What makes you think everyone else is wrong about belief

Gordian Knot

Gordian Knot

Being Deviant IS My Art.
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Lamson suggested it would make for an interesting thread to turn the question around. Instead of 'How do you know you are right about your beliefs', what about 'How do you know everyone else is wrong'.

My response is that I don't know that I am right. I have no idea whether I am right. To me, it is the height of hubris for anyone to say they know they are right and everyone else's beliefs are wrong.

What possible source could one offer to prove; and I do not mean justify, but actually prove they are right? The ways of Gods are by definition beyond this reality. An afterlife is merely a guess because there is not one irrefutable documented case of someone who has died and has returned to say how the weather is on the other side.

No matter how strongly someone holds their beliefs, if they are going to be honest they have to admit that there is a percentage chance, even if just a tiny one, that they could be wrong.
 
Yes, my current level understanding of my belief is right for me...maybe not you...and maybe not anyone .

Yours may be right for you....but wrong for me.

Most beliefs I can accept. I have issues with the ones that warp belief so to make it violent against others.
 
Agreed. The concept that my belief is right for me is sound. And fair. The concept that my belief is right for everyone is neither.
 
wil said:
Yes, my current level understanding of my belief is right for me...maybe not you...and maybe not anyone .

Yours may be right for you....but wrong for me.

Most beliefs I can accept. I have issues with the ones that warp belief so to make it violent against others.
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This is my take as well. It's almost like favorite colors. Just cause I like blue and you like green doesn't mean either is right or wrong.

I have a problem, actually, with anyone who wants to force, coerce, others into believing what they believe, not just the idea of violence. Prosyletzing is violence to me. If someone converts from within a family, it causes a ton of pain.
 
again.... Religions are like penises....it is fine to have one, but don't wave it around, and try to shove it down my mouth and we got a problem....
 
wil said:
again.... Religions are like penises....it is fine to have one, but don't wave it around, and try to shove it down my mouth and we got a problem....
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What constitutes "waving it around"?

Wearing faith-specific articles of clothing? Saying prayers in public (while trying to avoid disturbing others)? Criticising behavior that is legal but that one considers immoral due to one's beliefs?
 
I wasn't specific enough I suppose, don't wave it in my face...when i ask you to leave the door or out of my school...move on.
 
For example if it says a God created the universe in six days and rested on the seventh. Or that a God picked up a clod of soil, made his replica and breathed into it to create the first human. I suppose you would agree that it did not happen that way.
 
Yes, I would agree that I don't believe it happened that way.

but that is answering the question Does the bible contravene science? (again more of an it than an is, I'm still totally confused on the is)
 
wil said:
but that is answering the question Does the bible contravene science? (again more of an it than an is, I'm still totally confused on the is)
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Not just Bible, all scriptures have such (absurd) claims even my own Hindu ones. Best to use science.
 
Gordian Knot said:
Lamson suggested it would make for an interesting thread to turn the question around. Instead of 'How do you know you are right about your beliefs', what about 'How do you know everyone else is wrong'.

My response is that I don't know that I am right. I have no idea whether I am right. To me, it is the height of hubris for anyone to say they know they are right and everyone else's beliefs are wrong.

What possible source could one offer to prove; and I do not mean justify, but actually prove they are right? The ways of Gods are by definition beyond this reality. An afterlife is merely a guess because there is not one irrefutable documented case of someone who has died and has returned to say how the weather is on the other side.

No matter how strongly someone holds their beliefs, if they are going to be honest they have to admit that there is a percentage chance, even if just a tiny one, that they could be wrong.
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In the ancient Jewish world that is why they had prophets...to speak the Word of God. Here and now communication.

Be here now, though takes on a different meaning for a post-Jewish pentecostal of Christ. Spirit to spirit is possible and calling no one master as a human is for these, now operative.

In other words, a more direct line of communication is possible for a whole passel of folks. Whoo hoo.
 
I have difficulty with a tolerance which declares that if person X believes belief Y, then belief Y is true for them.

My problem is that such an assertion contains hidden within it the assumption that there is nothing objective about spirituality -- that spirituality is a game some people play in their heads in their spare time (either that, or it requires the suspension of logic). It may be a position of tolerance, but it is also a position of disrespect for the belief under consideration.

I'm a perennialist, and I think that most human expressions of spirituality (all, minus the occasional fraud) are expressions of the same fundamental inspiration. I think that inspiration (whether it originates in our biology or outside of it (I believe the latter), is a very real thing. Therefore it is possible to assert a belief X which lies outside of that inspiration -- i.e., is wrong.

It gets much tougher to pin down how I know something is wrong. Essentially, its pattern matching. When I see someone assert something that does not look like universal spirituality, I begin to suspect it. If upon closer examination it appears to involve harm of some sort, I consider it definitely in error. I'm willing to rethink my judgement if someone who I know to have done considerable spiritual development (in any tradition) disagrees.

I almost never find wrongness in a belief (at least not among the well established traditions). I almost always find it in an individual's interpretation of their beliefs.
 
Hi HCS –
HCSpiritual said:
I have difficulty with a tolerance which declares that if person X believes belief Y, then belief Y is true for them.
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It's pure subjectivity.

HCSpiritual said:
... that spirituality is a game some people play in their heads in their spare time (either that, or it requires the suspension of logic).
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That seems to be the Western Way.

HCSpiritual said:
It may be a position of tolerance, but it is also a position of disrespect for the belief under consideration.
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Yes, I think such 'tolerant' people are blissfully unaware of how casually disrespectful they are.

HCSpiritual said:
I'm a perennialist ...
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Bravo! Welcome aboard. However, I think you'll find you're walking a lonely path here! The rule is relativism and subjectivity
 
HCSpiritual said:
It may be a position of tolerance, but it is also a position of disrespect for the belief under consideration.
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Thomas said:
Yes, I think such 'tolerant' people are blissfully unaware of how casually disrespectful they are.
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I'm well aware people feel disrespected when I tolerate faith they are intolerant of. We are all free to feel offended by others beliefs. But since there are no known objective truths we all have to live together in the end. Offended or not.
 
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