Yes.
2. Yes.

1.) Not really, my de-conversion from superstitions was almost complete already.
2.) No

NO
2. NO

Spot on, and well-said!
"How many angels can dance on the head of a pin?"

.... As many as fit.
:)

No
No
I learned at an early age that the word "faith" had been distorted to cover more than what it was (i.e. a feeling). Words have an exact meaning and should always be defined. I know that faith is an unquestioning belief without proof. I like to use the word confidence to explain the acceptance of ideas with empirical evidence as proof.

Indeed, I do not think there is a huge surplus of "real" history books. It seems some are slanted in one way or another. However, I have found there are more and more coming available, some republished, that have taken great pains to use references and citations to state their cases, indicating some are at least willing to look for the truth rather than just take a stab at it.I just finished an excellent book on the War of 1812, which has some disturbing echos of what we see today.

No, cited Heisenberg's uncertainty principle

You are indeed correct. I haven't seen anyone argue that it gets extinguished every time it goes below the horizon in the West and sinks into the Ocean, only to be reborn the next morning either.

H&MP? When I read that in Starship Troopers at the tender age of 11 I thought that sounded like a class that should be required, and I always wanted to attend in H.S., but strangely, never found.

You are correct, this brings up the fact that the word faith is used interchangeably with "confidence" and "expectation" without the religious connotation, at least in my observations. I would say he had faith in himself and his work. Not that magic would somehow provide...

Science predicts future events all the time based on proven principles.

If someone in ancient times wanted to understand why the sun keeps coming up and why he could count on it he needed more than repetitive observation. Inductive generalization by "simple enumeration" is a fallacy. The observational knowledge of the sun rising and when it does so must be integrated with other factors -- like the eventual realization that the earth rotates while orbiting around the sun.

In primitive times causality was associated with animism. People's only experience with causality was their own or others' personal intervention to cause something to happen. The need to explain the world in some kind of principles rather than watch one isolated event at a time go by led to religious speculation as the first, primitive form of philosophy -- gods caused the weather, volcanoes, the stars and the moon to move across the sky and the sun to rise and set. It took a long evolution of conceptual thought to understand that causality means that things are what they are and act accordingly by their nature, and how to conceptually integrate observations to isolate and identify causes. Philosophy began to replace religion (not always much better) and the sciences began to develop, first as part of one "natural philosophy" and then as special fields of knowledge.

From early knowledge of planetary orbits to Copernicus, Kepler and Galileo, to Newton's law of gravity and laws of motion (including conservation of momentum), to Einstein's general relativity our understanding of why the sun rises -- and how it can eventually burn out its nuclear reactions and stop -- along with the broader integrated knowledge of how and why the planets, moons and stars move around has grown.

The religionists are still at the level of the primitivists, insisting that a god orders the sun through his own decreed "laws", not the natural laws of physics as human principles objectively identifying essential observed relationships and conceptualizing causality in our contextual knowledge. They think the sun rising hasn't been "proven" by science without assigning a mystic intrinsic force understood by wrapping your consciousness around it in a mystic state with infinite knowledge across all time. With that mystical outlook nothing will ever convince them of scientific knowledge as anything but dabbling, and nothing can convince them of anything not dogmatically embraced by faith in dogma.

Did it say how many of them fit on the head of a pin?

And I would suggest that the word 'faith' might be inappropriate for the Edison 'example.'

I would be much more likely to describe Edison as having confidence and expectations that continued research, trials and errors, WOULD lead him to discovery of a 'solution' to the problem of creating a way to make an electric filament last long enough to be useful as a product!

Faith? Irrelevant. No predictive value. Confidence? Drive? Courage, Persistence? Those are the things that lead people to discovery.

Again, woodlema, 'proof' isn't necessary or relevant at all... requesting 'proof' is a red herring. No one can 'prove' ANYTHING WILL happen in the future.

Any more than YOU can 'prove' that God Exists (or I can prove God Doesn't). Mental masturbation, although, as Heinlein pointed out many times, many people have built careers and fortunes based on the discussion... :)

It's oxymoronic to think so and moronic to even ask the question. Stop it!

ewv, the problem I've had with Woodlema's request for "proof" is that, basically, there is no NEED, scientifically or otherwise, to PROVE that the 'sun will come up tomorrow.'

Past observations can lead to the prediction that 'the sun will come up tomorrow,' whether proven or not proven. It is an expectation based on past observations and factors in ALL possible reasons why it might NOT happen.

On the other hand, expectations of sunrise tomorrow have wonderfully accurate predictive value, usefulness and replicability, which does NOT accrue to religious 'predictions.'

Despite claims to the contrary, one of the defects of 'religion' is that it has no Predictive Value and, as such, is a lousy basis on which to evaluate decisions, forecasts or plans for one's future.

While 'science' can make observations, develop theories and test them with double-blind experiments, no such claim or success is possible for 'religion' or 'faith.'

Which, essentially, my answers, too, are "no" and "no."

Now, I pose the following question to the original post: Why did you ask the question in the first place? What kinds of answers did you expect, and why? And what difference to anyone, including yourself, would the answers make?

... and your 'handle,' Joy1InChrist' telegraphs a clear message about your beliefs and expectations and mental filters, too...


Maybe it'll be part of a Ph.D. dissertation, but the idea that the answers (or original questions) have any other usefulness or serious bearing on anyone's life is laughably small.

Cheers! And... has ANYONE changed their views or beliefs as a result of considering OR answering the questions?

My prediction: No and No.

Amazing indeed. Yet another religion of convienence

I became an atheist at the age of 12, all of my own insights. Rand 16 years later merely confirmed it. Oh, but with what clarity and vigor.

That may be the wrong word for it. I'm just saying I'm from that background, but my parents never taught me to take it literally.

My parents told me I was a Christian as a youth and took me to church and Sunday school. By age 12 I did not want to be bothered. In high school I rejected it and became a diest. In college I didn't care about the issue until I heard Lecture 4 of Basic Principles of Objectivism (that was in 1962) where he explained clearly the intellectual and logical problems with the supernatural. I became an atheist. All it took was one lecture.