>On Thu, 6 Nov 1997, David McFadzean wrote:
>
>> Is it because the belief comes from someone we have good reason to
>> trust? (assumption) Is it because the belief comes from someone we don't
>> have good reason to trust? (faith)
>
>This is a false dichotomy. The second case (faith) does not exist in
>nature.
Believe it or not, TV advertising exists in nature (as one example).
Surely you don't think that there are good reasons to trust the
guy who isn't a doctor but plays one on TV about what medicine
you should take for a headache, do you?
>> Is the belief non-falsifiable, but somehow useful if true? (faith?
>> assumption? I don't know.)
>
>These are the interesting ones to me.
>
>Why is it so hard to classify this one? What, by the way, is your
>criteria for classification in one category of another? How are you
>drawing the line? What distinction are you making?
I'm trying to distinguish between good reasons for believing and
bad reasons for believing. Do you think all reasons are equally
good? If not, what are your criteria?
-- David McFadzean david@lucifer.com Memetic Engineer http://www.lucifer.com/~david/ Church of Virus http://www.lucifer.com/virus/