Christian trigger words

[tackattack]

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@LadyForCamus @unfogged

If knowledge is the fact or condition of knowing something with familiarity gained through experience or association or  the circumstance or condition of apprehending truth or fact through reasoning (standard definitions from MW) then knowledge is pretty easy to obtain. You don't question whether the sky is blue, or a tree is firm enough to hold you, or that tomorrow is another day.

Thank you for a thoughtful response! And, now you'll hate me because I'm going to be pedantic about the definitions of knowledge, lol.  I'm not trying to be difficult; I just want to make sure we're on the same page before we move further on in the conversation.  I don't want us talking past each other. From MW:

knowl·edge

1.facts, information, and skills acquired by a person through experience or education; the theoretical or practical understanding of a subject.

2. awareness or familiarity gained by experience of a fact or situation.

So, knowledge is, 1.  the acquisition of facts about a thing, or said another way in definition 2., an awareness of facts about a thing. Would you agree with my summarization?  If so, then knowledge of a subject requires the subject itself to be a thing that exists.  As you said further down regarding your examples, we know the sky is blue, that trees are strong, and that the sun will rise tomorrow because these are material subjects that can be demonstrated. We can acquire facts about them, and these facts can be subsequently demonstrated. Facts are descriptive. They inform us of the reality of a thing. If a fact cannot be demonstrated, what qualifies it as a fact? We may intuitively understand these objects as real through our first-hand experience, but they can also be independently verified via the scientific method. Put another way, if I was the only one who ever saw trees, I may begin to doubt my first hand experience that informs me that trees exist. Intuition is functional short-hand, but it’s not without its flaws.

Those things are grounded in the material and natural. They are easy to quantify and measure with other tools we have like materialism and science. Neither knowledge or faith require evidence in their definitions.

I disagree here.  Facts, in and of themselves, are evidence.  And, knowledge is a collection of facts that inform us of a thing.  It's implicit in the definition, even if the word "evidence" is not explicitly stated.  If there are no demonstrable facts about a thing, then there is no evidence for that thing.  If there is no evidence, why believe it exists at all?

People however, demand proofs and evidentiary standards to include a view into their own beliefs. That could be difficult to accept for those that  don't believe there is a spiritual world.

I agree here.  I would need someone to demonstrate some facts that describe a spiritual world before I could reasonably believe in one.

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Of course I don't hate you and you're welcome. Now on to the pendantics.
If I thought it needed a summary I would probably disagree with your summary. If you were to say knowledge is the acquisition of facts, information, and skills acquired by a person through experience or education I would agree with that. I agree that intuition is good, but I've known people that rely on their intuition to survive (not that it's a plea or makes a difference in this convo). As to long term survival and practicality it could be good or bad. I consider faith an additional input to a belief, not the only input.

I'll bullet these for ease:
1) facts, information and skills are descriptors that enable actors - I agree with you on that.
2) A fact does need to be demonstrable because it needs to be proven or used as evidence
3) You disagreed with my second statement because we had not yet agreed on a definition. As I stated in 2 if you're only focusing on facts that inform knowledge then I can see where you would disagree.

4) Information can be evidenced too, it just has a much lower standard than facts. For instance:
You and I stand on opposite street corners, and between us is the typical doomsday gin holding, homeless looking loon. You look and say what a good actor, and I look and say what a crazy lunatic. Why is that? You know he's just an actor playing a role for a hidden camera TV show and I don't. You have more information from your perspective than I do, so you understand what you see a lot better, even though we see the same thing. I act on faith based on observation only and avoid the character and you act on evidence that's unknown to me.

Even though I was wrong, it still fortifies the belief that I should avoid doomsday lunatics on street corners and reinforces/informs that belief, even though it is a false premise. Having the facts in that situation might actually make me more inclined to question every lune on a street corner to see if I'm on a TV show.