What is more important for the future well-being of humankind: Faith or Reason?

[Riverwolf]

This seems to me that you're just drawing a distinction between a strongly justified belief and a weakly justified one (as opposed to a completely unjustified one, what you call "blind faith").

Is that a fair assessment?

Sure. Certainly, the one trumps the other.

A strongly justified belief will trump the weakly justified opposite belief. (Though it would certainly be funny if the weakly justified one turned out to be correct, as sometimes happens. lol)

 

[Meow Mix]

From a scientific perspective, it isn't. But since when were we talking only science?

Actually, you just brought that up... I said "any sense whatsoever" and you said "Not from a scientific perspective." That's not what I asked

 

[Meow Mix]

Sure. Certainly, the one trumps the other.

A strongly justified belief will trump the weakly justified opposite belief. (Though it would certainly be funny if the weakly justified one turned out to be correct, as sometimes happens. lol)

Ha, indeed. But we mere mortals have to go off of what the best we can know at a given time.

 

[Riverwolf]

I disagree. I want to examine them each:

1) "Trust that God exists." This is totally baseless. Do you "trust" that your friends exist, or do you know they do through reason? When driving to my girlfriend's parents' place once we came across a sign by some farm that said, "JESUS IS REAL." She quipped, "I'd be wary of any salesman that first had to convince me his product was real by saying so." That always kind of stuck with me.

2) "Trust that God loves us and will save us." Can you see how the connotation has shifted? The faith is no longer about the existence of something, but rather in how it will behave. This is a totally separate thing!

But "faith in God" can mean both of them (not necessarily at the same time). That's what I meant there.

In one context we have to just believe that something exists... in another context we know the thing exists but we're believing how it will act.

Having faith that something exists is always irrational. That's just hocus pocus mumbo jumbo.

Not necessarily. I think you're overgeneralizing here.

Having blind faith that something exists is pretty much always irrational. Faith itself, as I said, is basically trust with a very small reason, but a reason nonetheless, to do so.

It's a similar way in which we laymen trust what scientists are saying if we ourselves have no real way of testing their claims on our own.

I have no idea how time could possibly have started at the Big Bang (though I'm looking into the justifications for that claim), but the fact that it appears to be the accepted scientific model of the universe tells me that it may have some weight to it. So I trust that they know what they're talking about; I have faith that they know what they're talking about.

Having confidence in how something known to exist will behave, though, can be completely rational: we can base that confidence on past experience, on statistics, on induction because we form an expectation that's reasonable based on those things.

Now if I had "faith" that my girlfriend will get home tonight and hit herself repeatedly in the forehead with a frying pan while doing the macarena, spinning around and doing a handstand... that would not be reasonable at all because I have no precedent -- no REASON -- on which to base that belief.

Except that I have faith that my mom will get home tonight.

See how I use the word "faith"? I use it in the same context as "trust", as it's a usage I've heard many times. I don't see much reason not to.

 

[Mister Emu]

It isn't unreasonable to hope that things will get better

I agree... So you acknowledge that there are instances where belief without evidence is useful, and perhaps even reasonable... may I even say necessary for good health?

I must point out that if you "know" God exists then you don't have faith in God's existence.

Indeed... I do not believe I said I did

If Andy is a human being ascribed with ordinary traits then he's probably well within his epistemic duty to go ahead and accept the claim without skepticism.

It still falls under "having faith that a thing exists at all is completely different", and "Having faith that something exists is always irrational."

It's totally different from just believing that something exists without evidence.

Why move the goalposts, adding "without evidence"?

 

[Walkntune]

If this is meant to question the value of reaching another solar system body, $57 billion is a small price to pay for the technology that will ultimately be the sole chance of survival for the human race. Eventually this planet WILL be uninhabitable.

Are you speaking of a new heaven and a new earth?

 

[Eliot Wild]

I've read a bit of what's been heretofore posted, but not all of it. So, please forgive me if I am rehashing anything.

Since the question attempts to draw a distinction between 'faith' and 'reason', for the purpose of measuring their values against one another, then I am going to assume we are talking about a type of faith that is accepted without justifiable reasoning. So, I am going to qualify my answer as only applying to 'blind' faith, that which functions as a guiding behavioral mechanism without the benefit of rationally extrapolated supports.

And I'll probably need some scotch and water for this . . . Yeah, that's better.

Okay, as someone else wrote earlier (forgive me for not properly crediting the author, as I simply can't remember who it was), there is a huge difference, or so it seems to me, between 'faith' and 'blind faith'. If one has justifiable reasons for 'betting' on the unknown outcome due to rationally supported extrapolations, then that 'faith' falls within the camp of reason. If one has no justifiable reason for betting on a particular unknown, then they are acting on 'blind faith', one might say.

I have 'faith' that my Titans will beat the Redskins this weekend, based on certain rationally extrapolated expectations. The Titans are simply, in my opinion, more skilled and deeper on both sides of the ball. Plus, our defense can be monsters when fired up. It would be a position of absolute 'blind faith' to assume that Jesus himself is going to enter the game as our starting quaterback since we seem to be a bit weak at that particular position given recent injuries to both Vince Young and Kerry Collins. Although I will add, I would love to see the son of God throw the deep ball to Randy Moss.

Once a certain religious person told me that 'salvation was only attained through blind faith'. Then that person proceeded to give me explanations, some quite reasonable, for believing in the concept of 'salvation' and the need for it. To which I claimed their belief wasn't a matter of 'faith' but one based on reasoning, albeit somewhat flawed reasoning, in my humble opinion.

So, I suppose I personally believe the future well-being of humankind would be sorely undermined if we had to proceed without 'reason'. Conversely, however, I see no 'reasonable' harm, none that can be positively and conclusively identified, by proceeding headlong into the future without 'blind faith', leaving behind forever a type of faith that seeks not only to explain operative 'how's' and 'why's' of this world without any basis in reason but which is also used to bind 'non-believers' to its will.

Actually, this particular post required TWO glasses of scotch to complete. I guess I'm a more prolific drinker than philosopher. So it goes.

 

[Willamena]

Not really. Some are induction, some are confidence...

It takes a lot of trust and confidence, in one's self and the world, to induce reality.

 

[Ben Dhyan]

With reason there is simply no need for faith.

Seems to me from that statement that you have faith in reason?

 

[A Thousand Suns]

Can you give an example of reason used in Islam?

From an Islamic standpoint, science, the study of nature, is considered to be linked to the concept of Tawhid (the Oneness of God), as are all other branches of knowledge.In Islam, nature is not seen as a separate entity, but rather as an integral part of Islam’s holistic outlook on God, humanity, and the world. This link implies a sacred aspect to the pursuit of scientific knowledge by Muslims, as nature itself is viewed in the Qur’an as a compilation of signs pointing to the Divine.It was with this understanding that science was studied and understood in Islamic civilizations, specifically during the eighth to sixteenth centuries, prior to the colonization of the Muslim world.

'According to most historians, the modern scientific method was first developed by Islamic scientists, pioneered by Ibn Al-Haytham, known to the west as “Alhazen”.[4] Robert Briffault, in The Making of Humanity, asserts that the very existence of science, as it is understood in the modern sense, is rooted in the scientific thought and knowledge that emerged in Islamic civilizations during this time.'

source wikipedia

 

[ellenjanuary]

Welcome to the dawning of the Age of Aquarius, the passing of the trine; these are our options:

Carry life outward.
Carry mind inward.
Perish.

I apologize for my discord. My faith has a physical artifact, began at a specific event; certified - durable by a pair of sixes (the six is not an evil number, it is a science number). Experiment and testing, done. Next stage, the church down the street.

Reason? Like, horse logic? Like, political correctness? Like, religious tolerance? Like, the greater good, the lesser evil, the summation of ends and means? I believe in mathematics, evolution, and relativity.

Both these terms carry baggage; but I must be a theologian, for I have a definition. Faith is what remains. My faith is a balance between the descrete and the infinite; reason alone is an empty house, faith out of balance is the devourer of worlds.

I cannot accept that people are "without faith," it must just be a conceptual disconnect; but without faith, there is only the third option.

 

[Jeremiah]

Both, equally (provided you mean faith in its native context of an investment of trust or confidence). In fact, you can't have one without the other in equal measure. They are two sides of a coin called "knowing." Faith carries us forward, to and through the gap of unknowing; reason cements the gap behind us.

"Both, equally"

I don't accept pleas of equality in a comparative debate. They are typical wrong and pretty much useless in arriving at the truth of a matter.

"(provided you mean faith in its native context of an investment of trust or confidence)"

Native context? Don't you mean your preferred context? You can discuss it from any context you want, that is why I left it open ended. But that is not it's only "native" context.

"Faith carries us forward, to and through the gap of unknowing; reason cements the gap behind us."

I approach the unknown with reason, not faith. To me, faith is backwards; it starts at the end and moves to the beginning. Reasons starts at the beginning and moves to the end; this is the more reasonable approach. I, myself, don't need a carrot on a stick, reason gives me movement ahead as well as fills my life with meaning. I think it is better that we proceed on comprehension instead of following some nameless hope.

 

[Storm]

Faith leads us to curl up in dark corners moving our hands in special motions to ward off the demons and pixies.

Reason brought us to the moon and back.

I predict that some people will respond, though, that they're "equally important." I find that to be pretty silly myself though, when you compare what faith has done for humanity and what reason has done for humanity. The benefits are hardly "equal."

Well, it depends on how one understands the words. "Faith" to me means more than religion. Matters of justice, equality, and human rights are matters of faith. Science divorced from morality leads to horror as much as the misapplication of religion.

 

[dust1n]

Which ever one keeps you alive until the next day.

 

[Jeremiah]

Well, it depends on how one understands the words. "Faith" to me means more than religion. Matters of justice, equality, and human rights are matters of faith. Science divorced from morality leads to horror as much as the misapplication of religion.

"Many people fear nothing more terribly then to take a position which stands out sharply and clearly from the prevailing opinion. The tendency of most is to adopt a view that is so ambiguous that it will include everything and so popular that it will include everyone." - Martin Luther King, Jr.

 

[Storm]

"Many people fear nothing more terribly then to take a position which stands out sharply and clearly from the prevailing opinion. The tendency of most is to adopt a view that is so ambiguous that it will include everything and so popular that it will include everyone." - Martin Luther King, Jr.

You think that's what I'm doing?

 

[Jeremiah]

You think that's what I'm doing?

Clearly.

 

[Storm]

Clearly.

Tell me, how was I ambiguous?

As for popularity, I came into a thread full of atheists and declared morality a matter of faith. You seem to have a bizarre notion of "popular."

 

[outhouse]

i think its safe to say im on the reason side of the fence.

 

[waitasec]

Hope... believing that things will get better, even when there is no evidence that it will, keeps people alive and sometimes vibrant even in terrible conditions.

if i may...
hope is not a belief it is a desire.
there is a big difference between belief and desire.
it is reasonable to desire something good.
but it is not reasonable to have an intense desire for your belief to be true.