We all frequently hear Christians talking about choosing to believe as if belief is a switch we could turn on somehow. The general consensus among atheists is that while it's possible to change a belief, it is not a matter of choice. But many, maybe most Christians insist that belief is a choice. So I got to wondering about this.
Have Christians actually made a conscious choice to believe, or do they just assume they have. Sometimes I think they never really thought about it. Could they choose not to believe? Does this aspect of reasoning and understanding actually change if a person is a theist? How can we account for this to be true for a theist, but not an atheist?
Quote from: SGOS on October 19, 2014, 09:59:16 AM
We all frequently hear Christians talking about choosing to believe as if belief is a switch we could turn on somehow. The general consensus among atheists is that while it's possible to change a belief, it is not a matter of choice. But many, maybe most Christians insist that belief is a choice. So I got to wondering about this.
Have Christians actually made a conscious choice to believe, or do they just assume they have. Sometimes I think they never really thought about it. Could they choose not to believe? Does this aspect of reasoning and understanding actually change if a person is a theist? How can we account for this to be true for a theist, but not an atheist?
The key is forced belief. You just weren't beaten enough as a child to choose right.. But you say your parents did nothing but beat Christianity into you as a small innocent child? Well obviously not enough. Those who believe they get to chose weren't beaten enough either. You must be beaten to sufficiently cripple and maim you for life to actually not choose, but choose anyway..
I didn't say that there was logic here, just remember god loves those who are beaten sufficiently.. God hates logic.
I'm not a biblical scholar, but does the word LOGIC actually appear anywhere in the bible?
Belief is an ingrained mentality based on environment and people around us. Kind of like how someone who is raised by abusive parents can go on to be abusive to others themselves, or worse, christianity is a set of rules and beliefs forced on us from a young age.
The thing I admire the most in my fellow atheists is how they overcame this mentality, how they thought for themselves and not just doing whatever their parents or piers wanted them to think or feel. We atheists don't have organisations around every town, city, state, county or country that forces the message that faith is fantasy and fiction, its simply something a lot of us have discovered ourselves by being in the right frame of mind to do so.
Belief in something is a choice, the same as someone can believe that being a decent human being is the right thing, or that killing children is what they want to do, its all down to how the persons brain developers. And faith is an organisation of belief held by many with a set of rules for them to follow, because for these people the world is to scary a place not to have these rules in place.
See? Now you're using logic and god hates logic.. Burn in hell heathen. :naughty:
Quote from: AllPurposeAtheist on October 19, 2014, 10:11:59 AM
I'm not a biblical scholar, but does the word LOGIC actually appear anywhere in the bible?
I don't know if the word actually appears in the Bible, and I'm not sure when it was coined. However, the Bible does make several admonitions to avoid reason, but then there are probably a few places where it says you should use reason (as long as you arrive at the desired conclusion, I suppose). It's probably one of those "find whatever you want" things in the Bible.
I've talked to a theist or two that insists their belief in God is logical, although none have demonstrated the actual logic they use to arrive at their conclusions. I think they say it's logical, because they wouldn't consider themselves to be illogical.
Quote from: SGOS on October 19, 2014, 09:59:16 AM
We all frequently hear Christians talking about choosing to believe as if belief is a switch we could turn on somehow. The general consensus among atheists is that while it's possible to change a belief, it is not a matter of choice. But many, maybe most Christians insist that belief is a choice.
If it is a choice, it's strange how often people choose the deity of their hometown, usually for life.
People who think that this stuff can be switched on and off light a faucet should really try being an atheist for a day and personally demonstrate the truth of their proposition.
There is some comfort in giving over to it. Choosing to give up control to God and have him take care of you, and control your fate. It takes a lot of mental energy to do it all yourself.
I understand this, I think, this choosing to believe. That's what faith is, I spose. I envy people who can do that to a degree.
In my case, leaving Mormonism to become a Christian, it thought of it as a conscious act. But thinking back, I realize it was more a need to provide a peer group for my peer group hungry wife and something for my kids to do on Sunday. My children rebelled against religion before I did. All 3 of them became atheists before I did.
I think anyone who joins a religion because they are proselyted by missionaries or JW's or whoever is probably looking for a peer group or wanting a change, and the inducement of a new beginning entices them in. There is a high percentage of dropouts among new converts when they figure out the reality versus the initial perception. Like happy to have the meal, but not so fun when they get the bill.
Quote from: stromboli on October 19, 2014, 11:07:44 AM
In my case, leaving Mormonism to become a Christian, it thought of it as a conscious act. But thinking back, I realize it was more a need to provide a peer group for my peer group hungry wife and something for my kids to do on Sunday. My children rebelled against religion before I did. All 3 of them became atheists before I did.
I think anyone who joins a religion because they are proselyted by missionaries or JW's or whoever is probably looking for a peer group or wanting a change, and the inducement of a new beginning entices them in. There is a high percentage of dropouts among new converts when they figure out the reality versus the initial perception. Like happy to have the meal, but not so fun when they get the bill.
I think this same psychology applies to street gangs. Maybe not the droupout rate, but the peer group thing.
Quote from: Mermaid on October 19, 2014, 11:09:13 AM
I think this same psychology applies to street gangs. Maybe not the droupout rate, but the peer group thing.
I believe you just made a very accurate comparison between religion and street gangs. :clap:
Quote from: SGOS on October 19, 2014, 09:59:16 AM
Could they choose not to believe? Does this aspect of reasoning and understanding actually change if a person is a theist? How can we account for this to be true for a theist, but not an atheist?
How could it be true for one and not the other? I couldn't and it isn't. We're all people, we're all the same. Being a theist requires faith. Faith is believing something despite a complete lack of evidence and/or the presence of contradictory evidence. Faith is a choice.
Faith is something you make yourself do or will yourself to do. I suppose its possible indoctrinate some at a young enough age so that having faith no longer seems like a choice but faith at its core is always a choice because no one is born with it. Its a learned behavior.
Zero faith is required to be an atheist. The facts are the facts and the evidence or lack of it is very clear. But being an atheist still requires one to make a choice. None of us are born with faith so those that have it do so because they choose to have it. But those of us who don't have it are doing so because we have all made a choice to reject it. You do not label yourself as an atheist without having acknowledged that being a theist is a choice you could have made but instead choose against it. You simply cannot get to one without having dealt with the other.
Quote from: Mermaid on October 19, 2014, 10:51:22 AM
There is some comfort in giving over to it. Choosing to give up control to God and have him take care of you, and control your fate.
What you describe isn't choosing to believe. You are choosing to turn your life over to God, but you are not choosing to believe in God. You must already believe in God to do this.
I choose to give my life over to the big, giant flying tricycle in the sky we all see every day.. Or is it just a Big Wheelâ,,¢..?
Quote from: SGOS on October 19, 2014, 09:59:16 AM
Have Christians actually made a conscious choice to believe, or do they just assume they have. Sometimes I think they never really thought about it. Could they choose not to believe? Does this aspect of reasoning and understanding actually change if a person is a theist? How can we account for this to be true for a theist, but not an atheist?
I think every christian has made a more or less conscious choice to believe or to believe that faith is what is important. They understand that reason, in religion, is of the devil. It is created by the devil to lead them astray. What is amazing to me is that they seem so easily capable to apply 'reason' in a useful manner in some aspects of life, but not in the area of religion. So they strive to make their faith rock solid with no holes for reason to get through. It does not matter that Jesus did not exist, that the bible was not dropped from heaven already complete and error free, that the history of religion is replete with error and downright lies. Reason cannot successfully assault that granite wall of faith. Is that a choice--yes it is. An atheist is not swayed by the argument that one has to have faith. For them, reason is the most important element--for the religious, belief and faith is the most important.
Quote from: SGOS on October 19, 2014, 12:19:43 PM
What you describe isn't choosing to believe. You are choosing to turn your life over to God, but you are not choosing to believe in God. You must already believe in God to do this.
Mmm. I am not so sure this is always true.
I go back and forth on the question.
When I was a believer I never chose to be one--though I also never chose to be baptized. I was raised as one. One sister, two patents, four grandparents, (at that time) three aunts and two of their husbands, eventually three cousins, essentially everyone at every (religions) school I went to were all the same religions denomination. There really wasn't any choice about it.
When I stopped believing I didn't exactly choose either. I never said "today I'm going to stop believing"; I realized "I haven't truly believed for some time". Did I choose to question things that believers choose not to question, to think about things they ignore? Yes, or maybe no and I simply found myself questioning and thinking without actually choosing to do so. I didn't choose not to have religious/spiritual experiences (hearing the voice of god/feeling his guiding hand) but maybe I had experiences that others would have described in those terms but I chose to explain them differently--I distinctly remember lying about having one during a car accident because I thought one should have happened to a good believer and maybe, if I were a different person (not something I could chose to be) I could have succeed in convincing myself to actually believe that I had.
On the other hand, my mother had often said to me that when she encounters anything that challenges her belief she simply chooses not to think about those things and chooses to believe even harder. She's said that she wishes I was less of a thinker so that I could simply choose to ignore and believe too. But if you have to convince yourself to believe do you actually believe?
Maybe belief isn't a choice itself but involves choices. Maybe cognitive dissidence is a skill some people are born with or are able to cultivate and others aren't.
Strangely I never found myself suffering from cognitive dissidence when it came to 'believing' in certain things. I just went with it at the time, and when facts began to come into it, I questioned it, and came to conclusions that made me think differently to what i did before.
Quote from: Mermaid on October 19, 2014, 12:53:20 PM
Mmm. I am not so sure this is always true.
Well, always is a pretty big word. If I said that I might be out on a limb. But yet, I can't think of an exception off the top of my head. But that's why I brought up the topic. How in the world would a Christian choose to believe? I can certainly understand that they do. I can understand that they don't believe in science, but the choice part is beyond me.
In fact in Alcoholics Anonymous where I met a ton of fundamentalists, I remember one of them saying belief was a choice, although he added, "But how does a person come to believe?" He didn't have the answer. Never even attempted to describe the process of choosing. He never lifted a finger to defend his claim (not that I challenged him. I didn't). It made me suspicious, because his evidence was no more than "because he said so."
Quote from: Munch on October 19, 2014, 01:12:34 PM
Strangely I never found myself suffering from cognitive dissidence when it came to 'believing' in certain things. I just went with it at the time, and when facts began to come into it, I questioned it, and came to conclusions that made me think differently to what i did before.
Yes, beliefs change with various experiences. They can be educational or hallucinatory. But if a person is having cognitive dissonance from his belief, he's got some thinking to do. Hell, I've believed in shit in my recent life too, and had no cognitive dissonance at all until someone points out a logical error. Perhaps, someone will present an argument for choice that's convincing enough to change my belief about choosing to believe. Then there will be a transition from one belief to an opposite with only a moment or two of dissonance during the transition.
Quote from: Poison Tree on October 19, 2014, 12:58:13 PM
Maybe belief isn't a choice itself but involves choices. Maybe cognitive dissidence is a skill some people are born with or are able to cultivate and others aren't.
I really liked your post; the entire thing. It pretty much describes my transition from belief to no belief. I processed a hell of a lot of information, fought it with some light weight apologetics for a while. Then I got into to this "maybe/maybe" not thing. Then I discovered I didn't believe anymore. It was never a choice. It was more like a discovery of my current status. But when I believed, it was genuine. Well, mostly genuine. I guess I always had some doubts starting somewhere between 5 and 10 years old.
I usually counter this bullshit with "then choose to not believe." It usually shuts them up.
Quote from: the_antithesis on October 19, 2014, 04:22:11 PM
I usually counter this bullshit with "then choose to not believe." It usually shuts them up.
Yeah, it does shut them up, but I have no idea how they are processing it in their heads. And I've perplexed myself greatly wondering why they don't respond with something, anything.
Quote from: SGOS on October 19, 2014, 04:03:17 PM
How in the world would a Christian choose to believe?
Social pressure perhaps? Believing and going through the motions are separate things, I realize. I only have my own perspective.
Quote from: SGOS on October 19, 2014, 04:20:46 PM
I really liked your post; the entire thing. It pretty much describes my transition from belief to no belief. I processed a hell of a lot of information, fought it with some light weight apologetics for a while. Then I got into to this "maybe/maybe" not thing. Then I discovered I didn't believe anymore. It was never a choice. It was more like a discovery of my current status. But when I believed, it was genuine. Well, mostly genuine. I guess I always had some doubts starting somewhere between 5 and 10 years old.
I can say all of this is also true for myself.
Quote from: Mermaid on October 19, 2014, 04:29:55 PM
Social pressure perhaps? Believing and going through the motions are separate things, I realize. I only have my own perspective.
There is a catch phrase in Alcoholics Anonymous. It's assumed by many a member that the only way you can get sober is by turning your life over to God. This of course creates a problem for anyone that doesn't believe in god. If he says, I don't believe in God, their response is,
"Don't worry. You will eventually. Just fake it till you make it."They are quite proud of themselves for giving you this advice, but as an atheist, it makes no sense to me.
Quote from: SGOS on October 19, 2014, 04:26:23 PM
Yeah, it does shut them up, but I have no idea how they are processing it in their heads. And I've perplexed myself greatly wondering why they don't respond with something, anything.
I think it's because they weren't expecting that and they are kind of caught between two things:
1) They can't do it which proves they are wrong and they do not want to admit it.
2) There is no way for you to know what they believe or not, so all they have to do to save face is lie, which is a sin and they don't want to do that, either.
This leaves them with nothing to say, so they shut up and that's when you feel really good.
Quote from: SGOS on October 19, 2014, 05:16:48 PM
There is a catch phrase in Alcoholics Anonymous. It's assumed by many a member that the only way you can get sober is by turning your life over to God. This of course creates a problem for anyone that doesn't believe in god. If he says, I don't believe in God, their response is, "Don't worry. You will eventually. Just fake it till you make it."
They are quite proud of themselves for giving you this advice, but as an atheist, it makes no sense to me.
Ugh. I am all about AA if it helps you. But an atheist alcoholic hearing that shit is going to feel like there is no place for them. That is gross.
Wait! You all still believe in the Tooth Fairy right? Because if you don't you should be sent to FEMA death camps with the rest of the grandmas..
Quote from: SGOS on October 19, 2014, 04:26:23 PM
Yeah, it does shut them up, but I have no idea how they are processing it in their heads. And I've perplexed myself greatly wondering why they don't respond with something, anything.
Quote from: the_antithesis on October 19, 2014, 06:32:38 PM
I think it's because they weren't expecting that and they are kind of caught between two things:
1) They can't do it which proves they are wrong and they do not want to admit it.
2) There is no way for you to know what they believe or not, so all they have to do to save face is lie, which is a sin and they don't want to do that, either.
This leaves them with nothing to say, so they shut up and that's when you feel really good.
I can understand getting caught short for a response needed to address a challenge of critical importance. But it happens with such regularity with theists that I've hypothesized something like a blind spot in the brain. When information is presented that logically nullifies a claim, the theist brain treats the information as nonexistent. The theist doesn't actively ignore it. Rather it becomes "not there". This accounts for the theists lack of response, even in the presence of repeated requests for an explanation. The information and follow up requests remain out side the theist's immediate field of perception, and he appears unfazed and air headed.
The tooth fairy gave me money for a lost tooth. Father christmas gave me presents. The easter bunny gave me chocolate eggs.
I stopped believing this stuff when I grew up, as everyone else does.
But other people, who stopped believing in all the above characters, still believe in a magical sky daddy with an army of angels.
...
Quote from: Munch on October 20, 2014, 08:08:48 AM
The tooth fairy gave me money for a lost tooth. Father christmas gave me presents. The easter bunny gave me chocolate eggs.
I stopped believing this stuff when I grew up, as everyone else does.
But other people, who stopped believing in all the above characters, still believe in a magical sky daddy with an army of angels.
...
One day some older kids told me Santa wasn't real. So I asked my mother, and she must have thought I was old enough to know. She admitted that Santa wasn't real. I was devastated. I asked her if the Tooth Fairy was real, because I saw a similarity, and she admitted it was Dad and her. So I asked about the Easter Bunny, because it kind of seemed like the same thing. She said no; The Easter Bunny wasn't real either.
At this point I was crying, because I felt betrayed. I understood they were playing the roles for me, but I felt lied too. One other similar thing still bothered me. I asked Mom if God was real. She thought for a second and replied, "Yes, God is real." I sort of felt relieved and accepted her answer, but it was now with a great deal of caution. From that exchange with my mother, I now understood that 1)parent's lie about things, even if they do it out of love for you 2)if things don't appear to be real, they usually are not 3)if things sound too good to be true, they are likely to be false.
I didn't become an atheist that day, but believe me when I say a powerful seed had been planted. Clearly, I could not rely on adults for the truth. I would have to figure the God thing out on my own. But I was only 6. I would need to get more information, and develop more mature reasoning skills. Now being only 6, I didn't think of it in those terms. I just knew I needed to think really hard about it.
And so began a life of growing and searching trying to solve the puzzle. I enjoyed solving the puzzle. It took many many years, and while the question of a god's existence was never solved, I did come to understand that there was nothing credible anywhere that warranted a belief in a thing that sounded too good to be true, never left a trace of evidence for his existence, and was only relayed to me on the basis of authority and hearsay.
Quote from: Munch on October 20, 2014, 08:08:48 AM
The tooth fairy gave me money for a lost tooth. Father christmas gave me presents. The easter bunny gave me chocolate eggs.
I stopped believing this stuff when I grew up, as everyone else does.
But other people, who stopped believing in all the above characters, still believe in a magical sky daddy with an army of angels.
...
FEMA has a death camp with your name on it now..
Theists believe they are given freewill, and choose to believe in God, but never realize if they have freewill they can disbelieve in God. They are like small children, and need an authority figure like their parents were, to make decisions for them so they don't feel guilty, that is taught to them when they disobey and make the wrong decisions. God forgives them and removes the guilt reinforcing their belief in Him. The Catholic Church are experts at doing this with "Con"fessions.
So in essence this thread is about our obvious moral high ground we've had to climb up on to point our fingers of shame down upon the yearning masses..
Ye may be rich and own the bank or toil in a mine digging for coal, but cast thy eye always upon the donut and not upon the hole. :biggrin:
Somebody's got to take the high ground. The Christians are fucking it up.
If I was going to choose a believe system I certainly would not choose Christianity. It is a pretty bleak view of human existence.
Religious belief for the majority of people was never a real choice given the age when the "fear" was installed. Fear, as we all know is a very real motivator to little children who recognize they don't have answers to what they don't know and their parents do. Now with all that fear at night we add a persona protector and things can be calmed.
Many people will never get past the fear and the reciprocal protection religion offers. For most non-believers I would suggest that it took something rather powerful to get them to start thinking about the whole thing. For most it is the death, injury or illness of a loved one. "You told me god would protect us". Stock reply, we all know.
That is when choice becomes a real choice. I cannot say people choose to believe in a god when fear through ignorance has them wrapped to tightly to see beyond their own limits.
Remove fear and choices become much easier to those who cannot reason when stressed out about going to hell to burn fucking forever.
Ignorance removes choice. Now stupid, being stupid, knowing what one knows and still buying it, well....that's a whole other thing, but in the end, fear overcomes everything.
Quote from: aitm on October 21, 2014, 02:48:20 PM
For most non-believers I would suggest that it took something rather powerful to get them to start thinking about the whole thing. For most it is the death, injury or illness of a loved one. "You told me god would protect us". Stock reply, we all know.
For me, I don't think there was anything all that powerful. I'm not saying that isn't so for others, but just the strangeness of the whole Christian religion with an all powerful god that leaves no evidence of his presence, and the nonsense Bible stories of miracles reported only from hearsay. I thought hard about it, because if the God of the Bible were real, it would have rather important implications for humans, so it deserved an honest shot at verification.
Verification of God's existence always seemed like the necessary first step to me. Without verification of that specific issue, any further determination about god's will for us or descriptions of his exact nature would be a waste of time, and the more I tried to find verification (to no avail), the less I believed in God.
Not arguing, but the vast majority of believers are "hooked" at a very young age and for many, it takes some real shaking shit to get them to think about it. And even then, the process takes years.
Quote from: aitm on October 21, 2014, 07:00:02 PM
Not arguing, but the vast majority of believers are "hooked" at a very young age and for many, it takes some real shaking shit to get them to think about it. And even then, the process takes years.
yeah. environment and personality are important factors in all that, being raised in a theistic household, people are held down by it, but if they have the strength of will to find reason themselves it can work out in time. Infact I'm certain in many cases the reason why people become atheists is because of being raised by theistic parents, and it begins as a defiance against them.
Quote from: Munch on October 21, 2014, 07:41:05 PM
yeah. environment and personality are important factors in all that, being raised in a theistic household, people are held down by it, but if they have the strength of will to find reason themselves it can work out in time. Infact I'm certain in many cases the reason why people become atheists is because of being raised by theistic parents, and it begins as a defiance against them.
I was raised in a theistic extended family household. It was a mixed bag of beliefs. My grandmother was totally delusional. Half of her shit about religion came from the Bible, and half she just made up. My father followed her, but he had more respect for other Christian sects and even other religions. Indeed, he was of the attitude that what someone believed, even if it was sacred cows, was to be taken seriously, as somehow the belief was valid on the basis that it was a belief. My mother was the more level headed one in the household. She believed in God, but took a lot of the shit with a grain of salt.
I wonder about myself back then. I believed in God, but even in retrospect, I don't think I was ever 100% hooked. I always had nagging doubts, which I desperately wanted to get rid of. This may, as you have pointed out, been a logical reaction to some of my grandmother's and father's bizarre preoccupations with religion. I thought the only way out of doubt would be through more study of the issue and by somehow convincing myself. The study proved to be problematic, as it always seemed to undermine what I sought. The more I learned, the harder it was to accept.
It's like whatever innate psychological dynamic I came with, simply couldn't accept the miraculous. I could not force that square peg into the round hole no matter how hard I tried. For others, miracles, Bible stories, and tales of unknowable things fit quite well into their psychological make up. I'm hard pressed to explain why. They just don't seem to have a problem with accepting the illogical.