#45439 - 12/22/10 09:43 AM
Re: Faith - Dirty word or misconception?
[Re: Jason King]
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SkaffenAmtiskaw
veteran member
Registered: 06/24/09
Posts: 1318
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A good response, and one worth pondering. Evidence can, of course, as you suggest, be seen as a deus ex machina, or as some kind of epiphany. However, scientific evidence is gathered severally, and by double blind tests, from several sources, establishing a common reference among the proponents of a certain hypothesis.
Also, evidence is often used to *disprove* a hypothesis, and when the evidence fails to accumulate, the theory is strengthened.
The only thing that keeps evidence from being some mystic entity foisted on the unsuspecting observer by means of MEGO overload is the simple fact that everyone can test the experiment, everyone can try to disprove the theory and everyone is free to set forth new hypotheses under clinical conditions.
My main bone of contention with this procedure, however, lies with the bad rep hypotheses receive, since they are basically dreams with zero evidence to substantiate them. Hence we accumulate evidence by the method mentioned above.
You must be able to imagine in order to do science, in other words. But my support for the somewhat protean concept of evidence lies firmly rooted with the notion that everyone can replicate an experiment, checking to see if their findings support or weaken an already existing proposition.
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"I'd rather be right than consistent" - Winston Churchill
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#45440 - 12/22/10 10:08 AM
Re: Faith - Dirty word or misconception?
[Re: SkaffenAmtiskaw]
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Diavolo
RIP
stalker
Registered: 09/02/07
Posts: 4997
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What might be interesting in connection to evidence, reason and science being resistant to faith are the answers to Thaler's question at Edge.
The link starts at the first contribution. If you scroll up, you'll find Thaler's question and intro.
Especially Lakoff's part upon reason is quite interesting.
D.
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#45443 - 12/22/10 11:16 AM
Re: Faith - Dirty word or misconception?
[Re: Diavolo]
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Diavolo
RIP
stalker
Registered: 09/02/07
Posts: 4997
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What I want to add is that words have a certain value and in our context, the word faith is linked to a negative emotion. It's because of that link we Satanists struggle with the very word faith and all it calls forth. It is also why we prefer reason, logic and evidence. They not only seem better, they feel better too.
I do understand your reasoning about double blind testing or evidence being verifiable by different sources, but when we'd be completely honest, we'd have to admit that we close to never test something ourselves, or are incapable in doing so.
We rely upon the validity of the evidence in the same manner as we rely upon the validity of the hypothesis or theory. We trust the scientists, even when, as shown many times, they might manipulate or disregard data. What we do have is faith in our scientists and faith in what they say. They are our priests explaining us how the world is.
Of course our trust and faith doesn't degenerate to the same depths many religious allow it to, but nevertheless, we haven't liberated ourselves from it either.
D.
Edited by Diavolo (12/22/10 11:18 AM)
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#45444 - 12/22/10 11:19 AM
Re: Faith - Dirty word or misconception?
[Re: Diavolo]
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Jason King
Banned/Martyrdom Denied
active member
Registered: 10/24/10
Posts: 731
Loc: 65?1%833Q!92A24 (It's a code)
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What I want to add is that words have a certain value and in our context, the word faith is linked to a negative emotion. It's because of that link we Satanists struggle with the very word faith and all it calls forth. It is also why we prefer reason, logic and evidence. They not only seem better, they feel better too.
I do understand your reasoning about double blind testing or evidence being verifiable by different sources, but when we'd be completely honest, we'd have to admit that we close to never test something ourselves, or are incapable in doing so.
We rely upon the validity of the evidence in the same manner as we rely upon the validity of the hypothesis or theory. We trust the scientists, even when, as shown many times, they might manipulate or disregard data. What we do have is faith in our scientists and faith in what they say. They are our priests explaining us how the world is.
Of course our trust and faith doesn't degenerate to the same depths many religious allow it to, but nevertheless, we haven't liberated from it either.
D.
Awesome post. Utterly on point (as I see it, lol).
JK
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#45479 - 12/23/10 05:46 AM
Re: Faith - Dirty word or misconception?
[Re: Jason King]
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SkaffenAmtiskaw
veteran member
Registered: 06/24/09
Posts: 1318
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While I agree that the onus for establishing certainty lies with the individual, I would question the reason for ascribing 'faith' as the qualifier. There exists a scientific community. The competition for funding and research project priority is fierce. If there's something you can cut your teeth on, it's disproving a previously accepted theory and substituting your own. It gets you quoted and builds respect in the community. You get more funding to research all the hot topics.
In short, for anything other than objective truth to be researched, it would require a world-wide conspiracy to keep all the researchers from outing the scientific community to the world.
If there is some conviction in me regarding the scientific community's trustworthiness, it is that they can be relied upon to cut each other to shreds over any inaccuracy or fallibility. Much like bad ideas in here. People can establish credibility by tearing down other members' lines of reasoning, all in the interest of establishing a more perfect understanding of the topics.
Faith? I prefer to think of it as a conviction that the people who attempt to reach truth through the scientific method can be relied on to fight each other, tooth and bloody nail, over who has the more perfect understanding of objective truth. Since this will, by necessity, always be an approximation, the struggle will go on for ever and ever.
I don't need to research black holes through government-funded satellites and hi-tech microscopes to establish a good approximation of certainty that the research results are reliable. All it takes is the knowledge that competition will remain fierce.
_________________________
"I'd rather be right than consistent" - Winston Churchill
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#45481 - 12/23/10 06:21 AM
Re: Faith - Dirty word or misconception?
[Re: Diavolo]
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SkaffenAmtiskaw
veteran member
Registered: 06/24/09
Posts: 1318
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This very discussion is evidence that scientific progress, and the pursuit of knowledge will always win out over faith-based convictions.
Any faith-based arguments can be co-opted into the contention that 'I have been divinely vouchsafed this information by the Flying Spaghetti Monster, and as such I hold an intrinsically superior position to any supported by your silly 'evidence''.
While I support and even appreciate the arguments that you and Jason King supply here - I do recognize the inherent weaknesses in the scientific process - I still maintain that evidence-based research is superior to faith.
The ridicule of past theories that you mention is an example of these weaknesses. There are several others, far more condemning. But even so, they will be called out and ridiculed. And if there's one thing they will not stand for, it's ridicule.
As for my wilful dodging of the so-called 'synonyms', I have long maintained a strict separation of faith and evidence-based belief/conviction. If this makes me 'protest too much', then so be it.
Surrendering to faith sets a lethal precedent for your mind, and restrainst it. There is no escaping faith, but it can be isolated and recognized for its harmful influence.
With all of this said, I'll reiterate my opening statement that your input is vitally important for me to hold my convictions, since it challenges and refines them. Eventually, I may be convinced you're right, or vice versa, or we'll remain at a stalemate, but either way we'll have learned from the process. Which is sort of the point.
_________________________
"I'd rather be right than consistent" - Winston Churchill
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#45485 - 12/23/10 06:29 AM
Re: Faith - Dirty word or misconception?
[Re: SkaffenAmtiskaw]
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OrgasmicKarmatic
member
Registered: 08/01/10
Posts: 256
Loc: Michigan, USA
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Surrendering to faith sets a lethal precedent for your mind, and restrainst it. There is no escaping faith, but it can be isolated and recognized for its harmful influence.
Referring to a word with a christian undertone also restrains you. I can see how letting 'faith' in the context of laughing in the face of the skeptics and using it as an excuse for believing in shadows as being a restraint as well though.
but either way we'll have learned from the process. Which is sort of the point.
YES.
Note: I know that this was aimed at JK and D and not me but you hit the nail on the head.
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#45489 - 12/23/10 06:47 AM
Re: Faith - Dirty word or misconception?
[Re: TV is God]
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Diavolo
RIP
stalker
Registered: 09/02/07
Posts: 4997
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"Faith" can mean either of those things but I would argue that they are fundamental different things. One is the process of drawing probable conclusions from evidence, the other is believing in a conclusion and sometimes seeing evidence to support it. I would say it's an error of language to call these the same. Semantics and no more.
Of course, when you are the scientist in question. But what I am getting to, and what you would have to admit to, is that you, in all too many cases, haven't made up the theory or hypotheses, nor the evidence supporting or disproving it, and that as a result of that, for us personally, it all ends back at faith.
D.
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#45492 - 12/23/10 07:49 AM
Re: Faith - Dirty word or misconception?
[Re: Diavolo]
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Jake999
senior member
Registered: 11/02/08
Posts: 2230
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I don't draw my conclusion upon the probability of a theory or on the probability of evidence. I draw my conclusion on the fact that I don't even know the probability.
I draw my conclusion on the fact that I believe something someone told me, or which I read somewhere. You do the same. The only difference is that I admit it.
D.
Kind of throws me back into the words of The Satanic Bible, which is pretty much where the almost expected cynicism and distrust of faith arises.
"13 The most dangerous of all enthroned lies is the holy, the sanctified, the
privileged lie the lie everyone believes to be a model truth. It is the fruitful
mother of all other popular errors and delusions. It is a hydra-headed tree of
unreason with a thousand roots. It is a social cancer!
14 The lie that is known to be a lie is half eradicated, but the lie that even
intelligent persons accept as fact—the lie that has been inculcated in a little
child at its mother’s knee—is more dangerous to contend against than a
creeping pestilence!"
The Satanic Bible (Book of Satan - page 32)
The sun rising in the morning, the everyday things we take for granted are only loosely associated with faith, based on rational expectation, based on statistical probabilities. The sun NOT rising in the morning is simply a statistical anomaly of the highest order OR the catastrophic failure of a physical system. We really do ourselves a severe injustice when we allow our minds to somehow bring them under some divine control of a being or spirit.
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Bury your dead, pick up your weapon and soldier on.
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