by Coded Logic 82 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
" Who determines what is right?"
We do. Human well being is the metric we use to determine what is right and what is wrong. Things that promote human well being are considered good. Things that cause human suffering and harm are bad. Life is generally preferable to death. Pleasure is generally preferable to pain. We start with these basic principles and use things like induction and, conversley, deduction to weigh our moral actions.
Faith is Hope, expectation of good things, without it you may as well kill yourself. Faith is the source of joy. Faith in oursleves, our loved ones, in the future, which itself is unknown and unprovable. Don't you have faith your team will win ? Doesn't that create excitement ? Faith in God is faith in the future of all things eternally continuing and us being a part of it. Faith is good. Faith is necessary for our survival in any form that is even worth living. Every day of your life you live in faith.
You can have faith without having hope, and you can also have hope without having faith. They do not automatically go hand in hand.
Hope - wishing something is true or will be true.
Belief - is thinking something is true (or probably true) for a reason.
Faith - knowing something is true without any possible reason what so ever.
" Faith - knowing something is true without any possible reason what so ever. "
What is the difference then between Faith and Delusion ?
It would appear not a great deal.
Delusion
"What legitimacy do those who feel faith is immoral." -
The word “faith” is a very misleading ambiguous one in common words. As I experience it, religious people try to justify having faith by equivocating between different standard meanings of the word.
I could have faith the sun will come out tomorrow morning. (Based on past experience and very rational)
I could have faith in the legal system. (Based on a sometimes over-credulous faith in human nature, and a little less rational)
I have faith in a deity. (Established on myth, totally irrational and without reason)
My take is that we are not talking about the sun or the legal system. Faith is trust in an idea, or a feeling that is unsupported by evidence or lacks proof. I know most people don't conform to religious claims through and/or thoroughly. And I will never hold someone accountable for faith in and of itself, but look at the behavior which may or may not result from faith.
Those who want to especially praise faith as a virtue (rather than denounce it as a vice as I do) have a stake in clarifying what "faith" is the one we are talking about.
There are distinctly different circumstances in which people not merely hold a belief unsupported by evidence, but do so knowing that it is unsupported by evidence. These people believe out of commitment to the belief itself, independent of the degree of evidential support for the belief. They might believe it while thinking that there is no evidence for it (that's dishonest). They may perceive themselves to believe it more strongly than the evidence for it alone would justify (also dishonest).
The problems begin when people believe more strongly than their own perception of evidential support warrants, or when they believe against what their perception of the evidence weighs in favor of, or when they implicitly or explicitly commit themselves to continue believing even should further evidence counter their belief. (lying)
Faith, is the word believers reach for themselves when they are out of arguments and even insist on believing anyway, or when they try to justify why they believe things that they themselves do not perceive adequate evidence for (intellectual dishonesty).
I have encountered believers on this forum, who debates about beliefs and then outright say that they will not change their minds no matter what evidence or arguments are brought. They are committed in principle to believe their religious beliefs no matter what the evidence says. And even they would like to “reason” with others and insist people have to have an open mind and heart to accept their beliefs. (deceiving)
That's dishonest and morality involves conscious choices, including the choice to act in a manner that increases someone else’s moral good. If you are being dishonest (lying, deceiving), it's the opposite of a moral act.
So yes, it's immoral,
Ismael
Coded Logic and MadGiant, you are headed down the road I was hinting at. I protest however that our innate sense of right and wrong, of justice, is not a product of reason. And mirror neurons are overrated. Pinker summarizes the results of several studies that demonstrate that there are other forces at work, in his book, "The better angels..."
I maintain that some of our innate qualities where we voluntarily set aside our reason, such as loyalty, romance, hope and faith, drive us to greater risk and potential reward beyond what reason would dictate.
There is nothing innate about faith that demands it be evil.
How about the potential to do greater damage through faith from a bad decision (from the idea that illogical love hurts only two)? My parent's marriage, for instance, a terrible mis-match, harmed more than two people.
You might have a stronger argument that an abusive and charismatic leader has greater potential for harm if he manages to invoke the power of faith in his followers. I suggest however such abuses can be mitigated by a democratic organization as we do in politics.
I don't think that organizations such as the Boy Scouts, sports teams, or churches are inherently dangerous just because predators target them. There tends to be greater trust in the good-will of the participants, and a good part of that is justified. Don't throw out the clubs because they "might" be dangerous. Mitigate the risk.
"I protest however that our innate sense of right and wrong or justice, is not a product of reason." -
I am not sure if I understood your post, Morals are a product of reason/survival. We don't have an innate sense of right, wrong or justice, we developed them within culture and society. Humans are wired to survive. Fight-or-flight response is an example of hard-wired human instincts that help keep us alive. I am mentioning the FoF response because, in order to survive, people can put others in harms way in dangerous situations, regardless of morals
The development of modern morality is a process closely tied to the Sociocultural evolution of different peoples of humanity. Morality is a product of evolutionary forces acting at an individual level and also at the group level through group selection. Morality evolved largely because they provided possible survival and/or reproductive benefits. Humans consequently evolved "pro-social" emotions, such as feelings of empathy or guilt, in response to these moral behaviors.
Still, you have to teach this behavior (morals) to the young ones. And even though is a behavior that cultivate and regulate complex interactions like empathy, reciprocity, altruism, cooperation, and a sense of fairness. They are not the same around the world.
Faith is a component of survival in the self-aware.
A pathway may not be in evidence to get from point A to point B, so what remains to allow progess?
Faith allows forward momentum where a stall might otherwise be indicated.
The success comes down to a simple demonstration:
DO NOT TRY (because evidence suggests failure will occur)=NULL RESULT. Not trying guarantees failure.
TRY (even if no possibility in evidence)=POSSIBLE success. (Only those who try get a crack at what they desire.)
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If you are alone on an island, there are no moral acts beyond maintaining life itself.
To NOT TRY to maintain life (build a fire, make a "HELP" sign out of rocks, search for food, go fishing, attempt to purify sea water, etc.) is immoral.
To give up HOPE is to condemn yourself to non-existence.
FAITH is a form of HOPE.
Hope says, "I will maintain a positive outlook and effort even though I acknowledge the possibility of failure."
Faith says, "I am absolutely convinced things will turn out for the best no matter what comes."
Faith is irrational, but has the side-effect of giving you a fighting chance.
As I said, people who want to praise faith as a virtue have a stake in clarifying what "faith" is the one we are talking about.
If I understood correctly, sometimes "faith" is essentially saying "don't be so pessimistic", which may or may not be justified depending on the situation. "Faith in oneself", could be defined as having a rational trust in one's abilities, without unjustifiably assuming they are useless. The key point is justification: when we exhort someone to "have faith in yourself", we do it because we believe there is good evidence they can trust, not in spite of there being none. I can agree with those definitions of "faith".
But, when people hold a belief unsupported by evidence, knowing that it is unsupported by evidence, is a complete different story.
Take care,
Ismael
