- I would never die for my beliefs because I might be wrong. -- Bertrand Russell
Person A: Believe in my God!What I'm really confused about is this: what does it actually mean for Person B to say "Ok, I've decided to believe in God"? Or rather -- does it actually mean anything? Do we really get to choose what sounds reasonable in our minds? Isn't what we end up believing based on the evidence that we have (i.e. our experiences) and how we interpret those? Thus to change our opinion on something, we could (a) bring out new evidence that we haven't considered, or (b) refine our methods of reasoning about those evidences.
Person B: Ok.
I'm really curious about this -- do you think you can decide what you believe to be true? I don't think I can. Sure I can lie to myself, and I'm perfectly capable of pretend to believe in something. I can want to believe something, and notice myself biasing the evidence towards it. But deep down, I'd still know that it's wrong, that perhaps there's not (yet) enough evidence. This knowing is much stronger than the pretend-belief, and my hypothesis is that we all have this compass inside of us that knows how plausible things actually are.
Of course, I might be wrong.
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I like that quote from Russell.
ReplyDeleteIf you bring it down to basic levels, there is no knowing, period. It's a delusion of grandeur in pretty much all cases. One can always be wrong, about anything.
Faith is a rejection of this, as if one's belief can transcend (magically, like what god represents) all that binds us to reality.
But strangely, I think atheism is similar in that "believing" respect, and from this odd angle I can understand faith. Recently I've found myself overcoming my desire to be agnostic and leave all those arguments to where they belong - because I know deep down (since it's a personal feeling thing I'll use "know"), as much as I can about myself - that I'm atheist, probably a militant one haha. And I may be wrong, I admit, but I have a strong feeling that I'm not - maybe this is what faith is.
Or maybe god does speak to the faithful. XD
I think you can say a lot about what faith is, so maybe I picked the wrong word to use. I didn't intend for this post to be about "knowing deep down that something is right/wrong" -- but rather the process in which we arrive at that "knowing". I think that this "knowing" does come from evidence in the form of personal experience, and that it seems silly to think that we can decide/control this "knowing".
ReplyDeletesigh. who knows? =P
ReplyDeleteThis might help explain why we believe in stuff - http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2010/12/24/dropping-some-science/
ReplyDeleteI would suggest you to consider the social and mental health benefits that faith and organized religion have on the individuals. Besides, some suggest that our brains are wired for faith:
ReplyDeletehttp://edition.cnn.com/2007/HEALTH/04/04/neurotheology/
The altered states of consciousness are well known and attributed as god acting on people (each religion attributes it to their god, of course). Besides at the churches otherwise rejected people (or people having a boring life) feel accepted and get a sense of purpose. Finally, faith works as an immunization therapy against mental health problems caused by chronic or acute stress. Even that it cannot solve your life's problems, it keep your mind healthy with the idea of the possibility of a miracle.
Again, I apologize for being unclear here. "Faith" was definitely the wrong word to use. It isn't "believing in god/religion/whatever" that I'm criticizing, it is the way in which people arrive at the "decision" to believe. I find it puzzling that certain religious people try to convert others by simply telling them: "Please believe in God", thinking that it would make sense for someone to say "okay", or to simply "decide" to believe even though no new evidence was presented.
ReplyDeleteThere is no reason to apologize. Actually, I think that I was me who was not clear on the comment.
ReplyDeleteFirst, I think that people pretending to sell their faith to others using the scenario that you present are very rare. They do exist, but they are just bad sales(wo)men. They rarely get the expected results, and if they do, it is because somebody did a job before and the seller only closed the sell. As you explain, no rational person would buy in.
However, there are very good sellers of faith our there. And they get good results, not by selling a rational truth, but by selling an experience, just as a spa or a chiropractor does.
I agree that sharing experiences is valuable, and I also agree that people whose experiences point them to a certain religion are being rational by following that religion.
ReplyDeleteI do actually see a lot of the "believe in God!" pitch, mostly on campus at my university. And yes, I have heard people tell me, "I believe in God, because my friends told me to." Maybe people just aren't like that where you are. I certainly hope that is the case.