I Often Hear The Phrase “Have Faith In God” In Response

In Kelly James Clark’s Article “Without Evidence or Argument”, Clark argues that belief in God, does not require the support of evidence or argument in order for it to be rational. Clark’s argument is against W.K. Clifford’s article “The Ethics of Belief”, in which Clifford claims that everything must be believed only on the basis of sufficient evidence (139). Throughout Kelly Clark’s article he states many things that support his conclusion of belief without evidence or argument, however, my paper will only discuss what Clark says on p.139 starting with the paragraph “The first problem with Clifford’s…” and the following paragraph, ending with the words “...to see why.”

Believing in what you can’t see? Faith can get people through the toughest times. God once said “Fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your God; I will strengthen you, I will help you, I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.” It can seem obvious that believing in god can strengthen you. God says not be be afraid when he is with you, for he will strengthen you. In the bible Job,

When discussing faith is it important to look at the word closely and understand its meaning. The basic definition of faith is “confidence or trust in a person; and belief that is not based on proof” (Random House… 693). Whether someone puts their faith in a person or a religious being, faith can be simplified as having

4. The existence of God remains a matter of faith since it’s difficult to "prove" God to someone who does not believe.

Faith is accepting what you are taught or told without trying to prove or disprove it, rather than discovering it through experience. Those who believe in God have faith. It has not been proven that God exists; similarly, it has not been proven that humans are kind, honest, and good by nature. Young Goodman Brown is a character in "Young Goodman Brown," who leaves his known world in Salem village and travels an unknown road in a dark forest in the middle of the night, a common motif in literature better known as the Hero's journey, and is faced with obstacles. He must decide if he will carry his journey out till the end, or turn back and not learn the truth about himself and other

Should we have faith in something that has no proven evidence of its existence? Men struggle with this concept throughout their whole life. M. Night Shyamalan shows this concept in his film Signs as he goes through a journey of a family that struggles with an alien invasion. During the film, Shyamalan reveals the theme of man’s struggle between belief in faith and the nonexistence of a higher power through his use of allegory, symbolism, and flashback. One of the ways Shyamalan reveals his theme is through allegory, showing that just because something can’t be seen doesn’t mean it is not there.

The difference between knowing and having rational grounds for believing is that knowing entails that something is 100% true while having rational grounds for believing something is true means that we see reason to believe it is true but we don’t know it is true. An example of rational grounds is like a kid believing in the tooth fairy. We know the tooth fairy isn’t real but we still tell the kid the tooth fairy is real. For the kid, every source they trust is telling them the tooth fairy is real so they believe in the tooth fairy. These are rational grounds for believing because though the tooth fairy is not real the kid has every reason to believe it is. In the case of God, it goes the exact same

William James- says that a person is entitled to believe in god for purely prudential reasons if the belief provides a “vital benefit” and if no decision about theism can be made on the basis of the evidence available. “CHOICES” you choose your own fate.

Alvin Plantinga is a Reformed Epistemologist. He does not necessarily agree with the solidity and rational behind Classic Foundationalism, which states that all nonbasic belief’s are ultimately justified by basic beliefs and all basic beliefs must be incorrigible and infallible. Plantinga argues, though, that people have basic beliefs that are not infallible all the time. These beliefs are axiomatic to our belief system but they are not immune to doubt. For example, we believe there is a physical, mindless world that exists outside the self. We also believe there are other human minds all around us. People believe these things even though we don’t have arguments for them being true. Nonetheless, Plantinga thinks these beliefs as perfectly rational, while a classical foundationalist would have to disagree. It is true, then, according to Plantinga, that we can be fully justified in holding a basic belief even if its validity is vulnerable to new, contradicting,

What is faith? Scripture tells us in Hebrews 11:1 that “Faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see.” (NIV) Faith means trusting that various situations will provide results best suited to help us in some way during our life. I’m sure others may have a different opinion; however, throughout my life, that has been the most accurate description.

God became a fictional character meant to scare children into proper form, a being meant to keep adults on a path of morality. It is not my views that faith in God is wrong in any manner. Faith has been the saving grace for many people and helped countless others find purpose in their life and I view that as a wonderful thing, something I wish for all to find in their life in some way or another, but to me, there is no god to drive my decisions, only

There are some things in life you should believe in not because of evidence, but because of faith. Evidence is a very grey term in my book. There are two main types of evidence, hard and soft. Hard evidence are factual observed things that prove a case 100% or without a doubt. Soft evidence is evidence that is based on probability. For instance, let’s say you are trying to prove a suspect used a rifle to shoot a victim. Your evidence is the suspect’s finger prints on the rifle found at the scene. The evidence here is considered “soft” evidence. The fingerprints prove that the suspect had touched the gun, but not that he actually pulled the trigger. An example of hard evidence is if the suspect declined that he even touched the rifle at the scene. Because his fingerprints were found on it, this proves he in fact did touch the rifle. Not all cases are black and white, and its not always hard evidence that’s discovered. A court can use soft evidence if no hard evidence is determined. Making a decision based on soft evidence is based upon probability. The suspect’s fingerprints were found on the rifle, the suspect was seen in the area at the time of the shooting, and the suspect was seen purchasing ammunition for the rifle earlier in the day is all soft evidence. It does however (with no hard evidence at play) make it more probable that this suspect was in truth the

These are the reasons why I choose to believe the believing in God is a rational one.

Most rational people believe in ideas or occurrences that cannot be replicated or tested. Regardless of how a person assumes the universe and life itself began, no one alive today witnessed the beginning, and yet no rational person doubts that the world around us exists. They believe

If God exists, he wants people to believe in Him through faith (If A, then B).