{"id":1204,"date":"2026-04-07T06:27:00","date_gmt":"2026-04-07T12:27:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/?p=1204"},"modified":"2026-04-02T13:21:48","modified_gmt":"2026-04-02T19:21:48","slug":"the-diary-of-existing-beliefs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/2026\/04\/07\/the-diary-of-existing-beliefs\/","title":{"rendered":"The Diary of Existing Beliefs"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<h2><em>Skepticism, Faith, and the Fear of Being Wrong<\/em><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" width=\"642\" height=\"428\" src=\"https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/wes-huff-steven-bartlett.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-1209\" srcset=\"https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/wes-huff-steven-bartlett.jpg 642w, https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/wes-huff-steven-bartlett-300x200.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 642px) 100vw, 642px\" \/><figcaption>Wes Huff and Steven Bartlett<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-latest-posts__list wp-block-latest-posts\"><li><a class=\"wp-block-latest-posts__post-title\" href=\"https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/2026\/05\/05\/mother-knew-best\/\">Mother Knew Best<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a class=\"wp-block-latest-posts__post-title\" href=\"https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/2026\/04\/28\/moral-relativism-the-tyranny-we-call-kindness\/\">Moral Relativism: The Tyranny We Call Kindness<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a class=\"wp-block-latest-posts__post-title\" href=\"https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/2026\/04\/21\/why-therapy-is-so-hard-for-men\/\">Why Therapy is So Hard For Men<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a class=\"wp-block-latest-posts__post-title\" href=\"https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/2026\/04\/14\/according-to-research-you-and-i-are-probably-wrong\/\">According to Research, You and I Are Probably Wrong<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a class=\"wp-block-latest-posts__post-title\" href=\"https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/2026\/04\/07\/the-diary-of-existing-beliefs\/\">The Diary of Existing Beliefs<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<p>I watched the new&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=nrwNSSyKuD4\">Wes Huff interview on Steven Bartlett\u2019s Diary of a CEO.<\/a>&nbsp;Steven is one of my favorite podcasts to watch. He has the best guests and is genuinely curious. This one, however, had a bit of predetermined readiness for a duel. Steven was welcoming as always and asked questions in good faith, but he could not tolerate the way Wes was answering them. So he cut Wes off many times shortly into Wes\u2019 reply.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This showed me he was looking for predetermined outcomes to the questions he was asking and when it didn\u2019t go as planned, he shifted, as if to refocus the conversation on his own skepticism. Wes masterfully put every question to rest with facts and his overall interpretation of the events in question.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Let\u2019s take a few of Steven\u2019s objections for examples of what I\u2019m referring to.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2><strong>The Great Leap Backwards<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>The greatest leap was an early one. Steven comes out swinging concerning the time when the gospels were written. John was written approximately 40 years after Jesus\u2019 death. Steven attempts to make the case that this would be hard to remember. If this is the standard, we must throw out almost every text written in the ancient world as fact.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Throw out all of the Roman Empire. All Greek philosophers. Socrates? Gone. His pupil Plato? Gone. Plato\u2019s pupil Aristotle? Gone. Aristotle\u2019s pupil Alexander the Great? Gone. The earliest manuscripts we have of anything being written about Alexander the Great was approximately 250 years after his death. But we hang on every word of it as the undeniable truth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It would all have to go. But we would never do that. Why? Because we only want to throw out what challenges us.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2><strong>Both or Neither<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Then Steven suggests that there can\u2019t be a God with all of the evil in the world. Here, Wes delicately handles this objection (much more diplomatically than I would have\u2014realizing this interview was a setup for a duel) by illuminating the often agreed upon philosophy that if we acknowledge there is Evil, then we must agree there is Good. And also agree they have origins and authors. Again, he was trying to prove something false only to feed directly into its philosophical objectivity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2><strong>The Unmoved Mover<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Steven then gets into the evolutionary debate. They both quickly agree on adaptation. But the idea of a transition from chimpanzee to human has yet to be remotely adequately explained. Beyond this, Steven kept referring to existing realities and variations of the existing realities while dodging the origin argument the entire time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>At one point, Wes begins to say that there must have been a beginning and Steven interrupts, again, to shift into his creative brain making sense of the world outside of the need for a God. Wes even alludes to Aristotle\u2019s claim that while moving things are moved by other movers, it could not have begun by a mover. It had to have begun by an&nbsp;<em>eternal, unmoved mover<\/em>. There has to have been an origin story. But Steven kept dodging it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2><strong>The Holy Vending Machine<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Lastly, Steven travels into the arena of prayer. He says what many say, \u201cI have prayed for meaningful things that never came true. If there is a God, why would he not answer that prayer? And if He doesn\u2019t answer prayer, then how great of a God could He possibly be?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This is assuming&#8230;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ol><li>We have asked according to God\u2019s will, <\/li><li>We already know what God\u2019s will is ahead of time, <\/li><li>We somehow have an idea of what should happen regardless of how limited we are in our thinking. <\/li><\/ol>\n\n\n\n<p>God is not the Holy vending machine in the sky. \u201cA4 &#8211; new job!\u201d And prayer isn\u2019t solely asking for things, although at times, it involves that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3><em>The Lord\u2019s Prayer<\/em><\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>Allow me to briefly break down the Lord\u2019s Prayer as an example:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul><li><em>Our Father who is in Heaven:<\/em>&nbsp;This lays out that he is revealed to us as a father (paternal authority) and where he currently is. So when we pray, we know exactly to whom we are praying.<\/li><li><em>Holy is your name:<\/em>&nbsp;This indicates that when we pray, we are speaking to a perfect God.<\/li><li><em>Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven:<\/em>&nbsp;Here we see the idea that when we pray, we are to ask for what He wants, not what we want. We are also to ask God to bring what is in heaven here to earth. Eternal rewards in the afterlife are not enough.<\/li><li><em>Give us this day our daily bread:&nbsp;<\/em>When we do ask, we should ask for what we need, not necessarily what we want.<\/li><li><em>Forgive us, as we have forgiven others:<\/em>&nbsp;This one\u2019s tough. If we haven\u2019t forgiven others very well, we are saying, don\u2019t forgive us either. The opposite is equally true.<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>It ends with recognition that He is the creator and ruler of all. None of that is easy, nothing suggests indulging the self, and all of it challenge us to aim towards and&nbsp;<em>ineffable telos<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2>Conclusion<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Steven wanted to be right. This is new for him. He usually wants to learn. So why was this different? I think the answer is simple. Christianity calls us towards a better way than the easy path in front of us; the easy path of rejecting notions of delayed gratification. Never mind that&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/psycnet.apa.org\/doiLanding?doi=10.1037%2F0022-3514.54.4.687\">delayed gratification is a predictor of economic success<\/a>. Christianity also rejects the self and requires us to acknowledge the intrinsic deficiencies we all possess. This is often too much for our current self-driven society to handle. Personally, I\u2019m glad I grew up before they invented self-esteem.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Thankfully, Steven eventually gets to a place where he concedes that Wes really is a good guy, knows what he\u2019s talking about, and genuinely means well. It ended better than it started. Maybe next time Steven goes in ready for a fight, he will pick someone less informed so he can win.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Stay Classy GP!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Grainger<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Skepticism, Faith, and the Fear of Being Wrong I watched the new&nbsp;Wes Huff interview on Steven Bartlett\u2019s Diary of a CEO.&nbsp;Steven is one of my favorite podcasts to watch. He has the best guests and is genuinely curious. This one, however, had a bit of predetermined readiness for a duel. Steven was welcoming as always &hellip; <\/p>\n<p class=\"link-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/2026\/04\/07\/the-diary-of-existing-beliefs\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;The Diary of Existing Beliefs&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0},"categories":[72,12],"tags":[205,203,204,202,201],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1204"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1204"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1204\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1210,"href":"https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1204\/revisions\/1210"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1204"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1204"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tidbitsofaudacity.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1204"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}