Why do some believe easily, others hardly at all?

[Mock Turtle]

When that happens it can be a case of love for Jesus blinding people to what others might say about Jesus.

Perhaps, but many emotional experiences might be said to do this, and where they lead in other directions. I regard it as fortunate that my parents didn't thrust any religious beliefs upon me (tried a bit) but no doubt many will thank theirs.

 

[It Aint Necessarily So]

Phycology doesn't weigh love.

Psychology, right? Phycology is the science of algae. And love is discernible empirically. We can experience it as an attitude in ourselves assuming we can love, and we can witness its manifestation in ourselves and others.

Besides, God is Love.

The abstraction love and the abstraction God are not alike. Unlike the latter, the word love refers to something in reality that can be pointed to. From the pen of the poet: "love for real, not fade away"

Mathematics don't weigh anything

Your implied argument that a god is equivalent to mathematics and love because none can be weighed is flawed. It's not about weighing abstractions, which are ideas generated by material brains. It's about the ontological status of the referents from which they were derived. Love is the name for all of that activity one sees where one organism protects and shares with another in the support and promotion of its welfare. No, you can't weight that, either, but you can observe it through the material senses. Likewise with abstract mathematical concepts like twoness or circularity, which are abstracted from observing physical pairs of things and round things.

But what is this idea of a god abstracted from? Nothing. It's a creation of the imagination. It refers to an imagined entity with no apparent physical referent or manifestation. You don't grandfather God into reality by noting that it is as weightless as love and mathematics. So are vampires and leprechauns. Like gods, you can't weigh them. Unlike love and mathematics, there is nothing out there to point to corresponding with the idea. Is it proper to call them abstractions rather than just figments of imagination if they weren't abstracted from external reality?

"History should not automatically presume that historical claims of supernatural activity are not accurate", especially when those claims are in scriptures. That is saying from the start that they are not true. Hardly unbiased. Believing they could be true would be the unbiased approach imo.

Agreed. Open-mindedness requires giving any supporting evidence a dispassionate evaluation. To the extent it supports a claim, the claim can be believed. Belief is graded (disproven, unlikely, neither likely nor unlikely, likely, etc.), ought to be commensurate with the quality and quantity of available evidence, and tentative - amenable to revision if new evidence changes that degree of likelihood.

It's more like seeing and believing without too much reasoning I guess.

That's anathema to a critical thinker.

the evidence is always going to be patchy, incomplete or bad.

As I said, by the standards of critical thinking, belief ought to be commensurate with the quality and quantity of available evidence.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

That's all reasonable but perhaps where I differ is in giving more weight to the experiences of so many others. It seems reasonable to believe they are just as competent (and some more so) than me. So, I consider what they experience in my overall understanding of reality. This has led me to believe in a deeper than the surface universe.

The weight you give seems to be very selective. From where I sit, it seems like the weight you give to someone's opinion is proportional to how much you want to believe their conclusions.

I mean, how much weight do you give to the many people whose experience suggests that nothing supernatural exists?

 

[Alien826]

I should probably have said "History should not automatically presume that historical claims of supernatural activity are not accurate", especially when those claims are in scriptures. That is saying from the start that they are not true. Hardly unbiased.
Believing they could be true would be the unbiased approach imo.

Do you believe that the sun stood still for Joshua? We now know that it would have to be the Earth that stopped rotating, which would probably have destroyed the planet. Or do you think that would be so unlikely that the account should not be taken literally? If you don't think it actually happened, then you are "automatically presuming" something about the story, based on what you know now, and quite reasonably, I might add.

The moon landings could have been real. Any evidence I've seen suggests it was real except for the moon wind that was strong enough to hold the flag out stiff but did not blow the astronauts or shuttle or moon dust around.

That's funny! Did someone actually claim that as evidence?

 

[Soandso]

It's more like seeing and believing without too much reasoning I guess.
But the evidence is always going to be patchy, incomplete or bad.

No, it really isn't. While not every proposed idea is supported by a perfect evidential package with a nice pretty bow on it, good evidence can certainly be compelling enough to form concrete understandings of our world around. If all evidence was bad evidence, we wouldn't be able to progress past the stone age, since every technological advancement we've had up to our current time was built on solid evidence that has led us to where we are now

If you look at someone like Isaac Newton, he didn't come up with his ideas of gravity on his own. He had plenty of access to good evidence that his predecessors and peers had built up for him to work with

 

[Heyo]

That's funny! Did someone actually claim that as evidence?

Yep, it's one of the most cited arguments from the moon landing hoax conspiracy crowd. That's why it's the first to get debunked in this short video:

 

[George-ananda]

The weight you give seems to be very selective. From where I sit, it seems like the weight you give to someone's opinion is proportional to how much you want to believe their conclusions.

I weigh things as fairly as I can and consider argumentation from all sides. The evidence for the supranormal just becomes overwhelming in its cumulative weight. If you think it is a personal bias on my part, then that might be because I have different beliefs than you and you yourself may also suffer from some bias.

I mean, how much weight do you give to the many people whose experience suggests that nothing supernatural exists?

Well, I hold that the normal of course occurs 99+% of the time so their experiences are expected by me to generally be the case in my understanding of reality. And I think the analysis suggests some are more sensitive to the supranormal than others, so I have included such things in my analysis.

 

[Revoltingest]

Finally joining this thread.
Inspired by discussions with a friend who easily leaps to belief.

1) Desire to believe something that comports with what's already
believed, ie, seeking reinforcement, & living in an echo chamber.
2) Discomfort with ignorance, ie, not knowing the answer to questions.
3) Lack of skepticism.
4) Lack of logical rigor & organized reasoning, eg, cognitive dissonance.
5) Hostility to other ideas.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

Finally joining this thread.
Inspired by discussions with a friend who easily leaps to belief.

1) Desire to believe something that comports with what's already
believed, ie, seeking reinforcement, living in an echo chamber.
2) Discomfort with ignorance, ie, not knowing the answer to questions.
3) Lack of skepticism.
4) Lack of logical rigor & organized reasoning.
5) Hostility to other ideas.

Yeah and the other end is that the real reality is real, objective, logical, natural and physical, because critical thinking, rationality and skepticism show that with evidence.

The middle ground is that even knowledge has limits.

 

[Revoltingest]

Yeah and the other end is that the real reality is real, objective, logical, natural and physical, because critical thinking, rationality and skepticism show that with evidence.

The middle ground is that even knowledge has limits.

Gazing at that navel again, are you.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

Gazing at that navel again, are you.

Well, if everything is objective and all the rest, how come I can be subjective and all the rest of those irrelevant traits as in effect wrong. Indeed then wrong is objective and all the rest if everything is objective and the rest.

 

[Revoltingest]

Well, if everything is objective and all the rest, how come I can be subjective and all the rest of those irrelevant traits as in effect wrong. Indeed then wrong is objective and all the rest if everything is objective and the rest.

It seems that you usually want so claim something like...
"Nothing is real"
Treating what we observe as real is useful.
Better than ignoring it as "unreal".

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

It seems that you usually want so claim something like...
"Nothing is real"
Treating what we observe as real is useful.
Better than ignoring it as "unreal".

No, that even real is too simple and the world is more complex than the duality of real and unreal.
Btw. there is more than one version of empiricism or one definition of it.

 

[It Aint Necessarily So]

The evidence for the supranormal just becomes overwhelming in its cumulative weight.

I think people question your conclusions about that evidence. Skeptics have all of the same sensory and analytical faculties a believers, and so have access to the same evidence, yet come to different conclusions. It's not about the evidence, but rather, how it's understood. Believers in gods do the same thing. Large numbers of them are sure that they have sensed God using the same human apparatus as those who don't say so, like me. I did at one time, but today I understand that the spiritual experience is not an experience of spirits (gods), but of my own mental state, one I once considered represented the outside world impacting on my awareness, but now understand that same evidence differently - an endogenous mental state like the experience of beauty or value or humor previously misunderstood.

It's a common phenomenon. The ancient Greeks did this with the muses. They didn't have a concept for the mind being creative. Creative inspiration was not understood as a product of the mind, but rather, as a received message from a creative muse whispering silently into one's brain. And so, they misunderstood the product of their own minds as having an exogenous origin.

Likewise with dreams, who most understand to be products of their own minds, but others mistake as messages being delivered to them.

And likewise with internal moral conflicts, which are often depicted as a devil and an angel sitting on one's shoulder and arguing through one's ears. When I was a Christian, we were told that the products of our mind like doubt and cognitive dissonance were coming from Satan, who was trying to steal our souls, and they meant it literally.

If you think it is a personal bias on my part, then that might be because I have different beliefs than you and you yourself may also suffer from some bias.

I think his bias is the same as mine, and it is a rational, constructive bias intended to weed out false beliefs: the rules of induction that constrain critical analysis and belief.

I think the analysis suggests some are more sensitive to the supranormal than others, so I have included such things in my analysis.

There's no reason to believe that. My analysis suggests that such people claim to see things not there as described above, which brings us to the problem of deciding if a group sees something another group can't, whether one isn't seeing something present or the other is misunderstanding what it sees.

Do you know how to do that? How do we resolve the matter of whether one group is seeing something not there or the other not seeing something that is? There actually is a good test. Quiz the seers independently and see how well their reports correlate. If most or all give the same report, then they are probably seeing something real. Imagine a color-blind kid who can't tell red from green wondering whether he is being pranked by others the way they conspired about the Santa Claus thing. So, he buys five pair of red socks and five pair of green, has somebody identify which is which for him, he tags them, and has his friends independently identify the color of each. Then he compares their answers to his answer sheet. If they give the same report, he knows they see something he doesn't. If they can't agree, he knows that the opposite is the case.

When we do this with people claiming to see spirits or gods, their descriptions are all over the place. The discordant reports of believers are evidence that they see their own minds.

 

[George-ananda]

I think people question your conclusions about that evidence. Skeptics have all of the same sensory and analytical faculties a believers, and so have access to the same evidence, yet come to different conclusions. It's not about the evidence, but rather, how it's understood. Believers in gods do the same thing. Large numbers of them are sure that they have sensed God using the same human apparatus as those who don't say so, like me. I did at one time, but today I understand that the spiritual experience is not an experience of spirits (gods), but of my own mental state, one I once considered represented the outside world impacting on my awareness, but now understand that same evidence differently - an endogenous mental state like the experience of beauty or value or humor previously misunderstood.

It's a common phenomenon. The ancient Greeks did this with the muses. They didn't have a concept for the mind being creative. Creative inspiration was not understood as a product of the mind, but rather, as a received message from a creative muse whispering silently into one's brain. And so, they misunderstood the product of their own minds as having an exogenous origin.

Likewise with dreams, who most understand to be products of their own minds, but others mistake as messages being delivered to them.

And likewise with internal moral conflicts, which are often depicted as a devil and an angel sitting on one's shoulder and arguing through one's ears. When I was a Christian, we were told that the products of our mind like doubt and cognitive dissonance were coming from Satan, who was trying to steal our souls, and they meant it literally.

I think his bias is the same as mine, and it is a rational, constructive bias intended to weed out false beliefs: the rules of induction that constrain critical analysis and belief.

There's no reason to believe that. My analysis suggests that such people claim to see things not there as described above, which brings us to the problem of deciding if a group sees something another group can't, whether one isn't seeing something present or the other is misunderstanding what it sees.

Do you know how to do that? How do we resolve the matter of whether one group is seeing something not there or the other not seeing something that is? There actually is a good test. Quiz the seers independently and see how well their reports correlate. If most or all give the same report, then they are probably seeing something real. Imagine a color-blind kid who can't tell red from green wondering whether he is being pranked by others the way they conspired about the Santa Claus thing. So, he buys five pair of red socks and five pair of green, has somebody identify which is which for him, he tags them, and has his friends independently identify the color of each. Then he compares their answers to his answer sheet. If they give the same report, he knows they see something he doesn't. If they can't agree, he knows that the opposite is the case.

When we do this with people claiming to see spirits or gods, their descriptions are all over the place. The discordant reports of believers are evidence that they see their own minds.

In my analysis let's consider two types of supranormal events.

1. Those that are only subjective to the experiencers.

2. Those events that cannot be satisfactorily explained away as simply subjective events. This would include things like:

a) Physical events like physical objects moving.

b) Knowledge of facts not reasonably learned through normal channels or guessing as in mediumship and OBE and NDE experiences.

c) Controlled experiments showing psi abilities tremendously beyond chance odds.

d) Observations of competent careful investigators of activity and abilities not satisfactorily explainable as normal phenomena. Can even include photos and videos.

e) Multiple competent witness spontaneous events.

f) Whatever else is not jumping to my head now in this quick reply.



If all we had was #1 (subjective experiences only) I might well be on your side of the fence. After decades of consideration though I am beyond reasonable doubt that #2 things do really occur. This is why I believe in the catch-all umbrella term 'The 'Paranormal'.

 

[Brian2]

Agreed. Open-mindedness requires giving any supporting evidence a dispassionate evaluation. To the extent it supports a claim, the claim can be believed. Belief is graded (disproven, unlikely, neither likely nor unlikely, likely, etc.), ought to be commensurate with the quality and quantity of available evidence, and tentative - amenable to revision if new evidence changes that degree of likelihood.

That however still sounds like it is presuming the claims are false until shown to be true by supporting evidence,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, and we know that what you mean is that the supporting evidence needs to be independant.
So there is the claim that Jesus rose from the dead and that is presumed untrue until evidence shows otherwise.
There is plenty of evidence which is supposed to be from witnesses to Jesus death and subsequently being alive and doing miracles.
Even this is not good enough because the supposed witnesses actually believed what they saw and so became believers.

That's anathema to a critical thinker.

As I said, by the standards of critical thinking, belief ought to be commensurate with the quality and quantity of available evidence.

For your critical thinking however all experiences are no more than things going on in our head and body and emotions. You have closed yourself off to that with your choice to go only by your brand of critical thinking which has already eliminated religious faith and any conclusion that belief is reasonable without more and better evidence.

 

[Brian2]

Do you believe that the sun stood still for Joshua? We now know that it would have to be the Earth that stopped rotating, which would probably have destroyed the planet. Or do you think that would be so unlikely that the account should not be taken literally? If you don't think it actually happened, then you are "automatically presuming" something about the story, based on what you know now, and quite reasonably, I might add.

The actual language used should not be a problem as it is just language describing a phenomenon, as we might say that the sun rises and sets.
As for the sun slowing and stopping and speeding up again (or the earth doing that in it's rotation) I would say that God is able to do that without a problem.
The earth spins at about 1000 mph at the equator and if for example it was slowed by 10mph every minute that would mean it would take about an hour and a half to stop. Then after a time it could speed up at the same rate. (or deceleration and acceleration like that which would leave the sun in a section of the sky for a while.) Certainly to slow down and speed up at that rate (10 mph/minute) is not something that people will notice readily)
Who knows, maybe God achieved it by spinning the universe around the earth for a day or by setting up huge mirrors in the sky so that the sun appeared to stand still. We are talking about God here.

That's funny! Did someone actually claim that as evidence?

I doubt it.

 

[Heyo]

I think people question your conclusions about that evidence. Skeptics have all of the same sensory and analytical faculties a believers, and so have access to the same evidence, yet come to different conclusions. It's not about the evidence, but rather, how it's understood. Believers in gods do the same thing. Large numbers of them are sure that they have sensed God using the same human apparatus as those who don't say so, like me. I did at one time, but today I understand that the spiritual experience is not an experience of spirits (gods), but of my own mental state, one I once considered represented the outside world impacting on my awareness, but now understand that same evidence differently - an endogenous mental state like the experience of beauty or value or humor previously misunderstood.

It's a common phenomenon. The ancient Greeks did this with the muses. They didn't have a concept for the mind being creative. Creative inspiration was not understood as a product of the mind, but rather, as a received message from a creative muse whispering silently into one's brain. And so, they misunderstood the product of their own minds as having an exogenous origin.

Likewise with dreams, who most understand to be products of their own minds, but others mistake as messages being delivered to them.

And likewise with internal moral conflicts, which are often depicted as a devil and an angel sitting on one's shoulder and arguing through one's ears. When I was a Christian, we were told that the products of our mind like doubt and cognitive dissonance were coming from Satan, who was trying to steal our souls, and they meant it literally.

I think his bias is the same as mine, and it is a rational, constructive bias intended to weed out false beliefs: the rules of induction that constrain critical analysis and belief.

There's no reason to believe that. My analysis suggests that such people claim to see things not there as described above, which brings us to the problem of deciding if a group sees something another group can't, whether one isn't seeing something present or the other is misunderstanding what it sees.

Do you know how to do that? How do we resolve the matter of whether one group is seeing something not there or the other not seeing something that is? There actually is a good test. Quiz the seers independently and see how well their reports correlate. If most or all give the same report, then they are probably seeing something real. Imagine a color-blind kid who can't tell red from green wondering whether he is being pranked by others the way they conspired about the Santa Claus thing. So, he buys five pair of red socks and five pair of green, has somebody identify which is which for him, he tags them, and has his friends independently identify the color of each. Then he compares their answers to his answer sheet. If they give the same report, he knows they see something he doesn't. If they can't agree, he knows that the opposite is the case.

When we do this with people claiming to see spirits or gods, their descriptions are all over the place. The discordant reports of believers are evidence that they see their own minds.

:winner:

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

:winner:

Here is what I learned as a skeptic. Take X is Y and not Z versus X is Z and not Y. Then compare both and notice if both of them are without evidence and then test the following. Can you do the everyday life without believing in either of them.
I can, I don't believe as true that the world is natural nor from God. I don't have to, because apparently I am still here.
There are 3 positions of X is...
The 2 above as positives and the 3rd one, I don't know what X is and I don't have to, because I am still here.

So there are 2 kinds of skeptics and I can catch the scientific ones for their positive belief in X ix Y because I don't have to believe in that as true, just as with X is Z.

So there are in effect 2 kinds of skeptics for these debates.

 

[Heyo]

Here is what I learned as a skeptic. Take X is Y and not Z versus X is Z and not Y. Then compare both and notice if both of them are without evidence and then test the following. Can you do the everyday life without believing in either of them.
I can, I don't believe as true that the world is natural nor from God. I don't have to, because apparently I am still here.
There are 3 positions of X is...
The 2 above as positives and the 3rd one, I don't know what X is and I don't have to, because I am still here.

So there are 2 kinds of skeptics and I can catch the scientific ones for their positive belief in X ix Y because I don't have to believe in that as true, just as with X is Z.

So there are in effect 2 kinds of skeptics for these debates.

There are also 2 kinds of believers. When you get out of the house and don't see your car, you are certain to have left it there and you contemplate it having been magically teleported elsewhere, you are a True Believer™. If you think it has been stolen and you only contemplate magic when it fits your special kind of religion or philosophy, you are just making exceptions for special arbitrary cases.
True Believers™ are likely not able to live a normal life.