Making Sense of Negative Theology: Peter Rollins, Part 2

Believe it or not, this is our 100th episode! And what better way to spend it than diving back in with Peter Rollins, a guest who is unusually suited to the regular themes of our show, while also throwing some wrenches into pretty much everything we do. :-)

Picking up with where we left off in Part 1, we explore the sense in which Pete is a trinitarian Christian, some differences between Pete's and Kyle's philosophical approaches, the role of certain biblical themes in Pete's thought, his relationship to the historic Christian church, his beef with progressives, and a lot more. And we try really hard to get to the bottom of his whole negative theology thing.

You can find the transcript for this episode here.

The whiskey we taste in this episode is Barrell 15 Year Gray Label bourbon.

Content note: This episode has some adult themes and mild profanity.

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NOTE: This transcript was auto-generated by an artificial intelligence and has not been reviewed by a human. Please forgive and disregard any inaccuracies, misattributions, or misspellings.

Randy 00:06

I'm Randy, the pastor half of the podcast, and my friend Kyle is a philosopher. This podcast hosts conversations at the intersection of philosophy, theology, and spirituality.

Kyle 00:15

We also invite experts to join us, making public space that we've often enjoyed off-air around the proverbial table with a good drink in the back corner of a dark pub.

Randy 00:24

Thanks for joining us, and welcome to A Pastor and a Philosopher Walk into a Bar.

Kyle 00:39

Well, we are back for part two with Peter Rollins. So if you heard part one, your you know, somewhat of what you're in for here, it's gonna be a lot like that was we try to unpack some of his more complicated ideas, try to get to the bottom of some of them. At the end of it, I can say I feel a little bit better about understanding where he's coming from. But there are still fundamental disagreements and fundamental, probably misunderstandings, as you will see, I'm very curious what how listeners will receive this. So send us your questions, send us your reactions, your thoughts, I really want to know how this strikes you. If you feel at any point, like, why can't they just say that more clearly. Just know that we also felt that. And, and we honest to God, we're trying. And I have this sense after this conversation, that there are some things that maybe just can't be said, super clearly. And it's interesting to me that if Peter is right, maybe the most important things about God are in that category. And that I don't know, that's compelling, whether it bothers you or whether you like it, it's compelling either way. Yeah,

Randy 01:49

I think I in some ways, I mean, I had some real questions for Pete about what his concept of lack in negation, all that has to do with Jesus and what the Scriptures and the New Testament understanding and even Christian orthodoxy and you were getting at the same but I think I just appreciate his commitment to this idea of lack at the at the center of everything of negation at the center of everything and what that might mean and kind of potential ways out of messes that we find ourselves in as a society as a culture as in our in our cultural moments, that perhaps uniting around this lack uniting around, differences uniting around, unknowability can actually bring us together, perhaps this is I'm I'm processing we just literally got off the the zoom with Peter. So I'm still going to be processing for a long time, this conversation and I think it'll lead to another conversation. He's wonderful and, and very approachable and is like, Yes, this is a fun conversation. Let's dive back in. But I if nothing else, friends, if this is confusing for you, if it's a little bit frustrating, it's okay. Sit in that and ask him questions, send in your questions to us. Even I would suggest that you jump on to p rollins.com. I believe it is follow him on Patreon. He has tons of conversations and videos and talks and lectures that he has available. And then he's constantly updating and dive into the material if you're intrigued or if you're confused. And then come back to us and ask some more questions help us understand it.

Kyle 03:29

Yeah, and if you don't like this, if this isn't for you, next episode will be totally different. So yeah, no worries

Randy 03:34

yet, but I do. I do appreciate him saying like I am part of the Christian tradition. I consider myself a part of this, this faith expression, which actually puts me at odds against other ways of thinking and religious orders and all that. I appreciate when he can when anyone can but when a person like Pete Rollins, who thinks the way he does can say no, no, no, no, I'm, I consider myself within this tradition, even if some who are Christians would be like that. That's not

Kyle 04:01

mine. And not just within it. He's staking a claim about what the tradition means. At bottom right. Which is part of what I had some issues with. And that comes out a little bit in the conversation. I'm like that one of the things I'm struggling with is like is what he brings really just good for Lent, or is it good in general? Right, because I knew him primarily through his atheism for Lent stuff that we talked about last time, and I really liked it. But that's because it has a kind of functional place within a certain season of the Christian calendar. That makes sense to me. And then you come out of it at Easter, right? But for him, you don't come out of it. It's the whole thing. And so that's what I'm struggling to make sense is that like,

Randy 04:36

well, it reminds me of Creek, Keith de rose a little bit that if you are new to the show, you should go back and check out our conversation with Keith rose. He's a philosopher at Yale, but keep saying identify much more with good Friday than I do with Easter that seems much more compatible with reality and my lived experience. That's kind of where I feel Pete coming from a little bit, but also that then he says that's where resurrection happens. That for me, I still need a little bit more information or thoughts from Pete to clarify how resurrection comes out of or how

Kyle 05:06

resurrection is even meaningful if God is at bottom nothingness? Yeah, no. Yeah. So yeah, anyway, embrace

Randy 05:12

the conversation. Have fun diving in. If you can understand the terminology that Kyle and Pete are throwing around, you're in good company, don't worry about Google is

Kyle 05:23

your friend. Philosophical dictionaries are for the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy you might want to visit there's gonna

Randy 05:28

be a lot of positive show. So pauses in searches after this conversation, but I want to just say because Pete is going to be posting this around his world and everything. I'm just grateful for his kindness and his kind of availability to engage in these kinds of conversations with people like us.

Kyle 05:55

So we're joined again by our friend Tim from the power bourbon YouTube channel has sent us a bunch of delicious bourbon and we're tasting another of them here, and it's blind. We have no idea what it is, but it smells awesome.

Randy 06:07

It smells it smells like Cheerios to me. Smells like cereal.

Kyle 06:12

Nice thing. I could go I could get on board with like Cocoa Puffs because I'm getting some chocolate. Yeah, sure.

Randy 06:16

Yep. Just straight up cereal though. With a little. Smells

Elliot 06:21

like it's gonna taste dusty.

Tim 06:24

So for your viewers that are big into bourbon, I get Flintstone vitamins. Some people something Yes.

Randy 06:33

Yes. Totally. If you're old enough to know the reference. Yeah, that's there.

Kyle 06:37

It takes me back.

Randy 06:39

Man, Cheerios and Flintstone vitamins. Yeah, I'm

Kyle 06:42

gonna guess another lower proof one. We've had a couple of those before.

Randy 06:49

It tastes like Vincent's no vitamins. You can't? Yeah, no. That ruined me.

Kyle 06:56

Yeah, I can get a chalky thing a bit if I try. That makes it sound bad though. It does not taste bad.

Elliot 07:01

No, no, it's a bit stinky though. It's got it's got a

Randy 07:06

bit of funk. Especially the aftertastes.

Kyle 07:10

Yeah, if you told me this was another of those dusty things. Yeah, I believe you.

Tim 07:14

Yep. It's even got a little bit of medicinal cherry notes. Kind of like a robot test. Yeah. Everything

Kyle 07:20

we're naming is unpleasant on its own. I promise. It tastes good.

Randy 07:26

I used to just have epic battles with my parents trying to get out of taking a robot testing. Yeah, man. This is good. This is good. It's very unique. Tell us what it is Tim.

Tim 07:35

So this is barrel craft spirits bourbon, their 15 year old grade label. what's

Randy 07:42

what? Kyle thinking he should have liked it more.

Kyle 07:49

That is exactly what it is. That's crazy, man. Wow. Yeah. So

Tim 07:52

those the Flintstone vitamin that you get is what we refer to as decaled notes from tickle distillery. So it's mainly Tennessee. desolate. So does

Kyle 08:03

most of the local stuff have that character?

Tim 08:05

Yeah, so you've got a big part of the community that really likes Tennessee, whiskey, or they don't and it's all if they'd like Flintstone vitamins.

Elliot 08:16

Wow. So that local flavor would be one of the key markers of a Tennessee whiskey versus a Kentucky. Yes.

Tim 08:24

decal is one of those that has really old trade stock that other people can buy that like Barton has out of Kentucky and a couple places like that Jack doesn't have the ultra Age stuff. So generally if you see source from Tennessee, it's from decal.

Kyle 08:39

Any idea what would cause it to have that flavor profile that's ubiquitous across Tennessee whiskies?

Tim 08:48

I do believe it's the filtration process through the

Randy 08:55

chart. Charcoal filters. Yeah,

Kyle 08:56

I thought that was just Jack Daniels. Was that everybody?

Tim 08:58

To be Tennessee whiskey. You gotta be charcoal filter. No.

Randy 09:02

All right. So see what this is again, Tim? This

Tim 09:06

is barrel craft spirits bourbon, the 15 year old gray label.

Randy 09:11

Wow. All right. Cheers him and please go watch the power of bourbon on YouTube. Peter Rollins, thank you for joining us again on a pastor and philosopher walk into a bar. Welcome back.

Peter 09:39

Oh, it's great to be back for part two. I'm excited. This may even start to be part the beginning of Part Three. I've seen your some of your questions and they're so deep that you know might take us all day just to answer a couple of them. Yeah,

Randy 09:54

yeah. Especially with what you bring. So last time we spoke we did. We talked a lot of about the, the lack the, the kind of the void and the abyss and maybe God is in the abyss God is in the void God, you know, we need to not run from the lack, but actually embrace it and embrace the asymmetry. What I've been thinking about since we spoke is I really enjoy that perspective. But how do you reconcile that? Or how do you explain it? Or do you even care to reconcile and explain it in light of what we find in the New Testament, in particular, the apostle Paul saying things like, in Christ, all the fullness of the Godhead dwells in bodily form, or the church's job is to attain maturity and wholeness to the full measure of the fullness of Christ that we find there's a lot of fullness that we find in the New Testament, describing Christ describing what we find in Jesus, Jesus, this fulfillment of the law and prophets. Yeah, I could go on and on and you know, the texts, how do you reconcile those two things? Or how do you how do you hold those two things? Yeah,

Peter 10:57

so I mean, to start with I, what I don't want to do is try to pretend that the biblical text is some sort of, you know, unit vocal voice or something like that. So I, I'm going to say something that might make it sound like I'm saying that so that's why I'm starting off with a disclaimer that I'm not saying that. However, what I would say is that I take certain arts of the biblical text as a type of hermeneutical key to reading the rest. Now, what I don't mean by that is that I want to put everything else into your Procrustean bread where I stretch it and cut it to fit. But there is an I'll mention, three of the main things would be you know, creation story, the crucifixion, the resurrection, as kind of like this hermeneutical key. And in, for example, the crucifixion, which we I'm sure we'll be talking about a lot more in this conversation, you have, you know, this notion of the death of God, right, which I take very seriously. And also, in addition to the death of God, you have the self alienation of God, in at least couple of the Gospels. So you have these kinds of very fundamental ideas. So what I would do if, if I, you know, if I was so inclined, I might, I might want to say this is the tick fascism, as an example Fascism is a is a ideology of wholeness and completeness. Right. So the fascist believes in an organic system where everything runs, and in a kind of like in an organic kind of hole. And then of course, the figure of the Jew is the obstacle that prevents the smooth running of the system. So if you read mine Kampf, Hitler is always talking about this kind of the body is this smooth running organism, and then the G is a virus, etc, etc. So in fascism, there is this desire for wholeness, completeness, but you could make an argument that Fascism is not cool and hold enough, because it doesn't make space for the exception. And actually, I mean, if you if you think of Hegel, and Hegel says, he talks about what's called the identity of identity and difference, that's a have wholeness means you also have to include that which is outside of the hole. So in other words, what we talked about with girdles and completeness theorem, which we might come back to, but is that what if reality has is fully computable, but also has a truth that is not computable, then the whole requires both everything that is computable. And that which is not, in other words, fullness requires also embracing the luck. So I would maybe play a role in philosophically with that. But I don't know if it would fit with that, because that's not what I think the original authors were thinking at the time, you know, but I am wanting to say that, that all of reality includes a dimension that is not computable and the two, the two ideologies that reject that are superstition and scientism. So scientism says, basically all there is is computable reality, and superstition says there's that that even the other the kind of the spiritual is able to be manipulated, no one near and understood. So you've got scientism, and superstition as to ways of trying to render the world whole. But I think, therefore excluding a central dimension of reality, which is a truth that is not computable. So yeah, that's what I that's how I would understand wholeness and fullness is you have to include that and I take that from the Bible. I mean, as for me as Christianity, for me, Christianity is the idea that that reality is, is not so there's, I'll say is very quickly sorry. There's kind of broadly three metaphysical positions about ultimate reality, right? Reality is one monism reality is to write the universe is a jewel organized system, or reality is multiple. Right is the pilot monads everything is individual everything is is different. For me Christianity is the idea that the reality is not one. So reality is not one. It's not two, it's not multiple reality is a dialectic it is a one that is not at one with itself. And so we can count out as three, which is the one which is two because it's divided and the divide itself father. Yeah. So So So, you know, that would be higher with describe fullness from a crystal logical perspective.

Kyle 15:38

Yeah, go ahead. That's where we left off at the very end last time with that, seemingly like plot twist towards Trinitarianism. Yes, I

Peter 15:47

liked, I liked your exciting surprise at the party angle. And I want to, I want us to go out a bit.

Kyle 15:52

So I'm glad you just counted it for us. It was so we have the one the you know, the, the Plutonian, whatever, hold oneness oneness. And then we have, but that can't actually be one, there's got to be some division in it. Because of all that stuff you just described. Any hole also includes exceptions. And so if we want to include that as part of the whole, then that's got it, that's two. And then there's a relation between the whole and its exceptions, is that fair. And so that would be the third couldn't we keep like arbitrarily adding to that couldn't we just find ways to insert a fourth and a fifth and get some kind of multiplicity beyond three?

Peter 16:27

What that's why I was a I was a bite to kind of hesitated about the third being the relation between the two. Because for me, the third is simply the not at oneness with the way I would describe it is there's a city in Northern Ireland that is called that's got two names. It's called Derry or Londonderry, depending on whether you're Catholic or Protestant, during the Troubles in Northern Ireland, this was a way actually to, for people to tell whether you were you know, a nationalist or a Unionist, as they would ask you to kneel in the city. And it was always very dangerous because if you said Londonderry to Catholics, you might get in trouble and vice versa. But anyway, the city was called London dairy, or dairy. And in the media, the news presenters would always say, dairy stroke, London dairy, right to try to avoid the problems of dairy struggle on dairy. And then there is a radio host in Belfast who just took out the dairy in Londonderry and just call it stroke setting. So instead of London dairy, or dairy, stripped lung and dairy is called strokes today, right? So it was named by the stroke itself. Now there is one city named in two different ways, and there is the antagonism itself. And for me, that's what the Freudian unconscious is, the unconscious is not a union unconscious, it's not a something. It is that which disturbs the oneness of consciousness. And that's what I mean by Holy Ghost and Father, Son, and Holy Ghost is that you really, you just have the one and the disturbance within the one. And that's why I don't think you can kind of like, go in Infinite Journey with um, yeah.

Randy 18:17

I'm trying to follow with that man. So you have the one and the disturbance of the one. Can you explain that in a Trinitarian way for simpletons like me.

Peter 18:26

And always daxi Claude levy strikes had a brilliant way of describing this, I forgot the assets and structural anthropology. And there was this village. And the village. There was It was organized in a certain way. And there was this anthropologist interviewed the people in the village. And half the people in the village described the mapping of the village that on the inside was the temple on where the people a certain grip were hoist around the temple, and then on the right side was kind of the proletariat. Right? Then the other people in the village, they described the village as being cut in half, with one grip on one side and one grip. On the other hand, what was interesting was, these two descriptions of the Cartography or whatever of the of the village were completely different right? Now, what some anthropologists then did is they said, well, there must be a real cartography, like maybe taking a picture from the air, and then you can see how it's really, really created. But actually, what you really have is you have two different descriptions of the reality that don't map in a dual organizations, not ying and yang. They don't match. They're completely discordant. I could do this with Republicans and Democrats in America, whatever. So a discordant different way of mapping social reality. And the fantasy is that there is a real way of mapping social reality outside the antagonism These two positions. The lucky Indian real is the name for the antagonism itself. The antagonism that's generated from the two different interpretations of reality creates, you'd say an illusion of a third. But but there is no third, there is just the antagonism itself. And the antagonism, as I say is, is what an psychoanalysts we call the real? It's not it's not real, it's not it's, it's, it's, it's the reality of the non wellness of the village with itself. And

Randy 20:31

how does that relate to the Trinity than or to a Trinitarian way of thinking?

Peter 20:34

So for me, the for me, the Trinity comes out of the biblical text, right? It's not in the biblical text. But I actually think it's true to the biblical text. And the Trinity I would say, as a theological attempt to describe the truth of this divided nature of the Absolute, then, then it becomes philosophical with Hegel. And then I would say in it with the enlightenment, you see the Trinitarian notion entering into science as well and scientists various scientific endeavors. So for me, the Trinity is the truth. And this, this comes to the very heart of why I call myself a Christian is, for me, Christianity is a description. It gives a truth concerning the nature of reality, and also a way for us to correctly orient ourselves to that truth. And that truth is expressed, I think, in this notion that reality is not at one with itself. And when you embrace that non oneness within yourself, you identify with Christ who experiences the non at oneness, and you're actually unified in in the disunity. Okay,

Randy 21:46

one more question about in this direction and Allah Kyle have some fun. So I, I would identify as a progressive Christian, and that that isn't so much having to do with the fact that like, I affirm homosexuality, or I'm, you know, with this letter, the other theologically I just mean, I think that reality in the universe is moving towards wholeness and completeness and fullness because of the resurrection of Christ because of new creation that you know, we're moving towards how do we embrace the lack and embrace the nothingness embrace the abyss and meet God there while also moving towards an anticipating a unit? You united in whole future? Does that make sense?

Peter 22:32

Yes, it does. And I'm here to try to convert you going to try to see if your soul I don't know if we're going to be able to do it in this one episode, but let me try. Okay, the seat ready?

Randy 22:43

I'm ready. Okay,

Peter 22:44

ready. Okay. Are you ready? Is your heart open? Yes, I want you to. So I'll give you a few kind of reasons why I'm concerned about progressivism, and then and then we'll kind of draw it out from there. You no one I'm an Apocalypticism. Right. So a progressive is someone who sees as you say, the universe progressing almost like tile hard to shard down to an Amiga point of progression of history. One of the issues for me with progressivism is you kind of knew where it's going, right. So obviously, total guess is the kind of new words cool and I believe, and it's about fighting for that movement forward to progress. Now as an Apocalypticism, Apocalypticism, doesn't know the future. And Apocalypse Assist is someone who all they can do is raise up the antagonisms of the present, eh, bring them to the surface, and on something new will erupt. Now, to use an example. I want to use Northern Ireland as an example. In 1998. The peace process was was came into action called the Good Friday Agreement. And it was an apocalyptic moment. Because what happened is all of the political leaders and all the power millet major paramilitary parties, they had to give up their idea of what the future of Northern Ireland look like. And they had to sit down in a room together and talk together and debate together until something erupted that no one would see my booth care core on Hegel. embrace this idea that, you know, Kierkegaard said, Life has lived forwards but understood backwards. Yes. So you never understand the future. You only understand the past. And Hegel said the oil of Minerva spreads her wings at dusk, which means that philosophy understands the past, but it doesn't understand the future. And I'll give one example of this in terms of just practical in therapy, a good psychoanalysis. If a couple are arguing and they go to analysis to figure out whether to stay together or break up. The analyst doesn't really know the answer, either. The issue is everything comes up all the antagonisms that have been kept beneath beneath the surface, or bubbled up. And the only thing that everybody in Who's the analysts noses, things can't stay the same. They might break up, they might stay together, they might break up with the type of relationship they had whatever but but all you can do is bring the antagonisms up to the surface, and then a new rupture will happen. This is this is Hegel's kind of position and phenomenology of spirit, but it's also Karl Marx's position. Karl Marx's position, with a couple of exceptions, is that is was a critique of capitalism not telling you what the next thing looks like. So there's about five pages on on communism and the whole of Marx's work he was his, his thing was a critique of capitalism, the idea that, that every time just like science fiction, science fiction is not about the future. It's an idealization of the present, right? So whenever you see science fiction, you're really finding out about the present. Marx and Hegel and Kilgore over agree on this, that are fantasies of the future, are idealized dimensions of our present reality. And so the job of the activist is to as an apocalypse assist not knowing, you know, basically what happens after the apocalypse is, your the job is to show the central antagonisms of the present age, and let something else erupt, not even knowing if it's going to be better or worse. So that's one reason but also, progressives generally, take a non Christological look at the text, the biblical text, so like Jesus died, because he stood up against injustice. And, you know, he's he, you know, we should read the red letters of of Christ, and we should try and be good to your neighbor, etc. So they generally worse, conservatives really take it seriously, in a sense, the idea of Christology and whatever I saw an another reason why I'm not progressive as such is because I take a very deep crystal logical understanding of Christianity, I think it is an insight into the nature of reality, and not just a moral guide, but rather an invitation to a different mode of being through the self division. And then of course, I reject the notion of a wholeness and completeness. For me rather, Christianity is a freedom from wholeness and completeness and an ability to embrace darkness, despair, unknowing, and ultimately the absurd. I'll say one final thing, sorry, is that Tertullian? He knows a paraphrase. He didn't quite say this. But you famously said, I believe in the crucifixion of Christ, because it is absurd, right? And the one thing everyone agrees with, is that that's ridiculous, right? So theists don't like it, because Christianity is true, therefore, it's not absurd. And the atheists don't like it, because Christianity is absurd and therefore not true. Right. So what does it mean to say Christianity is true? Because it's absurd. That's what I affirm that that Christianity is a fundamental embrace of the absurd. And, again, this is where I rely on on a certain heretical reading of Kilgore that fifth is the embrace of a radical lock on unknowing and contradiction at the heart of everything. So yes, that's what I would argue we can unpack that as much as you want.

Kyle 28:17

Oh, boy.

Randy 28:20

We could just talk for the next hour about that. Okay.

Kyle 28:23

What is the virtue of that way of viewing it that Christianity is at bottom about embracing the absurd or the lack or the contradiction or whatever, over the conviction of the progressivism, as you've described it? Which I don't understand my own progressivism in that way. progressivism is not futurism. It's not. And I think there's a version of Apocalypticism and a version of progressivism, that guess can marry happily? Yes. I

Peter 28:51

think that's just because you'd like to hear her go or you do want to get her mom. You also want to be progressive. I think eventually. Well,

Kyle 28:57

I also think you might be Miss You might be leaning too hard on the pseudonyms and not hard enough on character guards, actual very Lutheran thought.

Peter 29:05

But anyway, sorry, people,

Kyle 29:08

but but like, what is the virtue of the one because they're both making a claim, right? Yeah. The progressive as you've defined, it, is looking forward to some kind of ethical future where everything is virtuous, and all the problems are eliminated. Why you couldn't also have a cross logical element to that I'm not quite clear, but they're at least looking forward to something that we can define now. And then on your version. We're not looking forward to anything, we're embracing the lack but there is still a position implied there, which is that the lack is primary or it's somehow metaphysically prior or it's, you know, foundation. It's the fount right they both have a foundation one is ethical and forward looking, but one is equally it's still making a claim. So if like I were just the agnostic, just pressing for intellectual humility here I couldn't choose between them. Right? I would have to say they're both making a claim. And the evidential basis for choosing is unclear. So what is it for you that privileges the one over the other? Yeah,

Peter 30:10

so like, I would argue that I don't know if we talked about this in the last episode, but it'd be good to cover it again, if we did. But there is a CS Lewis has a famous argument for the existence of God, did we cover this that is the Argument from Desire, it's actually a scholastic. Yeah, and just for your listeners, it's the idea that I think Augustine had a version of this, there's a few versions of it, but uh, say CS Lewis, was to give a very clear version, that human beings have certain desires, and those desires can be fulfilled, desire for food, for water, for sexual intimacy, for shelter, whatever. And in addition to that, we find ourselves having desire for the eternal, the desire for this dimension beyond the world. And, you know, just in a nutshell, the argument is that, because all of our desires seem to have an object that can fulfill them, it's reasonable for us to think that this desire that we have for something eternal, can also be fulfilled, right. But the issue for me and that is, it fundamentally misses the the key Freudian insight, which is human beings, not only do we have desires that can be fulfilled, and a psychoanalysis they're called demands, not desire, right? We also have a desire for desire itself. And that's called Drive. So the desire for desire itself is ontological, right? It's not contingent means that if you got rid of the desire for desire, you wouldn't get have them write so you no longer desire you retire, you get everything you want you everything you could possibly imagine right, would actually be the death of subjectivity. Because the desire for desire itself is basically a desire for luck for a type of struggle for a type of unknowing for a type of mystery, etc, etc. Now, if this is true, this is just there could make a million argument by just using this argument. If it is true that that also logically speaking, we have a desire for desire itself. Again, this is called Drive in psychoanalysis, we have a desire for desire itself, then fantasizing a world, a complete world, which, I mean, I hate to say it, but it's very new age, I'm very fascist, which I think you age and fascism are very intertwined. You scratch a hippie. I lived in LA for a long time. And the reasons they both, you know, there's a bit also in capitalism, there's a fantasy of the sacrifice of sacrifice. There's the fantasy of getting to a point in which sacrifice itself is sacrificed. And we can sit by the beach and just drink our margaritas and have pure happiness. And what I would argue is that as hell, that that to abolish desire, the desire for desire, in other words, the desire for Locke is fundamentally the death of subjectivity. So for me, yeah, I don't want to drive the home point the point home too much. But it's that, that the idea that there is some fundamental sacrifice and unknowing and complexity is not just I think, philosophically signed, I think it's also true to the ontology of subjectivity, I but I also think it's true of reality itself.

Kyle 33:36

This is really good. I feel like we it would take us 100 conversations to even unpack one of these things. Someday, I want to talk to you about one thing, and we're just gonna get to the bottom of that one. We're gonna set up boundaries and not be able to deviate from one topic,

Randy 33:52

I don't think we can get to this conversation.

Kyle 33:56

Okay, so for me, all of my questions, mostly come back to what is it mean to say that there's negativity or a lack? At the bottom of everything? Can

Peter 34:06

I can I use an example and this in terms of contemporary society very quickly, like, you know, what does this look like? So I make a very important distinction between community and communion. And a community basically is a group who share all sorts of characteristics, beliefs, values, a shared enemy, whatever is positive characteristics. Now in contemporary society, you have two broad positions. You have liberals who associate with the right, and you've liberals who associated with the left are arguments here. So those on the right, advocate for positive universals, truth, justice, Merit facts, so on the right you have people saying things like we live in a meritocracy or we should do right, you know, and institutions should be blind and largely, hopefully are blind and you have things like Fox don't care about your feelings, all of that. So the watchword of the right is a coup. Quality and equality means we all these values of truth and justice are universal positive characteristics enshrined in institutions that that are equally applied to everybody. Then you have the critique of that, which is identity politics, right? So, and the critique of that is the idea that this is actually crypto identitarian ism, that all of these seeming positive universals are actually particular positions that are disguised as a universal, they really privilege some people over others, they benefit some grips over others. So we say the judicial system is blind. But it's not really we say that anybody can be employed in this work environment, but it really only certain people get employed and certain people don't. Right. So and so the watchword there is equity, equity, meaning there is no universal, that is blind everybody. So you have to give different groups different things depending on what they need. You don't have with a say the right it's equality. It's positive universals on its one community, under these positive universals, with with the liberal left, its particularism, you've got multiple communities intersecting with each other and with equity being the value, right? My argument is that the critique of critique, right is where you say no, okay, there is a universal, but the universal is not a positive, the universal is a negativity. Well, we all share in common by being by dint of language and desire is that we are all castrated. There is a type of lack or nothingness that marks all, all, all subjects. Now, at a very basic level, you see this in desire, we were all desiring subjects, which means we all experience Locke, and we all speak, you know, if we could say everything we want to say we wouldn't say anything. He's we're always speaking because in a sense, we can never quite say what we want to say so. And that's communion. So what I'm arguing is Christianity builds a communion, which is a group of people gathered together around a shared loss, a shared lock that they hold in common. And it's a communion because in the Eucharist, it's a meal around the death of God, which is the lock at the heart of everything. So the communion is a liturgy in which people get together not because of shared enemies, shared beliefs, shared values, but because of shared negativity. So that's very practically that would be how I would situate it within the contemporary world.

Kyle 37:36

Okay. I think that was helpful.

Peter 37:40

When I think progressives are the second, by the way, so I would say I think progressives are generally particular. So yeah, anyway, yeah,

Kyle 37:47

sure. Sure, sure. I was once at a conference dinner with Alvin Plantinga. He's famous analytic philosophy. I've read them. I've read a lot. And he, he told this joke, he said, What do you get when you cross a continental philosopher with the mafia, and the punch line was an offer you can't understand? Yeah,

Peter 38:05

I've used that joke myself. I love that joke. And I always thought

Kyle 38:10

it was rich coming from the guy that wrote the nature of necessity, which is famously hard book to get through. But one of the virtues of that kind of writing is that there is a path that any sufficiently intelligent person could, in principle follow to understand the Theses in that book. What is the path that I could follow to understand a sentence like God is nothingness? Because, as hard as I try, it just seems contradictory to me. And I want to distinguish here between a contradiction and a paradox. So there's a there's a version of this claim that I'm very happy with not happy, but um, I think is, I accept it. Yes, I'm, I think it's an important part of reality and of Christianity, in particular. It's the thing that Kierkegaard harped on over and over and over again, and that is the paradoxical nature of the claim that the infinite became finite that God took on human form and then died. And I think that that goes to the point where I'm actually happy and have made the case in print, with the idea that you can be both a Christian and an atheist. That makes sense to me. But it's a different claim to say that Christianity is atheism. Or that at bottom, somehow, almost all the Christians in history have misunderstood what they've been doing, and that the thing that they've been worshiping, was actually nothingness, or actually negation. And somehow all of the great theologians and philosophers and Christian history have missed that fact, with like, you know, a handful of exceptions. So helped me to understand how what you're doing is not just a kind of hubristic dismissal of that entire history. And when you say you're a Christian, worshiping God and And that thing is actually nothing has helped that make sense to me. I

Peter 40:03

do want to dismiss any but I mean, and if you you know, watch my work or engage with it, you'll notice that I never disparage anybody, my God. And that fact I just did a talk two days ago where I talked about, I was critiquing people who critiqued evangelical Christianity and for a variety of reasons, you know, I was holding my colleagues to account and myself to account on that, you know, like that we always have to be deeply sensitive to taking seriously our interlocutors. And also understanding that one's religion and one's work once vocation can be doing multiple jobs at the same time, this is very important to me something that I think analytic philosophy kind of misses, to some extent, is, you know, somebody can rationally believe something like Christianity, but also it provides a function, sometimes propping up the paternal function if there was an issue in childhood, when anyway, so I don't want to disparage anybody, I think whatever position you take in the world, mind you, you're going to find yourself at odds with millions people, right? You know, so I, you know, whatever it is. So, like, I don't know, I hope you're not going to have an open door there. I think that you know, whatever one believes, as I say, through a stone, and you'll, you'll hit someone who disagrees with you. I am a Christian, I see myself very much embedded in the Christian tradition, which puts me at odds with Buddhism and various forms of atheism, a very and millions and millions of other people. So is your question primarily, Heidi, I see myself in relation to Christianity in particular. Yeah,

Kyle 41:36

I would like to hear the answer to that. I would also just like to understand the claim that God, which has, as I understand it, from almost the entirety of Christian history, a pretty well defined nature, and is like, a thing and not a not thing. Yeah. How the sentence, God is nothing. Yeah, can be meaningful. And I don't mean, how it can be useful in my life, how it can have a function, like atheism for length or something like that. But how it's coherent, how it has any truth value, how it how it is different from the sentence for is purple.

Peter 42:14

Yes. Okay. So it can do it a couple of ways. One is I could try to take the traditional definition of God, and see if it can apply to what I'm saying. That's one thing, which I think it can, you know, but I'll start with really basically first, because you're asking also like how to make sense of this idea, that contradiction lies at the heart of everything. So for me, it's actually super simple, much simpler than unreasonable. And not I started in analytic philosophy, interestingly, and I went away from this position is fundamentally simple in that anyone who does psychoanalysis proper, whether they understand these notions, theoretically will undergo the experience. And what I mean by that is, you know, a symptom, the definition of a symptom is a coagulation of a contradiction, that solves a problem and gives a substitute enjoyment. So, for example, somebody will then choose their teeth. And maybe through analysis, they find out that they want to show to their partner, but they're scared that if they showed it their partner, that our partner will leave them. And so how this is manifesting is in clenching their teeth, so they don't show it, or biting your nails, which is a kind of sense of which maybe you want to attack your boss, but you do want to get fired. So you're literally biting your claws, right biting your nails. But you know, we all have these symptoms, and symptoms are fascinating things. So you go to analysis, and you know you with some symptom that's causing you problems. And as you unpack it, you make connections with other contradictions within you, right. So maybe you actually didn't want to show that your siblings or your parents because you're scared that they will show it at you. So you connect this, this current thing with your partner and with your boss with your, your childhood, right, and you start to make all of these interesting, weird connections between things that are happening in your in your life. And on the past night, in therapy, often the idea is to overcome contradiction, ultimately. So mental health generally means there's a free, traumatic subject, and there's a post traumatic subject. And the idea is to adapt you better to your world, to get you to a point where you know, you're better able to be productive in the world or whatever. So analysis isn't therapy as such and psychoanalysis. You keep going deeper and deeper and deeper into deeper and deeper contradictions. And the cure is when for an erotic cure is when you realize that you are a contradiction, that you're full of contradictory desires. That You hear the person that you love, that you that you want to talk and not talk that you're between life and death that you're full of these contradictions. That psychoanalytically is kind of like is, as I say, the cure, the cure is that you instead of always chasing something that would work, you realize nothing works, but also, that the not working is itself enjoyable, the source of enjoyment. Now, very quickly, what Hegel does in his phenomenology of spirit, complex as it is probably one of the most difficult books it's ever been written, but he basically shows that life is a series of attempts to over overcome contradiction. So we can take the main ones, life out of being, consciousness, side of life, self consciousness, out of consciousness, reason, out of self out of self conscious, right? Take those major events in cosmic history, right? Hegel shows that each of these is an attempt to overcome a contradiction. But what happens is actually the contradiction is not overcome. It's just deepened, and deepened, and deepened. And Hegel and this is where I think Kierkegaard misunderstood Hegel, right? He went what Hegel called absolute knowledge was when you come to the realization, that contradiction is what drives reality. But that contradiction, ultimately, and he can call this a sound, Tom, there is a fundamental knot, or contradiction at the heart of everything. And when you come to that fundamental insight, that's a philosophical insight. But in psychoanalysis, it's, it's therapeutic insight. And then in radical theology, it's a liturgical insight.

Kyle 46:52

And it's still an insight that I'm struggling to make sense of, I just wonder if we're equivocating, like, are we just using the same words fundamentally differently here? Because to me, contradiction means something such that a sentence like there's a contradiction at the heart of everything is literally nonsense. So like in the terms of classical logic,

Peter 47:08

in terms of like a square triangle, yes, you're not talking about like a square triangle like

Kyle 47:13

are the psychoanalysts using the term to mean what say an analytic philosopher would call something that like a tension or a, I don't know said insert some kind of synonym that has some positive content? Because clearly it exists in the world, right? There are people as you describe, maybe we're all as you describe, I don't think the evidence supports that but maybe we are and in which case, that entails that there is a real thing that is what we're calling a contradiction, which is just not what most people mean by contradiction.

Peter 47:42

Well, this is why this is why I refer to a you know girdles and completeness theorem is that is just one example. We could also take a very like Hegel's an example. I have a version of Kierkegaard maybe but in girdles and completeness theorem, the contradiction is not a square triangle is not that kind of contradiction. The contradiction is reality is a total system, and an exception that there is a non total liable. So Roger Penrose, the cosmologists, and I'm not talking about Deepak Chopra here. I'm talking about cosmologists, you know, because last time we did talk about how, you know, when you're referring to physics and mathematics, it can go woowoo. But when I talk about girdle, he's one of the greatest mathematicians of the 20th century. And Roger Penrose is one of the greatest living cosmologists and he, when he talks about proto consciousness and I think he should call it proto unconsciousness, right? I think that's right. But But I, you know, he caught he calls proto consciousness is he says that reality generates in its total system, something that is in the system, but not all of it in the world, but not all of it. Now, actually, in psychoanalysis, mental health is about helping you integrate into the world. Psychoanalysis is designed to help you be in the world, but not all of it, to embrace a type of non oneness with the world. And that's the contradiction. I mean, and the reason why it's called contradiction in continental philosophy is because it cannot be formalized. It is an inherent ontological contradiction. It's an it's inherited. It's ontological, you know? Yeah.

Kyle 49:22

So maybe that's the point. And I think I even wrote this down to revisit is ontological versus epistemological. You called it unknowing In our previous episode, but there's other words you could use, because like girdle to me is an epistemological category, because it's about the provability of an axiomatic system. It's not obviously about metaphysics, you could make a case that it has metaphysical implications. I'm open to that case, but like what he was doing is showing that in a well defined axiomatic system, there will be statements that are both true and unprovable, and that's fine.

Peter 49:54

It's not epistemological, because it's not that but it's in principle doable in the future. It's inherently unknowable it's like a quantum mechanics where there is in the

Kyle 50:03

domain ality of proving an axiomatic system, which is not religion, which is not, you know, psychology, and it's not human meaning. It's it's within a very specific domain. And it's still, it's still an open position to affirm that and to then also affirm some kind of metaphysical or maybe better some kind of epistemological progressivism, as we've understood progressivism, which says that human knowledge is ever increasing. And even though there might be these kinds of axiomatic limitations on it, that doesn't mean we're going to like reach a point where we can't go any further or the or that, at bottom. Knowledge has a limit

Peter 50:44

you will do? Well, first of all, absolutely. Right. I am obsessed with watching YouTube videos about stuff that I don't know, right? I am not making a claim that I can't do more. And, you know, human beings count no more. Absolutely not. There's, there's an infinite sea of things that that, you know, we don't know yet. And we can know that. But the claim is ontological and this is where I think girdle is making an ontological claim is that can

Randy 51:09

you pause for a second Pete? What do you mean when you say the claim is ontological? Can you explain that?

Peter 51:13

Oh, yeah. So in Altova, epistemological, unknowing, right in kind of epistemological, epistemological humility. Let's call it epistemological humility. That's the idea that there are things that I don't know. There's things and it could be personal humility, right. There's things that I, as Peter Rollins don't know. And it can also be, you know, globally, right. There's things that we don't know. But it's still newable. Right? It's an it's in principle, these things are knowable, and hidden, you kind of like even if, even if it's a regulative principle, and we'll never get there. And hypothetically, you're moving towards, like what you mentioned earlier, Anamika point a point where, if you have an infinite mind, be like God couldn't do everything, right. God like so if you if you were good, you could know everything right? That's epistemological humility to say, I am not God, I don't have the mind of God. ontological unknowing, is where you say that there is an unknowing in the heart of reality itself, which means that the universe is non deterministic. At its core, there is a non deterministic dimension. There is I mean, interestingly, the arguments for the existence of God go into this is that if you think about, you know, the idea of a first cause the column argument, which is one of the weakest areas reduces the category. What was that

Kyle 52:34

you just made some of our listeners angry?

Peter 52:36

What was that right? Oh, yeah. No, I mean, if you want a good cosmological argument, I mean, Aquinas, you know, Aristotle's argument is so much better. Anyway, he's such a, it's such a stronger cosmological argument, I think. But But But the funny thing is, I think what the kalam argument does is it gives us a real insight into the nature of language, right? So you have an achievement, and you go, like at the beginning of the chi, and there is a non uncaused, cause. And then everything, everything is determined from there. But the one thing that's not determined is the uncaused. Cause, right? That's the so there is kind of one exception to the infinite web and the infinite chi and I in linguistics is similar. There's what's called a master signifier, which is language, the first word in language isn't the word. Because language requires two words. Language is differential, right? So you can't have language with one word you can't have without dying, right? So language begins with two words. So the first word doesn't have any meaning until the second word comes in. And then the second word retroactively interprets the first word. So now you're in the realm of language, why would unpack that is to say that there is a dimension in there's deterministic reality Reality is deterministic, but there is bubbling within the deterministic universe, a non deterministic core. So ontological unknowing, is saying, basically, that there is something that God doesn't know. If God you know, they, they because it's unknowable. It's only probabilistic ontological unknowing, is the idea that there is an unknowing that is an inherent part of nature itself. How

Kyle 54:13

do we get from that, which seems to me like a kind of pre theoretical commitment. I don't want to call it an accident axiom. But it's like, you guys are going to have strict however, the evidence on the ground shakes out I'm going to interpret it according to this commitment, which is that there's an unknowing, but the step to saying it's probabilistic seems to me an unjustified step, or maybe a step that needs some justification, right? Because probabilistic means a specific thing that is different from just saying it's unknowing at the bottom or there's some kind of limitation on our ability to know or whatever. So

Peter 54:47

I would say it's the opposite. And I think you're saying we need to dumb it down a little bit. So I'll try. First of all, I'll make one philosophical point and then we'll, you know, Hegel's funnel terminology of spirit is the exact opposite of this is he tries to show that you can start anywhere, and you will get to this point. So he starts with consciousness of subject and object. So a very basic, a basic experience that I am a subject I experienced objects in the world, and then the phenomenal phenomenology of Spirit starts there and takes you on a journey throughout the history of the universe, to the point where of absolute knowledge, that's kind of the Hagos, whatever. Now, I'll give a concrete example of what I mean by this in terms of Christianity, I would argue, as we can be, that, that in Christianity, if you imagine Christianity is one of those choose your own adventure books, you turn to page 20. And it says Johnny's in a prayer meeting, and he's praying to God, and then he realizes, I think all of this is crap. Should Johnny leave the church, turn to page 20? Or stay in the represses diets and keep going? What I would argue is that, that yes, the people who leave when cream Christiane, it seems rubbish, right? They just, they just get in there sounds good. You know, whether it's to say sexual enlightenment, psychedelic enlightenment, commodity satisfaction, there's all these are soft schools that do the same thing. What I argue is that Christianity is an escape room that you can only get out of by going all the way in. And what I mean by that is, the people who follow my work, most of them are come from the Christian thing. And they're not the people who didn't take it seriously. They're the people who destroyed the record collections there that went before they were all on phones, either the people who gave all their money to the church became missionaries. And the other the idea is that you go all the way in, and then you experience from within Christianity, and alienation, oh, my God, my God, why have You forsaken Me from within it. And when you experienced that crucifixion moments, that moment where you experienced this fundamental failure, that is the success of Christianity, that is the moment when you identify with Christ crucified, and that's where resurrection occurs. So, for me, it's not that you start by presupposing, that everything is contradictory. Nobody does that. It's the most philosophically and common sensical ly crazy thing to think, you know, one starts there, I didn't start there. My goodness, you start by trying to overcome contradiction, you start by always trying to overcome, overcome, overcome. And this brings you into evermore complex places. And I would argue until you actually encounter Christ crucified until you identify with the one who lost their identity. And in that identity with the one who lost all identity. That's the Salvatore event. And I'll say it in one one other way, very quickly, on a very practical level, is that one of one of the things we suffer from is as human beings is, there's the God of prohibition from the past, right? This isn't the past where there is this idea of, you know, life's a bit shit. And it's a bit shit for all of us. But you have to just get on with it, right. And that's the God of kind of prohibition. And as feudalism, and there is some lowered, he's has it all, but we don't have it all. Now, actually, for all of the terribleness of it, at least we're all in it together, right? We live today. psychoanalytically. And the God is the God of the demand to enjoy. So as the theological world we live in, which is constantly we're surrounded by this idea that we're not frustrated well, that everyone around us isn't castrated, that we can be all that we can be that we can be happy have loads of sacks of loads of friends to super cool, a conjunction is no longer oh, you should be nicer to your mom. But why aren't you more? Why don't you have more fun, you know, like, so it's the super ego and junction of Enjoy, enjoy, enjoy. Night for me in Christianity? The answer is what's the answer to that? Well, the false answer is, of course, because this creates anxiety, right? The more you have to enjoy the more social fragmentation, the more jealousy you are the people around you, the more anxious you are, because it's not working for you. And so you're always tempted to go back to conservative values. So a lot of progressives end up going back to conservative churches, for things like to have sex, right? It's very hard for progressives to have sex right in LA, there's, you want to go to Hillsong you want to kind of like have these structures of prohibition. So in America, they invented a technology to help young people have sex like this thing called a purity ring, where you wore I worry that you said I'm not gonna have sex, which then made sex sexy again, and you know, so people with purity ring statistically have more sex and people who don't. So you have to have these prohibitions in order to kind of create desire and all blahdy blahdy blah, anyway, but the answer for me on this is the Christian answer is it's not that some of us are castrated, but God doesn't right the earlier we were orchestrated except for God. but it's not that nobody's frustrated. That's only a contingent thing you can be non distributed. The answer is we're all frustrated, including God, right, including the absolute. And what that means is, you realize in yourself, that that no matter how good your life is, to be human is to be Riven with, with desire, and with unknowing. And as part of that very wound of being. And that that is in all possible worlds, to us a little bit of analytic philosophy is that you have to not only think that your present life is rich, and you have to realize all possible worlds are Riven with contradiction. And then in that you identify with Christ, who was experienced God is contradiction. And in that you're free not to be happy, you're freed from happiness. The Church gives you the space where you're freed, not to pursue what will make you whole and complete, but where you're finally freed from the pursuit of what will make you whole and complete. I hear an amen.

Kyle 1:01:01

You hear what the hell maybe just a really selective reading of Christ's life to say that he experienced God as a negation. I mean, it's true. He said that from the cross. There's something deeply important about that in Christian theology, but it's against a backdrop of a unity a prior primary unity with God, that we are all striving for within Christianity to get back to Randy's question, I mean, this, this is heading to wholeness and unity, or it isn't historic Christianity. And, um, here's, here's

Peter 1:01:31

the, here's a way of reading, like, I'm interested in, if you tick, which I think the historical Jesus stuff brings you here, right? And this is not like, I'm not as interesting. I'm very Christological. So I'm very interested in Christology but, but if you were taking historical Jesus looking this and if you were to say controversial as it is, if you were to say that the central kind of message of Jesus is to love your enemy, and love your neighbor, right? And if then you take love, as in the psychoanalytic notion that to love someone is to embrace not what is the see him about them, right with us last, you know, the guy like people here the same as me, but to love is to embrace the dimension of otherness within the other, right, so To love is to open yourself up to the torrent that is the other in their otherness, then I think you can connect Christology, and my Christology is that we embrace a fundamental, unknowing, in reality with with Jesus, who is saying that we have to embrace the unknown, and unknowing dusting of the author. So I do think you can link those two together. Yeah.

Kyle 1:02:45

I don't like that either. I don't know if I have time to explain why that seems like Randy is itching to say something. No,

Randy 1:02:53

no, I mean, I'm hearing a lot of when I try to interpret and make sense of what you're saying, Pete, I think of the Incarnation in the we could say paradox or contradiction of the Divine becoming human in God embracing limitations, and God embracing lack of experience in the Divine, perhaps, and maybe that's forever melded into the experience of God. Now, that's what that's where I'm trying to integrate it is, is this helping me make sense of incarnational Christianity, in

Peter 1:03:24

terms of what and this is where maybe we are together, one of the things we may we may be together made up a little, it's funny because you guys are more prone to epistemological humility, epistemological annoyed, which, by the way, is a difference between Kant and Hegel. Count is epistemological, I was

Kyle 1:03:41

just about to ask you about Khan. So I'm glad you brought that up. How is this not just maybe you think Kant was wrong? I don't know. But the whole it seems to me the claim that you're making is a metaphysical claim, which is, maybe you're totally comfortable with that. I'm not as familiar with Hegel as I am with Conte. My understanding is that Hegel got caught wrong in some significant ways. Which is a view I inherit from my teachers. So that may be wrong. But the the argument Kant makes about the inaccessibility of the noumenal world seems to leave us in a position of, like, the best we can strive for is a kind of intellectual humility. When it comes to concepts like is there a fundamental contradiction, or a fundamental, I don't know, positivity of being in the universe, like, like his whole intent, and the thing I think is really really useful to this because you can, you can totally construct seemingly sound arguments in both directions for any kind of claim like that. Yeah, and that's that seems compelling to me always has and so

Peter 1:04:48

yeah, this is and this Yeah, okay, brilliant. I'm glad to go because I was gonna bring the intended result because um, this is really where analytic and continental philosophy part right they part accounts, right. So Allah Lincoln Continental philosophy basically read everybody the same opposite account. And then after accounts, read the Continentals take Hegel seriously and most analytic stuff. There's a couple of analytic philosophers who read Hegel. But you know, but in general, analytic philosophy was born out of a rejection of Hegel. Think of people like obviously Russell Frager, all of that. So and even, you know, logical positivism, etcetera, cetera. But so here's the, here's the claim. Here's the difference between Kant and Hegel in a nutshell is because Hegel is accounting in in a sense, but he turns count up to 11. Right? The whole point is he, he critiques can't buy from a, from a Herculean position taking count, even more seriously than count, right? So count shows that reason, pure reason brings you to antinomies. And the intended these are things like God exists, God doesn't exist, the world is infinitely divisible to the universe is not infinitely divisible as a beginner and couple more, right. So the world has a beginning, the universe doesn't have a beginning, right? These aren't enemies. Now, what he's gonna have to show why he does, what Hegel does is he'll goes, Yes, and this is exactly what I'm doing with girdle is, is Hegel says, yeah, the problem here is, Kant thinks that because pure reason brings you to antinomies. It hasn't got had an insight into ultimate reality. And Hegel says, The antinomies is an insight into fundamental reality.

Randy 1:06:31

What's intended me

Kyle 1:06:33

contradiction, sort of it's not. Yeah, it's just the recognition that there are basic facts about the world not facts, there are basic disagreements, I suppose about fundamental reality that that all of human reason and evidence can't answer for you, because you can use it to construct opposed conclusions about those things. So for Kant, this implies, or actually was just kind of an outworking of his prior system. But like, it implies that the thing the world as it exists really in itself is unapproachable. To us. It's like not something we have any kind of rational access to all we have access to is the appearances. How things seem to us. And so everything we can describe down to fundamental physics is about appearances of things. Yeah.

Peter 1:07:21

And then what Hegel does is he ontologies is that where he says, you know, this, this unknowing, so like one example, she's like, use this, but he borrows it from somebody else's. You imagine a computer game that you're playing, and you go into your room that the computer programmer never expected you to go into? And so you kind of go into this weird, fuzzy thing, right? The ideas? Oh, well, do you know, do you know? Mitch? Hedberg? Whatever.

Kyle 1:07:51

This comedian, yeah, the

Peter 1:07:53

comedian. Yeah, he is. He has a great joke, but he says, he's like, in a stone kind of way. He says, he says, Have you ever noticed that all the photos of Bigfoot are blurry? And go like, Yeah, always blurry. And then he says, Listen, this really freaks me It says, What if Bigfoot is blurry? That's basically what he does. But he says, you know, we get whenever we push pure reason to ultimate form, we get blurriness or antinomies. Right. Y'all it is blurry. Yeah, that's fine.

Kyle 1:08:27

I did not expect Mitch Hedberg to come up in this session. That's wonderful. That's fantastic. Have you ever read Charles purse? Oh,

Peter 1:08:35

a long time ago, and only a small amount.

Kyle 1:08:38

So most of our homework will be I will go read some Hegel, you will go read some purse, we will come back together. Okay, perfect. Person is my favorite philosopher, the father of American pragmatism. And he has this famous quote, maybe you could consider this. Like a there's like a person axiom. And like maybe a galleon axiom. I don't know if that's a fair way to put it. But like, he says, there's a motto which deserves to be inscribed upon every wall of the city of philosophy. And that motto is do not block the way of inquiry. And he thinks that that has happened a lot. And to me, if we're not starting with that, because we have a desire to learn, and that's why we're getting into philosophy, right? We have a desire to examine ourselves in the Socratic sense. And if, if we're constructing along the path barriers to continue in that process, then we're giving up on the project. And it seems to me that some of the stuff you're describing is that kind of barrier, but maybe it's just because I'm misunderstanding it. No,

Peter 1:09:43

no, you're obviously right. No, I like I'm very unapologetically making a claim that we can have insight into ultimate reality, absolute unapologetically. And that's why I'm not I started off as a post structuralist, my PhD was in post structuralism right and But but I'm very much Hickey Lee and lucky and Ian, but I will say this I actually think that it's a pretty unavoidable. So you basically, if if you've got, you know, a variety of positions on negotiation, right either we don't know stuff, but we can do it like, like the whole he Galeon thing was that Kant was actually pretending to be. He was pretending to be humble, but he actually wasn't humble because he said the in itself is inaccessible. That is a claim. You know, it's like, it's so he goes, goes like

Kyle 1:10:33

he did his project to be an exercise in humility, like it entails some humility about metaphysics, but it's not itself, an attempt at humility, he thought it was just the rational outworking of the cognitive structure of rational beings. So but

Peter 1:10:47

but the in itself is obviously the barrier, you know, but but it is a positive claim, there's a, there's a limit to we've got the transcendental categories, and we you know, these are, these are limits, etc, etc. But he so, but my point being is like, so you've got count, you've got something like, let's take Derrida, Derrida is the idea that there is a constant openness within language to eternally eternal meaning. So whenever we talk about democracy, there is always a way to reinterpret democracy or hospitality or justice. So there's, there's the nature of language is an openness to eschatological future and unknown future, right, there's that, then there's the lucky Indian idea that the luck is the name for subjectivity that the unconscious is. So the lack is not something that you can't know. It's not some just some openness always to the future. But it is actually something in operation in your being. These are all positions. I just take the third.

Kyle 1:11:55

And the thing that maybe annoys me the most about a gala, is insisting that there is a third when there doesn't always need to be. Yes. It's kind of like the old joke about Freud. You know, sometimes it's just a damn cigar. Sometimes it really is just a binary. That's

Peter 1:12:11

true. You know, you don't want it straight. And even Hegel said, like Hegel was like, that don't turn dialectics into a dogma, like, if you don't find a dialectic, don't assume it's there. Right? And your is true that some people I'm a dialectician. And I would have a tendency to always look for a dialectical dimension. But the bots to be true, it's just like a psychoanalysis which I'm obviously I'm very influenced by psychoanalysis. You can do all the theory, but someone like beyond Winnicott, they say, this and lecan as well, when you go into the room with the analyzer, and you have to lie, anything to happen, don't allow the theory to dictate what happens in the clinic. So you're absolutely right, as that, that when I when I hit reality, I have to be careful not to see everything as a dialectic, Neil because I have

Kyle 1:13:05

virtual humility as a foundational principle.

Peter 1:13:10

When I talk about ontological humility, it's not that I'm saying as opposed to personal logical, like, I do want to say like, Oh, I know everything about it. I don't know anything about anything. So it's not a it's just whether there is a dimension to reality that is inherently non deterministic. Right? And and you could say, we don't know, we could say knew, or we could say yes, and those are all legitimate positions.

Kyle 1:13:36

There's so much more to dig into here. Man, I don't see non determinism as the thing that you're aiming at. It may be involved but it's in determinism is different from like, isn't saying there's negation or contradiction. That's a kind of determinism in the sense that it is a determinative property of the universe. It's not in determinism, which is a no no, because because

Peter 1:13:58

it's not, it's technically the nothing is is not something and this has been Lacan used it in terms of in the library system catalog where you can go into your library and the books have no gap in them. But when you look at the cards, you can see maybe a book is missing, right? So it's in the symbolic the real is in the symbolic the real isn't in isn't in the in physical reality, although I would argue it is. So non determinism. What I would argue is that basically that's exactly what I'm arguing about is that this this idea of luck or nothing, or in determinism is saying that there is a reality is not fully computable now, if an infinite mind can know everything can know where all things will be we're all all things are going on know everything. If an infinite mind can know all then the universe is in theory, or in practice. It is determined monistic if an infinite mind still doesn't know with exact accuracy, this the position and the speed of a subatomic particle, then there is a dimension of reality that is non computable. That's what I'm arguing for. Yeah.

Randy 1:15:18

Let's, let's let that sit there.

Kyle 1:15:20

Okay. All right. I'm gonna ask I'll hold it in. Yeah.

Randy 1:15:22

I'm gonna ask a really boring question. I'm sorry to dumb this down, Peter. But, um, you grew up in Belfast during the troubles. And you even hinted at what happened in 1998. A new vision of the future possibly, you know, being created together. But I'm interested in two questions. One, what was it like to grow up in in Belfast during the troubles. And we in the states live in a very fractured, bitter partisan world where it almost feels not, not nearly close to Catholic and Protestant in Northern Ireland. But it feels like this. There's bitterness and divide and division and partisanship is just growing and growing and growing. And something's gonna break like January 6, kind of. And I'm interested to know, do you see any parallels between the Troubles in Northern Ireland reality and what we find in the States right now?

Peter 1:16:14

Yeah, I mean, some people have said that, that Northern Ireland is where identity politics became weaponized, that we actually, because, you know, between Catholic and Protestant and all of this, that, that actually this the troubles the 30 year war was a conflict of about identity, or it was dressed up in that way. And that ultimately, we almost destroyed, the player through the whole country was almost destroyed, we got to a certain point where we had to sit down and try to work things out. And realize, you know, this is where the big my personal journey and my philosophical journey kind of intertwine in the, we realize that, that we were unified, not necessary, not in terms of identity, but in terms of shared trauma, which is shared luck, and that we could find some way to, to, to come together with that, and, and try to work things out without knowing what the future looks like. So I love America, I lived in America for 12 years, 15 years, I'm probably going to move back at some point. And because I do I love Ireland, and I love America. I love the west coast. But yes, I saw a lot of conflict that reminded me of my youth. Definitely, when I was living in LA, there are certain things I saw on the streets. That completely brought me back to Belfast. And so I would like to do more work. On trying to bring some of the ideas from the peace process in Northern Ireland, to a wider into wider political conversations as part of the work that I want to do in the next 10 years. Mostly what I want to do, but as is create these liturgies of luck, but that is connected to trying to help people who are very different in terms of their identities. So AAA is a good example in AAA, there's people who are rich and poor conservatives and Republicans and Democrats and all of that. But they come together through a shared particular trauma, the trauma of their alcohol. And weirdly, they unify around this space of pure grace, where they accept each other without judgment, they hear each other say, I'm an alcoholic. And they all nods, and we're alcoholics as well. And there is a social bond that is formed through a shared negotiation, a shared trauma. This social bond is fragmented in contemporary society for numbers. As I mentioned, there's a great book by Todd Mackay and called the end of dissatisfaction which I think is very, very good. But it explores the fragmentation of the social bond, and it was written 20 years ago. I want to see how we can harbor social bonds based on as I say, not some identity because you know, what, that is fragmenting in a huge way but somehow create a social bond. Orion shared a shared loss. So anyway, that's a sort of waffling ya know, I want us to get into theory again, because then we'll start arguing and we'll never get

Kyle 1:19:28

off. That's fine. Can ask two more questions. Just one serious and one less serious following on that. I was gonna I think I've

Peter 1:19:35

ruined your podcast. I don't think anyone's gonna

Randy 1:19:40

you're just gonna be like, can you gotta continue that conversation? Yeah.

Kyle 1:19:43

So following on what you just said, I was gonna ask you anyway about ethical boundaries, because it came up in our last conversation. And so in this in the sense of when you're doing this thing to the people, for the people But you do kind of Grudem restate

Randy 1:20:02

statement of when I disillusion you and yeah, you're nosy Yes. Related to that, again. Are you gonna have will be illusioned? Again? Yes. What are

Kyle 1:20:11

is connected to what you're just describing as this, this vision of having a community built around a shared loss. But what are like the ethical limitations on sharing that vision with people? I'm gonna give you just an example. And I'm not this isn't an accusation at all I recognize it's in thought that you're drawing from, but you've used castration a lot as a metaphor, which is obviously sexist, or it has some sexist implications, and like, you know, Freud and women as a whole fraught thing. And you're, and you're using that as a metaphor for like a deep truth about reality, and it has obvious gender implications. And so when we're when we're carrying ideas like this into a very practical context, where we're trying to help people think about their Christian practice, and their whole orientation to the world. How do you set limits on doing good for people or protecting from harm?

Peter 1:21:06

So first of all, I am very wary of using those big words. Sexism, reassigned? very wary of that I knew in America, those words are commonly used. So I want to back I want to say just publicly and whatever, like I've, those words are words I use very sparingly and carefully. The psychoanalytic discourse has castration is a term that is a technical term used by in a discipline that is predominantly I think there's more women in in that tradition than man so you know, like a like a Suppan checks what is sex for example, you know, but I, you could Julia Kristeva, you could talk about this Eric array or whatever. So, you know, I want to I want to be careful. I want to I'd want to pull back from I know, castration is not a, as a technical term within a psychoanalytic theoretical discourse. Just be wary of kind of like, just saying, Oh, it's sexist, or whatever. But so that's one thing. Then what was the other bit? Yeah,

Kyle 1:22:15

that was really just an example of, it seems like we're we're bringing these ideas into a practical context. And these ideas have some potentially harmful implications depending on how they're applied. And so how, how do you set for your, for your own endeavors? How do you set how do you guide yourself towards the good of the people you're trying to give this to?

Peter 1:22:38

Yes, but this is my ethical position. Like I'm fundamentally think that people who promise wholeness, completeness, fulfillment, whether it's capitalism, whether it's Christianity, whether it's the new age, whether it's psychedelic enlightenment as their sexual liberation, I think that that's profoundly damaging, profoundly dangerous, I think it leads to depression, melancholy, lots of the modern symptoms of the Eh, I'm fundamentally believe that creating a space where we can be freed from the pursuits of wholeness and fulfillment, and we can embrace our unknowing, our lack, where we can encounter each other in our unknowing and in that dimension of struggle, that that is fundamentally healthy, that it helps people profoundly I'm committed to psychoanalysis. I actually do psychoanalysis actually, as an I'm in psychoanalysis. And I take psychoanalytic ideas, and I apply them. Because for ethical reasons, this is again, I am against most mental health ideas, I'm against the idea that we should try to make people more productive, seize the day, kind of accomplish more, be more be all they can be all of that. I'm very much want to help people develop a curiosity with their own unconscious, to come to know their own defense mechanisms and come to a place where I think they can can live better. So we're all trying to be after like, we're all trying to do the good. But that's what I think the good is. And if I think the code is something else, then I'll move into something else. But But yes, I do. I do this work because I genuinely believe that we live in a society where we look at other people who seem to have the thing. We're constantly told that we should be more, do more, seize the day, optimize. We're constantly even tool that if we're going to do something recreational we do it so we can be more productive, etc, etc. And I am just, I just believe that that is damaging and dangerous.

Kyle 1:24:44

That's helpful. Thank you. Yeah. Last question. Maybe the most important one have asked what do you think about the movie The Big Lebowski?

Peter 1:24:50

Oh, I saw that you mentioned I love The Big Lebowski. I remember it but it's been it's been so long since I've seen it. That's it. I would like you to kind of tell me what, what what your association is this conversation or something. But I'd like to hear what,

Kyle 1:25:08

what made me think of that was your comment. And our last conversation was that I think you're talking about your experience and Li but you said something like, you can't even do drugs anymore without having it mean something. And to me the dude, you know, The Big Lebowski is like the antithesis of that to us a hug alien. He's, he's just existing. And he does drugs, and it doesn't mean anything. And there's a kind of heavy divides he bought. Right. And there's a heroism and implied heroism in that. And it seems like very much up your alley, the whole ethos. Yeah. So that's

Peter 1:25:44

that that connection? I love. So yeah, I think there's something really good there. Thank you.

Randy 1:25:49

Fun. Well, Peter Rollins, thank you for just opening up and trying in engaging this conversation with us. It's been fascinating, really fun, really challenging. And we'd love to have you on again, to just process some more about this stuff, Brady,

Peter 1:26:05

and listen, I really appreciate being a guest on the show. And I love this back and forth. Let's have more about so thank you. Awesome.

Randy 1:26:11

Thank you, Pete. Thanks for listening to A Pastor and a Philosopher Walk into a Bar. We hope you're enjoying these conversations. Help us continue to create compelling content and reach a wider audience by supporting us at patreon.com/apastorandaphilosopher, where you can get bonus content, extra perks, and a general feeling of being a good person.

Kyle 1:26:41

Also, please rate and review the show in Apple, Spotify or wherever you listen. These help new people discover the show and we may even read your review in a future episode.

Randy 1:26:49

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Kyle 1:26:57

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Randy 1:27:06

See you next time.

Kyle 1:27:06

Cheers!

A Pastor and a Philosopher Walk into a Bar

Making Sense of Negative Theology: Peter Rollins, Part 2

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