Faith

[QuickSilver]

@puddleglum

There is a difference between being wrong and being an irrational nut. He is probably a relatively intelligent person, but he is not all knowing and likely to be wrong.

I believe you’re the one who first used the phrase “irrational nut”. I belive Human Action and others view religious faith as simply “wrong”.

[Crotalus]

@Musicat

It’s possible. It’s also possible that it was invented.But we don’t have any “personal testimony” of any people. Maybe it survived and spread because it fulfilled an all-too-human need for hope, bolstered by wishful thinking and the belief in magic.

Maybe the story is 10%, 50%, or 100% fiction. We don’t know, and the fact that people believe it to this day is worthless for evidence. That’s what faith is, belief without the burden of evidence.

I wasn’t trying to justify belief or evaluate the truth of anything with my mention of personal testimony. I was just suggesting a mechanism by which belief can be passed on.

[Latro]

@puddleglum

There is a difference between being wrong and being an irrational nut. He is probably a relatively intelligent person, but he is not all knowing and likely to be wrong.

Because if millions of people believe that if you knock on wood, after challenging fate, they most likely are right in that that works in warding off bad-luck.

[Human_Action]

@QuickSilver

I believe you’re the one who first used the phrase “irrational nut”. I belive Human Action and others view religious faith as simply “wrong”.

I just think religious people are incorrect, yes.

puddleglum’s use of “irrational nut” was, I assume, inspired by the OP, who is more strident than I, and uses terms like “hoax”, “suspend their intelligence”, and “ridiculous concept”.

In either case, “This is evidence that you have missed something. Billions of people could be wrong or you could have missed something. Which one is more likely?” is totally at odds with his last post about epistemological humility and allowing for the possibility that one is wrong. Perhaps he feels that only other people need to be humble in this way.

[puddleglum]

@QuickSilver

I would be tempted to agree with your more tollerant stance if not for the fact that evidence for the existance of god is lacking and has been for a very long time now. Given the demonstrable lack of humility with which the faithful treat those of competing religions (or those with a lack of beliefs), in what way does deference to ignorance benefit humanity as a whole?

Given that we have also have had experience with letting atheism be in charge and that gave us the Holodomor, the Great Leap forward, the Killing Fields, etc. It seems to me that some humility on the behalf of the atheism side is warranted.

[Latro]

@puddleglum

Given that we have also have had experience with letting atheism be in charge and that gave us the Holodomor, the Great Leap forward, the Killing Fields, etc. It seems to me that some humility on the behalf of the atheism side is warranted.

It should rather give you caution in how you speak to us.

[Latro]

nah… nm

[puddleglum]

@Human_Action

I just think religious people are incorrect, yes.

puddleglum’s use of “irrational nut” was, I assume, inspired by the OP, who is more strident than I, and uses terms like “hoax”, “suspend their intelligence”, and “ridiculous concept”.

In either case, “This is evidence that you have missed something. Billions of people could be wrong or you could have missed something. Which one is more likely?” is totally at odds with his last post about epistemological humility and allowing for the possibility that one is wrong. Perhaps he feels that only other people need to be humble in this way.

I have never said that anyone’s beliefs are ridiculous or that there is no evidence for other’s beliefs. I have my beliefs and think they are correct and have lived my life accordingly. If you have looked at the same evidence I have and come to a different conclusion, one of us is wrong and it may be me. However, when I face the final judgement I will answer for my own beliefs and not those of others. You live according to your beliefs and I will live according to mine. I will not ridicule your choice and if you are a decent and humble person you would not ridicule mine.

[Czarcasm]

@puddleglum

I will not ridicule your choice and if you are a decent and humble person you would not ridicule mine.

There are no beliefs out there you would ridicule?

[Human_Action]

@puddleglum

Given that we have also have had experience with letting atheism be in charge and that gave us the Holodomor, the Great Leap forward, the Killing Fields, etc. It seems to me that some humility on the behalf of the atheism side is warranted.

If atheism requires belief in collective farms and primitive communism, I’ve been doing it all wrong.

@puddleglum

I have never said that anyone’s beliefs are ridiculous or that there is no evidence for other’s beliefs.

Right, the OP did, and I think you were responding to that.

@puddleglum

I have my beliefs and think they are correct and have lived my life accordingly. If you have looked at the same evidence I have and come to a different conclusion, one of us is wrong and it may be me. However, when I face the final judgement I will answer for my own beliefs and not those of others. You live according to your beliefs and I will live according to mine. I will not ridicule your choice and if you are a decent and humble person you would not ridicule mine.

No ridicule here. Can you see how the sentiments expressed above are at odds with the sentiments in this post?

@puddleglum

This is evidence that you have missed something. Billions of people could be wrong or you could have missed something. Which one is more likely?

That’s not “you live according to your beliefs and I will live according to mine”, now is it? That’s “I’m right because I have numbers, and you’re wrong because you don’t.” And the same argument was surely applied to witch burning and trepanning, and all manner of once-popular beliefs based on no evidence. Yes, evidence can turn out to be mistaken. Beliefs based on no evidence pretty much always do, however.

[panaccione]

@BrainGlutton

The debatable question is not why faith exists – which is not at all hard to answer, to anyone with any basic familiarity with human psychology – but whether faith has any value.

No, I understand why it exists. It just seems that it is so easily debunked that I can’t understand how most people can’t see it for what it is. One big lie. It takes a certain level of willful ignorance that few people display in any other area of their life.

[panaccione]

@Crotalus

My view of the bible is different from the fundamentalist view that leads to things like young-earth creationism and attempts to reconcile the contradictory (or at least very different) Jesus birth narratives. To quote theologian Roger Olson, I believe that the bible is “a complex narrative written and compiled by human authors led by but not over-ridden by” God. My personal belief about the bible is that it is what Olson said it is, with the additional description that it was put together from the writings of various communities who were experiencing life and having spiritual experiences and trying to make sense of it all.

My faith is, as I stated above, the result of spiritual experiences. My use of the bible is something that I think of as sacramental: the bible is a tool that I use in experiencing God. It’s not a history book or even a theology book, for me. My use of it is very personal. I don’t bludgeon people with it or even quote it much.

I don’t engage in much discussion of this on SDMB. I hope that my original post was a useful answer to your question.

As for your question about why Jesus has more followers than Bigfoot, I think it is possible that, whatever actually happened 2,000 years ago, a bunch of people had a profound spiritual reaction to the life and death of Jesus. It seems entirely possible to me that the personal testimony of these people was enough, like the guy I mentioned in my first reply, to convey their experiences as truth to those they spoke to. Maybe it survived and spread because it is true, if only in some spiritual sense.

Ok. I do appreciate you coming forth with your answer, too. It seems that for you, faith is what it is. I agree there is nothing I can say to take that away. Does that sound about right?

Also, do you have any doubt in your faith? If so, what amount of doubt would you consider acceptable? For example, I stated that I have doubt in my own atheism, but not enough to call myself a christian.

[panaccione]

@lekatt

OK your main objection to faith is when it involves God or a Creator of this universe. Many grow up in some religion in this country and are taught to have faith. Religion has its place to this world. There are things you can learn from your Christian friends The Bible does contain some pretty bad stuff and it also contains some very beautiful stuff. Learn to sort out what is believable and don’t judge others for believing what you can’t. It is a truism that all things are possible in this world.

Yes, precisely. In my view, I do not see how a book inspired by the creator of the universe, could contain such evil and ruthless stories, while at the same time claiming to be the source of all moral goodness. I mean I think he/she/it could do better than that.

[lekatt]

@panaccione

Yes, precisely. In my view, I do not see how a book inspired by the creator of the universe, could contain such evil and ruthless stories, while at the same time claiming to be the source of all moral goodness. I mean I think he/she/it could do better than that.

You are right, and God did not write the Bible, men wrote it. That is why there is a great variance of ideas and beliefs written there.

Now if you are looking for a real God-inspired book try “A Course In Miracles.”

[Crotalus]

@panaccione

Ok. I do appreciate you coming forth with your answer, too. It seems that for you, faith is what it is. I agree there is nothing I can say to take that away. Does that sound about right?

Also, do you have any doubt in your faith? If so, what amount of doubt would you consider acceptable? For example, I stated that I have doubt in my own atheism, but not enough to call myself a christian.

I view the faith that I have as something that happened to me, a gift. I wasn’t looking for it. I’m pretty sure that at the time that I began to believe, I was actively intellectually opposed to it. I don’t think there’s anything you could say that could take it away, but you wouldn’t want to do that anyway, would you?

I have doubts, sure. My experiences of the numinous are very powerful and real to me, but I have no voices or burning bushes. I don’t have a gauge for what level of doubt I would find acceptable. I guess that if my doubt overwhelmed my faith, I would have to reconsider what it is I think I am.

[Voyager]

@ITR_champion

St. Thomas Aquinas said, “The most slender knowledge that can be obtained of the higher things is worth more than the surest knowledge of the lower things.” If we are willing to trust sense data and our own memories, we can have absolute certainty about some things: the shirt I’m currently wearing is green, my calculus textbook has 673 pages, &c.. Other, more important things are not subject to the same sort of certainty. For instance, I can never know whether my wife loves me, but can only look at pointers which suggest one answer or another. Only faith in her love allows me to function properly in a relationship with her. Likewise in assessing whether Jesus Christ was who He claimed to be I have numerous pointers, but faith is what makes me functional in relationship to Him.

You clearly don’t listen to enough blues. Your faith is no doubt based on evidence - but the guy who has faith in his wife’s love despite her being out all night and his kids not looking a bit like him is a bit of a nitwit, right? The average believer in religion these days is more like that guy. “God loves us” he says - then here comes another flood or hurricane or earthquake.

[panaccione]

@Crotalus

I view the faith that I have as something that happened to me, a gift. I wasn’t looking for it. I’m pretty sure that at the time that I began to believe, I was actively intellectually opposed to it. I don’t think there’s anything you could say that could take it away, but you wouldn’t want to do that anyway, would you?

I have doubts, sure. My experiences of the numinous are very powerful and real to me, but I have no voices or burning bushes. I don’t have a gauge for what level of doubt I would find acceptable. I guess that if my doubt overwhelmed my faith, I would have to reconsider what it is I think I am.

I see. Well what is the purpose of faith? Is it the hope of going to heaven? Does it help you live your day-to-day life? or something else?

I hope I’m not grilling you too hard.

[Czarcasm]

@lekatt

Now if you are looking for a real God-inspired book try “A Course In Miracles.”

And how do you know that book is “God-inspired”?

[Voyager]

@Rune

That’s not evidence. That’s just hearsay. All I know is that I appear to see something one a computer screen, but for all I know you might be a space gorilla or a figment of my own imagination.

All so-called evidence is suspect and untrustworthy on account that it requires faith in a number of core assumptions. Our senses for instance. From an everyday practical point of view it may be silly not to trust ones senses to at least some degree, but the OP posted an existential question, and it is a fundamental condition of human existence that we’re forced to take everything – including existence itself – on faith basis. If the OP is of the opinion that he has no faith or that he doesn’t understand faith or some such ridiculous thing, then he is deluding himself. But if he want to experience faith I suggest he hold his hand out in front of him and take a look. If he believes he sees a hand then he has faith. I hope that answers his question. Not that I care that much. I don’t think he exists.

Ah yes, equating 99.9999..% confidence with like 1% confidence. I submit that we do not have faith in our senses - we have provisional acceptance that what our senses tell us is true, based on the fact that when we act on them things come out okay. And we all are quite aware that our senses do play tricks on us - optical illusions don’t rock the world of anyone over 5.
Now, you may say that you need faith to know I exist, but I can propose a simple experiment. You can pay for me to to back to Copenhagen, you can arrange a meeting, and I can pop you in the snoot. Or buy you a drink, whatever is convincing. That increases the probability of my existence quite a bit. Now, if I invented reasons why this is impossible, even if you want to come here (like whats his name’s fake girlfriend) then you have reason to doubt.
Same with God. We can define all sorts of tests, but the believers keep making excuses for him not showing up.

[Revtim]

@Czarcasm

And how do you know that book is “God-inspired”?

Maybe there’s a blurb from God on the cover.