Wednesday, September 12, 2007

Language of Faith

Okay so in class a week ago some people in our 5th hour TOk class got into a discussion about the word faith verses the word belief. To use an authority we decided to look this up in a dictonary to see if anyone's justifications were correct. I neever saw this before, before listening to my classmates; it is very surpriing how much you can learn if you listen to what people have to say but any ways in the dictonary the word faith and believe are almost interchangable, this taking into account was a very old dictonary that I asked a Science teacher to use. What do you think of this? Take a look at your dictonary at home and see if it has anything to say about them being similar. Then tell what you think it means personally, is faith and believe have the meaning to be switched?

3 comments:

lisaking said...
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Mr. Pseudonym said...

I am going to post a passage from a speech I am writing.

"Atheism and Faith. Faith is one of those touchy things that the theists say is reserved for only those who believe in higher powers. That is not the case. The Miriam-Webster Dictionary defines faith as "firm belief in something for which there is no proof or complete trust," and although that can be applied to a deity, that is not necessarily the case. Id est, "I have faith that humans evolved from apes." There is no substantial proof to that effect, but there is no doubt in my mind that it is the truth. Indeed it may only be a matter of time before it is proved that humans didn't evolve from apes, but that doesn't change my faith in it's truth currently, or even then. My faith won't necessarily change in the face of facts otherwise, just as other people's faith isn't changed by the "fact" that earth is millions of years old. The fact of the matter is, is that it is truly irrelevant in the eyes of other people what I have faith in. They may use it against me, or to connect to me, but in reality faith is something personal. Faith can come in any form beyond God. I have no faith in the sense of belief in god, which what people typically mean by faith, so in that sense it true that atheists don't have faith. However I faith in the Human Race. I have faith in the human ability to do good. And, most importantly, I have faith in my ability to do good. I feel that that is almost a more important kind of faith than the faith in an afterlife, or an all-powerful super-being who controls my destiny for good or ill."

katrina337 said...

I...agree with Wolf. I think he summed it up pretty well.