do religious people really believe?

[EGross]

So when you come right down to it, if you do not think about the problems with your faith

Haha! I love how you miss out those who understand their faith, rather than rely heavily on expert advice. And slyly imply that actually understanding it isn't even an option.

Do you understand fully any scientific theory? Would you condemn those that take expert advice? Are there any theories you would adhere to without fully understanding every detail yourself?

You cannot compare who a dogmatic person seeks to validate his belief with a scientist who seeks to have someone disprove his theory, or validate it with the inability to disprove it. Well, you did, bit it is not the same.

And because of the community where I live, I was relating to it in the following way: You are lacking faith that the earth is 6000 years old. You have reviewed the scientific data and it contradicts your belief. So you go to your Rabbi (here) or whatever and speak of your crisis. His job is not to validate the truth, but to strengthen your faith. And because of his position of authority, you rely on that, and the typical "nobody knows how long a day is without a sun" or some nonsense like that might be all that is needed.

In a scientific world, you might have doubts that a specific theory applies to a project that you are working on. You go to experts in the field, and they may or may not say "Yeah, it doesn't work" and they might give other suggestions, or maybe not. But they are not committed to a dogma that this theory must be true, and neither is the person who doubts it. In fact he can chuck it out the window and still be a scientist in his particular field. The man with a religious dogma issue, if he chucks that out the window, everyting else evaporates ("Yeah, you are right, this entire young earth thing doesn't pan out at all.")

Religious people like to sometimes see themselves like they are doing some sort of scientific methodology, but they cannot due to the fact that dogma removes that possibility from their lives.