To believe or not to believe, that is my question

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@NOG: Hey, hey, hey...out of context, out of context.

Missed those quotation marks there by a mile.

Aaaand, jumping to conclusions there ilke a bull attacking a red cloth.

Wild conclusions.

And making allegations that have no basis on reality, by assuming that my previous post is a statement concerning how I see the world.

It's not.

Then there's the funny thing about my post and what you read to be in there is that in not a single sentence did I write that "if there is no proof it does not exist"

I did write however that according to some atheists (I'm not one of them, but I'm not a theist either, and not agnostic either ) "if there is no proof, direct or causally derivable indirect scientific evidence, then the subject matter is irrelevant and possibly detrimental for the well being of humankind".

I don't think that there is a single atheist with a strong backround in scientific studies in natural science who'd say that science is absolute.

Science is not as good as the totality of pure logic. It's better. Logic is infallible. Science is not. That's the beauty of it. Logic and it's axioms are perfect, rationality is not. What is logical and what is rational do have a lot to do with each other, but logic's limited in it's perfection. There's bound to be paradoxes. Especially with binary logic.. Now the failure in logic is a failure of someone thinking that logic can explain everything there is not avoiding a truck that's bound to crash into that someone 100mph, because according to Zenon's paradox there is no movement...

So logic is good, up to a point. Same with rationality. Works only up to a point. Science works up to a point as well, but when it doesn't, when it fails to work, a better theory, a better way of explaining what's going on is required and this is what happens. And when this new theory fails to work, there'll be another one, and another and another, as long as is needed...

Then there's this: Dark matter, dark energy, planets orbiting other stars, the black hole at the center of our galaxy, Oort Cloud...all of these have been hyopthesized and proven to exist through indirect evidence. Before that, there was no knowledge of them existing. No information, no "existence", no relevance. Information that challenges what is known requires scientific studies, extrapolation, revision of the previous theories and hypotheses.

My belief in what? I believe nothing. Belief is not necessary. Faith? Unnecessary. Irrelevant. Fun, but irrelevant. Interesting, but irrelevant.

 

Has it now?

No, it hasn't. Now, I'm not someone for a static universe belief, but I believe everything we can see can be explained away with normal interstellar events (for extraordinary values of "normal"), with no need to break causality nor go "a magic ball of nothing exploded and created space and time and therefore causality". I'm one of those folks who accept the concept of "time" just as much as "a Jewish space zombie said so".

Taking the same definition of rationality and logic to it's extremes; yes, believing in your senses without a doubt is irrational and illogical. And that's cold hard fact.

Basing your worldview on something unprovable and preaching it, well. The same definition of delusional I take antipsychotics for.

No. Faith and rationality can coexist in the same person, no doubt. Faith and rationality cannot interact without destroying rationality and throwing it entirely unto faith. Garbage in garbage out.

Belief in a god, specifically, no. Basing your handling of subjects on a belief in a god, however, is a whole different subject matter.

You're right, belief in god, left to *that* and that is not a contradiction with rationality in other subjects, but it's still irrational and illogical, even if those words may have implications that are not strictly accurate.

Dark matter and dark energy no, supermassive black holes, Oort Cloud and planets orbiting other stars yes.

No defined undiscovered species; no proof of undiscovered species at all. Nice strawman.

The idea that if we can by definition *never* test something, it's both irrelevant and a stupid idea, then again, isn't ridiculous, merely offensive.

Trust in one's senses overall falls into the second; the reason for this is that human senses are not very reliable at all. They're highly dependent on interpretation, and seeing I've spent plenty of time hallucinating, I don't trust my senses without imposing a sanity check or a few.

Acceptance of the existence of Pluto, however, falls squarely within the first.

 

Oh my, yes I had taken that as a statement of your position. I'm sorry if it was not, and rescind everything I said about you and rather direct it to the hypothetical 'strong atheist' there.

Ok, the bit about the 'no proof' refered specitifally to:

I guess a better way of putting it would be "if there is no current way to subject the phenomenon to scientific enquiry". I kind of extrapolated from there along the common theme of "only evidence which 'I' (the arguer) can see or which science can examine is real", which I have seen thrown out on these boards.

And there was my extrapolation, which I didn't specifically state. If you're going to reject the claims of religious people of evidence, if your going to challenge the validity of that, then why not challenge the validity of any evidence you cannot yourself observe. This goes for Pluto as well. If you have not seen Pluto yourself, through an actual lense and not on TV, then you don't really KNOW it exists, you have faith in those that tell you it does. As I said, this is an extrapolation based on other arguements I've seen in the past, both on these boards and elsewhere. If you weren't going there (or even close to there from the look of things), then I appologize. I jumped to conclusions.

Yes, it has. Entropy cannot be decreased, and any real process must increase it, it's one of the laws of thermodynamics. If the universe had been around forever, entropy would have been increasing forever, which means it would be infinite. Now, it is theoretically possible that, long ago (min. 15B+ years), entropy COULD BE decreased, but then you're looking at a radical change to the basic way the universe works. Not to say that's impossible, or even that it couldn't happen through natural processes, it turns out the laws of nature aren't so static as we once thought (the speed of light in a vacuum has changed over the past 15 billion years), but it would be a radical change. On top of that, the universe is not only expanding, but expanding at an increasing rate, so even the cyclical universe (Explosion-expansion-collapse-implosion-repeat) model is no longer viable because the rate of expansion would have to be slowing.

... You'll have to explain that one to me. Do you mean you don't believe in time?

Actually, no, it isn't. If you were prescribed antipsychotics by a psychiatrist, it is because your 'worldview' was demonstrably false AND hindered your ability to lead a safe and productive life. On top of that, odds are you were diagnosed with a recognizable brain chemistry defect. Repeated attempts by some of the best psychologists and psychiatrists to define religious faith as a delusion have failed again and again, mainly because it can't be proven wrong (and thus you don't know it's a delusion), but also because, in general, it does not hinder people from leading normal and productive lives. Religious faith does not cause people to huddle in a corner and cower in fear 24/7, nor does it make them attack cars as 'the devil's poison machines'. Delusions do.

You'll have to defend this I'm afraid. Religion and rationality can easily co-exist, as can be seen in just about any of the intellectual discussions on theology. They apply undeniable rationality to the given assumptions. You may disagree with the assumptions, but the rationality and logic work just fine.

Your distinction itself is irrational. If it is reasonable to believe in a god (not certain or proven, but reasonable), and it is reasonable to believe that god has given commands, how is it unreasonable to follow those commands? Either the belief in god must be invalid on it's face, or the end results of following the commands of that god are reasonable themselves.

So things which are merely theorized don't exist, while things that have been photographed do?

Since every deep-sea exploration mission comes back with a host of new species discovered, even today, and since there are whole ecosystems we've barely even scratched the surface of, I think it's safe to assume there are yet undiscovered species out there.

Even here we disagree. Many ideas being presented today by quantum theorists and proponents of M-Theory are not only beyond our current capabilities to test, but are flat out untestable as a whole. This makes them not scientific theory, yes, but they are still either right or wrong, and many of them may well be right. By the nature of the subjects they cover, something untestable must be right.

If you cannot even prove your senses are accurate, given only logic and rationality, how can you prove anything based on those senses is accurate? On top of that, even if you assume your senses are accurate, unless you have procured a high-power telescope, peered into the heavens yourself, and seen Pluto, you can't be sure it's there. Given modern capabilities to fake photos and to generate virtual images, you can't really be sure any image or description of Pluto is original or accurate. You believe in society, which falls into the second category, as there is certainly plenty of evidence that society can be false.


Amaster, you do realize that archeology is regularly confirming more and more of the Old Testament's account of the world. Whole nations and people groups that, 100 years ago, were thought to be myth have turned out to be real, historical groups. In terms of it's description of normal events and international histories, the Old Testament is turning out to be one of the most reliable historical records we have. Does that prove that the God described in it is real? No, but it does lend some credibility to the claim.

 

I'm not and not going to challenge the validity of anything. I'm more interested in how and what arguments are presented, how they affect on people, how they behave if they claim or seem to behave under the influence of the said arguments. Through the studying of the rhetorical strategies people use, through detecting, analyzing; dissecting and deconstructing them one might become more able to perceive unwanted influence strategies that are used in order to try to bend people to act (even willingly) in one way or another. The history of Christian chruch is abundant in different rhetorical tactics and strategies and it is so even in modern times. The more people are dug themselves deep into their positions, the more they are trying to use different strategies to influence and defend their positions. You could call it as a runaway selection through competition for certain resources on a specific topic...

Nu-uh-uh, nope, not me. Personally, I couldn't care less if there's this thing called 'Pluto'. Might as well be a planet, might as well be a name of a deity from the antique, might be Mickey Mouses' dog. Doesn't affect my life in any way which one of these it is or if all of them or none of them and if they exist, are they "really real", "imaginary real", "symbolically real", what ever level of "real" one might want them or it to be. I don't need to validate or disprove anything, everything and anything exist or doesn't, but not in a binary way, so you can say that they exist and/or don't both at the same time depending on the perspective. Reality and existence is not an on/off switch. Logic works that way, except perhaps for fuzzy logic and rhetorics might work that way, but it gets a little awkward if you go there. Reality doesn't. It doesn't have to. All I need to know is that it works in a convenient manner (and what's for supper).

To me, it's a question of potato patata. Different dialects. Same language, different ecological niche, an adaptation, but still within the boundaries of the same species. There is interconnectedness, but a competition for resources, that sometimes can seem quite fearce as well. I think it's fascinating and inspiring, frustrating at times, but definitely more interesting than frustrating. Through competition new adapatations rise, even in language and in the way we use language in a given context.

 

A Question for the Theists

I tend to think of myself as an agnostic, I'm pretty open to these things, if people want to believe in God(s) thats fine I might even pray to them myself every now and then even though I don't have any strong convictions that they exist. If people want to be straight up against the idea of God thats cool too I will admit to taking the Lords name in vain, and sinning on some mighty scales now and then and I don't really think about God when I'm going about my day to day life.

Now I pose a question to all the people who are atheists...who down right don't think there is a God.

What happens if someone comes out tomorrow with proof there is a God? undeniable proof like a photo of him from the hubble telescope giving a big thumbs up....and its signed...and he's there next to the person all jolly like santa, pulling off miracles like Tony Hawks pulls off tricks.

I am just curious where that leaves you apart from red faced I mean theists would be dancing about obviously, some more than others. I mean its pretty obvious it leaves you wrong, and you have to seriously reconsider your...thoughts? (not your beliefs)...but I just don't know how to word it without using the word belief and probably using it wrong

More thoughts to follow, though just to clarify I am not much of a debater, so I'll probably get something wrong and rub someone the wrong way...not my intent

I sort of struggled to see the difference between all those scentences back in the start, and I personally think words can be taken too literally, I mean a belief is just an opinion right? So if you are of the opinion God exists you believe he does and if you are of the opinion he doesn't you believe he doesn't...well thats what I thought...I never really thought that the word "believe" automatically associates you with any kind of religious-ness I just thought it expressed your opinion. I might have to start going careful in my use in the future, when asked which way someone went I won't say "I believe he went that way" incase they think I religiously believe he went that way I probably got all that wrong but meh its a funny thought to me.

PS. I capitalise my Gods and Lords just in case not because I am religious

 

Interesting view. Obviously, one I reject.

Either way we're looking at a radical change, given that the alternative option is the universe (including ALL dimensions) popping out of nowhere.

I don't believe in time. At all.

Right, and show me a psychiatrist who dares to define over half of the world's population as delusional and gets away with it.

Also, your assumptions of why I was prescribed antipsychotics are dead on in bizarro world. Keep guessing.

Just as I said. Garbage in garbage out. Rationality and logic applied to assumptions return something just as illogical and irrational as the assumptions.

Now, I didn't say that belief in a god is reasonable and I decidedly didn't say that belief that the god has given commands is reasonable.

I was saying you can still be (overall) rational with faith, but as soon as you start using faith as a cornerstone in your assumptions, you've thrown rationality out of the window.

Things that we have proof for have been proven to exist, things we don't have proof for haven't been proven to exist. Simple enough.

Safe to assume, yes. Proof of? No. If you have proof of undiscovered species, they're not undiscovered species anymore.

In fact, proof is incompatible with undiscovered species the very exact same way that faith is incompatible with rationality and logic.

Something untestable must be right? Given the first cause/infinity/causality problem, you're actually right on this one.

However, doing any assumptions on unprovable things is fruitless and stupid.

No, it isn't.

It's lending credibility to the claim that the Old Testament was written by people who actually lived or had information about groups of that time.

Which is hardly as impressive. A book was written at a time the book was written and the book is really very old. Nothing supernatural about that.

 

An interesting perspective, and an admirable one, but I believe the ultimate effect is moot. The same can be said for any organization that has survived more than one generation of leadership, and many that have not even survived that long. It is the nature of man and man's organizations you see there, not the nature of a particular religion. It is the same effect as studying the terrors a particular idea has been used to justify.

Here you are playing on a rhetorical flaw. Whether the fact of Pluto is the fact of the planet, the mythical god, or the cartoon character, each one exists in a set manner. The facts are set. Different definitions of terms may alter the answer to a particular question, but the facts do not change. Whether the reality questioned is the reality of the myth's existence or the factual accuracy of the myth itself, there is only one correct answer.

I expect the answer is very simple. For those who truly refuse to believe simply because there is no proof, there would now be proof, and every reason for them to believe. For those who disbelieve from an emotional standpoint, they would continue to challenge such existence, likely claiming falsifications, conspiracies, etc.

It isn't a view, it is a scientifically demonstrable fact (inasmuchso as any scientific 'fact' is). The universe is expanding, the expansion is accelerating, and entropy is not infinite. As for radical changes, actually, science is beginning to accept the idea that radical changes in the nature of our universe have happened. As I said, evidence now shows that the speed of light in a vacuum (pretty much the universal constant) is not actually constant, and has gradually been changing since the Big Bang. Modern theory also postulates that the four basic forces of the universe were not always there, that in the beginning several of them were fused together into one force (not that they were not exhibited, but that they actually did not exist, it's kind of like saying the number 3 didn't exist right after the Big Bang, and it took time before there could be 3 of anything, in any combination).

I think you'll have to explain that one to me. The idea seems rather self evident to me. What I wrote in the previous posts was in the past. When you responded to them, this post was not here yet. Thus, a progression through time can be seen.

Actually, there have been a few, but the simple fact is that religious beliefs do not meet the scientific definition of a mental disorder.

... Then I'm quite curious. And worried. If you're willing to talk about it, I'd be fascinated to hear the reason.

This is true, but to apply it to anything in particular, you would first have to establish that the basic assumptions are faulty. Before you go anywhere else, I would simply like to remind you and others that all logic and rationality are inherently dependent on 'illogical' and 'irrational' assumptions.

No, what you actually said was:

So, belief in God is not in opposition to rationality. If one believes in God, and in a specific God who has given commands (also not contradictory to rationality), then the only rational thing to do, given those grounding assumptions, is to obey those commands.

In it's most grand definition, faith must be the basic assumption of all rationality and logic. Whether it be faith in the scientists who tell people things, faith in the religious leaders who do the same, faith in the repeatability of experiments, or even simply faith in your own senses, all these things are a basic assumption of the reliability of an unproven source. They are faith. You may see some of those assumptions as more reliable than others, with more witnesses and more evidence in support of them, but the absolute assumption of any of them is irrational. Such is the nature of the relationship between rationality and faith.

Ah, but the original statement said that that which could not be tested simply didn't exist, and implied that those things that had not yet been tested/discovered also didn't exist. What we know is not the definition of existence.

I may not have explained that properly. By the nature of the topics (the basic existence of the universe, for example), something must be true, yet any possible explanation would be untestable. Therefore the truth is unconfirmable.

That all depends. If nothing can be proven on the topic (such as the nature and existence of God), yet some action must be taken (belief, non-belief, avoiding the situation), any action must be based on unprovable things. Are your beliefs about religion fruitless and stupid? They fall into the same category, logically, as my own.

The Old Testament is also, by a vast margin, the best preserved (over time and culture changes) historical document known to man. The Torahs that were burned by the Nazis were word-for-word, letter-for-letter, even down to the shaping of paragraphs and the treatment of the paper, identical to the Torahs being read in Istanbul at the time. The Torahs in Istanbul were identical to the remaining fragments of the Torah in, for example, the Dead Sea Scrolls. There were other scrolls with the books of the Torah, but what was duplicated was duplicated identically. The greatest difference between 15th century Torahs from Europe and those from the Middle East is the type of scroll-casings they used.

Now, is that evidence of the supernatural? No, but if one set of historical observations from a given author is accurate, it does lend credibility to another set of historical observations from the same author, even if those observations defy your assumptions.

 

You don't have the scientific background to grasp my meaning even partially.

I was prescribed antipsychotics because I was religious. Well, to be precise - I requested antipsychotics because I was religious. Wildly religious, with heavy fluctuation according to my state. The only people on this board understanding why it was a problem are me, 8 and Frosty, and I'd rather they didn't talk about it.

Please read the original statement again. This time, also trying to understand the context.

Frankly, God is hardly a "historical observation" even in the Bible. Much less than God appearing the Bible talks about "God" talking to people. Alone.

 

Absolutely not, mainly because of what you define as historical observation. Yes, there is some element of historical accuracy in some of the stories we see in the Bible (and the Torah, and the Dead Sea Scrolls, and so on). Others completely and utterly contradict real evidence we have of historical events. We're not going to start disregarding all the evidence we have and blindly believe these "historical observations" just because there's some element of truth in them.

The other thing you have to consider when thinking of old documents like this as historical observations is that, if you use the argument on one of them (say the Torah), you'll have to apply it to other documents as well. Homer's Iliad has a lot of true historical observations backed by archaeological evidence. Does this mean we believe that everything in all of Homer's works is true historical observation? Do we say that there is evidence in Homer's works that the old Greek gods really did exist and walked around? And why would we not?

 

I think you'll find that I am very good at understanding scientific theories on many levels. If it can be presented in a format that will fit in a post, please do so. If not, please direct me to any available references you can. You've piqued my curiosity a great deal.

I understand that talking about such things can be painful. That's ok. Let me make a few generalizations and you can counter me if any of them are wrong. The very fact that you were medicated at all suggests to me (as someone who knows psychologists) that your condition was, at the very least, severely uncomfortable and inhibiting your ability to lead a 'normal' life. They don't prescribe antipsychotics for casual matters. The fact that you describe yourself as 'wildly' religious also suggests similarly.

Taza, the 'context' of the original statement on 'strong atheists' was:

After someone else had posted a brief definition of the beliefs of a strong atheist, a weak atheist, and an agnostic. Would you care to explain what you think I missed in that?

It says God appeared to people and spoke to them, on more than one occasion the author themselves. If their interactions with kings, merchants, and armies were accurate, it does lend credibility to interactions with God.

 

You'd already have grasped my handling of time if you had the necessary background knowledge. As for the disbelieving the big bang point, I'm not saying there wasn't a gigantic explosion - I'm merely highly doubting it had anything to do with the beginning of the universe (which, as you might note, I believe didn't happen).

Nice generalizations, all wrong.

We could go on "does not; does too" all day. Rather pointless.

 

Definitely. Every organized religion (and world-views) that has survived through centuries and millenia have similar patterns in common in the way the ideas in them are constructed and in the way the ideas are presented.

The nature of a particular religion ro any religion for that matter is the way that it is presented in the social conventions and in the way the language is used. Every religious language has its particularities and standards. People in a specific religion might extend the religious language to express even everyday mundane phenomenons. What differentiates a "believer" from a "non-believer" in a given social context is the way that they use language. The use of language can and is even used to extend to separate "believers" from "true-believers" (separating wheat from chaff)...which in itself is an interesting phenomenon that keeps repeating over and over again within every group of people that grows beyond an easily controllable limit of individuals.

Christianity is interesting, since it is the most widespread religion of the world and has had to adapt the way the theological language and its concepts are used in a wide variety of different cultures. Might be preaching to the choir, but theology in the first place was born as an interaction of a certain judeo-christian cult's doctrine and the methods of thinking of ancient greek and roman philosophy. Scholastic theologians shaped formal logic even further in the middle ages and formed the basis of western formal logic of the modern ages.

As an offnote, christianity as a religion with the amount of followers in these days would be impossible without the power of the (not yet christian) Roman empire in the antique world (and amusingly enough this is true even from a fundamentalist religious perspective as well).

Within a specific context this is true, with a given value of 'true'. The problem is that can this 'true' statement be extended into other fields of thinking and other ways of using language and how it relates and functions in these other fields, especially if these other fields are completely different and have quite specific methods of thinking and using language.

Wonderful example on a cultural scale is how christianity fares in completely different traditions, such as in Japan and in East-Asia in general. In modern times it can be accepted as a valid religious tradition with it's ceremonies, but the perspective on its value of 'truth' is something completely different than what it is in our culture. There is a point of view that it is not something that is right or wrong; something that necessarily takes the place of other ways of thinking with its truth or something that should be vehemently fought against as utter and complete nonsense. Japan (with quite a bit of generalizing) is exemplary in this case since it is one of the leading countries in scientific research and yet the whole discussion on secularization is something that at least seemingly does not take place at all.

If and when you start using scientific method they do. A couple of decades ago it was a fact that there is no regeneration of neurons. A few months ago it fas fact that there is no regeneration of heart muscle cells. Now we know that the previous "facts" were...well, not true. They worked well for a while, but now we know better and can use this information to all sorts of nice things, such as curing paralysis in cases of spinal injuries..

 

Taza, so, basically, you've stopped saying anything? That's a pitty, as I'd really like to know what on earth you're talking about. On the medications, I just have to ask one more thing: were these medications prescribed for you by a doctor somewhere in the western world (I include Finland in there)?

Iku, the way the ideas are presented do run into common themes throughout society, such is the nature of rhetoric, but what those ideas are do not. May religions are radically different from each other at the very core of their being, and I'd suggest that it is these ideas at the core that define the religion, not how they're presented.

I'm guessing you're talking about Christian theology here. In either case, I think I have to say you are wrong. Christian theology was certianly influenced by those things, but if you want to see the essential formation of most of modern theology, I'd suggest you study the book of Hebrews. It was basically the first penning and construction of most of the most fundamental elements of Christian theology, and it pulls almost entirely from the Old Testament. Even if you only study it as a historical and sociological curiosity, it really is fascinating. In it, you can see that just about all of Christianity is just a different perspective on the old Judaism. The transition from one to another becomes less of a social schism and more of a paradigm shift, a changing of fundamental perspecives with relatively little new concrete information.

I think the difference here is that I, as an engineer, look at the 'material' actuality as the important point and language and communication as only a tool to transmit information about that actuality, whereas you seem to see the language and thought as the important thing. Essentially, you're asking if the statement would still be true if we redefined all the terms. Without knowing what you're changing the definitions to, I can't know. I do know, however, that the statement: "Pluto is real" with the given definitions of Pluto = a pseudo-planetary body with an orbit beyond the first 7 planets and in majority beyond Neptune as well, and real = physically exists, is a true statement. Likewise, I know that the statement: "Pluto is real", with the definition of Pluto changed to refer to the roman greek god, is false. The basic facts behind these statements do not change, even if the statements do change.

Again, we disagree. Our knowledge was proved wrong, but the facts did not change. It isn't like the neurons only started regenerating 50 years ago. Instead, we discovered that they did, and that we had been wrong. The commonly accepted scientific 'fact' may have been altered, but the reality of existence did not change. This is what I see as the important thing. We can get mired down in communicative confusion, but reality exists outside our perception of it and does not change based solely on our beliefs.

 

@NOG: Yes, christian theology. And it is arguable whether it's started with St. Paul's correspondance with different congregations.

Thewhatnow?

Here lies the problem. Certainly it is convenient to think that there's a reality beyond our perception, a reality beyond our rationality, a reality of which might be possible to experience 'as it is', but of which we cannot communicate anything to anyone else since it is beyond the ability of language. Hence the 'given value of true'.

A definition of a fact is: 'a piece of information about circumstances that exist or events that have occurred'. A piece of information. A definition of information being 'a message received and understood'. Language is a medium through which information can be transferred and processed. Our senses seem to give more or less accurate information about our surroundings on which we actively process and act upon.

How's that for difficult if we define a fact as 'a thing in itself that exist even if there's no information of it'?

Now the question 'To believe or not?', phrased as 'To hold a proposition to be true or not?' with 'true' being 'consistent with fact or reality' with 'reality' being 'the state of the world as it really is rather than as you might want it to be' with 'real' being 'being or occurring in fact or actuality; having verified existence; not illusory' with 'fact' being...

You see the problem?

It's not even possible to verify existence 'in itself' through the use of language. There is no need to verify the existence of anything 'in itself'. Now do I 'believe' there to be something or anything as a 'thing in itself' thus justifying it's existence? Do I really really need to? Do I cease to exist, right here, right now if I can't justify my existence? Do I need to believe that I exist in order to function in this world in a coherent manner? Do I need faith for me to exist, to be here, writing these words?

No. This is not to say whether I have or have no faith in this or that, but perhaps it helps to understand why I have stated 'belief' to be and why I'm stating 'faith' to be irrelevant.

The extent of what can be said to exist, whether they exist or not, is the limit of what can be said at all.

 

Yes, because I requested so. I was tired of depending on (obvious) lies for my happiness.

@Iku-Turso: Science doesn't deal in absolutes. There is very little "fact" in science.

 

Iku, what you see is a problem with language, in that, in trying to define words with more words, you ultmately must create a closed loop. If one starts with the simple assumption of an absolute universe, one that does not change based on our perceptions or beliefs, but which rather relies on actions to change (I think standard definitions of all the above terms are appropriate), then we can avoid that problem.

Hence lies the problem. I am less concerned whith what can be said to exist and more with what actually does exist, regardless of how it can be said.

As to Christian theology, it is certain that Paul's letters laid some foundational work, but the real core of the theology, Christology as it is called, is first laid out in Hebrews.

Taza, I'm not sure if I grasp all this correctly, but you *requested* anti-psychotic medication because you wanted to change your beliefs? If I understand you correctly, you were tired of relying on lies for happiness (understandable, though I'm not sure why you needed them), so you turned to psychopharmacology? That seems kind of extreme to me. Actually, very extreme. Especially if you could recognize the lies as such. Please correct me if I've gotten something wrong.

 

You're wrong; again.

I requested the medications so that what I feel and what I think are on the same line.

 

Ok, Taza, you're obviously using different terminology than what I'm used to for psychology, so please bear with a stupid question:

What do you mean by what you "feel"?