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Hello tlhall,
It's much too easy to state polar opposites and choose one end over the other since one will naturally make some sense and the other will make less sense. Blind faith is just that, blind. Mechanistic logic denies life. Which do I choose... blindness or death? Happily, neither is the only option. The teachings of The Urantia Book promote the exercise of both rational faith and rational logic.
Ayn Rand is the epitome of a fallible rational, logical thinking being; hers was a great mind that proposed a philosophy she termed "objectivism" as mankind's salvation, and to a large degree I agree. What would life be here if everyone was rational? I believe overall the world would be a much better place for all if Rand's athiestic proposals were adopted. But that would require that a mortally devised god replace the God of creation; such a belief system wouldn't contain mankind's spirit for long.
I disagree with a number of the statements made in the above post, statements such as:
one must be willing ...to induce a trancelike illusion of understanding (that's blind faith and mysticism, not faith in the Father).
...to repress one's critical faculty and hold it as one's guilt (nowhere does TUB express such narrow minded sentiments. It would be good to recognize the teachings of TUB before criticizing them).
...to drown any questions that rise in protest (TUB expects rational beings to question).
...to strangle any trust of reason convulsively seeking to assert its proper function as the protector of one's life and cognitive integrity (neither fanatical faith nor distrust of reason are teachings of TUB).
A tenet of Objectivism is that "good" are those beliefs and actions that promote life, beliefs and actions are "evil" that do not promote life. Ayn Rand was a heavy smoker; any logical, rational thinker knows, without having to have the surgeon general's say, that continually filling one's lungs with smoke is not a life promoting activity. She knowingly defied her philosophy and behaved irrationally.
In this statement, "The foundation and starting point of man's thinking are his sensory perceptions; on this base, man forms his first concepts, then goes on building the edifice of his knowledge by identifying and integrating new concepts on a wider and wider scale" the supposition is that intellect is king and that by relying upon it solely one is naturally led further and further from unprovable faith. That's constructing an inverted pyramid, for in fact, as we learn from TUB, belief has attained the level of faith when it motivates life and shapes the mode of living. Faith is the higher influence.
John Galt's statement in Atlas Shrugged that "the alleged shortcut to knowledge, which is faith, is only a short circuit destroying the mind" is true if the kind of faith it is applied to is fanatical and unreasoned. That's not faith as promoted by TUB, nor does TUB promote faith as an alleged shortcut to knowledge.
Saying that "There is no greater self-delusion than to imagine that one can render unto reason that which is reason's and unto faith that which is faith's" implies that faith is governed by the same influences that science is. Science, religon and faith are separate mental activities. They can rely upon one another but they don't fall under the same disciplines. TUB relates the interdependence between faith and logic in a faith-son on a cosmic journey.
Proclaiming that "Either reason is an absolute to a mind or it is not" is proof that reason is no absolute. A life lived by reason alone is not a human life.
"When one turns from reason to faith, when one rejects the absolutism of reality, one undercuts the absolutism of one's consciousness - and one's mind becomes an organ one can not trust any longer. It becomes what the mystics claim it to be: a tool of distortion." This may hold true for zealous and fanatical faith. TUB does not promote mysticism. It's pointless to attempt to compare mediocre belief systems (faiths) with logic and reason. To identify faith with mediocre mind is to build a strawman that is easily knocked down. Again, one needs to understand the teachings of TUB before criticizing them.
Perhaps these quotes will benefit the discussion:
"Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen."
"You were meant to use your mind but not to depend upon it solely. Just as you were given a body, but were not meant to rely on its power alone. What kind of life will the mind design if the spirit does not guide it?"
Rand's philosophy is one we can all benefit from understanding better. However her vision is through one eye, the eye of materialism. She had yet to recognize that as grand as materialism is, it floats upon and is subject to the leadings of the spirit.
Best wishes,
Larry
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195:7.5 The realities and values of spiritual progress are not a “psychologic projection” — a mere glorified daydream of the material mind. Such things are the spiritual forecasts of the indwelling Adjuster, the spirit of God living in the mind of man. 
