What is faith? Really?

[JimC]

rEvolutionist wrote:

God is claimed in his autobiography to be omniscient, omnipotent, and omni-something else I've forgotten. THAT's supernatural, not natural.

Omnipresent, implying that he somehow pervades the entirety of space and time...

[mistermack]

I think you should lead a libertarian anti-theist campaign against the ultimate threat to human freedom...

Obviously god isnt the ultimate threat to freedom, but as I've mentioned before if Seth's comrades every find out he is an atheist (sorry non-theist tolerist - not trade marked as there is already a book on tolerism which definitely isnt libertarian) they will disown him.

Except that they all know and don't, probably because I don't arrogantly demean them or attack their faith for no better reason that that I think I'm infallibly right.

This is where your argument is complete bollocks.
I demean them and attack their faith because it's baseless bollocks, not because I think I'm infallible.
It's the quality of their argument and the sheer baselessness of their beliefs that invite ridicule, not some obsessive belief in my own infallibility.

If somebody proposes something, and I disagree with it, I'm not going to ridicule it just because I disagree. Not if there's an argument there that is reasonable and logical.
The religious beliefs deserve ridicule because of the way they are arrived at, and supported.

And all the dressing up, and worshipping, and singing praises, and ritual, and ''saints'' and miracles, and human sacrifices. (now in wafer form only).

[pErvinalia]

rEvolutionist wrote:

God is claimed in his autobiography to be omniscient, omnipotent, and omni-something else I've forgotten. THAT's supernatural, not natural.

Omnipresent, implying that he somehow pervades the entirety of space and time...

Oh yeah, of course. That's definitely natural, not supernatural...

[Seth]

Well you answer your own question then. If you don't know, then you don't know what god is. Who is the only type of person qualified in assessments of God? The people who claim he is real, of course.

Are they?

For the nth time, no one denies this. It's about practicality. If you want to speculate that God did all that, then you need to account for the flying tea pot doing it, and the flying spagghetti monster doing it, and zeus doing it, and He Man doing it, etc etc... I.e. it serves no useful purpose to invent entities that add nothing to what we know about the world already.

Why does one "need" to account for the FSM or FTP? Would proof of their non-existence say anything about God? Nope. And under some versions of the multiple universe theory at the moment that someone thought of the FSM, reality split into two new universes, one of which contains an FSM and one which does not.

As to "serving a useful purpose," that's very subjective. People cling to their religion for a reason, and that usually involves how they interact positively with one another and get through the day in an uncertain and often hostile world. So the useful purpose is to ease the individual's path in life. If belief does so, it doesn't matter whether the belief is true or false because it has positive social effects for the individual and society regardless.

That's something you Atheists seem constitutionally incapable of understanding.

[Seth]

rEvolutionist wrote:

God is claimed in his autobiography to be omniscient, omnipotent, and omni-something else I've forgotten. THAT's supernatural, not natural.

Omnipresent, implying that he somehow pervades the entirety of space and time...

He's right there, reclining on the quantum foam...

[pErvinalia]

You ignored the rest of this post where i point out you are a liar, you lying fuck. I'm not addressing anything else from your reply till you admit you are a lying fuck and have absolutely ZERO evidence to back your slanders up.

[pErvinalia]

rEvolutionist wrote:

God is claimed in his autobiography to be omniscient, omnipotent, and omni-something else I've forgotten. THAT's supernatural, not natural.

Omnipresent, implying that he somehow pervades the entirety of space and time...

He's right there, reclining on the quantum foam...

You don't even know what that term means.

[Seth]

You ignored the rest of this post where i point out you are a liar, you lying fuck. I'm not addressing anything else from your reply till you admit you are a lying fuck and have absolutely ZERO evidence to back your slanders up.

Would you be so kind as to extend that ban to everything I post? Pretty please? With sugar on it?

[pErvinalia]

No

[Seth]

No

Darn...

[mistermack]

So, what is the final definition of faith then?

I'll have a go, without looking it up.

A strong belief in something, for which the evidence is either poor or non-existent, stemming from childhood indoctrination, wishful thinking, or insanity. ( or, most commonly, a combination of all three )

[Brian Peacock]

Faith, accepting something as true for no good reason, is also touted as a virtue in a way that says The Lard, or whatever, requires us to demonstrate our worthiness by believing something without reference to things like established facts or reasoable evidence. Therefore turtles.

[Animavore]

Faith is a boot stamping on a human face - forever.

[JimC]

It's what someone with a lisp calls a face.

"I've got a bad faith-ache today"

[Svartalf]

That is funny.

If godlings exists but aren't supernatural then they must be natural. If they're natural they must be something to point to their existence other than just old myths.

Maybe. Or maybe they were a transient phenomenon that no longer exist, like the dodo or the dinosaurs, except they didn't leave any fossils. In any event, nothing in physics or science precludes the existence of God(s), therefore if god(s) exist they must perforce be natural, not supernatural. After all, people thought electricity was supernatural for rather a long time. They were wrong however.

The bit about dead godlings sounds like a speculative fiction to me. The bit about godlings being natural sounds like a nice story, but it's not what your regular believer says and it still adds up to speculation really. If I understand the last bit right, you're just saying that at some point what people currently call supernatural, something which is beyond scientific explanation, might one day be explained by science, which is also rather speculative. Holding out for future scientific verification, and in the meantime believing that the old myths are true and will probably be demonstrated by future science to be so, sounds a bit conflicted in my view.

It may be so, but then again they may be privy to information that you are not and that they, and God, do not wish to share with you because you're an Atheist skeptic. But even if it is conflicted, that has nothing whatever to do with my claim.

Nice story, bro. Got any other children's fiction you are selling?

God is claimed in his autobiography to be omniscient, omnipotent, and omni-something else I've forgotten. THAT's supernatural, not natural.

Actually, Gd is anything BUT omniscient...
He haggled with Abraham about the number of just people to be found in sodom rather than just crushing himm with the figure of one,
he named Saul king of the jews and later regretted doing this

So it doesn't know everything.