Lara Buchak's Can It Be Rational To Have Faith

Faith and reason are thought to be foundations of defense for religious beliefs, having the same purpose many theologians and philosophers argue their relationship. Many believing that reason relies on faith while others think that just because you do not believe in one you are going to believe in the other, Karen Armstrong would agree since she suggests that they are not like political parties. Many theorists believe that reason is more on the logical side of the spectrum while faith is directed towards your beliefs and understandings of religious and theological claims. While scientists have argued they are not compatible because reason by itself gives us the answers to human life and faith is not a reliable source to provide us with those answers. Terry Eagleton suggests that they are one in the same and rely on each other.

Pascal suggests that the faith in believing God is a "wager". For any person S, he or she has two choices can be made. One choice is α, the other is β, and if α is chosen to have a greater benefit for S, S should choose α. Taking into account the existence of God or not has half of the possibility, and believing God has greater benefit. Therefore, people should choose to believe in the existence of God.

“Tell the truth.” Everyone has heard that countless times before. Since we were young we have been taught that telling anything but the honest truth is never acceptable; however, lying has appeared to play a massive part in society. It has effects in people’s daily lives such as teenagers taking a parent’s car and saying they went to the car wash when really it was taken for a joy ride, all the way back to ancient times where the Greeks lied about the Trojan horse being a gift when really it was just a cover for an attack. It is acceptable for lying to occur among today 's society due to its ability to preserve dignity, provide safety, and protect important relationships.

Now faith is defined as the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen. In the stories The Song of Roland and Dante’s Inferno both main character’s faith was tested on their spiritual quest to salvation. Roland was betrayed and outnumbered by his enemies and Dante was lost in the darkness of sin. As each man faced difficult situations on their missions, both relied on their faith to overcome their enemy, persevered through obstacles and refused to turn back. Although Roland and Dante journeys were completely different, their values in what they believed in were the same.

In the Merrriam-Webster dictionary, hope is defined as; to cherish a desire with anticipation. However, those words don't convey the meaning deep enough, hope is more than that. Hope is a feeling deep in the gut, a motivating force, for some hope is everything. Hope must be stronger than any fear and it must have fight in it. Lina Vilkas, a fifteen year old Lithuanian, she fights for hope. In Between Shades of Gray by Ruta Sepetys a family is ripped apart by russian soldiers and sent to prison camps. The prison camps have the worst living conditions and the soldiers are brutal to anyone. Lina meets Andrius in the camps, a friend who helps her stay strong while she is imprisoned for 12 years and loses both parents and almost her brother. Lina finds her hope even in the darkest situations, because hope is bright and believing in a brighter future it isn't giving up because of fear. Ruta Sepetys theme of the power of hope on a survivor is expressed when a young girl loses everything, finds

Throughout history, we have had to deal with conflict. How we deal with conflict can be most challenging of all. We all can find our strength to make it through treacherous times. A positive attitude can help a tremendous amount when dealing with conflict. An example of this can be found in The Diary of Anne Frank. Anne’s positive attitude and hope helped her overcome her distressing time in hiding during World War II. Other examples can also be found in the poem “Homesick”, and journal entries written by youngsters living during World War II. Having hope helps overcome obstacles that you may have thought was unfeasible to surpass. Hope can be found in everything. Fear can leave you petrified, but hope is the greatest strength that you can possess and hope will always overpower fear.

“Everything we see hides another thing, we always want to see what is hidden by what we see.” Rene Magritte. When you read this quote you can think of the deep symbolism in Lord of the flies. In the book there are many things that have different meanings, such as the fire means hope and how the lord of the flies is a sign for evil. They each have deeper meanings that can be related to WWII (but also) as well to modern America.

Hope is a feeling inside you that makes feel like you can do anything. When you have that feeling you set yourself up for success and it makes you want to live life like a fairytale. The war started at Valley Forge, George Washington made an army that he had hoped for. Then the British came and forced war over them. “The harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph.” (Paine 153) What Paine is trying to say in this quote is that the better we fight, the more joyous and exciting the win will be. I have decided to re-enlist for three reasons which are: sicknesses, the encouragement of the soldiers, and the congressmen helping the soldiers.

Hope is one of the may things that leads people to having one of the best lives they can ever imagine.Out of all the things you can do to make your life better, hoping is one of the best ways. When Ben Carson had hope, that helped him through school, college, and his job at John Hopkins Hospital. That also means if I have hope like Ben Carson I can succeed in many things. Even society can have hope like Ben Carson, and do many great things in their lives.

One 's life may be difficult at times, so why do some people see the good in these situations? To be a survivor one must not see everything as bad and see the positive to move toward a better future. A survivor 's eyes sees hope.opportunity, and purpose to get through hard times for a better future.

Furthermore, another example of faith playing a role in deciding if knowledge we acquire have

Gill, S. (1994). The Academic Study of Religion. Journal of the American Academy of Religion, 62(4), 965-975. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org.ucc.idm.oclc.org/stable/1465226

When have you ever been in a situation where all that you could do was hope for the best? Did you have hope for others or for yourself? Hope is like a dog that ran away. It starts out being lost and confused but once it gets found, you realize that everything will turn out fine. Think about it as if you missed school for a week because you were sick and you come back and realize that you forgot to get your absent work. When you ask your teacher for the work , they say it was up to you to get the work and you are too late for it. Your teacher then says to be prepared for the big test tomorrow. That’s when all your hope is lost. You get ready to go home and tell your parents to expect your grade to plummet because of the test. When you get home

In this essay, I will set out to prove that Thomas Aquinas’ First Cause Argument does not show that God exists and the conclusion that God exists does not follow from the premises of the first cause argument. I do think that the conclusion is valid and could be sound/or has the potential to be, but the premises fail to provide the basis upon which to reach such a conclusion. Hence, I will be raising some objections to the premises and will try to disprove any counter-arguments that could be raised in its defense. This would be done by examining Aquinas’ First Cause Argument and trying to disprove it whilst countering arguments in its defense.

One can gain knowledge by reviewing and reflecting on information one possesses. You cannot have knowledge without information; and once knowledge is obtained, understandings about that area are formed through new ideas. Ambiguity also plays a part in knowledge acquisition and understanding as information can be understood in many possible ways. Given access to the same facts, how is it possible that there can be disagreement between experts in a discipline? Many people might think with the same fact comes a certain fixed conclusion among experts, but surprisingly, there is often not one answer to questions regarding knowledge. A claim that this question could possibly make about knowledge could include that knowledge is subject to interpretation