Is faith a reliable way to know truth?

Exactly. The opposite is true, the survival in nature is dependent on killing of others or running away from others who try to kill you.

Its not beneficial not to hurt others, naturally.

you may not want to deceive, but do you ever actually do it?

Society as a whole says officially that deception is wrong. Yet, the vast majority of people practice deception in some way. For example, here in the USA most people will under report their wages for tax purposes, if they think they can get away with it.


(glad to hear you have a good boyfriend!)

yes then it becomes a matter of cost-benefit analysis.

but of course if we have no choice, then what factors we use in our analysis or which things are valued are not really under "our" control.

Cooperation is against natural selfish tendencies.

Its a strategy requiring rationality and planning, impossible to get by random mutations.

on the subject of morals being determined by culture.

I read an academic paper some years back which studied soldiers who commit atrocities. The author found that the soldiers often did not feel bad about the atrocities while it was happening. indeed, they often began to look forward to it.

It was not until they returned to their home country that they began to feel bad.

which culture should the soldiers then be judged by? The one from their home country or the one they had created out in the field?

That is a common misconception. Survival is about genes, not about the individual. That's why we procreate, to promote our genes. Since you share at least 99% of your genes with other humans, it does not make sense to kill them from a survival of the genes perspective. Also, trying to kill someone is a good way to get yourself killed.

No. Nothing will make vishnu true if that is some false god hindus worship.

To know the Truth, you need to know the true faith. and that true faith if you're a Christian is faith in Jesus.

About your example, yes it is still faith but as Christians, it is not the truth.

Ah....I see now...


Welp I had many doubts about God for many reasons growing up.... long story short I was agnostic ...

Then one of the many nights I was seeking truth (not Jesus but just truth in general... usually in history or science) I was hit with a spiritual brick (at least I called it this at the time)

I at that moment knew there is good
and there is evil
satan has had his hands in the way this world is headed and what people value

I knew at that moment I too was wicked and so where my desires

having never even read 1 page of the bible I had no idea God calls us
later I found out thats what this was


anyways
after this calling i HATED the fact i could have been wrong all this time

and I tried to disprove God to myself but I couldnt lie to myself

no matter how much I chose to do the things I then knew were evil..... it convicted me in a way it didn't before


and in my attempts to disprove God through science
and trying to find error in the bible
and make fun of pastors who would have even 1 fact incorrect

I became more and more soft to the truth
and hardened towards the lies my flesh wanted to be true


then I considered myself not a Christian
but a man who knew God to be true
and Jesus to be who He said He was


then I moved to a different state

and someone I knew happened to have an extra bible

instead of looking it up on the internet
I wanted one to hold for myself

so I asked him to give me one of his bibles

he agreed

and it already had my name on it..... it was the bible i recieved as a child over 15 years earlier that passed hands until it was returned to me....

I got goosebumps and this strange feeling all over me

from that point on
the more I walk with God

the stronger my faith grows

but even as just a droplet

the initial call was more than enough to keep me from believing anything else other than Him

I know He is who He says (the truth)
because His call
His work in me
His word

my faith is a product of being exposed to these

not how I know Hes true

oh
and now I am definitely a Christian man
and I also know I'm saved from the just punishment I deserve for the things I have done

Gene does not have any rationality to want to survive or not. It does not have any mind. Its programmed.

Its not a gene that struggles for a survival, its a creature that does that, being lead by pre-programmed instincts.

The actual truth is found in the fact that Hinduism does not espouse the concept of salvation as a Christian knows the term. And that then would make that statement false.

Faith something is true does not make what is held in faith truth.
The components are opposites. Truth is arrived at based on facts and reality. Faith is arrived at based on hope and belief.
One can have faith something is true. That does not mean it is so.

I could have faith I can fly. It would be a bad idea to think that is true. And then start flapping my arms from atop the roof of a five story building thinking to take a leap and hope to glide safely to the ground below.

suppose there was a virus that killed off 90% of all humans.

As Long As I am one of the survivors, and I can still reproduce, that plague would actually benefit my genes. there would be more resources left for myself and my Offspring, thus increasing the odds that my particular genetic information would be replicated many times.

another thing that baffles me about the atheist point of view is the common in distance that even though humans evolved, all races are equal.

A theist can say, along with Thomas Jefferson, we hold these truths to be self-evident that all humans are created equal.

But evolution does not produce equality. for example not all skin types are equally adopted to climates with long periods Of bright sunlight.

Well I don't agree with you because of my personal life experiences (Which mean nothing to your question) But your honesty with yourself is refreshing IMO. One thing I learned by believing the Word enough to follow it, is how important it is, and also how difficult it is, to be totally honest with ones self.

Hopefully you will continue to look into the Word, and if you do you will find that what you were taught by religious man is different than what the Book actually teaches. Since you have already submitted your mind to the truth about your true beliefs, you may be able to accept and maybe even receive some of the amazing knowledge the Bible has on the true mind of man. For me, it changed my life.

My only advice for you, not that you asked, LOL, is not to let what the religions of the world have taught you about the Bible, influence you on its content. Do your own work. If you are seeking the unbiased truth of the Word, if you are truly interested, you may just find it. If your not, you won't. It is a voluntary program, IMO.

I hope you find what you are looking for.

KJV

Actually, the self-evident truth is that all men* are created** equal, as in the same process of procreation.

Say what? All flesh is not the same flesh: but there is one kind of flesh of men, 1 Cor 15:39

So there are not skin types, but pigmentation genes. So what skin color is more adapted to long periods of bright sunlight?

In Greek, there is no word "kind" here.
οὐ πᾶσα σὰρξ ἡ αὐτὴ σάρξ, ἀλλὰ ἄλλη μὲν ἀνθρώπων, ἄλλη δὲ σὰρξ κτηνῶν, ἄλλη δὲ σὰρξ πτηνῶν, ἄλλη δὲ ἰχθύων.

Translated into English without any English additions, it would look like:
"not all flesh the same flesh, but different of humans, different then flesh of cattle, different then flesh of winged, different then of fish."

Paul is talking about general classes of creatures. Not about kinds. Like there are many kinds of birds, there can be many kinds of humans.

I took it more as that the skin of all men is the same, as in cell structure- composition

That's what I did, and that's what led me to believe there is not God.

I always took equality to mean equal in value and rights. Not that all humans are literally the same.

Genes do not literally "want" anything. It is just a convenient shorthand for saying that genes that make an individual survive stick around, while other genes go extinct. Individuals only want to survive because they are pre-programmed by their genes. A gene that makes you want to kill other people would quickly die out, because the people you are killing are likely to have the same gene, and because trying to kill others is a good way to get yourself killed.