Do we choose our beliefs? (yes and no)

[Link]

I propose how we build our beliefs is up to us to some extent. That is we can build around standards that make us truth seekers.

(1) We can choose to build on clarity and clear proofs and not on shaky grounds.
(2) We can learn how to reason properly and become aware of our ways of thinking that lead us away from truth.
(3) We can funnel our seeking knowledge to reliable sources of information, if we attain skills to recognize who and what is a reliable source of information.
(4) We can asses who provides proofs and insights, and who is best in providing clear insights and proofs.
(5) We can use doubt to asses properly what we don't know at the same time not let us not build on what we should know and believe in with certainty.

That said, most people don't choose a lot of their beliefs, because they have not trained themselves to hold on to truth and leave falsehood and not mix the two. When you believe falsehood as much as truth, then you are a confused person, your faith on clarity is as strong as what is on ambiguity, and what you should be certain is true is built on what even might be what you should be certain of is false.

If we are truthful to ourselves, and this is hugest factor, we can asses what we really know and what we don't. But if we let our caprice choose what is true based on what it wants to be true, then we have no way of distinguishing falsehood from truth by those standards. We choose on whims.

And when you choose this way, yes, you don't chose to follow truth nor choose to follow falsehood, you simply chose to not be strong in pursuit of truth, which leads you to let go of holding on to truth, and in that case, your belief formations will seem chaotic as you don't build them on strong foundations.

So it's not that we choose to believe a particular belief, but we chose the factors on how to build knowledge. God is of course always there, and if we choose to not try to observe him, that's on us. If we throw out all spiritual vision, philosophy, knowledge of one self, out the window, and just want physical evidence, we might not find God.

So these are choices we make. And it's always a choice when presented with evidence and proofs to accept the evidence or proof or be stubborn. Stubbornness in face of proofs is also a choice.

 

[Spirit of Light]

Many people are born in to a religious family and gain the first taste of belief through their parents, but if the right conditions are there the child will be able to discover their own belief, it can be with in same religion as their parents, but they can also start investigate other religious teachings and some will convert to a new belief during their search. And some even become none believers in their search. But yes we often chooses our own belief

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

I propose how we build our beliefs is up to us to some extent. That is we can build around standards that make us truth seekers.

...

Well, I am a skeptic, so I seek false. What is left, is, what works. What that has to do with truth, I don't know, since I am a skeptic.
Regards
Mikkel

 

[SalixIncendium]

As I see it, one can choose a religion or spiritual path, one can choose to educate oneself or not, and one can choose to succumb to indoctrination or set out on their own journey. But one can't choose a belief; beliefs are inherent.

 

[Vichar]

Most people act with less volition than they think. Despite Western culture's emphasis on freedom and free will, what a person actually does is largely motivated by a pursuit of pleasure and the avoidance of pain. In a sense, we are like little biological robots, watching our lives but not actually living them. This only becomes apparent when a person is able to see themselves from the outside looking in.

The faith or philosophy one adopts for most of one's life is usually karmically determined. Where you are born, the parents you will have, the people you will meet are all part of your karmic plan, and so the starting line is pretty much set. It is a rare individual who is able to look beyond the path of least resistance and actually take a serious look at themselves and what they've been up to. Some refer to this as "waking up."

Waking up doesn't need to be some crazy esoteric thing. Consider this scenario: you are living life happily in the suburbs with 2.5 kids, a nice house, a loving spouse, and a stable job. On day you lose your job and your spouse leaves you and takes the kids with her. If you loved your family and they were your purpose for living, this could really be a catalyst to shock you into waking up (for a while at least). You may come to realize that there is more to life than just what your neighbors seemed to be valuing. (This scenario never happened to me personally, but I know people who went through this and it changed their outlook on life. We could easily use landing in prison, losing a loved one, or any manner of life's ups and downs as examples.)

I have only met a few thousand people in my life, and only around a hundred well enough to understand their life's trajectory. And of these people, I have no idea what hidden lives they might be leading. Still, from what I can see, they largely remain the same people with the same beliefs. Among my family, friends and acquaintances, many have changed careers, changed where they lived, and maybe even adopted a different life philosophy. Only a handful ever even considered changing their spiritual beliefs.

 

[Link]

There's more to it from my perspective. There is a dark sorcery that tries to make ambiguous of what is clear. To unlock clarity with respect to the signs of God, you need to fight and reflect. Choosing to fight and reflect is also a choice. Choosing to not fight and let the dark magic blind you your whole life is a choice, it's a choice not made on insight but a choice to be weak and let Iblis and his forces do what they want with us.

Fighting the lower self and the dark magic and the dark idol is a choice, and it's a choice if we strive for the sake of God.

 

[pearl]

So these are choices we make. And it's always a choice when presented with evidence and proofs to accept the evidence or proof or be stubborn. Stubbornness in face of proofs is also a choice.

But its not a one time choice, equally or more important is the choice to remain in the initial choice.

 

[Link]

But its not a one time choice, equally or more important is the choice to remain in the initial choice.

True!

 

[InvestigateTruth]

I propose how we build our beliefs is up to us to some extent. That is we can build around standards that make us truth seekers.

(1) We can choose to build on clarity and clear proofs and not on shaky grounds.
(2) We can learn how to reason properly and become aware of our ways of thinking that lead us away from truth.
(3) We can funnel our seeking knowledge to reliable sources of information, if we attain skills to recognize who and what is a reliable source of information.
(4) We can asses who provides proofs and insights, and who is best in providing clear insights and proofs.
(5) We can use doubt to asses properly what we don't know at the same time not let us not build on what we should know and believe in with certainty.

That said, most people don't choose a lot of their beliefs, because they have not trained themselves to hold on to truth and leave falsehood and not mix the two. When you believe falsehood as much as truth, then you are a confused person, your faith on clarity is as strong as what is on ambiguity, and what you should be certain is true is built on what even might be what you should be certain of is false.

If we are truthful to ourselves, and this is hugest factor, we can asses what we really know and what we don't. But if we let our caprice choose what is true based on what it wants to be true, then we have no way of distinguishing falsehood from truth by those standards. We choose on whims.

And when you choose this way, yes, you don't chose to follow truth nor choose to follow falsehood, you simply chose to not be strong in pursuit of truth, which leads you to let go of holding on to truth, and in that case, your belief formations will seem chaotic as you don't build them on strong foundations.

So it's not that we choose to believe a particular belief, but we chose the factors on how to build knowledge. God is of course always there, and if we choose to not try to observe him, that's on us. If we throw out all spiritual vision, philosophy, knowledge of one self, out the window, and just want physical evidence, we might not find God.

So these are choices we make. And it's always a choice when presented with evidence and proofs to accept the evidence or proof or be stubborn. Stubbornness in face of proofs is also a choice.

Certainly we choose our belief. No one else! Of course, the environment has its effects, but ultimately we are responsible for our belief. If it was not so, God would not held us responsible for our belief and actions! But it may not be that we directly choose our beliefs!
We choose to be a good person or not. We choose our deeds to be righteous or not. If we do good deeds, God will inspire us with the truth! Then we will have the true belief! If we are wrongful and unjust, God would seal our heart, so, we cannot understand and see the truth! Thus We will be misguided!

 

[Unveiled Artist]

I propose how we build our beliefs is up to us to some extent. That is we can build around standards that make us truth seekers.

(1) We can choose to build on clarity and clear proofs and not on shaky grounds.
(2) We can learn how to reason properly and become aware of our ways of thinking that lead us away from truth.
(3) We can funnel our seeking knowledge to reliable sources of information, if we attain skills to recognize who and what is a reliable source of information.
(4) We can asses who provides proofs and insights, and who is best in providing clear insights and proofs.
(5) We can use doubt to asses properly what we don't know at the same time not let us not build on what we should know and believe in with certainty.

That said, most people don't choose a lot of their beliefs, because they have not trained themselves to hold on to truth and leave falsehood and not mix the two. When you believe falsehood as much as truth, then you are a confused person, your faith on clarity is as strong as what is on ambiguity, and what you should be certain is true is built on what even might be what you should be certain of is false.

If we are truthful to ourselves, and this is hugest factor, we can asses what we really know and what we don't. But if we let our caprice choose what is true based on what it wants to be true, then we have no way of distinguishing falsehood from truth by those standards. We choose on whims.

And when you choose this way, yes, you don't chose to follow truth nor choose to follow falsehood, you simply chose to not be strong in pursuit of truth, which leads you to let go of holding on to truth, and in that case, your belief formations will seem chaotic as you don't build them on strong foundations.

So it's not that we choose to believe a particular belief, but we chose the factors on how to build knowledge. God is of course always there, and if we choose to not try to observe him, that's on us. If we throw out all spiritual vision, philosophy, knowledge of one self, out the window, and just want physical evidence, we might not find God.

So these are choices we make. And it's always a choice when presented with evidence and proofs to accept the evidence or proof or be stubborn. Stubbornness in face of proofs is also a choice.

What are our standards and criteria for truth in which our we judge whether our beliefs are true or not?

 

[Nimos]

I propose how we build our beliefs is up to us to some extent. That is we can build around standards that make us truth seekers.

(1) We can choose to build on clarity and clear proofs and not on shaky grounds.
(2) We can learn how to reason properly and become aware of our ways of thinking that lead us away from truth.
(3) We can funnel our seeking knowledge to reliable sources of information, if we attain skills to recognize who and what is a reliable source of information.
(4) We can asses who provides proofs and insights, and who is best in providing clear insights and proofs.
(5) We can use doubt to asses properly what we don't know at the same time not let us not build on what we should know and believe in with certainty.

That said, most people don't choose a lot of their beliefs, because they have not trained themselves to hold on to truth and leave falsehood and not mix the two. When you believe falsehood as much as truth, then you are a confused person, your faith on clarity is as strong as what is on ambiguity, and what you should be certain is true is built on what even might be what you should be certain of is false.

If we are truthful to ourselves, and this is hugest factor, we can asses what we really know and what we don't. But if we let our caprice choose what is true based on what it wants to be true, then we have no way of distinguishing falsehood from truth by those standards. We choose on whims.

And when you choose this way, yes, you don't chose to follow truth nor choose to follow falsehood, you simply chose to not be strong in pursuit of truth, which leads you to let go of holding on to truth, and in that case, your belief formations will seem chaotic as you don't build them on strong foundations.

So it's not that we choose to believe a particular belief, but we chose the factors on how to build knowledge. God is of course always there, and if we choose to not try to observe him, that's on us. If we throw out all spiritual vision, philosophy, knowledge of one self, out the window, and just want physical evidence, we might not find God.

So these are choices we make. And it's always a choice when presented with evidence and proofs to accept the evidence or proof or be stubborn. Stubbornness in face of proofs is also a choice.

Its impossible to distinguish truth from falsehood. Both are created through whatever information we hear or gather. So the only way to tell them apart is to put them to the test.

And that is how we decide to pursue truth over falsehood. However this doesn't come easy and unless one is critical and consistent in how they approach informations and beliefs and stick to a method for doing this, one will believe more falsehood than truth.

If a person doesn't demand evidence for their beliefs, then they are not seeking truth, nor are they consistent and definitely not critical either. They are bias and seek confirmation of what they already believe or want to believe is true.

 

[PureX]

I think that what we choose to accept as being "the truth" is based almost entirely on whatever proposed truth "works" for us in our experience of existence. Meaning that when we act on the presumption that "X" is true, and we get the expected/desired result, we then assume that "X" is true. We don't really know that "X" is true. All we really know is that presuming that "X" is true worked for us. And this is why so many of us have differing ideas about what is true and what isn't. What works for some of us some of the time may not work for all of us all of the time. So some of us will believe that "X" is true, while others of us will believe that it's not true even as both are basing their belief of their own experience of that proposed truth.

Our mistake is that we keep assuming that truth is universal, so that our experience of it should be everyone else's experience of it. But even though the truth may be universal, our experience of it is not. So we can't really know the truth. All we can know is OUR truth. (The truth from our individual experiential perspective.)

 

[Nakosis]

Well, I am a skeptic, so I seek false. What is left, is, what works. What that has to do with truth, I don't know, since I am a skeptic.
Regards
Mikkel

I agree. I tend to recognize/accept what I don't know. Areas I don't know much about, there's not much sense in investing a lot of belief. Unfortunately people make claims of knowledge when often it turns out they really don't know any more than you do.

Kind of weird how we can fool ourselves into believing we have knowledge. I suppose a lot of it comes from accepting without a critical evaluation of the claims made by others.

 

[Nimos]

Our mistake is that we keep assuming that truth is universal, so that our experience of it should be everyone else's experience of it. But even though the truth may be universal, our experience of it is not. So we can't really know the truth. All we can know is OUR truth. (The truth from our individual experiential perspective.)

It depends what you mean by your experience of truth?

If you mean that you like a certain piece of music, then I agree, that it is your experience of what truth is in regards to that. Why you like it etc, is probably not easy to explain, but you enjoy hearing it, so its good enough proof for you.

But in regards to things we can "argue" about and where we are not personally involved, we can put claims to the test ."Is the Earth flat?" We might fool ourselves to believe that it is, because we "choose" to not look at the evidence for each claim and compare them. But then we are no longer talking about how we experience truth, because that is easily shown to be false.

Furthermore, one ought to look at truth, when there is no obvious solution, as to what is reasonable to assume is true and what is not. Which is where staying sceptical and demanding proofs first, before jumping on the belief wagon, is the most reasonable position to take.

 

[PureX]

It depends what you mean by your experience of truth?

If you mean that you like a certain piece of music, then I agree, that it is your experience of what truth is in regards to that. Why you like it etc, is probably not easy to explain, but you enjoy hearing it, so its good enough proof for you.

But in regards to things we can "argue" about and where we are not personally involved, we can put claims to the test ."Is the Earth flat?" We might fool ourselves to believe that it is, because we "choose" to not look at the evidence for each claim and compare them. But then we are no longer talking about how we experience truth, because that is easily shown to be false.

Furthermore, one ought to look at truth, when there is no obvious solution, as to what is reasonable to assume is true and what is not. Which is where staying sceptical and demanding proofs first, before jumping on the belief wagon, is the most reasonable position to take.

Whether or not the Earth is flat, or spherical, depends on whether or not the proposal of it's "true nature" works according to one's experience of existence. Humans believed the Earth was flat for a long time because that presumption of truth worked experientially for them, for a very long time. Very recently, though, most humans have changed that belief and now presume the "true nature" of the Earth to be spherical, because that's the proposed "truth" that now works best for us, given our new technologies and experience of it. But in the future, we humans may well adopt a new concept of the Earth's "true nature' based on a conception that will work better for us via some new technological or intellectual interface with existence on the Earth. So which "Earth-truth" is the true truth? All of them, and none of them. Because we don't know the Earth's truth. We can only know our conceptualized experience of the Earth, as our "Earth-truth".

 

[Mock Turtle]

As I see it, one can choose a religion or spiritual path, one can choose to educate oneself or not, and one can choose to succumb to indoctrination or set out on their own journey. But one can't choose a belief; beliefs are inherent.

From birth?

 

[Mock Turtle]

There's more to it from my perspective. There is a dark sorcery that tries to make ambiguous of what is clear. To unlock clarity with respect to the signs of God, you need to fight and reflect. Choosing to fight and reflect is also a choice. Choosing to not fight and let the dark magic blind you your whole life is a choice, it's a choice not made on insight but a choice to be weak and let Iblis and his forces do what they want with us.

Fighting the lower self and the dark magic and the dark idol is a choice, and it's a choice if we strive for the sake of God.

Do you not ever think that you might be stuck in your religious belief system?

 

[sun rise]

@Vichar laid out a viewpoint very much like my own. I'll just add a bit.

People learn their family's and culture's beliefs and most accept them unthinkingly. And most never question what they absorbed from the culture or taught by their parents etc.

And scenarios like @Vichar illustrated do indeed happen when someone is shaken out of a rut by trauma or have experiences like near death.

But sometimes it can happen in a flash perhaps much more often in the East. For example:

..., Tukaram awoke early one morning, as was his habit. His wife and children still slept soundly inside his little, grass-roofed house. He stood up, and tied a large red cloth about his waist, as he did every day, to serve as underwear.

When he narrated this to me for the first time in the early 1990s, “Mo” paused here a moment and then said, “And then it happened like that!” and sharply snapped his fingers.
-“What was it that happened?” I asked.

“I became a deva!” he said.
-“What did you do then?” I asked.
He told me that he had then stretched both his arms directly up above his head; he stood to show me how he had remained standing, dazed and ecstatically entranced in that position, clad only with underwear, in his hut for about 12 days.

 

[Revoltingest]

My beliefs are thrust upon me by that ultimate trickster....
That unrelentingly mysterious & misleading reality thingy.

 

[SalixIncendium]

From birth?

Yes. Beliefs are a product of experience. But they are inherent.

I’m not saying beliefs are not subject to change based on new information, but I don’t think one can simply make a choice to decide, “today, I’m going to stop believing in Santa” or “today I will start believing that God created the earth” without some sort of catalyst to precipitate that change.