Belief

Under faith is understood mostly a chance guess. Faith in this sense means that a situation is held hypothetically true. This distinguishes "believe" on the one hand the religious faith that is always based on the will to believe and (eg the existence of God ) placed under the absolute truth of faith content. On the other hand, faith is different from knowledge which can be understood as true and justified opinion. Faith in everyday language is thus a presumption or hypothesis which, while assuming the truth of the alleged facts, but also leaves open the possibility of refutation, if the assumption turns out by facts or new evidence to be unjustified. The word "believe" but can be used in different ways in different contexts, such as (in terms of people) in the meaning of " trust anyone " or in legal contexts.

Etymology

Believe the word comes from the Middle High German gelouben, Old High German gilouben, hold for dear ',' approve ' and goes with the related words of praise and fond of, inter alia, to the Indo-European root * leubh back. The same etymological family are from other languages ​​also English be - lieve, believe ', Latin Libet, it is popular ', ' compliant ' libido, desire ' and Russian любить ljubit, love ' on. Furthermore, went forth from the root also pledge the German words prefixed, betroth, allow, leave and vow.

Philosophy

In philosophical and specifically epistemological sense faith is an assent to their own perceptions, beliefs (faith, dogma, paradigm ) and conclusions, however, do not have to be logically compelling here. This holding true does not necessarily require objective justification and can be subjective.

1962 Jaakko Hintikka examined the logical structures of belief and knowledge statements in his book Knowledge and Belief, thus founding a new branch of philosophical logic; the epistemic logic.

For a long time it was assumed that justified true belief is knowledge (GWG - assertion ). Edmund Gettier gave to this counter-examples, which showed that the knowledge of justified true belief is not sufficient ( Gettier problem).

Faith property with respect

In everyday parlance describes the verb believe in the framework determined by uncertainty expectation regarding any facts or relationships. About: " I believe that tomorrow the sun will shine " or ". I think it goes along here and not there " Unlike the word use in a religious context is "believe" always fallible with payment in kind, ie, by facts or new evidence be disproved and corrected. In the sentence "I believe that it will rain " so the possibility is admitted that this assumption was also not confirmed. In such faith in the everyday sense, therefore, expresses the opinion of: " Maybe it's true or is it true, maybe not. " Faith here also means " my " or " suspect ".

The belief may be plausible and pragmatic, for example, " I believe that I am not a brain in a jar and that the environment that I see is real. "

As a rule, believe means something to accept as true on the basis of a credible witness or a credible source of information. Also, the holding true of scientific theories that have not been verified or can be understood as faith. This is the case, for example in scientific hypothesis. Faith in this sense always implies the lack of an accepted justification or lack of evidence. If this justification or evidence later this possible, for example by allowing new facts or evidence, the justification or evidence, the hypothetical belief in the truth of a fact to the knowledge can be.

Faith with reference to individuals

Faith is to be found in everyday language and in a different sense than in the sense of " my " and " suspect " back, for example sentences such as: ". I believe you," "I believe in the love between us." Such faith is not here so much a suspect on facts, but expresses primarily from an interpersonal relationship in which a person is guided by what is believed ago. Faith is here in the meaning of " trust " used. In sentences such as "I believe you " but can also be expressed, that one accepts an opinion of the person addressed (that you trust ), but has not yet verified this opinion itself.

"Faith " in this purely human sense is the consciousness act of trust ( trust faith) with the corresponding trusting action -Akt ( Tatglaube ) that what is believed is a possibility, the reality may be, or is not yet tangible reality, so that is traded, that what is believed to be reality or as if what is believed is already tangible reality. Otherwise, the faith would be only a pseudo - belief and confidence only a pseudo - confidence.

In other words, is the belief in a close connection with the Trust or the " can trust " to see. This form of belief can therefore be accompanied by a lifting of sole responsibility that is nourished by the adopted faith and justifies their own actions.

Legally

In some laws, the term " faith " and " good faith " occurs, for example, in § 8 of the German Patent Act. This assumes the party a reasonable assumption, which is not rejected by better knowledge or highly reasonable doubt. So it can be assumed on the correctness of a product description in good faith, as they must be correct by legal requirements, yes.

Another example is the bona fide acquisition of property in § 932 of the BGB dar. After this legal norm, it is possible in principle that a party may acquire ownership of a thing, even though the seller was not the owner. One of the prerequisites for this is that the acquirer has believed with good reason that the transferor has heard the matter.