What is faith (not religion)

Each of us can say with one or another certainty what he understands what faith is. But whether everyone can formulate clearly and clearly the definition of such a complex phenomenon? It is worth saying that (and this is indicated in the header) we are talking about faith not as a religion. We will not mix the phenomenon of a person’s mental life and the social institution of management. And how it is worth considering faith: we will try to proceed from facts that have more connections with science than with abstract ideas.

Probably, most people will attribute faith to the processes or manifestations of human activity of a certain exalted nature. Inevitably, it is associated with the expectation of some achievements that are independent of human will. Associations in most cases lead us to something supernatural-so firmly faith in the mind is somewhere near the Divine. But we cannot talk about the divine in view of the incompatibility of such an approach with practice, with scientific, reasoned.

What is faith (not religion)

So. Let us try to push away from such a message: faith is a cognitive phenomenon, which is a product of the mind that determines a person does not critically relate to the truth of existing information, and he (a person) perceives the latter, realizing some probability of its falsity or truthfulness

What does it mean? To do this, you should find out what it means to “believe” in general. If I believe in the existence of something that I have never heard, I saw, touched, then I rely on the arguments provided to me or gleaned from somewhere. I perceive these arguments in advance as truth. So, we still operate on the criterion of the fact – some knowledge. This is fundamentally important. For the especially curious ones: “Russell’s kettle” is an interesting paradigm, proposed by Bertrane Russell, which suggests that the burden of evidence of the existence of anything, which is presented with a claim to faith, should not lie on the shoulders of the doubtful.

What is faith (not religion)

After all, people of a particular religious worldview also believe, suggesting some facts that are considered the truth: T.e. describe people, events, phenomena ever happened. The question is why they believe. It will be fair to say that they believe because they consider their source of knowledge true (for example, the Bible). Or because the source of knowledge, being a person, enjoys authority. These are the second and third criteria – the attitude to truth and experience.

Truth is a completely defined property of information. Her weight. Therefore, it is measured mathematically without difficulties, which can also be gleaned in various works on the relevant topic.

Experience is also a quantitative and qualitative phenomenon at the same time. It is measured in temporary indicators (for example, aged) and, again, in truth, objectivity.

Having such terms that characterize faith as a phenomenon, one can say: faith is measured. After all, it is impossible to call organic what does not consist of organics. Vera is a cognitive phenomenon, it consists of the phenomena of quantitative. Everything is cognitive – the product of the mind. From this we can conclude that you can take it with all seriousness to the affirmation above confidently. Faith is a cognitive phenomenon, which is a product of reason. Reason.

What is faith (not religion)

It is worth noting that all the arguments in this subject in this narrative are based on the already mentioned paradigm of Bertrand Russell and the arguments of science, more than materialistic in the present time. It just so happened that the more research deepens into the secrets of the psyche and nervous activity, the more it becomes clear: you should not look for exalted principles – everything is quite difficult.

In conclusion, we mention the idea of ​​the great Conrad Lorenz, which was a simple fact: nature after the scientific explanation of one of the amazing phenomena did not look like some kind of charlatan who, before “revelation”, enjoyed the authority of the wizard; The natural picture has always turned out to be more complicated than the most beautiful mythical interpretations.