Welcome to Gaia! ::

I flirt around with ED-M&R occasionally, not often but enough to notice something unusual. There are lots of threads there that either start out as "Why do you believe?" or boil down to that after a few pages, as well as the odd one that eventually doesn't belong because it concerns itself more with determinism or evolution, but those are rarer. In the case of the first, many people respond to "Why do you believe?" with the "I choose to believe because ______" form letter response.

Of course, because religious belief need not be based in fact or at all verifiable, due to the nature of religion, this response seems to be completely valid, and for the most part, I have no beef with everything that goes in the blank. However, I've been wondering as of late.

Is belief truly a choice?

I'm agnostic. I find the idea of god and the spirituality behind most religions to be ridiculous, but at the same time I recognize that affirming that god/s and religions are false cannot be done at this time, if ever, due to the lack of evidence and that this affirmation is equally ridiculous from a logical standpoint. Given who I am now, I do not believe because I have a complete absence of belief with regard to whether or not gods exist or religions are true. I can certainly profess to be a Christian or Pagan or Buddhist or what have you, but nothing I do can change the fact that I do not have belief. Even atheism and rejection of religion are technically belief (that of the untruth of theism and religion, respectively) but I lack even this. I cannot choose to believe. Telling others that I believe is deception and telling myself would, of course be self-deception.

It is, for example, similar to the case with myself and hamburger meat. I hate the taste of hamburger meat. I can choose to eat hamburger meat and I can choose to say "Mmm-MMM! This thoroughly processed hunk of what was once identifiable as bovine flesh sure tastes delicious!" but I can't choose to like the meat.

However, this may be just myself, and as is the case with all analogies, my comparison of belief in religion to the liking of hamburger meat is suspect. That is why I ask:

Is belief in religion truly a choice? If so, doesn't that mean that a person could easily choose to believe completely in Sikhism one day, but Islam the next, then Druidism the day after? Or am I missing out on some key aspect of choice or belief that would clarify why "I choose to believe" makes sense?

I think you might like a book called Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse. Actually, I think you should read my essay on Siddhartha that I posted in the writing sub forum of this guild. It talks about this. People can tell you to believe whatever they want. You come to your own actualization of what you believe on your own.

On a side note, I am spiritually Christian. I don't hold blind faith that the Bible is the word of God. Historical evidence shows Constantine the Great took all versions of Christianity together and made one comprehensive Christianity to unify their land. They all fought on what they were to believe in. The word of God? - Hardly. I do, however, believe in God and the Lord and my personal relationship with them rather than through the Bible. There is historical evidence that shows that Jesus could have existed and there is scientific evidence to support that he existed. I could go into a debate about it, but I feel like I am a little off topic.

Hmm... I think somewhere you have chosen to believe it. Then now no matter how much you try to not believe it, your prior logic surpasses it.

If you want proof for heaven, look up past life hypnosis. Yes, I believe in the Christian God and I believe in reincarnation biggrin

Point.
Although I have no idea what the hell that image is about.. eek

I look up the word habeeb in the urban dictionary. It means believe. So I guess it says "Believe it."

There is evidence to suggest that humans are inherently religious.

I read an article recently that described human nature as "duelist," meaning we believe and experience a distinct separation between the physical and the psychological. The physical is considered the body, and the psychological is considered the soul. This distinction allows us to believe that both the body and the soul can exist with and without each other. For example, a chair would be a soulles body, and a god would be a bodiless soul. Furthermore, this separation allows us to think that souls can continue to exist after their host body expires. From that, we get beliefs in an after life or reincarnation.

This duelism has been studied in infants, todlers, and other young children. Their behavior suggests that regardless of whatever they are taught at home, they still have the inherent belief of body and soul. Even if they do not believe or comprehend a god, they still comprehend the idea of an eternal soul, be it their own or some kind of deity.

But then, what about atheists? It's possible that atheists -- true atheists -- may be the result of some kind of genetic foul up. Or, it's possible that they have a certain ability to overcome the inherent duelist nature to the extent that they can renounce bodiless or eternal souls (i.e. gods).

I'm an atheist, and I feel as if my belief was inherent. Though I accepted God at first, I never truly felt a connection to God in any level that could be considered a belief or faith. So my personal belief is that belief is mostly inherent, but it can be changed. Some people become born-again religious people, other's abandon their religion. And others never really change.

I think to answer your question once and for all, however, there just needs to be more studies done on the matter. Studies that take into account all situations such as changing religion and belief, as well as what is inherent in children.