700 people in one isolated part of the world and not allow that message, which is required for

00:49:15.040 salvation, to not reach most of the world for a thousand years or so?

00:49:19.840 You know, Jesus is in historic Israel, and yet that message can't reach the Americas for

00:49:26.640 about a millennium.

00:49:27.620 That strikes me as logically inconsistent to the level where I would have trouble convincing

00:49:33.220 my kids of this.

00:49:34.800 However, with Judaism, I don't have the same problem because Judaism is not all-encompassing.

00:49:40.140 Judaism doesn't say, oh, this message is meant for everyone.

00:49:43.100 It says, oh, it's meant for this specific population group, which fixes this hole in the

00:49:47.780 logic when I'm trying to convince my kids of this system.

00:49:50.480 Judaism, the Old Testament God, is a God that is very clearly not a good entity from the 1.00

00:50:04.840 perspective of people living today.

00:50:07.040 He's only a good entity insofar as you define everything done by God as good.

00:50:12.580 And I think that that's also a much more easy and realistic God to convince kids of than

00:50:19.200 a all-powerful, all-good entity actually created the world that we live in today.

00:50:24.800 There is suffering to exist that no positives come out of.

00:50:28.840 And I think it's pretty objectively true that that type of suffering does exist in the world

00:50:32.840 we live in.

00:50:33.740 And this is one of the problems that we had when we were in the debate with the Mormon 0.67

00:50:37.000 transhumanists where they're like, well, God is compassionate.

00:50:39.280 And I'm like, very clearly not by what we as humans mean when we say the word compassionate.

00:50:45.220 And they're like, well, that's true.

00:50:46.280 And then it's like, well, then you, why would you even use that word?

00:50:48.960 Why would you even say that if you're just defining compassionate as the things that God

00:50:53.100 does?

00:50:54.060 And here I should note, when I say that God is not good from the way that we like normal

00:50:58.480 people define good, I think God is better than that.

00:51:02.500 But I think that that's because the way that we as normal humans define good is bad.

00:51:06.680 And we should study God's will to try to understand it better.

00:51:10.680 And that that will is much more read in tooth and claw than we would pretend in the kumbaya

00:51:17.640 world.

00:51:18.560 We'll add one more note, though, which is that it's not just that we're only going to expose

00:51:25.880 our children to Jewish traditions.

00:51:27.900 Now, we're not going to go like take our kids to like Easter mass or something like we're not

00:51:33.180 going to practice other forms of religion, I think, unless our kids like really want to

00:51:37.920 have a go at it.

00:51:38.760 You know, they're willing to organize the holiday.

00:51:40.660 Yeah, they're like, I'll handle the organization.

00:51:43.040 Yeah, I'll do the research.

00:51:44.080 I'll have us, you know, I'll do the recitals or whatever.

00:51:46.780 But we do want our children to be educated in every major religious tradition.

00:51:51.780 We want them to understand the stories, the philosophy they should have read, you know,

00:51:56.520 at least excerpts from.

00:51:57.780 I mean, certainly they should have read the whole like all the New Testament, clearly.

00:52:01.640 But then also like no excerpts from major religious books from other traditions as well, and also

00:52:07.700 understand like the moral and metaphysical frameworks of these other religions.

00:52:12.760 And so, you know, I think it's also important for that to be made clear, because otherwise

00:52:18.960 it just seems like, well, oh, they're just going to like do Judaism.

00:52:22.860 I also say like when it comes to that, if you look at the skill tree we're building out

00:52:26.900 in our education system, you know, one religion we focus a lot on was in it is Islam.

00:52:31.780 But I think today a lot of people are really sleeping on Islam as a religious tradition because

00:52:36.900 and we'll do another video talking about this.

00:52:39.620 But if you look at Muslims today, you're essentially looking at what would be the equivalent 1.00

00:52:44.740 of, you know, Europeans in the Dark Age. 1.00

00:52:47.200 You are looking at a collapsed former empire.

00:52:51.840 We right now are in the Muslim Dark Age. 1.00

00:52:54.120 They had a shining empire that was so magnificent that when Europeans would write books on chemistry

00:53:03.020 or physics, they would write them under fake Muslim sounding pseudonyms because nothing else

00:53:09.300 was taken seriously in the world of academia.

00:53:11.320 That is how dominant they were as intellectuals, as people moving civilization forwards during

00:53:17.860 their bright period.

00:53:19.300 But they just flamed out more recently and are right now in a dark age, which leads to

00:53:25.380 many people looking at them and looking.

00:53:28.700 And I will agree with this, you know, in our show, we're often like when we talk about the

00:53:31.920 future enemies of pernatalism, we talk about you have right now the urban monoculture, but

00:53:36.600 you also have groups that are antagonistic to anyone other than them existing in the

00:53:41.500 world.

00:53:42.040 Right.

00:53:42.920 And a lot of these groups right now, like the most populous of these groups in terms of

00:53:47.880 fertility rates right now in the world, or not even fertility rates, just total population

00:53:51.580 right now are some Muslim groups.

00:53:55.320 But these these groups, they do not represent what is actually in the Koran.

00:54:01.380 And and then a lot of people are like, well, we need to be antagonistic.

00:54:04.660 I'm like, even like Jews, right? 0.98

00:54:07.040 Like Jews need to understand that the United States is withdrawing from the Middle East. 1.00

00:54:11.420 The Middle East is no longer relevant to the United States.

00:54:13.860 That means your future key allies are going to be Saudi Arabia and the UAE.

00:54:19.060 They're going to be Muslim groups.

00:54:21.920 OK, so so so be aware that a lot of these mindsets we have towards Muslims today are going

00:54:27.460 to need to evolve and really understand that there are multiple groups that wear the mask

00:54:34.200 of Islam.

00:54:35.680 Yeah. 0.55

00:54:35.860 Well, you have to look at the monsters where it doesn't mean that everyone who wears it

00:54:39.500 is a monster.

00:54:40.320 One hundred percent. 0.95

00:54:41.260 Or it's not sophisticated.

00:54:42.540 The questions to ask also when looking at like not just which groups will be present in

00:54:48.240 the future, but which groups will have power in the future is who is able to maintain at

00:54:53.640 least a stable or ideally higher birth rate and is technophilic.

00:54:58.920 So I think what the problem is, is a lot of people are looking at really high birth rate

00:55:04.440 groups from many different ethnic and religious traditions and they're like, oh, my God, look, 1.00

00:55:08.920 they're like reproducing like crazy.

00:55:10.460 They're going to be the only people in the future.

00:55:12.660 But these people are not employed.

00:55:14.980 These people are not very educated.

00:55:16.900 These people are committing a lot of crime.

00:55:18.800 These people are like basically like they are anti-society agents and they are not going

00:55:22.860 to build.

00:55:23.340 They're only going to destroy at their like current societal trends.

00:55:26.740 So what you need to look at is any groups that are building, that are both having kids

00:55:32.640 and contributing to culture, following and creating laws, designing things, building enterprises,

00:55:39.900 building businesses.

00:55:41.020 And those, yeah, totally the ones to watch and the ones to ally with.

00:55:45.400 Well, to use as backups.

00:55:46.840 And I think this all comes down to something from our cultural groups perspective, which is

00:55:51.860 for your kids, if you're of a conservative tradition, I would have a backup tradition for your kids.

00:56:01.060 And so you might think all of our religious nonsense here, if you're like, actually, that

00:56:04.840 kind of sounds like a good idea, this future day stuff and stuff like that, that could make

00:56:10.520 for a good backup tradition for you in terms of at least.

00:56:13.860 This is like a why not Zoidberg moment.

00:56:15.860 Yeah, at least having a backup that's not the urban monoculture.

00:56:20.920 No.

00:56:21.840 Well.

00:56:22.880 No, but seriously, I actually, we are beginning to celebrate really seriously for the first

00:56:29.660 time because our kids can get it.

00:56:31.060 One of our major holidays.

00:56:32.880 Biggest holiday.

00:56:33.660 Our religion's biggest holiday.

00:56:34.860 Like the biggest one, future day.

00:56:35.900 I mean, like I'm really excited to celebrate Lemon Week this year too.

00:56:38.700 But like, yeah, future day is like the one we splurged on the decor.

00:56:44.220 We're getting our, like our kids ramped up for it.

00:56:46.560 We're, we're starting the music and the movies and like, it's, you know, it's a fun religion.

00:56:53.260 So.

00:56:54.380 Well, there's not many other religions.

00:56:56.340 You can terminators, a holiday movie and stuff like that.

00:56:59.080 Well, there's not many religions that get, they got to like develop holiday decorations

00:57:03.200 in a post like projector or post Tesla coil world.

00:57:06.760 So it's also kind of cool.

00:57:09.880 I love it.

00:57:10.740 I love it.

00:57:11.560 Yeah.

00:57:12.020 And I love you.

00:57:13.360 And I really am blessed.

00:57:16.120 And if you talk about the ages of Providence that I happened to marry somebody who somehow

00:57:19.980 let me into the Jewish cultural club.

00:57:22.320 Oh yeah.

00:57:23.000 Without knowing it.

00:57:24.120 Cause I didn't know that rule existed.

00:57:27.160 Yeah.

00:57:28.040 And you didn't particularly care or identify was the group when I met you.

00:57:32.380 I probably cared more about Judaism than you did.

00:57:35.020 I was like, oh cool.

00:57:36.220 Cheat code.

00:57:37.100 And you were like, oh, so, so I, I, I think that these things are interesting.

00:57:42.060 Another way to think about why we raise our kids with a backup culture is somebody can

00:57:46.140 look at everything we're doing, you know, especially even all the work we're putting

00:57:48.780 into like building up this religious and cultural system for our kids and think, oh, that must

00:57:53.640 mean that they really want the kids to feel indebted.

00:57:56.440 Like they're definitely going to pick this up because of all the work and sacrifice that

00:57:59.520 we've put into this.

00:58:00.600 When if anything, it's quite the opposite.

00:58:02.000 I mean, it's doing something quite cruel to a kid to be putting them and raising them

00:58:06.740 in a new cultural group that you have created yourself and raise them feeling like you won't

00:58:12.960 appreciate them.

00:58:13.880 If they do anything other than this really insane, weird thing you set up for them, it

00:58:19.040 would be, I mean, it's just, it's, to me, it's obviously, it would be a cruel thing to

00:58:22.760 do to our kids.

00:58:23.340 So to give them another option outside of just the urban monoculture that they feel that

00:58:29.320 they were to some extent raised within is very important to us.

00:58:34.240 Another thing I'd, I'd add to the end of this for any of our listeners who are interested

00:58:39.420 is the school system that we're developing is about to reach a next critical stage.

00:58:45.640 Any of you who are open to helping with it, reviewing it right now, what we really need

00:58:52.300 is eyes on the big skill tree that we've built.

00:58:55.080 So if you have domain expertise in any area, like physics, chemistry, something like that,

00:59:02.380 and you could review a skill tree, like think of a video game skill tree and be like, is

00:59:07.100 this an accurate representation of how I would build this out from my field of domain expertise?

00:59:11.080 But, you know, do email us, let us know, and we will talk to you guys and send you a copy

00:59:17.280 and you can be like, Hey, this is how I change this.

00:59:19.340 That's how I change this.

00:59:20.700 Because that could, that could help us a lot in making this as high quality as possible.

00:59:24.780 You know, when I, when this launches, I want this to be a full skill tree, basically of all

00:59:29.320 human knowledge.

00:59:30.580 It's already so cool.

00:59:31.820 You guys, like I'm insanely proud of what Malcolm has put together.

00:59:35.440 And I don't think, you know, I mean, you've, you are combining an incredibly sweeping knowledge

00:59:41.400 base on your own personal front with the help of AI, which is just like super powered this

00:59:47.180 in a way where it gets me really excited about, I want to go through it personally, because

00:59:51.860 it, the most important thing about the skill tree, isn't like the knowns that it will show

00:59:57.020 you, like, you're like, oh, grammar and English is there, but like the unknowns, you're like,

01:00:01.000 wait, I didn't even know I could learn this.

01:00:02.580 What is this?

01:00:03.220 This is insane.

01:00:04.160 Like, and, and school, I'm learning schools, universities, even the very best, the most

01:00:09.540 elite institutions, the most big institutions do not have the capacity to teach you everything.

01:00:15.520 They just don't have, they don't have the money.

01:00:18.940 Here's the course on aquaculture pharmacology, you know, like this, I mean, and I'm sure

01:00:24.120 there are, there are like three universities that have good programs for that.

01:00:27.400 But like, you know, usually you don't have access to that.

01:00:30.760 And this is like, oh, game changer.

01:00:32.640 So guys, you have to reach out to Malcolm about this, because it's kind of a big team.

01:00:36.180 We do look at the comments, and we try to read all of them.

01:00:39.960 But I do, I, we do always go through the comments, and we really appreciate it.

01:00:43.640 And we feel like we do have a personal relationship with our, with our fans that is much stronger

01:00:49.380 than the personal relationship we have with our fans, friends.

01:00:51.920 Because you guys don't force us to meet you or talk to you.

01:00:55.520 Like, oh my God, what a blessing.

01:00:57.760 What a blessing to have a friend that is, I don't need to talk to or meet with, but is

01:01:02.520 like intelligent and well-considered and often says nice things to me.

01:01:06.780 It does get even better when we get to meet them though.

01:01:08.840 Like we've met some of the, some of you who are watching, we've met in person.

01:01:11.820 Hey guys.

01:01:12.240 And it's been really great to meet you.

01:01:14.820 And I'm looking forward to meeting, to meeting, weirdly, because I don't, I hate meeting people

01:01:19.600 in person, but somehow like the people who watch our podcast are really cool.

01:01:26.000 At least someone's capable of also meeting in person, I guess.

01:01:28.580 So yeah, anyway, thanks to all of you for watching, but I'm also extremely glad to be

01:01:34.100 hidden away in our little farmhouse just with you, Malcolm.

01:01:36.420 You're my number one main squeeze.

01:01:38.280 I love you too.

01:01:38.940 And it's funny, one of the things that Simone has always said that has made her most resistant

01:01:42.960 to joining these religious communities is having to engage with other people.

01:01:46.860 Oh, I mean, if our kids are as autistic as us, they'll just be like, screw all other 0.93

01:01:51.380 people.

01:01:52.140 I mean, just, you know, one of the things we're going to do for our kids, like if you guys

01:01:54.740 are like, well, what would it look like to be like ancillarily flirting with this cultural

01:01:59.620 group for our kids?

01:02:00.220 We'll probably be putting together like some sort of a summer camp for kids so that our

01:02:03.680 kids can meet other people.

01:02:04.760 Oh, and eventually I think we're going to do like an illustrated like holiday book with

01:02:11.540 weird holidays.

01:02:13.200 So, you know, like we're going to outline stuff like there will be, you know, if you

01:02:18.560 want to understand our holidays and what we do, we will eventually provide materials,

01:02:23.080 but we're playtesting first.

01:02:24.700 Okay.

01:02:25.040 Got to get to playtesting.

01:02:26.400 Yeah.

01:02:26.880 Speaking of which, we need to return to our movie lineup for future day.

01:02:32.160 We're going to continue watching Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, you know, so let's

01:02:36.260 I love you to death, Simone.

01:02:37.520 You are the best wife that anyone could ever hope for.

01:02:41.240 And you clearly were meant for me because I don't think anyone else would tolerate you.

01:02:46.900 I don't think anyone else would tolerate me.

01:02:49.420 Like we are so uniquely like just love everything that's weird about each other.

01:02:55.120 Well, but here's the thing.

01:02:56.020 You made me into who I am, but also that person was who I wanted to be.

01:03:00.280 I'm your Pygmalion, but I wanted to be that person.

01:03:03.100 So thank you for that.

01:03:04.240 Thank you for making everything so perfect and wonderful.

01:03:06.620 And I love you.

01:03:07.620 Let me go.

01:03:08.140 Love you too.

01:03:09.940 Like a weird. 0.80

01:03:11.320 If you die, one of our friend's wife died recently.

01:03:13.940 I don't know.

01:03:14.600 Which breaks my heart.

01:03:16.660 I mean, we'd probably I'd go to the channel.

01:03:18.820 I'd be like, who's looking for a husband?

01:03:21.100 And it's okay with like four or five kids from another wife, because I'm not going to go

01:03:26.000 out there and date again. 1.00

01:03:27.020 Fuck that. 1.00

01:03:27.940 Good luck. 1.00

01:03:28.260 But I also don't want my kids to grow up without a mom.

01:03:31.080 Oh, well, okay.

01:03:34.320 Don't die.

01:03:35.060 Be careful.

01:03:35.800 This is why I always put you in the safe car.

01:03:37.540 This is why I'm always, you know, even though it takes my death.

01:03:39.880 I need to be a little less clumsy.

01:03:41.260 So let's.

01:03:42.780 You promise to not carry so much when you go up and down the stairs?

01:03:46.440 But there's so much to carry.

01:03:48.340 Just give it to me.

01:03:49.220 I'll handle it.

01:03:50.300 All right.

01:03:50.760 Thanks.

01:03:51.180 I love you, Malcolm.

01:03:52.220 I love you too.

01:03:54.660 You're so sweet to me.

01:03:55.860 I love you too.

01:04:15.980 Thank you.

Based Camp - January 12, 2024

Why Give Our Kids a Backup Religion？ & Why Judaism？

Episode Stats

Summary

Transcript