tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19835303.post114528454856539325..comments2023-08-18T07:04:22.633-07:00Comments on Areté: Faith vs. RealityLifewishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07133804300464048756noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19835303.post-1162237016674062162006-10-30T11:36:00.000-08:002006-10-30T11:36:00.000-08:00As you know already, I disagree with you on what f...<I>As you know already, I disagree with you on what faith is.</I><BR/><BR/>I'm fully aware of that - many religious people prefer to treat "faith" as a synonym for "trust". The fact remains that many <I>other</I> religious people prefer the "you just gotta have faith" version. It is these Christians that I'm discussing in this post.<BR/><BR/><I>Consider the assertion: "I believe in things for which I have evidence". Why? Why should the universe be amenable to this interpretation?</I><BR/><BR/>See discussion of "usefulness" ad nauseam in later posts.<BR/><BR/><I>How can you know that the evidence you have is secure?</I><BR/><BR/>Who cares? If it's predictive, it's useful. Even if there's some evidence that I might possibly come across at a later date that might possibly falsify my models, merely suspecting that evidence's existence is decidedly <I>not</I> useful.<BR/><BR/><I>You continue to work on the basis that the evidence is secure, the universe is a meaningful place, but without the foundation of that security or meaning. This, in my opinion, is an irrational basis for your epistemology.</I><BR/><BR/>As with most issues of this kind in science, the concept of a comprehensible universe is not a premise; it's an hypothesis. If scientists discover an area of the universe that's fundamentally unpredictable, they delineate the precise boundaries of the unpredictability and (provisionally) call it a night. In fact, that's what happened with quantum mechanics. <BR/><BR/>In the majority of other cases, this hypothesis works just fine.<BR/><BR/>As a side-note, I'd point out that theists have no better explanation of all these qualities of the universe - they just push the problem back a step. Thus the atheistic approach wins on grounds of parsimony. Rather than saying "quality X exists because God wanted to create it; God's desire to create X just existed", why not simply say "quality X just existed"?Lifewishhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07133804300464048756noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19835303.post-1161685751647441832006-10-24T03:29:00.000-07:002006-10-24T03:29:00.000-07:00As you know already, I disagree with you on what f...As you know already, I disagree with you on what faith is. You are using faith in its post-modern sense of "a leap of faith" - a belief that has no grounding in reality. Faith in the Christian sense isn't the same as this. It is belief in something that is not seen, but it isn't a belief in something for which there is no evidence - for more, see <A HREF="http://exilefromgroggs.blogspot.com/2006/03/faith-versus-faith.html" REL="nofollow">here</A>.<BR/><BR/>Also, I believe that you are epistemologically wrong to believe that scientists and skeptics are all entirely objective and rational. Consider the assertion: "I believe in things for which I have evidence". Why? Why should the universe be amenable to this interpretation? How can you know that the evidence you have is secure?<BR/><BR/>I think that the only sound answer to that sort of question can be found with reference to an external absolute - which was the basis of the development of modern science. You continue to work on the basis that the evidence is secure, the universe is a meaningful place, but without the foundation of that security or meaning. This, in my opinion, is an irrational basis for your epistemology.Exile from GROGGShttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00520118288960599976noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19835303.post-1145285064704689172006-04-17T07:44:00.000-07:002006-04-17T07:44:00.000-07:00For a slightly less long-winded version of the sam...For a slightly less long-winded version of the same argument, see <A HREF="http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2006/04/easter_brings_out_the_insipid.php#comment-71795" REL="nofollow">this comment</A> on Pharyngula: <BR/><BR/>----------<BR/><BR/>Fran:<BR/><BR/><I>See, christianity takes something you don't have, with all due respect, FAITH.</I><BR/><BR/>Faith is, with all due respect, little more than an apologia for helplessness. It's what you use to make "sense" out of the shit you don't understand. In short, an appeal to faith is a cop-out. It conveniently absolves you of any obligation to have the slightest clue what you're talking about, but somehow does not preclude you from expressing absolute, unshakeable certainty in that which you do not understand. It is a socially glorified form of unapologetic intellectual laziness.<BR/><BR/><I>If it were easy to believe in, what would be the point?</I><BR/><BR/>This isn't the fucking Olympics. You don't get bonus points for degree of difficulty.<BR/><BR/><I>If you truly experienced the LOVE of God, you would have no doubt. Even if it's totally dubious to you, I would much rather HOPE and have FAITH that I will be in Heaven with my Father than the alternate choice of being in Hell with the Father of lies. So, be careful, who's the master of lies? He's so good he has you believing the lie that Jesus did not raise from the dead that it would be impossible. Open you heart and your mind and you might see how it is possible to believe even though it seems so impossible. God bless you and keep you! He loves even you!</I><BR/><BR/>Yay! Lobotomies for everyone!<BR/><BR/>Dan<BR/><BR/>----------<BR/><BR/>...<BR/><BR/>What he said.Lifewishhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07133804300464048756noreply@blogger.com