Why do religious believers need 'faith'?

wretcheddomain

I never really understood this but maybe I'm missing something obvious.

Faith is belief in something with insufficient or negligible evidence because if there was sufficient evidence then we wouldn't need faith. I think that's an uncontroversial definition to start off with.

If God intended us to have more and more faith then that must mean that he deliberately obscured his presence to make his existence somewhat uncertain, after all, there would be no atheists if his presence was made certain.

Thus, the difficulties I have with this concept are:

1) Why would a God, so powerful as can be, play games of deception to make his existence uncertain such that he can reward those who recognise such uncertainty in his existence? Does this just not appear like petty mind-games?
...and
2) Why is this method of deliberate uncertainty a better method than revealing himself such that no doubts could exist.

In conclusion, why do we need 'faith' at all to be religious believers?

The floor is open to the good members of the forum.

Because then you get to feel extra special because you figured something out that most people didn't
If everyone knows the truth, how are you going to feel special?

wretcheddomain

bluewolf wrote: »

Because then you get to feel extra special because you figured something out that most people didn't
If everyone knows the truth, how are you going to feel special?

That's a good stab at it and this question only goes to reveal the psychology of religious believers rather than the ground-breaking 'good news' they feel they've discovered.

Bannasidhe

bluewolf wrote: »

Because then you get to feel extra special because you figured something out that most people didn't
If everyone knows the truth, how are you going to feel special?

extra special = 'chosen' people.

wretcheddomain

Bannasidhe wrote: »

extra special = 'chosen' people.

Yes - but does anyone know what logic, or lack thereof, that believers use to justify the 'concept' of faith. They must have some sort of rationale, however banal, surely?

Sarky

Because if religious people relied on anything besides faith, they wouldn't be religious for long.

Zen65

wretcheddomain wrote: »

I never really understood this but maybe I'm missing something obvious.

Stop being so hard on yourself; you're not missing anything, you're just hindered by logic!!

wretcheddomain

When I watch debates between atheists and those of a religious persuasion, I can't help but cringe when I hear the 'F word' because if I was on such a panel, my immediate response would be to ask that individual to justify exactly why faith is needed. If they can't answer it effectively, then they basically admit their belief is foundationless. I often find in many of these religious debates, including the one with VB the other night, that the premise is granted for 'faith' and never questioned or interrogated for justification purposes.

georgieporgy

wretcheddomain wrote: »

I never really understood this but maybe I'm missing something obvious.

Faith is belief in something with insufficient or negligible evidence because if there was sufficient evidence then we wouldn't need faith. I think that's an uncontroversial definition to start off with.

If God intended us to have more and more faith then that must mean that he deliberately obscured his presence to make his existence somewhat uncertain, after all, there would be no atheists if his presence was made certain.

Thus, the difficulties I have with this concept are:

1) Why would a God, so powerful as can be, play games of deception to make his existence uncertain such that he can reward those who recognise such uncertainty in his existence? Does this just not appear like petty mind-games?
...and
2) Why is this method of deliberate uncertainty a better method than revealing himself such that no doubts could exist.

In conclusion, why do we need 'faith' at all to be religious believers?

The floor is open to the good members of the forum.

Not a bad question. For what it's worth i'll try to shed a little light on the subject;

Faith is one of the 3 theological virtues.

In Catholic theology, it is held that these virtues differ from the cardinal virtues in that they can not be obtained by human effort. A person can only receive them by their being "infused"—through Divine grace—into the person.

http://www.princeton.edu/~achaney/tmve/wiki100k/docs/Theological_virtues.html

Read the whole article, it's not too long. You can't actually acquire Faith on your own, it has to be given to you by God. There is only one condition for receiving it and it's an easy one.http://catholicism.about.com/od/beliefsteachings/p/Faith.htm

Sarky

georgieporgy wrote: »

Not a bad question. For what it's worth i'll try to shed a little light on the subject;

Faith is one of the 3 theological virtues.

In Catholic theology, it is held that these virtues differ from the cardinal virtues in that they can not be obtained by human effort. A person can only receive them by their being "infused"—through Divine grace—into the person.

http://www.princeton.edu/~achaney/tmve/wiki100k/docs/Theological_virtues.html

Read the whole article, it's not too long. You can't actually acquire Faith on your own, it has to be given to you by God. There is only one condition for receiving it and it's an easy one.http://catholicism.about.com/od/beliefsteachings/p/Faith.htm

Well that wasn't a load of poorly thought out dingo's kidneys.

joseph brand

georgieporgy wrote: »

Not a bad question. For what it's worth i'll try to shed a little light on the subject;

BLIND Faith is one of the 3 theological virtues.

FTFY.

What are the other 2? Bigotry and misogyny?

joseph brand

Why do religious believers need 'faith'?

Because George Michael said so.

Fresh!!!!

wretcheddomain

<snip content moved to other thread.>

I've now got some renewed faith that the thread can re-focus itself back on...er...faith.

Turtwig

wretcheddomain wrote: »

<snip content moved to other thread.>

I've now got some renewed faith that the thread can re-focus itself back on...er...faith.

Your faith has been rewarded. All discussion of Nationalism should take this place in this new thread.

Ta

jank

joseph brand wrote: »

FTFY.

What are the other 2? Bigotry and misogyny?

Sarky wrote: »

Well that wasn't a load of poorly thought out dingo's kidneys.

See, this is what bugs me about this forum. A poster genuinely tries to answer the question from a religious and faith based point of view and all he/she gets abuse, mockery and scorn. The poster imo was genuine maybe some people should afford them a bit of courtisey back? Is that the level of discourse we can expect?

kylith

georgieporgy wrote: »

Not a bad question. For what it's worth i'll try to shed a little light on the subject;

Faith is one of the 3 theological virtues.

I would imagine that Faith is classed as a virtue by the clerical class because it essentially boils down to: 'If I say you should have faith it means I don't have to bother proving anything'. Faith is what you have when you have no evidence, nor any hope of finding any evidence. I can have faith in the inherent goodness of people because the inherent goodness of people is disputable, no-one has faith water is wet. Faith is a wish. Faith is make-believe to make yourself feel better.

swampgas

georgieporgy wrote: »

Not a bad question. For what it's worth i'll try to shed a little light on the subject;

Faith is one of the 3 theological virtues.

In Catholic theology, [...]

Yep, but can you define faith in a way someone who knows nothing about Catholic theology would understand?

Otherwise you might get caught up with circular definitions: "Faith is defined by Catholicism as such and such, and I believe that this is a correct definition because I have faith in the Catholic religion" ?

mickrock

wretcheddomain wrote: »

Faith is belief in something with insufficient or negligible evidence because if there was sufficient evidence then we wouldn't need faith.

Just like belief in the origin of life by abiogenesis.

Hey atheists, keep the faith!

EdenHazard

Maybe god doesn't care if people believe or not, that's just something humans have interpreted as so.

Geomy

jank wrote: »

See, this is what bugs me about this forum. A poster genuinely tries to answer the question from a religious and faith based point of view and all he/she gets abuse, mockery and scorn. The poster imo was genuine maybe some people should afford them a bit of courtisey back? Is that the level of discourse we can expect?

The mockery and scorn says more about the poster rather than the reply to the post...

I think it's more of a cognitive thing,or a behavioural problem lol

Let's just say I wouldn't ask them for directions you could end up in Athlone rather than Doolin :-)

swampgas

mickrock wrote: »

Just like belief in the origin of life by abiogenesis.

Hey atheists, keep the faith!

I accept abiogenesis based on the available evidence, but I'll change my mind if new evidence emerges to the contrary. That's not "faith".


And your faith (if you have one) is based on what exactly? What was drummed into you as a child perhaps?

PopePalpatine

mickrock wrote: »

Just like belief in the origin of life by abiogenesis.

Hey atheists, keep the faith!

Have you ever heard of the Miller-Urey experiment?

I suppose you haven't read any scientific journals in the few months before you decided to return here.

Bannasidhe

EdenHazard wrote: »

Maybe god doesn't care if people believe or not, that's just something humans have interpreted as so.

Maybe god doesn't exist at all and humans just need to believe there is a big daddy in the sky who rewards them when they are 'good'*, punishes them when they are 'bad'* and helps them out in times of trouble. 'We' don't need to be afraid in this big scary universe as our daddy made the universe and we are his special creation so he will mind us. Of course, Big Sky Daddy gets very cross if we doubt anything about him so we wouldn't want to be doing that now would we else there will be hell to pay...

As there is no proof of the existence of Big Sky Daddy it has to be taken on 'Faith' - i.e. a belief in something regardless of the amount of actual evidence.



* 'good' and 'bad' as defined by those who claim to speak for God.

swampgas

Bannasidhe wrote: »

As there is no proof of the existence of Big Sky Daddy it has to be taken on 'Faith' - i.e. a belief in something regardless of the amount of actual evidence.

... and as "Faith (TM)" is obviously quite silly, we need to imbue it with special magical trusty goodness, so that somehow having "Faith (TM)" makes you a better nicer person, unlike those nasty cynical old atheists.

Although I suppose if you can get children to accept the concept of faith, on ... faith, perhaps, then your job is done. It's a circular-logic virus inserted straight into their developing minds.

mickrock

swampgas wrote: »

I accept abiogenesis based on the available evidence, but I'll change my mind if new evidence emerges to the contrary. That's not "faith".

There is no available evidence, so you have faith in it.

You "accept" it because it appeals to your worldview.

swampgas

mickrock wrote: »

There is no available evidence, so you have faith in it.

You "accept" it because it appeals to your worldview.

I accept it provisionally, based on the available evidence - like I accept many other things - but I don't think you can argue that that's the same as religious faith, which is explicitly NOT based on evidence at all, but on making a choice to believe something.

To me, choosing to believe some arbitrary thing is no more than self-deception, and not a positive thing to do.

Bannasidhe

mickrock wrote: »

There is no available evidence, so you have faith in it.

You "accept" it because it appeals to your worldview.

No available evidence you say?
Have you told NASA as they seem to believe they found evidence 13 years ago...

"The discovery of this sugar molecule in a cloud from which new stars are forming means it is increasingly likely that the chemical precursors to life are formed in such clouds long before planets develop around the stars," said Jan M. Hollis of the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, MD

http://science1.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2000/ast20jun_1/

robindch

mickrock wrote: »

There is no available evidence, so you have faith in it.

There's loads of evidence Mick, so please don't claim that everybody here is as clueless about it as you are.

mickrock

Bannasidhe wrote: »

No available evidence you say?
Have you told NASA as they seem to believe they found evidence 13 years ago...

You're really clutching at straws with this sort of stuff.

As time goes on abiogenesis research is going nowhere fast. At least admit that belief in it is faith-based.

georgieporgy

For those who haven't had time to read the 2 articles I linked to here is another snippet to help clarify what we are talking about;What the Theological Virtue of Faith Is Not:

Most of the time when people use the word faith, they mean something other than the theological virtue. The Oxford American Dictionary presents as its first definition "complete trust or confidence in someone or something," and offers "one's faith in politicians" as an example. Most people understand instinctively that faith in politicians is an entirely different thing from faith in God. But the use of the same word tends to muddy the waters, and to reduce the theological virtue of faith in the eyes of nonbelievers to nothing more than a belief that is strongly, and in their minds irrationally, held. Thus faith is opposed, in the popular understanding, to reason; the latter, it is said, demands evidence, while the former is characterized by the willing acceptance of things for which there is no rational evidence.

http://catholicism.about.com/od/beliefsteachings/p/Faith.htm

robindch

mickrock wrote: »

As time goes on abiogenesis research is going nowhere fast.

And how exactly do you know that, since you know nothing about abiogenesis, or even biology?

Sarky

Which sounds like religion made up its own definition of faith so it wouldn't be bogged down by pesky things like the need for evidence, it what the rest of the world takes the word to actually mean.

Bannasidhe

mickrock wrote: »

You're really clutching at straws with this sort of stuff.

As time goes on abiogenesis research is going nowhere fast. At least admit that belief in it is faith-based.

LULZ.

Sarky

Poor Mickrock.

kylith

mickrock wrote: »

You're really clutching at straws with this sort of stuff.

As time goes on abiogenesis research is going nowhere fast. At least admit that belief in it is faith-based.

So since you reject NASA's findings, and I presume you're rejecting the Miller-Urey experiment too, would you care to present your evidence for your alternative?

Bannasidhe

kylith wrote: »

So since you reject NASA's findings, and I presume you're rejecting the Miller-Urey experiment too, would you care to present your evidence for your alternative?

Shure what do NASA know like.

kylith

Bannasidhe wrote: »

Shure what do NASA know like.

I know! Sure after being at the head of their field for years they think they know it all.

robindch

kylith wrote: »

Sure after being at the head of their field for years they think they know it all.

Head of their field? Sure doesn't everybody know that the moon landings were faked? The Soviets were in on it too!

kylith

robindch wrote: »

Head of their field? Sure doesn't everybody know that the moon landings were faked? The Soviets were in on it too!

Oh yeah, how could I forget they were such good friends with the Americans in 1969?

wretcheddomain

kylith wrote: »

So since you reject NASA's findings, and I presume you're rejecting the Miller-Urey experiment too, would you care to present your evidence for your alternative?

Unfortunately it gets much worse for the disagreeing poster above.

Recent versions of the experiment have produced even more organic molecules than Miller managed to achieve in 1952.

Sorry to put the final nail in your coffin Mick but someone had to do it.

Sarky

Won't stop him banging on the lid.

I've lost count of the number of times I've openly begged him to read up on the subjects of microbiology and evolution, so that he might stop posting nonsense, but look how that's worked out

Turtwig

Everybody needs to have faith. For example, most people on this forum follow the assumption that beliefs require evidence. There's really no reason to assume this. Other than it's pragmatic applications. But, that's an another assumption. Just because something provides seemingly pragmatic results doesn't mean it's providing actual knowledge. We just assume it does.


The thing is the 'faith' I mentioned above isn't religious faith. Religious faith is so much more than just trust and assumption. It's active devotion. You worship and pray everyday. You hope that you can change the will of the cosmos. Influence your own fate as it were. Religious types love to conflate the two. "You have faith in your partner". The difference between faith in science and faith in religion is that science is consistently looking to test and doubt it's own claims. That's how the process works. Religions on the other hand aren't proactively seeking to test their own claims. Rather they just expect you to follow and accept them without question.

Sarky

Jernal wrote: »

Everybody needs to have faith. For example, most people on this forum follow the assumption that beliefs require evidence. There's really no reason to assume this.

Beliefs do require evidence in order to be taken seriously. A belief without is just, well, pointless. Without evidence, 2,000 or more years of faith ends up on a par with any old sh*t I can make up on the spot. That's one of the points of Russell's Teapot and the Invisible Pink Unicorn.

Brian Shanahan

kylith wrote: »

I know! Sure after being at the head of their field for years they think they know it all.

They probably just trained Armstrong, Aldrin and Collins solely with the following speech:
"Sure, just press the big shiny red button here, and the wishes of thousands of children will make the unicorns who'll magically transport ye to the moon appear, so that ye can make yere appointment with Jesus, Mohammed and Buddha for tea and scones at Ozmodiar's new café up there in the moon man's left eye."

mickrock

wretcheddomain wrote: »

Recent versions of the experiment have produced even more organic molecules than Miller managed to achieve in 1952.

How very underwhelming.

There's probably as much chance of detecting Invisible Pink Unicorns as showing how abiogenesis supposedly happened.

Sarky

Even when people show you blindingly obvious evidence, you dismiss it without so much as glancing at it, let along understanding. It's very sad to see.

mickrock

Sarky wrote: »

Even when people show you blindingly obvious evidence, you dismiss it without so much as glancing at it, let along understanding. It's very sad to see.

It makes me so sad that you have such blind faith in abiogenesis. I'm starting to well up.

I'm thinking of you there surrounded by all your bacterial and viral chums.

Sarky

You must have missed half this thread if you think anyone here has blind faith in abiogenesis. Have you put a bunch of people on ignore? I mean, the only other reasonable explanation is that you're just not looking at any links people use to show you why you're wrong, maybe just banging the same old drum in the hopes that you'll annoy someone. And that would be a really stupid thing to do, as it'd make you look really, really silly.

mickrock

Sarky wrote: »

You must have missed half this thread if you think anyone here has blind faith in abiogenesis.

Ok, none of you has blind faith in abiogenesis.

I'm not surprised given the lack of evidence for it and the lack of progress being made in the field.

Sarky

Again, it looks like you've missed half of the thread, or didn't understand the parts that showed you that you're wrong. If it was a lack of understanding, you've shown no interest in becoming less wrong. That's tragic.

Pherekydes

Sarky wrote: »

Again, it looks like you've missed half of the thread, or didn't understand the parts that showed you that you're wrong. If it was a lack of understanding, you've shown no interest in becoming less wrong. That's tragic.

Nope. It's the very definition of ignorance.