I think that we are talking at cross-purposes.
Yes. You are playing with the multiple meanings of the word "faith" which makes you engage in false equivocations.
I'm talking about faith in the religious sense, where it means "belief without evidence".
faith:
--------
1. complete trust or confidence in someone or something.
2. strong belief in the doctrines of a religion, based on spiritual conviction rather than proof.
Yes. It's the second definition that is relevant in this topic.
Naturally, there is a connection between the two.
Do you know how dictionaries work?
They give you
multiple meanings of a word. And which meaning is applicable, depends on context.
And the context here is
religion. Which means the definition that applies in this topic, is definition number 2.
You tar all theists with the same brush.
No. I just don't entertain false equivocations.
Religious faith is definition number 2. Not number one.
And the definition itself says it:
belief based on "spiritual conviction" rather then proof.
So it's what is being invoked to believe religious claims
that can't be supported or demonstrated with evidence / proof.
This is not the same as me saying to my kid "
i have faith in your abilities!" right before he starts a soccer match. There, "faith" means "confidence". And it's not blind. It's based on a previous track record of his previous soccer matches and training. It's about knowing what he can do and having confidence he can do it again, since he already did it before.
You accuse them all of irrational belief.
Believing things on faith (definition number 2) is by definition unreasonable, since it literally states right there that it is a belief that one holds
without proof / evidence.
Such beliefs are unreasonable. By definition of the word "unreasonable".
I merely point our that rational belief [or facts, as you prefer to call them] can be wrong.
All beliefs can be wrong.
That doesn't mean that all beliefs have the same merit or are equally likely or reasonable. Not even by a long shot.
Back in the day, people believed the earth was stationary and the sun orbitted the earth.
This was wrong. But nonetheless, given the information that was at their disposal, it was not an unreasonable belief.
The earth "feels" stationary and you can literally see the sun come up "there", move across the sky and then go under at the other side. So it's a reasonable inference if you have no other information.
As it turns out, new evidence showed this to be incorrect and the belief is then altered.
However, the main point is that it was NOT unreasonable to believe it back in the day. It was an evidence based belief. The evidence was the earth feeling stationary and the observation of the sun moving across the sky, coming up at one side and going under at the other.
To then conclude that the sun orbits the earth is a reasonable inference from the evidence. at their disposal at that time.
Now, the Egyptian belief that Ra has a magical airship with which he pulls the sun from one side to the other... now that was an
unreasonable belief (based on "faith" rather then evidence).
Both beliefs are wrong.
Yet one belief
at the time was reasonable.
The other was never reasonable.
Because faith based beliefs ("faith", as defined in definition 2 of your quote)
are not reasonable.
