Alex's view of Atheism

[Typoz]

Hmm. All of the proponents seem to have left the field. Do they know something that I don't? Well, in any case, I will respond, and if it is a mistake, then I hope someone lets me know - privately if not publicly.

I think "faith" is kind of paradoxical. It is not hard to understand, though - just read the Gospels and it's laid out pretty well. The paradox, it seems to me, is that faith is based in faith: you kind of have to pull yourself up by your bootstraps. Faith is justified by the works it performs, but the works it performs depend on its existence in the first place. So, somehow, you have to "have faith in your faith" to start with - pulling yourself up by your bootstraps. But again, I speak merely from theory, and not experience, and in any case, if all of this is opaque or gibberish to anybody, then so be it. I would simply draw an analogy with @Typoz's theory that we form an hypothesis and then test it out in our everyday lives. Our "faith hypothesis" might be that, in having faith, we will perform works, and so we operate from a faith basis to start with (pulling ourselves up by our bootstraps), and if our hypothesis works out (we *do* perform works based in faith), then we strengthen our faith like a muscle. If not... well, let's not go there.

I'll respond since my name was mentioned.

First I should say I find discussions like this tend to flow in directions which don't move me much, so I lose interest. For me, personal experience is important. Perhaps it's the only thing I feel I can depend upon in getting to grips with subjects like this.

Thus I tend to argue on the basis of what I've found to be a pragmatic approach. Now this isn't intended to 'convince' anyone of anything. If one was to follow some of my suggested approaches, it could take years, perhaps decades to reach any firmer conclusions. I'm not here to blow anyone away with a few clever words which will solve all the issues over which people like to debate.

so, if I may quote, then comment,

I would simply draw an analogy with @Typoz's theory that we form an hypothesis and then test it out in our everyday lives.

If I may add a correction. I don't regard this as a theory. It is a pragmatic suggestion, much like the recipe for something, one would not describe it as a theory, merely a way of getting the job done.

A couple more comments. One regarding the idea of 'faith'. If I might use a simple analogy (and one deliberately chosen to be less than perfect). When I was learning maths at school, the teacher presented the well-known formula for finding the roots of a quadratic equation. In that sort of situation we were told to accept it 'on faith'. But later, perhaps a year or two down the line we were able to derive the formula ourselves and thus it was no longer a matter of faith, it was something established from first principles. Now mathematics isn't a particularly good analogy for real life, so my analogy here is more of a caricature. Nevertheless, I don't particularly regard faith as an accurate description. The only reason it looks like faith to an observer is that it is difficult to explain personal experience to someone else.

One other comment. Everyone is different, ideas which have been useful for me might be of no direct use to anyone else. But I will repeat something I said yesterday in another thread, some people would like to learn to swim before they get into the water. That is, some want to know the answers at the outset, but perhaps the only way to uncover answers is through actually doing.

 

[Laird]

You talk good sense, man. Talk is all I do, but you actually put it to the test.

 

[Typoz]

You talk good sense, man. Talk is all I do, but you actually put it to the test.

Still, there's a saying, 'All roads lead to Rome'. It would be a boring world if we all had to go the same way.