What to believe, crisis of faith

TheLiteralist said: This is, I believe a version of Pascal's Wager, and it leaves me singularly unpersuaded. It isn't very convincing because it applies to all faiths (most pertimently those that threaten eternal torment). It doesn't give you any way to choose between, say, belief in Islam or belief in Christianity. Secondly, I think its a bit cowardly to believe in something primarily because it might prevent eternal suffering - but that's just a personal opinion.

IMO you are trying to find something that doesn't exist. Hopefully I can explain that comment clearly.First a little Purpledawn background: I have over 40 years of active Protestant Christianity. I grew up in the church. I would not classify my past belief as fundamentalist as I understand its use. Today I do not align myself with the Christian religion or any religion actually. I do not feel that God exists outside of literature and mankinds imagination.While I am not a scientist and hold no degrees, I do enjoy basic science and psychology. I grew up on a farm and my father was an intelligent man, a jack of all trades so to speak but he was an electrical engineer by trade. I am very much my father's daughter although I never became an EE I did marry one.Some of my work background includes public affairs and journalism which is very concerned with presenting the proper face to the public.About 15 years ago I came as close to death as one can get without crossing the line. Upon recovering I felt the need to delve deeper into my religion/beliefs because some of what they were preaching conflicted with reality. My journey followed the path backwards from Protestant to Catholic to Jewish etc. I also looked at Native American beliefs when possible and purpose of ancient religion. My search covered a lot of books (My best time is 1800wpm) and a lot of prayer. Yes I had a crisis of faith and worked through it.Oddly enough my time on this forum has helped to solidify my position.Keep in mind that words/languages are very fluid and change over time. Some disappear altogether. From my simple viewpoint, science is mankind's perception of how reality works. Many of these results help me in my daily life: cars, medicine, etc. Many do not from my viewpoint: Black holes, origin of man etc. They are beyond my physical and mental needs.IMO, ancient people explained their perception of how their world worked through stories; and what we have separated today as spiritual, science, legal, etc. were all under one heading.If you are looking for absolute truths other than the obvious (we need air to breathe etc.) IMo, you are going to be disappointed. Religious truths change, because they are precepts of man. Legal truths change, because they are precepts of man. Many scientific truths will change, because they are theories of man. Therefore as man changes so will his perception of reality.IMO, the term "god" is a personification of what man cannot change or understand.To me a lie is an intentional action. If I come up with a theory and it turns out to be wrong, that doesn't make it a lie. I was just wrong.

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What’s the right question to ask?

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The question is what is essential to survival and inner peace?

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"The average man does not know what to do with this life, yet wants another one which lasts forever." --Anatole France

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I could pray for someone who later reported either inner peace or even so much as an answered prayer. A disinterested observer could verify the reaction and check back with that person in six months to see if they had stronger faith...either in God, prayer, or even in themselves.

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That is an experimental design with way, way too many uncontrolled variables, all of which could very easily affect the outcome.That's why my experiment is much better.

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If a disinterested observer hung around me or some (very few, but some) ministers, they would see a positive corallary between our interactions with the inner city kids and the results and changes within their lives.

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That doesn't prove that God exists, and for exactly the same reasons I give above.It does show that when kind people take an interest in the lives of inner city kids, the kids do better in life.

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Perhaps you could argue that the reaction is due to human interaction and that God is not a provable part of the picture or process.

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Indeed I could.

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Thus...it all comes down to belief. Perhaps the disinterested observer would sense more than human interaction at work. Scientifically, they could not record their subjective feelings and interpretations as fact.

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But that's just it, Phat.I suggested a real test of your claim in my previous message that was specific and narrow in scope (which would actually be able to tell us something useful), and you instead came back with vague tests that have so many uncontrolled variables that the results would be meaningless.

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Does this prove that belief, although perhaps effective, is not scientific? (Or are you going to cite the human interaction as the placebo effect, where God is the pill being presented?)

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I think that kindness and personal interest combined with social pressure to follow societal rules will help any neglected kid to do better in society.Here's an experiment.Don't mention God at all to the next couple of kids you meet and help. Do everything else the same; encourage, counsel, etc.See if they do about as well as the kids you preach to.

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Thats one difference between believers and non-believers. Believers are often satisfied with non verifiable "warm fuzzy" feelings whereas non-believers want to see concrete results on a graph or blips on a brainwave.

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Well sure, when you make a positive claim about "god" being as real to you as a human being, I'm going to question you about that.

Believe it or not, I don't mention God to perhaps half of the kids whom I talk with. They know that I am a Youth For Christ volunteer, and unless they bring God up, I never do.

Tusko,I understand you. I really wouldn't use such an argument with someone starting off in the "I don't believe the Bible" category. If such a person were willing to listen, I'd try to present positive arguments for the Bible...but mainly I'd probably just try to answer whatever concerns they might have about the Bible (If I could...and if they were interested, which is rarely the case).However, Aztraph (sp?), is a person who does/did have a faith in the Bible. To me, that makes the argument a bit different. There will be time that doubts creep up. Don't give up so easily. What have you got to gain by giving up the faith? (There are some practical things...you can do the forbidden things: lie, cheat, steal, fornicate) What have you got to lose? Eternal salvation.It was intended as an encouragement to hold on to his/her faith in spite of the doubts he/she has encountered...God might answer the doubts for him/her. He did for me.--Jason

Schraf, Why? What purpose does this serve for you? What if you succeed in causing people to doubt that which they originally believed? What will that accomplish for you? What will it accomplish for them?Aren't you, in a way, a preacher? A preacher whose message is "I really highly doubt the existence of the God of the Bible, because He has not revealed Himself in any experimentally verifiable way."Have you convinced anybody of your message? How many? What if your doubts turn out to be wrong?--Jason{edited because I left out a word}This message has been edited by TheLiteralist, 09-15-2005 11:19 AM

Schraf, But this experiment cannot truly be completed until we pass over to "the other side" can it. Being well-adjusted to society is not the only benefit to believing and obeying the gospel. Indeed, sometimes those obedient to the gospel have found themselves outcasts.If two people do "about as well" as each other in this life, and one goes to hell and the other goes to heaven...are their circumstances in this life really a fair basis for comparison?--JasonAlso: what if God decides to bless (societally) youths who heed Phat's counsel, whether they get "preached to" or not. How could one know?This message has been edited by TheLiteralist, 09-15-2005 11:20 AMThis message has been edited by TheLiteralist, 09-15-2005 11:22 AM

Aztraph, I sympathize. Many of us have gone through a similar crisis of faith. It's not fun to have the belief system you've been taught and held to since you were a child shaken by education.When it really comes down to it, only you can decide what you are going to believe. Here at EvC we have representations of just about every step from fundamentalist, literalist Christian to full-blown atheist.I think it's important to remember that there is no black-white conflict. You can remain Christian and still hold to science.When I went through a similar crisis of faith, I asked myself what kind of life I want to lead. It turns out that, for me, the teachings of Jesus work. I want to be that kind of person. Next, I asked myself if it really mattered if the Bible was literally true or not. It turns out I would want to be a follower of Jesus' teachings even if He never existed, and the Bible was a fairy tale. So, the challenges presented by science to a literal interpretation of the Bible were swept away for me - it doesn't need to be literally true. Further ivestigations simply backed up that idea. Archeological finds like the Epic of Gilgamesh tablets that predate the Flood story (and were likely the basis of the Flood), modern observations of the way religious leaders can promote basically any idea as God's Will, and other things along similar lines showed me that literalism is highly unlikely. So, I take the message I get out of the BIble and interpret it by looking at the people who wrote it, their motivations, their culture, etc. But this is what works for me - you may find that a different path makes the most sense to you.When it comes down to it, Aztraph, all you can really trust is your own heart. For Biblical literalism, all you really have is the say-so of several people who already believe that way, and a really old book that says it's all true. For science, you have theories based on reproducible experiments that, while accurate in describing the world around us, are beyond your ability to experiment with yourself (well, not all of them anyway). I would say that one is the more rational choice, but personal faith doesn't have to be entirely rational. Since you say you believe in God, regardless of Biblical literalism, I would advise you to pray. He won't steer you wrong if you're asking for help. My advice would be to put your faith and trust in your own heart and God. Whether they tell you to believe in an old book about God, or science, or a little of both, you can never go wrong trusting in God and what you know to be true deep down.

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Every time a fundy breaks the laws of thermodynamics, Schroedinger probably kills his cat.

You have a habit of misrepresenting my position and beliefs. No, I don't have faith in human wisdom; I merely recognize that as a human, whatever wisdom we might have is the wisdom of humans.But I recognize the limitations of human wisdom, which is why I only tenatitively hold to the conclusions that my human wisdom offers. I have faith in nothing, because faith is not required. There is no need for faith.

Well, maybe. Or maybe you'll lose salvation by believing in the Bible. What if God, for reasons that he need not explain to us, wants us to be atheists? (That would be a perfect explanation for the lack of proof of God.) What if God will reward only those who trusted the evidence of their experience and rationality, and punishes with eternal torment those adopt distasteful blind faith?Pascal's Wager cuts both ways, as you must surely know. And our friend here doesn't seem like the kind of guy who's not going to immediately see right through its clumsy sophistry.

Fish or whale is irrelevant to my argument. When you say that Jesus “freely quotes from the Old Testament and never once indicates that there are problems with it”, it sounds like you’re support biblical literalism with the teachings of Jesus.My argument is that Jesus doesn’t support biblical literalism.One of the passages that comes up on this is that Jesus “freely quotes” the story of Jonas so the story must be literally true. My first reply to you on this topic was to show that Jesus referring to the OT doesn’t mean the story is literal. I think the 2nd and 10th commandments were ”corrupted’. The 2nd one was removed entirely and the 10th was split into two separate commandments, 9 and 10, so that there would still be 10 after the removal of the 2nd one. this was removed This was changed into 2 commandments So now we still have 10. I’ll leave my opinions of your church out of this. Have you ever spoke in tongues? If you have you should start a thread on the experience as I am interested in what it is like to someone who has. Do you guys refuse treatment for people and leave it up to God? What about less extreme views of evolution? Do you believe that evolution doesn’t occur? It becomes gobbledygook in this context: A scientific interpretation is not considered ”fact’ by the scientists. It is a misunderstanding by creationists that they do. In science we don’t consider interpretations to be truth. In a sense, the truth is unknowable, unless you’re a mathematician.

You need to get comfortable with the fact that the only truth you will ever know, is that you exist. The consolation is that at least you do get one absolute truth in this life.Unfortunately no other truth comes directly from that, or is revealed from that. There are obviously more truths out there, and your life is a search for those truths, or making your way through life using them the best you can.So hold that first and absolute truth very carefully and ask yourself if there are other truths out there, what is the best method to get at them?People will lie trick and decieve you. So will your own body sometimes (maybe all the time). Perhaps all you will ever get to know is a relative truth (consistent but not accurate). But being you, and knowing that you are you means you have the will to choose the method of looking for more truths, so that you at least get something you can work with.As far as I can tell the scientific method is one of the best ways of working out natural phenomena. It has generated consistently the most consistently useful rules for working in this world. That's the method I choose for most attempts at gaining knowledge.Logically if there is a God or Gods, at least ones that want you to have truth about the world they made, studying natural phenomena can't hurt. Unlike a book, people can't as yet rewrite natural phenomena.But don't be fooled by claims that 1000s of scientists can't be wrong, and can't be part of a conspiracy. They can and they have. The platitude that it gets worked out with more evidence is no use to a person living in real time. The counterevidence may lie surpressed or never appear within your life time.Trust in the method of searching for truth and don't get hung up on a specific theory. If you can't spend the time going over other people's work then accept findings with the knowledge that something may not be right. Make sure to review the evidence if the matter ever becomes important.But that's my take on the situation.(AbE: The scientific method generates no moral truths. You can test yourself to find your own character, but in the end you can even change that if you find some aspect which isn't desirable. You may find that religion serves a purpose in guiding you to personal moral truths. Though I'd make sure not to confuse the mythology with the moral lessons. And like studying natural phenomena, you should explore different religious/moral phenomena.)This message has been edited by holmes, 09-15-2005 06:34 PM

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holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)

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Believe it or not, I don't mention God to perhaps half of the kids whom I talk with. They know that I am a Youth For Christ volunteer, and unless they bring God up, I never do.

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Do any of them not know you are connected to any religious group at all?OTOH, how do the kids whom you never have any religious conversations with do compared with the rest?

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Why?

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Um, because this is a debate board?

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What purpose does this serve for you? What if you succeed in causing people to doubt that which they originally believed? What will that accomplish for you? What will it accomplish for them?

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Doubt is good.Being too certain in what one believes leads to dogmatic, lazy thinking, and also to close-mindedness and rigidity.Doubt can be scary and uncomfortable, but it's a necessary part of personal growth.

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Aren't you, in a way, a preacher? A preacher whose message is "I really highly doubt the existence of the God of the Bible, because He has not revealed Himself in any experimentally verifiable way."

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A preacher of doubt? I am a pretty big supporter of evidence-based determinations of reality, it's true.However, I don't reserve doubt for the God of the Bible, you know. I also include doubt of fairies, the Loch Ness Monster, Chakras, Theraputic Touch Therapy, alien abductions, Krishna, Santa Claus, ghosts, dowsing, levitation, and dozens more claims that have not been experimentally verified.

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Have you convinced anybody of your message?

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Yes. But it wasn't because I feel a need to change people. I just like to debate and various discussions with a couple of people have given them some major food for thought, I suppose.

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How many?

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Two or three, that I know of.

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What if your doubts turn out to be wrong?

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Then I'll have evidence that will convince me.This message has been edited by schrafinator, 09-15-2005 07:39 PM

Well, if those are going to be your parameters for the experiment, the experiment is useless.Phat used the fact that the kids he does outreach with imporove themselves as evidence that god exists. He wasn't stipulating that the kids go to heaven as evidence.