Has the Enlightenment Failed? | Peter Boghossian & Faisal Al Mutar

Iraqi-American Faisal Al Mutar is a human rights activist and the founder of Ideas Beyond Borders, a non-profit organization countering extremism and misinformation through global access to new ideas. He came to the U.S. as a refugee in 2013 and received the President’s Volunteer Service Award in 2016 for his commitment to education. This year, Ideas Beyond Borders won Atlas Network’s Middle East & North Africa Liberty Award.

Peter and Faisal are close friends. In this conversation, they discuss the persistent attack on enlightenment values in the U.S. and how this affects young people. Peter and Faisal are both atheists and they consider how the decline of religious belief has opened doors to alternative manifestations of tribal and authoritarian impulses, including in groups of supposed heterodox thinkers. Faisal also shares his views on the role religion plays in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

This podcast was filmed October 30, 2023 at the Alliance for Responsible Citizenship Conference in London, England.

Ideas Beyond Borders https://ideasbeyondborders.org/

“Are Western Values Worth Defending?" Peter Boghossian & Faisal Al Mutar with Freethinkers of PSU (2017) https://youtu.be/Nob0nlw7qps?si=8Bb-gPi5YNCVop3F

Follow Faisal on X https://twitter.com/faisalalmutar
Facebook https://www.facebook.com/faisalalmutar

Chapters
0:00 Intro
0:55 Enlightenment values under attack
6:40 Battle of Ideas/heterodox ideas
14:24 The future of American society & culture
19:40 Cultish behavior of authoritarian ideologies
27:50 Convenience in speaking up
36:15 How and why to preserve Enlightenment values
46:05 Israel/Palestine conflict
1:03:55 Previous conversation between Peter and Faisal

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