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"The United Nations has two core defects" - peace entrepreneur Anders Reagan - Sentientism 225
Manage episode 477353313 series 2882727
Anders Reagan is a peace entrepreneur, philosopher, academic, and technologist. He is founding director of the Peace and Conflict Science Institute (PACS), an academic think-tank and advocacy organisation with special consultative status at the United Nations that aims to put peace and rights mechanisms on more rigorous, evidence-based foundations. Anders is also an AI Consultant at the University of Oxford.
In Sentientist Conversations we talk about the most important questions: “what’s real?”, “who matters?” and "how can we make a better world?"
Sentientism answers those questions with "evidence, reason & compassion for all sentient beings." The video of our conversation is here on YouTube.
00:00 Clips
01:06 Welcome
02:58 Anders' Intro
03:58 What's Real?
- "My upbringing and emotional impetus for initiatingthe academic journey that I went on... happened because of a clash between a non-theistic, agnostic background and a religious, Christian environment"
- Born in Boulder, Colorado "rather liberal"
- Agnostic parents, father interested in Buddhist traditions
- Moving to Arkansas at 7 yrs old "quite conservative leaning"
- "A sudden transition happened with our social relationships... encountering people who had a Christian religious doctrine at such a core place... in their personality"
- "Oftentimes the first question you'll be asked is 'what church do you go to?'... and at the time we didn't have any answer"
- "It is an ingratiating tactic... These people are so kind and approchable... they're clearly looking for common ground to build off of"
- "But when you respond with 'I'm atheist I don't go toany church at all'... the reaction... would be suspicion, confusion..."
- "My mum... took the tactic of saying we would 'homechurch'... either indicating that we have no religion at all or we're way more intense than the rest of you" :)
- At 7 years old: "That was intense... I didn't haveany concept of god or theism or religion - I'd never heard of any of these things... it was like living through a culture clash even though I hadn't left my own country"
- "We eventually did find a home in a Unitarian Universalist fellowship... very welcoming of what they called liberalreligion... people who had found themselves ostracised by other congregations... LGBTQ+... Muslims... the Wicca faith... they would congregate in this space... exchange ideas... trying to find common ground across all of these different religious doctrines... I found that to be very enriching"
- "Sunday School programme which offered a survey ofreligions. By the time I finished that programme... I felt like I had a pretty thorough understanding of the full range of religious and spiritual traditions"
21:54 What Matters?
42:14 Who Matters?
01:09:40 A Better World?
01:32:30 Follow Anders
And more... full show notes at Sentientism.info.
Sentientism is “Evidence, reason & compassion for all sentient beings.” More at Sentientism.info. Join our "I'm a Sentientist" wall via this simple form.
Everyone, Sentientist or not, is welcome in our groups. The biggest so far is here on FaceBook. Come join us there!
225 episodes
Manage episode 477353313 series 2882727
Anders Reagan is a peace entrepreneur, philosopher, academic, and technologist. He is founding director of the Peace and Conflict Science Institute (PACS), an academic think-tank and advocacy organisation with special consultative status at the United Nations that aims to put peace and rights mechanisms on more rigorous, evidence-based foundations. Anders is also an AI Consultant at the University of Oxford.
In Sentientist Conversations we talk about the most important questions: “what’s real?”, “who matters?” and "how can we make a better world?"
Sentientism answers those questions with "evidence, reason & compassion for all sentient beings." The video of our conversation is here on YouTube.
00:00 Clips
01:06 Welcome
02:58 Anders' Intro
03:58 What's Real?
- "My upbringing and emotional impetus for initiatingthe academic journey that I went on... happened because of a clash between a non-theistic, agnostic background and a religious, Christian environment"
- Born in Boulder, Colorado "rather liberal"
- Agnostic parents, father interested in Buddhist traditions
- Moving to Arkansas at 7 yrs old "quite conservative leaning"
- "A sudden transition happened with our social relationships... encountering people who had a Christian religious doctrine at such a core place... in their personality"
- "Oftentimes the first question you'll be asked is 'what church do you go to?'... and at the time we didn't have any answer"
- "It is an ingratiating tactic... These people are so kind and approchable... they're clearly looking for common ground to build off of"
- "But when you respond with 'I'm atheist I don't go toany church at all'... the reaction... would be suspicion, confusion..."
- "My mum... took the tactic of saying we would 'homechurch'... either indicating that we have no religion at all or we're way more intense than the rest of you" :)
- At 7 years old: "That was intense... I didn't haveany concept of god or theism or religion - I'd never heard of any of these things... it was like living through a culture clash even though I hadn't left my own country"
- "We eventually did find a home in a Unitarian Universalist fellowship... very welcoming of what they called liberalreligion... people who had found themselves ostracised by other congregations... LGBTQ+... Muslims... the Wicca faith... they would congregate in this space... exchange ideas... trying to find common ground across all of these different religious doctrines... I found that to be very enriching"
- "Sunday School programme which offered a survey ofreligions. By the time I finished that programme... I felt like I had a pretty thorough understanding of the full range of religious and spiritual traditions"
21:54 What Matters?
42:14 Who Matters?
01:09:40 A Better World?
01:32:30 Follow Anders
And more... full show notes at Sentientism.info.
Sentientism is “Evidence, reason & compassion for all sentient beings.” More at Sentientism.info. Join our "I'm a Sentientist" wall via this simple form.
Everyone, Sentientist or not, is welcome in our groups. The biggest so far is here on FaceBook. Come join us there!
225 episodes
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