IndigoChild5559
Loving God and my neighbor as myself.
I'm going to speak in generalities, so realize that I acknowledge the exceptions to the rules.
We have two ways to reach truths. The older way is intuition, an instinctual gut level decision making that is great for survival, but makes a lot of errors. The newer way is reason, a very efficient way, but not always the quickest, best way, nor should it be the only way--by the time you reason it out, the predator has already killed you.
My thesis here is that belief systems are intuitive. I choose to use the word passion, because they involve so much emotion in most cases. Because they are passion rather than reason, they are impervious to rational arguments against them. This is why you don't often see people in forums converting to other religions or flipping sides. At best, we agree to disagree agreeably.
That doesn't mean we shouldn't try to have reasons for our beliefs. But lets be a little honest that at the core, we really aren't reasoning our way to them.
For example, a person doesn't become an Evangelical with a "born again" experience because they study the Bible first and evaluate the prophecies, and study the archaeological evidences for the validity of the Christian scriptures. Rather, they have problems with their lives, and intuit that this emotional experience will transform them, and they are almost always emotionally moved by an charismatic appeal to their heart. They continue in their faith for reasons of a passion for Jesus, not theological arguments.
What do you think of my theory?
We have two ways to reach truths. The older way is intuition, an instinctual gut level decision making that is great for survival, but makes a lot of errors. The newer way is reason, a very efficient way, but not always the quickest, best way, nor should it be the only way--by the time you reason it out, the predator has already killed you.
My thesis here is that belief systems are intuitive. I choose to use the word passion, because they involve so much emotion in most cases. Because they are passion rather than reason, they are impervious to rational arguments against them. This is why you don't often see people in forums converting to other religions or flipping sides. At best, we agree to disagree agreeably.
That doesn't mean we shouldn't try to have reasons for our beliefs. But lets be a little honest that at the core, we really aren't reasoning our way to them.
For example, a person doesn't become an Evangelical with a "born again" experience because they study the Bible first and evaluate the prophecies, and study the archaeological evidences for the validity of the Christian scriptures. Rather, they have problems with their lives, and intuit that this emotional experience will transform them, and they are almost always emotionally moved by an charismatic appeal to their heart. They continue in their faith for reasons of a passion for Jesus, not theological arguments.
What do you think of my theory?