The Journey Begins
I’m pretty sure you’re not going to like this. Probably not one bit. It talks about all sorts of things that a lot of us spend a lot of time trying to avoid. Like death! Yes, that’s right, death. Death, judgement, hellfire and paradise (or is it all pie in the sky?), the meaning of life and of course, the big one - is there really a God, or is it all a delusion? Just the sort of things you’d try your utmost to avoid thinking about. And what has this got to do with the man in the red underpants anyway?
I’d like you to come with me on a journey. It’s not a long one, but on the way we are going to encounter some very interesting and probably scary things; things that you might not want to believe even though they make sense.
What would you do if a man in a pair of red underpants came knocking on your door saying that he’d come to read the gas meter?
Let’s begin the journey and step aboard our vehicle; reason and common sense.
Yes, I am serious, what would you do? Actually, what you would do is not so important here as compared with what process you would use and what faculties you would employ to come to a decision about this man and his claim. Would you believe him without thinking and let him into your house? Just ‘have faith?’ Or would you think about the situation, ask some questions and apply reason?
Now, before we go any further I need you to agree with me on one thing. If not, there isn’t much point in going any further. We need to agree that the world we live in is real, and you, me and everything around us really does exist and is not the product of a computer generated illusory world, or some dream that you happen to be in. Now I know that I can’t actually prove this, and that it really is possible that all we see around us is a dream or an illusion, but how does that help us? If we think THAT, then we could never make sense of anything, and even if we did accept that, we’d still use our reason to try and make sense of it and would still inevitably have to accept what we see as being real in some sense.
