Does Belief Require Choice?

This article dives into the philosophy of belief and how it can go full circle with belief supporting other beliefs.

This is an article for the purpose that the reality many people know as true may not be the way they think it is when it comes to career and jobs experiences. Or maybe certain individuals know what their experiences are telling them, but they ignore those experiences, believing that there is nothing to do to change it for those it does not work for. For instance, I need a job to survive, even as a means to an end, and there is not anything I can do change the system of the world we live in and even if there was a way, the system works for me now and always has so who cares – system in terms of automated and man-made processes. With this example, it is apparent that type of person doesn’t care about those who don’t have jobs due to the system limitations, as if the system cannot affect their life in the future. The person would care if it began to affect them though, wouldn’t they?

Changing beliefs to support what our experiences are showing us or who we desire to become in the future is the only path to eventual peace of mind and/or fulfilling purpose. Otherwise, we would continue to gamble with our life experiences, assuming that it will always continue to support our current beliefs. Supporting who we currently are is not the only purpose of experience though. That is if we are desiring evolution and growth of ourselves.

Let’s dive into a basic understanding of belief. Here are a few definitions of the word belief to start with.

1. Something that is accepted, considered to be true, or held as an opinion.
2. A state or habit of mind in which trust or confidence is placed in some person or thing.

I understand there are two avenues of these definitions too. The first is more focused on belief with yourself and the second more focused on belief in others, which leads to trust. For the sake of this article, we focus on the foundational philosophy and logic of belief first.

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Belief Logic Breakdown

We can see in these definitions, truth and trust is a part of their meaning; truth of the information for said belief or trust in another who provided information about said belief. Now let’s consider the duality of data (information and misinformation) and how it can represent a particular truthful value. 

Let’s say we have 3 pieces of information, denoting as i, that support a belief, which will be denoted as, b. 

b = Belief someone has.

1. i1 = Information proving statement of belief
2. i1 = Information proving statement of belief
3. i1 = Information proving statement of belief

To start, let’s understand belief by knowing the difference between believing in something as opposed to not believing in the same thing. One can believe in anything (b), and that thing is the focus of the belief. If one gets too far into the rabbit hole while trying to prove something that is not believed, I do not believe in fairies, then any piece of information can support the non-belief, i.e., that isn’t a fairy that is this species instead because of x, y, and z. With the belief I believe in fairies, the information must be specific to fairies, or at the very least the conclusion of the information must be specific to fairies, i.e., that is a fairy because of x, y, and z, which are the requirements for one being a fairy.

The importance of this distinction is why would someone care about disproving another individual’s belief in something? Why would someone care about disproving another individual’s non-belief in something?

Even further, to believe in something, it is important to focus on the belief of something’s existence, not the belief of something’s inexistence. Anything could prove something doesn’t exist because it is not experienced for the person that doesn’t experience its existence. In other words, someone who believes in fairies has experience and information to cause that belief, just as the person who doesn’t believe in fairies has experience and information to cause that belief.

So that brings forth the question, is the information that supports a belief also believed?

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Notation Example

Let’s try an example with the notation.

1. i1: Jesus existed and died for people’s sins.
2. i2: The universe was created by something instead of nothing. 
3. i3: There is a divide between good and evil, and while subjectivity in experience is present, it is not in morality.

Someone has truth and/or trust in this belief that God exists. 

But wait. What if information is shown to this believer in such a way that causes doubt. What happens then? Let’s say:

1. i4: Someone claims that the Bible is purely fiction and there is no way to prove any of the text like we can with science. 
2. i5: A well-known textual source claims that the Big Bang didn’t need a creator for it to come from nothingness because of information presented in Quantum Physics.
3. i6: A credible professional in the religious field claims that there is no divide between good and evil and that subjectivity is shown with morals all the time given all the commandments in the Bible can have cases where they are acceptable.

Those are all reasons to not believe in God’s existence (or to believe in a different type of God), therefore the person who believes God exists has also decided to at least partially believe the information itself, i1, i2, and i3, to support their belief instead of believing in information that contradicts it, i4, i5, and i6. We can then start to think about belief in terms of percentage at this point, where b is believed with 100% certainty and the information that supports or contradicts b is less than 100% certainty, i.e., thoughts and feelings about b. If there is information that is believed with 100% certainty, the same process laid out in this article can apply to that belief too. As an example, i1 could be a 70% believed, i2 could be a 95% believed, and i3 could be 100% believed.

We can think of the thought and feeling percentages for the information of b independently as well, but this is getting to a deeper level of understanding of belief not requiring belief, so I’ll leave this for another time.

Also, if we consider an atheist perspective being relevant to i4, i5, and i6, then we can think of the creator they believe in is nothingness. They may focus on the belief in no creator instead, but then this gets into why they choose to focus on the lack of a creator instead of believing in one.

I’ll make it clear too that the same information, i1, i2, and i3, that’s experienced to support God’s existence could also support someone believing God does not exist because another thing is the creator instead. Just as the seemingly opposing information, i4, i5, and i6, that’s experienced to doubt in God’s existence could also support believing God exists.

That is another way to look at nature of choosing to believe in something or not. Of course, the first step is: why do you believe in the information you do when it comes to core beliefs you have? If you don’t know, then perhaps dive into the why when it comes to the belief itself because starting with supportive information helps with clarity; be sure that the belief and the information supporting it you are choosing instead of someone else you know or love. Also be sure that the information doesn’t contradict your belief though feelings too, and if you feel as if it does, then you are likely not seeing information or haven’t experienced something that the belief requires in order to belief in it.

To summarize, the information that supports a specific belief can either be thoughts, feelings, or beliefs that support or contradict the belief of focus. I understand that is a lot to take in, but in essence, that is what was laid out.

Last choice to consider here: There are two paths one can take when it comes to their choice of beliefs.

1. One believes the belief itself matters more than being right to others.
2. One believes being right to others matters more than the belief itself.

Notice what I did there? Does believing in being right overweight the belief that one decides is theirs? Does the belief of being right require belief or is it separate from it?

Either way, this choice with every belief you currently believe creates your past, present, and future. And yes, that is my belief.