No one couldn’t.
It’s not a fork. It’s reality vs fantasy. To borrow your mistaken belief that the scientific method is believed in that way a god is believed in, you worship at the foot of scientific method every time you flip a lightswitch, turn on your car, or type something into a computer. Your computer doesn’t require belief for it to function or for you to understand it’s mysteries.
when Sam Harris made his case for removing the protected status of religious beliefs I agreed and I seem to remember most of the atheists on this board strongly agreeing as well. It seem odd to me that when it comes to the subject of faith there seems to be an effort to keep “religious” faith separate from the day to day faith every human operates on. I suppose that makes it easier to ridicule and criticize. Certain aspects of faith deserve criticism but IMO if we hope to understand it better and contribute towards progress we must look at the inner mechanics of faith that we all share, believer and non believer alike.
DT uses a broad brush to paint all religious faith with the same characteristics. It’s ludicrous. If he could be more specific and nuanced I’d agree with some of his points, but as it is, his exaggerated approach ruins any valid underlying truth for me.
Looking at faith as an emotional and mental phenomenon we an see that what occurs within the details of religion also occurs outside religion.
Trust. Based on experience we trust our significant other or our best friend. We are aware that it’s possible they could do us wrong and life changes but we go on with “faith” based on past experiences.
When parents teach their kids about God and Jesus wouldn’t you call that an example of trust? When someone has a powerful subjective experience and they translate it with the influence of those around them wouldn’t that be an example of trust? People trust the good intentions and the “knowledge” of the people around them. When people hear a repeated meme from good people around them
they are inclined to accept it as true. That sounds like trust to me.
What interests and disturbs me about faith is the strength of the emotional attachment people seem to have for certain doctrine and dogma. Why does it seem to be a “must” to believe certain things. Is it just being a part of the certain group that is important? Do people need acceptance from their denomination of choice so much that they are emotionally unable to question the details? It sure seems so. Can’t we see something very similar outside religion in families and other groups. I think so.
IMO it’s not religion per say but the emotional need or the emotional disconnect that causes people to cling to false beliefs and deny or rationalize in spite of what the evidence suggests.
It’'s important to note that faith in spiritual matters does not have to include a denial of evidence and the kind of closed mind often attributed to a fundamentalists. The classic definition in Hebrews 11
does not have to be the kind of blind faith that denies evidence. We go forward moment to moment acting on faith about our world, our relationships with those close to us. We operate on what we believe is true even though a new experience or new evidence may alter our beliefs.
Really? What did Jesus say that sounded like “Burn the witch! Burn her, I say!”.
Nice clutch at that straw of “But the Bible’s self-contradictory!”. You could have said that yourself instead of repeating “No True Scotsman!” like it won the argument for you.
Try something out on your pianola. I stole the phrase from Wodehouse. It doesn’t, as far as I know, involve sticking anything anywhere (unless you are one of those avant garde musicians).
So why were the people who lead the religion, the priests and bishops and popes who supposedly have more or clearer knowledge of the whole thing, not only not stopping them, but actively encouraging them? It wasn’t just isolated incidents.
Jesus doesn’t say it, but the OT says “Suffer not a witch to live.” Now, there is debate as to how much of the OT teachings are abrogated by Jesus’ teaching, but clearly some Christians take the OT very much to heart.
Oh course not. Trust in what? Trust that jesus will return ‘soon’? Or that god will provide? Or that prayer has any effect whatsoever beyond sitting still for a few minutes? There’s nothing there to trust in.
Ask Andrea Yates.
This is quite different from actually trusting anything about god. Believing something just because ‘bob believes it, and he seems like a nice guy’ is most certainly not a good reason.
Yup.
But somehow it usually does.
That quote is practically a textbook example of blind faith. Be sure of what you hope for? Yeah.
Well, just as a hypothesis, and let’s not pretend I’ve any insight into the history, but perhaps some of the senior churchmen were more motivated by a lust for temporal power than actually doing what Jesus said? I mean, I may be completely wrong, and someone might be along to show me that, say, the Borgias had a truly astonishing theological insight, but I think we should at least toss the idea down on the table.
Well, I’m pretty sure that Luther was a sincere Christian and very knowledgeable about the Bible, but when he wrote “On the Jews and Their Lies” and argued that the Germans should ethnically cleanse the Jews from their land, and make sure not one trace of the Jews’ existence remained behind, I think you have a clear example of someone advocating evil in the name of God, and in complete good faith. And I scarcely think this is an isolated example. Unless you are a member of Opus Dei or something, I scarcely think it is plausible to say Luther had *chosen * Satan over Jesus.
AFAICT, this thread is not about faith in God.
From the OP:
I offered other definitions of faith.
Also, Der Trihs says:
According to *which * definition?
From the definitions that I presented, it’s clear that faith is not “immensely arrogant”, and that “faith in a non-religious context” **does not ** “*invariably * wind up meaning trust or belief as a result of evidence” and *proof * **is not ** “something you only find in geometry textbooks.”
Also, someone who claims that religious faith is the same as trust should provide evidence of that claim. If you (hotflungwok) want to ask for “evidence that produces the trust” then it’s up to you to explain why evidence (or the lack of it) is relevant in equating religious faith with trust. But, as I’ve already pointed out, this thread did not start out as a debate about religious faith. These were the questions posed in the OP:
What is an “*unrealistic * attitude”? One that is not based on reality? Is there such as a thing as an attitude that has no basis in reality?
Are beliefs a negative? I don’t know how to answer this question, other than to say that we all have beliefs.
Is it OK to trust in things that we feel? Is this a moral or practical question? It seems to me that all feelings are based on *some * evidence, even if we aren’t explicitly aware of that evidence and even if we can’t present a rational argument for experiencing that feeling.
A discussion of faith/belief/evidence/feelings can be an epistemological and psychological quagmire. It seems to me that the difficulties could be reduced if we agree on the basic definitions. (Also, as I see on preview, a thread will go in whatever direction the posters take it …)
I don’t know what your point is. Would you like me to present definitions for evidence? :dubious:
The biggest stumbling block in theology is the necessary assumption that mine is right, and yours is wrong. That single intellectual step invokes an assumption of authority, no matter whether my theology is based on direct revelation, or textual interpretation, or authoritarianism. What we tell others to believe is our theology. The real message of your theology, and mine is what we do, not what we say.
Trying to convince you is evidence that I am not seeking to give you faith. Providing you with evidence leads you away from faith, and gives you nothing but logical argument. If I wanted to prove something, I would certainly avoid invoking the concept of faith. On the other hand, if I have faith, I might simply choose to offer you love, and hope that you will find faith from that.
Tris
“We have too many high sounding words, and too few actions that correspond with them.” ~ Abigail Adams, 1774 ~
Now in another thread a “God spot” in the brain was discussed, didn’t the brain evolve, so how can you say with any certainty that belief in God and the afterlife was not part of evolution. I don’t think you can say that honestly. If we are created by our brain (body) then this belief must be evolutionary.
I believe you mean to put “god” rather than “God” in both of those instances. I don’t believe people have suggested that there is a part of the brain that is connected to that specific god only.
I thought I read somewhere that in Islam, faith requires proof.
Because it isn’t always god that fits in the ‘god spot’. There are many people around the world who have no need whatsoever to believe in any form of a god, and they’re doing just fine. If humans had a need for belief in god, the way have a need for oxygen or sunlight, then those people would not be doing well. God just happened to be the easiest thing for a bunch of primitive ignorant humans to put there. It’s no longer necessary.
So how do you tell the difference between someone doing what’s really in the book and someone just making it up? How do you know god doesn’t want all the $group slaughtered and their children dashed on rocks, etc? Why is your interpretation of the stuff in the book any better then theirs? What gives you the right to say that they’re wrong and you’re right?
Sounds like arrogance to me.
It is common for beliefs to have strong emotional attachments. There are very strong emotional attachments being displayed in this thread in the name of science. A very strong belief that science is reason and religion is folly. Why shouldn’t those who believe in religion feel as strongly about their faith and scientists do about science. There is a lot of talk about blind faith, but to spiritual people there is no blind faith. The distrust is building between those scientists who wish to deny religion its rightful place and those religionists who wish to deny science its rightful place. Science will never replace nor destroy religion, ala Richard Dawkins, so how about learning to live in peace with each other.
I believe the elections next year will be greatly influence by the rift. Probably not in the manner favorable to science.
If you bothered to read DT’s post you could see that it does in fact refer to religious faith. The OP does want to talk about different kinds of faith, but eveything that DT said has to do with the religious variety. And yes it is important to distinguish between the two, because religious faith tends to be let off the hook when it comes to evidence and reality without any clear reason.
It’s relevant because there’s no reason it isn’t. Religious faith is like other faith but for some reason it’s ok to ‘just believe’, and not have any real evidence behind it. There is no reason to give it this pass, religious faith should have the same standard of evidence every other kind of faith is supposed to have.
Feelings are based on evidence? Huh?
Equating religious belief with trust in science is a mistake. The two are very different. You do not have faith that your computer is going to send your message across the internet, you trust that it will. However, since religion does not produce any actual results, you have to have faith in it.
Hence the label ‘blind’.
Religion’s rightful place is alongside all of mankind’s other mistaken beliefs. People who distrust science are free to never benefit from it again, but since peope like light & heat & food I don’t think they’re going to do anything anytime soon.
Science will exist in peace with religion when religion stops insiting that it has anything to do with reality.
I was referring to trusting other people and our trust in them lending credibility to what they tell us is true. There are thousands of examples outside of religion as well.
great example. Somebody legally insane.
And yet human beings, believers and non believers, do this all the time, which is my point about the mechanics of faith.
And you say this because you have examined the evidence carefully and found it to be true? Or could it be an assumption influenced by your own distaste for religion in general. Something you hold to be true for reasons other than evidence. Let’s see, what might we call that?
I think it’s unfortunate that certain people interpret this in a way that makes it very difficult for them to question dogma they have accepted. They interpret it as a lack of faith to question what they have been taught by someone else as God’s will. It’s also unfortunate that non believers see this as what you just described. Neither has to be true for this statement.
There are many examples of this type of faith outside of religion. How do martial artists learn to do things that seem almost impossible. to most people. They have to approach it from a a surety. Motivational speakers teaching people to believe in themselves and visualize their goals as already accomplished.
We can and do act with surety and certainty when making daily decisions as well as with hope. We act in faith that certain behavior will yield favorable results until new experiences and information that we gather every day refines and changes our beliefs. Sometimes the change is extremely subtle. Sometimes profound.