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This is the Only Truth

Page history last edited by Paul Hazelden 2 years, 11 months ago

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This is the Only Truth

 

Introduction

The initial content of this page was taken from an online discussion.  The original question was: how important is it to avoid claiming that my belief system is the only right belief system?

 

 

Initial Response

To fully answer that question probably needs a deeper analysis of what we mean by 'belief' and 'belief system' than we have space for here. But as a starting point ...

 

If you believe anything, then whatever you believe, you believe it to be true: even if you do not believe it is the only truth or the ultimate truth about that thing, you have to believe that, to the best of your knowledge, it is more true than the alternatives.

 

So - you may believe the Earth is round, or you may believe the Earth is flat.  Either of these beliefs is valid - has an initial plausibility - and can be investigated.  But it does not make sense to say you believe the Earth is round, but you accept that 'the Earth is flat' is also a true belief.

 

I think the real issue is whether you believe that it is impossible for you to be mistaken on this matter and that your understanding is the complete and final word on the subject, or whether you believe that your understanding is probably true but possibly incomplete.   And these two positions can apply to beliefs in both the scientific and religious realms.  So you may believe that the Earth is round and orbits the Sun, like the other planets, in a circular orbit, but you may not understand the orbit is an ellipse, and you may not understand how Relativity also affects the orbits.

 

In order to believe anything, you have to believe that your understanding of what you believe is true, but you don't have to believe that your understanding is the full and final truth.

 

 

Reactions

Two people reacted: one to say," I don't see science as a 'belief'," the other "science questions, faith only believes And on the test of life, just believing fails more frequently than questioning".

 

 

Second Response

These two replies seem to be missing the point of what I was saying.

 

To the first: I was not saying that science is a belief, only that scientists have beliefs. Regarding Quantum Mechanics, do you believe in the Copenhagen interpretation, or the Many Worlds theory? Or some other approach? However you look at it, scientists have beliefs. But those beliefs get questioned and revised.

 

To the second: scientists believe, and they also question.   But, in practice, they don't question often enough or well enough - there are many problems with the way we do science, well documented and well recognized by the scientific community.  And people of faith also believe and question.   Every single religion is full of people who are promoting alternative ideas, beliefs, doctrines and principles to be followed.  Some Christians doubt evolution, and some Christians doubt God, and some Christians doubt pretty much anything else you can think of.   Again, this is very well documented. 

 

While I was not saying that science is a belief, I think it is fairly well established that, for some people, science functions as a belief system, and replaces the religious belief system which was often assumed in previous generations.  Certainly, in talking with people, I have lost count of the number of times I have been told, "I'm not religious - we now have science," as if science answered the questions which religions have traditionally wrestled with.

 

 

Comments (1)

markinpowys@... said

at 8:37 pm on Apr 19, 2021

Perhaps science suggests that there are an awful lot of questions that can't be answered given our current knowledge (and probably never will be answerable). So perhaps a scientific world view doesn't answer those questions, it just suggests (to me at least) that asking them is probably a fruitless endeavour. Pondering them is interesting, pretending we can have answers rather than speculation not so much.

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