Christ's birthday

[rjh4 is back]

If evidence is sujective, quantifiable, falsifiable

You have to be careful, here. I don't think you are using the word "evidence" correctly. For current purposes, "evidence" can be either written or an artifact. It is what it is. What gets subjective, etc., etc., is the interpretation of that evidence.

A simple example: a coin bearing the image of Alexander The Great is found in Libya or Tunisia by an archaeologist. We know that Alexander's empire did not extend west of Egypt. The discoverer writes that the coin is evidence of trade in the Alexandrian/post-Alexandrian period between the Greek-based entities in the East with the locals in Libya/Tunisia.

Another writer comes along and says that the coin is evidence of Greek military/political expansion into Libya/Tunisia. Such an interpretation is absurd but the original artifact remains the same.

With textual sources the problem becomes doubled. Every author has a point of view. The writings themselves ARE subjective. It was even worse in antiquity when literacy was generally restricted to the upper classes only. So you not only have to sort out the actual meaning of the words within the context and language of the time they were written you also have to ascertain what point-of-view the author was trying to promote. People lie. People exaggerate. People are simply mistaken. But that does not stop them from writing things down. However, the original document still exists and still can be read by scholars and they can dispute the meaning.

I know we do not agree on much, Minimalist, but I do agree with you here.

[Minimalist]

Well, that's something to build on then, isn't it?

[tackattack]

I'm obviously not a careful person to jusmp onto an atheist forum with some of the questions I've worded. My deffinition of evidence is:
From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.44 [gcide]:

Evidence \Ev"i*dence\, noun [F. ['e]vidence, L. Evidentia. See {Evident}.]

1. That which makes evident or manifest; that which furnishes, or tends to furnish, proof; any mode of proof; the ground of belief or judgement; as, the evidence of our senses; evidence of the truth or falsehood of a statement.

I include our 5 senses as well as historical text(as far as I trust history) and physical artifact. If we're limiting evidence to your definition then I will retract evidence from the statement.

[Violet]

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Evidence is completely subjective. That which a scientist considers evidence is a far cry from the idiocy that the faithful accept as evidence.

Don't we discuss this enough? There is no absence of faith in belief... only degrees of faith a person needs to believe.

I make a distinction between 'trust', for instance, and 'faith' though...

If there is a lack of evidence then the belief is 'faith'. Just because evidence is, obviously, subjective, doesn't mean that 'faith' does not have the connotations of irrationality that it does.

The fact that evidence is subjective and, say, Science does not claim to know the absolute when it cannot, it doesn't mean that scientists beliefs are faith-based. The fact that doubt is left open does not mean that our belief is not based on evidence. To say that all belief requires a level of faith is, in my mind, claiming that no belief is based on evidence. Because, how I understand it, having faith = not having evidence.

I understand that there must be 'trust' or 'belief' in evidence... but that is different to faith. The words 'trust', and 'faith', for instance, are not identical by definition.

With or without evidence, there can be trust... but there, by definition (at least how I understand it), cannot be evidence if you "have faith", for faith is belief without evidence.

So, the claim that anyone can have faith in evidence, I understand to be an oxymoronic claim.

EvF So since faith is blind, then "blind faith" is just redundant right? Heard that in a couple places....

Exactly.

Unless the term is out of context, in which case it's perhaps better to specify the 'blind'. Since the term 'faith' has other meanings too of course... (like as in 'faithful').

EvF

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I actually contend the point that faith is anything different from trust, confidence, belief, assertion, or acceptance.

Faith |fāθ|
noun
1 complete trust or confidence in someone or something

As you can see, faith means fully trusting.

trust |trəst|
noun
1 firm belief in the reliability, truth, ability, or strength of someone or something

Trust means a firm belief in <insert attribute>. (Ie, i trust the computer not to crash on me. Interchangeable with I have faith that the computer will not crash on me)

belief |biˈlēf|
noun
1 an acceptance that a statement is true or that something exists

A belief is accepting that something is true (which takes trust, see having faith)

acceptance |akˈseptəns|
noun
3 agreement with or belief in an idea, opinion, or explanation

Acceptance under the relevant definition is simply believing (aka having faith in) something.

So as I've made my point before: asserting anything to be true leads to circular faith. We simply cannot function without believing what we think to be true (is true)... even believing that we can say. We simply have to take these things on faith. Faith as we commonly use it is in reference to those individuals with a lot of faith... but to exclusively use that definition is like saying that only the most extreme of the muslims are really muslims.

[Minimalist]

The five senses are sight, touch, smell, taste and hear.

Let us say that you claim to see "Bigfoot." How is someone else supposed to evaluate your claim? The whole point of providing evidence is that someone else is able to look it over.

[tackattack]

I could use a camera to take a picture of bigfoot. There have been pictures of UFO's and the lochness monster. They were then proved as fakes, explained away with science or naturally occuring phenomenon or just doubted. In the context of someone actually believing they saw Bigfoot and record visual perception of them; The analysts then takes the one instance captured as their own percetion. The only have that small frame of reference to base their perception. That however is still not the same perception of someone seeing a "bigfoot" running through the forest and capturing a still of it. Can we at least agree that the eyes take in more than we can conceptually process at one time and our focus determines our perspective?

[Minimalist]

Sure, but I don't know what that has to do with the issue. If you go into town and announce that you saw "Bigfoot" but were not quick enough to get your camera out to take a picture you have nothing but your own statement. People will either think you are a liar or hallucinating or mistaken OR someone who believes in Bigfoot might well believe you. It doesn't matter. It still isn't evidence that does any subsequent investigator any good at all.


If you did get a picture than the picture becomes the evidence and, as you indicated above, would be subjected to tests to determine if it were legitimate or not.

[tackattack]

but the test would only be testing the limited field of view registered by the camera. Not the fact that you caught him humping an elk and couldn't get your lens cap off before he started running.

Not only is the evidence in question based on the method of capture (no cameras in christ's time)but it doens't encompass the entire scope of the "experience".

I think that's why people agree that God can't be proven or disproven emphatically. Hence I believe he does and you believe he doesn't. I can allow that he might not exist, but by the definition of atheism I was given you can not even allow for the possibility that it does. Am I way off on the nail here?

little add before I go to bed. I think it's the level of creditbility we disagree on the most. You see the fuzy picture of "bigfoot" and can prove that it could be a man in a suit. I'm telling you you weren't there and didn't see him humping the elk as well. I think thhat, in general, atheists (as it has occured to me in the RW) just dismiss God despite not seeing the whole picture (which does require a predeposition to believing in God) and wonder why Christians get so frustrated and some even get angry. "But you didn't see him hump the elk!" and just chalk it up to coincedence. So I guess Atheists believe in Coincidence and Christians believe that not everything is just random? Wow I'm sure that doesn't make sense and I'm very tired. Night everyone.

[Minimalist]

I usually try to avoid that particular dilemma (some believer will usually demand "PROVE that god doesn't exist" as if a negative can ever be proven) by pointing out that there is no evidence that god exists....or that jesus ever existed nor any other god created by the fertile mind of men.

Tends to keep things focused on the tangible.

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"Belief" is simply not good enough for me.


Good night.

[rjh4 is back]

Well, that's something to build on then, isn't it?

Yes, it is!