Faith
Offline If I told you something amazingly impossible happened 60 years ago, with no evidence whatsoever and only myself and 3 other people together that made the claim and said that you have to take it on faith...would you?
What if we tried to tell you that faith in what we say is a virtue?
Is trusting people blindly really a good thing?
Theism is why we can't have nice things.
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Offline Is trusting people blindly really a good thing?
This is an empty question.
Not enough raw data to make an objective or educated assumption or answer.
What you are asking is to trust you blindly with no real empirical support.
The answer is simply –NO
If I may ask-
What is the credibility of yourself and the three people standing beside you?
What is the criteria required for you to believe someone?
How many eyewitnesses would it take to believe if you were not there?
If there is no one alive who actually lived the experience than does it become - not true?
If it was written – What would make it true?
How long does a deceased author keep their credibility?
Why is this a question for theists?
Unless you have experienced something for yourself than are you not taking some truths on faith ?
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Offline O, sweet irony teat
Let me suck you dry
Incredulity never knew
You could taste sweet
BigUniverse wrote,
"Well the things that happen less often are more likely to be the result of the supper natural. A thing like loosing my keys in the morning is not likely supper natural, but finding a thousand dollars or meeting a celebrity might be."
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Offline O, sweet irony teat
Let me suck you dry
Incredulity never knew
You could taste sweet
How can not believing in something that is backed up with no empirical evidence be less scientific than believing in something that not only has no empirical evidence but actually goes against the laws of the universe and in many cases actually contradicts itself? - Ricky Gervais
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Offline What? no answers?
Everybody has some kinda limit
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Offline Unless you have experienced something for yourself than are you not taking some truths on faith ?
To you, what is the difference between faith and trust? To me faith is a total BS concept that says believe whatever feels good.
Trust is a concept I can understand. Nothing is 100% certain. But based on how things operate, we come up with rules for how much we can trust something or someone. Sometimes were fooled so we change the rules. But it must be based on some rational principles.
So to answer your question, I partially believe somethings based on model of how the world works. I have 0% trust in anything of a religious nature based on experiences and understanding. I have about a 98% trust in thing from a reliable scientific source.
Taxation is the price we pay for failing to build a civilized society. The higher the tax level, the greater the failure. A centrally planned totalitarian state represents a complete defeat for the civilized world, while a totally voluntary society represents its ultimate success. --Mark Skousen
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Offline If you had AIDS, would you believethis guy?
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Offline How can you theists be so skeptical? How can you deny the TRUTH? Why do you hate the TRUTH of what is said in the OP?
I don't understand...they are only trying to help you. If you don't believe in the truth they say, something terrible might happen to you.
Maybe after you die!
Theism is why we can't have nice things.
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Offline To you, what is the difference between faith and trust? To me faith is a total BS concept that says believe whatever feels good.
I admit that faith is often tied to religion but I believe that they are synonyms. My true belief.
Trust is a concept I can understand. Nothing is 100% certain. But based on how things operate, we come up with rules for how much we can trust something or someone. Sometimes were fooled so we change the rules. But it must be based on some rational principles.
I almost completely agree with this with the exception to rational principles. Rational principlesh are still tied up with how we see the world. I know a man who swears he is the only human in his family and all other members are aliens. Outside of that 1 little point, he is extreemly rational and very scientific. This was not made up and I really enjoy our talks on physics and chemisty.
So to answer your question, I partially believe somethings based on model of how the world works. I have 0% trust in anything of a religious nature based on experiences and understanding. I have about a 98% trust in thing from a reliable scientific source.
I have never met of anyone who can honestly give 100% trust (faith) in anything they have not experienced, basic psychology. I have been in a chemistry field for almost 30 years and wouldn’t give science a 98% even if I did the work. (Only a little sarcasm.)
But I am about 98% sure that clock cat is on heavy medication.
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Offline I admit that faith is often tied to religion but I believe that they are synonyms. My true belief.
Then if faith = trust, having faith is incompatable with having courage. If you trust a bridge will hold you up, it takes no courage to drive over it. If you trust Jesus, you have no need for any courage.
I almost completely agree with this with the exception to rational principles. Rational principlesh are still tied up with how we see the world.
I would say rational priciples are tied up in how we measure the world. The eye and the mind is very susesptible to illusion. A rational set of principles would say don't just believe what you want to believe, change your belief with evidence. This is completly incompatable with Theism. If one 'sees' the earth as flat you would believe it was flat. If one measures the earth and takes evidence from trusted sources and is open minded, one could believe it was a sphere.
I know a man who swears he is the only human in his family and all other members are aliens.
But he never does any experiments to verify this. Why?
I have never met of anyone who can honestly give 100% trust (faith) in anything they have not experienced, basic psychology.
So your faith is just based on your personal experience. We atheists are just so unlucky that God hates us and doesn't want to give us a personal experience like you've had.
Taxation is the price we pay for failing to build a civilized society. The higher the tax level, the greater the failure. A centrally planned totalitarian state represents a complete defeat for the civilized world, while a totally voluntary society represents its ultimate success. --Mark Skousen
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Offline Then if faith = trust, having faith is incompatable with having courage. If you trust a bridge will hold you up, it takes no courage to drive over it. If you trust Jesus, you have no need for any courage.
Well, having courage requires a sense of trust too. The courage of running into a burning building to save a child, requires a trust that I will save that child, regardless of the odds. Courage requires some sort of trust that doesn't allow us to see our efforts as in vain. With out it, none of us would be courageous at all.
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Offline "No", as to the OP's 1st
question.
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Offline EXC wrote:Then if faith = trust, having faith is incompatable with having courage. If you trust a bridge will hold you up, it takes no courage to drive over it. If you trust Jesus, you have no need for any courage.
Well, having courage requires a sense of trust too. The courage of running into a burning building to save a child, requires a trust that I will save that child, regardless of the odds. Courage requires some sort of trust that doesn't allow us to see our efforts as in vain. With out it, none of us would be courageous at all.
I disagree. Take the example you gave of the burning building. The person running in is well aware of the odds that they will die, but they run in regardless because they would rather risk it than simply let the child inside die. They can't trust in the structural soundness of the building because it's been burning steadily, and they can't trust their own body due to smoke inhalation. Courage is acting despite the doubts you have of your own survivability in the situation.
"Do not, as some ungracious pastors do, show me the steep and thorny way to heaven. Whiles, like a puff'd and reckless libertine, himself the primrose path of dalliance treads. And recks not his own rede."
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Offline I disagree. Take the example you gave of the burning building. The person running in is well aware of the odds that they will die, but they run in regardless because they would rather risk it than simply let the child inside die. They can't trust in the structural soundness of the building because it's been burning steadily, and they can't trust their own body due to smoke inhalation. Courage is acting despite the doubts you have of your own survivability in the situation.
Read what i wrote again: "requires a trust that I will save that child, regardless of the odds." If he believed (regardless if it was rational or not) that his effort to save the child would be in vain, he wouldn't do it at all, it's only by believing or trusting his effort won't be, that he does so.
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Offline Well, having courage requires a sense of trust too. The courage of running into a burning building to save a child, requires a trust that I will save that child, regardless of the odds. Courage requires some sort of trust that doesn't allow us to see our efforts as in vain. With out it, none of us would be courageous at all.
Courage requires some uncertainty about the outcome. If a fireman runs into the burning building with a flame retardand suit and he practiced like 100 times going into a burning building, would this require any courage? So he had faith or trust in the suit. So where was the courage? Where is the courage when one has faith(trust)?
Taxation is the price we pay for failing to build a civilized society. The higher the tax level, the greater the failure. A centrally planned totalitarian state represents a complete defeat for the civilized world, while a totally voluntary society represents its ultimate success. --Mark Skousen
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Offline I disagree. Take the example you gave of the burning building. The person running in is well aware of the odds that they will die, but they run in regardless because they would rather risk it than simply let the child inside die. They can't trust in the structural soundness of the building because it's been burning steadily, and they can't trust their own body due to smoke inhalation. Courage is acting despite the doubts you have of your own survivability in the situation.
I never said they had trust in the structure of the building, it could just be trust in themselves, a faith, a trust they can save the child. It's because you believe you can save the child that you attempt to save the child. It's because you "trust" have "faith" that you can do it. A person in a wheel chair is far less likely to wheel himself into a burning building to save a child, than an individual who can run. One has faith that he can actually do it, the other doesn't.
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Offline A person in a wheel chair is far less likely to wheel himself into a burning building to save a child, than an individual who can run. One has faith that he can actually do it, the other doesn't.
That has fuck all to do with faith.
The dude/babe in the wheelchair understands their limitations as a fact of life and would act accordingly.
How can not believing in something that is backed up with no empirical evidence be less scientific than believing in something that not only has no empirical evidence but actually goes against the laws of the universe and in many cases actually contradicts itself? - Ricky Gervais
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Offline Nothing is 100% certain.
Are you sure about that?
There is no largest prime number, and I am 100% certain of that.
People need to stop pulling the post-modernist "but we can't know" stunt. It's so self-defeating, and even if it weren't it still doesn't help the case for faith. I know you (EXC) didn't use the quote in that way, but you opened the door for Mjolnin's "Rational principlesh (sic) are still tied up with how we see the world..." nonsense that relies on this stunt.
Faith isn't "I believe this even though I don't know that it is definitely true" Faith is "I believe this even though I don't know that it is at least probably true."
Faith reaches conclusions without evidence that said conclusions are even probably true. It doesn't require faith to believe something when you can prove that it's 99% likely, or even just 60% likely.
The difference between faith in yourself and confidence in yourself is that confidence is based on past experience. Faith says "I can't reason that I have good odds, but I believe I will succeed." Confidence says "I can reason from past experience that I have good odds, so I believe that I will succeed." It's not that the man in the wheelchair lacks faith, its that his prior experience tells him his odds of success are very slim. The firefighter doesn't have faith he'll succeed, he just knows that he's had training and probably experience and thus his chances are pretty good. An rational bystander may reason his chances are fairly slim, but decide to try anyway despite knowing he probably won't succeed because he thinks it's worth the risk. None of this requires faith, even if we can't know things 100%
The difference between faith in someone and trust in someone is the same. Faith says "I can't reason that this person is probably correct/capable, but I'll believe he/she is correct/capable." Trust says "I can reason that this person is probably correct/capable, so I'll believe he/she is correct/capable."
Questions for Theists:
http://silverskeptic.blogspot.com/2011/03/consistent-standards.html
I'm a bit of a lurker. Every now and then I will come out of my cave with a flurry of activity. Then the Ph.D. program calls and I must fall back to the shadows.
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If someone told me a story the he/she and 3 others experienced. I would listen politely and ask questions about the experience. If I was told that I have to 'trust or take it on faith' that the story were true, I would kindly imply that although whatever happened obviously made an impact on the story-tellers life, it isn't something that I would personally repeat to someone else~the story stops here in other words.
Slowly building a blog at ~
http://obsidianwords.wordpress.com/
First of all, someone telling me something amazing happened is "evidence", it doesn't make what they claim happened probable, but its still evidence, in the sense that we can use it as a starting point to determine a truth claim. We have a false conception of evidence, that assumes that we have evidence for something that makes that something likely, but that's not true. Both prosecution and defense have evidence, but this doesn't mean that each of their arguments are of equal wait.
Secondly, faith is a term often interchangeable with terms such as trust, and at some point everything we believe we have to take on some form or faith, or trust. It's beyond my means to evaluate all the evidence for evolution, I can't build a dating machine, or examine the actual fossils, and I have to have faith in those that gathered it, in the community of scientist that support this view, that the cases they make are honest and correct. We have faith in our wives, we have faith in our children, in the same sense that we have faith in a scientific community.
Secondly, there is no such thing as faith without reason, because there always some reason as to why we have faith in the first place, if you ask me to have faith in something you said, i would have to have some reason to trust you, or to have faith in you, so I can. Often times we take things that people say on faith, such as if my mother were to come and tell me that some kids were fighting in the street, I'd accept that as true, without have to investigate the matter much further, because this assumption of truth is based on the character of my mother. Her "character" is the reason as to why I trust her, or have faith in what she claimed.
What if we tried to tell you that faith in what we say is a virtue?
Is trusting people blindly really a good thing?