Is 'faith' really a 'great cop-out'?

[bozo]

I ask this as I just noticed a quote of Richard Dawkins. I would love to be able to proove things for myself e.g E=mc2. (I am rubbish at even basic maths and know that I can't fathom equations like this but I have faith that others understand and know the workings of them.) I don't think faith need always be negative as Dawkins asserts. Yes, it can mean you have blindly accepted something without trying to understand it, (which would make you a fool) but it can also be because you are not capable of understanding the whole picture but you understand and 'see' how other related stuff works.

In religious terms, I think claiming faith is the lazy choice for the masses who can't be bothered asking questions. Simple as that.

[CoxRox]

Bozo, I think there's more to it than 'its the lazy choice for the masses'. They probably haven't thought about it and as you say not bothered to ask questions because they've been conditioned not to think for themselves. I'm glad I'm not one of the 'sheep' and have made a dash for it (in terms of free thinking and questioning).

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Leo, I'm reading up on dna at the minute. I've found this interesting site which I'm going through:
http://ds9a.nl/amazing-dna/ (dna seen through the eyes of a coder) and I've emailed some other guy to clarify some things so once I've got enough info it will be interesting to see if you were correct when you said of dna: '....it does not mean it is a code'.

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Leo, I couldn't resist posting this. It's not too long an article but a bit too long to past here so I've just picked out some interesting words and sentences from the article. The full article is from here:
http://www.accessexcellence.org/RC/AB/IE...e_rDNA.php

....the analogy of language. ....the foundation of a communication system, Let us think of DNA as the totality of information needed to reproduce any organism. It is, in a manner of speaking, a language. ....the rules of grammar render language intelligible. By a similar process, all the random information in the DNA molecule is made specific and meaningful through the very precise ordering of the A, T, G, and C bases. :

Letters: Nucleotide Bases
Words: Codons
Sentences: Genes
Book: DNA

But DNA's store of information comprises more than just four bases arranged into sixty-four different codons; just as the words of a language can be put together to form an infinite number of texts, so the codons on the DNA molecule can be ordered in innumerable ways.

[leo-rcc]

Hi Catherine,

Well if you can convince me that DNA or RNA is a code I'd be mighty surprised. The patterns in the chains that get formed can vary, that is how natural selection gets its diversity. But to make that out as a code, you would be looking in semantics. Some biologists refer to DNA patterns as DNA code and of course the genetic code, I personally think that is wrong since it often leads to the analogy with computer code which in turn gives theists the notion "well if there is code there must be a coder/programmer". And that is exactly not how DNA and RNA works.

But I am curious what you come up with.

[CoxRox]

Adrian, earlier you said:

DNA is far from designed though. It isn't even very complex at all. Consider the English alphabet; it contains 26 letters (27 if you include spaces) and even more if you list all the punctuation etc. That is very complex! DNA on the other hand, is made up of 4 "letters" A,C,G,T and is simply a sequence of pairs.

During my research into dna and trying to determine if it does indeed contain 'language' or 'code' I came across this section in an article and thought of your above comment:

'Besides all the evidence we have covered for the intelligent design of DNA information, there is still one amazing fact remaining—the ideal number of genetic letters in the DNA code for storage and translation.

Moreover, the copying mechanism of DNA, to meet maximum effectiveness, requires the number of letters in each word to be an even number. Of all possible mathematical combinations, the ideal number for storage and transcription has been calculated to be four letters.

This is exactly what has been found in the genes of every living thing on earth—a four-letter digital code. As Werner Gitt states: "The coding system used for living beings is optimal from an engineering standpoint. This fact strengthens the argument that it was a case of purposeful design rather that a [lucky] chance" (Gitt, p. 95). '

http://gnmagazine.org/issues/gn58/tinycode.htm

[Daystar]

I don't think faith need always be negative as Dawkins asserts. Yes, it can mean you have blindly accepted something without trying to understand it, (which would make you a fool) but it can also be because you are not capable of understanding the whole picture but you understand and 'see' how other related stuff works.

Faith doesn't imply blindness or lack of knowledge. You get to know your parents, your friends, your mate - and have faith in them based upon what you have come to know about them, not what you feel or are blind to.

Dawkins was faithful, perhaps, in a traditional or cultural perspective which is more of a social need. Tribal. He couldn't make any sense out of science or evolution at first but he needed it to replace his old philosophy. Alot of Atheists are like that. They knew their faith only as the myths they were spoonfed without bothering to investigate the reality behind that and so they grasp firmly hold of something else with the emotional attachment of the zealot.

Notice that if these people were as gifted intellectually as they like to present themselves they could provide some rational defense of their sudden enlightenment other than the obvious drama of jumping out of the frying pan and into the fire - and I ain't talkin' 'bout hell.

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Ok, to take it a bit further, I've been looking at the definition of 'theory' (scientifically speaking) to see if that was similar to 'faith' and I found this definition: 'In science a theory is a testable model.....' (Wikipedia) so that can't be anything like faith but then I thought of 'string theory' and with my smidgen of understanding, I thought it was an unproven 'theory' and as I read further along the definition I found this: 'The term theory is regularly stretched to refer to speculation that is currently unverifiable. Examples are string theory and various theories of everything.' So maybe my speculation about an intelligent designer isn't such a cop out after all.

Whooo!!! Careful, you tread dangerously close to blasphemy of the almighty science! I sense the caution in your words - will it be enough!

Remember, evolution only deals with what happened after we got here. Not how we got here.

Lets look at it this way. Science has no explanation of how we got here. They will admit that no one knows. Most armchair scientists (blind faithful) won't but the priests who depend upon it will because they know better. There is only one theory of how we got here and that is creation. What do you know about the only one.

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In religious terms, I think claiming faith is the lazy choice for the masses who can't be bothered asking questions. Simple as that.

Yeah, right. And you could enlighten my lazy ass?! Ha! If you knew a fraction of what I know about the Bible and Jehovah God your own lazy choice I might take far more seriously. But you don't and so your point is moot.

[leo-rcc]

Catherine,

Before you get to carried away, please keep in mind DNA and RNA are biochemical processes and not mathematical. Because the basic simplicity of the parts that make up the genetic patterns, it is very suitable to place them in a mathematical model. That does not suggest any outside coding, just that patterns in all DNA that is found match up in that model. Which in turn is something you would expect there would be if there is common ancestry as Evolution through natural selection and genetic mutation suggest.

Now as to the original formation of the first RNA patterns, as Daystar already suggests, there are some hypotheses on this, one of which is abiogenesis. Research is being done, but this has no where near as much evidence as evolution does. It doesn't mean no evidence, but not enough to claim it a scientific theory. So maybe your god does have a hand in that, could be. The likelyhood of that are pretty slim though.

Daystar,

Blaspheming against science is one I'd like to see you try. There is nothing to insult. Science is objective, looks at facts, does not have emotions. You can insult scientists, but that is hardly blaspheming, it is just rude.

They knew their faith only as the myths they were spoonfed without bothering to investigate the reality behind that and so they grasp firmly hold of something else with the emotional attachment of the zealot.

In other words, atheism is just as much a religion as theism. Like that one is never mentioned before. Apart from that, the "reality" behind the myths only make sense to those who are prone to believe it in the first place. I did not lose my faith, i never believed it in the first place. Sure, that Jesus was a prophet spreading his message in Judea, I had no problem with that
and some stuff told by my pastor sounded reasonable, but Noah and the arc, Moses and the burning bush, Adam and Eve, sorry, even as metaphor's they make no sense to me.

And sure, you can scrape up 5 pages of apologetic writing to account for it all, but I am not buying it.

[CoxRox]

Daystar, you said: 'Faith doesn't imply blindness or lack of knowledge'. I can see how faith is viewed this way. If I went to a church where everyone was saying that the earth was created in six literal days then I'd think they'd had some sort of lobotomy. 'Faith' has become for many a means of just accepting beliefs that have been passed down to them from previous generations, who were not as enlightened as we are. The Bible, if I recall correctly admonishes one to test things out, to be sure of things, so we need to do this with regards to what we 'prop up' with faith. You mention science, and I can see how 'science' is a superior 'discipline' (is that the right word?) than religion. I love all things 'science' as to me, science is unlocking the 'truths' about the universe and how it and we are made etc. (it is unlocking God's workings). We have nothing to fear from science but I think you are implying (correct me if I am wrong) that some folk place science on a pedestal, and elevate it to a kind of 'religion'. I don't think they do. I think the awe and power that science evokes is worthy of a kind of reverence but again I would say it's akin to the awe David felt when he looked up at the night sky and took in the beauty of the universe.

Leo, I didn't intend to make a 'mathematical connection' with the 'four letters' as such. We had discussed there only being four letters. The article I quoted was explaining why four is a good number. I think that is far as it goes witht the maths. I'm not sure- I've still got lots of reading to do. I hope I can understand it well enough or I may have to get a dollup of faith ready (only joking).

[allan175]

'Besides all the evidence we have covered for the intelligent design of DNA information, there is still one amazing fact remaining—the ideal number of genetic letters in the DNA code for storage and translation.

Moreover, the copying mechanism of DNA, to meet maximum effectiveness, requires the number of letters in each word to be an even number. Of all possible mathematical combinations, the ideal number for storage and transcription has been calculated to be four letters.

This is exactly what has been found in the genes of every living thing on earth—a four-letter digital code. As Werner Gitt states: "The coding system used for living beings is optimal from an engineering standpoint. This fact strengthens the argument that it was a case of purposeful design rather that a [lucky] chance" (Gitt, p. 95). '

The problem with that line of reasoning is that, to my mind, it completely ignores the *idea* behind evolution, namely that good solutions eventually appear.
If a 6 letter based DNA is not "as good" as 4 letter then the 4 letter version (ie: takes more energy to reproduce or takes longer etc) then the 4 letter (mutation?) will be more favoured and end up dominating.

Ok, to take it a bit further, I've been looking at the definition of 'theory' (scientifically speaking) to see if that was similar to 'faith' and I found this definition: 'In science a theory is a testable model.....' (Wikipedia) so that can't be anything like faith but then I thought of 'string theory' and with my smidgen of understanding, I thought it was an unproven 'theory' and as I read further along the definition I found this: 'The term theory is regularly stretched to refer to speculation that is currently unverifiable. Examples are string theory and various theories of everything.' So maybe my speculation about an intelligent designer isn't such a cop out after all.

If religious people are so keen on the definition of the word "theory" maybe its time they started saying "The unproven theory of god." when referring to their deity.

[Edwardo Piet]

Faith doesn't imply blindness or lack of knowledge. You get to know your parents, your friends, your mate - and have faith in them based upon what you have come to know about them, not what you feel or are blind to.

I think what you are talking about here is trust, not faith. Faith is a blind and very often religious version of trust.

[Kyuuketsuki]

Faith doesn't imply blindness or lack of knowledge. You get to know your parents, your friends, your mate - and have faith in them based upon what you have come to know about them, not what you feel or are blind to.

As others are pointing out there is a huge difference between faith of the religious kind (faith without knowledge & often in spite of it as Dawkins would say) and faith based on reasonable expectation (the kind based on experience) ... I have "faith" that the sun will rise in the east each morning, that faith is not religious but based on reasonable expectation based on the fact that I have been taught that it does so and my own experience has confirmed that. I have faith that my family loves me because I have a kind of idea what love is and because they are fairly demonstrative people and make it clearly known to me that I am in some way very important to them (and not just for the money) ... again, although it is possible to interpret these things in a variety of ways, that is not a religious faith but one based on experience.

Religious faith OTOH is inherently based on blind trust and if you like we can put it to the test

Kyu