The difference between a belief and a theory is no one was ever burned at the stake disagreeing about a theory.
In my view, beliefs are important. To me, a person is built from their beliefs.
Beliefs are mutable and can change for all sorts of reasons, at all sorts of speeds, and in all sorts of ways. They’re not permanent, but I do think they’re fundamental to the character of a person.
People do that. Like kids talking about their favorite baseball team. The same focus on things that move them to the core, while having no effect on to their life apart the place they willingly give them.
if a belief is a model/theory/assumption that a person will not change regardless of evidence against it, it is by definition a delusion.
If a belief is an opinion, it is a personal statement. Statements like “Vim is the best IDE” are really conveying the information “I prefer Vim over all others IDEs” which is a true statement.
If a belief is a hypothesis then the person holding it will accept if it ends up being wrong.
Only in the first and second cases do people usually place importance on their beliefs, and typically, only the first case leads people to harm others or themselves with no way to convince them to stop.
To generalize it, I’d call a belief “an idea that you are attached to”. And it bears upon your more general blob of beliefs, thoughts, memories, etc accordingly. Like a constant among variables in the midst of an algorithm.
The word for established assumptions is “axioms”
Definitions are kind of the most fundamental axioms. Abstracting things helps us build with them and they’re true because you say they are.
We use axioms in models to derive new theorems/information. But that is often what makes us resist changing them. If you build your other assumptions on an axiom, you have to rethink all those assumptions or even throw them out when it gets proven wrong.
However, attachment to a belief, holding to an assumption even when it’s been proven wrong, is called “delusion” and yeah those beliefs tend to be the most destructive
Yeah, of course they do. They literally form the cornerstone of your worldview. If you change someone’s beliefs, you change how they see the world. That sounds pretty damn big and important.
Cornerstones, my ASS. Beliefs are just goofy fiction. I believe you’re wearing fruit as a hat. Nobody gives a shit. Nobody should ever give a shit. It’s not a cornerstone of my life, it’s a fleeting nothing, based on nothing, worth nothing.
Some asshole taught you that beliefs are everything? They lied. You know what IS everything?
Fucking everything is! Matter, energy, reality, facts, - that’s what’s important. You believe you can walk on the Sun? “Fuck you” - Reality.
So why are beliefs so important for ao many people then?
I mean sure, maybe it’s just indoctrination.
Or maybe it’s utility. Believing a nice scientific model or car repair manual can deliver definite advantages.
Or maybe it’s habit. I’m stuck in my head so arranging my mental furniture becomes important.
Or something else
So why are beliefs so important for ao many people then?
They’re a coping mechanism.
Reality often sucks, so how do you go about your day knowing that so many suffer so many injustices every day? Easy! Just ignore them and pretend like everyone will get what’s coming to them in the afterlife 👍
It’s the perfect system for tyrants: Think I’m a monster who abuses my power and intentionally makes people suffer? Well, if you even try to do anything about it you’re going to hell! Overthrowing an openly evil government is not what Jesus would do!
It’s the same mental gymnastics that people use when they blame minorities for their problems. It’s not me or my beliefs (about the world) that are wrong! It’s those trans furry kids and immigrant invaders who are destroying the very concept of everything I believe in!
It can also be a tool.
For example, the model for gravity is just a useful fiction. But it’s useful. And it being constantly useful like that, one becomes attached to it.
Nietzsche would be proud 🥲
Why does it get that special role of “cornerstone”.
You have a thousand things in your perspective. Sights, sounds, vibes, random thoughts… Why does belief get this special treatment?
I think by cornerstone, they are referencing that beliefs are assumptions that form one’s model of the world.
You think by logically building on assumptions. “I remember putting leftovers in the fridge last night, so I don’t need to make dinner tonight” You assume your memories are accurate (or accurate enough) and then build on other things you “know” to construct every thought.
Sights, sounds, and vibes are a different story. They are called qualia and the raw experience of them cannot be described.
Think of qualia like the raw data you collect from an experiment. Your worldview is the scientific model you’ve built to describe this data and it rests on both fundamental logic and the beliefs/theories you currently believe in.
Unfortunately people don’t like having to change their worldview. And when you’ve held a belief for long enough, it becomes foundational to many of your other assumptions. Some people would rather say reality is wrong than change their beliefs.
The word for a belief that cannot be changed via evidence is called a “delusion” in case you ever want to piss off a religious person who says “nothing can shake my faith” like it’s a good thing.
Sounds like the idea of “belief” is just being accepted as a religious or spiritual idea. Beliefs are the cornerstone because it’s a tool we use every single day.
At the center of how we think is the fundamental idea of The Way Things Work and that comes down to how we believe the physical things around us will act and react. Just about everyone will start making a choice by comparing what we know to be real or true for ourselves and the things around us.
That cornerstone of belief is what we use to define “real and true”. Ghosts or spirits are absolutely real and true for some people while others don’t see the same evidence.
Beliefs get the special treatment because we are a collection of our experiences and each one of us has a different way of understanding how things work.
Ahhh. Yes, they are thinking religion. I didn’t think they’d lunge that way. I mean, with all the politics and gender stuff around these days, I figured the term would bee seen as broader. A wider range of options.
That said. Meh. Your thesis sums to “beliefs are important because beliefs are important”.
Well, they are.
They define one’s view of the world, your paradigm.
That depends on the person.
You perceive a thousand things. Sights, sounds, nameless feelings… as well as beliefs.
One can be guided by any of that. And one can treat any of that as central.
Whether or not one treats one’s beliefs as centrally important appears to be a matter of preference or perspective. Or something .
My dogma defines my in-group, and my in-group can’t be wrong because then that would mean that I am wrong, which I categorically can’t be. And even if I was wrong, then I would no longer be part of my in-group. Therefore, your science and logic and proof must be wrong if it contradicts my dogma.
Okay, but what about your catma? Does that define your naptimes and your need to make people believe that you must’ve meant to smash your face into the table leg after darting through the house?
Sure, but don’t even ask about my ligma
Your ma has lots of experience and wisdom in this regards.
Whatever the case, just make sure you keep your catma inside so it doesn’t get run over by your karma.
Ah, so it’s a narrative control thing. Controlling the narrative (including the narrative of me, my ego or whatever) is important.
Well this begs another question. “Why is the narrative so important”?
I mean, we stand in the midst of a constant hurricane of sights, sounds, thoughts, vibes and nameless sensations, but the narrative gets this primary role.
You gotta ask why.
Judging by all the vaguely hostile comments, you seem to have struck a chord here.
Well that’s a terrible truth.
Beliefs lead to actions. Actions affect others. It’s not super complicated.
Lots of things lead to actions. Feelings, habits, inertia, inspiration… Beliefs are not special in this.
Yes and I believe this isn’t really a showerthought
So defensive. I believe that I have struck paydirt.
In the wrong community
Defensive? Now who’s stooping to insults because someone doesn’t believe in your belief?
Because everything we can say about reality is through the human perspective and the construct of language. We believe that this can yield us truths. But its just a belief. Our human-ness might just as well blind us to what is actually true. And as such, most of everything we think we know is based on belief. There is no escaping this problem.
Ahh, now that’s an interesting idea. Beliefs are important because they are communicable. So belief gains weight from its social significance. As society is powerful then so are beliefs.
So a man outside society, a hermit, might find his beliefs falling away.
Yes. And also explains why worldviews are so different between cultural, linguistical and geographically different groups of people.
Even though we’re becoming more and more unified, through the internet, through logic systems like maths or science in general. This is not to be mistaken for truth. Western scientific ideology specifically has as unspoken ‘truth’ that when ideas ‘win’, they are more valuable. While English, our logical rules, our ideologies are winning not because they are true but because they are believed more, or over, other languages, logic systems and ideologies.
Ofcourse these systems of beliefs create opportunities and knowledge for people. Don’t mistake my dismissal of truth for disaproval.
To some people it is.
All I know is that nobody knows shit.
If you don’t know shit you need to eat some real food!
Nonetheless we definitely get attached to certain ideas. For various reasons.
But more than that, getting attached to certain ideas (believing stuff) is widely considered to be normal, right, healthy and necessary.
So you gotta ask why that is.
You definitely assumed that the message you typed could be understood by a random stranger and be delivered through a series of wires and rocks that can think, and possibly sent over magical waves which cannot be seen. Maybe it’s all just your or my imagination.
What does that imply? I want the complete statement here.
You believe in something that you cannot see.
Believe in yourself - if nothing else.
So you stand for nothing? You’ve no values? I mean, I guess one doesn’t need to have an ideology to be a hedonistic, consumerist pig, lol, it would get in the way!
Please, go on. You seem to be having a perfectly nice conversation with yourself here.
I mean, I assumed you didn’t believe beliefs were fundamental and important since your whole post consists of being shocked by it, lol. Don’t retreat now, silly man.
Your thesis so far consists entirely of trite accusations. You got something with more substance?
Thesis? Substance? Do you hold any beliefs, are there any value systems or ideas you appreciate greatly and by which you live by? Or don’t you? Cause if you do, then your initial post is either a bad attempt at comedy or, idk, a social faux pas? Regardless, it’s false, cause you do understand how beliefs are important. And if you don’t, then why do you care? Why did you act out when I said values and ideas get in the way of hedonism and consumerism? It’s not your case, right? That would be shameful, but whatever. And if it is, then at least admit to it the same way you ‘admitted’ not to understand the importance of beliefs, or else it’s double shameful and a certain sign of a silly man.
This asshole thinks that religions and beliefs stop people from being hedonistic, consumerist pigs. lololololol.
You brought religion into this, and your sophist insults.
Sounds like someone has a belief and is upset it’s being exposed.
How do you think you pass over riches, drugs, sex, etc that you can easily acquire one way or another? You don’t cheat on your wife because of your beliefs, you don’t do coke because of your beliefs, you don’t undercut your employees because of your beliefs, etc etc. There literally isn’t any other way to curtail your hedonistic impulses (and other impulses, ofc) but to BELIEVE in something, a sentence or a group of sentences that resound within you at least, that tells you “no, it’s okay, I can hold it in cause if not I’ll regret it later”. It’s either that or, idk, locking yourself up in a room? 😅
Wait, what?? Are you guys walking around holding back a savage animal through raw force of will?
Like…I’ve done lots of things I regret, but then later I don’t want to do them anymore, because I know it’ll feel bad
I dunno, I’d say people do things like coke, cheat, etc, because of beliefs.
They have a belief that “it doesn’t matter”.
But yea, our beliefs, our paradigms, are what help us be better people to each other.
Hell, science is founded on the belief that the universe is rational, that “God does not play dice with the universe”.
Studying quantum mechanics makes me wonder otherwise. Nothing about it is rational. Not to say I don’t operate on a day-to-day basis that the underlying framework makes sense, what other choice do we have?
