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Feelings is my word, not theirs. Since there is nothing empirical about supernatural explanations, what is faith based on? It seems to me like it's based solely on the feelings of the believer, supported only by the feelings of other believers, who get together to express their feelings about what they believe in. They have their books, handed down for centuries, translated and re-translated, full of flaws but also full of stories that reinforce the feelings each religion wants followers to have.

 

I hear the reasoning behind such feelings and it seems like religion is all about making people feel confident in hoping they will be blessed or allowed to live eternally or be healed of a malady. Religious leaders know the more confident people are about something that has nothing tangible to support it, the harder they will defend it and the more they will feel good about it. Religious leaders have become artists in the area of confidence, imo.

Sensory interaction with the world around us is one thing, but concluding that sensory interaction is a.) the only interaction available and b.) capable of identifying all that can and does exist, is unfounded.

I can't help but think that the difference between those that have faith and those that don't is irreconcilable through the medium of language. It's like trying to explain sight to someone that was born blind.

Where is this strength coming from? No one can has given me anything but feelings as a basis for such strength.

What do these people mean by the word 'feelings'? Are they referring to emotion, as in happiness/sadness is the basis of faith or is it something else?

If faith had a method, and if that method is backed by mathematical epistemology (the stuff I do), then you'd be correct. But faith has no such method, so, once again, you're comparing apples to oranges.

 

Is this an appeal to authority then? I was highlighting that having a method substantiated by reason doesn't imply that is of any worth with regards to reality.

Bayesian Epistemology can be derived (quite easily, actually) from the Kolmogorov axioms which are derivable from Cox's axioms and basic sentential logic. This mathematical epistemology tells us exactly how evidence confirms/disconfirms things. You are completely wrong. Or, hey, let's see you argue that the Kolmogorov axioms are inconsistent.

I don't see how any of this solves the problem of induction.

Probably, yes. Math.

Because it happened in the past or do you have a better answer for your probably?

Science (the method, not the result) is 'validated' by pure reason. Science (the result) is validated by science (the method) and the empirical world.

 

Faith isn't validated by anything.

 

Again, it's a false analogy. Faith and science aren't anything alike at all.

That's like saying Faith, the method, is validated by pure reason.

The result is not validated by the empirical world beyond intuitive assumption.

Ah, here's where the misunderstanding lies. I wasn't trying to validate anything with pure reason. I will try to simplify.

 

When I first heard someone say that two bullets, one fired from a gun and one dropped straight down at the same time and same height, will hit the ground at the same time, I didn't believe it. It was counter-intuitive for me and made no sense. I read up on the phenomenon, but still couldn't believe it. I worked out the math using the formulas I found and began to grudgingly accept it. I had it explained to me by a physicist I know and it made much more sense. I slowly began to trust the scientific explanation for this phenomenon, and have even explained it to others who shared my initial skepticism. Then I came across this experiment done by the Mythbusters and the strength of my trust increased tremendously:

 

 

I didn't have to accept the explanation by reason alone. There was plenty of math, but also empirical evidence and actual experimentation to eventually make the explanation worthy of my strongest form of belief, my TRUST.

Ok, so you fire a bullet and you drop another bullet and they land at the same time. Will it happen again next time and why do you think it will or won't?

When I compare that kind of belief with faith, which many religions ask me to have, I find nothing to support it but feelings. I'm supposed to have very strong feelings about beings that purposely avoid the kind of empirical evidence that evokes my strongest form of belief, my trust. I'm asked to have faith, abiding, unwavering faith in forces that followers can't explain. Indeed, some of those followers even seem proud that their God works in such mysterious ways, that His will is unfathomable. And try as I might, all I hear from those statements is, "You need to believe strongly in things you can't possibly know".

 

So why is faith considered stronger than trust by so many believers?

I don't hold faith and 'trust' as opposing ideas so I can't answer why others do. It seems rather convenient that language and human sensory experience would be able to contain all existing things. If we can't know everything then to access things which we can't know would need faith. Faith in that sense is reliant on the ego and ownership of itself, which it could/should never lay claim to since we did not bring ourselves into being (something which is difficult to dispute regardless of religious view).

But pure reason wasn't a criterion for validation to begin with. Hell, actual validation goes against the point of faith as it is used in the thread.

 

If you really want to get into how we can classify science as working better through objective validation, I'm having a conversation with other people at different times in different places through the use of science/religion (choose best answer).

 

The topic doesn't seem to be a science vs. religion subject. Only if faith can be considered a strength or weakness in regards to religious ideals.

 

If reason isn't a criterion for validation then what is the problem with faith?

I'm willing to back off the assertion that each religion has it's own perspective on what it considers "faith" to be, if you wish to discuss that part further and clarify why you think this isn't so. You need to be willing to back off the assertion that science is also looking for absolute truth the way you claim religion is. This simply isn't so.

My point was that neither science nor faith are validated by pure reason so to attack faith as not having reason to validate it and then propose science as the answer is ridiculous. I'm not saying that science isn't a valid concept, but in order to accept it one has to be willing to give up pure reason as a bases of validation. How then can we classify science as better than religion? It certainly seems better suited for certain criteria but that intuitive assumption is the very fault that is given to faith.

Kierkegaard's concept of faith in Fear and Trembling which is taken from the Abraham/Isaac story in the Bible is not a faith that is in competition to science and I see little reason to think that science and faith are competing.

If I choose to wear a parachute when I jump out of a plane does that mean I've forsaken my faith?

You seem to not understand the difference between an assertion and a demonstrated fact.

If only seeming was good enough then your demonstrated fact might mean something.

This is a False Dilemma. You're setting a condition neither can meet (absolute truth) and then claiming it's the only way to compare them without bias. It's actually very easy to compare them without bias, since science does its best to arrive at its explanations without bias, whereas each religion, indeed each sect in each religion, explains phenomena based solely on their individual biased perspectives.

If you're still making that assertion then there seems little point in debating this any further.

Trust is based on evidence, faith is not. Induction has mathematical grounding, faith does not. It's not special pleading in any sense of the phrase.

In terms of absolute truth neither science nor religion can demonstrate truth through reason which is the only way of comparing the two in a neutral fashion.

Saying that you can mathematically determine which hypothesis is the best doesn't solve Hume's original problem.

It still makes no sense.

 

Where did I substitute all the experimentation with math? In fact, it's the ongoing and constant experimentation to add supportive evidence to each idea, hypothesis and theory that's the hallmark of the scientific method. This is one good reason why I trust scientific explanations to be the best supported, why I don't have to rely on faith in them. I don't even have to hope they're the best explanations, since the tests are reproducible.

What or who are you trusting in when it comes to the problem of induction?

Trying to classify one as trust and the other as faith when reason is vacant of both premises sounds a lot like special pleading to me.

Evidence isn't falsifiable, but hypotheses are falsifiable.

Hypothesis are only falsifiable if...

^ For someone so focused on challenging empirical evidence and the process of validating our understandings against the world before us, you sure don't seem to mind that people accept extraordinary and incredible things as true and real based on nothing other than their personal desires and wish thinking. Double standards, much?

 

Evidence is repeatable. It is supportive of claims. It is falsifiable. It is consistent across observers regardless of worldview or ideology. Faith is claiming to know something unknowable. It is subjective. It is specific to the individual, and is rather often held and protected and propagated despite well established facts that show its tenets and claims to be misguided and rather often plainly wrong.

 

To implicitly claim as you have above that evidence and faith are equivalent to one another does little more than to show how willing you are to abandon reason and rationality and even your own integrity all in some vain attempt to protect your preferred worldview.

 

Falsifiable, now that's a big claim. What reason leads you to believe that evidence is falsifiable?

On the contrary, I felt the need for further detailing of the definition of belief because others spoke to me of faith as being different from mere belief. For most Christians I know, the concept of faith is rooted in its unwavering strength. They believe "with all their heart", or "with complete conviction", or "beyond a shadow of a doubt". So many biblical stories talk about the unquestioning faith of certain followers, holding them up as examples of faith in God's will.

 

It doesn't matter that others don't separate their belief system the way I do. I took my definition from those who told me their faith was different, abiding, deep, loyal, allegiant, assured, convicted, and all the other words I've used. Those who talk in church about how abiding and unyielding their faith is are praised for it, while those who waver are helped towards shoring up their convictions and solidifying their faith in God.

 

This is not a minority view, no matter how much your argument is hurt by it. There are tons of references to this kind of faith. I'd cite them but since religion is all about how the individual interprets it, I'm sure you could spin them however you wanted. It remains though that faith is often talked about in a qualitative fashion, and strong faith is praised.

 

 

Since science isn't interested in "proof", but rather supportive evidence based on observable reality, trust is an adequate description for what is the best supported explanations for natural phenomena.

Ok, what is supportive evidence based on observable reality and why should it be considered or trusted? What use does supportive evidence have, can we use it to predict future events and how can we know things will operate in the same way as they did in the past? Are there any unsupported conditions that I would have to blindly accept? How does evidence differ from faith?

No. As I mentioned before, I've separated my belief system into Hope, Trust and Faith. Hope is for things i want to be true but have little to support them and could have multiple outcomes. Trust is for explanations that are heavily supported by observational reality, experience and testing. Faith is for unfalsifiable explanations with little or nothing to support them but strong feelings.

 

So I trust science because I can test it, or check the rigor others have used to test it. I can hope that I'll win the lottery, or that consciousness lives on after the body dies, but not put such strength of belief into it that I change my life to sustain that belief. Faith seems to require belief unsupported by anything but feelings and it's often characterized by strength, commitment, dedication, and lots of other qualitative criteria that seem disproportionate to the reality in which they're based.

It's worth pointing out that others probably haven't taken on your system of Hope, Trust and Faith and when they speak of faith are not referring to it in the same way you do.

Considering that all three are based on unprovable assumption, you'd be hard pressed to validate any through pure reason.

Does no Believer think, "With the appalling realities of suffering in the world, a god obsessed with who loves whom, of who is attracted to whom, of a maximum of 5? 10? % of the human population... This is a god that has the shallow interests and deep compassion of a womens' magazine?

 

If the homosexuality of individuals of SO MANY species is established, and they are supposed to be created without free will, unlike the HUGELY important human species, then IF you buy into this invisable, all knowing, perfect father figure never making mistakes, then the homosexual individuals of all other species MUST be created deliberately and knowingly.

 

So, either that god is clearly making mistakes or can't remember his previous rulings OR making points, that the ghastly judgemental loathing of homosexuals, by the fundamentalists of most/all? religions, is based on the interference of the nastier men who claimed ownership, editing rights or only correct interpretation of those religious texts. Or indeed, that the Bible, etc., and the opinions held, are the creation of men - and unpleasant sex obsessive men, at that.

 

I am continually surprised by the OBSESSION of fundamentalist religionists, with other people's sex lives. I've never met an educated atheist who CARES, if it is consensual and between adults of the same species. It appears from the regular exposure, world wide, of evangelistic preachers in America, that they have FAR kinkier sex lives than any gay men or women I know. I don't know a gay person in a lifetime committed relationship, that has extra sexual partners of the same OR opposite sex, yet ask me the same thing about committed Christians, and even I, with no interest, can reel off a dozen, all from the tv evangelists of America. Then you get into the AVALANCHE of catholic officials, from Cardinals down, in EVERY country, AND understand, these are just those CAUGHT...

 

For God Believer, read Sexual Obsessive, it seems. Not even, necessarily, their own! Who is MORE interested in SOMEONE ELSE'S sex life? Religious middle aged men or fairly vacuous teenage girls?

 

Often, this is an easy target to aim for, when bringing up religious hypocracy.

Now this is an example of hipocrisy, making a statement about sexual obsession in a topic that has nothing to do with sex only goes to show that the poster is themselves sexually obsessed and condemns others for the very actions that they themselves commit.

I've mentioned several times that faith, to me, is a form of belief that requires unquestioning adherence and unshakeable commitment. People who consider themselves very devout followers of their religion often talk about the strength of their faith, and how it's like a comforting rock of solid footing in the stormy sea of Life.

 

In marketing (stay with me), we often take the weakest flaw in a product or service and paint it as one of our strongest points. Dick's Last Resort, a restaurant chain that despaired of ever finding a non-obnoxious waitstaff, eventually embraced the weakness and started hiring purposely obnoxious people and made it a convention for their whole chain.

 

In US politics, the major parties have learned to spin their weaknesses into apparent strengths. Republicans cry out that Democrats don't respect the sanctity of free market enterprise to cover up the fact that their biggest contributors are corporations looking for special considerations that will let them unfairly trump their competition, which is about as foul a thing to do to the free market as there is.

 

Is faith a similar weakness spun into strength in religion? Believing so strongly in things that have the least amount of evidence to support them seems ludicrous to me. Absolute conviction about things you can't possibly know is touted as steadfast, abiding faith, and practically every follower would be congratulated and praised for this kind of devotion to their god. If you divide belief into trust, hope and faith, faith seems the weakest to me but is often seen as the strongest.

 

Are the priests who preach faith just great spin doctors or is unassailable, resolute belief in things you can't prove really a strength?

Would it be fair to say that you have great faith in science because of the reassuring results that you have gotten from your previous experiences in it's methods?

Those that speak highly of their faith in their religion probably have the same reasons.

Re-read my post.

 

Religion and other false studies = brainwashed = can't think for yourself = hypocrite.

 

Not brainwashed = think for youself = nonconformist = not a hypocrite

This suggests that you have misunderstood the word hypocrite.

Imatfaal,

 

I suppose, I am challenging the accepted definition. I do not consider the universe as currently containing all points in time. It has aged. From the godlike stance, considering all points in the universe, as currently existing in a particular state and arrangement, positionally referencable with all other points, there is no point that is other than 13.8 billion years old. 1 billion years ago, every point was only 12.8 billion years old. That condition, no longer exists. It is the past. For the entire universe.

 

I suppose I am suggesting that time, as in age of existence, is one thing, and time as in distance, is another.

 

 

 

Age of existence is movement which implies distance.

Here's my anti-Kalaam argument. If you think of a nifty name for it, let me know. I may work on it and submit it to one of the undergrad paper contests.

 

(1) If a causal agent A causes object O to begin to exist, then A stands in a prior temporal relation to O with respect to A's proper time.

(2) If an object exists at all points in time, then nothing stands in a prior temporal relation to it.

(3) The universe exists at all points in time.

(4) Therefore, nothing stands in a prior temporal relation to it.

(5) Therefore, there exists no causal agent that caused the universe to begin to exist.

 

Premise (2) and (3) are true by definition. So, the only premise that really needs defending is (1). Premise (1), however, is rather uncontroversial since almost every philosopher ever has held it as a necessary condition for causation. It is also extremely well supported evidentially since every single time we've observed something caused to begin to exist, the causal agent stood in a prior temporal relation to that thing wrt said agent's proper time.

 

Line (4) follows from (2) and (3) via Modus Ponens. Line (5) follows from (1) and (4) via Modus Tollens.

Definition of time?

Thread,

 

Had a waking thought on "authority's" potential role in this discussion.

 

A drunk, wishing to rehabilitate, often looks "outside" himself for the strength. (not to mention that an "intervention" may have brought him/her to the "support" group, in the first place).

 

The tie-in is the thought of "independence", in the sense that education (knowledge is power), intelligence (the pen is mightier than the sword), and wealth (money is power), seem to coincide to some degree with the thought that one can "do it on their own", and turn to themself for support, authority and validation.

 

If God is to be, symbolically at least, objective reality, how one has developed or structured their own internal world and their own relationship to the objective reality that they are in and of, is pertinent to the discussion.

 

And very important as well, is what other human or group of humans does one turn to for authority, and include in their "feeling of self". (if one needs no other humans for support, and authority, then a "personal god" would be the only place left to go for such).

 

So scientists have the "scientific community" to reference. They need no personal god.

Super intelligent folk, wealthy folk, politcally powerful folk that gain personal power over the world around them, in one way or the other, I would theorize, have less need for God, than those who are powerless.

 

Secular societies are based on a body of law, that all look toward for authority. "The group" everybody looks to for support is everybody that believes in, upholds, and obeys those laws. These people have less need for religiousity, I would surmise.

 

United States is an interesting mix of peoples from all over the world, coming from varied traditions, built on the idea that all men(male or female) are created equal and endowed with unalienable rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Freedom to believe in any and all personal gods is embedded in the law.

 

A secular society, one nation of laws, under god, that is a trusted authority, even for the atheist.

 

Regards, TAR2

 

When one turns to God (objective reality) for support, that might include the community of humans with which he/she associates.

Be that a church community, the scientific community, the neighborhood, or the legal entity with which he/she communes.

Nothing new here....

On hearing this, Jesus said to them, "It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners." (Mark 2:17, The Holy Bible:New International Version 1984).

 

The obvious point to make in respect of the first clause is that of course it's a tree- it grew from an acorn. What do you think it is ? an elephant?

 

At a slightly deeper level you seem to be arguing against yourself here.

 

You say that "Something can exist without us having knowledge of it's existence, such an existing thing would not be a tree though" but you also say that " Even if you describe something that is exactly the same as an existing entity, you have not described that existing entity."

 

So, it's only a tree if we perceive it but, even when we describe it we only describe what we perceive it to be rather that its true self.

 

There's a tree in my garden. When I look at it is it not really a tree, just my perception of it or is it a really tree because I perceive it?

 

When you make up your mind please get back to us.

What you have done is take the description of trees and imagined a tree. This tree is by definition a concept of a tree and remains a concept of a tree. At no point in time does our concept of a tree have the value of an existing tree. When we speak of a possibly existing tree, we are not describing a tree that was discovered in 2020 (the point at which we gained knowledge of the tree), we have not travelled back in time and applied the knowledge that we gained in 2020 now. The limitations of the concept remain in place when we ultimately discover the tree in 2020 and a new description is given, but even if it is the same as that of the concept, they have different meaning. That is why I said that the existing thing is not a tree, because as we converse at this present time and with our present knowledge we are not conversing about a tree in reality but merely the concept of a tree. The concept only exists as a concept.

There's a tree, deep in the jungle, it's an unusual shape.

It exists, but until someone sees what shape it is, the concept of that tree doesn't fully exist.

More importantly, that concept didn't exist until I thought of it.

 

 

Something can exist without us having knowledge of it's existence, such an existing thing would not be a tree though. We cannot meaningfully describe something that we don't have knowledge of. Even if you describe something that is exactly the same as an existing entity, you have not described that existing entity. The description is only a description of a concept.

 

The concept of God can exist independently of the actuality of god.

The 'concept of x' necessarily exists independently of the actuality of 'x'.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

A painter can describe their painting but can a painting describe it's painter.

 

 

"Is saying God/gods doesn't/don't exist really adding or subtracting from the concept of God/gods though?"

Yes, of course it does.

For example, it takes away any point to getting up early on a Sunday to go to church.

It destroys any justification of the role of the church(es) in politics.

It means that one of the largest organisations on earth is a fraud.

 

Did you really not understand that?

No, I fail to understand the meaning of the expression. It seems that you think there is one being conveyed. You put forward 'God' as an idea, therefore God exists as an idea.

Much the same as when I say unicorns don't exist.

 

Re "If the word god has an accepted meaning, then it has an existing referent."

From WIKI

"In semantics a referent is a person or thing to which a linguistic expression refers"

 

The word "God" refers to an idea- not a thing or person so, in as far as that definition is correct, then you are wrong.

The word God usually refers to some sort of all powerful being that created the Universe.

the word Unicorn usually refers to a roughly horse shaped creature with a spiral horn that can only be tamed by a virgin or shod with silver.

People used to believe in both of these.

Belief in one is now rare because there's no evidence for them.

Oddly, belief in the other persists.

 

In maths i usually refers to the square root of minus 1

 

Perhaps the simplest point is that, while I have heard plenty of definitions of God from various theists I have never seen any evidence of God's existence.

It doesn't seem to matter whose definition of God you choose, He still doesn't exist.

Similarly, some definitions of unicorns have the animal looking like a cow, rather than a horse but, since neither version exists, the details are beside the point.

 

Can you provide a definition for any widely accepted God that actually exists as anything but an abstract concept (like the unicorn)?

I know that there are supposedly people who think that Prince Philip is a God but I don't think that counts even though I think he is real. he doesn't meet the "normal" requirements of being a God. (He's not old enough for a start)

Is saying God/gods doesn't/don't exist really adding or subtracting from the concept of God/gods though? From what I understand God/gods are not portrayed as material objects (at least not for long durations of time), saying that God/gods don't exist is ultimately taking an agnostic position towards the knowledge that we could portray of God/gods (which is a given considering the definition and meaning of knowledge). Since there is no meaningful word for describing something that might or might not 'exist' outside of our conception of the universe, although 'universe' itself with our limited experience is no doubt limited in meaning, concluding that unicorns and God/gods have equal non-existence is meaningless unless they are both meant to have existence.