Would the World be Better off Without Religion?

@anthony1312002,

You cannot handle anything except your imaginary friend in the sky..

If the greatness of an answer is measured by the fact that it comforts your beliefs, reason lost the game.

1 Reply

onevoice wrote:

I have sided with no one

What I read in the threads you participated says otherwise.

1 Reply

@timur,

So predictable. Good by my friend.

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@neologist,

neologist wrote:

InfraBlue wrote:
You're flailing a straw man seeing as how you're referring to another meaning of the word "faith," i.e. "honesty, sincerity." FBM is referring to "faith," i.e. "strong or unshakeable belief in something, esp without proof or evidence."
Oh, I see.
We're not talking about faith.
We're talking about faith.

Please stop with the evasive rhetoric. I respect you in a number of ways, but when you start this evasive wriggling, it wears thin (It's late and I can't go to bed for a couple more hours, so everything is wearing a bit thin at the moment). Infra is correct with regards to the obvious way that I was using the word. You have either faith or evidence-based knowledge; you can't have both, for the latter destroys the former. What do you have to show us?

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@timur,

Hey, Timur... I am done disrupting this thread. If you would like to provide the evidence to support your claims about me I invite you to start a thread about me to carry on with it, so as to not be disrespectful to those who would actually like to to discuss what this, or any other thread was started to discuss.. I am sure you will have Setanta's full support. Smile

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Anthony wrote:

So predictable. Good by my friend.

Bye-bye. Oh, and by the by, if you go to the mall, I wish you a good buy.

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@FBM,

Fbm, sorry to interrupt, but I have a question or two about a statement you made.

"You have either faith or evidence-based knowledge; you can't have both, for the latter destroys the former. "

Does that apply to everything or just this particular issue? How is it that evidence-based knowledge destroys faith? That is an interesting perspective!

1 Reply

onevoice wrote:

I am done disrupting this thread.

Then, a farewell.

and wrote:

If you would like to provide the evidence to support your claims about me I invite you to start a thread about me

I don't need and don't feel compelled to comply with your desiderata.

But you need attention, hum?

and wrote:

I am sure you will have Setanta's full support.

You may not know but I'm quite lonesome and live well with my loneliness.

1 Reply

@onevoice,

Faith is, by definition, belief in/the assertion of something unknown and unseen. Something for which there is insufficient evidence to consider it incontrovertible and demonstrable. Once you have sufficient evidence, faith no longer applies. The existence of elephants, for example, compared to the existence of angels, gods, fairies, etc.

1 Reply

@timur,

Lol the only attention I want is in regards to the information I am seeking. It is you and a few others who feel this constant need to bring me into the lime light and call me out, as you see it. I invited you to start a thread to get it all outta your system. I never said I would visit it. After all, if I did, that it would imply I actually care what you or anyone else thinks about me. Unfortunately for you, I really don't. Smile

Have a nice day!

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@FBM,

FBM wrote:

. . . You have either faith or evidence-based knowledge; you can't have both, for the latter destroys the former. What do you have to show us?

Sorry.
Wrong.
You can't have faith without "evidence-based knowledge". Otherwise, you have credulity.

I don't know for sure whether we disagree on what constitutes 'evidence', or on how 'evidence' is or should be evaluated. But I clearly have evidence that we disagree.

1 Reply

@neologist,

What's the difference between faith and credulity? Not a lot. The latter enables the former.

I've been waiting for a long time for your "evidence-based knowledge" with regards to faith in your deity. You seem to keep dodging and weasling with definitions instead of showing what you've got. Knowledge renders faith obsolete. Faith based on knowledge is an oxymoron.

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@FBM,

Perfect. Thanks!

@neo
"But I clearly have evidence that we disagree"
Lol, you certainly do! I am interested to hear the rest of this discussion!

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@FBM,

Quote:

What's the difference between faith and credulity? Not a lot. The latter enables the former.

I think there is a difference. Faith is about the things that we actively WANT to be true, that are important to us, yet unproven. Often enough, we know very well that they are not proven, or even that they are broadly challenged, but we still stick to them in spite of that, out of want or need. Credulity is much more passive.

1 Reply

@onevoice,

Pssst!
Frank and Timur have a history of trading billets deux.
Stepping in between could prove fatal.

1 Reply

@FBM,

Quote:

@neologist,
What's the difference between faith and credulity? Not a lot. The latter enables the former.

Having spent many years as an EE, I have faith that the electron actually exists even though I have no direct evidence for that. I haven't looked at the very latest science on it but several generations of EEs have spent their careers manipulating these objects for which circumstantial evidence was the only 'proof' they required. They found that 'faith' in it was adequate to accomplish useful goals. It worked for them.

The circumstantial evidence for God was enough for me to begin. After that, going forward on that 'faith' also accomplished useful goals. It works for me.

If your faith that there is no God works for you, keep on truck'n. If ever it stops working, give it a second look.

1 Reply

@FBM,

"Knowledge renders faith obsolete. Faith based on knowledge is an oxymoron."

No, knowledge really doesn't. Maybe evidence based knowledge does, yet even evidence can be a subjective thing. Now, before anyone gets their panties in a knot please let me explain why I believe that.

If I am walking down the street and I come across a broken lens cap for someone's car on the side of the road. Then a few feet later I find a hubcap. Then I see a broken mirror, The natural assumption might be, Huh, looks like there might have been a wreck here. Yep. There might have been, but I would be foolish to assert that because it could have just as easily been parts falling off of people's cars as they drove by that accumulated over time, and I am sure that is the response I would get if I did.

The point being this. Just because someone considers something evidence doesn't mean it will be considered or looked at the same way to the next guy.

1 Reply

Wow!
Two in a row who understand the value of circumstantial evidence.
Who wouldda thunk?

1 Reply

@Olivier5,

Olivier5 wrote:

Quote:
What's the difference between faith and credulity? Not a lot. The latter enables the former.

I think there is a difference. Faith is about the things that we actively WANT to be true, that are important to us, yet unproven. Often enough, we know very well that they are not proven, or even that they are broadly challenged, but we still stick to them in spite of that, out of want or need. Credulity is much more passive.

Yes, strictly speaking there is a difference, but to paraphrase William James, a difference that makes no difference is no difference. Pragmatism over lexical exactitude. Credulity is the state of primed openness to accept that for which there is insufficient evidence. Accepting it requires contact with the concept in a favorable context, but credulity is the ultimate culprit. Lack of critical reasoning skills.

1 Reply

@Leadfoot,

Leadfoot wrote:

Quote:
@neologist,
What's the difference between faith and credulity? Not a lot. The latter enables the former.

Having spent many years as an EE, I have faith that the electron actually exists even though I have no direct evidence for that. I haven't looked at the very latest science on it but several generations of EEs have spent their careers manipulating these objects for which circumstantial evidence was the only 'proof' they required. They found that 'faith' in it was adequate to accomplish useful goals. It worked for them.

The circumstantial evidence for God was enough for me to begin. After that, going forward on that 'faith' also accomplished useful goals. It works for me.

If your faith that there is no God works for you, keep on truck'n. If ever it stops working, give it a second look.

You're equivocating. You say that they have experience of electron-manipulating systems that "worked for them," but seem to deny that this is credible evidence. Those systems are repeatable and falsifiable, as are the experiments in the basic sciences that resulted in those systems. You have not presented anything of competing magnitude to support your invisible god hypothesis. You have only your personal anecdote. My personal anecdote of having seen through the Bronze Age myths is of equivalent strength as yours, as anecdotes are just that. If you want me to believe in your deity, you need more than rhetoric and anecdotes. Show me something repeatable and falsifiable.

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Would the World be Better off Without Religion?

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