Do people "choose" their beliefs?

[Shading Inc.]

But in terms of choices, everyone still has the capacity to choose their beliefs and choose to see whether their beliefs conform to reality.

A fire can't kindle itself. There has to be a spark if ever la lumière naturelle is to shine. What motivates a man think - to really think? I don't know, but one thing's for sure: It's not the unthinking man himself.

[Maarten]

A fire can't kindle itself. There has to be a spark if ever la lumière naturelle is to shine. What motivates a man think - to really think? I don't know, but one thing's for sure: It's not the unthinking man himself.

Before you can choose to think your mind must be in focus, and that's the even more fundamental choice someone must make. But I'm not sure what you are trying to say. Do you mean that a man who has already gotten into the habit of not thinking cannot rekindle his mind on his own, or that it is simply impossible for any human being to initiate the process on its own?

I'm not sure what the implications are of this, either. From observing small children it'd seem obvious to me that virtually all of them are very eager to learn more about the world, so it does seem like a child can focus his awareness without anyone telling them that they should do so. After that point I think this behavior just reinforces itself further because it pays off for the mind to be in focus, which is more reason to do it more, etc.

[hunterrose]

A fire can't kindle itself. There has to be a spark if ever la lumière naturelle is to shine. What motivates a man think - to really think? I don't know, but one thing's for sure: It's not the unthinking man himself.

Well, I'm speaking from the situation of a man already wanting something.

E.g. a lot of people want to be millionaires, and this is, for intents and purposes, the spark you speak of. Importantly, even with this initiating spark, many people not only don't become millionaire, most of them don't even try beyond cursory efforts.

Someone could argue (ineffectively IMO) that such a desire to be a millionaire isn't chosen, but from the context that a person does have wants/"sparks", the "unthinking" man does motivate himself, so to speak.

[Shading Inc.]

Before you can choose to think your mind must be in focus, and that's the even more fundamental choice someone must make. But I'm not sure what you are trying to say. Do you mean that a man who has already gotten into the habit of not thinking cannot rekindle his mind on his own, or that it is simply impossible for any human being to initiate the process on its own?

I'm not sure what the implications are of this, either. From observing small children it'd seem obvious to me that virtually all of them are very eager to learn more about the world, so it does seem like a child can focus his awareness without anyone telling them that they should do so. After that point I think this behavior just reinforces itself further because it pays off for the mind to be in focus, which is more reason to do it more, etc.

What I'm saying is that if you aren't already, you can't choose to 'from now on be volitional'. Things don't start (or stop) rolling without something to initiate that rolling. I'm talking about the principle of inertia here, basically. That means that unthinking / non-volitional people are powerless to do something about their situation. One either has to be born volitional, or be as fortunate as to somehow become volitional during one's life. But non-volitional people can't become volitional all by themselves.

[aequalsa]

What I'm saying is that if you aren't already, you can't choose to 'from now on be volitional'. Things don't start (or stop) rolling without something to initiate that rolling. I'm talking about the principle of inertia here, basically. That means that unthinking / non-volitional people are powerless to do something about their situation. One either has to be born volitional, or be as fortunate as to somehow become volitional during one's life. But non-volitional people can't become volitional all by themselves.

What do you mean by being non-volitional? People are always choosing one way or another. I do not understand how someone could lack the ability to choose. At most they lack knowledge of some particular alternatives. Not the ability to choose, per se.

[Shading Inc.]

Well, I'm speaking from the situation of a man already wanting something.

E.g. a lot of people want to be millionaires, and this is, for intents and purposes, the spark you speak of. Importantly, even with this initiating spark, many people not only don't become millionaire, most of them don't even try beyond cursory efforts.

Someone could argue (ineffectively IMO) that such a desire to be a millionaire isn't chosen, but from the context that a person does have wants/"sparks", the "unthinking" man does motivate himself, so to speak.

I'd say that someone wanting to become a millionaire but who doesn't make any reasonable efforts towards it, doesn't really want to become a millionaire.

[algieM]

What do you mean by being non-volitional? People are always choosing one way or another. I do not understand how someone could lack the ability to choose. At most they lack knowledge of some particular alternatives. Not the ability to choose, per se.

The use of the word "chosing" seems to imply conscious decision. But many of our choices are not blatantly conscious. For example, do I get to my morning job on time, or do I call the vendor whose product another customer is waiting for? Do I sit there (after having "chosen to think") and weigh all the rational possibilities? No. I don't have time, and if I was to go delving into all the possible logical ramifications of this decision, I'd never get to my job OR make the phone call! No, I think, "Damn it, I'd better just be late and call and get it over with." That's one of the amazing things about the human mind - that we can make decisions - and important and useful decisions, without having to consciously weigh each and every minute detail.

I still don't get this "choosing to think," or this volitional/non-volitional business. Very, very little of what we do is done after we consciously think, "I'm going to do this." Richard Feinman didn't "choose" to be interested in science or to be naturally talented as a mathematician and scientist. My son didn't "choose" to like ketchup. My (now dead) dog Jack didn't "choose" to like catching frisbees or ignoring me when he was the field behind the neighbors house and knew I couldn't see him. Conversely, Feinman couldn't have "willed" himself to be interested in car racing, my son couldn't "choose" to dislike ketchup, and my dog couldn't have "volitioned" himself to hate frisbees. You want something on a more concrete level? What about "choosing" whether to shoplift something or not. The type of personality that is likely to shoplife is not one that goes around philosophizing over the ethics of crime - and they don't choose to be that type of personality. That is not a decision that is made on a logical level at all. Is the person "not thinking"? You're damn right they're thinking!!! They're thinking, "I better be careful. Can anyone see me?" In fact, they're not even thinking that on a conscious level - they are doing what we do more than think, acting automatically - automatically being careful, automatically looking to see if anyone is watching. "Bad" decisions are not from a lack of thought, but rather the result of thoughts (if they're the result of intentional, deliberate thoughts at all) that are (like the vast, vast majority of thoughts we have) not as "rational" as the idealized objectivist would like to believe they are.

As for the "Who wants to be a millionaire" idea, I'll give you an example from my own family that flies in the face of people "chosing" to be millionaires, or having "sparks" that come along and motivate them. I have a brother who, from the time he was a little kid and really couldn't even conceive of a million dollars, much less that he would get that way by saving and investing his money, saved and invested his money! He also washed his hands a lot, and didn't get that way by "choosing to think" about hand-washing. I, on the other hand, really never cared too much about money one way or another. We're different people by our very constitution and innate personality. He didn't "chose" to be a saver and to be interested in money and actively enjoy manipulating stocks, and I didn't "choose" not to be a millionaire, any more than he "chose" to be interested in old movies and I "chose" to be interested in the guitar. If someone, by dint of their innate personality, is interested and enjoys things that will lead him not to succeed, or even to ruin, that's not his fault any more than it's to Einstein's credit that he was good at and enjoyed math. We are who we are, and we go from there.

Something I see over and over again in many of these posts is the need, or desire, for the posters to be able to portray success in life as the result of "choices," "chosing to think," or "volition," and the lack of success as being the lack of "choosing," not "chosing to think," or the lack of "volition." My point, which I think I've made from the beginning, is not that choice has NOTHING to do with it, but rather that it is only one of many aspects of conscious and unconscious experience that contribute to where we find ourselves in life; that choices are not made in a psychological and contextual vacume, but rather are part of an ongoing dynamic that we call life. We, not to mention the world we live in, are far, far too complex to be put into the simplistic box that objectivists would like to put us into.

I think what's really going on here is that some people (objectivists), for whatever psychological reasons, need, or at least are content to look at people and place blame or credit squarely on their shoulders. On the other hand are people like me who, for whatever psychological reasons, need, or at least are content to look at those same people and say, and without being any less rational, the world is not that simple. We're talking about different worldviews, and we will never convince each other to change those views. But we can have fun and exercise our minds by doing what we're doing here - not because writing in forums makes sense (from a rational point of view there isn't much of a bigger waste of time than carrying on un-win-able arguments with invisible strangers - which is proof to me that you hard-core objectivists are not as rational as you would like to think), but because WE ENJOY IT! Isn't irrationality great.

Edited January 17, 2007 by algieM

[DavidOdden]

The use of the word "chosing" seems to imply conscious decision. But many of our choices are not blatantly conscious.

I think you are confusing the notion of being conscious and being focused. No choice can be made unconsciously, but you can be unfocused in your decisions. A rational person will need to carefully deliberate certain alternatives, depending on his knowledge or the significance of the alternative. Only an idiot would spend an hour sketching out the logic of what kind of donut to get instead, if they didn't have sour cream and only had jelly donuts and crullers. Only an idiot (or a very rich man) would treat a million dollar investment decision with the same lack of focus as befits dealing with the stor being out of your favorite type of donut. Both are conscious decisions.

Richard Feinman didn't "choose" to be interested in science or to be naturally talented as a mathematician and scientist. My son didn't "choose" to like ketchup. My (now dead) dog Jack didn't "choose" to like catching frisbees or ignoring me when he was the field behind the neighbors house and knew I couldn't see him.

Your dog doesn't chose: dog aren't volitional. Richard Feinman didn't even become a mathematician-scientist, he became a biochemist. Richard Feynman, however, did choose to become a mathematician and then a physicist. And your son chose to "like ketchup". It's a bit easier to deal with people who choose not to to like broccoli, because we understand that better, but the principles apply to ketchup also. Remember that an automatic physical reaction is not chosen, it is, as the name implies, automatic. There may be some pleasurable physical reaction that automatically arises from sticking ketchup on his taste buds, but what follows from that is chosen. He could, if he wanted to, suppress the recollection of the pleasurable feelings arising from tongue meeting ketchup, giving no more thought to ketchup.

The major mistake that most people make when it comes to understanding volition and the importance of choice is that your choices don't guarantee success. Only rational choices guarantee success.

Edited January 17, 2007 by DavidOdden

[Shading Inc.]

What do you mean by being non-volitional? People are always choosing one way or another. I do not understand how someone could lack the ability to choose. At most they lack knowledge of some particular alternatives. Not the ability to choose, per se.

Well of course people always choose one thing or another. In my mind it is impossible for something to do nothing. That is, nothing is not something that can be done - or to put it differently, we (things that are) always do something. Now, I can imagine myself doing a lot of things tomorrow; there're truly more paths of action for me to take than I can conceive of, yet I am not God and will end up taking only one such path. And this is how it goes with everything that is something: We can imagine a great lot of things to happen to any given entity, but in the end it will end up taking but a single course of action (for as far as I know, at least).

One could say that thus everyone (or even everything) chooses its course of action, but then you're missing a fundamental issue. Choosing (being volitional) means that the origin of starting or ceasing movement in a certain direction (towards a certain goal) lies solely within the choosing entity. That is, the choosing entity is forced to take a certain action by nothing but itself - and in order to be worthy of the predicate volitional, this entity should also have been able to choose not to take the action.

To get down to earth: How many people do know who, when deciding on what course of action next to take, are influenced by nothing but their own rationality and volition? Mind you, drugs, other people's opinions and environmental conditioning, although they do reside in your body somewhere (I think), are not part of of your rationality or your volition.

Edited January 17, 2007 by Shading Inc.

[aequalsa]

The use of the word "chosing" seems to imply conscious decision. But many of our choices are not blatantly conscious. For example, do I get to my morning job on time, or do I call the vendor whose product another customer is waiting for? Do I sit there (after having "chosen to think") and weigh all the rational possibilities? ........

......hat we're doing here - not because writing in forums makes sense (from a rational point of view there isn't much of a bigger waste of time than carrying on un-win-able arguments with invisible strangers - which is proof to me that you hard-core objectivists are not as rational as you would like to think), but because WE ENJOY IT! Isn't irrationality great.

I don't have time for a full response this mornig but I would like to clarify two mistaken premises. First is, with regard to our active subconcious decision making, we are aware of our actions and can introspect and determine what beliefs caused us to act in such a way and then decide if it is in our best long term interests. The shoplifter chooses not to do this.

Second, I don't consider participating in this message board a waste of time. (In many other boards I would, so I do not participate)I find the people here, even those I disagree with to be, by and large, very honest intellectually with a sincere interest in understanding things further. Disagreement in debate, often takes on the characteristic of devils advocacy. Before accepting an idea you do not hold, it is perfectly sensible to strike it from every angle. A great deal can be gained by having other rational types scrutinize your ideas and force clarification. (See the most recent exchange on the strip club thread between IAMMetaphysical and myself for an example of this value.) I dont "enjoy it" in some hedonistic way that I can't help but do for the reasons I have stated.

Third, you might have missed Sophia's post above where she explained that people get what they deserve out of life. That they get the happiness they deserve. Not necessarily everything they want. But on that note, how likely you are to get what you want is largely dependent on your focused mind and persistence. You have to know what you want and keep getting up and walking towards everytime the world knocks you down.

My experience has been when someone makes an offhand comment like "I want a million dollars" or "I want to write a book", they are confusing cause and effect. They want a million dollars to land in their lap or they want to have wriiten a book without actually writing it. To have any chance in hell of getting those things, you have to "want to earn a million dollars" or actually enjoy writing regardless of the accolades you might later recieve. Happiness and achievement both result from valueing productivity. This is something that you can conciously decide to do.

Edited January 17, 2007 by aequalsa