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Is 'faith' synonymous with 'denial' when applied to creationists/religionists? How to counter the 'faith' argument?

Back when I was actively engaged in yahoo answer's religion & spirituality section, I came across the faith argument. Oftentimes debates can end with the theist retreating to "You just have to have faith".

I've had trouble arguing against faith for a while, but then I came up with this retort:

Your 'faith' is merely another word for 'denial'.

Take this passage from the God Delusion, for example: (pg 19, paperback)

"Fundamentalists know what they believe and they know that nothing will change their minds. The quotation from Kurt Wise on page 323 says it all: '...if all the evidence in the universe turns against creationism, I would be the first to admit it, but I would still be a creationist because that is what the Word of God seems to indicate. Here I must stand'."

Another example: "No matter how much your stance makes sense, no matter how much evidence you present, no matter how many contradictions there are in my stance,

my faith keeps me believing."

Now replace 'faith' with 'denial'

"No matter how much your stance makes sense, no matter how much evidence you present, no matter how many contradictions there are in my stance,

my [denial] keeps me believing."

Does anyone have other ways to argue against religious faith? (not faith in the general sense)

"Faith is believing in something without evidence" is not convincing enough, I'm afraid.

Here are the theists' responses:

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;_ylt=AphhAXYhSMPbtg9kdCEsvg...

And uh:

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;_ylt=AteFim6xlSFXfnG7IQ469_...

Tags: denial, equals, faith

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Permalink Reply by eric stone on March 26, 2010 at 1:54am

Here are two arguments I use:
1) Faith can be wrong as in the case of the flat earth or the earth being the center of the universe which was once religious doctrine.
2) Faith can lead you to murder people and in the case of religion frequently did.

Eric Stone

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Permalink Reply by Objection on March 26, 2010 at 2:13am

Thanks! I'll add those to my arsenal right now :)

Although, for the second one, the theist may argue that in the history of religious conflicts, the underlying motives behind those conflicts were things other than faith, such as politics, greed, territory.
Also, the theist may argue that murder resulted "because they [the murderer] lost their way", "they did not follow god's/jesus's word/teaching", or they had free will.

Do you know of a direct and indisputable connection between faith and murder?

I can think of a 12-year old girl that died because her parents, Dale and Leilani Neumann, refused to send their daughter to the hospital. But the theist would argue that the parents allowed her to die out of stupidity, not faith.

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Permalink Reply by Jason Spicer on March 26, 2010 at 2:42am

Death caused by insistence on prayer/faith-healing over actual medicine is murder (or suicide, if done on one's own behalf) in my book.

The basic problem with any "argument from faith" is that the conclusion is simply placed into the givens, and all "argument" is window-dressing. If you successfully attack the window-dressing and eliminate all of it, the theist simply retreats to their givens as sufficient "proof" of their conclusion. When it comes right down to it, anything "argued" on faith alone is no more than bare, unsupported assertion. Which is no more meaningful than "because I say so".

I think it's useful to strip theists down to this childish position. Even they know that "just because" doesn't cut the mustard.

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Permalink Reply by Objection on March 26, 2010 at 3:06am

"Rational theists" can recognize that faith is not a proper argument.
Unfortunately, this does not convince the rest of them.
Theists can also accuse you of being close-minded.

I just remembered another argument I used to have against faith. If they have faith that the judeo-christian god exists, then I can just counter by saying I have faith in the FSM, Thor, Zeus, Krishna, etc. Not all of these beliefs can be "true", and since there are an infinite variety of religions, gods, and faiths, the possibility of the judeo-christian god existing is practically zero.
I tried this one time on the comments in Youtube, and the theist had to abandon faith and switch to evidence to disassociate her BS from other BS.
So it seems at some points a theist may argue from evidence (religion is reasonable), and other times they will argue from faith (religion is not reasonable, but it's somehow still virtuous to believe). This is very frustrating to deal with, and if I ever notice that again, I will point that out.