AS229: No Straw Men Allowed

Transcript

This transcript was generated automatically and may contain errors — the audio is the record.

0:00:31 Thomas: Hello and welcome to Atheistically Speaking. I'm your host Thomas Smith. This is episode 229. Lots of fun topics for you today, but before I get to that, I would like to say I went on the show called Inciting Incident today. It was a fun little interview. If anyone wants to get more of me, feel free to check that out. It is a live show, but I'm sure it goes up somewhere if you just Google Inciting incident. So, thanks to those guys for having me on their show. While I'm on announcements real quick, I'll say that iTunes review is 259. Thank you guys so much, every single one of you, I really appreciate it. If you can't support the show any other way, at the very least, pop into iTunes, write a review, click 5 stars, really helps the show get discovered.

0:01:19 Thomas: Thank You very much. Well, now I think it's time to hit that old tomentary music.

0:01:32 Thomas: First things first, I want to talk about something that came out of the last episode about GMOs. So that was a great discussion. It inspired a ton of comments. I thank you guys for sounding off, for emailing me, for commenting. I love that. It's a contentious issue. It was well received. I know for some reason a lot of people started off the episode thinking it was going to be one thing and then it turned out to be another. I'm not sure what that that was about, but I got more than one comment saying like, "Oh, what's going on?" And later on, they said, "Oh no, nevermind. It was fine." So who knows? I don't know what kind of preconceived notions are going on there. One, first thing I can say, it's kind of exciting, I got Kevin Folta to come on the show. So, a lot of people talked about that, actually.

0:02:18 Thomas: A lot of said he's not a spokesperson for Monsanto. I don't precisely remember how Derek characterized him, but long story short, he is not a spokesperson for Monsanto, like Derek sort of said. He's actually just a scientist, just in charge of the horticulture department at University of Florida. So I got him on the the show. He's a really cool guy. I can't wait to give you guys that interview. And that'll go further and deeper into this topic. And it's a Really Awesome Interview. I actually already recorded it. So look forward to that. It'll answer a lot more questions, I think, and it gets even more technical. So thanks to Derek for recommending Kevin Folta. And most of all, thanks to Dr. Kevin Folta for agreeing to come on the show!

0:03:05 Thomas: So that's the first thing to announce. Secondly, related to to that GMO episode, I need to go more into a certain topic. I sort of let something slide that I guess I didn't know enough about, and I apologize for that. It wasn't a topic I knew was going to come up, but Derek brought up the antibiotic use in cattle, and I simply wasn't well equipped to deal with that because I had no idea about the arguments. I just, he sort of set up a straw man and I certainly, I'm not putting it on him. I definitely bit on that straw man. And I thought, oh, that's ridiculous that people would think, you know, we would be getting these toxins or something from eating cattle that have taken certain drugs or taken, have been given certain drugs.

0:03:53 Thomas: So I certainly perpetuated that strawman and I want to apologize for that because as listeners have pointed out, the concern with antibiotics in cattle is that we're administering so many that we are actually helping create superbugs that are immune to antibiotics. So I'm going to go a bit more in depth in that. I thank you guys for pointing that out. I did more research and I just want to tell you what I found. So we shouldn't, or at least I shouldn't have, and I don't think we should, write off the antibiotic concerns with cattle as pseudoscience or anti-scientific claims. I really apologize for doing that because I don't think they are. Now, with the caveat that this is incredibly contentious because this, you guys know this, I mean, you research, if you want to find 400,000 articles that say antibiotics are fine in cattle, you can.

0:04:46 Thomas: Can. If you want to find 400,000 articles that say antibiotics are the devil and we're actually going to die immediately because of them, you can. It's really difficult, but I've Googled around, I've done quite a bit of research on it today and reading, and from what I can gather, it seems to be a legitimate concern. And there's definitely concern that it's not necessarily 100% non-controversial, of course, but in all likelihood, so something like 80% or 70% of all antibiotics being used currently are in cattle. So let me back up.

The main problem, as you guys probably know, is that there is such a thing known as super bugs, and there, I know it's a bit of a Fear-mongering kind of name or or or an alarming sounding name, super bug, and all that sounds really bad and it's gonna, we're gonna die and all that, but it's kind of true, and it just simply evolution. You guys probably already know this. It's when we develop any sort of uh treatment, uh, antibiotic, or or a good example I talked to Kevin Folta about, I won't mention too much because you'll hear it in the next episodes, is Roundup. So that's a good sample everybody knows.

When you develop something like that, yes, it kills most everything, but then if you keep using it and using it, chances are there will be some mutation that allows whatever you're targeting to be able to to survive through it, and then if you're really pessimistic, that means you're screwed and you're going to die.

0:06:28 Thomas: Probably not, but it is a problem, and it's certainly a problem with antibiotics, and the area of concern is that doctors are over-prescribing them. We shouldn't be using them willy-nilly. The solution seems to be really limit our use as best we can. Well, somewhere along the line, someone realized, wait a minute, 70%, as I said earlier, 70% of all the antibiotics we're using are used on livestock. So, how is this going to contribute? And the reason they're used on the livestock, well, the The reason they should be used is, and this is where it gets a little interesting, is to prevent disease because they live in, you know, very close quarters, and I think this was the angle Derek was coming from, these antibiotics are necessary to fight disease among close quartered, you know, disgusting animals.

0:07:18 Thomas: Pretty much. And that already has concerns of its own. I mean, if we're having to shoot these animals full of drugs to put them in conditions that are really terrible just to have them be able to survive, that's already pretty questionable. I mean, I could come down either way on that. I think Derek certainly came down on the side of, you know, it's worth it and it's necessary for human, you know, survival and for human food production that we do this. And so it's okay.

So that's a different debate, more debatable question. But even if you grant that, what people found, what farmers found when they used these antibiotics for legitimate reasons is that all of a sudden they, the cows, and this is something that I thought was just a conspiracy theory, but it's actually not, so the antibiotics, from the best they can figure, it does something, interferes with somehow the, you know, flora and fauna of the cow's stomachs and digestion system so that when you give them these antibiotics in non-therapeutic doses, so this isn't for curing, you know, some sort of infection or preventing infection. This is, we're going to give you a little bit of this antibiotic every day, every single day. It's less than a dose, but it's enough to have this effect. That's going to cause the animal to be fatter. It's basically, it's actually really good for the economics of food production because it gives you more meat for less input, basically.

So for whatever unit of grain you give the cow, it actually vastly increases the amount of meat you get out of that grain, which on paper, obviously that sounds great. If there was some easy way to do that and there were no consequences, that would be a good thing because we would be producing more food for less resources.

0:09:08 Thomas: So ignoring everything else, that Would be good. But the problem is now we're giving all these cattle, all these cows, a dose, a non-therapy dose of a single day and combine that with this superbug problem and people are very worried. I haven't seen, like I said, that it is a hundred percent proven that it contributes to superbugs that would have, you know, affect humans. I've seen a lot of people suspect that. I have seen the World Organization for Animal Health has said that. Who knows with these organizations, it could be like, you know, the Family Council or something. It could be like some, you know, very sinisterly named thing where it disguises the purpose. But Pew Charitable Trust have stated hundreds of scientific studies conducted over four decades demonstrate that feeding low doses of antibiotics to livestock breeds antibiotic resistant superbugs that can infect people.

0:10:09 Thomas: The FDA, the Department of Agriculture, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention all testified before Congress that there is a definitive link between between the routine non-therapeutic use of antibiotics in food animal production and the challenge of antibiotic resistance in humans. So that does, just reading that, that makes it sound pretty certain, right? Well, then I read other sources that say, "Well, there wasn't actually a confirmed," so that's, that's what gets tough. And I, I could try to dig more and more and more and more and more into it. But what I may do is, is try to find an expert to help me with this a little bit. It. But just to give you an idea, it sounds likely, in my opinion, from what I've read, it makes sense.

0:10:54 Thomas: And it sounds unlikely. And I could, if I see better evidence that it's not true, sure. But from what I'm seeing here from pretty reputable sources, like the FDA and all that, and the, you know, it seems as though there's a link. And, uh, it's unfortunate for food production. And maybe that could be where Derek's, I'm not accusing him of anything, but But maybe that could be where his bias was, maybe a little blind spot for Derek, just guessing, not saying for sure, but could be that he errs on the side of, you know, what's good for food production because he's involved in cattle production, that sort of thing. But I'm not trying to assign any bad motive or anything. I'm just saying maybe that's why he comes up on that side of it is because he is looking at it from that perspective.

0:11:40 Thomas: Perspective, whereas these sources look pretty troubling that there is a link between giving people the giving people, giving cattle these antibiotics all the time, like I said, non-therapy, for another purpose, not even for disease, in order to fatten them more, that causes the breeding of antibiotic resistant superbugs that can infect people, and that will be a huge problem. So it, it seems to be a big enough problem that they're actually trying to phase it out in the U.S. over the next three years. They're supposedly phasing out the use of antibiotics in non-therapeutic doses for this. But the part where I would say it goes a little too far is I think some people, some, some activists can go too far and say we can't use any antibiotics, this is terrible.

0:12:30 Thomas: No, none. You can't have them all. And actually, I did see, to sort of defend that straw man a little bit, I DID see some people alleging like, oh, it gets in the milk and then we drink the antibiotics, and it's like, I don't know, I'm pretty sure that's not true. So, I am pretty sure it's still not true, but it is true that it's bad for us, and like I was starting to say, there are some activists who are trying to get rid of it altogether, and I would come down on the position just from my limited research here, and I'll be happy to talk to an expert about it sometime if this proves to be an interesting enough topic. I don't know that it is necessarily for you guys, but in my opinion, from what I've read, it makes sense that we would use these shots to prevent the disease, but if we dial back and get rid of the non-therapeutic doses, that would be a good thing for everybody.

0:13:19 Thomas: It would be a little bad for food production, but I think we we would survive. I hope we would survive, maybe. And here's the thing. We have to be willing to pay a little more for food, and that sucks. No one likes that, and especially, and that's why these issues are so difficult oftentimes, is because the poorest among us have the hardest time paying for an increased, you know, an increase of the cost of meat or an increase of the price of whatever it is, whatever food type it is. So that becomes difficult. That becomes another sort of socioeconomic issue that complicates things, but it seems to be that I misrepresented and I allowed Derek to kind of get rid, get away with a straw man on the last episode. And I should have, should have been more wary on that.

0:14:04 Thomas: I just wasn't exactly knowledgeable about that particular topic. And I didn't know that was going to come up. So apologies from me. I hope that clears that up for the thank you to the commenters who let me know that, Hey, you know, you, you weren't representing this properly. I really appreciate that. I will always, if someone lets me know something like that, I will investigate it. You might not always be right, like you were in this case. You were definitely right in this case. But I will take a look at it because the last thing I want to do is perpetuate strawman arguments or anything. That is the last thing I want to on this show. On that, and hopefully that's cleared up!

0:14:52 Thomas: This next topic might be a little difficult, might be, this is this is one of those soul searching topics. I just want to Take you through some soul searching. I don't know if everybody did this soul searching if nobody did but Let's let's take a look at what happened recently. You'll no doubt have heard about this. I would assume soon. It was announced that the Tribeca Film Festival was going to do, uh, screen the film by Andrew Wakefield, who you'll likely know was the disgraced doctor behind the, if he can be called a doctor anymore, because his license was revoked, Quote, He's the guy behind the Anti-Vax Movement. I'm sure you all know this just in case you've been living in a cave or something.

0:15:37 Thomas: He published a study that was debunked. It linked vaccines, certain vaccines like the MMR, to autism. And even though it was quickly debunk and has been several times, and there have been several studies that show no link between vaccinations and autism. Despite all that, it really seems to never end, these conspiracy theories about vaccines. And he had a documentary called Vaxxed. The basic description of Vaxxed is, the film purports to show an appalling cover-up committed by the government agency charged with protecting the health of American citizens. That's the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, CDC.

0:16:25 Thomas: An alarming deception that has contributed to the skyrocketing increase of autism and potentially the most catastrophic epidemic of our lifetime. So that's the film there. And no doubt you'll have noticed the giant controversy and the quick Twitter shitstorm that happened over this. People were demanding that it be taken out of Tribeca, and then it was revealed that Robert De Niro was actually responsible for this. I want to read his statement. Grace and I have a child with autism, and we believe it is critical that all of the issues surrounding the causes of autism be openly discussed and examined. In the 15 years since the Tribeca Film Festival was founded, I have never asked for a film to be screened or gotten involved in the programming.

0:17:16 Thomas: However, this is very personal to me and my family, and I want there to be a discussion, which is why we will be screening Vaxxed. I'm not personally endorsing the film, nor am I anti-vaccination. I am only providing the opportunity for a conversation around the issue. Now, you may know what I'm already going to say here, possibly, but I couldn't help but notice in all of this, the first thing I thought of was the eerie parallels. Now, bear with me because, again, this is soul searching. I don't know where this is going to end up. This is just self-reflection that I think we ought to do in a case like this because everybody came out, everybody and their mother on Twitter that I know, and I know a lot of mothers on Twitter, everybody Everybody and their mother on Twitter came out and just raised hell, said, I can't believe this.

0:18:09 Thomas: Get this crap out of Tribeca, all that, all of that stuff. And I couldn't help but think, isn't this an awful lot like when a speaker gets no platform at a university or something and the defense is usually, you know, look, we just want to have a conversation. A while back, someone named, a feminist named Germaine Greer was disinvited from something or other and Dawkins defended her and said, look, you may not agree. She was dis-invite, she was allegedly no-platformed because she has some very controversial beliefs on transgender people. I'm not too terribly familiar, but it's something to the extent of, I would guess it would be that they don't count as whatever gender they are. Are transitioning to. I'm not totally sure, to be honest with you, of her beliefs. But it's something like that. And she was disinvited from stuff for that. And Dawkins said, look, let's just have a conversation, all that. Is there a parallel? That's the crucial question that I want to ask. And then I really think it's important for everybody who's on either side of this. Now, if you're on one side of this consistently, then you're fine.

If you're always on the side of, yeah, de-platform her, deplatform, you know, the Tribeca thing, deplatform whatever, well, then you're being consistent. That's fairly obvious. You're consistently on that side of it. Same goes for the reverse. If you're always saying, no, don't de-platform anyone, and if you're saying, don't de-platform Jermaine Greer, let's have a discussion, I think that you either have to just say, yeah, same goes for this Tribeca guy, or, now bear with me, or we need to take a good look and make sure we are precise about this. Like, is there a difference? Is there some difference between these two situations? Is there a reason why it might be logically consistent to say, let's not de-platform, de-platform, I don't know, Richard Dawkins or Peter Boghossian or just any random person, any random atheist. Let's not de-platform them for some view they might have, or maybe let's not deplatform Dawkins for his tweets or something like that. Is it consistent to say that, but then also to say, hey, deplatformed the hell out of this Andrew Wakefield guy.

0:20:36 Thomas: Let's get him out of here. Is there a reason? So that seems to be the option to me. I don't see any way of escaping that. Either you need to consistently be on the same side of it and say Tribeca should be able to screen whatever they want, and maybe they screen another documentary that's pro-vaccine or something like that, or maybe they should, or Maybe they should hold some forum after the movie where they get actual scientists and actual doctors to talk about. Maybe if that's your view, that's fine. If you're consistently against the no platforming, you got nothing to worry about. You're consistent. What I'm worried about, what I'm wondering for myself, because when I saw that Vaxxed was in Tribeca, I thought, oh, great, that's not good. And I couldn't help but be pretty happy when it got taken out.

0:21:25 Thomas: But at the same time, I'm also the kind of person who tends to think, let's not deplatform people. So I've been doing some thinking about this. I want to make sure maybe I'm wrong, you know, and maybe I need to revisit my view or maybe there's some distinction between these two things. So, as I'm thinking about this, I don't know how satisfying this will be for you, because I'm not 100% decided. When I'm think about what might be different about it, I would say directly fraudulent people. Who have claimed, you know, fraudulent things or have gone against science in a way that's been debunked by an overwhelming majority of scientists. That maybe, and this is just me thinking through it, maybe that's different than having an opinion on something like a social issue.

0:22:16 Thomas: Maybe that's difference than saying, you now, I don't believe in gay marriage or something, which I would disagree with. With, but would I take someone who didn't believe gay people should have the right to get married, would I de-platform them no matter on what topic they were talking about or just de-platform for that view? So, another variable to keep in mind is this isn't de- platforming someone for a different view they hold. This would be de-performing the movie Vaxxed precisely because of what it's dealing with and how it deals with it. So does that add another wrinkle to it? Is it a different situation? Let's say Jermaine Greer, who, again, I'm not terribly familiar with, but it was the example that I thought of and so I thought I'd use it because it makes sense, let's say she's speaking on something completely unrelated, completely unrelated to trans issues or anything like that.

0:23:13 Thomas: You could argue that it could always come up, sure, but let's let's say it's Dawkins. He's going to talk about the evidence for evolution. That's it. That is the topic of the discussion. The Greatest Show on Earth, his book, he talked about the evidence for revolution. But he's also, let's Say Dawkins, for the sake of argument, he's tweeted some really bigoted stuff. Maybe not horribly racist or something where he would pretty much lose all his following immediately, but something that is maybe a little more disguised so that people still follow him, which some people would allege he has. Is that different? So because he's speaking on something else, he's speaking in an area of his expertise, and then he's tweeting about something that's not his expertise.

0:24:00 Thomas: It's just an opinion on a social issue. Like when he tweets about, you know, stranger rape is worse than date rape or whatever, or vice versa. When when he went back and retweeted the opposite and said it works either way, if that's what he's tweeting and you no platform him for that when he's there to speak about something else, maybe that's a different issue. The reasoning we can't use, though, is, well, no, I'm going to try to de-platform people I don't want speaking and let people talk who I do, because that's constantly the defense that comes up. That's what was so startlingly similar about these cases, is that's what's always said. No, allow a conversation. Don't de-platform. Don't just get rid of the vaxxed movie.

0:24:45 Thomas: Allow a conversation, that's always used in these cases. And we need to find out if that's consistent. If we're being consistent, if we simultaneously want to get rid of this Vax video, but don't want to rid of speakers at universities. Reflecting further, is there any difference, maybe, between a university and a film festival, where film could be considered more artistic and there's not really wrong answers in art, per se?

0:25:12 Thomas: That's just a quick avenue to look down, and I would say since it's a documentary and since it directly deals with a scientific question, I would no, but that was a potential to think about. And I could go through every single possible difference. I'm not going to. I went through some of them. But I would say my overall impression is that I definitely want, for me personally, I want to err on the side of not deplatforming somebody. But when it comes to this Vax documentary, when it's someone who is making an alleged documentary about a scientific question that is very answerable and has been answered in studies. And he has been, you know, stripped of his license.

0:26:01 Thomas: So, he's making this documentary and he's been stripped of the license that should even allow him to be qualified on such a thing. I think, in my mind, I'm comfortable with that difference. I'm comfortable that that's a distinct enough thing. And maybe you all were way ahead of me. Sorry if you were, but I just, I think it's important to reason through these things. That, to me, is distinctly different from from someone has an opinion on something, but they also are coming to talk about something else, or even if they want to talk About their opinion of that thing, I would say once it gets into easily debunked science, and furthermore, from someone who's been, you know, dismissed as and just just I was gonna say just barred, but he's not a lawyer.

0:26:47 Thomas: Well, he's been stripped of his license and all that. That's distinctly different enough to me. But I thought that's interesting. I think that maybe you might have a different justification, or maybe you don't have a justification. Maybe you would come to the conclusion that we shouldn't de-platform anyone for any reason ever because free speech and more speech is always better. I think one ought to be consistent there. So if your go-to is always that more free speech is better, which which I'm sympathetic to that, I certainly am sympathetic to that reasoning sometimes, then we need to allow this vaxxed video. But I didn't see anybody, now please send me links if I miss something, I didn't see anybody advocating against getting rid of the vaxx video.

0:27:35 Thomas: I didn't see any atheists that I know or free speech advocates saying, no, no keep it in, we shouldn't de-platform this or no-platformed this. I didn't see that. And so that's interesting to me. I think it was ignored because people just didn't see the similarity or didn't want to see the familiarity. So correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought that was interesting. I think that's a tough issue, but I would have to say all in all we're dealing with two different things, but that's contingent upon your approach to it. Like I said, if you're someone who says more free speech is always good, you better have a good reason for de-platforming or no, I keep saying de-platforming, sorry about that, for no platforming this vaxxed documentary.

0:28:28 Thomas: Some time here to talk about comments, but I don't know that I have a great one to read, unfortunately. So Maggie, so here's the issue. The people who are commenting, most of it was on GMO stuff, and I would gladly read it, except as I mentioned, I've got that great interview with Kevin Fulta coming up, and I think that will likely negate most of these comments. And if it doesn't, then I would just be repeating them, because then it's going to come down to a question of people simply not accepting the same evidence that we're working with. But anyway, thank you, though. I do want to thank everyone who, especially the anti-GMO people, especially the pro-GMO labeling people, because that's a minority view on the show, from what I can gather among the listeners.

0:29:19 Thomas: But I appreciate that. And I like dealing with these disagreements and doing what we can to try to resolve them and try to go over the evidence. I will say, Maggie, thank you for your comments. As always, I'm glad that you do, but they're so long that I can't read them. I would love to read one on the show, but it's just far too long. I'm not finding even a good paragraph that distills everything because it's an awfully, awfully long thing. But I will just also say to you, Maggie, hang on for the... I think I'll go ahead and do the GMO one next. I was going to wait, but since this is kind of pressing and all All the comments I've gotten are related to the GMO episode recently. I think I will just do the Kevin Folta interview next.

0:30:08 Thomas: So, and it's a doozy of an interview, so it will be a two-parter. So that'll be, let's just wait and do that. And then we'll come back and revisit GMOs and any questions people still have. And at that point, I'll probably either, maybe I can refer them to Kevin or ask Kevin or get answers for you guys. But I'm going to hold off on reading those comments. One thing I'm really surprised at, this is genuinely, genuinely surprising to me. The episode with Sarah Moorhead that was, I don't know, a couple weeks ago, I didn't get a single comment on that episode. That never happens. I didn't get a comment of any kind. It is weird. It's spooky. It wasn't, I mean, that means no negative comments.

0:30:56 Thomas: I think that it would probably be a lot worse to get a bunch of like, oh, this was a horrible episode for some reason. I think maybe it was a really sensitive issue, so people didn't want to comment on it. It's kind of a difficult issue to deal with. But the only reason I bring it up is because when I posted just on Facebook, not long before I was talking to Sarah about it, when I just posted about the Jared Fogle thing about, about, hey, let's maybe not advocate extrajudicial beatings of a person in our prison system. I got a ton of response on Facebook from people who are listeners, I think. Most of my Facebook friends that for this show, I have a Facebook account and a lot of you've added me recently. Thank you for that. You can find me Thomas Smith or Search Atheist.

0:31:41 Thomas: I mean, I don't know. You can find me. Somehow people found me. But most of my friends are listeners, they commented, and I was sad that I didn't get more of that when the episode came out, because I had a lot of people on the Facebook saying the things that Sarah Moore had said, and maybe she dealt with them so well that people were convinced. That's a possibility. I know usually not everyone's convinced, but yeah, people were saying things like, you know, wait till you have children that or victim of this crime or whatever, we dealt with all that. One thing I wanted to bring up that I found so hilarious is a certain gentleman who was on my Facebook page and who was friends with a lot of other atheist podcasters. I have no idea if he's a listener.

0:32:27 Thomas: I don't remember his name because I actually unfriended him. I didn't block him. I still haven't really had to block anyone policy, but I did unfriend him on Facebook because he can't, he was spouting nonsense, like, like just all kinds of vitriolic hate for Jared saying, oh, that guy got what he deserved, blah, blah. He's this, he's that. I think even getting pretty extreme in his language, like he should, deserves to be whatever, maybe raped or it was, it was bad. It was bad comments. And I asked like one, I gave it one try. I said, said, I don't agree. I mean, I think, you know, he's been punished. All the arguments I said on the Sarah Moorhead episode and the kinds that she said. And then he did something that was so hilarious that I had to tell you guys.

0:33:16 Thomas: He commented, by the way, this is on my thread. This is on my page. I didn't go to, I didn't find him. He commented, well, that's my opinion, so if you don't like it, you can fuck off. And I just thought, is there any more pointless an activity in life? Or is that it? Is that the most pointless? So I'm going to go on someone's page and comment on their thread, and then when they try to interact, I'm just going to say, if that's my opinion, if you don't like it, fuck off, you know, is there anything more pointless than that? Is that is literally just like screaming your opinion out a window at someone and then shutting the door and running away or something like it? Just nothing can can possibly come of that.

0:34:02 Thomas: It is amazing. I would think this kind of thing couldn't exist, but it does exist. I'm here to tell you this happened to me. I don't know if this is a listener. Maybe he's listening right now and is pissed at me or something. I don't know. I didn't want to use his name because, well, I don't remember, but also just in case. But isn't that funny that that could be an attitude? That has got to be about the worst attitude a person could have. Don't you think? I mean, that goes against everything I believe in. And I believe in, I mean, it's one thing if you say, agree to disagree. Look, I just don't want to get into it. That's fine. You came, by the way, he came to my page. He came and commented. It wasn't, I didn't seek him out. It wasn't like I went to him and did a bunch of comments. And then he was like, dude, leave me alone. That would be a different story. He came to me.

0:34:47 Thomas: I tried to start a discussion, and, and he said, if you don't like it, fuck off. And the, the idea that that accomplishes anything, what does that get him? What does anyone get out of that? It's just shouting with your ears plugged your opinion on something like, I hate Obama or something like that. It is incredible. And so I just wanted to tell you, because I thought that was the most insane comment, one of the most insane comments I've ever gotten, maybe the most insane. And the, so I said, okay, sounds like my response to this, by the way, when he told me to, to fuck off, if I don't like his opinion, my response was sounds like we ought not to be friends on here since there's no point in talking to you or interacting with you.

0:35:33 Thomas: So I just unfriended him. And to his credit, didn't hear from him after that. It's not like he got mad at me or said I had to hear his opinion. So maybe he's consistent. Maybe he's like, fine. Thomas did indeed fuck right off. So there you go. All right, well that ought to just about do it for me here today. I can't wait, really can't wait for next episode. And of course, patrons will get the full thing at once. They'll get the full interview with Dr. Kevin Folta at once, it was really fascinating. And it broached far more topics than the last GMO episode did, so don't worry about it being a repeat or anything. It was a much different discussion and it went a lot further in different ways.

0:36:18 Thomas: We actually even even talked about plants in space for a little bit, because he's an expert, and it was really fun to talk to him. So, patrons at patreon.com/atheist will get the whole thing right away. If not, it's going to be a Thursday-Monday two-parter. I know, your favorite kind, but thank you guys so much for listening, and And I can't wait to see you then.