David M said: ...I have faith that America exists but never been there. Hard to make sense of my life without this belief.
dmb says: Oh, please. The existence of nations you've never visited is not accepted on the basis of "faith". There are many, many reasons that make it perfectly legitimate to believe in France or Iceland or any other place on earth. There is nothing wrong with putting some trust in maps, history books, satellite photography and reports from people who have been to France. That kind of reasonable trust is certainly NOT what concerns Sam Harris or any other anti-theist. The problem is that public policies are being designed and implemented on the basis of faith. It reaches into our schools and our foreign policies. Its a problem because people act on the basis of their faith based beliefs. What could go wrong if a guy "acted" as if France and the USA actually exists? And what could go wrong if you "acted" as if the earth was on the verge of being destroyed and reconstructed by God? And what if you "acted" on the belief that God hates gentiles, or infidels or science or secularism? What if, as Christopher Hitchens points out, God hates ham? Is it reasonable to believe that lobster and bacon are evil? To believe in Paris or Denver requires no faith and the fact of there existence can be ascertained with ease. But you know what bugs me the most? You already understand that but blurt out these silly obfuscations anyway. _________________________________________________________________ Climb to the top of the charts! Play the word scramble challenge with star power. http://club.live.com/star_shuffle.aspx?icid=starshuffle_wlmailtextlink_jan Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/
