Is faith a reliable method for determining truth?

[bluegreenearth]

For example:

Hebrews 11:3

3 By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God’s command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible.

There are numerous verses following the one above that equally proclaim, "By faith," something is understood or known to be true. Therefore, in this context, "faith" is being encouraged for use as an epistemology. How does "faith" function to reliably distinguish true claims from false claims or does it fail in that regard? What would demonstrate to the satisfaction of the Christian community that "faith" is not a reliable tool for discovering what is true or false?

[Danmark]

They believe or one reason:
Because they've been told they'll receive eternal life. That's it . That is it.

This is true (at least in some).
Impossible creation theories, impossible global floods, talking animals, gods speaking from the heavens, a man living in a fish and corpses reanimating are all justified if the person believes the eternal life claim.

There's no amount of foolishness a person can't believe if the reward is great enough.
There's a sucker born every minute.

[marco]

I have never once inferred, or insinuated, in all my years on this site, that there was some sort of, "supernatural interference".

Neither have I. So we agree.

If by "fact" you simply mean that there exists a gospel of Matthew, fine. It is a harmless fact.

If by "fact" you mean Paul travelled to Damascus - there is a report of this, but it may not be true. The report is fact but its substance may not be.

There is a report that Paul heard something and Paul deduced he was being addressed by God. We are some distance from "fact" here.

You then add up all these non-facts and feel sure there is something behind them, but you don't want to call it supernatural. Let's call it Paul's imagination, then.

The question that it is tempting to put before you is: Do you think there was a resurrection? Your answers, rejecting the supernatural, would suggest not. But there is just an iota of doubt. Perhaps you might clarify for us, since it seems we may well be on the same side of the argument, with you making an understandable error of what constitutes "fact".

With me: I believe there was NO resurrection, just in case you think I am unsure of my position. I hope this brings more clarity to you. My method of determining truth comes not from Theophilus or Paul or Uncle Tom but from KNOWING corpses do not walk. I think you know that too, but I suppose Paul had a smooth tongue.

[marco]

[Replying to post 268 by Realworldjack]


Perhaps I have not done the following justice.

" It is a fact that, both Paul, and the author of the two letters to Theophilus, report that Paul was once opposed to Christianity. It is a fact, both of these same authors report that Paul converted to Christianity. It is a fact, both of these authors report that it was an encounter with the risen Christ, which caused his conversion. It is a fact, Paul went on to travel the known world at the time, planting Churches as he went. It is a fact, we have strong evidence to support the fact that the author of the two letters to Theophilius, traveled with Paul on his missionary journeys. It is a fact, this author reports that Paul was arrested, and remained under arrest, for some 2 years. It is a fact, we have letters attributed to Paul, which would have clearly been written, while Paul would have been under arrest.

I could continue on, with fact, after fact, after fact. . . . . . . . . "

We deduce strength of conviction; literary ability; ability to preach and convince. Thus we have an excellent preacher, a Billy Graham character, much respected.

Fine. All this is harmless stuff and we can accept it. At what point does disagreement come in?

Paul tells us of an event - in fact Paul is pretty scant in his talk of the event - that changed his way of thinking and his way of life. Is this fact enough to persuade us of what may have happened?

There are reports that a man was crucified, died and then when his tomb was found empty, some people saw him alive, walking about, talking and even eating with friends. Do numbers count? - if we say (as Paul does) that some 500 saw this risen man, would that be enough to persuade?

Let us then examine the mind set of these reporters, their background, their level of education, their beliefs...

Ah, wait, we cannot do this as we know very little about these people who were actually there. We do not know how astute they were or how gullible. Next to nothing.

So we ask: can human beings die for a false story? Can they willingly give up their lives for something they hold dear - if it was a lie? Why yes, people can, and still do, surrender their lives for a faith that others find foolish.


I am not decrying the power of a narrative from 2000 years ago: I have read many in their original language. There is something beautiful and sad about a voice, living on the page, speaking to us from distant death.

Horace: Eheu fugaces, Postume, anni labuntur: Sadly, Postumus, our flleeting years are slipping away .....

Catullus (at his brother's grave): in perpetuum, frater, ave atque vale ;
so for ever, dear brother, welcome and farewell.


I am also touched by the desperate words of the brilliant youth Galois, knowing he would die next day in a foolish duel, writing the most incredible mathematics and saying in despair; "Je n'ai pas de temps," (I don't have enough time) when time was running out for him to offer extensive proofs.

The world is open to resurrection when we open books and it is no sin to be impressed by dead words. Sadly, it is irrational to accept that corpses move around.
Let Matthew on whom much respect is showered, have the last words and let us ask whether we should believe what saints of the past have said. From the same book that brought Christ to life:

The bodies of many holy people who had died were raised to life. 53 They came out of the tombs after Jesus' resurrection and went into the holy city and appeared to many people. (Matthew 27.)

[EarthScienceguy]

[Replying to post 1 by bluegreenearth]

What everyone believes about the origin of life and the creation of the universe is taken on faith. It is just a matter of what you want to have faith in. Man or God.

[Clownboat]

[Replying to post 1 by bluegreenearth]

What everyone believes about the origin of life and the creation of the universe is taken on faith. It is just a matter of what you want to have faith in. Man or God.

This is false and obviously so.
I personally can point to countless individuals that admit they do know how life originated.
I'm one such person and no faith is required to not know something.

This black and white religious thinking is clouding your reasoning. Being set free was one of the most difficult things I have ever gone through. I wish you well on your journey...

[brunumb]

[Replying to post 1 by bluegreenearth]

What everyone believes about the origin of life and the creation of the universe is taken on faith. It is just a matter of what you want to have faith in. Man or God.

This is patently false. There is no choice involved. What we believe is based on how compelling our brains perceive the evidence to be for any given position. As much as I might want to believe in a loving God offering me a wonderful afterlife, I am unable to. My brain won't accept the claims about such a being as anything more than wishful thinking on the part of imaginary human beings.

[bluegreenearth]

[Replying to post 1 by bluegreenearth]

What everyone believes about the origin of life and the creation of the universe is taken on faith. It is just a matter of what you want to have faith in. Man or God.

You are making an equivocation fallacy. Faith in unfalsifiable supernatural claims that have no implicit empirical basis is not equivalent to the kind of faith you suggest scientists have in their natural explanations which are falsifiable and have have an implicit empirical basis. In other words, if you want to equate faith with trust, you have to demonstrate how that trust was justifiably earned. There are reliable and unreliable reason to place trust in something. The reliable reason for trusting scientific explanations is that they make testable predictions that are falsifiable and survive every test designed to disprove them. Another reliable reason to trust science is that it has an ability to identify where mistakes were made and correct itself accordingly.

[JJ50]

[Replying to post 273 by EarthScienceguy]

Faith in humanity is much more reliable than faith in a god, which in all probability doesn't exist.

[Realworldjack]

[Replying to post 271 by marco]

Neither have I. So we agree.

No! It is not that we agree. Because you see, you are assuming what I am deducing, when all I am doing is laying the facts out on the table. What I conclude, or what you may conclude, has no bearing upon the facts we can know.

If by "fact" you simply mean that there exists a gospel of Matthew, fine. It is a harmless fact.

It is not a "harmless fact" in the least. Moreover, there would be 3 other reports, which have been called "Gospels", one of which we have very strong evidence to support the fact, that this author would have traveled for years with Paul, which would mean he was alive at the time of Jesus, would have known the Apostles, along with the claims they were making, which would go on to mean, that he could have very well "investigated everything carefully from the beginning", as he assures Theophilus at the time.

Then of course we have the letters of Paul, which we can compare to the two letters addressed to Theophilus, and when we do this, we can clearly see we have certain evidence in support, that Luke would have indeed been the author of the two letters to Theophilus, and that Luke did indeed travel with Paul.

Of course, then we have the letters attributed to Peter, and in one of these letters the author claims to have been an eyewitness to, Christ. I assure you, these are not, "harmless facts" my friend! Of course, I am sure you wish they were.

If by "fact" you mean Paul travelled to Damascus - there is a report of this, but it may not be true. The report is fact but its substance may not be.

What would be the facts, and evidence to support the idea, the reports would not be true?

There is a report that Paul heard something and Paul deduced he was being addressed by God. We are some distance from "fact" here.

Let's get the facts straight here! Paul claims to have encountered the risen Christ. So then, what would be the facts, and evidence which may suggest this would have been false?

You then add up all these non-facts and feel sure there is something behind them, but you don't want to call it supernatural. Let's call it Paul's imagination, then.

Again, the thing is, I am not attempting to call it anything. Rather, I am simply supplying the facts. You are the one who seems to want to insist on calling it something? The problem seems to be, you have no facts, and evidence in support.

The question that it is tempting to put before you is: Do you think there was a resurrection?

What I think, has bearing whatsoever on the facts, that we know to be facts.

Your answers, rejecting the supernatural, would suggest not.

Again, it is you who is doing the insisting, and rejecting. I have not, other than on the things I can demonstrate to be facts.

But there is just an iota of doubt.

I have no doubt at all, concerning the things I proclaim to be facts.

Perhaps you might clarify for us, since it seems we may well be on the same side of the argument, with you making an understandable error of what constitutes "fact".

Again, you need to demonstrate where I have proclaimed something to be a fact, which cannot be demonstrated to be a fact? I assure you that I can show time, after time where you will state an opinion, as if it were a fact.

With me: I believe there was NO resurrection, just in case you think I am unsure of my position.

I am certainly happy for you. And I assure you, I was never unsure about this.

My method of determining truth comes not from Theophilus or Paul or Uncle Tom but from KNOWING corpses do not walk.

No, "corpses do not walk". If that is as far as you would like to think, then I have no problem with that in the least. In other words, if you know this to be a fact, and you want to have doubts about the reports because of this, then that is fine. However, let us not pretend we have arrived at, fact.

I think you know that too, but I suppose Paul had a smooth tongue.

Did you mean to say, pen? Because I have never heard his, "tongue'?

[Realworldjack]

[Replying to post 272 by marco]

Paul tells us of an event - in fact Paul is pretty scant in his talk of the event - that changed his way of thinking and his way of life. Is this fact enough to persuade us of what may have happened?

You seem to ignore the fact that, I am not attempting to persuade you. I have no problem with your doubt. The problem comes in when you begin to tell me that I have no reason to believe the accounts, and all you seem to have is, "the claims are extraordinary"? Well okay? If that is enough for you to reject the claims, then I have no problem with that.

The fact of the matter is, I continue to give you facts, and evidence to support the claims, and you have no answers whatsoever for these facts, but simply supply possibilities, with no facts, nor any evidence to back these other possibilities.

There are reports that a man was crucified, died and then when his tomb was found empty, some people saw him alive, walking about, talking and even eating with friends. Do numbers count? - if we say (as Paul does) that some 500 saw this risen man, would that be enough to persuade?

Now, you are even supplying the facts, and evidence for us, and the only legitimate reason you seem to have supplied thus far for doubt would be, "the claims are extraordinary." Again, if that is enough for you, and your mind is settled, then I have no problem.

Moreover, any way you analyze the facts we have, something extraordinary did in fact take place, and all you seem to be doing is to go with the one which seems less extraordinary to you.

Let us then examine the mind set of these reporters, their background, their level of education, their beliefs...

Ah, wait, we cannot do this as we know very little about these people who were actually there. We do not know how astute they were or how gullible. Next to nothing.

But "ah, wait"! We can in fact analyze how these folks went on to live the rest of their lives, in the face of persecution, jail time, and even death, and these folks were not simply convinced of things which had been past on to them, but rather were claiming to have witnessed these things themselves.

Let us also go on to consider what we have been told about these folks. We are told these folks were ordinary, uneducated fishermen, who had just witnessed their leader, whom they thought was the coming Messiah, crucified as a criminal, dead, and buried, and you would have us believe that it would not be extraordinary, for them to be somehow involved in what would be the biggest hoax, in the history of all the world, or, things just happened to work out as they did, with things seemingly falling out of the sky, that just so happen to continue to bolster this movement along, against all the odds? Again, if this is what you would like to believe, I have no problem. But I cannot imagine how one could come to the conclusion, "there would be no reason to believe these things? GOOD GRIEF!

So we ask: can human beings die for a false story? Can they willingly give up their lives for something they hold dear - if it was a lie? Why yes, people can, and still do, surrender their lives for a faith that others find foolish.

You are correct, but this is certainly no evidence that this is the case here. Moreover, and again, these folks were no simply "holding on to a dear belief". Rather, they were proclaiming to have been witnesses of these events, and there is a tremendous difference between suffering for what you believe to be true, as opposed to suffering for what you know to be false.

I am not decrying the power of a narrative from 2000 years ago: I have read many in their original language. There is something beautiful and sad about a voice, living on the page, speaking to us from distant death.

Maybe for you? It does nothing for me!

Horace: Eheu fugaces, Postume, anni labuntur: Sadly, Postumus, our flleeting years are slipping away .....

Catullus (at his brother's grave): in perpetuum, frater, ave atque vale ;
so for ever, dear brother, welcome and farewell.


I am also touched by the desperate words of the brilliant youth Galois, knowing he would die next day in a foolish duel, writing the most incredible mathematics and saying in despair; "Je n'ai pas de temps," (I don't have enough time) when time was running out for him to offer extensive proofs.

I do not know how in the world we got here, but I want out!

The world is open to resurrection when we open books and it is no sin to be impressed by dead words. Sadly, it is irrational to accept that corpses move around.

The thing here is, the folks who were proclaiming these events, were not attempting to argue that it would be, "rational to believe that a corpse moves around", but were rather simply reporting that they knew would have been an extraordinary claim, and they also knew these claims would absolutely cause them nothing but trouble, and they continued to proclaim it, in spite of these things.