The value of Faith

There are different kinds of faith. In Buddhism, Shraddha sometimes translated as faith, refers to belief in or devotion to the teachings of the Buddha that emphasize perfect view and perfect resolve (two of the Eightfold Path). As a view, it is not blind. It is rather, the wisdom that comes from direct personal experience with the teachings of the Buddha (dharma) as they are lived. Faith is a kind of awareness of the dharma as one lives in the world. In other words, it is the understanding of the application of the dharma as it is lived. Faith is wisdom and knowledge that develops from living in the world as the ethical embodiment of the dharma.

Faith, as it were, is another proof of the meaning-charge that we have fallen under in the post-modern era. It is a perfectly useful word that has built up a lot of connotation that makes people understand in it as something completely irrational. We probably all actually use faith (and to draw a bit on what Alan was saying about there being many different 'types' of faith) much more than the rational mind - the sort that we all hope to have - would care to admit. When we admit that we 'intuit' things, we tend to feel a little shame-ful about that, hoping to put everything that we know into the built-up from 'logical' parts, valid conclusion from the chain of valid propositions and true premises, founded on an attention to precision and detail. Yet, it is only faith in the philosophical or scientific methodology that permits us to prefer that. Reason cannot reason its own reasonableness ... That isn't new. Although we don't hear it very often - and it is certainly akin to heresy for the scientistic value structure - but it remains very much so.

Faith, in its strictest sense, simply means to let go, to wait and see. This concept has been battered flat by many pop-psychology, self-help and New Age writers, but that doesn't bleed all of the value out of it. One who clings to some sort of belief in the supernatural or even supposedly metaphysical (by extension, any faith that some later knowledge of physics may 'save us' from our abuses of our nature is as irrational as the belief in any super-human, godly or extraterrestrial saviour) is not at all engaged in faith, but in a relatively inferior sort of reasoning.

So, for the many different types of faith, they could very well be as numerous as the probabilities of combinations and recombinations of circumstances that we may find ourselves in. Yet, it feels to me that the thing to remember herein is that we are incapable of dissecting away every element, aspect and condition of all of these circumstances. That leaves a lot of room for gaps that we can only fill with intuition, and it is that part of the whole situation that we just have to recognise as faith (albeit we could call it something else to avoid the conflictive connotative confusion).

rugadd wrote: Why defend faith? What value does it bring?

I agree. Every time we have or believe to have rational reasons for believing something we will state those. We only begin to cite faith either if we have nothing else to go on or when everything we thought we had was debunked to our satisfaction. And because faith is considered as such great a virtue, to cite faith is a good way of avoiding any further conversation, because nobody could or would possibly dare argue with that.

But of course there is nothing virtuous about faith. If I had to translate belief and faith respectively to German or to Russian I would end up with twice the same word in either language. So to believe on faith quite literally means to believe because you just believe. It doesn't get any less rational in my humble opinion.
Now there will be people employing their beloved equivocation fallacies in defense of faith, saying that we have faith in our spouses or whatever (Yes, I'm looking at you, Psyddhattha, but not exclusively you). Frankly though, there is a word for that: Trust. That trust, by the way, is based on evidence, be it that the doctor has a track record of helping his patients and a little paper on the wall testifying to how he stood the rigorous test of his peers and proved he meets a standard high enough to be allowed to mess about with people's bodies. If we had to find a meaning that the word faith has that we cannot substitute with a different word, belief on no grounds would have to be it, and that use isn't out of the picture just because there are other uses, nor are these different meanings equivalent just because there happens to be a language that can call them by the same name. For all intents and purposes try replacing "to have faith" with "to believe" and nothing will have changed.
No, there is nothing wrong with believing things. But if one starts saying that one's belief is the reason one believes, there is no reasoning left to be had because whosoever does that cares more about himself and his own little world than about any truth of the matter at hand.

tzb wrote: If people only ever believed in things they already have evidence for, how would we discover anything?

There is that thing called "evidence", you know. Discoveries aren't made by being made up. They are being discovered. That is evidence came in, a hypothesis to account for the evidence was formulated, predictions were derived, and experiments showed them to be accurate or inaccurate such that a more refined hypothesis could be formulated.
Nobody actually made a worthwhile discovery by making things up, much less by believing anything without evidence. And I know, you are going to cite someone like Columbus who discovered America by hypothesizing that there ought to be a way to India across the ocean rather than around Africa. But of course that wasn't a hunch, since the spheroidal shape of the earth had been known for some two thousand years by that time and known among the intellectual elite of his day fairly well. He didn't just make it up and it was the evidence that led him to believe it, both before and after his first journey.

Yes, faith is inherently illogical. If you believe something with reason, be that good or bad reason, there are other words to describe that and faith is not even among the first ones you'd use. When you say you have faith in something, you mean that you don't have and/or don't need evidence. Unreasonable is what that is by its very definition. Illogical is by the way defined as and synonymous with unreasonable, too.

It's all a matter of how you choose to define the word in my view...and I choose to make the word interchangeable with trust and belief....one can trust science, one can believe science, one can have faith in science...one can trust the force, one can believe in it, one can have faith in it...

I can be called an idiot or whatever for having that view, but I don't care what others think about me...opinions are like @$$holes, everyone has one, and they all stink but no body is willing to admit it....and until I choose to let someone elses opinion influence mine I'll continue with my own...

I can be called an idiot or whatever for having that view, but I don't care what others think about me...opinions are like @$$holes, everyone has one, and they all stink but no body is willing to admit it

Very cliche, but not true at all. Opinions are not equal.

Whose opinion would you trust more on your health? A Doctor? Or a homeless man?

Who would you rather do surgery on you? A surgeon? Or me?

We could both have an opinion on how to operate, but in only one instance will you have reasonable success of making it out alive.

Truly, not all opinions stink, and were we to apply that logic, then we wouldnt have very much going for us as a species.

This isnt about trust, or faith as it is apparent some doctors have gotten things wrong ,and in surgeries, the wrong foot has been removed, etc, and any good doctor is absolutely cool with you getting a second opinion( Meaning they know that they are fallible) still, it is reasonable to assume that his opinion at the very least stinks less than mine.

I can be called an idiot or whatever for having that view,

You could, and some would, but I wont. I simply think its a bold statement but its obviously not a true statement.

and until I choose to let someone elses opinion influence mine I'll continue with my own...

Which is what we all do. I simply have a criteria to allow that influence. That criteria removes the proposition of faith.

Such a path has its own unique challenges, and it is not without cost.

Thats actually why critical thinking is important, so you can discern the difference of value in opinions.

I see you have apprentices.

They must not think your opinion stinks, or it would make for a poor training relationship.

Haha, in fact, they may have faith in your abilities.

I like to think in regards to the apprentices I have had, that I have simply supplied evidence to my teachings enough so that they saw value in them.

Unless they simply sought me out on a whim...

Still, when searching for a martial arts dojo, I went to many, asked questions watched classes, sat in and participated, and then came to a decision.

Because I dont have faith, but I can get a good idea of the value of there....opinion, on martial arts by gauging its value through the evidence of testing it.

Delusion: an idiosyncratic belief or impression that is firmly maintained despite being contradicted by what is generally accepted as reality [evidence].

Those that exercise faith in spite of mountains of evidence...that faith has no value to me.

But for some reason (the human mind being as amazing as it is) many people derive value, life changing value, from practices that science has deemed pseudo. So while their faith hasn't found acceptance among the greater sciences, as long as they aren't trying to deter science, and are helping people, then maybe there is some value there. I choose not to exercise that faith for myself, but I leave them to it if they face their life more positively because of it.

I don't form my opinions on a whim, I do research and study and use the information I have to form my own opinions which are mine and mine alone...with my apprentices I simply guide them into finding and forming their own opinions...most often theirs differs from mine and there is nothing wrong in that, if it mirrors mine again there is nothing wrong in that so long as it is truly theirs..parrotting an opinion simply because you're told to can lead to disaster....parrotting belief,trust, or faith because you're told to is disastrous....holding a belief, trust, or faith because you choose to is better, but not without its faults....nothing is perfect...that statement is also subject to perspective....each person holding an opinion will believe that theirs is the only right one...perhaps they're all right or all wrong...it depends on how one chooses to see it...

When I had my appendix removed a week prior I had heard about a surgical mistake at the same hospital in which the patient died...so when I went in for surgery I was understandably apprehensive, but I chose to have faith/ trust that I would be ok despite immediate evidence to the contrary...

I don't form my opinions on a whim, I do research and study and use the information I have to form my own opinions which are mine and mine alone

No ones opinion is only there own no more than no man is an island.

As you said, you research and study, etc.

Which is a good thing

However its in direct counterpoint to faith.

Even if your apprentices disagree with you most often( Odd, that) there is still the influence of your opinion as a counterpoint.

When I had my appendix removed a week prior I had heard about a surgical mistake at the same hospital in which the patient died...so when I went in for surgery I was understandably apprehensive, but I chose to have faith/ trust that I would be ok despite immediate evidence to the contrary...

Except thats not faith, as the evidence is overwhelming that appendectomies go well. No surgery is 100% guaranteed for survival. Also with an appendix removal, which only happens do to infflamation ( its the itis in appendicitis) you really had no choice but to have it removed. No matter where you went in the word, any hospital has a fail rate to any procedure, no matter how common, which appendectomies are.

Statistically, it is reasonable to assume that you would survive, though any apprehension removes faith.

It is perfectly rational to be apprehensive about surgery regardless of how common said procedure is.

Evidence works on a percentage.

An example I used earlier.

I could find people that pray the night before to win the lottery and win the lottery the next day.

Now, going off that evidence alone, I could reasonably assume that prayer = $ right?

No.

I also have to account for the people who pray the night before, and dont win.

Now, compare the evidence, and I am led to a different assumption.

Appendectomies have a fail rate, for a myriad of reasons. From the anesthesia to the actual procedure, to the post op infections that can happen.

Now, take that one example, draw a conclusion, and you could say that you were acting on faith.

However, take in the overwhelming amount of appendectomies done in the US alone, with success, and the conclusion you come to is much different.

Evidence does not act in a void, and is subject to change.

Science is a cemetery of dead ideas precisely because nothing is sacred.

Simply the medical process of dealing with appendicitis, at one time, they would have tried leeches.

Much, much, much, lower survival rate.

Then they would have operated not using proper sterilization.

Higher, but still with many deaths.

Then they also provide post op care, and rehab as well as proper sterilization, modern techniques( they dont make as large incisions due to technology, meaning smaller chance of infection) as well as antibiotics, etc.

Much, much higher success rate.

Still not 100% though.

Its not faith based.

Its evidence based.

Which is how that works.

Now, this is interesting, and pretty much my view as it stands.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5xvILvxYbFA