Faith! What's it good for? Absolutely nothing!

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Physics Guy
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Re: Faith! What's it good for? Absolutely nothing!

Post by Physics Guy »

I didn't detect any snippiness in your tone, Morley. You made your points clearly, that's all.
Morley wrote:
Sat Mar 04, 2023 9:23 am
I went back and persued the OP a couple of times, and maybe I'm missing something--but how does religious faith necessarily involve risk-taking, let alone be seen as an example of risk-taking? A woman is born into a faith and stays in that faith--I'm not seeing the example of risk-taking. Maybe if she'd married a one-armed drummer with a cocaine habit--that would serve as a better example of risk-taking.
This was the OP question:
Nimrod wrote:
Thu Mar 02, 2023 7:58 pm
Why does god favor those that will act on 'a fair amount of uncertainty' than those who want proof? Why does god value those who act on 'a fair amount of uncertainty' over those that require higher degrees of assurety from facts and evidence? What is inherently better about those that act on less information than those that require more information?
If acting on insufficient information isn't your definition of risk-taking, then how do you define risk-taking?

Except perhaps for rare psychological cases, soldiers who volunteer for hazardous missions do think they are going to survive. They generally know that they might not, and will even make some preparations for that possibility, like writing a last letter home. By the time they're actually on the mission, though, they are not devoting mental energy to every alternative in proportion to its likelihood. They are focused on the upside: they're going to achieve the mission and make it back, damn right. That is how people take risks. It's not some mysterious ability to enjoy the anticipation of painful outcomes.
How the hell is faith, by definition, a virtue? Faith seems to be something that can be either good or bad. I will grant that possessing the ability to exercise faith can be a virtue.
I guess there may be two shades of meaning in the term "faith", where it can mean either faith in some specific thing, or the general ability to have faith in things. I'm pretty sure that Darth Vader was disturbed by a lack of faith in the Force, specifically, not by a lack of the general ability to have faith in anything. On the other hand, your own construction "ability to exercise faith" implies that faith is something which can be exercised—in other words, that faith itself is an ability.

At any rate, when I say that "faith is a virtue" I do mean that the ability to act firmly in spite of uncertainty is a virtue, although faith in any specific thing can be misplaced. I don't believe that's any new interpretation on my part. It's what I have always understood the old medieval "theological virtue" of faith to mean. Maybe I've misread it. Perhaps one of our historians could advise us on the medieval Christian theory of virtues?

And now having said all that, I have to admit that Morley and Gadianton have a point when they say that soldiers and entrepreneurs aren't the people who spring to mind when they think of faith. The person who gets cited as a great example of faith is more likely to be someone who just never questions the beliefs into which they were born. I don't think that that really is a good example of faith, but it's not a straw man. People really often do mean just that, when they talk about faith.

So, hmm. I have an idea that a lot of virtues have evil twin vices. Impatience pretends to be courage; cowardice pretends to be patience. Faith is a virtue that sometimes works as courage, and sometimes as patience. There's probably a vice form of faith, that can work as impatience or cowardice. Are these evil twin vices really different things from the virtues, tares that look like wheat until it actually counts? Or are they really the same things as the virtues, which can end up being good or bad, right or wrong, depending on circumstances? I don't know. I'm not even sure whether those are different alternatives, or just different ways of labelling things.

At any rate, if I'm defending faith, I don't mean to defend simply sticking to the rut into which you were born. Yes, people do include that under the label of faith. What I mean to say is that there's also more than that, under that label.
Even with all of the above, using the word faith does not imply religious faith, nor any of dimensions unique to that concept.
No, it doesn't, and I think that's important. By all means abandon religious faith, if that's the call you see to make, but it would be a mistake to conclude that faith in general is inherently bad, just for fear of conceding something to religious believers. Our faith may be misplaced, but not all faith has to be. We might be overvaluing faith in general, but it shouldn't be undervalued, either.

It's not clear to me that God is especially keen on religious faith. I do find it natural, though, for God to want humans to have enough faith in some higher purpose to do what they can for it. Perhaps the killer application of faith is when agents with less information exercise faith to follow plans made with more information than they have. Soldiers have faith in their leaders, children have faith in their parents—and there's no other way, because children can't understand what their parents know. An ultimate being would surely be to us like a parent in that way.
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Re: Faith! What's it good for? Absolutely nothing!

Post by honorentheos »

I'm reminded of the old Reese's Peanut Butter Cups ad. Someone got their epistemology in their ethics. Probably a categorical error.
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Re: Faith! What's it good for? Absolutely nothing!

Post by Doctor CamNC4Me »

dastardly stem wrote:
Sat Mar 04, 2023 2:32 pm
I have no issue with trusting others, but I’d maintain, I think, faith is a weasely concept as advocated by religion.




Sure we have a need to trust each other. We ought to bravely take risks, perhaps. But our risks ought to have reason and purpose. …. There may be something good there, but what is it? What good comes of it? What would god really see value in?

..

That’s seems the other problem with faith. How far do we take it? …
Stem’s observations closely mirror my own, and I appreciate him taking the time to flesh them out. The definitional gradation between trust and faith is so slim to me, and I acknowledge I have a LOT of faith in all sorts of claims because I’m not omnipresent and omniscient. I suppose the difference to me between trust and faith is that trust is earned or broken when facts come to bare, but faith is often immune to facts; it flourishes in ignorance.

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Re: Faith! What's it good for? Absolutely nothing!

Post by Morley »

honorentheos wrote:
Sat Mar 04, 2023 7:01 pm
I'm reminded of the old Reese's Peanut Butter Cups ad. Someone got their epistemology in their ethics. Probably a categorical error.
Ha! No doubt. As you've probably noticed, I often get the yummy chocolate of philosophy mixed up with my brain's gooey peanut butter.
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Re: Faith! What's it good for? Absolutely nothing!

Post by Morley »

Physics Guy wrote:
Sat Mar 04, 2023 6:11 pm
I didn't detect any snippiness in your tone, Morley. You made your points clearly, that's all...

<snip>

...An ultimate being would surely be to us like a parent in that way.
Thank you for the thoughtful reply, Physics Guy. I'll answer you more fully, when I have a few minutes tomorrow.
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Re: Faith! What's it good for? Absolutely nothing!

Post by Res Ipsa »

Morley wrote:
Sat Mar 04, 2023 5:12 pm
Apologies for the snippy tone, Physics Guy. I wrote the above at 2 AM--apparently not my best time of day.
LOL. Snippy Morley is much more polite than Best Behavior Res Ipsa.
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Re: Faith! What's it good for? Absolutely nothing!

Post by Philo Sofee »

Res Ipsa wrote:
Sat Mar 04, 2023 11:54 pm
Morley wrote:
Sat Mar 04, 2023 5:12 pm
Apologies for the snippy tone, Physics Guy. I wrote the above at 2 AM--apparently not my best time of day.
LOL. Snippy Morley is much more polite than Best Behavior Res Ipsa.
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Re: Faith! What's it good for? Absolutely nothing!

Post by Nimrod »

Not all risk taking is rewarded. The better informed risk taken is more likely to yield a reward than the less informed risk taken. So I'm not convinced that risk taking is that great of an analogy. To play into it, though, why would god reward the uninformed risk taker over the more informed risk taker?
Apologists try to shill an explanation to questioning members as though science and reason really explain and buttress their professed faith. It [sic] does not. By definition, faith is the antithesis of science and reason. Apologetics is a further deception by faith peddlers to keep power and influence.
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Re: Faith! What's it good for? Absolutely nothing!

Post by malkie »

Nimrod wrote:
Tue Mar 07, 2023 3:31 am
Not all risk taking is rewarded. The better informed risk taken is more likely to yield a reward than the less informed risk taken. So I'm not convinced that risk taking is that great of an analogy. To play into it, though, why would god reward the uninformed risk taker over the more informed risk taker?
If, for the sake of argument, we agree that the god of Mormonism and/or Christianity exists, might there be fewer questions and puzzles of that sort if we stop assuming that that god is either benevolent, or rational?
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Re: Faith! What's it good for? Absolutely nothing!

Post by Morley »

Thanks, again, Physics Guy. Sorry this took me a while. Life and all that.

Physics Guy wrote:
Sat Mar 04, 2023 6:11 pm
If acting on insufficient information isn't your definition of risk-taking, then how do you define risk-taking?
A person isn't engaging in risk-taking if she's not aware that there's a risk. She's just stupid or uninformed. Idiots aren't taking risks; they're just being idiots.

Physics Guy wrote:
Sat Mar 04, 2023 6:11 pm
I guess there may be two shades of meaning in the term "faith", where it can mean either faith in some specific thing, or the general ability to have faith in things. I'm pretty sure that Darth Vader was disturbed by a lack of faith in the Force, specifically, not by a lack of the general ability to have faith in anything. On the other hand, your own construction "ability to exercise faith" implies that faith is something which can be exercised—in other words, that faith itself is an ability.
I don't think that exercising faith is an ability. There are certainly many, many circumstances under which I'm unable to generate any faith at all. Try as I must, having faith in a literal Bible is a nonstarter, for instance.

Physics Guy wrote:
Sat Mar 04, 2023 6:11 pm
At any rate, when I say that "faith is a virtue" I do mean that the ability to act firmly in spite of uncertainty is a virtue, although faith in any specific thing can be misplaced.
As sentient beings, we all act under various degrees of uncertainty. Even a grasshopper does this. I don't see how that's either virtue or vice
Physics Guy wrote:
Sat Mar 04, 2023 6:11 pm
So, hmm. I have an idea that a lot of virtues have evil twin vices. Impatience pretends to be courage; cowardice pretends to be patience. Faith is a virtue that sometimes works as courage, and sometimes as patience. There's probably a vice form of faith, that can work as impatience or cowardice. Are these evil twin vices really different things from the virtues, tares that look like wheat until it actually counts? Or are they really the same things as the virtues, which can end up being good or bad, right or wrong, depending on circumstances? I don't know. I'm not even sure whether those are different alternatives, or just different ways of labelling things.

At any rate, if I'm defending faith, I don't mean to defend simply sticking to the rut into which you were born. Yes, people do include that under the label of faith. What I mean to say is that there's also more than that, under that label.
This is revealing as to your definition of faith. Mine would be different, I'd put the continuum for faith as trust being the virtue and gullibility as the vice. I don't think faith has much to do with either a bravery--cowardliness or patience--Impatience dynamics.

Physics Guy wrote:
Sat Mar 04, 2023 6:11 pm
No, it doesn't, and I think that's important. By all means abandon religious faith, if that's the call you see to make, but it would be a mistake to conclude that faith in general is inherently bad, just for fear of conceding something to religious believers. Our faith may be misplaced, but not all faith has to be. We might be overvaluing faith in general, but it shouldn't be undervalued, either.
Meh. I don't think faith is necessarily bad. I do think the term faith is often assigned some unwarranted mystical dimension that the word doesn't merit. Because of this assigned mysticality, those who say they have faith often want it accorded special privilege.

Physics Guy wrote:
Sat Mar 04, 2023 6:11 pm
It's not clear to me that God is especially keen on religious faith. I do find it natural, though, for God to want humans to have enough faith in some higher purpose to do what they can for it. Perhaps the killer application of faith is when agents with less information exercise faith to follow plans made with more information than they have. Soldiers have faith in their leaders, children have faith in their parents—and there's no other way, because children can't understand what their parents know. An ultimate being would surely be to us like a parent in that way.
Yes, trust can be good. Yes, children do need to have faith in their parents--until they find that that faith is ill-founded.

God doesn't care whether or not we have faith or believe. All she wants from us is for humankind to make a little art and to stop screwing up the Earth and each other. It's pretty basic.
Last edited by Morley on Tue Mar 07, 2023 1:12 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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