Faith in [$SUBJECT]
is obviously faith, but the meaning is getting muddled here. It's not the wording that is important, but the definition you need to clarify.

I think your original post confuses hope and faith, then later you define faith as a synonym for trust or confidence, rather than having irrational beliefs, which confuses things further.

An example of faith as irrational beliefs which just about fits your original post might be a person who is scared of death, who genuinely believes that medical science will advance within his lifetime, with no particular reason to think so, i.e. no evidence from the scientific or medical community. He wholeheartedly believes it *will* happen, he doesn't just hope so. That's the key difference.

If that's what you're on about, then of course that's faith (as in belief) because it's grounded in nothing but hopes and dreams. It's possible to have an irrational belief about anything, including any branch of science.

If on the other hand, you mean faith as in placing one's trust in the abilities of medical science because you have reason, that's *another, different* definition of faith (the word) which is not the same as the one being used in the QOTW.
( chart cat has an itch, Thu 26 Mar 2009, 2:01, Reply)