Why is Faith a Virtue?

i have thought long and hard about my response to this thread (in internet time).i think that faith, inasmuch as it is hope, is a virtue. it is good to trust, it is good to hope. but, it is not good to faith to question. the worst thing you can do to your brain is stop asking questions, to stop being skeptical. i was taught skepticism as part of my religious upbringing. i was told that if i did not check and recheck what anyone said against relaity and what i considered to be correct, that i was not doing my job. i think my brain trnslated that to mean that the bible (or any religious understanding, really) is a tool that can be used or misused, but it is not necessarily a source of knowledge. this was probably not the intentions of my teachers, but it is the result.i trust that eventually everything will pan out. i have faith in the inherrent utility of humanity. i believe this comes from inherrent and intended purpose, though not a "kinded" creation. i hope against all things and i think this is what will allow me to make an impact on the world. i think this is what will allow me to pursue the studies that must be pursued outside of the norm. i believe i was made with this hope for that purpose. do i know what that means anymore? no. do i have to? no. but will i stop asking why or how or what if i'm wrong? no.i think the thing about faith is that it has the potential to provide peace in the presence of questions. i'm always asking, but it doesn't disquiet me too much, because whatever the truth it, whatever the answers to the questions, i know that it's going to be okay. perhaps the true need is for more people to have a more vague sense of faith and less of this unamendable bill of beliefs. that is not faith. that is foolishness and stubbornness.

the iliad was considered a factual account of the batle of troy. in truth, the war against troy was much longer and drawn out, but a great deal of the information in the book is more accurate than our understanding prior to considering the text. (especially considering that we thought troy at all was a myth).and i do have to mention how much we know for certain about the reliability of eyewitness accounts.... there isn't any. eyewitness accounts are completely untrustworthy. Edited by brennakimi, : No reason given.Edited by brennakimi, : No reason given.

i actually don't generally want to get out of bed in the morning. but i got shit to do. why? cause you say so? why don't you do some research and find out what eople who study the brain say about eyewitness accounts.

you're confusing interaction being untrustworthy and memory and recording being untrustworthy. i can in fact believe that the computer in front of me is sitting on a very solid desk and i am sitting on a chair in front of it. assuming existence is real, these perceptions can be trusted. however. if you ask me tomorrow what side of the page a part of a text is on, my response is probably flawed. if you ask me if the guy i met had blue eyes or brown, i'll probably be mistaken. if you ask me if the whole world flooded or just "my" whole world flooded after 60 years, i'm probably going to forget that my story is a fish tale. we invent the history that we want to remember. it's how the human mind works. yes, i know that i wore a yellow shirt yesterday. do i remember what i was wearing the morning of my 5th birthday? yes. and i remember where my dad took me for breakfast and what road it was on and what i ate. how about the day before? no. no idea. how about the last conversation i had with the friend i used to have? i might remember a few things and i might melange several conversations we had. but chances are i have no idea and if you make me recount it, my brain will invent something for me to recount. but chances are it will be an exaggerration or worse.moreover. i have memories i never experienced. they are fabricated from the stories of others and from photographs. one time, i went horseback riding with my family at my uncle's ranch. i don't remember what the weather was like but in my memory it is very dark and hazy because the photo i have is thus. was it realy? probably not. it was probably just into the evening and simply too dark for the film.maybe the day jesus died, there was a really bad thunderstorm and it was really dark. or maybe god turned of the sun. i don't remember, but my mystical tendencies will sugest the latter.

why does something have to be a lie if it is untrue? when taking a test i know for sure that the output of the citric acid cycle is adp. but i could be MISTAKEN and confusing it with an entirely different cycle. the same with events.(btw. it's been 4 years and i have NO IDEA what comes out of the citric acid cycle.)

very well. but your opinions do not change the truth.

and how long have you spoken fluent hebrew?Edited by brennakimi, : No reason given.

oh. atp. i was close. that must be the one that alternates between the two.and it's not really currency... it's the transfer between atp and adp and the release and rebonding of that phosphate that releases energy. energy is in bonds, not in substances.

not really, but good luck finding any fundies who admit that their idea of god is such and not objective absolute truth.