Belief... or lack thereof

[PRmerger]

We’ve done this before and I’ve explained it before.

This is not an example of faith.

Why don’t you give a definition of what you think Catholic faith is?

 

[Bradski]

But the thing is…you don’t actually do that for most of the knowledge you have.

Correct. Only for the important stuff. Like the air in the tank. I had to learn a lot before I could make that decision myself and I apply that knowledge in that case. For other stuff, I don’t bother. And neither do you.

 

[Bradski]

Why don’t you give a definition of what you think Catholic faith is?

A belief that what the Catholic church teaches is correct. Not based on proof but on…a religious/divine/spiritual/personal conviction.

Your definition may vary but I can’t see you saying that it’s: ‘A reasonable expectation that what the Caholic church teaches is correct’.

 

[PRmerger]

We’ve done this before and I’ve explained it before.

This is not an example of faith. This is a reasonable expectation. Just like you have a reasonable expectation that the bridge you cross to work every single day will not collapse the next time. Or the guy driving in the opposite direction will stay in his lane. Or the meal you eat at lunch is fir for consumption. Or the doctor who is going to fix your knee dips actually qualified to do it and will be sober whilst doing it.

All reasonable expectations. To imply they are faith based considerations is to twist the word so far from it’s meaning as to make it nonsensical.

I think it may be helpful for you to read this quote from philosopher Peter Kreeft:

Faith is an act by which one person says to another: “I
choose to trust you and believe you."

And this:

Perhaps such a person misunderstands what faith is, and
thinks of it as some irresistible mystical experience, or some
sudden, undeniable light of certitude. Instead, it is like pledging
your loyalty to a king, or a friend, or a spouse: it is a choice.

And, I would add: it’s a reasonable expectation that the king, your friend, or a spouse, is going to do what you’ve supposed.

So…yes, it is indeed an example of faith.

And thus we conclude that you live your life in faith.

Just like Believers do.

 

[PRmerger]

A belief that what the Catholic church teaches is correct. Not based on proof but on…a religious/divine/spiritual/personal conviction.

Then your modus falls into this category as well. You have the belief that what the airline promises is correct. Not based on proof…but on a personal conviction.

(Again–you have no proof that the pilot is legit. I am 100% certain that you have never, ever, ever demanded proof for this.)

 

[Bradski]

I think it may be helpful for you to read this quote from philosopher Peter Kreeft:

Faith is an act by which one person says to another: “I
choose to trust you and believe you."

That’s acceptable. No problem. But again, it cannot be used where there is a reasonable expectation. They are different. It’s over and above a reasonable expectation.

If I take my daughter diving, she isn’t experienced so she will rely on me to make sure all the equipment is OK. She will have a reasonable expectation that I will be looking after her best interests. If my wife say: ‘Make sure you do what the old man says’, she wouldn’t reply: ’ Yea, I have faith in him’. It’s the wrong word for the circumstance.

If I get in Qantas plane, I don’t have faith that the pilot can fly, I don’t choose to trust that he can fly, I have a reasonable expectation. If, however, everyone except me got sick and I was convinced I could land the plane, I would tell everyone: ‘I can do it. Have faith in me’. They wouldn’t have a reasonable expectation but they might need faith in that case.

 

[PRmerger]

That’s acceptable. No problem. But again, it cannot be used where there is a reasonable expectation. They are different. It’s over and above a reasonable expectation.

If I take my daughter diving, she isn’t experienced so she will rely on me to make sure all the equipment is OK. She will have a reasonable expectation that I will be looking after her best interests.

Heh. As I was reading this, my mind went faster than my eyes and I read (that is, “thought”)
this as your comment: “…she will rely on me to make sure all the equipment is OK. She will have FAITH that I will be looking after her best interests”.

And you know what? That works. My, er, expectation of what you were going to write isn’t at all any different from what you actually wrote, is it?

 

[Bradski]

Then your modus falls into this category as well. You have the belief that what the airline promises is correct. Not based on proof…but on a personal conviction.

It’s not even a personal conviction. I don’t even consider it. If I were paranoid so to do, then I’m sure Qantas would supply me with the proof I needed.

As per the earlier definition, religious faith has no proof. You can’t ask the priest for it. There’s none available. That’s why it’s called faith.

Just like the passengers in my plane. There’s no proof I can fly so they need faith. There is proof that the pilot can fly…we just don’t bother asking to see it because we have…a reasonable expectation.

 

[PRmerger]

As per the earlier definition, religious faith has no proof.

The proof is that the source for my beliefs has given me…reasonable expectations…that what she asserts are actually correct.

 

[Bradski]

And you know what? That works. My, er, expectation of what you were going to write isn’t at all any different from what you actually wrote, is it?

Yes, it is. I am qualified as a diver and my daughter knows this. Just as the pilot is qualified. Everyone has reasonable expectations that we know what we’re doing.

However, if I’m a random passenger who is convinced I can land the plane, there is no proof or reasonable expectation of this available, so everyone needs faith. If I was asking my daughter to do something for which I wasn’t qualified and for which there was no reasonable expectation or proof then I would to ask to her to trust me. To have faith in me.

The examples are clear enough.

 

[Darryl_B]

So I’m an atheist, yippee!

What does that mean?
The dictionary typically provides two possibilities, one of them does apply quite nicely: a person who disbelieves Some will call this simply “agnostic”, “agnostic atheist” or “weak atheist”… I don’t care… For me, I’m just atheist.

I’ve been in a few threads on this forum and some of them have veered a bit off-topic (can’t take all the blame for it, but some is certainly on me ) so those threads ended up closed.
I’d like this thread to be one where we can discuss any detail concerning how this disbelief of mine affects any particular aspect of life, of how I view the world, of how I envision that which is, as far as I am aware, unknown… and even that which is unknowable…

There are also some people in this forum who seem to operate under a few misconceptions about atheists, so I’d like to address them… Here’s one:

• All-mighty Lady-Chance-did-it: If no God creator of the Cosmos made all this and provided that mighty initial spark for life, then chance must have done it - no purpose, no intent, no reason… Or something like this, right?
  Well, I prefer not to be so bleak, but ultimately, yes… Under the assumption that no God exists, there seems to have been no consciousness that somehow started the Universe. Mind you, we, human race, don’t know how the Universe came into being. We can trace it back to the big bang… well, almost to the Big Bang and then our known physics becomes unsuitable, so the real answer is “I don’t know”, actually, no one knows. If anyone claims to know, they’re making it up. Any claim of divine revelation is also seen as making it up.

So, provided no God is available, why do people believe in them? How did that happen?
Sadly, written history starts at a time when religions already exist, so we don’t have any way of knowing the answer to this question.
We can try to reason it out, using the few pieces left behind for archaeologists to find, mingling them with known psychological traits shared by most humans (and likely shared with those humans who started the belief in spiritual entities).
Bah… we can never know the particulars, but my general guess is that, at some point, the frustration of not knowing many answers to questions that were burning their early curiosity-ridden minds led them to speculation… from wild speculation told over a campfire to a story which feels like it’s conveying the reality of things would go but a few generations, if any at all.
And then… just build upon it. The evolution of religions… it seems there are books written on that subject… (no, I didn’t read that… I arrived at that conclusion independently). It does make some sense, seeing as Christianity itself is clearly an evolution of the Judaic model.

With this, my mind is satisfied as it allows for everything that we see and experience to be caused by natural means.

Feel free to pick my atheism apart… I welcome you!

A very close atheist friend of mine was having a discussion with me. I asked him what be your future. He openly proclaimed “nothing”. There was a long moment of silence between us two, because he felt that emptiness, and I felt his emptiness. And that emptiness was more than I could look into.

 

[pocaracas]

Hi Mark

And just how much food are we wasting each day in the United States? Are you sure we can’t feed many more people?

Tons of food… but would it be able to arrive at where it’s missing without spoiling?

###############

I would say that I see very little evidence of this happy care free existence in most non believers. I would say you found it in the earliest Christians and that most current Christians need rediscover and live the faith as they did.

“most”…lol
“care free” as in not a care for any sort of life after this one, because… it’s not likely to be there, is it?

 

[pocaracas]

That doesn’t look quite that bad. In fact, I have no idea what one could say in reply to such post - or are you expecting many answers saying “Good for you.”?

Some people did just that on this thread.
Yet, some other people tried to have a conversation.
It’s a good thing not all are equal, apparently.

Anyway, my point was that repeating the same exchange again is rather pointless. And that there is nothing impolite in avoiding that.

Roger.

That looks like something that can be cited whenever you claim that Catholics haven’t proved, um, just about anything.

Thanks. I left it there for free.

Second, as you can see, you haven’t added quotation marks around “methodology”. You added that word yourself. In fact, it is more of a “precondition” than a “methodology”.

Very well… a precondition. So why was it presented as a sort of methodology?

In the context (you do remember it, right?) it was reasonable to expect you to tell us not just the book, but the verse as well.

And I think I did so when it was brought to my attention that you were not fully aware of what I meant.

OK, it looks like the main issue of this “debriefing” has been solved. Since other questions seem to be relatively minor (some of them are “minor”, because they seem to have reached the point where any progress is unlikely), I guess it means we can end the whole “debriefing”?

[the end]

 

[pocaracas]

How did you learn all the science you put your trust in? Was it through other peoples teaching you about it–and your believing what they have told you? Or have you done all this science yourself? Or are you trusting all those who have taught you this science–those who have given you their testimony regarding this science?

The peace of Christ,
Mark

Starting with macroscopic physics, I was first shown the way things happen and then the mathematical formulation that describe those events.
And then it took off from there.

The great thing about science is that you can track it all from first principles - You can. It doesn’t mean that you have the monetary and temporal means to accomplish it, but, you can.
If, tomorrow, all human knowledge were to disappear, science would be rediscovered… Christ on a cross… not so sure.

 

[pocaracas]

Actually various religions co-existed quite a bit and for quite a long-time in a great portion of the world. I suggest checking out “The Lost History of Christianity. The Thousand -Year Golden Age of the Church in the Middle East, Africa, and Asia–and How it Died” by Philip Jenkins. It was not really as geographically bound as we have been led to believe–there has been an ebb and flow.

Still, each of them started at a particular geographical location… but you knew that was what I meant.
Why the sidetracking?

 

[pocaracas]

A very close atheist friend of mine was having a discussion with me. I asked him what be your future. He openly proclaimed “nothing”. There was a long moment of silence between us two, because he felt that emptiness, and I felt his emptiness. And that emptiness was more than I could look into.

Welcome Darryl!

The same nothing that was before I was born, if that’s the future you’re talking about.
We must make way for the next generations.
The materials themselves get recycled, reused… The software that’s running stops.

Do you think M$ Windows carries on, in some other plane of existence, when the motherboard on the computer burns due to some electrical failure?

 

[PRmerger]

Yes, it is. I am qualified as a diver and my daughter knows this. Just as the pilot is qualified. Everyone has reasonable expectations that we know what we’re doing.

Yep.

And it is reasonable to say that your daughter has faith in your ability to teach her how to dive correctly.

However, if I’m a random passenger who is convinced I can land the plane, there is no proof or reasonable expectation of this available, so everyone needs faith.

Not at all. If I were on an aircraft and some random passenger announced that he could land the plane, *I wouldn’t have faith in him. * I would have no reason to.

All I would think is, “What the heck? Get me my pilot back!”

If I was asking my daughter to do something for which I wasn’t qualified and for which there was no reasonable expectation or proof then I would to ask to her to trust me. To have faith in me.

And that would be faith, for sure, since she would choose to believe you and trust in you.

 

[You]

Welcome Darryl!

The same nothing that was before I was born, if that’s the future you’re talking about.
We must make way for the next generations.
The materials themselves get recycled, reused… The software that’s running stops.

Do you think M$ Windows carries on, in some other plane of existence, when the motherboard on the computer burns due to some electrical failure?

if we are computers then our creator exists, computers did not create themselves. wasn’t this is a star-trek episode?

 

[Aloysium]

. . . wasn’t this is a star-trek episode?

From what I observe, this sort of stuff is at the foundation of many people’s ideas about science. People prefer the imaginary over reality, with its demands and challenges, perhaps. These are the superstitions found within a material Zeitgeist.

 

[pocaracas]

if we are computers then our creator exists, computers did not create themselves. wasn’t this is a star-trek episode?

bzzzzz wrong!
Our “software” seems to have evolved. From simple principles such as avoid danger & get food & breed, through social behaviors like those found in wolf packs or hyenas, to us.
It’s faulty, as we’d expect from such evolution… unlike what we’d expect from a super-designer/creator (of course, such a designer could arbitrarily choose to design faulty beings).