Comment by notdonspaulding | Hacker News Reader

Comment by notdonspaulding | Hacker News Reader

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notdonspaulding

I find your lack of [a good definition of] faith disturbing. -- Darth Webster

Seriously though, I think the "blind faith" usage of the term faith is its weakest form. "Trust" and "confidence" are good synonyms. Because as a rule, humans have faith in a great many things, and the vast majority of those faiths are not characterized by a lack of knowledge or evidence. Consider the following statements:

- The astronauts had faith in the laws of physics.

- My husband was unfaithful to me.

- I've lost my faith in humanity because FooBar was elected.

- Have you no faith in me?

- The war started when our allies broke faith with us.

- You should always negotiate in good faith.

- My dog has been my faithful companion for a great many years.

Think about the faith being represented by those phrases. Does the person who had the faith have it without intimate knowledge of the object of the faith? No! The faith existed because of what they knew about the object, not in spite of it.

I'm not sure if you think your making a point against my definition. Replace the word "believe" with "trust" and it could fit perfectly as one of your examples:

> In fact, I argue that such is the definition of faith -- to trust despite not knowing.

I don't think that's such a big difference. Believing in something is trusting it to exist and to have the properties that you think it does. If the astronauts were wrong about the laws of physics, it would have broken their trust and thus their faith.

Hell, just for funsies, to drive the point home:

> belief - Trust, faith, or confidence in someone or something

https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/belief

You argue that the definition of faith is to (trust, believe, have faith) in something despite not knowing.

We agree in the main. My point is one of where we put the emphasis.

My counterargument, if it is one, is simply that when humans actually have faith in something, it's almost always "trusting what I don't know is going on, because of what I know of this object in other circumstances".

The husband "trusts" his wife to be faithful, not because he has a tracker on her and so knows where she goes at all hours, but because he knows who she is when she's with him.

A soldier "has faith in" in the general's battle plan because of the general's past victories.

I'm just arguing that all the really useful definitions of faith imply that the trust is actually rooted in knowledge and past experience, not merely blind, hopeful, stick-your-fingers-in-your-ears-and-sing-la-la-la ignorance of reality.

Ah, I see. I don't think I necessarily agree with that definition of faith. For two reasons:

1. I don't think it serves much purpose if it's directly synonymous with trust.

2. Such a definition of faith runs directly against the definition of agnosticism, which asserts that such knowledge is unattainable.

I think the word faith brings to the table much of the denotation of trust, but with the connotation of doing it despite not knowing. After all, there are many husbands who find their wife cheating. There are many soldiers that end up dead, despite the best general's most careful planning. There's a level of the unknowable in all these scenarios, and faith is the continuation of belief in the face of these unknowns.

Or, put this way: The saying is that "trust is something earned". It's earned through proof of intention via past experience. I think faith removes this "earning" step -- it's trust without necessarily being earned.

> The astronauts had faith in the laws of physics.

You have used an analogy here, in order to aid your point, but it is not valid. Laws of physics do not intersect with faith. At all.

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