by wobble 128 Replies latest watchtower bible
I enjoyed your post, Cedars.
Wobble, you should have a more clear understanding now of what was meant, just by the posts, lol.
Faith is belief without evidence.
Says who? Perhaps without proof. But not without evidence. There is evidence for my faith. There is evidence for God, and for Christ. It might not be enough for some people... but then it is enough for others. You get to choose and to think what is or is not enough for you. As do we all.
Peace,
Tammy
Tec: In reference to evidence - “It might not be enough for some people”
I hear this argument from time to time. It’s basically saying the fault lies with the other party for not agreeing with the evidence already presented. I would counter that the evidence hasn’t met necessary criteria for evidential reasoning. The FiLCHeRS are as follows:
Falsifiability -- It must be possible to conceive of evidence that would prove the claim
false. If nothing conceivable could ever disprove a claim, it is meaningless. There are two
principle ways this rule is violated:
-- By the undeclared claim: a statement so broad or vague that it lacks propositional
content, such as the claim that quartz crystals can restore balance and harmony to a
person's spiritual energy. How could you disprove that? The undeclared claim has the
advantage that virtually any evidence that could be adduced may be interpreted as
confirming the claim. It is especially popular with paranormalists.
-- By the multiple out, which is an inexhaustible series of excuses intended to explain
away evidence that would seem to falsify the claim. Psychic healers, for example, will
attribute failure to a person's lack of faith. The multiple out means, in effect, "Heads I
win, tails you lose."
Logic -- Any argument in support of a claim must be both valid and sound. To be valid,
the arguments premises must be true. To be sound, the rules of logic must be correctly
used to reach conclusions based on such premises.
Comprehensiveness -- The evidence must be exhaustive--that is, all of the available
evidence must be considered. The successes of psychics, for example, are cited without
reference to their much more numerous failures.
Honesty -- The evidence must be evaluated without self-deception. Parapsychologists
violate this rule when they conclude, after failure to replicate an initially positive result,
that psi must be an elusive phenonemon. The more honest conclusion would be that the
original result must have been a coincidence.
Replicability -- If the evidence for a claim is based upon an experimental result, or if the
evidence offered in support of a claim could logically be explained as coincidental, then
the result must be repeated in subsequent experiments or trials.
The rule of replicability, which requires independent persons to follow the same
procedures and achieve the same results, is an effective way of correcting bias, error, or
fraud in experiments. When I correctly predict the roll of the dice, is it psychic ability or
coincidence? You should demand that I repeat feat a convincing number of times.
Sufficiency -- The evidence offered in support of a claim must be adquate to establish the
truth of that claim:
-- The burden of proof for any claim rests on the claimant. UFO buffs argue that UFO
sightings not explained by skeptics must be extraterrestrial spacecraft. Hitler is alive and
well in Argentina. Is it true just because you can't prove me wrong?
-- Extraordinary claims demand extraordinary evidence. If I claim that it rained on my
way to work last Tuesday, you would be justified in assigning that claim considerable
credibility. But if I claim that I was abducted by Martians, you would want better
evidence.
-- Evidence based on authority and/or testimony is inadquate for any extraordinary
claim. No amount of expertise in a field is a guarantee against human fallibility, nor does
expertise preclude the motivation to lie.
Passing all six tests does not assure that a claim is true (there may be contrary evidence
tomorrow), but it does mean that you have sold your conviction for a fair price, and that
it has not been filched from you.
The above cut and paste has been brought to you by James Lett in the Winter 1990 issue of
Skeptical Enquirer
xchange: I hear this argument from time to time. It’s basically saying the fault lies with the other party for not agreeing with the evidence already presented. I would counter that the evidence hasn’t met necessary criteria for evidential reasoning. The FiLCHeRS are as follows:
damn straight!
noun 1. confidence or trust in a person or thing: faith in another's ability. 2. belief that is not based on proof:
belief that is not based on proof:
LOL...I believe I stated that very thing.
Faith IS based on something though; and so that something would be evidence. As for the first part of that definition, faith in another's ability is usually based on evidence (past performance, reasons to trust them, whatever)
Peace,
Tammy
It’s basically saying the fault lies with the other party for not agreeing with the evidence already presented
Don't some atheists think the same? (I say some because I don't lump all atheists into one category - same as I would like to be treated; and some believers don't deign to think along the line of 'fault' at all)
So don't some atheists think that the fault of 'belief' lies with the other party, in being unable to come to the same conclusion and dismiss belief? (believers believe only because they are scared, superstitious, irrational, illogical, or whathaveyou?)
Peace,
Tammy
Tec: So don't some atheists think that the fault of 'belief' lies with the other party
The fault lies with the framing of the arguments and evidential reasoning being employed.
Can we perhaps agree then, that belief in something with no proof, cannot be termed a rational belief ?
This is not to infer that the person holding the belief is irrational in all their thinking, it may just be in the one belief.
It isn't the religious believer that is irrational, it is believing in things with a dearth of evidence. A person can be rational most of the time and still commit irrational acts. People aren't robots with binary (1=rational, 0=irrational) programming.
People, ALL people, are sometimes rational and sometimes irrational. Some people are irrational in many areas and rational only in a few. Others are rational most of the time and only succumb to irrational thoughts and behaviors on the rare occasion.
Why then, are religious believers often classified as irrational? Because they are quite often of the former group. In addition to believing the universe began with a singular intelligent act, they also often believe dozens of other things that are irrational: there are invisible beings all over the place, there is an invisible being alive right now who was a visible man a couple thousand years ago, that same invisible being has the ability to save your eternal soul, everyone has an eternal soul that lives after you die, sometimes these souls get to go to a place called heaven where you can be with the invisible being that started the universe, sometimes these souls stay on earth and play grab-ass with Jay, Grant, Amy, and Kris on the SciFi channel, sometimes these souls go to a bad place where they suffer, around 4000 years ago the entire earth was covered with water for more than a year and the only way humanity and animals survived was because a guy built a big wooden box for every type of animal to fit into, there was once a battle of bronze-age tribesmen in which one tribal leader asked for daylight savings and the invisible being that began the universe held the sun in place for him, a donkey once spoke to its master, around 2000 years ago a virgin had a baby, need I go on?
Why do non-believers sometimes consider believers irrational? In light of the evidence, it seems it would take a great deal of restraint NOT to.
haha "Rational" is actually a synonym of "intelligent" you can not be one without the other........ So the that statement in itself is a pleonasm.
Now addressing the issue here. Can you have religious beliefs and be 'rational'? yes. an intelligent person is not one who always takes intelligent decisions...
I would ask... is it intelligent to believe in things we can not understand? to believe in things that are not logical? I would say that it is intelligent to analyze and question what we believe always.
