Wednesday, 11 November 2009
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Six Things We Have Faith In
[By "we", I guess I mean most people. It may not always include me, but it tends to. You might not fit into this, but you probably will. Faith as I use it in this entry, and only in this entry, is belief without empirical evidence to provide grounds for it. This whole entry is just an exercise showing that this is a really broad category.]Six Things We Have Faith In
1. We have faith that the physical world exists. We can't prove that it exists with evidence that doesn't already presuppose it exists; in other words, we can't prove that it exists without circular reasoning. So we're left to hope that we're not living in someone else's dream.
2. We have faith that we are agents. A dose of physics should dispel the rumor that we are responsible for our beliefs and actions. Instead, we just limit physics, and continue on happily believing that we are things that control our destinies.
3. We have faith in the goodness of humanity. This is despite my lit. professor's insistence that "humanity" is a category that can be deconstructed and done away with for any other category that would be just as valid. And he also believes in the inherent goodness of humanity.
4. We have faith that we are of equal worth to each other. What's so interesting about the idea of intrinsic worth is that it's almost a self-contradiction since, almost always, a thing's worth is a label placed upon it by something else. But when we talk about human beings, we believe they are somehow equal (not in size, length or color, but) in worth, and we believe that that is an essential trait - not a contrived or somehow constructed thing.5. We have faith in people we love. When she moves to another school, none of your phone conversations will settle your doubts about her loyalty (if doubts begin to arise in the first place). You won't be able to map out her whereabouts or find out who she's been talking to from tapping her phones. If you are sane, you won't need to, because you know she will remain yours. You know this for no other reason except that you love her and you trust her when she said that she loves you, too. I told this to someone who responded that, when he has a girlfriend, he will take as the default position that she is cheating on him, unless he had sufficient scientific, falsifiable, repeatable evidence to prove otherwise. To my knowledge, he is still single.
6. We have faith that we will eventually find someone we were meant to be with (and if we don't, we're not bitter about it). Is it just a trick of language that we tend to use superlatives to describe life? Don't we secretly believe that there is a guiding purpose behind and beyond it all? "I don't believe in God, but I miss him."If you're down with my definition for faith-belief (which I won't use in the future), you'd agree that we do take a lot of things on faith, whether we'd like to or not. And, contrary to the accusation that faith is for the paranoid, the superstitious and the fearful few, faith is elemental to the human experience. The people who reject all forms of faith (if there are any people like that) must be the ones who are paranoid and cynical. What separates us from other animals is not our knowledge, but our faith.
Do you agree with this definition of faith and its application? What are some other things we believe in without evidence? Does this prove that faith is human nature?
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- From: nyclegodesi24@xanga
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- Location: Staten Island, New York, United States
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Comments (19)
my definition of faith has begun to stem from Matthew 6:25-34
i have no problem with faith in and of itself. but i would argue that the reasoning behind WHY you have certain types of faith can be very different. and very few Christians i know are willing to admit they could be wrong.
for #1: i'm not sure that's something we can ever determine anyway, so to me, pondering such things is useless.
for #2: destiny is a loaded word. and not everyone agrees with this (case in point, the insanity defense). personally, i limit it as such. when we choose to act or not act (and i do believe we choose), we are responsible for the outcome of that choice. that's far different than being in control of every single thing.
for #3: again, goodness is a little bit of a loaded term. i prefer to say that i believe that humanity as a whole means well, and that we are capable of being good through our actions (not accepting redemption from an invisible being).
for #4: i'm not sure i equate "worth" with "equality" like you do.
for #5: that could be a bad comparison to religious faith. if your SO hurts you and your response is to say it's all part of their plan to teach you something, you're nuts.
for #6: i don't believe in soul mates or a guiding purpose.
What is the purpose of expounding on a definition of faith that the OP doesn't even believe in? The answer according the to OP: This whole entry is just an exercise showing that this is a really broad category.
What is "it"?
And what good is an exercise that is based on a definition that is so clearly non-sense?
Faith as I use it in this entry... is belief without empirical evidence to provide grounds for it, says our sophomoric OP.
What about mathematics? Mathematics is an area of study that is based on pure reason not empiricism. Einstein's theories of relativity were developed by the power of reason not empiricism.
The flaw that makes this post totally useless is that it confuses faith and reason. Other errors include the New Age distortions of quantum mechanics.
We do in fact live in reality not someone's dream. What poppy cock to believe otherwise!
Each person's perception of reality may not be in total agreement with another but there is enough agreement that billions of different individuals have lived and worked together all over the world and throughout history to create coherent civilizations complete with coherent cultures.
Unless human beings shared the same general sense of reality, culture and civilization would not be possible.
And no, we are not mere agents, whatever that means. Human beings have the power to design their own lives and destinies. We are free to choose all sorts of things that work to bring about what we explicitly desire.
We are free to reject what we think is not in our best interest.
I freely reject this post. For incoherent gibberish is not in anyone's best interest.
Nice stuff.
@LoBornlyte@xanga -
We do in fact live in reality not someone's dream. What poppy cock to believe otherwise!
Prove it.
And just in case you think the following proves it...
Each person's perception of reality may not
be in total agreement with another but there is enough agreement that
billions of different individuals have lived and worked together all
over the world and throughout history to create coherent civilizations
complete with coherent cultures.
How can you prove any of that without assuming that all of the things you mentioned (i.e billions of different individuals, coherent civilizations) are real to begin with? The agreement you speak of is only relevant if those agreeing are not part of a dream or hallucination.
@LoBornlyte@xanga - Are you familiar with Cartesian thought experiments?
@LoBornlyte@xanga - you keep talking about mathematics being based on reason, but you never ever cite where you get your ideas from. i did a little research myself and found that your idea only applies to pure mathematics. other philosophers would disagree, citing that many theories function the same way as natural scientific theories. so at the very least, your opinion of mathematics is not universal. i just find it funny that you keep citing it as such.
@too_pretty_to_die@xanga -
i could be wrong. note that i'm not tryna pull an apologetic on anyone. it's just that people so often try to pit faith (as I defined it up there somewhere) against rationality. i just wanted to show that it's an essential part of the human experience, and that it doesn't mean you're paranoid or cynical or something - all claims that i've heard often.
i put spiritual reality on par with 1. we know of physical reality because of our physical experiences. our physical experiences are our starting point, not our ending point - in other words, we do not start outside of physical reality and try to prove that it exists. the same thing is true with at least my own take on spirituality. i begin with those spiritual experiences themselves, and not with my physical experiences or my understanding of logic or metaphysics.
you're right; believing that we're responsible for our actions doesn't necessarily mean we're in complete control of our lives. but even at the modest level of responsibility for our immediate actions, i think you have to smuggle in some sort of transcendentalism. and i think any sort of hope in humanity is strictly a form of faith (as i defined it up there somewhere.) and i dont equate worth with equality. if i did that, then saying that we're of "equal worth" would've been redundant. with regard to my SO; it's often unclear whether God specifically hurt us, or if it only seems that way. and when it is that way, perhaps a better analogy is that of a parent-child relationship. at any rate, the example wasn't intended to prove anything about God or religion, it was just an instance of having faith. it wasn't a comparison to religious faith in particular (sorry if it looked that way). and to the last part, you're a thoughtful exception to the rule. and by "we" i did say that some people wont fit in this. in fact, i don't think there are soul-mates, either (but that's for other reasons, which would also be based on faith.)
We're left to hope that we're not living in someone else's dream.
Heh...this was actually one of my biggest fears when I was little. I used to worry that my whole life was just one big long dream, that all my friends and family were just an illusion, and that one day I'd cease to exist because I wasn't really "real" either. Completely forgot about that until I read this. I had many a sleep-deprived night due to an extremely overactive imagination...
@nyclegodesi24@xanga -
"i begin with those spiritual experiences
themselves, and not with my physical experiences or my understanding of
logic or metaphysics."\
true. but you're still working from the assumption that they are primarily spiritual experiences to begin with. not to mention, they aren't nearly as universal as physical experiences. if you take any person anywhere in the world and tell them to stick their hand in ice water, they're essentially going to feel the same thing. take any person anywhere and give them a spiritual experience, and the outcome is far more varied. that leads me to believe that seeing something as spiritual is an interpretation/explanation, not what it is in any pure sense.
you could view it in a broader way (what i tend to do)... that humans in general have experiences which go beyond anything physical. but then i see that the specifics---where the spiritual experiences come from, what they mean, etc---are entirely subjective. i tend to hold this view... and while (probably because of my upbringing) i would lean more Christian in terms of expressing my spirituality, i steer clear of it because i cannot ascribe to it being an absolute truth. Christian faith, then, is more than just believing that what you've experienced is true.... it's the genuine belief that everyone else in all of history has felt exactly the same, and that any differing interpretations are simply mistakes. i'm not sure i could ever have enough faith for that.
"but even at the modest level of
responsibility for our immediate actions, i think you have to smuggle
in some sort of transcendentalism."
possibly. but i tend to view it as more of a cause-effect. to me, such outcomes are inevitable simply because it's what is most likely to happen. if i speed down the highway, my risk of getting a ticket is greater regardless of whether or not there are any cops around. however, perhaps if i didn't speed, i'd be late for work and be more likely to lose my job. so, i make a choice, and i have to live with whatever happens. after all, i can't really argue that i had no say in the matter.
"and i think any sort of hope in humanity is strictly a form of faith (as i defined it up there somewhere.)"
i don't view it as hope, mostly because i don't aspire to anything to be hopeful for. the reality of good acts is apparent to me on a hourly basis. i don't think it takes grand gestures to be good, nor do i think that one should be good to somehow make up for a past one had no involvement with.
"if i did that, then saying that we're of "equal worth" would've been redundant."
gotchya. then in that case, i don't believe that worth is an objective factor. at best, i believe that all humans are worth something simply because they are human. beyond that? it's too subjective. you could graduate top of your class from Harvard.... in a farming community, you'd be useless if you didn't know how to properly harvest a crop. so, it's not so much faith as it is saying that anything beyond being a human being shouldn't matter at all when it comes to worth.
@subSacred@xanga - You say "Nice stuff," to the OP who debunks the your idea that you need proof.
Then you turn right around and ask me for proof of what I said. That is totally irrational.
There are many ways to reason out that we live in an objective reality. One simple and obvious way is to look at all the different languages in the world now and through out history. If we all didn't share the same reality there would not be any coorespondence to the meaning of language.
But even ancient Chinese and Mayan can be translated to modern English or Russian or any language. Surely every language has its nuances but even complex concepts can be transmitted and understood from language to language and culture to culture and from ancient to modern.
That is proof positive that human beings share the same reality.
@too_pretty_to_die@xanga - i did a little research myself and found that your idea only applies to pure mathematics.
What do you mean "only"? Pure mathematics is the source and proof for all mathematics. All mathematics follow the same consistent set of reasonable rules. And I am not referring to anything more complicated than high school algebra and geometry.
The quadratic equation is studied as pure math in high school. Yet lo and behold you will see it in physics as part of Newton's laws of motion.
Geometric proofs are almost all non-empirical. Funny how something purely reasonable like mathematics jives so exactly with physical reality.
@SirNickDon@xanga - Are you familiar with Cartesian thought experiments?
Decarte is the father of incoherence. The grand daddy is William Ockham. I reject the philosophies of those two lunatics outright.
@LoBornlyte@xanga -
"The quadratic equation is studied as pure math in high school. Yet lo and behold you will see it in physics as part of Newton's laws of motion."And quantum physics throws Newtonian physics under the bus. The logic behind simple addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division falls apart when faced with the speed of light. We function in a world that thinly veils the truth of life. Next time you pick up a rock think about this. That rock is not a solid object. It's a conglomerate of subatomic particles that appear, disappear, and appear anew every nano second. None the less it maintains it's appearance of inherent integrity to our five senses by something that holds it and us together.
Whether or not we actually think about it, everyone lives on faith. We go to sleep with faith we'll wake up the next morning which in reality doesn't always happen. We exhale with faith that we will inhale which in reality will one day not be the case. The most disciplined of scientists researches in the faith that he or she will discover something new but that doesn't always happen. Even the most skeptical of us has faith. What is most important is that even the scientist who never discovers something new learns more for him or herself, the person who inhales yet one more time makes the most out of that breath because the next one may not come and as Alex Hitchens said in the movie "Hitch", "Begin each day as if it were on purpose."
@TheSutraDude@xanga - And quantum physics throws Newtonian physics under the bus. The logic behind simple addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division falls apart when faced with the speed of light.
The speed of light is Einstein, not quantum mechanics. Newtonian physics works in the everyday world; Einsteins theories for the insanely large and quantum mechanics for the insanely same.
Just because we do not understand all of reality doesn't mean it doesn't exist. At the level human beings operate, reality is as solid as a rock even though we know that at the quantum level this is not so.
@LoBornlyte@xanga - That's all true and we are able to function in day to day life because of the Newtonian way in which the world works. Quantum mechanics are most interesting to me in terms of "faith". It's most likely not Newtonian physics someone taps into to walk on water or to catch all those fish. Using Newtonian physics I've rarely caught any fish and frankly most of those I did catch I had to throw back. /sigh
@TheSutraDude@xanga - It's most likely not Newtonian physics someone taps into to walk on water or to catch all those fish.
There is no corelation between walking on water and any level of physics, quantum or otherwise. What has walking on water to do with spirituality?
Jesus made it clear that physical signs were for dummies. Dummies like Saint Peter and the Apostles.
The ability to walk on water by tapping into some sort of quantum priniciple is no more spiritual than using gas to power a car.
I wouldn't know actually. I haven't done it. Have you?
"What has walking on water to do with spirituality?"
Walking on water doesn't do much for me but everything can have something to do with spirituality depending on how one looks at it.
@LoBornlyte@xanga - You say "Nice stuff," to the OP who debunks the your idea that you need proof. Then you turn right around and ask me for proof of what I said. That is totally irrational.
No,
it is not. I enjoyed reading his post. I thought it was a nice post.
His post suggested we have "faith" that reality is real, you declared
that this was poppy cock, which led me to believe you have proof. It is
possible to have pure faith in something, and then find proof of that
something. I just thought maybe you had some proof. It's okay that you
don't, nobody does.