Nature of God

[loseyourname]

Originally posted by Anonymouse Faith is not reason, therefore it is not epistomology. It can only provide knowledge, spiritual knowledge for my own experiences which I attribute to God, certain spiritual experiences, which reason cannot answer. Therefore, the way you are seeking faith as some knowledge on par with reason, is silly, for like I said, you just cannot grasp that the two are different things.

I'm only arguing because you cannot see the distinction between faith and reason and you are holding them on the same measuring stick, asking evidence of faith, on an equivalent ground with reason, whereas faith is far beyond reason. That is what your mistaking, and I can show that even in our everyday knowledge we hold , there is a grain of faith.

You're ignoring the fact that just claimed something can be true for you and not for me. The truth is the truth, my friend.

I see the distinction between faith and reason perfectly well. It is you that is pretending you are capable of attaining knowledge through faith, while at the same contending that faith begins where knowledge ends. That is a contradiction.

I have no issue with a person having faith. I have issue with people who behave as if their faith is indicative of knowledge. Faith is not knowledge.

[Anonymouse]

Originally posted by loseyourname Again, if you use faith as a basis for knowledge, you are leaving the door open for any possible faith to be invoked as justification for any behavior, including destructive and unethical behavior. That is morally reprehensible. Why is your faith any better than Osama Bin Laden's faith? You have no more basis for your beliefs than he has for his.

You are mistaking faith with religion here. I have faith that God exists. I have faith that those people who went to China are telling the truth. I have faith that my neighbor won't steal my car when I leave the window open. I have faith that the person I am buying this from won't rip me off. The world would be a bleak place without faith, and faith is evidenced in almost all our actions and doings. You trying to extend what is ethical or not, with regard to faith, is pointless and has nothing to do with faith. Man will dogmatize anything, even science, not because of his faith or his convictions or reason, but because of his ignorance. Thus my personal spiritual experiences are for me, which I attribute to God and I have faith in, for these things cannot be answered by reason nor can you grasp them. Therefore you dragging this into ethics and Osama is totally pointless, for I have not nor do I see any reason in going in that direction. It started out as a nature of God, and God is in each and every one of us, in our souls, and we have faith in God. If you admit that there exists a soul, then you are placing faith in that admission.

[Anonymouse]

Originally posted by loseyourname You're ignoring the fact that just claimed something can be true for you and not for me. The truth is the truth, my friend.

I see the distinction between faith and reason perfectly well. It is you that is pretending you are capable of attaining knowledge through faith, while at the same contending that faith begins where knowledge ends. That is a contradiction.

I have no issue with a person having faith. I have issue with people who behave as if their faith is indicative of knowledge. Faith is not knowledge.

I said faith begins where reason ends, don't mutate what I said to conform to what you want me to have said. My spiritual experiences and the events that I've been through, are to me testament that there is God. If you want to call this knowledge, fine, call it faith, fine. There is no contradiction, there is truth. I only said that for me, because I am the one that experienced these things, not you. Therefore I acknowledge this truth, which you deny, that is all. There is no contradiction aside from what you make. Faith is only knowledge to each and every one of us of that thing which reason cannot show us, namely God. Thus reason could not answer the experiences I've had.

[loseyourname]

Originally posted by Anonymouse You are mistaking faith with religion here. I have faith that God exists. I have faith that those people who went to China are telling the truth. I have faith that my neighbor won't steal my car when I leave the window open. I have faith that the person I am buying this from won't rip me off. The world would be a bleak place without faith, and faith is evidenced in almost all our actions and doings. You trying to extend what is ethical or not, with regard to faith, is pointless and has nothing to do with faith. Man will dogmatize anything, even science, not because of his faith or his convictions or reason, but because of his ignorance. Thus my personal spiritual experiences are for me, which I attribute to God and I have faith in, for these things cannot be answered by reason nor can you grasp them. Therefore you dragging this into ethics and Osama is totally pointless, for I have not nor do I see any reason in going in that direction. It started out as a nature of God, and God is in each and every one of us, in our souls, and we have faith in God. If you admit that there exists a soul, then you are placing faith in that admission.

Let us go in whatever direction we are taken. I simply want to know how, if you use faith to justify making a knowledge claim, which is what you are doing by saying that you know God exists, you could ever repudiate someone who uses a similar retreat to faith as a justification for actions such as suicide bombing and genocide. They are extreme examples, granted, but there are smaller examples such as Orthodox Mormons who abuse their wives, or small cults such as the Heaven's Gate group, that invoke the same faith in spiritual experience that you are to justify their brutal and immoral actions. Surely you agree that what they have done is morally wrong, but on what would base a judgement of them?

[loseyourname]

Originally posted by Anonymouse Thus reason could not answer the experiences I've had.

Perhaps your drug usage could. You're completing ignoring the fact that there are alternative hypotheses that would explain your experiences that are equally or more likely than an experience of God.

[felizitation]

Originally posted by loseyourname They are most likely mentally ill, but that is beside the point. The point is that they are willing to do it precisely because they are uncritical. They continue to believe that what they are doing is right in spite of all evidence to the contrary. You and the Mouse both continue to believe in God, without any evidential basis, and despite all of the evidence to the contrary. My qualm is not so much with you, as you say you take no worldview from it and it does not effect your daily life. But Mousy at least claims to be a Christian, and that certainly entails a certain structure to his beliefs and his life that requires a better justification than faith alone. As I said, faith can be used to justify anything. If you find that an acceptable epistemology, then you have no grounds for opposing what was done by suicide bombers who invoke exactly the same argument that you do.

I disagree with you in this point. Look, i'm christian, as Mouse and I believe in God. Maybe that had affected me in the way I understand what is the "good" and the "bad", and thus how I'm considering others. Religion is an heritage though, and is a kind of human explanations of what remains unexplained, i.e. God.
Since for me, religion should "serve" God, i think it is secondary.

Beside this, you're saying that faith can justify anything. That is simply not true.
A belief can can be fed by ignorancy. That is the case for ppl you are mentionning. But faith and belief are from different nature - for me.
Belief is something that reason cannot explain, based on intuitions, feelings, also lack of knowledge. Faith is a very special belief dealing only with God, believing in the idea of an entity embodied by the supplementary nature of humans (ie. a domain of existence that would supersede all others) - I think this is unclear -

Once again, ppl thinking "God wants me to kill some people" don't have the necessary detachment to understand that these thoughts are made by humans. This is also why any religion would suffer (ie. ade by men) as soon as we self-clarify what is God.

My third point is the doubt, which is said to be the salt of the spirit (french philosopher "Alain"). I put the doubt on every sciences human kind has made. You are saying that there is no evidence of God's existence.
Of course there is not ! But it doesn't change anything.
But, being merely human, physical particles, we are simply unable to prove its unexistence. You cannot prove the unexistence of an idea, the idea exists as soon as it was thought, conceived; and this is the same for God (which is an idea for me)

Ignorance, fear, belief, conditionning were the tools used to make suicide bombers. Once again, some ppl are saying that in the Coran (just an example), it is said that is someone looses his life during a religious battle, God would reward him with a place in heaven. This is simply human preoccupations, notions and crap. God is eternity and omiscience and I do not see heaven in this two words; heaven/hell are two tools used to induce the notion of the good and the bad, through fear.
Again, this is not "faith", this is ununderstanding and ignorancy, thus belief. These two terms are very different to me.

[felizitation]

I don't know if you've read "The Karamazov Brother" (F.Dostoiovsky). This author tended to avoid dogmatism of religion.

There is an absolutely delicious part of this book, called "The great inquisitor". I highly recommend you to read it.

I found some commentary about the mentionned part on the net:
http://www.philosophos.com/knowledge...ions_1392.html I didn't read it, and don't know its value.

I found also the whole book (2MB) at the following URL:
http://www.friends-partners.org/oldf.../brothers.html

The mentionned part:
http://www.classicreader.com/read.ph...id.276/sec.36/

[loseyourname]

Originally posted by felizitation Beside this, you're saying that faith can justify anything. That is simply not true.
A belief can can be fed by ignorancy. That is the case for ppl you are mentionning. But faith and belief are from different nature - for me.
Belief is something that reason cannot explain, based on intuitions, feelings, also lack of knowledge. Faith is a very special belief dealing only with God, believing in the idea of an entity embodied by the supplementary nature of humans (ie. a domain of existence that would supersede all others) - I think this is unclear -

You haven't given any reason why your faith is valid and the faith of a Branch Davidian is not. They both stem from the same principle - that personal conviction without evidence or logic constitute usable knowledge.

I've read the book. That is a great passage.

[Anonymouse]

Originally posted by loseyourname Let us go in whatever direction we are taken. I simply want to know how, if you use faith to justify making a knowledge claim, which is what you are doing by saying that you know God exists, you could ever repudiate someone who uses a similar retreat to faith as a justification for actions such as suicide bombing and genocide. They are extreme examples, granted, but there are smaller examples such as Orthodox Mormons who abuse their wives, or small cults such as the Heaven's Gate group, that invoke the same faith in spiritual experience that you are to justify their brutal and immoral actions. Surely you agree that what they have done is morally wrong, but on what would base a judgement of them?

Yes people could manipulate faith to do evil things, no different than people could manipulate science to do evil things, your point? Should we stop having faith because of that? Should we also stop research in science because of that? Nothing is perfect, the state of man is imperfection, that is what you can't understand, for you are approaching this from a purely rational perspective. Do you have faith that you won't be beaten up by the person in the line next to you? Or do you know this for a fact? If you know this for a fact, please tell me, for I'd like to know too.

[Anonymouse]

Originally posted by loseyourname Perhaps your drug usage could. You're completing ignoring the fact that there are alternative hypotheses that would explain your experiences that are equally or more likely than an experience of God.

Tylenol, Pepto Bismol, Advil, Sports Creme, Marijuana? So you're saying these have made me believe the things I have? Of course, most of those experiences that I did live through happened before I even touched weed, so I don't see how you can know about my experiences any better than I can, and your need to try to pin miracles or supernatural events otherwise not explainable by reason or science, into the realm of science. To me you are trying to make everything fit in to your cozy worldview so you can be right.

Of course, I've already highlighted that if we approach faith and God via reason, there is no proof. Reason can never deal with faith, the two are mutually exclusive things which you still have not grasped. How we got here, what our purpose is, and our ability to come up with reason is the exact mystery which science cannot answer, then and there faith comes in. But don't let this deter you, for you are absolutely convinced that everything is explained by reason.