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Cerebral Faith got its start in 2012. It was a tiny little apologetics blog on Blogger or Blogspot (whatever you want to call it), and the funny thing is that I created the blog because I got tired up typing out arguments for God’s existence or the resurrection on Twitlonger and Facebook. I was still a fairly new Christian never mind student of theology. I wasn’t that great of a writer and some posts were so bad I’ve completely deleted them from the website. I kind of wish I had waited a little because my writing wasn’t something I’d really consider good until at least 2014 at the earliest.

The posts were meant to be discussion launchers. Like the online equivalent of an opening statement in a debate. Then I got Facebook and memes became a thing. Memes were used for a variety of reasons including making political or theological points. And I also used these as discussion launchers. I’ve always been kind of shy and introverted, but having discussions with people online felt easier than striking up a conversation about the gospel in person. While I don’t regret anything I’ve done on this site, if I’m being honest, it was a bit of a cop out to avoid having to deal with people in person. I thought it was a good way to still be obedient to Jesus to spread the gospel without having to get out of my comfort zone.

In 2020, COVID happened and that kind of isolation was on steroids. But in 2022, after I was certain things were safe (which I now think they probably always were, and the pandemic was likely overblown, but I digress), I got a job at Dollar General and I was put on register. This meant having to deal with the public. Not just stocking shelves left to myself, this time, I had to interact with people. Initially it was extremely draining. My social battery was taxed to its limit every week. I was miserable. But something happened. Gradually, I became less shy. You might be surprised to hear that since I came across so confidently on the Cerebral Faith Podcast. But it’s easy for many of those episodes, because it was just me and a microphone. But I will admit to having some social anxiety when I had guests on. Nothing severe, but I wasn’t exactly relaxed either. It didn’t really don on me just how extroverted I had become until recently at the DMV, I was chatting up some people as I awaited in line as if I knew them. Even I, in that moment, realized how out of character that was for me.

All of this is background information for what I’m about to say; I now prefer to have conversations with people in person as opposed to over a text medium.

The way I found this out was through a gradual process. First, I finally was able to have some Jehovah’s Witnesses come into my house and I debated them over the Trinity. They visited about two or three times and we had some riveting discussions over the biblical text and whether or not The Bible really supported the doctrine of the Trinity. One of them gave me a pamphlet titled “Should You Believe The Trinity?” And I wrote a 3 part essay response on this website that you can read here, here, and here.

In addition to that, I’ve even had some friendly debates over in-house theological discussions with a guy named Chris. I remember when I was in Florida, he was saying that he thinks the plural “us” in Genesis 1:26 are the other persons of The Trinity, not angels. And he gave his reasons why. I was like “No, no, no. You see…” and we just went back and forth. It was very cordial and friendly. No mud slinging.

As an apologist, I also dealt with the objections, concerns, and doubts of a Facebook friend of mine who had left the faith. It was an over the phone discussion, and while I could tell he was emotional at times (he had a right to be, his story was filled with hardships), he wasn’t exactly mean or took out his frustrations on me.

I’m subscribed to a content creator who hosts monthly Zoom calls. And although he doesn’t technically make theological or apologetic content, he and I are both huge theology nerds and we can go from talking about what kind of knife is best for stripping wood to whether or not angels and demons are truly immaterial or whether they are physical beings that exist in higher dimensions such that they are imperceptible to us. I’m sure to the chagrin of everyone else in the call. Although phone calls and Zoom aren’t exactly “in person”. They get MUCH closer to it than pounding away at a keyboard.

I think in person discussion is actually healthier and more conducive to having cordial discussions for a variety of reasons. Allow me to get into them.

1: The Creator’s Intended Purpose

First and foremost, we have to acknowledge the fact that Yahweh Elohim did not create us with the intention of being in a dark room, pounding away on a little pop tart or clicking clacking away at a computer screen as our primary way of communicating with each other.

Theologically, we were made to be in a community because Yahweh is himself a community of persons; The Father, The Son, and The Holy Spirit. We are made in His image. So we are likewise meant to be in a community together. Genesis 1:26-27 teaches that we are made in his image.

And before the advent of not so social media, people used to go outside and talk to each other. People lived in communities. People knew their neighbors. Any conversations that we had were had face-to-face. While it is true that people wrote letters (e.g Paul’s epistles), that was not the primary way of communication. Written correspondence was the exception, not the rule.

2: It Prevents Google Wars and Essays

I’ve been in some unfortunate conversations online where people can’t defend their point, so they just decide to send me a gazillion links to different articles. Somehow they expect me to read all of these articles and to respond to all of these articles, which would be tantamount to writing an entire book! In other cases, people can defend their points and they do type out their own words and defense of their views, but these are usually the length of a blog post of themselves. And then I have to write something just as long in response in order to respond to them point by point. And then they write a response just as long in order for me to respond to that point by point. And then they write a response That is really long. If you peruse the comment section of this blog, (see “Why There Is No More Comment Section” as to why I don’t have one anymore), you will see some of these exchanges where we are just giving lengthy speeches back-and-forth. And while I have enjoyed some of these conversations, they can be quite time-consuming because I’m basically having to write an entire essay just for a comment because the other person gave me that much to respond to. And we just sort of feed off of each other because we keep giving each other essay length comments worth of arguments to respond to.

In face-to-face conversations, you don’t really have that problem. Sometimes people can be long-winded, but typically they are not. And even if they are, you can try to interject and say something like “before you go on, do you mind if I respond to your three points?” or something. Moreover, the conversation doesn’t go on for three weeks as each of you leave a new essay every single day. If you have your conversation for an hour or maybe two hours, then it’s over with and you go both go home or leave the Zoom call or whatever. And this is if you are essentially debating a topic.

3: Disagreements Tend To Be More Cordial

The third reason I prefer face-to-face conversations, or at least phone calls or Zoom calls or something that more approximates to in person conversations then texting does, is because conversations tend to be a whole lot more cordial. Even on some of the most controversial issues like the age of the earth. This isn’t to say that people don’t get heated, even in real person conversations, of course! But it seems to be the case that there is something about social media and the way we communicate on that that tends to lead to conflict way way faster than in person conversation does.

My theory is that the non-rational part of your brain doesn’t register the other person as a person. Consciously, you know you’re talking to a person. But subconsciously, you don’t register the other person as a person. Because when you were talking to a person, you see their face, you hear their voice, you see their body language, and on Facebook or TikTok, you get none of that. All you have is a picture and a wall of text. That’s not a human, that’s a picture and a wall of text, so goes then on rational part of your brain. Or what my friend C.J calls “monkey brain”. Given this, it is a whole lot easier to dehumanize those who disagree with you. And when they are dehumanizing you and are being royal booty holes, that makes it even easier for you to return the favoring kind. Especially since they can’t reach through the Internet and punch you in the face (nor can you punch them). The possibility of getting a black eye has typically been a deterrent to a lot of people who would otherwise make donkeys of themselves. So that could also be a factor.

But there’s also the fact that tone doesn’t always come through in text. There have been times where I have been deeply misunderstood. People thought I was being condescending or arrogant, or even coming off as angry when that was not my intent at all. I was just giving an argument for why I held to the view that I held. I thought I was being nice, but the other person didn’t think so. I can’t help, but wonder how these conversations would’ve been if they could’ve seen my face and heard the tone of my voice and seen my body language. Perhaps I would’ve come off as confident that my view was right, but not arrogant. Energetic and excited because I’m passionate about these issues (I am a self proclaimed Bible Nerd after all), but not angry.

4: I May Or May Not Be Getting Arthritis

As if all of these reasons weren’t enough for me to prefer talking to people in person rather than having a keyboard war with them, there is a possibility that I may or may not be coming down with arthritis. For the past couple of weeks, my right hand has been very achy in the ring finger and the “bird” finger. The pain seems to be worse when it rains, and it also gets worse throughout the day as I work the cash register. I haven’t been to the doctor yet and so I don’t have an official diagnosis, but that is what I’m worried about. My mom got arthritis when she was in her mid 30s, and I just turned 34 of the writing of this. I’m currently writing this on my phone, and thankfully I use my thumbs to type when I’m on my phone so it doesn’t hurt quite as bad. But even here, I’m trying to use. Talk to text as much as possible. Hopefully, it doesn’t butcher what I’m trying to say too badly. But the point is, there is a chance that I won’t be physically able to have long drawn out Internet arguments with people in the future because it will be physically painful for me to do so.

I am praying that it is not what I’m worried that it is. I’m praying that my right hand is just overworked. It is my dominant hand, and I have essentially written two books back to back. One was a fan project called “Digimon Universe: Song Of The New World“, This is the final arc in a Digimon fan fiction saga involving a lot of original characters. The first series was written by me and some friends on the internet when we were teenagers. In 2021, 2022, and 2026, I decided to write additional stories about these characters because there was a lot of hanging plot threads from the original series that needed to be resolved. If you like Digimon, or if you’re even just into the sci fi and/or fantasy genres, check it out at www.DigimonUniverseFDD.net. And the other was my book “Eyewitnesses Of His Majesty: Why The Gospels Can Be Trusted – and the Case For The Resurrection Of Jesus“. If you read, both works, you’ll know that they’re both complete books. One is a book length web novel and the other is an actual book. And I wrote them back to back without a break! So I’m hoping that I just overdid it and that if I just go for a period of time without writing — at least on a computer — that my hand will heal.

If not, I have no fear. I have a strong will. I do plan on looking into higher quality dictation software than what my smart phone has. William Lane Craig, from what I remember, uses dictation software to write his books and articles. I remember one video where he talked about the frustration of getting the dictation software to properly say sin instead of send. In fact, I had to type out the word “sin” in the making of the prior sentence. But, Dr. Craig uses dictation software because he has some kind of condition that affects his hands as well as other parts of his body. If he can do it, I can do it. If Stephen Hawking could write books on physics, I can write books on apologetics and theology. It may be weird at first, and I may have to get used to talking out my writings instead of typing them, but until I write everything I want to write about, I’m not going to stop. And who knows? With the advent of AI, there may be a dictation software in the works that will be able to predict exactly where it should put proper punctuation, such as quotation marks and commas and so on. Speaking of my book, “Eyewitnesses Of His Majesty”, the last chapter of that book is a conference talk. I gave the talk at Defend 2024. I had an AI transcribe the entirety of the audio, and the punctuation was just about perfect. I didn’t hardly need to touch it up at all. All of the words were mine, but the transformation from pure audio into written text was done by an AI software. So if AI can do that with pre-recorded audio, then maybe it can transcribe audio in real time that way (i.e as I’m saying it). I need to do some research on this. For all I know, something like this may exist already, or at the very least it may be in the works. Even if it doesn’t exist now, I wouldn’t be surprised if it does within the next two or three years. 

Conclusion

I have come to really appreciate in-person discussions. I prefer them over talking over text. Whether it is with non-Christians and I’m making an apologetic case, or whether it’s with Christians I disagree with on theological issues, or whether it’s with Christians I do agree with on theological issue, or whether it’s just with people on literally any topic. I just prefer to talk rather than type. That didn’t used to be the case. Like I said at the beginning of this blog post, I used to be really shy and part of Cerebral Faith was just kind of my attempted work-around to try to obey the command to share the gospel without having to get out of my comfort zone. But being a cashier for 4 years has made me a much less socially anxious person, and actually having those discussions with the Jehovah’s Witnesses, talking to my apostate friend, and even just talking about Divine Council worldview stuff and demonology with Chris over Zoom is just so much more fun. It’s very human. It’s very normal. I would encourage you to spend less time on not-so-social media and more time talking to people in real life. And if you’re separated by distance, talk to them on Skype. Talk to them on Zoom. While it’s not face-to-face, it approximates to that far more closely than formats where you just have a picture and a block of text.