(September 4, 2014 at 6:14 pm)FreeTony Wrote: When I say that I believe something, it does not mean that I am absolutely certain that it is true. I'm not sure that I can say anything with absolute certainty.Theists clearly don't use evidentiary, statistical or logical rules. They use emotional congruence-- if it "feels" real, then it must be true.
If I flip a coin, I will neither believe the claim that it will be heads, nor the claim that it will be tails. However what if the coin is a biased coin. At what stage should I believe that it will be Heads? Traditionally in a scientific test it would be at 95% (2 std dev). However, as far as I'm aware, this is fairly arbitrary (it's 5 sigma for new particle discoveries).
Any thoughts?
What level does a Theist use?
In the theists' defense, we all do this. How many of us actually understand cutting edge science well enough to evaluate the conclusions of new theories/hypotheses?
Can we "prove" that anything is real? Can we "prove" that someone else is a thinking person, and not just a cyborg? No. It just feels so right that we take these things as obvious. But sometimes what feels right is wrong anyway.
