why do humans believe without proof

[jfoldbar]

i am new to this forum ( see me thread in general chat) and one thing i find myself thinking is :

why do humans believe something without proof. or simply a question mark. almost all humans believe some kind of thing, whether its god, or Buddha, or ghosts or aliens. according to psychology studies it is in our genetic make up to have a desire to believe in something.

in this thread i dont want to discuss what you believe or dont believe, but the question im asking is:
how can we believe something if it has a question mark or disproof? or just simply doesnt add up.

many of the things we as humans can believe can be argued either way. we cant prove we are alone in the universe and we cant prove we're not. but surely if there are ifs and maybys, then why do we still believe. this can go for so many topics, but in a religion debate forum then the subject matter is religion.

so, people who believe in god (we all have our own personal reasons to believe something), how do you justify in you mind believing something that is not 100% black and white.
so if, for example, we can see that the great flood could not have happened because of things like ""; ark can not hold all the animals,australia has different animals to africa,antarctic ice core dates back much further etc etc :"" why does something like this not make you question your faith. in a world where 2+2=4, why are some people ok with 2+2=4.000001.

this thread is not to discuss the flood or any of the proofs,disproofs, but to discuss the "why do we still believe" part




me personally, i will stay completely on fence about any subject unless it is 100% proven.
we could argue though, do we have 100% proof of anything at all.

an example could be this:

im a tradesman. i go to work each day. leave about 6am and get home bout 4pm.
my wife does not "KNOW" for sure that i am a tradesman. shes sees me leave, and sees me come home dirty. she knows i get calls from clients and my friends are tradies. she knows i know how to do the work of tradesman when i work on our house, but because she doesnt come to work with me every day, she couldnt be 100% that i actually go to work.
but in her mind, everything must add up, and it does. if i was to sometimes come home freshly showered or with golf clubs in the car, this would be a slight question mark on the evidence that she has, and only a fool would dismiss this as "nothing" if they saw it. everything must add up for us to conclude that we are not fooling ourselves.


to me it seems that Christians could " see a pair of golf clubs " and dismiss it as "the lord works in mysterious ways", then continue to believe 100%.
why???










i hope i have conveyed my question in a way that makes sense to others, please ask if you dont get what im asking

[jfoldbar]

divine insight.


Buddha was just an example, as there are too many examples to list
im aware that buddha does not expect us to believe as god does, but it is still a 'belief' that some have.



ttrusscott.

you seemed to have stated the definition in belief or faith, rather then saying 'why' you believe




benchwarmer

i get you.
however there is a difference in those 'in your face' things that make up our daily lives that we do without even thinking, and the more detailed/complex thought and emotions involved in believing or having faith in something that is not so obvious.
as you said we all want to 'know' things in order to function daily. if we couldnt then our life would be a mess.
but the 'knowing' comes from our life of experience.
if we hit ourself on the head, we 'know' it will hurt because every human who ever hit themself on the head said it hurts, and whenever we hit ourselves in the past it hurt every single time. so we can 'know' that if we hit ourself it will hurt. yes we would go mad if we had to test it every time.
but we as humans (essentially animals) do not have the biological need to 'know' some being is looking down upon us from heaven. knowing or not knowing this would not affect our ability to function physically. but it seems many people need this to function mentally/psychologically



marco.


yes there are patterns in our daily lives. some perceive the patterns different to others.
but to me it seems like you are saying "i believe because i believe".
meaning there isnt actually a 'reason' apart from the fact that you dont 'see' any reason not to believe. but why does not seeing a reason to disbelieve translate to having a 'belief'?


glorified one

i think this statement is a bit silly if it refers to obvious things like 'if it rains will we get wet today? prove it!"
yes, we could not function at all every we had to prove every single obvious thing.
but im talking about the not so obvious things.

your statement suggests you believe in god but concede its impossible to prove. then what is the reasoning in your mind to believe in something that can not be proven?

[marco]

yes there are patterns in our daily lives. some perceive the patterns different to others.
but to me it seems like you are saying "i believe because i believe".
meaning there isnt actually a 'reason' apart from the fact that you dont 'see' any reason not to believe. but why does not seeing a reason to disbelieve translate to having a 'belief'?

As it happens I don't believe. Nor do I accept things on blind faith. It is possible that 2 + 2 = 11, depending on your number base.

We are not all endowed with the same degree of reasoning power and it is wise to defer to experts in matters where we are ignorant. I don't repair my car; I let someone else do it. As I said, most things in life work that way - on trust. And we generally have a reason for placing our trust in something.

Those who believe in Yahweh think that the Bible is an inspired Holy Book and so lessons they extract from it are divine instructions. Muslims sometimes memorise the entire Koran (Hafiz) believing they are memorising God's words. Why? Because Muhammad had a reported meeting in a cave with Gabriel, in the 7th century. Apparently the perfection of the texts, given to an illiterate Arab, proves it is divine.

Thus there are reasons why people believe. For them there is adequate proof.

[FarWanderer]

[Replying to post 1 by jfoldbar]

Hi, late response from me.

I think that the human proclivity to believe comes from our childhood. As a child, you learn everything from your parents. You believe everything they tell you... because you have no other option.

I don't think the impact this early experience has on our psychology can be overstated. We all grow out of it to some degree or another, but never completely. There is a reason why God is often referred to as the "Father".