Featured Article: Why Should Anyone Believe Anything at all?

[weighman]

There is much contridiction among all Faiths. But they do have much in common.
Most teach to do good and follow laws or principals for betterment of mankind Not all logic, evidence or science reveals truth. There is such an experience as Spiritual revelation. Most all faiths will attest to this. It is by this experience that most believe.One is tofollow Gods way, the other to follow what is not Gods way. All faiths in some form of good and evil. You can make it as complicated as you wish.

[gersh0m]

Not at all. Logic is governed by the semantic definitions inherent in our language. If you redefine "and" to mean the connective that we usually denote by "or", "X and not-X" becomes a tautology, instead of a contradiction.

But isn't that treason, by your own standard?
As you have presented it, redefining "and" violates the logic governed by language. You implicitly agree that a word is only as good as the meaning one puts into it (or uses it to point to), but abandon then type for the token.
... if you are correct?: why do you bother to say "Not at all" In fact, why are you disagreeing at all? Aren't you just agreeing when you say 'not at all' and then go on to explain how a tautology may be formed? Perhaps you where at a loss for words... Allow me to instruct you on the common semantic "Amen"; it means 'not at all' in your language.
Let's see if i've got this right. If X and Not-X are tautologies of each other, then do they both point to the meaning to which X points, OR (or, as you would prefer, "and") that to which X does not point? Or ('and'), does it come down to who says what first? If one considers "Not-X and X" does X mean the same as it does when one considers "X and Not-X"
It has just occured to me that your use of "and" (as "or") in "X and Not-X", expresses not a contradition and a contradiction; and not a tautology, but is in reality, a legally binding, true confession that you owe me $50!

Pay up!

[Dee Dee Warren]

I am about halfway through the book, and am enjoying it thoroughly. The one thing I did not like was the jab in a chapter on Intelligent Design (defending ID from the smears of Darwinists that it is illegimate) at YEC. To me that seemed to be doing very much the same thing it was defending against.

[HRG_new]

But isn't that treason, by your own standard?
As you have presented it, redefining "and" violates the logic governed by language.

I haven't said that at all. Redefining "and" simply means that we are speaking a different language.

You implicitly agree that a word is only as good as the meaning one puts into it (or uses it to point to), but abandon then type for the token.
... if you are correct?: why do you bother to say "Not at all" In fact, why are you disagreeing at all? Aren't you just agreeing when you say 'not at all' and then go on to explain how a tautology may be formed? Perhaps you where at a loss for words... Allow me to instruct you on the common semantic "Amen"; it means 'not at all' in your language.
Let's see if i've got this right. If X and Not-X are tautologies of each other,

Your very wording proves that you didn't get this right. "Tautologies of each other" is meaningless.

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[reasonabledoubt]

Isn't there a distinction between truth, ie, facts, existing, and a person's ability to fully know and be certain of those facts? If, in fact it is true that all major religions contradict each other, then yes, only one must be correct (or it would be possible that all are incorrect). But since it is impossible to scientifically verify which one is correct, the best one can hope for is to make an educated guess- and how can you then say you "know" your religion is true?

Just because we say we can't always know the truth doesn't mean that the truth does not exist. It's just that humans' abilities are not infinite, we are fallible. Since we can't know the truth about the veracity of different religious beliefs, it seems the most prudent to not judge as though we did. We can believe the one religion to be true, but we must respect someone else's decision to believe something else. For how can the "truth" of a religious belief be verified?

In the article, one of the authors says that he his navy friend said, "I don't believe the Bible, but if it is true, then I'll be in big trouble." And the author says, of course he was right. This is totally problematic. It is presupposing that there is only one correct interpretation of the Bible, and that that interpretation is known. Of course, even if there is only one correct interpretation, it doesn't follow that anyone can know with certainty what it is. There are a lot of Christians who believe in universalism, or alternatively, CHristian inclusivism. They believe that to be the true message of the Bible. Geisler believes exclusivism is the true message of the Bible. Who is right? And how is it in any way possible to prove which position is correct?

Geisler says that those who cavalierly say, "So what? Who cares about truth in morality and religion?" are ignoring reality and are blindly skating on thin ice. I wouldn't say that most atheists or agnostics do not care about truth in morality and in religion- on the contrary, they do care about truth and do not believe religious dogma to be true. That is why they cannot "believe in" something that contradicts what appears to be true to their intellect.