Do People Choose their Beliefs? What are the Ethical Implications of our Response?

[drug_mentor]

So a while ago I was reading some of Bernard Williams work and I came across an interesting argument for the conclusion that people do not choose their beliefs. I do not wish to take credit for this argument, as I am essentially paraphrasing Williams. The argument is taken from the paper 'Deciding to Believe' which I read in Problems of the Self by Bernard Williams.

I have long suspected that the idea of choosing one's beliefs is incoherent, but I found Williams' argument both interesting and accessible enough to share here. I thought it might be interesting to connect up discussion of whether people can choose their beliefs with a discussion of whether we should pass ethical judgements on others for their beliefs. If people can't choose their beliefs, it seems highly questionable whether they ought to be morally condemned for them.

What follows is Williams' argument against choosing to believe:

Beliefs aim at truth, by this I mean that the following three claims are true of them: (i) Beliefs can be assessed as being true or false; (ii) To believe that p is to believe that p is true; (iii) Assertions of the form 'I believe that p' in general report than more a psychological state, they report that p is true.

The fact that beliefs aim at truth suggests that there is something quite problematic about the idea of deciding to believe something. If I could consciously will myself to form the belief that p, then it seems I could acquire the belief that p whether or not I had any grounds for thinking p was true. Furthermore, I would know that I was able to acquire the belief irrespective of its truth. If I could consciously decide to 'believe' that p regardless of whether I had any antecedent reason for thinking that p might be true, it is not clear that prior to acquiring this 'belief' I could genuinely regard the state which I was about to produce in myself as a belief, i.e. as a state which purports to reflect reality.

Suppose I was able to carry out such a procedure, there does seem to be an incoherence in thinking that I could know that I willed myself to 'believe' that p (irrespective of whether I had any reason to think p were true) and still regard this as a belief I hold, i.e. something I take to be true. It seems, then, that in order to believe that p is true, I could not be conscious of the fact that I had acquired it at will (possibly arbitrarily). If this is right, then it seems in the act of willing myself to believe that p I must necessarily also forget that I had so willed it. But, is there any reason for thinking that, as well as the ability to will ourselves to believe, we also have a reliable faculty which permits us to intentionally forget? Perhaps there are some cases like this (though, I am inclined to think otherwise); but, at the least the foregoing considerations suggest there is something highly suspect about the notion of 'choosing to believe'.

What do people make of this argument? What about the idea of choosing beliefs more generally? If people don't choose their beliefs, is it fair to pass moral judgements on others for their beliefs?

 

[Xorkoth]

This is an interesting question. I think that people are given beliefs by those who they look up to, as children, and this is unavoidable. You're going to believe whatever you're presented with as the truth when you're too young to question things or make sense of the world yourself. For example, I was raised Christian, and until I was a teenager I believed it by default. I had a sense that I HAD to believe it or else it would be bad for me, so there is an element of fear/force involved. However, as a person grows, if they are able to distance themselves enough from their childhood beliefs and think critically enough, it is certainly possible to choose your own beliefs consciously, and set aside your instilled, choiceless beliefs. I did that, I pushed away from Christianity because I thought about it enough and decided it's merely one way to look at things, and not THE answer. I began this process at age 16, and then at age 18 I had a peak psychedelic experience that helped me to form my own beliefs. My own belief structure is entirely based on my own experiences. But it took years of life as well as difficulty to come up with my chosen beliefs.

However, I was brought up in a family where we were always told that it was up to us what to believe in, ultimately. So I didn't feel a very powerful enforcement to stick to Christianity. Many people in religions around the world probably never consider it an option to not believe. Fear, either of the afterlife or even of actual reprisals in the real world, is a huge factor in maintaining instilled beliefs. Because of this, and because instilled belief systems are so powerful since they bypass logic (in fact logic is usually considered to be bad when applied to belief systems of faith), I don't think people can really be blamed for their beliefs. Like I said in the meta-ethics thread, everyone does things for their own reason, and people believe what they're doing is right. Someone who has always been Christian or whatever and refuses to consider otherwise believes that they are acting righteously.

 

[drug_mentor]

This is an interesting question. I think that people are given beliefs by those who they look up to, as children, and this is unavoidable. You're going to believe whatever you're presented with as the truth when you're too young to question things or make sense of the world yourself. For example, I was raised Christian, and until I was a teenager I believed it by default. I had a sense that I HAD to believe it or else it would be bad for me, so there is an element of fear/force involved. However, as a person grows, if they are able to distance themselves enough from their childhood beliefs and think critically enough, it is certainly possible to choose your own beliefs consciously, and set aside your instilled, choiceless beliefs. I did that, I pushed away from Christianity because I thought about it enough and decided it's merely one way to look at things, and not THE answer. I began this process at age 16, and then at age 18 I had a peak psychedelic experience that helped me to form my own beliefs. My own belief structure is entirely based on my own experiences. But it took years of life as well as difficulty to come up with my chosen beliefs.

Thanks for the reply Xorkoth!

I should clarify that when I say people don't choose their beliefs, I am not saying people never change their beliefs, rather, that when they do form or change their beliefs they do not do so through a conscious choice. Of course, people do decide to reevaluate a position they hold, and in these situations it is quite common that they find the weight of the evidence compelling enough to force them to change their mind. What I question is the coherence in being able to choose to believe some proposition irrespective of how convinced one is by it; it seems to me that once a person reviews the evidence for and against a particular belief, they will be persuaded one way and not the other, i.e. they could not choose to believe the proposition they find less compelling.

You used your eschewing your previous religious beliefs as an example of choosing to believe something, but, do you think that you could decide tomorrow, without undergoing any kind of experience which genuinely renewed your faith in God, to believe in Christianity again? I would be surprised if you felt that you could. I question whether your adoption of your current religious beliefs was a meaningful choice if you could not now decide to believe otherwise. Surely, the present inability to believe otherwise indicates that you are thoroughly convinced, and thus could not choose to be convinced otherwise?

 

[Foreigner]

My perception is that beliefs are the structures we develop into in order to express foundational experiences that all humans share, much like how all religions are expressing the same essential experience through different lenses. Beliefs are the interface for present awareness to experience itself within and part of the whole.

The question is a variation on determinism vs. free will, and it's not really one or the other. It's co-creative. You have free will within your design and the designs of humanity are multitudinous, although the underlying present awareness is universal.

 

[Xorkoth]

I should clarify that when I say people don't choose their beliefs, I am not saying people never change their beliefs, rather, that when they do form or change their beliefs they do not do so through a conscious choice. Of course, people do decide to reevaluate a position they hold, and in these situations it is quite common that they find the weight of the evidence compelling enough to force them to change their mind. What I question is the coherence in being able to choose to believe some proposition irrespective of how convinced one is by it; it seems to me that once a person reviews the evidence for and against a particular belief, they will be persuaded one way and not the other, i.e. they could not choose to believe the proposition they find less compelling.

I guess this points to the free will vs determinism debate (oops Foreigner just said that too). You're right, I could not just decide to believe Christianity tomorrow and truly believe it. But, in that case I think none of us would ever decide anything, everything would be purely the result of myriad external factors and any apparent choices we made were more like the "choices" of an automaton. I do not believe this is the case. I believe free will shapes the rest of the universe, locally at least. Given that I make my own decisions, even though of course I am influenced by various factors, the reason I couldn't decide tomorrow to believe in Christianity (or any other belief system that isn't mine) is because I would not choose that. My life experiences and accumulated thoughts on the subject of what to believe are the reason I have changed my belief system. If I had never had thoughts or experiences that pulled me towards something other than Christianity, then I'd still be Christian. If I have another powerful experience, say a true NDE (which I have never had), or if I died but was revived perhaps, and my experience pointed me with a feeling of truth towards a new belief, then I would probably change my beliefs and truly believe it. If that never happens, my belief system will likely stay in the realm of where it is now.

You used your eschewing your previous religious beliefs as an example of choosing to believe something, but, do you think that you could decide tomorrow, without undergoing any kind of experience which genuinely renewed your faith in God, to believe in Christianity again? I would be surprised if you felt that you could. I question whether your adoption of your current religious beliefs was a meaningful choice if you could not now decide to believe otherwise. Surely, the present inability to believe otherwise indicates that you are thoroughly convinced, and thus could not choose to be convinced otherwise?

I could be convinced otherwise by having an experience which convinced me more of something else. I believe what my experiences have shown me is what is most likely to be what existence is. I would never presume to KNOW beyond a shadow of a doubt that I'm correct. This is why I never try to ram my beliefs down someone's throat, because I've just found what I believe to be true. I'm always open to being convinced otherwise, but it will take something beyond someone else's words to do so, most likely.

 

[drug_mentor]

The question is a variation on determinism vs. free will, and it's not really one or the other.

It isn't really. One might endorse the view that people don't choose their beliefs because they find the notion of deciding to believe something conceptually incoherent. I thought this argument was interesting in part because it does not involve an appeal to determinism.

the reason I couldn't decide tomorrow to believe in Christianity (or any other belief system that isn't mine) is because I would not choose that. My life experiences and accumulated thoughts on the subject of what to believe are the reason I have changed my belief system. If I had never had thoughts or experiences that pulled me towards something other than Christianity, then I'd still be Christian. If I have another powerful experience, say a true NDE (which I have never had), or if I died but was revived perhaps, and my experience pointed me with a feeling of truth towards a new belief, then I would probably change my beliefs and truly believe it. If that never happens, my belief system will likely stay in the realm of where it is now.

I feel that what you are saying reinforces my point. You could only change your view if you had an experience which convinced you that your current belief was mistaken, and if you became convinced that was true you would have no choice but to abandon your current belief. The point is you only revise your belief once you hit an evidential tipping point, and once you hit this point you couldn't decide not to revise your belief. So where is the choice in all of this?

 

[Xorkoth]

^^ If I had an experience that shattered my world view, I could do one of three things. I could, (a), become convinced of a new belief system, or (b), I could react with fear and anger, leading me into a variety of possible emotional problems and cognitive dissonance, because I am denying something I experienced, but I might do that because I am so attached to my existing worldview; or, (c), I could decide that the experience I had didn't mean as much as it seemed to at the time and maintain the same worldview I already have. I still have a choice how to react, but since I allow myself to remain open, I would react in the first way, personally. We say the words "I was convinced" as if in this process we are passive, and it's happening to us, but in reality we are convinced of something, anything, because of our thought process when confronted with something that challenges our existing beliefs. It's not like, oh man I had this experience, now I am automatically convinced of a new thing. I'm speaking of hypothetical, abstract situations. A real-world example might be: I get in a car crash and it's very serious, and I actually die for several minutes. During that experience, I ascend through a tunnel of light and emerge into a place where a massive presence tells me that I lived a life of sin, and then I feel the most fiery pain imaginable. Then I'm revived, pulled out of that scenario. I have a lot to consider at this point. Since this hasn't happened to me, I have no idea how I'd react. On one hand I could end up, after thinking about it a lot, deciding that, wow, that felt so real, I think I've been wrong all along and that was god, and I went to hell for not being pious enough. At that point I might legitimately begin to believe Christianity. Or, I could arrive at the conclusion that it was all in my head, and maintain my current worldview. Either way, it would be my choice, the path I decided to take based on reflecting upon a powerful experience.

 

[-=SS=-]

In short, no, we do not choose our beliefs. We like to think we're such complex autonomous creatures with free will but in reality we're just reacting to what's placed in front of us, or what impinges upon us internally. When you can't even remember 99% of what you did on this day last year it's ridiculous to assume you're even remotely aware of all the things you reacted to that have shaped your current mental arrangement.. to insinuate we have choice in the matter is laughable quite frankly. How can you have real choice when you can't even remember yourself!

 

[drug_mentor]

^^ If I had an experience that shattered my world view, I could do one of three things. I could, (a), become convinced of a new belief system, or (b), I could react with fear and anger, leading me into a variety of possible emotional problems and cognitive dissonance, because I am denying something I experienced, but I might do that because I am so attached to my existing worldview; or, (c), I could decide that the experience I had didn't mean as much as it seemed to at the time and maintain the same worldview I already have. I still have a choice how to react, but since I allow myself to remain open, I would react in the first way, personally. We say the words "I was convinced" as if in this process we are passive, and it's happening to us, but in reality we are convinced of something, anything, because of our thought process when confronted with something that challenges our existing beliefs. It's not like, oh man I had this experience, now I am automatically convinced of a new thing. I'm speaking of hypothetical, abstract situations. A real-world example might be: I get in a car crash and it's very serious, and I actually die for several minutes. During that experience, I ascend through a tunnel of light and emerge into a place where a massive presence tells me that I lived a life of sin, and then I feel the most fiery pain imaginable. Then I'm revived, pulled out of that scenario. I have a lot to consider at this point. Since this hasn't happened to me, I have no idea how I'd react. On one hand I could end up, after thinking about it a lot, deciding that, wow, that felt so real, I think I've been wrong all along and that was god, and I went to hell for not being pious enough. At that point I might legitimately begin to believe Christianity. Or, I could arrive at the conclusion that it was all in my head, and maintain my current worldview. Either way, it would be my choice, the path I decided to take based on reflecting upon a powerful experience.

Saying that you don't choose your beliefs is not the same thing as saying belief acquisition is a passive phenomenon. Of course, when you are considering evidence there is some cognitive activity involved, if by passive you mean lacking cognitive activity then clearly belief acquisition is not like this. My point is this, you engage in cognitive activity whereby you evaluate the evidence, at some point you reach a conclusion. I submit that you don't get to choose this conclusion, rational deliberation convinces you that one conclusion is true and the alternatives false.

Saying people don't choose their beliefs is not to say that everyone who has the same experience and/or is exposed to the same evidence will form the same belief. It is just the claim that, any particular individual will be persuaded one way or the other, and they do not consciously choose beforehand which way they will be persuaded (if they did one might question whether this could rightly be described as a case of persuasion).

Do you accept the claim that beliefs aim at truth? If you do, it seems that by insisting we do in fact choose our beliefs you are committed to the view that people can in some sense consciously decide what kind of evidence they find compelling. Starting from the assumption that we want our beliefs to be correct, it seems incoherent to suppose that we choose them - surely an arbitrary choice to believe some proposition has no bearing on how likely you are to be right?

Can you think of a single belief that you hold where you could decide tomorrow to believe the opposite? I doubt you could. Doesn't this suggest there is something problematic about the idea of choosing to believe something? If you can't do it now, then when and where does this choice occur? I can not personally recall any moment in my life where I thought 'you know, I never believed that p, I don't presently have any more reason for thinking p true than in the past, but reflection tells me it would be nice/beneficial/whatever to believe that p, therefore I will henceforth believe that p'. I can't speak for anyone else but I find such a thought process self-evidently preposterous, moreover, I suspect it would be literally impossible to consciously have that thought and then afterwards actually believe that p is true (without having encountered additional evidence in favour of p).

Where do you think Williams' argument for the conceptual incoherence of choosing to believe goes wrong?

 

[JessFR]

I try to thoroughly vet my beliefs and ensure they're arrived at from an objective and open mind.

That said, some core beliefs and values are simply subjective and can't be easily said to be objectively provable one way or the other.

I've found as an adult an enormous amount of my underlying values and morals and belief reflect my mothers when I was growing up. And also strongly reflect an American cultural background. Strong belief in absolute freedom of speech, civil rights, etc.

Living in Australia as an adult, it's interesting to see how Australians have slightly different takes on some of these things than I do. And that I think most Americans do. That's not to say one is superior to the other. But it's pretty evident a large amount of my most fundamental subjective beliefs and values reflect my upbringing. They can't be easily values objectively.

Like for example believing that free speech must be afforded to even the most repugnant viewpoints. I've found such a belief is far less widespread among Australians than Americans. And I'm sure it's because of slight cultural differences in how people are raised. And likewise I reflect that in how I was raised.

Even with as much effort as I put in to knowing what I believe and why I believe it and believing it for the right reasons. Some basic things can't really be evaluated that way. You either believe it or you don't and it's not easily proven that one belief is right and the other wrong. You just gotta have a little faith at some point that you believe he right thing or at least the better thing.

And no doubt for me a great deal of it reflects how I was raised in carrying my mothers beliefs and having a cultural value set that is fairly American in ways that aren't always all that obvious.

It's easy not to realize how much your culture as influenced you until you spend a great deal of time living in another. Even with Australia and America which on the whole are extremely similar.

 

[drug_mentor]

Thanks for the reply Jess!

I certainly agree with you that culture and upbringing has a lot to do with a persons beliefs. I take it that your point with the example is that, even if we choose some beliefs, there are certainly a whole lot which we don't. Is that what you were getting at? Do you think we can ever choose to believe something?

 

[Xorkoth]

To me, this seems to get into the question of what a choice even is. Following the line of your logic, it would suggest to me that we don't in fact even have free will, because everything we choose to do or to not do is based on deliberating and arriving at a conclusion which, perhaps, only appears to be a choice. It's the way we would always react in that particular point in time, faced with that particular set of circumstances and past experiences. As in, if we could re-live our lives, they would turn out exactly the same. So are we automatons then, with only the illusion of choice?

I've thought about that question a lot before and I'm not sure what to think about it, honestly.

 

[drug_mentor]

To me, this seems to get into the question of what a choice even is. Following the line of your logic, it would suggest to me that we don't in fact even have free will, because everything we choose to do or to not do is based on deliberating and arriving at a conclusion which, perhaps, only appears to be a choice. It's the way we would always react in that particular point in time, faced with that particular set of circumstances and past experiences. As in, if we could re-live our lives, they would turn out exactly the same. So are we automatons then, with only the illusion of choice?

I've thought about that question a lot before and I'm not sure what to think about it, honestly.

That question gets into philosophy of action. I suppose if one is inclined to think that people only act upon their beliefs, then the conclusion that we do not choose our beliefs would seem to suggest we don't choose our actions. Perhaps one might concede that we do only act upon our beliefs but protest that we still do have a choice as to which beliefs we act on. In reply, I think it would be prudent to point out that we obviously do not act on all of our beliefs, but it doesn't seem entirely implausible to think that our actions are driven by beliefs such as what we ought to do, what would be of benefit to us, and so forth. I am not so sure that this view is correct, but if one could establish (i) that we don't choose our beliefs and (ii) every action we perform is caused by some belief, then this would be a convincing argument that people lacked libertarian free will.

I think one might well be able to argue convincingly for (ii), but my interest in this thread is really to evaluate claim (i); in particular, whether one can establish (i) without presupposing that determinism is true. I do think that (ii) is a harder claim to motivate than (i), there is not an obvious feature which all actions possess in the way that it seems quite obvious (to me, at least) that all beliefs aim at truth.

 

[Junkyard Dawg]

Of course we can choose out beliefs. Beliefs and values can change throughout life, though it often takes a little elbow grease. Especially with the deep set beliefs regarding where and how we came to be - and how we appear.

 

[belligerent drunk]

My understanding of the question is perhaps more grounded, but I in no way believe (see what I did there) that one chooses their beliefs in the true sense. For example, did you choose to believe that at room temperature and atmospheric pressure water is liquid? No, you do so because you've observed it. A person usually tries to correlate their beliefs with their experience of reality. That is just how the human brain (and not just human, other animals too!) works, because if the case was the opposite, then that would be very disadvantageous in terms of survival/evolutionary potential.

That is to say, one's beliefs are both a result of their genetics (not a lot of difference, most humans share the same basic principle) and their environment, which can have varying effects on their beliefs. But none fully consciously decide to believe either A, or B, or C etc. One's beliefs can drastically vary depending on their point of origin, time (ancient, medieval, modern times) or even social status, and not because of their genetics!

Even such beliefs as whether drugs should be legal or not are based on many (ir)rational arguments, or scientific facts.

 

[GodandLove]

What do people make of this argument? What about the idea of choosing beliefs more generally? If people don't choose their beliefs, is it fair to pass moral judgements on others for their beliefs?

Beliefs are not actions. As long as the individuals beliefs are kept secret, there should be no judgement passed. Hence your argument is infantile.

If the argument was " Do people choose their actions", then there would be room for in depth discussion.

 

[alasdairm]

^ your logic makes no sense. his argument is not infantile.

do you believe in god? that the earth is not flat? did you choose these beliefs?

alasdair

 

[GodandLove]

^ your logic makes no sense.
alasdair

It often does to the illogical.

do you believe in god? that the earth is not flat? did you choose these beliefs?

What are those things? I can't exactly believe in something if I don't know what it is I'm supposed to be believing in, can I?

By the way, I'm a meat Popsicle.

 

[drug_mentor]

Beliefs are not actions. As long as the individuals beliefs are kept secret, there should be no judgement passed. Hence your argument is infantile.

If the argument was " Do people choose their actions", then there would be room for in depth discussion.

Okay, I think I see what you are trying to say here. Your point is that we can only judge people for their beliefs if they express them, and since expressing them is an action, what is of real interest, at least from an ethical point of view, is whether people choose to perform this declarative action. There are several points I would like to make in reply:

(i) I did not argue that we shouldn't judge people for their beliefs, I raised the point that it is not obvious that we should if it is conceded that they are not chosen. I only argued for the view that we do not choose our beliefs. Hence, it seems this is less a matter of my argument being infantile and more a failure of your reading comprehension skills.

(ii) While I take your point that we can only judge people for the beliefs which they express, I still think it is quite obvious that we generally judge people for the beliefs themselves and not simply for the act of expressing them. If someone expresses that they have racist beliefs, for example, we generally think there is something wrong with their character, i.e. we think they possess a persistent quality which is worthy of disapprobation. If the only thing which we judged negatively was the assertion itself, I don't think we would think racist beliefs reveal such a persistent flaw in someones character - we are ordinarily willing to forgive single transgressions without assuming that they reveal such a deep character flaw. (Of course, single instances of severe crimes like rape and murder are an exception to this, but, it isn't really plausible to think that the expression of a repugnant belief carries anything close to the moral weight that these kinds of severe transgression do.)

(iii) Even if I were to entirely concede the point that we really do judge only particular declarative actions and not beliefs which people hold (and I make no such concession), it seems fairly intuitive to think that these beliefs must play a partial causal role in any decision to assert said beliefs. Perhaps this causal role is not significant enough to absolve one of moral blame, but it is not implausible to think that it might at least mitigate moral blame. So, it is not clear that such a concession makes the question of whether we choose our beliefs as removed from ethical considerations as you have supposed.

(iv) This thread is about two things: (1) Whether we choose our beliefs; (2) Whether a lack of ability to choose our beliefs would mean that it is illegitimate to pass moral judgement on people for what they believe. Even if I grant arguendo that your criticism of (2) is sound and there are no ethical consequences from a negative answer to (1), that would hardly be sufficient to establish your (implicit) claim that the thread topic leaves no room for in-depth discussion. There is still a substantive question as to whether we choose our beliefs, a question which I believe creates enough room for an in-depth philosophical discussion.

 

[GodandLove]

(iv) This thread is about two things: (1) Whether we choose our beliefs; I only argued for the view that we do not choose our beliefs

No, this thread is about one thing.... "Does God exist"?

You can't prove your argument
You can't disprove my arguement

There is no objective proof or disproof of whether we chose our beliefs. Thus this is a pointless infantile "dick measuring contest" argument.

There is no objective conclusion.

Only conjecture and speculation.