Religious faith in videogames

[MrPopo]

Whether religious or not faith is a part of everyone's life. Unless you know everything, and lack an imagination.

Faith is the confident belief or trust in the truth or trustworthiness of a person, concept or thing

Having faith isn't moronic. To live your life you have to have some sort of faith or you would just rot and die. Faith doesn't even need to be based on fact, and it doesn't have to be accepted blindly either. Accepting scientific theories and religious views both require faith. The only absolute thruth as far as I am concerned is -- + -- = ----, even then I could be wrong because my mind can't comprehend anything else.

I'd argue that you don't need actually need to have faith. You can simply go for the probability math and game theory. And sometimes you'll still be on the short end of the dice roll, just like sometimes whatever you have faith in falls short.

[pepharytheworm]

Whether religious or not faith is a part of everyone's life. Unless you know everything, and lack an imagination.

Faith is the confident belief or trust in the truth or trustworthiness of a person, concept or thing

Having faith isn't moronic. To live your life you have to have some sort of faith or you would just rot and die. Faith doesn't even need to be based on fact, and it doesn't have to be accepted blindly either. Accepting scientific theories and religious views both require faith. The only absolute thruth as far as I am concerned is -- + -- = ----, even then I could be wrong because my mind can't comprehend anything else.

I'd argue that you don't need actually need to have faith. You can simply go for the probability math and game theory. And sometimes you'll still be on the short end of the dice roll, just like sometimes whatever you have faith in falls short.

Of course you could argue anything. But in truth have you met anyone personally and truely believe they live there life without faith. I highly doubt you know anyone who doesn't trust anything including himself. Possibilty and reality are two differnt things. Even if you know such a man who lives his life by probability math and game theory you never truely know they are not basing anything on faith, you would have to have faith that they are telling the truth. Plus wouldn't they have to have faith in the probability math and game theory. After all its only a theory

[lisalover1]

"Hmm. If God was wrong about slavery, then maybe it's possible that he was wrong about other stuff." Once you are able to start doubting religion, it will quickly crumble like a house of cards.

Allow me to quote Scott Adams' list of common logical fallacies:

#25: Inability to Recognize Incidents May Have Multiple Causes
Example: "The Beatles were popular for one reason only: They had good instruments."

You are looking at this topic from a very one-dimensional viewpoint. You think that people are stupid because of religion, and that all religious people are idiots. This is not true, and is actually quite a laughable idea. The reason behind all these examples of so-called "religious extremism and idiocy" is quite simple: some religious people are stupid, but not because of religion. Also, stupid people are loud. Let me explain. Because stupid people do not have the intellect to back up their claims, so they do extravagant, controversial things to get attention, instead. Religious people aren't all stupid. Idiots are everywhere, in every group of society. It's just that the ones who happen to be religious are the ones that flaunt that aspect of themselves to get even more controversial attention. These are the people you hear about; the minority that are loud enough to make themselves look like the majority. To put it simply, If you have a room of 98 normal people and 2 idiots, the only people you would be able to hear are those two, and the whole room would look dumb. All you are doing is adhering to that broken record of a stereotype.

[MrPopo]

Of course you could argue anything. But in truth have you met anyone personally and truely believe they live there life without faith. I highly doubt you know anyone who doesn't trust anything including himself. Possibilty and reality are two differnt things. Even if you know such a man who lives his life by probability math and game theory you never truely know they are not basing anything on faith, you would have to have faith that they are telling the truth. Plus wouldn't they have to have faith in the probability math and game theory. After all its only a theory

First off, please understand the meaning of theory in science and math. A theory is a VERY strong thing in those contexts. They are testable and verifiable. The reason they're called a theory is that there might be another way of explaining phenomena in the world. For example, Newton's Theory of Gravity was supplanted by General Relativity, but in the macroscopic world Newton's Theory is a perfectly good approximation.

Remember, faith isn't just trust. Faith is trust without anything to back it up. I trust my coworkers to get their work done in a timely manner based upon past observation. That's not faith.

[Limewater]

After all its only a theory

First off, please understand the meaning of theory in science and math. A theory is a VERY strong thing in those contexts. They are testable and verifiable.

I was looking for a fun, arrogant "Actually, you're both wrong!" image, but this was the best I could do:

http://adaptershack.com/s/19.jpg

While Perphary's "it's just a theory" comment is a little misinformed, this definition of theory is completely inappropriate when it comes to Mathematics. Wikipedia is actually a pretty good resource when it comes to Math, so I'll defer to them:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematical_theory

There's not really much of a notion of "testability" or "verifiability" in probability theory or game theory, at least not in the way that you are describing. This is true of Mathematics in general.

What you say is close enough to right for Science, in general. However, you were referencing Math.

For example, Newton's Theory of Gravity was supplanted by General Relativity, but in the macroscopic world Newton's Theory is a perfectly good approximation.

Not really. Newtonian physics fails for lots of macro stuff-- even some terrestrial stuff. It's fine for driving your car at 55 mph and stuff, but it fails for long-distance, high-speed projectiles, for example.

Remember, faith isn't just trust. Faith is trust without anything to back it up.

source?

I trust my coworkers to get their work done in a timely manner based upon past observation. That's not faith.

Why do you trust your perception?

[Original_Name]

Okay, Inazuma, I always seem to miss the trouble you stir up in threads until they're either dead or locked, but let me share some thoughts with you -- you should be commended for your ability to question the universe that you live in in ways deeper than many individuals care or dare to and for the courage to express it without fear of the contempt of others. Here's the thing though: you will never get anyone to change their mind on a damn thing if you're calling them "morons" the whole time -- that will only make them try harder to prove you wrong. I had a teacher who tried to convert the whole class to Objectivism by calling us irrational slaves to our own flawed dogmatic ideologies based purely on emotion rather than reason -- it made people like me, even being an apathetic agnostic, work harder to bring him down. Now, the thing with Mr. Sierra is that even though he went about his whole act in an outrageously divisive manner, he had at least taken the time to make some good arguments (I, covering epistemology and my friend Robert, covering politics eventually brought the ongoing conversations to an impass and actually got the fucker to start teaching AP Government, but I do respect him for having a good argument that had us stumped for awhile).

You can't take teensy parts of the Bible that are flawed and point at them and go, "This is flawed, so the whole thing is flawed!" -- everyone knows that the Bible has been epically mucked with, and devoted Christians try their best to sort the good from the bad, because they firmly believe that at least some significant quantity of it are pure accounts of a divine presence. If you really want to make a real impact on dogmatic Christians you should A.) not be dogmatic yourself and accept that there are multiple logical ways to view the universe and that you simply believe that you may have come to a conclusion that is "the most right" in the vein of Socratic wisdom and B.) dig for deeper, more fundamental flaws than surface crap like, "Why doesn't God want you to eat lobster then, huh!?" and more along the lines of the startling similarities between Jesus Christ and Horus and the many other (mostly Pagan) messiahs who came chronologically before Christ and how they all directly relate to astrological patterns -- but do it respectfully! I'm all for trying to galvanize people to push beyond their conceived boundaries, but all you seem to be capable of is pushing people away from you in this setting. And y'know what? Some people will not budge, and will see you as pure evil because they believe that God is always testing them in inventive ways -- they believe he was capable of creating the universe, thus he is capable of using any other sort of trickery on any individual. Is this absolutely terrifying to you and I, Inazuma? Absolutely. But no more terrifying than your (or even MY for the particularly touchy individuals) words are to them.

Let me try and reveal to you a little bit of why you might want to be less pompous in your rebuttals to "flawed logic" -- your logic is equally "flawed". You have placed an immovable faith in specifically a lack of divine presence. Well, that surely means that you have placed a faith in the validity of the Big Bang Theory over that of an intelligenty designed model of the universe, correct? (and I'm not going for a "Well there's too much stuff in the universe for it to have just happened by random!" argument) And the core at what we would now call the center of the universe was a massive collection of atoms, correct? (and I'm not going for a "Well how did the atoms get there, huh!?" argument, either) Alright, let's think about this: every single quantative entity in the universe is composed of atoms -- all atoms, atoms, atoms in different configurations to make different stuff. Atoms -- little, non-sentient, non-reasoning, non-thinking vibrating units of energy. But if you put them in just the right order, you can create something that, while composed of individually non-"living" entities, is like you and I -- Sentient! Reasoning! Thinking! But all we're made of is atoms... so answer me this:

If we are composed of atoms in such a manner to allow these super-atomic capabilities, who's to say that the collection of atoms at the universe's core wasn't a sentient, reasoning, thinking individual? Who's to say that that big collection of atoms wasn't a living organism that had a plan for a universe and exploded itself in order to create it, lending itself to the Pagan epistemology that "God is in and of everything"? Who's to say this organism isn't an immortal being cheating death like the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turritopsis_nutricula by undergoing the same process of maturity and renewal through http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Bounce ? Sounds like a God to me... a God that can be rationalized through scientific logic.

That doesn't mean you HAVE to believe in such a thing -- but it's 100% as accurate as your concept of the constructs of the universe, and thus demands your respect. Perhaps most religions are a simplified account of this process?

[Limewater]

B.) dig for deeper, more fundamental flaws than surface crap like, "Why doesn't God want you to eat lobster then, huh!?" and more along the lines of the startling similarities between Jesus Christ and Horus and the many other (mostly Pagan) messiahs who came chronologically before Christ and how they all directly relate to astrological patterns -- but do it respectfully!

Original_Name: Great post! I really appreciate what your wrote. However, I am going to take issue with this part of it. The Jesus Christ/Horus thing is largely an internet myth rather than being based upon legitimate scholarship.

[Capcomwarrior]

Remember, faith isn't just trust. Faith is trust without anything to back it up.

Limewater - "source?"

Exactly. I left the conversation when it seemed like he was just creating his own absolute definition for faith. Just to be sure, I immediately looked up the definition in many sources. A few did list his definition as #4 or 5 of the 6 or so different meanings, but in none of them was it the only or even the main definition. (I thought I remembered that the meanings are in order of most used, but I may be wrong on that, which wouldn't change anything)

On Inazuma, don't even bother. He clearly doesn't even have a basic understanding of the doctrines he criticizes, or himself for that matter. He even concluded that perceived positive changes in his thought process over time were a result of abandoning his religious beliefs instead of maybe... maturing? Just one of the many funny examples he has provided us with. It also doubles as one of the oldest, most cheap and obvious strategies in the book - the "I used to be one of them" card. In the game of offense fishing, these are almost always tall tales anyway.

Although I am contradicting this by even posting... I usually just let characters like this have their say and bury themselves. I mean, really nobody even needed to respond to him. Just his comments alone do the job pretty sufficiently.

But most likely... he was just looking to offend anyway, it seems very obvious by his dialog. DNFTT please!

edited to add quotes

[Inazuma]

@Original_Name
I get what you are saying about calling people morons. I just tell it like it is and I am very open, honest and blunt about things.

Part of the reason God was created was to give people an answer to the big questions "Why are we here? How did the Earth start?, etc". There are theories such as the big bang and whatnot, but nothing is known for certain. The thing is, we simply do not know how we all got here and how the universe began. I don't claim to have an answer for this and that's perfectly OK. Some people just have to have an answer for everything, even if it means clinging to some random bullshit that has no proof whatsoever. Advances in science and technology have helped up solve mysteries before so maybe one day the really big questions can be answered.

[Capcomwarrior]

Original Name - Now this is more like it - intelligent and well-thought criticism. I really like your Big Bang god idea! Actually Big Bang and Christianity are not as incompatible as many seem to think: http://www.godandscience.org/slideshow/ ... FCapBfoIHD
That site is actually a pretty impressive vault of scientific info (from real life physicists and cosmologists) used as evidence for the existence of God.

Im a Christian who believes that the universe began with big bang. It definitely does not make creation any less true. The thing is - many critics of Christianity are thinking within serious confines when trying to understand our beliefs. I for one don't and never have believed that there is an old human man with white hair in the sky, shooting lightning bolts out his finger to fabricate the stars and planets into existence... or even that how it actually happened/is happening is even perceivable by my 5 human senses.