Originally posted by Suzianne
This is what happens when you believe stuff based on faith instead of reason and evidence.
I'd agree with this if you're talking about blind faith. Yeah, I know. You think all faith is blind faith by definition. Not so. The faith I have includes realizing that God is not a freaking idiot. Some of the stuff in the Bible IS literal. A lot ...[text shortened]... n science until high school, but I still picked up the basics in 5th grade science class.
Note:
There are different uses for the word faith, some uses are essentially interchangeable with the
word religion... i.e you could say "I am of the Christian faith" instead of "... Christian religion".
However the important meaning here, that we are arguing about, is the meaning of "belief without
evidence or despite of evidence to the contrary"... Or Blind faith.
Unless and until you find evidence for your god (or any other supernatural belief you hold) then belief
in that thing is based on blind faith, which is what I take issue with.
Other meanings of the word faith are not relevant here.
Ok that done, Main Argument:
The problem is that if you accept it to be ok for some beliefs to be based on blind faith, if you
accept it as ok to believe despite a lack of, or in the face of contradictory, evidence.
Then you are saying that it is ok for someone to decide what to believe based on evidence and
reason and what to believe because they just feel like it.
The point is that while you chastise RJHinds for believing things despite evidence to the contrary
you can't provide any satisfactory reason for doing so because you yourself believe things despite
evidence to the contrary.
Both of you hold beliefs based on blind faith that run contrary to the evidence we have.
RJHinds beliefs are just slightly more spectacularly obviously false than yours are.
The fact is that people can and do believe ANYTHING based on blind faith and thus can also dismiss
ANYTHING based on blind faith.
The ONLY way to have beliefs about the world that reliably and verifiably match up to reality is to base
your beliefs on reason and evidence. On science.
And on the occasions where new evidence suggests that your current beliefs are wrong then you must
change them.
No faith based belief (or disbelief) is subject to testing or can be refuted.
The ONLY way to attack a faith based belief of someone who is not prepared to look at the evidence because
they don't care about the evidence is to demonstrate that faith based belief itself is wrong and indefensible.
And this is how and where 'moderate' theists (or other faith based believers) prop up and give cover for the
fundamentalists.
You are going around saying that it's ok to believe based on faith and that the bible is the word of god.
The fact that you protest that it's not ALL literal doesn't impress those who reason that if it's the word of god as
you say it is then it should be accurate and true in it's entirety and thus anything and anyone that appears to
contradict it must be wrong. RJHinds says as much often on these forums.
Every person who goes around saying that it's not just acceptable but good to believe based on faith is covering for
and protecting those who believe really truly dangerous and stupid things based on faith.
The fact that your beliefs are less extreme, and I do bear in mind that you still believe in rapture and Armageddon
happening in the near future which is pretty extreme, does not make your beliefs good or defensible.
It doesn't even make them more defensible.
They are just slightly less cock-eyed crazy.
Go ahead and try to produce a convincing argument as for where you draw the line on what it is acceptable to believe
based on faith and what isn't acceptable to be believed (or disbelieved) based on faith.
And when you fail, when every argument you make boils down to simple personal preference, you might see that the
ONLY defensible rational position is not to believe ANYTHING based on faith.
PS:
I still would like to know where in the Bible it says that the Earth is motionless, though.
http://www.lhup.edu/~dsimanek/febible.htm
"... Except among Biblical inerrantists, it is generally agreed that the Bible describes an immovable earth. At the 1984 National Bible-Science Conference in Cleveland, geocentrist James N. Hanson told me there are hundreds of scriptures that suggest the earth is immovable. I suspect some must be a bit vague, but here are a few obvious texts:
1 Chronicles 16:30: “He has fixed the earth firm, immovable.”
Psalm 93:1: “Thou hast fixed the earth immovable and firm ...”
Psalm 96:10: “He has fixed the earth firm, immovable ...”
Psalm 104:5: “Thou didst fix the earth on its foundation so that it never can be shaken.”
Isaiah 45:18: “...who made the earth and fashioned it, and himself fixed it fast...”
Suffice to say that the earth envisioned by flat-earthers is as immovable as any geocentrist could desire. Most (perhaps all) scriptures commonly cited by geocentrists have also been cited by flat-earthers. The flat-earth view is geocentricity with further restrictions. ..."
http://www.theskepticalreview.com/tsrmag/1flat90.html
http://www.biblicalnonsense.com/chapter7.html
Does the Earth really rotate?
13 May '12 06:57
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