EdenOne

Joined

• started 155 topics
• posted 2,912 times   see topics posted on
• send a message

Posts by EdenOne

• 
  59

  How the human mind processes facts and faith differently

  by EdenOne in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  i found this very interesting article by t. m. luhrmann in todays edition of the new york times (i've highlighted a few parts i 've found most interesting):.

  it seems weird to deny them.. and yet a broad group of scholars is beginning to demonstrate that religious belief and factual belief are indeed different kinds of mental creatures.

  people process evidence differently when they think with a factual mind-set rather than with a religious mind-set.

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
• 

  EdenOne

  Oubliette: Or do we simply need to take it on faith?

  Here's your empirical evidence. Just because some people don't experience this themselves, that doesn't become the norm.

  Eden
• 
  59

  How the human mind processes facts and faith differently

  by EdenOne in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  i found this very interesting article by t. m. luhrmann in todays edition of the new york times (i've highlighted a few parts i 've found most interesting):.

  it seems weird to deny them.. and yet a broad group of scholars is beginning to demonstrate that religious belief and factual belief are indeed different kinds of mental creatures.

  people process evidence differently when they think with a factual mind-set rather than with a religious mind-set.

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
• 

  EdenOne

  nicolaou: More avoidance EdenOne? Answer me plainly, did Jesus walk on water?

  Based on what I know on the properties of water and technology available in the 1st century, I can say with a great degree of confidence that such feat never took place, therefore the account, as it exists now, is legendary.

  Happy now, Nic?

  Eden
• 
  59

  How the human mind processes facts and faith differently

  by EdenOne in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  i found this very interesting article by t. m. luhrmann in todays edition of the new york times (i've highlighted a few parts i 've found most interesting):.

  it seems weird to deny them.. and yet a broad group of scholars is beginning to demonstrate that religious belief and factual belief are indeed different kinds of mental creatures.

  people process evidence differently when they think with a factual mind-set rather than with a religious mind-set.

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
• 

  EdenOne

  It would be interesting to see if faith claims are processed by the brain in the exact same manner that statements of fact. Only by analyzing results from that experiment one could come up with a theory.

  Eden
• 
  59

  How the human mind processes facts and faith differently

  by EdenOne in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  i found this very interesting article by t. m. luhrmann in todays edition of the new york times (i've highlighted a few parts i 've found most interesting):.

  it seems weird to deny them.. and yet a broad group of scholars is beginning to demonstrate that religious belief and factual belief are indeed different kinds of mental creatures.

  people process evidence differently when they think with a factual mind-set rather than with a religious mind-set.

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
• 

  EdenOne

  I know the difference between objective evidence and subjective evidence; what I'm curious about is what brain mechanisms are at work behind the choice each individual makes to look at an objective fact and then one builds a belief / opinion about the significance of that fact ( evidence of X) and another individual makes a completely different judgement over the subjective value of the same fact ( not evidence of X).

  Eden
• 
  45

  How to Choose a Wife!

  by snugglebunny in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  back in the day, when my family moved to a new congregation, i fell head over heels with a young sister who was an elder's daughter.

  it wasn't long before we were talking about marriage and i was contemplating buying her an engagement ring.

  my parents were not happy at all.

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
• 

  EdenOne

  It's more or less 'standard practice' to go to the elders of the congregation of your love interest and ask for informations before going ahead with serious dating.

  Eden
• 
  59

  How the human mind processes facts and faith differently

  by EdenOne in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  i found this very interesting article by t. m. luhrmann in todays edition of the new york times (i've highlighted a few parts i 've found most interesting):.

  it seems weird to deny them.. and yet a broad group of scholars is beginning to demonstrate that religious belief and factual belief are indeed different kinds of mental creatures.

  people process evidence differently when they think with a factual mind-set rather than with a religious mind-set.

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
• 

  EdenOne

  It's fascinating as the same fact can be intepreted as "evidence" for different things in the minds of a believer and a non-believer.

  Fact (let's assume data is reliable): between August 2012 and August 2014, 100.000+ bible studies were requested online through jw.org website.

  The JW believer will point to this fact as evidence that God is blessing the work or the website. He will assert: "God is blessing the Governing Body's efforts, and therefore, this is God's true religion". The non-believer won't challenge the fact, but will question if it constitutes evidence for the belief claimed by the believer.

  What baffles me is the neuronal processes that are involved in processing facts and interpreting them as evidence for this or that.

  Eden
• 
  59

  How the human mind processes facts and faith differently

  by EdenOne in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  i found this very interesting article by t. m. luhrmann in todays edition of the new york times (i've highlighted a few parts i 've found most interesting):.

  it seems weird to deny them.. and yet a broad group of scholars is beginning to demonstrate that religious belief and factual belief are indeed different kinds of mental creatures.

  people process evidence differently when they think with a factual mind-set rather than with a religious mind-set.

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
• 

  EdenOne

  Cofty,

  thanks for the link. It seems the study you mentioned is about a different subject, namely, to what extent an individual belief an individual has about what is God's will on a certain issue, is merely a reflexion of one's own belief about that same issue, thus egocentrically projecting one's personal belief into God.

  From that study:

  "The inherent ambiguity of God's beliefs on major issues and the extent to which religious texts may be open to interpretation and subjective evaluation, suggests not only strong egocentric biases when reasoning about God, but also that people may be consistently more egocentric when reasoning about God's beliefs than when reasoning about other people's beliefs."

  However, in the case of this thread's subject, I'd be interested in learning if the brain processes statements of fact and statements of faith differently. I find it fascinating that "evidence" has different meaning and value for rationalists and theists, for example. I wonder if that has to do with some differentiated brain processing of said information.

  Eden
• 
  59

  How the human mind processes facts and faith differently

  by EdenOne in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  i found this very interesting article by t. m. luhrmann in todays edition of the new york times (i've highlighted a few parts i 've found most interesting):.

  it seems weird to deny them.. and yet a broad group of scholars is beginning to demonstrate that religious belief and factual belief are indeed different kinds of mental creatures.

  people process evidence differently when they think with a factual mind-set rather than with a religious mind-set.

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
• 

  EdenOne

  I found this very interesting article by T. M. Luhrmann in todays edition of The New York Times (I've highlighted a few parts I 've found most interesting):

  
  

  MOST of us find it mind-boggling that some people seem willing to ignore the facts — on climate change, on vaccines, on health care — if the facts conflict with their sense of what someone like them believes. “But those are the facts,” you want to say. “It seems weird to deny them.”

  And yet a broad group of scholars is beginning to demonstrate that religious belief and factual belief are indeed different kinds of mental creatures. People process evidence differently when they think with a factual mind-set rather than with a religious mind-set. Even what they count as evidence is different. And they are motivated differently, based on what they conclude. On what grounds do scholars make such claims?

  First of all, they have noticed that the very language people use changes when they talk about religious beings, and the changes mean that they think about their realness differently. You do not say, “I believe that my dog is alive.” The fact is so obvious it is not worth stating. You simply talk in ways that presume the dog’s aliveness — you say she’s adorable or hungry or in need of a walk. But to say, “I believe that Jesus Christ is alive” signals that you know that other people might not think so. It also asserts reverence and piety. We seem to regard religious beliefs and factual beliefs with what the philosopher Neil Van Leeuwen calls different “cognitive attitudes.”

  Second, these scholars have remarked that when people consider the truth of a religious belief, what the belief does for their lives matters more than, well, the facts. We evaluate factual beliefs often with perceptual evidence. If I believe that the dog is in the study but I find her in the kitchen, I change my belief. We evaluate religious beliefs more with our sense of destiny, purpose and the way we think the world should be. One study found that over 70 percent of people who left a religious cult did so because of a conflict of values. They did not complain that the leader’s views were mistaken. They believed that he was a bad person.

  Third, these scholars have found that religious and factual beliefs play different roles in interpreting the same events. Religious beliefs explain why, rather than how. People who understand readily that diseases are caused by natural processes might still attribute sickness at a particular time to demons, or healing to an act of God. The psychologist Cristine H. Legare and her colleagues recently demonstrated that people use both natural and supernatural explanations in this interdependent way across many cultures. They tell a story, as recounted by Tracy Kidder’s book on the anthropologist and physician Paul Farmer, about a woman who had taken her tuberculosis medication and been cured — and who then told Dr. Farmer that she was going to get back at the person who had used sorcery to make her ill. “But if you believe that,” he cried, “why did you take your medicines?” In response to the great doctor she replied, in essence, “Honey, are you incapable of complexity?”

  Moreover, people’s reliance on supernatural explanations increases as they age. It may be tempting to think that children are more likely than adults to reach out to magic to explain something, and that they increasingly put that mind-set to the side as they grow up, but the reverse is true. It’s the young kids who seem skeptical when researchers ask them about gods and ancestors, and the adults who seem clear and firm. It seems that supernatural ideas do things for adults they do not yet do for children.

  Finally, scholars have determined that people don’t use rational, instrumental reasoning when they deal with religious beliefs. The anthropologist Scott Atran and his colleagues have shown that sacred values are immune to the normal cost-benefit trade-offs that govern other dimensions of our lives. Sacred values are insensitive to quantity (one cartoon can be a profound insult). They don’t respond to material incentives (if you offer people money to give up something that represents their sacred value, and they often become more intractable in their refusal). Sacred values may even have different neural signatures in the brain.

  The danger point seems to be when people feel themselves to be completely fused with a group defined by its sacred value. When Mr. Atran and his colleagues surveyed young men in two Moroccan neighborhoods associated with militant jihad (one of them home to five men who helped plot the 2004 Madrid train bombings, and then blew themselves up), they found that those who described themselves as closest to their friends and who upheld Shariah law were also more likely to say that they would suffer grievous harm to defend Shariah law. These people become what Mr. Atran calls “devoted actors” who are unconditionally committed to their sacred value, and they are willing to die for it.

  One of the interesting things about sacred values, however, is that they are both general (“I am a true Christian”) and particular (“I believe that abortion is murder”). It is possible that this is the key to effective negotiation, because the ambiguity allows the sacred value to be reframed without losing its essential truth. Mr. Atran and his colleague Jeremy Ginges argued in a 2012 essay in Science that Jerusalem could be reimagined not as a place but as a portal to heaven. If it were, they suggested, just getting access to the portal, rather than owning it, might suffice.

  Or then again, it might not. The recent elections in Israel are a daunting reminder of how tough the challenge is. Still, these new ideas about religious belief should shape the way people negotiate about ownership of the land, just as they should shape the way we think about climate change deniers and vaccine avoiders. People aren’t dumb in not recognizing the facts. They are using a reasoning process that responds to moral arguments more than scientific ones, and we should understand that when we engage."

  Comments?

  Personally, I would like to see an experiment that scans the brain while the person is making a factual statement: 'I believe my dog is alive'; if there's a difference in brain activity or area of the brain activated when saying: "I believe Jesus is alive".
  

  Eden

  
  
• 
  69

  "Your bad attitude is evident, because you don't bring a meeting bag to the meetings anymore!"

  by stuckinarut2 in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  yes friends.....this is the comment said to me by an elder!.

  "your bad attitude is evident because you don't bring your meeting bag anymore!".

  i calmly replied: "but everything i need is on the tablet now......".

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
• 

  EdenOne

  Not the exact words, and not aimed at me, but I heard an elder once ranting about publishers who came to the meetings without bags / briefcases, just holding the bible, songbook and magazine in their hands. It was "disrespectful to Jehovah" and a "negative witnessing" to observers. It's all just about impressions.

  Eden
• 
  16

  Did Jehovah's Witnesses dishonestly insert the word "Apostate" in their custom version of the Bible

  by Watchtower-Free in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  interesting article.

  http://doctrinesoffaith.com/more-errors-in-jehovahs-witness-new-world-translation-bible/.

  more intentional repeated errors in new world translation bible: a study on apostates.

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
• 

  EdenOne

  To my knowledge, there are only two occurrences of the greek term ἀποστασία ('apostasies') or in the NT:

  Acts 21:21 - Paul was falsely accused of teaching the Jews apostasy from Moses;

  2 Thessalonians 2:2, 3 - A great apostasy foretold by Jesus, which would precede the "day of the Lord".

  So, in true accuracy, only in these two stances the modern term "apostate" or "apostasy" should be used. Although the idea of falling away, or withdrawal or abandonment from faith or God o Jesus is abundant in the NT, other terms are used in the original Greek to convey that idea.

  A related word 'apostasion' is used in the NT to denote a divorce or a repudiation. (Matthew 5:31; 19:7; Mark 10:4)

  
  

  Eden