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Originally posted by humyDo you seriously think RC capable of rational or even honest discussion?
I don't know what you are talking about: what “original premise” are you referring to and Which “assumptions” are you referring to?
I completely debunked and demolished all your claims.
List these assumptions/premise that you say I made that you say my argument is based on so I can check I made them and used them.
Then state how you have shown each one of those assumptions/premise to be false so that I can see how so.
Like I said in the OP:
"Seems like another danger of such beliefs (both religious and non-religious) is that they are extremely resistent to reason since they are not formed by reason. What's even more alarming is that those who defend such beliefs often seem to view even the most irrational of arguments as being reasonable as evidenced by many discussions on this forum."
RC is the poster child for the above.
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Originally posted by ThinkOfOneGalatians 2:20
An interesting comment about the side-effects of "faith" was made by Bruce Bartlett in an interview with Bill Moyers that I saw recently.
The following puts the comment in context. You can watch the interview in its entirety (approx. 25 mins.)
[quote]Bill Moyers talks with conservative economist Bruce Bartlett, who wrote "the bible" for the Reagan Rev than deluding themselves into thinking that they are based in reason.
Comments?
I am crucified with Christ: neverthless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me:
and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.(italics mine)
I have no doubt that those who seek to label others are insecure with themselves.
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Originally posted by humythis is certainly not reliable “EVIDENCE” of “past events” to say the least especially if those said “past events” are supposed to involve something absurd such as something supernatural ( such as a god )...
“...man of faith has assurances, based on EVIDENCE of past events as
recorded in the ancient text ...” (my emphasis)
this is certainly not reliable “EVIDENCE” of “past events” to say the least especially if those said “past events” are supposed to involve something absurd such as something supernatural ( such as a god ) because it is blind faith to believe y to use reason, not faith.
It is immoral and highly irresponsible to propagate faith.[/i]
Your line of reasoning here, taken from Hume's (outmoded) in principle argument against belief in miracles, contains two questionable claims: (1) no amount of evidence can serve to establish a miracle, and (2) miracles are by definition wholly improbable.
Regarding claim (1), if we do nothing more than weigh the probability of an event against the reliability of the witness to the event, this would, in principle, lead us to deny highly improbable events we would otherwise reasonably infer actually happened. For instance, if a news station announces the winning lottery numbers, a set of numbers you happened to have picked, an event which has a probability of ~1/200 million, even if we assume the reliability of the news station is 99.9% Hume's in principle argument would require you to completely deny the news station's testimony. But we need to also consider the probability of your set of numbers being called if, in fact, they were not the numbers chosen. This probability is also very small. Using Bayes' theorem, if we place the probability of the event occurring given the total evidence over the probability of the event not occurring, the comparative likelihood offsets the initial improbability of the event.
So, if nothing else, it is clear that an in principle argument which establishes an insurmountable standard of evidence for believing that a highly unlikely event occurred (e.g., a miracle) fails. There are always other factors present which augment the initial improbability.
Regarding claim (2), again using Bayes' theorem, if we take the intrinsic probability of a miracle happening as the numerator, and take the intrinsic probability of the miracle not occurring as the denominator, both relative to our background information and abstracting from the evidence for M, we have: Pr(M|B) / Pr(not-M|B) , and then multiply this ratio by a second ratio: the numerator Pr(E|M&B) representing the explanatory power of the miracle, and the denominator Pr(E|not-M&B) representing the explanatory power of the miracle's not occurring , then it is clear that even if M is highly improbable, M's improbability can still be offset by the ratio representing the explanatory power in favor of M.
Further, it isn't clear that M is intrinsically improbable in the first place, if M is assessed relative to one's background knowledge. For example, the claim that Jesus rose naturally from the dead is a different hypothesis altogether than the claim that God raised Jesus supernaturally from the dead. Yes, it is highly improbable for a corpse to spontaneously come back to life. However, this is not the claim under consideration. How we assess the probability of M, therefore, dependent as it is on one's background knowledge, may or may not include the belief that God exists. In other words, if I am convinced that God exists based on (e.g.) the various arguments for God's existence, and we include the probability of God (assuming he exists) raising Jesus from the dead in the above ratios, this must further augment the probability of M. Granted, there is no way to know for sure what value to assign the probability of God supernaturally raising Jesus from the dead, assuming God exists, but at the very least there's no reason to think it must be insurmountably low.
I reiterate, just because the NT claims include supernatural events does not, in principle, make belief in the NT claims irrational.
Faith is dangerous and immoral.
Your claim that faith is immoral, insofar as it is based on the immoral acts of the 9/11 hijackers, is a non sequitur. You admitted that faith is only potentially dangerous. That is true, but how do you arrive at faith's immorality based on a mere potentiality? A hammer is potentially dangerous, too (hammers can be potential murder weapons), is it therefore immoral to use a hammer in all instances? No, therefore it doesn't follow that "faith is dangerous and immoral," as you claim.
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Originally posted by epiphinehasWhile true that you can't argue that faith is immoral simply because of one instance where faith was
[b]Faith is dangerous and immoral.
Your claim that faith is immoral, based as it is on the immoral acts of the 9/11 hijackers, is a non sequitur. You admitted that faith is only potentially dangerous. That is true, but how do you arrive at faith's immorality based on a potentiality? A hammer is potentially dangerous, too (h ...[text shortened]... ]all[/i] instances? No, therefore you can't make the blanket statement that faith is immoral.[/b]
used for immoral actions, you fall into the fallacy fallacy by stating that because the argument was
flawed it's conclusion must be wrong.
It IS possible to argue that faith is immoral (not going to in detail right here because it's too late
this evening for that length of post) and the fact that it hasn't been argued fully here doesn't disprove that.
The short version is that if you allow belief in things based on faith you by definition allow belief in
things that are wrong with no method for detecting or correcting those incorrect beliefs.
Those beliefs about the world that are wrong cause other beliefs that are wrong and all those beliefs
alter your actions and decisions.
As your actions and decisions effect others and are likely to be wrong if based on faulty beliefs then if
you believe things based on faith you will Inevitably make bad decisions which effect others.
As this can be foreseen, (and witnessed) it is thus immoral to intentionally use a method of deciding what
to believe that is inherently guaranteed to cause you to believe that which is not true and thus to make
poor or incorrect decisions based on those beliefs.
For example, on the Titanic the officers lowering the boats sent out many without a full complement despite
not having enough boats for all the people to start off with.
They did this because they incorrectly believed that the boats couldn't be safely lowered while fully loaded,
and that once lowered into the water the boats would hang around close to the ship and the men could swim
out to the boats and get in.
Thus the decisions they made were logical, but based on faulty premises.
These decisions cost lives.
The boats could have been launched fully loaded, when they got into the water they rowed away to avoid getting
pulled down with the ship (which is nonsense) and to avoid getting swamped by too many people trying to get in
from the water.
And the water was icy cold making it almost impossible to swim and people died of the cold rather than drowning.
Faulty beliefs cause immeasurable amounts of harm (both large and small) and it is thus a moral imperative to try
to hold as few false beliefs and as many true beliefs as possible and to have a valid mechanism for detecting false
beliefs and correcting them.
As faith is belief without evidence or justification and often despite evidence to the contrary it is inherently and by
definition gaurenteed to lead to false beliefs and resists any attempts to correct those beliefs.
This means that belief by faith is immoral.
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Originally posted by googlefudge...you fall into the fallacy fallacy by stating that because the argument was
While true that you can't argue that faith is immoral simply because of one instance where faith was
used for immoral actions, you fall into the fallacy fallacy by stating that because the argument was
flawed it's conclusion must be wrong.
It IS possible to argue that faith is immoral (not going to in detail right here because it's too late
this ists any attempts to correct those beliefs.
This means that belief by faith is immoral.
flawed it's conclusion must be wrong.
Touche.
As faith is belief without evidence or justification and often despite evidence to the contrary it is inherently and by definition gaurenteed to lead to false beliefs and resists any attempts to correct those beliefs.
I agree with you, but only insofar as faith is defined as belief lacking any evidence or justification. The problem is, it doesn't seem possible for anyone, religious or otherwise, to form beliefs in this fashion.
For example, suppose that P accepts, all things considered, the NT as true and, furthermore, all things considered, is convinced by the various arguments for God's existence. For P, then, God's existence has all the evidence and justification in its favor. According to the description of faith you are using (disregard, for the moment, its relationship to the OP), it ought to be possible for P to form the belief that God does not exist despite believing God's existence to be the justified option. Is it really possible to form a belief without actually having any reason to think it's true? I doubt it.
This means that belief by faith is immoral.
More specifically, what is immoral is the failure to cultivate informed beliefs, not faith generally speaking, since it is possible for religious faith to operate in harmony with contrary evidence and/or counter-arguments by recognizing certain defeater-defeaters and remaining a rational enterprise.
Originally posted by googlefudgeFaith without evidence or justification, who in the world has that?
No, we really don't.
Faith (taken to mean believing things without evidence or justification for doing so) is
never reasonable or rational.
And not everyone has faith by any stretch.
I certainly don't have faith in anything.
And I know many others who can say the same, and the entire skeptical/rational/free-thought
movement is predicated on NOT having faith.
So no, not everyone has faith.
Kelly