Although I have to say, the adage that “you can’t reason a man out of beliefs he hasn’t reasoned himself into” always struck me as a load of cobblers. Growing up is, to me, a process of discovering that what you always believed was true ain’t necessarily so. But I’m sure it gets harder as you get older.
Serious question: what difference does it make if your beliefs are untrue, as long as you live a relatively long, productive and enjoyable life?
William,
1. The two aren’t uncorrelated. False beliefs tend to interfere with living a long, productive and enjoyable life.
2. Truth can be an end in itself. For many of us, acquiring true beliefs can be a source of great satisfaction even when they don’t yield practical benefits.
3. In my experience, truth tends to be more interesting than the falsehoods and woo typically on offer.
keiths said:
Can you support this contention with any research?
People who have false beliefs can feel quite satisfied that they have acquired true beliefs, even if they are in error. So, the truth value of the belief doesn’t really matter as far as getting a sense of satisfaction that you have acquired a true belief.
If “finding a belief interesting” is a criteria for adopting a belief, then false beliefs can be as good as true ones depending on the person.
It doesn’t appear you’ve provided a particular value distinction, unless you can provide some research to prop up #1. And, even then, that avoids my question.
This cartoon is just a attempt of someone to complain about others not changing their views.
People change their views all the time.
The protestant reformation happened very quickly with changing the convictions of Northern Euro Catholics. no big deal.
Creationism expects to move tens of millions to our side . Not that hard once audiences are reached.
its true that conclusions about invisible things don’t come from mere normal investigation with sight and so more error prone.
So less likely to be reasoned away by someone else.Yet reason does work.
It seems t me you can get all of the same value from false beliefs (given you live a relatively long, productive and enjoyable life) that you can from true beliefs as long as you believe your false beliefs to be true 🙂
People who have false beliefs about whether it is safe to cross the road tend to finish up as road kill.
Neil Rickert,
That is sort of what Christians say about atheists isn’t it?
Ask a designer if true beliefs about the properties of materials are important.
I’m not convinced that true beliefs about Xenu are important.
It would appear that acquiring true beliefs is important to the extent that it is important. If you will be killed for expressing certain beliefs, that’s important.
The human population has increased in proportion to the expansion of science and technology.
Not a lot.
But “believing” the right things in science (scare quotes there because “believe” isn’t really really how scientific conclusions are held) is what generates new, and often useful, discoveries. In fact, “useful” is a better word than “right” for the validity of a scientific “belief”.
Until it kills you, or other people. Anti-vaxxers are killing people right now.
William,
Your given isn’t a given.
Consider two Minnesota farmers, Farmer John and Farmer Bill. Farmer John understands all of the principles of good farming. He knows when to plant and when to harvest, how to control pests and improve yields. He understands soil health and knows when to rotate his crops. He picks crop varieties that are appropriate to the local soil and climate. He has accumulated a nice cash reserve to sustain him through the occasional bad year.
Meanwhile, Farmer Bill, known to the locals as “Mind Powers”, just started farming last year after quitting his job as a drug store manager. Farmer Bill thinks he can make a big profit growing sugar cane in Minnesota, and he’s convinced that the only thing standing between him and a big payout is his intention — that is, he thinks he can “manifest” a reality in which sugar cane thrives in Minnesota and makes him a very rich man.
Which of these two farmers is more likely to be successful, and why?
I seem to recall a study showing that orthodox Jews are more at risk of traffic accidents as they really do believe god will protect them.
I believe that abortion is a sin and only men and women can marry. I’m in charge of you via the mechanism of government.
Enjoy your life, woman forced to carry a baby and man/woman who cannot marry who they desire.
Neil said:
Do you have reading comprehension issues, Neil? Did you miss the whole “…as long as you live a relatively long, productive and enjoyable life?” part of my question?
I’ll take that to mean you have no research to back up your “difference”, which doesn’t really even address the question I posed.
Well, at least EL sorta answered the question:
wiith the added caveat about “usefulness”.
EL, you seem to think that people should believe “useful” things. If it is more useful, then, to believe X than Y, does it matter which one is “true”? IOW, which matters more – true beliefs, or useful beliefs? Also, useful towards what end? I’m assuming you mean useful towards whatever end suits the individual?
I wonder what the state of the world would be now if you took science out of the equation? Would the world be overpopulated? Would we have weapons of mass destruction? Would the state of the global climate and ecology be what it is today? One might wonder, in evolutionary terms, which beliefs would actually serve mankind and the world we live in better – supposedly true scientific beliefs, or perhaps more superstition and less reason? It’s hard to put nuclear bombs together or create landfills full of toxic, trashed technology without science. Just something to consider when you think of “useful” beliefs vs “true” beliefs”.
Is it useful to think of a die as fair, or is it true?
William J. Murray,
Mmmm. Hard to feed large numbers or perform much medicine too. Of course, doing these things creates as many problems as it solves – something a certain Mr Malthus noticed.
Still, if you believe it doesn’t matter if your beliefs are true, you are automatically right, even if that belief is wrong.
Well, Allan, that doesn’t really answer my question, it just avoids it. I’m asking you and others here that given a relatively long, enjoyable and productive life, does it matter if your beliefs are true or false? If so, how so?
Bolding mine.
Could you provide me with a single true scientific belief? Science does not deal with truth or belief. And it most certainly does not deal with Truth. Religion is the only institution that looks at these terms as absolutes. Scientists may often use these terms but not in the religious sense. Whenever anyone uses terms like self-evident, it is obvious that… and Truth, you know that you are dealing with someone who is not willing to change their perspective on something. They are preaching, not debating, as we often see with Barry.
No.
I realized that you were asking “If the false belief doesn’t have any bad consequences, then does it have any bad consequences.”
Following the principle of charity and the site rules, I concluded that you could not have intended to be that stupid or dishonest. So I responded with an example of bad consequences from having false beliefs.
Yea right, I am sure you have insight into all the independent science.
I wonder how wildebeests have a managed all these years without vaccines?
Its skeptics who are doing all the killing-by letting big pharma decide what medicine we should eat, by letting big Agro fill our food supply with antibiotics, by letting Monsanto stuff us with pesticides and GMO’s, by letting the health care companies and insurance companies decide what is a cost efficient way to let some people die, by letting Donald Rumsfeld decide how safe aspartame is, based on how many millions they pay him, by letting big chemical companies decide how much will it cost them to give cancer to ten percent of the population, if they can sell enough dioxin.
Thanks a lot skeptics, you are some of the biggest murderers on the planet.
Question for skeptics: How many monkeys can you kill with aspartame?
Answer: How much will you pay me?
And yet the average life span keeps increasing.
Nobody is arguing that there are not risks involved in what you have listed. The question is whether or not they are manageable risks.
Here’s are a couple questions for you Phoodoo.
1) If we developed a vaccine that could prevent cancer, would you support it?
2) If we developed a vaccine that could prevent STDs, would you support it?
Acartia,
For wildebeests or humans?
Phoodoo, are you avoiding the question? OK, I will make it simple for you. For humans.
Oh right. Because Wildebeests don’t have health insurance, and can’t pay.
Well, it depends, do I have to rely on Pfizer, and Donald Rumsfeld and Steven Novella to tell me if its safe?
Won’t someone think of the wildebeests?
Neil, to William:
Yep. And the answer to William’s question is ‘no’, of course. If we lived in a world where we were magically protected from any negative consequences of our beliefs, then it wouldn’t matter if they were true or false.
No one lives in such a world, including William.
William J. Murray,
It matters to me, so yes. Why? because I am interested in what is, so far as I can determine it. I could believe that moths regularly fly to the moon, but I’d rather know if, in fact, moths regularly fly to the moon. I suspect they don’t, but could be persuaded otherwise.
In my family, we have what we call the Woody Allen* medical report. The latest (and sketchiest) medical news, most of which will eventually be reversed or fade into the woodwork. Foodoo could be the anchorman for the Woody Allen Report.
*A reference to the movie, Sleeper.
So, another question: if a true belief makes you miserable and less productive for the rest of your life, and a false one would have the opposite effect, which would you personally prefer?
Neil said:
Nope, that’s not even remotely what I asked. However, you’re certainly under no obligation to answer the question I actually ask.
What?
Kook Koncept Kluster.
Lizzie:
You forgot some punctuation:
petrushka:
Donald Rumsfeld made you say that.
What actual difference does it make? Nobody (apart from you) holds beliefs they know to be false. If they knew them to be false they are by definition not being held any more (apart from for you).
And as you seem to be doing questions and expecting answers here’s one – fair die possible – Y/N?
They’ve managed. Just as human beings managed before the discovery of vaccination. But they managed a lot better after . Today, we don’t see rows of patients trapped in the ventilators nicknamed “iron lungs” because they’ve been paralyzed by the poliomyelitis virus. Prayer didn’t put a stop to that, vaccines did.
I wonder how many of the executives of those companies, including Rumsfeld, would loudly and firmly proclaim their religious beliefs if pressed? It wasn’t so long ago that you couldn’t get a job, much less get elected to public office, if you admitted to being agnostic or atheist in parts of the US. If there have been bad decisions by individuals and companies, and I’m not denying that there have, you could argue that the people making them were more likely to be believers than skeptics. People are fallible. They can be corrupted by wealth and power whatever their professed beliefs,
The enslavement and near-genocidal policies pursued by European colonists against the native peoples of North and South America, Africa, Australia and New Zealand were practiced by people who held themselves to be good Christians. You don’t get to make skeptics scapegoats for the sins of all humanity. The seeds of racism and bigotry are in all of us. It’s those who believe themselves to be above such things that are the most dangerous.
How many monkeys or rodents or human beings have actually been killed by aspartame? How many people have actually been harmed by GMOs? Crops which a large and growing number of people depend on for food can be decimated by pests. What is the safe level of the pesticides that can protect them and prevent mass starvation? Given that all these things are dangerous in the wrong amounts – there ain’t no such thing as absolutely safe – what is the acceptable level of risk? Who would you trust to give you an honest answer? How would you actually decide because someone has to do it?
Aspartame is so 15 minutes ago. It’s gluten now, unless its 15 minutes has passed.
Everyone really needs to keep with the latest food quackery.
Antibiotics are a problem because of evolution. Does phoodoo’s opposition to antibiotics mean he believes in evolution?
Edited for typos.
Sending extra chemtrails (gay ones!) to Phoodoo’s house.
William J. Murray,
What beliefs did you have in mind? (he asked innocently)
Allan Miller,
IIRC, Star Trek: The Original Series provided the definitive answer to WJM’s little conundrum in the first season opening two-parter “The Menagerie”
Thank you, Richardthughes!
Could you send some my way, too? We could use a lot more gayitude in my little town, and I’m tired of having to indoctrinate the neighbors one by one. An aerosol attack would be just the thing!
Argument from utility, not truth.
Since science is in the construction business, we won’t ask architects if things are true; only if they will not collapse under pressure.
If you want to know what is true, as yourself.
keiths,
William is right.
Actually studies have shown that religious people live longer lives.
How do we know?
Googlefu.
What is most interesting is that religious people have a better track record for discovery.
Creationists do science better, whowudathunk??!!
But then, there it is.
Desirability trumps verifiability.
So a teleological creation explanation trumps a skeptical evolutionary explanation.
Now THAT is the way the world works.
Not too shabby.
Steve:
Steve,
We are talking about the consequences of false beliefs. Good of you to concede that religious beliefs fall into that category, but probably not what you intended.
Now normalize for relative population size. whodidntthunk?
Could you explain what you are referring to here?
Do they? What science have *you* done then?
No, it wouldn’t be. Just as it was not a delusional belief to think that because your wife didn’t drown when you put her in a ducking stool, she must have been a witch.
It would be delusional now, but wasn’t in a era when it was a perfectly reasonable thing to think, given that it was held by most people.
It is not irrational to assume that what most people seem to think is probably right. Often it isn’t, but it’s a useful working assumption. If people are running out of a building, shouting “FIRE!” it’s a good idea to assume that they are right, even if you have no independent evidence.
It could well turn out to be a hoax, or a movie set, or simply a cascading error.
But in general, in the absence of evidence to the contrary, it’s often pragmatic to go with what other people apparently are finding reasonable.
Allan Miller,
It’s just a general question I asked myself a long time ago after I became an atheist/materialist. I realized then that my search for true beliefs was grounded in a theistic/spiritual perspective – that’s when I gave it up. So, I wonder why other atheists/materialist care whether or not their beliefs are true, as long as their beliefs aid in them living live the way they would prefer.
IOW, what i hear a lot of is that “it matters if my beliefs are true or not because …..” fill in the blank, usually stuff like “true beliefs are better at predicting future events” or “true beliefs are better at keeping me safe” or “true beliefs are better at getting from point A to point B”. But, if false beliefs were better at all of those things, I run across few atheists who will agree that they’d then rather have false beliefs.
As if getting through life with true beliefs rather than false beliefs somehow “matters” at the end more than increased enjoyment/productivity. You might say that it matters to you, but that’s the question: why does it matter to you that you toughed it out without the crutches or soothing relief of false beliefs?
I asked myself that as an atheist/materialist and realized – it didn’t really matter to me; at the end I was going to be non-existent and eventually nobody would care and the history of my existence gone. Why make life potentially harder on myself by regulating myself to only adopting what I thought were true beliefs? It didn’t make any sense to me at the time, and it still doesn’t make any sense to me now.