“Would you say that a belief system is no more than an aggregate of many facts accrued over time? - Or is belief an emotional condition which then selects facts to maintain itself?” –Chris
“I would argue, Chris, that since it would be hard to see how one might derive a belief from a fact such as 1+1=2, that beliefs are more closely tied with data (formal and informal (and truth as defined by Rorty: an intellectual construct that seems sufficiently justified.” –me
“As you know we are born into many beliefs religious and political, sometimes seeming more like ideology than belief but functioning the same. Beliefs are required for everything we do. I think you’re right. They do seem to have a life of their own when tribalism and identity are entwined with beliefs.” –David
“Yes, the problem with tautolgoical facts is they tend to be trivial and lack the complex meaningfulness of belief which as David McDivitt explains is also about constructing a narrative. There’s a circularity in believing in the idea that facts make up your beliefs, if that makes sense…” –Chris
“Yes, I agree with David McDivitt’s point as well. And it does make sense. In fact, I would argue that the endgame of truth (with a lower-case “t” as defined by the pragmatic approach (is synonymous with beliefs. I would also argue (in terms of the circularity you describe (that the relationship between facts, data, and truths is not one way. Our truths (beliefs (can sometimes effect what facts we choose to focus on.
“Because of this,I stand with David McDivitt’s stand against over-zealous secular obtuseness when it comes to dismissing religious beliefs. The problem with Cervais’ point is that he confuses data with facts.” –me
And I would say the same concerning Dawkins’s, Bill Maher’s, and Sam Harris’ rather obtuse dismissal of religious belief systems that are based on informal data that leads to their individual truths. And I am not (being an agnostic myself: an atheist that hedges their bets (suggesting that we accept religious belief systems. What I am suggesting, however, is that we push the pragmatic agenda to the point of recognizing that there are religious people out there who see the same problems with Capitalism that people like me do. And for my pragmatic purposes, it really doesn’t matter what belief systems my potential allies may hold, that is as long as it gets the job done: social justice: a world in which I can enjoy what I have while knowing that the worse off among us have, at least, a minimum of comfort.
Rorty says:
“Truth cannot be out there - cannot exist independently of the human mind - because sentences cannot so exist, or be out there. The world is out there, but descriptions of the world are not. Only descriptions of the world can be true or false. The world on its own - unaided by the describing activities of human beings --cannot…” -Richard Rorty. Contingency, Irony, and Solidarity (Kindle Locations 135-137). Kindle Edition.
So by what criteria do we dismiss religious statements beyond the pragmatic criteria of working in a pragmatic way? In other words, from a pragmatic stance, if a religious perspective is useful to the extent that it furthers social justice (if it works to our ends, there is no reason we shouldn’t use it.