We use faith everyday

Hi,

I heard a conversation recently where a skeptic was saying faith is not something people should go by because it doesn’t equal fact and how blindly believing something like religion makes no sense. He was then countered by someone religious who said that everyone uses faith everyday because for instance, we cannot see atoms or protein so the fact we believe these things means we have faith they exist. Then the skeptic said that there is scientific proof of atoms and proteins and that models exist which show exactly how they work, whereas for something like a God we don’t have that so the “faith” is not the same. Finally the religious dude said that when kids in school are taught atoms exist they blindly believe it so it proves everyone uses faith everyday, since the start of education. Therefore all skeptics who say faith is illogical are silly because they use it.

Do you think it’s true that faith is used everyday

2 Likes

Theists often use the word faith to mean belief without evidence (or even belief contrary to evidence). That version of faith is (hopefully) not used every day by atheists.

Some people use the word faith to mean they believe something based on evidence from the past. I have faith that my friend isn’t going to steal money off my desk, because I’ve known him for a long time and it isn’t something he is likely to do. This we all do, all the time.

4 Likes

Here is the issue with “Faith.” When theists use the word, they create an equivocation fallacy. They use the word in two different ways.

According to the bible “FAITH” is the “EVIDENCE” of things not seen. Theists believe that ‘faith’ equals ‘evidence.’ When their assertions are torn down one after the other, their fall back position is “You just gotta have faith.” And when that is denied; “I don’t have faith and don’t need it.” they assert everyone has it. Then they interpret the word as hope, trust, expectation, etc…

When you are talking about children learning about atoms, FAITH is not the evidence children learn about. Their science books are loaded with facts and evidence. Their science teacher will show them models and demonstrations. The simplest demonstration that I recall was “Diffusion.” A bottle of cologne is opened in front of the class and by the end of the lecture even the kids in the back of the room can smell the cologne. Do we need faith to move molecules through the air? NO! We have evidence. Evidence that even a child can understand.

It depends on your definition of faith. “Faith” as the evidence of things not seen." is complete theistic bullshit. On the other hand hope, trust, confidences, desires, or expectations, are used all the time and the word “FAITH” can be applied in a very general way to them. THIS IS NOT THEISTIC OR BIBLICAL FAITH. Hebrews 11:1 KJV

Hope that helps to clear up the issue. We do not need faith in our lives. We especially do not need the Biblical definition of faith. We have other words that are more accurate and certainly more useful.

Depends on the person’s personal definition of “faith.”

If faith is believing without evidence, then no, atoms are very different then the various god concepts.

Sadly Hiroshima and Nagasaki is compelling evidence of the atom and what happens when you get them to collide right and the atoms are highly unstable. This is just one particularly violent and obvious of many examples of real world interaction with the atom. The god ideas have nothing even remotely similar or obvious.

Even the computer you use to post here has real world implications of the atom. As silicon based circuitry fabrication shrinks down to just a few atoms across real issues due to the size of the atoms manifest. Billions have been spent dealing with issues due to the hard limits of the size of atoms. The real world implications of the atom is all over, where despite thousands of years of looking, none of these sort of real world implications have shown up for any god idea I ever heard of, and I have spent considerable time looking around.

1 Like

No, not in the context religions use it, and not in the context this moron is implying, and certainly not for any objectively evidenced scientific fact, that’s axiomatic. This is a vapid game of word play religious apologists like to use to justify their unevidenced religious beliefs.

@King-Arzan

A provisional welcome, from Adelaide,South Australia. I say provisional because the approach you are using is commonly used here by dishonest theists

IF you are being sincere, great, I hope you hang around. To your question:

By definition, faith is belief without evidence.So no I do not use it every day.

No less a person than Jesus himself is reported as saying:

John 20:29 " Jesus saith unto him, Thomas, because thou hast seen me, thou hast believed: blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed."

I’ve always thought he had a bloody cheek demanding that. Probably more correct to say WOULD have had if he had ever said such a thing, which I strongly doubt.

I have confidence in and believe in great many things, built on evidence .Simple things,such as trusting my doctor.This is based on the evidence from having had him treat me for 20 years and always keeping to THE medical maxim “First,do no harm”

As a general principle, I do not trust any professional politician. This because 50 years of experience has shown me they lie,a lot. That their promises are smoke in the wind.Sometimes they do something positive they have promised to do and I’m pleasantly surprised.

These things are true for me,because they are based on my direct experience, which has shown me it is predictive. The experiences of others may differ but are perfectly valid for each individual. This is not about truth but about how we process experience. So far, apart from death,I have never come across an absolute truth .

The theists we get here tend to be anti science and anti reason. Yet they regularly insist on trying to use those tools without understanding first principles.First few times it’s amusing.It soon becomes boring and finally annoying because of stubborn,dogmatic,willfull pig ignorance.

2 Likes

Welcome to the forum, King-Arzan.

You’re right that people use faith everyday. But faith is the product of past experience, knowledge of the world, and expectations about the consequences of not acting in good faith. I have faith that my bank is looking after my money because every time I’ve tried to access it, the money always has been there. I have faith that when my traffic light is green, cars on the other side have a red light and will stop. Sometimes that faith is betrayed, but the record of fulfillment is close to 100%.

But faith in god is based purely on indoctrination and authority. I grew up learning to pray, but not one prayer was ever fulfilled. Every time people need god’s help, they are let down. Always. Faith in god is wishful thinking and a substitute for taking action against problems. Nothing more.

But I don’t blame god. God can’t answer prayers in good faith because he’s too busy not existing.

1 Like

Ah, this tiresome mythology fanboy trope rears its ugly head yet again

Namely, the deliberate (and frequently duplicitous) apologetic conflation of “faith” with inference from insufficient data.

The latter, of course, being in operation when the examples trotted out by the mythology fanboys as purportedly requiring “faith” are examined properly.

On the other hand, NO data is involved in the uncritical acceptance of unsupported mythological assertions by the mythology fanboys.

1 Like

A single strontium atom

1 Like

I smell a theist…

Faith is a bullshit concept and the word has no value. People have reasonable expectations which are based on evidence.

I have a reasonable expectation that the chair I’m sitting in will support my fat ass based on the fact that it is made from sturdy parts, which were put together, by me, according to the well written manual.

When I finished putting it together I had an expectation, based on the materials and my experience with those materials, that when I plopped my ample backside into it, it would not succumb to my rotundity YET, I was still skeptical on that matter until the moment at which I did place my husky hindparts and, indeed, it managed to support my gargantuan glutes…with gusto, I might add.

Now here’s how a skeptic’s mind works: Every time I prepare to perch my porcine posterior upon this chair, I recognize the fact that my previous experience with this particular chair may not hold up to this repeated abuse and prepare myself for the possibility that it may crumble beneath my titanic tuchus.

There is no faith there. There is no faith in the existence of atoms or subatomic particles or gravity or any of those other “unseen” things because there are mountains of data (including, in some cases, photographic evidence) which indicate they exist.

Faith…useless.

1 Like

Gosh, not this conversation again…

I just love how dumbshit theists intentionally decieve people with choice word selection. In this case “see.” What does “see” even mean in this case? I have different sensors (sight, smell, taste, touch, etc.), why do they always hone in on vision? I have other means of detection besides “seeing” it. I can smell the presence of rotten eggs, (i.e. my brain can interact with the environment, thus detecting the presence of something…) but since it is not “seeing” the eggs, is that “faith”? My brain is like the enterprise, scanning with its sensors, and I have more than one sensor…but a premium is put on vision. Why?

Plus, on the flip side, we know vision isn’t full proof. Hallucianations, illusions, etc. can fool vision.

Plus, we can extend our sensors with devices. We can use our eyes to see in regular light, and our ears to hear sonic sound. We can use electron microscopes to see electrons and sound enhancers to hear ultra-sound.

Finally, raw sensory data has to be analyzed. The analytics (logic, math, etc.) that we use to see how all this info fits together is also importatn. A rope with one end can’t exist. Likewise, laws of physics that seem mundane can lead, like a logic puzzle, to discoveries when we put these things together. Plus it helps use weed out when our senses fail (like visual hallucinations).

Thats why the correct term isn’t “see” it is “DEMONSTRATE.” You cannot demonstrate God (See, hear, taste, touch, smell, MRI, Electron Microscope, etc. and put the data together to point to a God). We can demonstrate atoms, proteins, etc. So if “see” means “demonstrate” than we can, in fact, “see” that stuff.

The fact that “see” is the word of choice tells me these theists are being deceptive. They know “see” isn’t the right word, but euphemistically it can mean demonstrate…they want to draw you into an EQUIVOCATION FALLACY. If I use the word “see” one way, they will try to use it the other way.

Except that the Kids grow up, and more to the point, even if they don’t understand these things, we can DEMONSTRATE that they exist. We can’t do that with GOd.

Again, another EQUIVOCATION FALLACY:

///////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
A: FIsherman’s Weekly say that large-mouthed bass are biting off the coast of califonia.

B: They can’t bite off the coast of california, their mouths are too small!
///////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

What meaning of “biting off” is being used here? WHat meaning of “see” (‘see’ as in demonstrate or as in visually ‘see’). Finally, what meaning of ‘faith’ is being used here?

‘Faith’ (meaning 1) in the sense of ‘someone who knows more than I do told me something that PERSONALLY may be beyond my ability to demonstrate, but can be CORROBORATED through experimentation and demonstration’ as opposed to ‘Faith’ (meaning 2) as in ‘things hoped for…things unseen’. Its merely an artifact of language that we use the same word for both.

Faith (1) in the boogey-man as opposed to faith (2) in the boogey-man.

I have no faith (1) in the boogey-man, because it is impossible to have faith (1) in the boogeyman since he can’t be DEMONSTRATED TO EXIST.

I also don’t have faith (2) in the boogeyman (i.e. simply use my emotions to validate his existence) because faith (2) is its self a ridiculous concept, even worse than the boogey-man.

1 Like

There are different definitions of faith

Welcome to Atheist Republic, may the Flying Spaghetti Monster touch you with his noodly appendage. :wink:

That is a constant sticking point and cause of misunderstandings. For an effective dialogue, all parties must agree on common definitons.

1 Like

This is called an “Equivocation Fallacy.”

Faith is interchangeable with other words like hope, confidence, expectation. This is not the way Theists use the word. “11 Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” Hebrews

A Theist will tell you that you “Have to have faith.” “That faith IS the evidence.” The theist’s faith is nothing at all like my 'confidence, hope. or expectation.

I have confidence that a chair will support me because it looks sturdy. I have seen others sit in it. I know it was built for sitting in. I have evidence and fully expect. even predict. that I will be able to sit in a chair providing it looks sturdy enough. Yes. I have faith (This kind of faith in the chair.)

I do not have the theist version of faith which is to accept something as true with little to no good evidence at all. It’s like the theist is telling me that there is a chair in the corner that I can sit on but I can’t see it. They are telling me to simply trust and have faith. Faith is the evidence of things not seen. Well. bullshit to that. I may walk over and feel around. Feeling nothing, I am not going to sit. “Oh you silly Atheists.” they assert. It’s there, you just have to have faith. THIS FAITH (an epistemological foundation for reality) I do not have.

1 Like

Can you please provide them?

I just did…(20 words)

For myself, I do not use the word "faith " in my life. I use “confidence”.

And as Cognostic described, it is based on real world evidence.

1 Like

[

Faith | Definition of Faith by Merriam-Webster

www.merriam-webster.com › dictionary › faith
](Faith | Definition of Faith by Merriam-Webster)

1 : strong belief or trust I have faith in our leaders. 2 : belief in God. 3 : a system of religious beliefs : religion people of all faiths. 4 : loyalty to duty or to a person or thing The team’s true fans keep the faith

I have faith that my wife will return home tonight at around 5:30. I base this upon past experience, and because she has assured me that she will. She may well not due to an accident, breakdown etc.

I do not have faith in a god. I base this upon past experience, and because no god has ever assured me that it does exist.

Billions of people have faith in diverse, contradicting religious systems.

I

A mundane claim.

Fuck, lots of people return home safely. Like I’ll believe “what you are for dinner” (people eat, fucking mundane)

What is mundane about an invisible creator being?

Lol :laughing: I took it on faith that eating hot dogs :hotdog: would cost me my life at Armageddon.

FAITH: THE HOLY FUCKING BIBLE
Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. (faith IS the evidence, no further inquiry needed)

[2 Corinthians 5:7])
For we walk by faith, not by sight.

Hebrews 11:7,27
By faith Noah, being warned of God of things not seen as yet, moved with fear, prepared an ark to the saving of his house; by the which he condemned the world, and became heir of the righteousness which is by faith…

2 Corinthians 4:18
While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen: for the things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal.