Recently an airline pilot friend of mine (who is a Christian) challenged my concept of not having any "beliefs" by offering a familiar scenario for consideration. Below is the transcript of our conversation about it. 

Pilot Friend: 
"Concerning your not having any beliefs; I think it is not possible, unless you mean that you have no religious beliefs. We all have beliefs, that is to say that we hold something as true even though we cannot prove it. We believe things based on reliable information, that is credible in our minds. If you were a passenger on an airplane and the pilot told you that there was serious turbulence ahead would you believe him? You would have no way of verifying this for yourself but you would probably trust that the pilot was not lying to you. Even though you might not like it, you would sit down and keep your seatbelt fastened because you believed there was turbulence ahead." 

Me: 
About my not having any beliefs...No, we do not all "hold something to be true even though we cannot prove it". I don't. Believing in something (counting it true without valid, conclusive, scientific  evidence) and acknowledging the possibilities of the current circumstances are two very different things indeed. In your example, I would not jump to the conclusion of "belief" concerning the issue of whether or not there was turbulence ahead. Because of the circumstances of being in an airplane, i would already be aware of and fully acknowledging the fact that it is quite common to encounter such things while flying. I've even encountered it personally before. 
    Also, just because i trust the pilot, it does not mean that i will necessarily "believe" that there is turbulence ahead. Rather, i will acknowledge that, since this info is coming from someone i've chosen to trust based on their position as pilot and the help of the instruments which reveal such things to the pilot and their experience as a pilot, and since it is very likely and in fact highly probable statistically (if thought about critically with the scientific method) that such turbulence might be encountered during any flight, i would prepare for the turbulence as if it were coming. 
    I would have nothing to lose by preparing for turbulence which might end up not happening the way they are forecast, yet i would clearly be making a statistical mistake to not prepare. This is not a "belief", but an acknowledgement of the facts at hand; probably the only logical conclusion based on scientific probabilities. It's not just based on some uncorroborated, unscientific, unverifiable party's story. It's not "believing" in the unknown, but acknowledging what is already known and what is most likely "real" based on the actual circumstances at hand. Pick another example perhaps?" 

Pilot Friend:
 "My example of turbulence was a weak one regarding beliefs". 

Me:
I'm glad you can acknowledge this point. Thank you. I respect your willingness to be honest about it. 

Pilot Friend:
 "We may be talking semantics here so I won't pursue it". 

Me:
We're not just talking semantics. You choose to simply "believe" (being convinced that something is true or false without knowing for sure either way) that the turbulence is ahead while i actually calculate whether or not it makes any sense for turbulence to be ahead based on the available data and then conclude to either prepare or not to prepare for it, but i do so while keeping an open mind and without ever making the jump to "belief". Two very different things. Not just a matter of semantics. I guess, in the case of the airplane ride, we could say that we'd both end up in the same situation since we would both most likely be getting prepared for the turbulence at the same time, but we would be doing it for two very different reasons. 
    In this situation it could be said that it doesn't matter as long as we both end up alright as a result of having chosen to prepare for the turbulence. In some situations in life though, like your "belief" in a "young earth", this would not be the case. For instance, just because you decide to "believe" that the earth is younger than 4.6 billion years old, that believing doesn't make it actually "be" younger than 4.6 billion years old. Besides, no belief that you have about the age of the earth can come from the bible. The bible says nothing about how old the planet is. That makes your "belief" based on the traditions of men and not even on the bible in the first place. 

Pilot Friend:
"I just think we all have beliefs that we can't necessarily prove". 

Me:
Ok, you "believe" that, but even the belief that everyone has beliefs is just that, a belief (choosing to be convinced that something is true or false without knowing for sure either way). Not bashing on beliefs, just acknowledging out loud what they are. If i have them, i am open to considering them as being there. Perhaps i'm overreacting a bit. I don't know. I just don't see them in my world view. 
    Do you mean "believe" in the sense that there are things which i hold to be true without seeing them for my self and without actually doing the scientific experiments necessary to prove or disprove their validity as facts for my self? If so, i guess then, in your view, if that is how broadly you are defining the word "belief" i can see how you think that i have beliefs. I just don't define that word as broadly as you do i guess. 
    I would prefer to spell it out every time and take the time necessary to explain that i am considering the possibilities and concluding that a thing is most likely statistically probable based on the facts at hand and based on the character of the career of the one presenting the claim....i still wouldn't say that i am as settled on it as i would be if i were to actually do the tests for my self though. 
    What do you think? Am i splitting hairs in your view? If so, are the hairs there to be split or am i just making them up? You see, my thing in life is to acknowledge where there are and are not any hairs to split. If there are no hairs to be split, i like to think that i would say so out loud and get on with the others. However, if there are hairs to be split, i am not going to just pass them by and say that they don't matter. Sometimes splitting the slightest, most insignificant or pointless hair in one person's view is the very thing which sets another free from the darkness of an uncritical mind. 

(If you share my pilot friend's definition of "believing" then you may very well be in for or may already be experiencing much turbulence while reading through this web site. It's not necessarily my intent to throw anyone for a loop or go to one extreme when trying to avoid another, but I do want to think critically about exactly what it is we're doing when we say that we "believe" something.) 
 [conversation from 200211, entry added 200302]