Would you tolerate your beliefs if they were irrational?

[Wootah]

Would you tolerate your beliefs if they were irrational?

If there was a logical chain that was demonstrated to be a contradiction would you still follow your beliefs or would you simply accept that God could do all things?

For instance suppose you had to accept that square circles existed. Would you claim that God could make square circles or would you abandon your beliefs?

I for one would not follow my beliefs once I knew they were irrational. Would you?

[Divine Insight]

For instance suppose you had to accept that square circles existed. Would you claim that God could make square circles or would you abandon your beliefs?

It's easy to make a square circle. Even I can do that.

I for one would not follow my beliefs once I knew they were irrational. Would you?

Not everyone even agrees on what should be deemed "rational".

When it comes to the existence of our physical world, I personally see this as something that is both irrational yet obviously true. Our physical world exists. We're here. So this cannot be denied.

Buy why should anything exist in the first place? For me the idea that anything exists at all is "irrational". In other words, there is no logic or reason that I can imagine that would explain why anything exists at all.

However, we must instantly recognize that to proposed that a "God" exists who started it all doesn't help one iota. Then you would still have the question of how this God ever came to be in the first place.

So from the above observations I conclude that reality, insofar as I can tell, is necessarily an irrational event. God or no God. Proposing a God doesn't help a thing.

Even if a God exists that God would necessarily need to be "irrational" in terms of how humans thinks.

I also can't imagine an entity that fully understands its own existence completely with absolutely no questions at all about the nature of itself or reality.

If there existed a "God" that entity would need to know and fully understand precisely why it exists and has always existed and can never cease to exist.

That very idea seems "irrational" to me.

~~~~~~~

So this brings us to the ultimate question. If everything is ultimately irrational, both a Godless existence, and a God Created existence, then they are both on equal footing right?

Well, I personally believe they are, and this is ultimately whey I am agnostic on this question. I do not have enough information to answer it.

So then you might ask, "Well if both a Godless world and a God Created world are equally irrational, then why not chose to believe in religion?

And now we're getting into a WHOLE OTHER TOPIC. Which religion should I believe in?

From my perspective all of the Abrahamic religions and perhaps especially Christianity, are not only irrational, but they are utterly absurd, and SELF-CONTRADICTORY. Being self-contradictory is far worse than merely being irrational.

The idea that a "God" of some sort might exist seems plausible to me. At least as plausible as a universe existing which we already know exists. However, for a God to exist and behave in the utterly ignorant ways that are described of the Abrahamic God is not merely irrational, but it's also seriously absurd, and logically contradictory.

Therefore, if I was going to consider a possible God concept I would reject all of the Abrahamic religions immediately as clearly not being viable candidates as a sound description of what a God might be like.

Looking into many other religions I've found the most likely candidates would be religions that proposed a pantheistic or animistic view of "God". If a "God" does exist this is far more likely what God would be like.

So for me, religions that are far more logically consistent and therefore more "rational" would be religions like Buddhism, or Taoism, or some other form of mystical naturalism.

I think I can rationally, and logically RULE OUT the Abrahamic religions for certain. Especially if we are going to assume that a "God" would be benevolent or honest in any way. The God described in the the Bible is both dishonest, and malevolent. This is not to say that a God couldn't be these things if a God existed, however, the Bible also proclaims that its God is the epitome of honesty, truth, justice, and is trustworthy. But none of those traits are reflected in how they have their God behaving.

So the Biblical God is SELF-CONTRADICTORY. And that's a serious problem. Even if it did exist it couldn't be the epitome of honesty, truth, justice, and be trustworthy. So it's dead in the water no matter what. It's not merely irrational, its SELF-CONTRADICTORY and that kills it right there. Time to move on to a more rational religion if we're going to continue to consider the possibility of the existence of a "God".

Buddhism certainly offers a potentially logically consistent "God". So that would be a religion that might be plausible. But the God of Abraham is definitely not plausible.

[Wootah]

[Replying to post 2 by Divine Insight]

Since you so graciously replied. Would you answer my question?

Would you tolerate your beliefs if they were irrational?

This might be the question I want to ask:
Would you tolerate your beliefs if they were illogical?

[Divine Insight]

[Replying to post 2 by Divine Insight]

Since you so graciously replied. Would you answer my question?

Would you tolerate your beliefs if they were irrational?

This might be the question I want to ask:
Would you tolerate your beliefs if they were illogical?

I thought I already did answer that question.

IMHO it's illogical that anything exists at all. But I exist and apparently so does the the entire universe. So I am forced to believe in illogical things.

Adding a concept such as a "God" doesn't help. If anything that just makes things even more illogical.

So I'm forced to believe that reality exists as illogical as reality may be.

[ttruscott]

Is logic in the eye of the beholder?

Two stories to illustrate the point.

1. Dead Men Don’t Bleed

Perhaps you’ve heard of the man who thought he was dead? In reality he was very much alive. His delusion became such a problem that his family finally paid for him to see a psychiatrist.

The psychiatrist spent many laborious sessions trying to convince the man he was still alive. Nothing seemed to work.

Finally the doctor tried one last approach. He took out his medical books and proceeded to show the patient that dead men don’t bleed. After hours of tedious study, the patient seemed convinced that dead men don’t bleed.

“Do you now agree that dead men don’t bleed?� the doctor asked.

“Yes, I do,� the patient replied.

“Very well, then,� the doctor said.

He took out a pin and pricked the patent’s finger. Out came a trickle of blood.

The doctor asked, “What does that tell you?�

“Oh my goodness!� the patient exclaimed as he stared incredulously at his finger … “Dead men do bleed!!�



2. Three men are sitting in the pub window seat, watching the front door of the brothel over the road.

The local Protestant pastor appears, and quickly goes inside.

"Would you look at that!" says the first man. "Didn't I always say what a bunch of hypocrites they are?"

No sooner are the words out of his mouth than a Rabbi appears at the door, knocks, and goes inside.

"Another one trying to fool everyone with pious preaching and stupid hats!"

They continue drinking their beer roundly condemning the vicar and the
rabbi when they see their own Catholic priest knock on the door.

"Ah, now that's just sad," says the third man. "One of the girls must have died..."


Cute but expressive of the mind's ability to reframe any experience according to their personal values and biases. While I see Christians acting this way, I also see secular, materialistic humanists also acting this way.

Who indeed thinks their beliefs are irrational without changing them? IOW, if a belief is being tolerated it is not being defined as illogical, no matter what someone else says about it.

PS: I just love that line: Dead men DO bleed!

[Wootah]

[Replying to post 4 by Divine Insight]

I fear you are the one collapsing terms now. It makes no sense to say reality is logical. Logic is quite separate from reality.

If I call it formal logic does that make more sense?

If your beliefs contradicted formal logic then would you abandon them?

[Wootah]

[Replying to post 5 by ttruscott]

Funny jokes but I don't think madness or cognitive dissonance should be used as proof against logic.

Should a sane person tolerate an irrational belief?

[ttruscott]

[Replying to post 5 by ttruscott]

Funny jokes but I don't think madness or cognitive dissonance should be used as proof against logic.

Should a sane person tolerate an irrational belief?

And my point was that no, sane people do not tolerate what they believe to be irrational beliefs...it is only irrational from an different pov.

[McCulloch]

Every sane person's beliefs make as much sense as possible to the person who believes them. However, there is no belief system that is completely immune from mysteries. In physics, the wave partical duality; in mathematics, irrational numbers; in religion, Theodicity; in politics, Donald Trump.

[bluethread]

[Replying to post 5 by ttruscott]

Funny jokes but I don't think madness or cognitive dissonance should be used as proof against logic.

Should a sane person tolerate an irrational belief?

Physiologically, belief and rationality are two different things. Belief, even for the rational atheist, appears to take place in the ventromedial prefrontal cortex, which is an area associated with emotions, rewards and self-representation. It appears to balance out the input from the other parts of the brain. Rationality is not a singular activity. Specific reasoning is primarily conducted in the left frontal lobe, while spatial reasoning is a parietal lobe characteristic. Some linguistic rules, such as grammar, are handled by the temporal lobe. On the emotional side, thought is processed by the right frontal lobe, hippocampus, amygdala, anterior thalamic nuclei, and limbic cortex. In addition, certain things are hard wired with veto power. When one is hungry, angry, lonely or tried, logic goes out the window. So, the rationalist orthodoxy that one should never believe in what is irrational is nothing more than a philosophical ideal. It is not the way humans work.