I’ve watched knock-down, drag-out Internet flamefests before, where once the opponents finished strutting and posturing, they realize that they are arguing for the same side of a problem. Usually, the argument is speedily dropped afterwards.
What is frequently lacking, however, is what we in the computer industry call a “post-mortem”. Once the problem is dead and resolved, who sits down to figure out what happened, when it happened, and why?
I’m subscribed to quite a few mailing lists which interest me:
- A “Tungsten C” list about the Palm organizer I use
- An interfaith list helping people resolve issues in mixed marriages
- A list discussing how to educate children to think for themselves despite public education conformity training
- Another one discussing issues with a car I own, the Honda Insight
- Yet another one talking about Cakewalk Sonar
There are more, of course. Not to mention the forums I occasionally frequent when trying to find an answer to a question, those where I have a transient interest — like when I’m thinking of buying or have just purchased a new techno-trinket — and forums where I mostly lurk and only chime in when I think I have something relevant to say, which is rarely.
A common thread in many of these forums is routine arguments. Hey, we’re humans. Humans argue about stuff. It’s just part of what we do.
But it frequently turns out the argument is really about what to label something. Sometimes this is called “framing the argument”. Very often, the argument isn’t about what to do about something, it’s about what definitions to use so that we can decide what to do about it. These types of arguments often use loaded words that have many ambiguous definitions:
- Truth
- Faith
- True X (such as “True Republicanism” or “True Democracy”)
- Belief
- Knowledge
- Argument
This morning, I read an essay from an acquaintance of mine which finally nailed down three senses of one of these words. What about FAITH?, by Richard Packham.
Richard’s an atheist, and doesn’t tend to mince words with his opinions. He’s 72 now, and I figure he just doesn’t think he has time to beat around the bush 🙂 So you may not want to read everything he wrote if you’re easily offended by that kind of stuff. I’m a big believer, though, that just because I don’t like someone’s opinions doesn’t mean they aren’t valid. Anyway, he brought up three distinct categories of faith that, I think, really lead to better understanding. There’s:
- “Necessary”, unavoidable faith, or faith which is supported by evidence which is indisputable by most reasonable people.
- “Harmless” faith, or faith in things which cannot be proven or disproven.
- “Dangerous” faith, or faith held in spite of abundant evidence to the contrary.
I’ve often been guilty of lumping all sorts of faith into that third category, and attempting to eschew it in public and private writings and conversations. I just realized that I may have, sadly, painted all faith with too broad of a brush since August of 2002, when I first began publicly questioning matters of faith.
Ahh, well. It’s only a couple of years of stupidity out of a lifetime that, probably, will be filled with much more of it 🙂
Anyway, I’m sure folks can argue distinctions between the three. But in any case, his essay helped me clarify my thoughts on faith a bit:
- I support faith supported by provable evidence. To me, this kind of faith is what we all have. Faith that the sun will rise. That our computer will boot up. It’s the kind of brain-prediction mechanism we rely on just to get through the day, and includes a great deal of scientific inquiry.
- I think faith without evidence, or with arguable evidence, can be a fine thing. It often leads people to aspire to be more and do more with their lives. You can be born to a life of poverty, which statistically indicates you’re likely to remain in poverty, and you have faith that you can pull yourself up by your bootstraps. I might contest points with a person with this kind of faith, but I respect the right and desire to have it.
- I oppose faith in the presence of overwhelming contrary evidence. This, to me, is “blind faith”. There are certain inarguable things where I find people taking it “on faith”, flying in the face of the facts. Like New-Earth Creationism. Flat-Earth theories. Holocaust denial. etc. It’s anti-thinking and reprehensible, yet encouraged by far too many political and religious figures.
This last type is the one that worries me. Too often, people (including me in “people”) conflate the three types, arguing that we should ignore inconvenient facts which would deflate our pet beliefs.
It was fun to find a guidepost to distinguishing types of faith, rather than throwing out the baby with the bathwater of what I regarded as an over-loaded word.