MBS

Hi everyone. This will be my first topic post.

What are your thoughts regarding this subject? How can people (converts) change their beliefs on will alone, without regard to any evidence? I can't personally comprehend this.

To me, belief is part of my perception of reality and the idea of 'willing' reality to change at my whim seems absurd. From my experience it is possible to hold on to old beliefs despite contrary evidence, but now that I no longer believe, it would take a miracle to make me a Christian again. I didn't choose to become a non-believer because I didn't like Christianity (as Christians often think). My belief was painfully forced out of me through a long period of examination. No matter how much I would like a god to exist and help me out in hard times, I have no evidence that he exists and I can't change that.

Now that I am no longer a believer it really bothers me when I hear Christians explaining to other non-believers how its "their choice", to not believe. (The standard "God doesn't send you to hell, you do" argument) They seem to think we purposefully 'reject' their dogma just to piss God off.

Looking on the Abrahamic faiths from the perspective of a non-believer I see this as the most disturbing aspect they all have in common. Belief is treated as a willful act ("act of faith"), so a person can be judged, for good or for bad, on his/her belief as if it were a deed. In fact blind faith is elevated above any other kind of action, both in rewards and punishments. In Christianity, worldly actions may affect you in your current life, but whether you enjoy eternal bliss or eternal torture is based on your faith. In Islam, the Quran seems to punish the 'act' of apostasy as or more harshly than the act of murder.

Here is my "atheist testimonial" if you would like to read.

Zora

Hi MBS,

You are obviously more educated and articulate than I am, and I am grateful to you for putting this idea forth so eloquently.

I don't know a great deal about Islam, but you have hit upon the major objection I have to Christianity...and which to me proves its fallacy. I can't just choose to believe something either. Unfortunately, the Christians with whom I have discussed this take my disbelief as somehow being mad at God or in denial of the "evidence" for their God.

There are circumstances under which I could belive the religious dogma. Torture comes to mind. Dementia, perhaps. Nervous breakdown/mental ilness. Brainwashing.

There are other circumstances which could induce me to SAY and act like I believe...threat of death, imprisonment, removal of my children. But true belief can never be voluntary without evidence..for me.

The "eternal punishment for disbelief" was one of the major objections the Romans had to Christianity in its infancy, as was the "faith" doctrine, according to a book I just finished. If I had been introduced to religion from a standpoint other than Abrahamic, I might have been able to accept the existence of a god/gods.

It will be interesting to get the viewpoint of the more educated here.

Pyrrho

The issue of whether or not one chooses to believe something is far from straightforward, but there are clear cases where choice seems completely irrelevant to belief. You probably cannot choose to believe, right now as you read this, that you are not reading something. Such cases seem pretty obviously beyond any possible choice.

However, one can try to get oneself to believe some kinds of things, and this is not without its effects, as you have suggested yourself, when you state:

"From my experience it is possible to hold on to old beliefs despite contrary evidence..."

William James had some interesting things to say about these kinds of things. See:

http://ajburger.homestead.com/ethics.html

However, I recommend that you read Clifford's essay before you read James' essay, as James wrote in response to ideas like those expressed by Clifford.


One of the ways you can influence your beliefs is in what you choose to read, and what you choose to avoid reading. This is one of the reasons why many religious people regard reading certain things as immoral. And why it is often recommended that one avoid the company of nonbelievers, as they may "corrupt" you. You also have some choice in whether you will dwell on certain things or not. For example, if you wanted, every time you think about the Problem of Evil, you could start to pray to god, or sing hymns, or some other thing, to try to avoid thinking such thoughts. You could also read the rationalizations that apologists write about such things, though if you are too rational, they will tend to have an opposite effect to what was intended.


I agree with you when you state regarding Christianity:

"In fact blind faith is elevated above any other kind of action."

I think this is because faith and general irrationality are necessary for having religious belief. Which takes us back to the link I provided above.

HallaK9

I think that faith and belief meant something different for people in the polytheistic timeframe of OT than in the last millenia when monotheism had consolidated it's position in the society.

I have not studied these things that much, but to me it would be logical to suppose that when a person in the OT times 'chose to believe', he chose to follow the Judaic war god Yahve (whatever the correct spelling is ), and not for instance, Baal. It wasn't about believeing whether or not those deities exist, as a person in those times very likely didn't doubt the existence of deities, but it was a choice between which one to follow. Hence the apparent ease at which the OT people seemed to change beliefs.

IIRC, didn't Judaism transform into a monotheistic religion only at about the time of the Babylonian rule? At those times there would have been a natural need to strenghten the ethnic and cultural identity of the Jewish people. Elevating the war sky god over all other deities by starting to think of him as the only "true" God with capital G would have served well to that purpose.

There are clues of the polytheistic past scattered in the OT, for instance the book of Job, and some oddities in the Genesis, but I am sure someone else here can give a better account of them.

But I digress When it comes to choosing to believe in Christianity, I am with you. I cannot force myself to think 2+2 = 5, no matter how sincerely I try. Sure I can say it is, but then I will be lying, and what's the point of that?

Regards,

Antti

emotional

Yes. I've done that many times.

BadBadBad

When I was nine, I remember being confronted for the first time with this "being saved" concept. The "do you accept Jesus Christ as your personal savior" concept. "You better get your heart right with Jesus." I started to say "huh?"

Well, despite all the Santa Claus like stories I'd been told, as my adult mind started to function, I found I didn't have anything to believe in. Believe in what? No one could tell me what, but they threatened me I sure better.

To me, for the next twenty years, it became simply a matter of conformity. At first, I tried to do exactly what they asked. I was going to believe with all my little heart. I prayed to Jesus in my little brain. No matter though, I couldn't fool myself. I couldn't make my self believe nothing was something. I was an atheist (damned to hell at the tender age of nine).

The only issue remaining was the conformity and whether I could get away with not believing. I was a pretty smart kid though I guess. I concluded pretty quickly that no one could tell me what I had to think within my own little brain.

That's the bottom line. Society wants me to conform at every level. Religion is it's weapon of choice. I'm an individual, and it can only go so far.

Taffer

Right then. You're a theist, aren't you? Could you convert to atheism right now and stay that way indefinitely?

emotional

Yes.

I don't think so. The next news of a SARS-like disease would have me rushing back to the afterlife belief.

Taffer

Well yeah, the second bit is sort of the crucial point. I could probably convince myself that God exists as well (I'm very good at lying to myself), but it certainly wouldn't last long before the facade comes crashing down. Probably until I think of the next argument that I've used myself in debates, or at the very longest until I get a glance of the II again.

I think we can exclude five-second de/conversions.

So, put it this way: Since you want to believe in god and eternal life, you can't change to atheism willingly, right?

Jamie_L

I slogged through some threads along this line when I first came to II. In the end, I walked away more confused than I started - at least on the topic of choosing beliefs.

In some instances, it seems choice can play a role. In others, it can't. Describing the difference between the two is something I found to be quite thorny.

But this I know, I did not choose to become an atheist, much as the OP suggested. I can no more choose to believe there is a God and/or an afterlife than I can choose to believe that I can fly by flapping my arms up and down. As the OP said, perhaps better than I've ever said, this 'belief' of mine is really a perception of reality. I can't chose to believe my car is red (it is green). I can't choose to believe my first child is alive (he's dead). I can't choose to believe there is a god. All observations I've made point to the contrary.

With that said, if my observations ever changed, then my perception of reality would change.

Jamie