"Belief" An Unnecessary Distinction?

[Proverb]

From my readings on Wikipedia about belief I am lead to think that 'belief' is a component of faith and is unnecessary to someone who lives without faith. If I am devoted to the application of reason to the reality which I perceive, what would be the role of belief in my life?

I don't see the point in 'believing' that I am human and must live by my nature.

The only possible context I could reasonably use 'belief' is to describe my state of mind after I validate some hypothesis or assumption. Even that however seems redundant to me.

All comments welcome!

I am not necessarily endorsing the validity of any particular entry in Wikipedia, the aforementioned entry simply coincided with my current understanding of the concept.

[JMeganSnow]

Well, in general the term "belief" just means that you accept something to be true; it makes no distinctions on why you accept it to be true, unlike the term "faith", which (usually) means that you have little or no evidence.

If you omit the term "belief" from your lexicon, I want to know what you intend to replace it with. Can you think of another term that encompasses those referents?

The closest I can think of would be understand or know, neither of which has quite the same connotation as "belief". The connotation, which I think is at least somewhat important, is that when you believe something you are open to the possibility that you are mistaken; you've accepted it to be true barring further evidence. If you understand something, that has the connotation that you've integrated it into your sum of knowledge; that you know not only the isolated fact, but also what it implies and how it relates to what else you know. If you know something, you are certain of it; you can, in fact, use it as a basis for rejecting other information, however it doesn't necessarily mean that you understand it.

I don't see much point in dropping terms because they have bad associations; I still use the term "faith", for instance. I prefer the method of nicking them for your own use.

[Proverb]

I hadn't considered the different connotations. That's an interesting point

Can you think of another term that encompasses those referents?

What exisitents does the concept of "belief" refer to?

..nicking...

You mean always making sure to state in what way you might be using a word?

[Proverb]

After some further consideration of the significance of connotation, I say that a belief, as I would use it in relation to my mind, is a psychological reaffirmation of a piece of knowledge. If I were to say that 'I believe said fact' I would be effectively communicating that, being a rational person, I have come to a certain conclusion as a result of using every means available to me and that I stand behind it. I honestly don't use the word all that often (I think because I haven't considered any use of it past that of use in conversation about the 'belief 'in god) I think now, however, that it connotes a certain level of 'devotion' as it were to whatever it may be and that it may in fact be useful in my lexicon.

[softwareNerd]

... a belief, as I would use it in relation to my mind, is a psychological reaffirmation of a piece of knowledge.... it connotes a certain level of 'devotion' as it were to whatever it may be and that it may in fact be useful in my lexicon.

That's interesting, because I use the word to represent a concept denoting less, rather than more, 'devotion' (aka certainty).

Here's the way I use some of these words, and the connotation (i.e. underlying referents):

• "I know he ate the apple": represents an extremely high degree of certainty, near 100% if not 100%.
  
• "I'm certain he ate the apple": I know it and I'm making my certainty explicit.
  
• "I believe he ate the apple": I have some reason to think that he ate it, but I'm open to the possibility that he didn't. Most of the time I stopped at belief and did not pursue certainty, because it was not worth my while to really figure out if he ate the apple
  
• "I think he ate the apple": A slightly less degree of certainty than belief
  

One more difference: I use the word "believe" when my uncertainty results from taking someone else's word. Once again, (for me) the word "belief" connotes a situation where I had no reason to explore the issue any more; so, I accepted something as a "tentative fact" or as a "working hypothesis" and went on.

[Hal]

Talking about beliefs gives us a framework in which to explain the behavior of others. Why did John bother go the shop when it was closed? Because he believed that it was open. Why did Peter duck when a football was kicked at his head? Because he believed it would be sore if he let it hit him.

It also makes sense when youre talking about things you used to think were true, but now dont; "I used to believe that Sydney was the capital of Australia but now I know otherwise". At any given point in your life, some of the things which you think are true are almost certainly going to be false, but you still believe them. You wouldnt normally say something like "I believe that the world existed 10 years ago" or "I believe the moon exists" though, becuase use of the word 'believe' in this particular context implies uncertainty.

Edited February 18, 2006 by Hal