Belief is not a choice, but only a result

Thanks Con! I did have a good trip and thanks for delaying so I can take some time to deliberate for my response. As far as tidying up the religious side, you concluded by asking if we could agree on the logic as follows: "The idea of belief as something we cannot choose does not impact the validity of Christianity that is not religiously-exclusive." I have no choice but to say yes to this as the statement as written is logically sound. I HOPE that you are right and this statement is in fact truth, but I"m afraid I have no choice in the matter of believing (see what I did there?). I did ask earlier what makes one that doesn"t believe in Christ but calls themselves a Christian different that a Jew. I suppose there are subtle differences but wouldn"t that basically be what ones view is? Would they not be Jewish? I could be wrong here and it"s a bit off point but I"m just curious so your thoughts are welcomed. One more thing on this topic because I can"t help myself. For those Christians whom do not take the resurrection as truth but by fabrication (the only other way to take it), how does a made up story by man in any way bring us closer to understanding the divine? The logic doesn"t follow there, unless I"m missing an angle. Would love to hear your view. Let"s move on to your well thought-out viewpoint on belief as a choice and free will. Is Belief a Choice or a Result? First off, I applaud your logical-proof style of argument and your ability to articulate your points. This has been terribly fun. Obviously, your Conclusion 1 and Conclusion 2 are sound given your premises, but I"m afraid although I believe Premise 1 and 2 are accurate, Premise 3 misses the mark. Premise 3: Our actions are dictated by our beliefs " False This definition by its nature assumes all actions are dictated by our beliefs. You back this up as you stated, "Every choice we make is a direct result of what we believe to be the truth." I contend that our actions can also be dictated by our values. For example, we may believe we will be late for work but our values will dictate if we decide to speed down the road or not. Values are changeable (through free will), beliefs are not. We have the choice over what values we wish to demonstrate and thus are able to have free will over our actions. Just because we don"t have control over our beliefs does not mean we do not have free will. There are many examples of values that you can control. Being financially conservative (plan for future) vs. spendthrift (live it up while I"m young). I"ve gone through periods of my life where I tended one way or the other. We might value expression of our ideas as you and I are doing now or we might value exclusivity of our thoughts to those close to us. I think you can agree on this one that you can make the choice to withhold your thoughts on belief or express it. I can"t really say I "believe" being a spendthrift will result in higher happiness or fulfillment, there"s not enough evidence and no realistic way to weigh the evidence for or against it. Another way to think of it is this: If I"m forced to call heads or tails, I might pick the side I like more than the other (value) because I do not have a belief that either side will show up. It"s a subtle difference, but I think it"s important. The point here is that in absence of significant evidence (either pro or con) we can make choices based on our values. You mentioned that people can choose to focus on whatever evidence they want to in order to support their views, despite how unwise and imprudent their process is. I agree with this unequivocally. They do this because of the values they hold that coincide with such a belief. They choose to ignore opposing evidence. This is basic foolish human nature. We see it everywhere as you stated. 24 hour news stations thrive off it. What"s really going on here isn"t that they are choosing their beliefs, they are choosing their values. They think they believe and may profess as much, but they are ignorant and do not understand what belief actually is. They are picking tails because the eagle on the back of a quarter looks cooler than an old man"s head. This is a choice based off value - not belief. As we conclude this debate, I think this might be the epicenter of our viewpoints. Here"s another example of what I mean as this is my last chance to prove my case: we"ve all heard stories of someone getting in trouble, maybe arrested, maybe committing serious crimes. Almost invariably, the parents of said troublemaker can"t believe their son/daughter could ever do such a thing. They value the person so much that they think they believe their son/daughter can do no wrong. Do you think this is true belief? Or is it really an expression of value? A parent will often refuse to even listen to whatever evidence corroborates the crime committed and they will often dismiss it " AKA "reframe" their thinking to all the reasons their son/daughter is innocent. It"s easy to see that the parent is not concerned with truth and therefore not concerned with belief, but is only concerned with value. When they say "I can"t believe my kid would ever do such a thing" they really mean "My values are being threatened so I choose to not search for truth". This is but one example I have time to think of, but similar examples are ubiquitous. Religious followers value salvation so they "believe" in God. Democrats and Republicans value different constructs and thus focus on only the pros of their constructs and the cons of the others to form their "beliefs". You get the point. People are rarely in search of truth. Value is much more appealing. I think this has been a great debate. Your responses have challenged me to further understand what is truth. Before making this post I considered that you might be right in that it is possible - for ignorant minds only - to manipulate themselves towards a belief. After much thought I think that I've made a case for such an instance to be merely an expression of value and not of true belief. A fraudulent belief I suppose. Perhaps there is still a case to be made there that it is still belief and I look forward to your response. But what about those who are wise, who are prudent, who do search for truth? You agreed with me earlier that it is possible for some to be unable to believe in religion. But since you go against those who believe that Christ is the only way to the divine, I am unable to argue with you that those who do search for truth are often damned by discovering that they cannot actually believe that the religion is objectively true. This poses a fatal flaw to the veracity of "exclusive" Christianity, but it is evident that you and I would agree on this. So I will end with a similar logical argument as yours that both of us can agree upon and is the conclusion I was intending to draw all along: "Belief as something we cannot necessarily choose impacts the validity of Christianity that is religiously-exclusive to believing Jesus is the only way to God." Side note: I'd like to apologize for the pesky quote marks as apostrophes. I edit my responses in Word and the translation gets screwy when pasted back here. I'm new at this too. Thanks for a provocative debate Con. Let's do it again soon.