Transcibing the Podcasts idea

[Near]

So, several months ago I got a wild idea to try to transcribe the podcasts, to make them available as a resource for people who are deaf or hard of hearing, so that they could still enjoy the content.

I got a small chunk done of the very first episode, and then emailed Seth, to see what he thought, and if it was OK. While he appreciated the thought, he said that he thought it would be too much work for one person, and that he would probably eventually pay someone to do it. I said that I might just continue anyway, and post what I had on the forums. Well, I decided to float the idea past ya'll to see what you think.

Why couldn't we, as a community transcribe the episodes? We would have to come up with a standard format, and all of that, but it could be like, a donation to the community. It could save Seth some cash, and it would be a fun community building project I think.

So here is what I came up with, the formatting may seem off, cause I'm just copy and pasting it from the document I have it in (Not sure how to use Google Docs, or whatever, so if somebody can help me out, I would appreciate it. )


It looks more professional in the file I have on my computer, but copy and pasting it messed it up a bit.



~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

THE
THINKING ATHEIST PODCAST

“What
Christians Don't Know About The Bible – Jul 31, 2010”

EPISODE
1

*Note:
Some editing has been done for clarity. If you find any mistakes,
or if you have concerns that the intent of the statement has not been
faithfully transcribed, please contact me at
ttatranscriber@gmail.com

Intro:
'OK here we go,
stand by! 3...2...1...Action!' Assume
nothing.(Preacher
1) 'In the name of
Jesus Christ of Nazareth!' Question
everything.
(Preacher 2) 'God
wouldn't steer you wrong' (Richard
Dawkins) “I find
it extremely hard to imagine.” (Preacher{?}3)
'Brash, bald-faced blasphemy.' Open
your eyes.
(Richard Dawkins)
“What they do is stick their fingers in their ear and say 'la
la la'.” (Muslim
Call to Prayer{?})(Religious
Woman) 'I put my
faith in, god above.'
(Hysterical Man)
'Thank you Jesus!' (Preacher
4) 'And the
truth...Shall set you free!' Engage
your senses.
(Christopher Hitchens) “The
fastest growing group of people in the country has been measured as
being those who have no belief, or, who are Atheists.” Overcome
your fear.
({?}) “It is
quite all right, to be an Atheist.” Challenge
the opposition.
({?}) “You
don't have to be apologetic or quiet about it.” Embrace
the truth.
(Sam Harris {?}) “You
see religion, on a hundred fronts, losing the argument.” And
start, thinking. This, is The Thinking Atheist, worldwide.

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(Seth
Andrews, host of The Thinking Atheist): If you are a believer in the
Bible...if you believe the Bible is true...if you believe the Bible
is the perfect, divinely inspired word of god. I want you to take
what you are about to hear, skeptically! I don't want you to believe
what you are hearing. Okay? I don't want you to take our word for
it! I want you to disbelieve. And then I want you to take an MP3 of
the audio. To write down, take note of the scripture references, and
I want you to do your own homework. To do your own thinking.

Because
I was once a believer in the Bible. I believed that it was
absolutely the perfect, divinely inspired, inerrant word of god. I
thought 'Man, this is it. This is my blueprint for living.'. And
what happened was, that after while I began to realize that much of
my life, and much of what the Bible said about life and about god and
about everything didn't really make sense. It wasn't adding up. And
I dared to start to question for the first time, after reciting verse
after verse after verse when we were growing up. I mean, they were
all these little 'soundbyteable' happy verses you know? Scripture
was like Pez. They were like, little, sweet morsels that didn't fill
you up, but they sure did taste good. You know? We recited them, I
went to a Christian school, and we recited them as homework.

“For god did not send his son into the world to
condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him.”
{John 3:17} “And in everything give thanks, for this is god's will
for you through Christ Jesus.” {Thessalonians 5:18} “Yea though
I walk though the valley of the shadow of death, I shall fear no
evil....” {Psalm 23:4}

We
knew the Bible, or we thought we did, and all of the sudden when you
start to look deeper
in the scripture, and you stop excusing scripture,
you realized “Wait a
minute, wait a minute. Some of this stuff simply doesn't make
sense.”

Well, if you've got a dog in this fight, and you want
to talk more about it, if you log in you will see our guest call in
number at the top of the screen I want your input.

We're
going to start with special guest AronRa, who is a YouTube legend.
I'm going to start, since I'm waiting for Aron to call back in, with
Meg from Germany. Meg, can you hear the sound of my voice?

(Meg): Yes I can.

(SA): What part about the Bible started to ring your
bell? When you started to read this stuff, which part made you raise
the eyebrow?

(Meg):
Definitely Deuteronomy {laughs}
I mean, when you're reading though Genesis you can think 'It's
just a fairy tale, or a myth.' And
you can kind of push it away mentally, but then I got to Deuteronomy
and some of the things in Numbers, and I was just horrified. And I
thought, you know 'Somethings
not right here.'
And there were also bits like, Deuteronomy 25:11-12. In which two
men are fighting with each other, and it says that if one of the mens
wives gets involved, and grabs the opponents genitals and twists,
then she should be shown no mercy and have her hand cut off. And,
you know, that kind of thing.

{When men strive together one with another, and the wife of the one draweth
near for to deliver her husband out of the hand of him that smiteth
him, and putteth forth her hand, and taketh him by the
secrets:[12]Then thou shalt cut off her hand, thine eye
shall not pity her.” KJV}

(SA): So if, wait a minute,
if a couple of guys are out fighting..

(Meg): Uh huh.

(SA):...and one of the wives
comes out to intervene...

(Meg): Right.

(SA):...and she accidentally
touches his groin area, they have to take her out, and hack her hand
right off at the wrist. According to god's law right?

(Meg): Or if she does it
intentionally.

(SA): You don't hear that
stuff in Sunday School.

(Meg): No, you definitely
don't. So sitting down and reading the Bible, was definitely a very
eye opening experience, and that was primarily what pushed me on my
way.

(SA): Meg, I've got AronRa
here on the line finally...

(Meg): Oh, great!

(SA):...so I'm going to go
ahead and move that direction. You take care of yourself in Germany,
and thanks for calling us, I appreciate it.

(Meg): Thank you.

(SA): You bet. Aron, are
you on the line with me?

(AronRa): I am, can you
hear me?

(SA): I sure can. I
appreciate your time so much. I know a lot of people know who you
are, and are huge fans, but I also know that some people within the
sound of my voice are still learning who you are and what you're
about. So, can you give me the quick nutshell biography? Who are
you, where you came from, what's your story?

(AronRa): Well, I...I don't
know how to summarize this. I was not a serious student in my youth,
I became one later on as I grew older. I'm a former tattooist, and I
went through a change in my life and I wanted to be doing something
in my life that was a bit more responsible. I got into an internet
related job, I found myself on an extreme learning curve and I found
myself on discussion boards like Talk.Origins. I found myself
investigating peoples arguments, for and against the religious
position. I then attached to that, I developed over the course of a
few years or many many hours on the internet as part of the job,
unrestricted browsing. I was able to learn a hell of a lot about
paleontology, archeology, and ancient mythology and such.
Eventually, I found myself on a college campus, signing up to go back
to school, to put some of this knowledge to use. I've been a student
most of the time since then. It's been years and years, I enjoy
being on a learning curve, and it got to the point where people
started citing my research
and some of my science research has been cited on at least one
Masters Thesis. I've gotten, as a result of the posts that I did on
Talk.Origins and the videos that I've been coming out with on
YouTube, I've gotten a good deal of supportive, I hesitate to call it
fan-mail, but I guess that's what it is, from professors, from
professional scientist, from administrators, and teachers and it has
all been very encouraging. The big thing that I learned about how
to put those together, is that when you're debating online, and with
the religious folk I often find that there's no real criticisms of
the substance of your subject, but any detail that you get wrong, the
scientist will chew apart. I've consequently had to become very
detail oriented, making sure that everything that I say is as
accurate as it can be, and that I have to be ready to defend whatever
it is that I am saying. I have to be very meticulous.

(SA):
I don't know about your videos, but when I post something online,
usually a video, and the first day or so, it's going to be a comment
about the substance of the video itself. They'll say something about
the story, or 'You made a good point.'
or 'You missed this...'
or whatnot, but usually after the first day, all of the sudden, all
of the comments sections turn into sort of a tit-for-tat argument
that never gets resolution. Do you find that it's futile, arguing on
the internet? Or do you ever have someone who says 'Oh
man, you know, I never thought of it that way, before.'
And they actually start to open those doors in their mind. Does that
ever happen for you?

(AronRa):
I will not say that it is futile to argue on the internet. No.
There's two contexts here. The woman that was just talking—described
a situation that i've seen myself. One of my best friends in High
School, ironically, is now the administrator of a fundamentalist
Christian school in Fort Worth, Texas. It's a mega-church, and he
teaches kids that the Earth is 6000 years old. He looks at Joe
Martin and Answers in Genesis, and people like this as authorities.
He gets teaching material from these people, and distributes it to
children in the name of truth. I had a several hours long interview
with him, (we haven't seen each other in about 20 years) and I'm in
his office, we're having this long discussion wherein I am talking
about how it can't be true...and if I can prove that things
that you are saying cannot be true, and then you should correct them.
And them I came to the realization that even if I can prove to this
man, that there are hundreds of transitional species, for
example, or any one of the other specific arguments—It's not
going to matter, because he is not going to change the argument. He
can't. He's forbidden to.
And he's not going to admit that he is forbidden to, but when you
start to make a point and he realizes that you are making a point—The
strangest thing happens when his face turns into that of a mannequin
and his eyes glaze over.

(SA):
(laughs)

(AronRa):
And he really does look like a smiling mannequin. And I realize
'I'm not getting through
to him.', he's chanting
mantras in the back of his mind. Behind his eyes there is a wall of
resistance, and he is not hearing anything that I say. He is
practicing whatever is the next rehearsed line to dismiss
whatever it is I'm putting forward. But—not
all of them are that way. You yourself are a good example of this.
The best advocates of
rational, free thinking, of secularism, of Atheism if you will...All
of the best advocates for this mode of thought are former believers.
And one of the things that I would like all of the Atheists to
realize, is that very fact. That if you attack everyone who believes
what they were conditioned
by their society to believe, then you are probably taking the wrong
course. Because Matt Dillahunty {Atheist
Community of Austin,
Atheist Experience}
and Michael Shermer {founder of The
Skeptic Society and
Skeptic magazine}
and virtually all of the leaders in secular thinking were once
believers themselves. It becomes like ex-smokers, who are the
staunchest advocates against tobacco use. The same thing happens
with religious belief.

(SA):
We're speaking on here with AronRa, you have a huge subscriber base
and a tremendous following, and you're a voice of authority. I
appreciate the words about being a former {religious person}, I mean
for thirty years I
was raised, by wonderful well meaning parents, that the Bible was
simply fact—that it was true. I mean, we questioned everything
else in our lives, you know we would go out and test and retest and
we would evaluate, and seek
truth. But when it came to the Bible it was an automatic given: 'If
it's between those covers, from Genesis to Revelation it's true.'.
Boom, don;t even think about it. And if we began to question, we
felt guilty, we
felt wrong, we felt a little bit like we were betraying; our
foundational beliefs, our parents—we were betraying our god. And
for a lot of people, they feel that way. 'When
Jesus said it I believe it, I believe it 'cause he said it, it's in
the Bible it's going to be true.' and
they just repeat that mantra over and over again, because if they
start to look critically
at scripture...I mean the Old Testament alone,
if you read it out loud and you were to put anyone else's name in
there other than god you would think 'This
guy's atrocious, he's a monster!'.
Has that been the case for you? When you look critically at
scripture especially the
Old Testament, do you think anyone else would abide
any of the actions that
are portrayed by god, if it was a human being doing those things?

(AronRa):
Well anybody that says they want to follow the teachings and the
morals in the Bible, I want to simply hand them a Bible and show
them, or rather, have them show me,
what morals they think
are worth following or what morals they think are legal to follow, in
any society on this
planet. Because, you and I both know, that the Bible is full of
endorsements of misogyny, of slavery, of spousal abuse, of child
abuse and in places child molestation, even abortion is supported in
the Bible. Not only with gods permission, but with his direct
involvement. We have genocide, we have all manner of racism and
sexism and the practices of hamstringing horses are just...All of the
horror that goes on in the Bible...What is the great thing that we
are all supposed to do? What is the thing that we are supposed to be
forgiven for? What is the degree of forgiveness...what is the way
that we get forgiveness? What we need to get forgiveness for, was
for not knowing the difference between right and wrong. OR what we
actually need forgiveness for is for find out the difference between
right and wrong. Because that's what we are being punished for. And
the way that we get forgiveness is through gullibility, because it
doesn't matter what else you do. You can be the greatest soul, the
most charitable person the most selfless individual in the world. If
you are not gullible enough to believe these stories, without
reason, and with complete conviction, then you are damned to eternal
torment. It doesn't matter what else you do—you can't be saved if
you don;t believe. And if you do
believe you can be
forgiven anything.

(SA): Talking on air here with special guest AronRa, if you have a
few minutes I would like to start rolling through some of the calls
we have, and allow our listeners to provide some questions that maybe
you can speak to. You game?

(AronRa): Yes.

(SA): Our first call is going to be from Logan in the States. Logan
you're on The Thinking Atheist, hi.

(Logan): Hi.

(SA): What have you got for us Logan?

(Logan):
Well I was just wondering where the evil in the New Testament is?
Because I've read Leviticus, and all of the bad stuff in the Old
Testament, however when I try to use that against Christians I get
'Well, that's the Old
Testament, {and with a loving god and the New Testament?}, that's all
out the window.'.

(AronRa):
Well those same people would argue that homosexuality is forbidden
in the Bible, but they are quoting the same chapter that also
prohibits eating shellfish. So they pick and choose. It's the same
chapter, they can't say 'This
applies, and this doesn't.'
They just arbitrarily make that decision anyway. You're looking
for, where the evil is in the New Testament, you have to remember
that Jesus told his own followers that he was going to divide
families, that belief in him was going to require that parents be
separated from their children, and that husbands be separated from
their wives. That they were not worthy
of being in heaven with him if you were not not willing to forsake
your own family. It's a complete irony that everyone that promotes a
Biblical morality claims to be so family oriented. Especially when
you consider that Evangelicals have the highest divorce rate, they
have the highest rates of teen pregnancy, they have the highest rates
of child abuse and abortion even, statistically across the country.
And they are well
represented in our
prison populations, whereas Atheist have virtually no presence in
there at all.

{(49)I
am come to send fire on the earth; and what will I, if it be already
kindled?

(50)But I have a baptism to be baptized
with; and how am I straitened till it be accomplished!

(51)Suppose ye that I am come to give
peace on earth? I tell you, Nay; but rather division:

(52)For from henceforth there shall be five in one house divided,
three against two, and two against three.

(5)The father shall be divided against the son, and the son
against the father; the mother against the daughter, and the daughter
against the mother; the mother in law against her daughter in law,
and the daughter in law against her mother in law. KJV}


(SA): Logan I appreciate you calling in

[Hobbitgirl]

Amazing of course. I'm probably biased however

[ClydeLee]

That's some good work thar.

I think the only flaw is a personal issue; the intro doesn't feel right without acknowledging the base line.

[Near]

I'm not sure what you mean sir. Could you elaborate?

[ClydeLee]

(02-02-2013 12:13 AM)Near Wrote:  I'm not sure what you mean sir. Could you elaborate?

Okay, as in my head I read it:

OK here we go,

stand by! 3...2...1...Action!' (bun dun dundundundundun bun dundundundundun)Assume

nothing.

[Paj]

I'm just a newbie here, but doesn't someone out there have Speech-to-text software? By the time the podcast ends, you'll have at least a rough draft (proofreading required - computers DO make mistakes!).