Clarification requested (split from "War Against Islam" thread)

[aamantubillah]

Salam,

Just a teeny, tiny thing; a religion cannot be "right" or "wrong". It can only be believed or disbelieved.

I just thought I'd add this tidbit. Why? Because, I guess.

Regards,

Can you elaborate on this and to what extent this goes?
I believe if we take Christianity and Islam and compare the articles of belief required, we can deduce that one must be right.

God cant be a man and not be a man at the same time. By that, I feel that a religion has to be right in order to be believed correctly. I think I am not sure what the implication of your statement are and thus would disagree by default until you would elaborate.

just my 2 cents.

[Ratatosk]

Salam,

Thank you for your post.

There's a semantic issue with your question, having two possible meanings; I'm going to address both. "Right" and "wrong" can mean "correct" and "incorrect", in a scientific sense. Further, it can be a simple value judgement.

Firstly; regarding belief in the supernatural, nothing can be proven, any and all things must be assessed on faith alone. While epistemologically there's little difference between "knowing" and "believing", there are some things that differentiate the two. For instance, statements in regard to belief and statements in regard to knowledge can both be true, while on the other hand knowledge always entails belief, even in the most basic forms of knowledge. As an example, not only do I need to view "2 + 2 = 4" as an immutable fact, I must also believe it is true.

While knowledge has its basis in objective facts, independent of the observer, belief on the other hand is a subjective, personal notion not based on observable reality. Epistemologically concepts such as "right" or "wrong" do not apply regarding the supernatural, the supernatural can by it's very definition only be believed or disbelieved.

Also in this sense, one would have to say "I believe Wicca is right, and I believe Taoism to be wrong", not "Wicca is right, and Taoism is wrong".

Secondly; making relative value judgements ends up in Nonsense Territory. Also, value judgements aren't provable, either.

If you understand where I'm going with this; this is what I meant with "wrong" and "right".


Thanks again for your post. Oh, and your €0.02, as well. In this time of economic downturn, every little bit helps. Cheers.

Regards,

[vinod]

Thank you Ratatosk for a very illustrative answer. Just made me that bit wiser (sounding atleast).

Epistemologically concepts such as "right" or "wrong" do not apply regarding the supernatural, the supernatural can by it's very definition only be believed or disbelieved.

Also in this sense, one would have to say "I believe Wicca is right, and I believe Taoism to be wrong", not "Wicca is right, and Taoism is wrong".

Just a tiny verification of my understanding, in the above "right" and "wrong" are used in the sense of scientific right and scientific wrong i.e. correct or incorrect. Am I right? (argh...too many rights/wrongs...hope you can understand my question)

[Ratatosk]

Indeed they are. And so are you. And I can.