Objects of belief or; A belief isn't the thing believed

In my last post, I claimed that belief is the acceptance of the truth of something. To believe is to accept something as being true (which is not known to be true); confidence in or conviction of the truth of something. This belief requires an object of belief and differs substantially from belief in Truth (that objective truth exists, in general). I will refer to the object of belief to as an hypothesis, although it can be any sort of claim from completely fanciful to scientific theory and of any degree of complexity, logical soundness, or verification. Beliefs, like premises, can be implicit and explicit, recognized and unrecognized by the believer. Lastly, a belief is not the same are the object of belief; while this may seem self-evidently true, I’ve found that most people do not, in practice, recognize this subtlety. “The sun will rise tomorrow morning”, is not a belief even if someone believes it; it is the object of belief – belief is the accept-as-true part. “The sun will rise tomorrow morning”, in my vernacular, is an hypothesis.

What is belief? No, really?

Are beliefs really just the realm of subjectivity?

I don’t think that this is the nature of belief. In order to understand what Dr. AC Grayling was really saying in his essay Facts and Fairy Dust, I wanted to take his implicit logical framework to its extreme. I felt this was necessary because Dr. Grayling seems to identify strongly with scientism; that is to say that he disputes the existence of fairies because evidence for their existence does not meet the requirements of a narrow definition of science. As he says;

“every belief or hypothesis depends for its respectability on how it was arrived at, how open it is to test, and how it consists with what is powerfully established and repeatedly (a billion times repeatedly) confirmed in our common sense and scientific views of the world.”

The scope of respectability is defined by the boundaries of scientific empiricism; the realm of possibilities is limited in the same manner. In short, only that which fits within the scope of scientific method is respectable (real). However, I do not think that this is a reasonable requirement because it fails one of its own requirements; it is not open to testing and requires a series of additional un-testable beliefs to support it. But, I’m not quite ready to get into this quite yet, so I’ll get back to the topic at hand; what is belief?

As I mentioned in an earlier post, belief is the acceptance of something as being true. Correlational to this definition is that beliefs are not known to be true; if they were they would no longer be beliefs, but knowledge. (There is a relationship between beliefs, knowledge, scientific method which the cleverer of you may already have perceived. However, I am not ready to address this relationship, yet.) All beliefs require an hypothesis, either explicitly or implicitly, but an hypothesis does not directly require a belief; however, in practice, virtually all do.

As previously stated, beliefs have a subjective component, but are not themselves subjective. Also, beliefs are not (as I have used them previously) divorced from reality. Beliefs can be identical to an hypothesis, with the difference being that hypotheses are not (ideally) believed to be true. Description vs. unproven truth is the game at hand. Be careful, this is a game filled with subtleties and whose elements are often difficult to ascertain. Luckily, Truth is bullet-proof and we are going to fire a lot of rounds into it and see how well our view of reality holds up.

Theories

Between belief and fact are theories. If beliefs are the acceptance of something as true which has no descriptive or explanatory value and no predictive power, then what I am referring to as theories are the opposite; the acceptance of something as true which has descriptive or explanatory value, or predictive power. Although the denotation of belief accurately describes most theories, I am using both terms differently here. Theories are different from beliefs in that they refer directly to an objective component; they describe, explain, or predict some part of the universe for which knowledge is possessed.

In another way of talking it, facts are objective, beliefs are subjective, and theories bridge the gap between the two because theories are a subjective analysis of objective phenomena. Theories are the inevitable byproduct of intelligent, conscious creatures with sense receptors (remember, I am classifying mental states as objective phenomena). Is this clear? Since a theory requires sensory data and a subjective experience, it is necessary that these two requirements are met.

For the materialists out there who believe that consciousness is epiphenomenal, this idea is utter nonsense because they believe that what we call consciousness is really just the firing patterns of neurons in the brain and so, there is no subjectivity. While I would like to cover this some day, it simply cannot be done quickly in any way that would make sense to a die-hard materialist. For those who are undecided explicitly or implicitly (many don’t know they are materialists, although they cling to many dualistic concepts, and so, are partial materialists), I can offer up some nuggets that may help them understand that consciousness is real and a fundamentally material universe is incoherent. It goes some thing like this: A subjective experience is a constrained experience. The scope of our awareness and decision space is limited to a seemingly unique perspective which is based on a set of intrinsic features and our interaction with our environment. What is like to be each of us is the result of our limitations and experiences. This is fundamentally the nature of subjectivity and while there is an objective reality of which we are a part, we only know it through our individually, somewhat unique experience of it. Yes, I am aware of the standard refutation of this description. And no, I don’t find it convincing because a real experience and sensory data of an experience are not the same thing (presupposition of the non-existence of subjectivity) and because it requires the assumption that materialism is true (the premise and conclusion are the same) and consequently, that mental states are caused by the brain. None of these are necessarily true and I personally think they are nonsense, but more on that another time.

So, what does this mean? Am I saying that theories are not scientific? Am I just redefining words in an effort to change their meanings?

At this point, what I am doing is showing that virtually nothing is purely objective as far as we can know. Although I am using some terms unconventionally, I am doing so to avoid the sloppy conceptualizations that I think many people have. In my next post, I will begin to explore theories and beliefs and their seemingly codependent existence with more musings and some examples.

Words and Meanings

It’s been brought to my attention that I’m using words and concepts with non-traditional meanings and that some people are having trouble understanding me. While I certainly don’t intend to confuse people, I often find that words have definitions which do not work very well for detailed analysis or may inherit meanings from sloppy usage.

An example:

Belief - As I mentioned in a previous post, belief is the acceptance of something that has not been verified as truth. With this definition, belief can be pure fantasy or one’s educated opinion on a long-studied topic. Belief can also refer to knowledge of something not directly available to logical analysis; religious belief. While all of these definitions are correct, if one wishes to consider one facet of belief, one can either use the same word with limited meaning, find a more accurate word, or make up a new word. Since I am writing casual posts to a blog with no expectation of peer review, I am using the more general word and expecting people to stretch their minds and come to an understanding of my meaning so I don’t have to resort to words which may send them either scrambling for a dictionary or to the next web site. If anyone is confused about the use of a word, leave a comment. I will try to answer your questions.

My intention for this blog was for it to be thought-provoking and increase understanding. It isn't rocket science, nor is it in any way critical for anyone but me (if that).

Belief

At the bottom of these musings about Dr. AC Grayling’s essay “Facts and Fairydust”is a discussion about knowledge; the cold, hard facts. So far, I have taken a narrow view of justification for knowledge. It is narrow in the sense that I have placed all human knowledge into the realm of probability and shown how we can never prove that we know anything. Looking at it from the other direction, one could say that what I define as knowledge is something that requires no justification. Knowledge is either real knowledge, or it is speculation. Direct knowledge however, seems a lot like a belief. However, there is a distinct difference; a belief is not known to be true, but knowledge is. Is that clear?

So far, I have seemingly classified anything that isn’t knowledge as belief, but that isn’t my intention. If belief is the acceptance of something as true which has no justification, descriptive value, explanatory power, or predictive power, then there must be something that is not knowledge which is justifiable and has descriptive value, explanatory power, or predictive power. Considering this model, knowledge is the realm of the objective. The information received from senses is knowledge about the universe and, when considered objectively, only includes the raw data from our senses. When I talk about senses, I am referring to awareness, not sense receptors or processors. We are aware of not only what comes from physical receptors, but also what comes from the non-physical realm; the brain. Yes, I know the brain is physical and I also know that physical sensations actually come from the brain. Come from? Where do they go? Another time…

What I mean by the non-physical realm is the information from the brain whose origin is not from physical sense receptors. You have those sensations, right? Feelings, intuition, inspiration, eureka moments, et cetera. There are more of them than that, but for the purpose of this musing, I’d like to limit them to the non-physical sensations that nearly everyone would agree are sensations.

If you do not think that these things are sensations, I’d like you to consider happiness. Is happiness are theory? An Idea? A belief? When you are happy, you feel happy. You are sensing happiness. Is this not true? If you are still unconvinced, consider the source of happiness next time it strikes you. You could also do this with anger, fear, apprehension, or any other emotion. Do these sensations come from outside of you? Do you will them to happen?

Not all non-physical sensations are knowledge, but those that aren’t are related to knowledge in the same way that thoughts, ideas, beliefs, theories, and models are. They are about knowledge. They refer to knowledge. They are a representation of organization. While knowledge (data/information) has only one component (knowledge is a thing in and of itself), non-knowledge has at least two components; a knowledge and contextual component. The contextual component could be anything from the subjective realm. By subjective, I mean not only the traditional definition of subjective, but also any limitation of extent of knowledge; purely defined, it is the realm of speculation.

Are you saying that theories have no value? No. I’m saying that theories have a subjective component; no more, or less.

Beliefs (as I am considering them), are not directly about the universe; they lack the knowledge component or any direct reference to knowledge. They are not descriptive, do not explain anything, and are not able to predict anything objectively. What is left is pure subjectivity, and they most certainly are subjective. Beliefs lack directly informational content but can be filled with meaning. Though they most certainly say something (indirectly, perhaps) about the person with the belief. So, how do beliefs relate to theories? If you are clever and have been paying attention, you may already know the answer. Otherwise, you may have to wait for the next thrilling post.

I believe that what you believe is not what I believe that you believe

Belief is commonly known as acceptance of something that has not been verified as truth.
Generally, the acceptance of the existence of fairies, flat earth, monsters in closets, or Thor, would be considered beliefs by virtually everyone. These are examples of beliefs for which the reason for the belief (for most people) is hearsay or pure fantasy. Believers in such things would have no supporting data for their belief, correlational events to which they are attributed, or any appeal to reason. In the purest sense of it, their belief is a False Belief.

Less generally, the acceptance of the existence of an Aether, out-of-body travel, relativity, and near-death experiences are considered beliefs by a significant number of people (though not necessarily most). These beliefs differ from the former in that they are related to or explain some phenomena, but lack any verifiability for themselves. For instance near-death experiences are real experiences, but because of their lack of repeatability and the difficulty, if not impossibility, of the study of the phenomena (the subject’s body is unconscious), they are mostly closed to direct scientific scrutiny. On the other hand, relativity is a theory about the mechanism behind an observed phenomenon, where the proposed mechanism cannot be shown to exist or to be capable of causal power.

The beliefs which are most widely accepted are beliefs related directly to phenomena. The belief that the sun will rise tomorrow is a belief with a basis in fact. I have seen that the sun has risen every day of my life, have never heard anyone speak of a day where the sun hasn’t risen, and have heard evidence from scientists that the sun will rise tomorrow and for every day for several billion years. They tell me that on those days when I can’t see the sun, it still rises behind whatever obscures it. There is a theory about the motion and positioning of the planets in relation to the sun which has enough explanatory power for me to be able to accept the explanation given. Although such beliefs are virtually universally accepted to be true, they are rarely thought of as being belief; they are facts.

But are these beliefs actually facts? From a theoretical perspective, one can easily admit that the belief that the sun will rise tomorrow is indeed a belief, but are such beliefs acted upon as facts? I think this is the case more often than not. The belief that the sun will rise tomorrow isn’t necessarily a belief about the sun, predictability, or knowledge about the motion of the solar system; it is a belief about a belief. What does that mean? I didn’t know when I typed it, but I’m going to go with it.

So what is the belief that the sun will rise tomorrow actually a belief in? As with any other belief, it could be a belief in anything. Some people might believe in what others say; some might believe in the constancy of the laws or nature; some believe in the solar model, while some probably believe in a divine origin for sunrises. In these cases, the belief in the sun rising tomorrow is really a belief in what follows from a prior belief. To bring the belief about the sun rising into question is to really bring the prior belief into question. To bring the prior belief into question probably brings a deeper-level prior belief into question. But perhaps the sun won’t rise because an asteroid hits the earth and stops its rotation, or perhaps God is displeased with us and He stops the planet; but how difficult would it be to switch from the solar model to God’s doings?

Religious folks might say that an asteroid is God’s way of showing his displeasure. Scientists might go on a search for “inertions” which, seemingly, we had run out of. Undoubtedly, others would say that the sun has never risen and that it is absurd to think it ever had.

I can see that some of you think that if such a thing happened, it would simply invalidate the old model and that soon enough a better theory would be put forth. The new data would be a welcome addition to past discoveries and would represent a turning-point in our understanding of the universe. That sounds like a fine attitude to me. But what if it only happened once? What if the earth stopped spinning for one day and then resumed 24 hours later where it had left off as if nothing else had occurred?

Belief can take many different forms. Some of them can be quite useful, while others can be useless or worse. Dr. Grayling says that we should not believe in thing for which we have no reason to believe. But what constitutes good reason? Common sense? Logic? Obviously, anyone who has actually seen a fairy has reason to believe that they exist. Aside from them, those who believe in metaphorical fairies, or in the idea of fairies, there exists the realm of rational justification.

“I’ve not seen a fairy and neither has anyone I know.”

In a simple consideration of this statement, we can easily see that there is no reason for this person to believe in fairies. Likewise, there is no reason for them to believe that the existence of fairies is impossible. For this person, the existence of fairies lies completely in the realm of possibility, but outside the realm of reality. In order to have a preference for or against fairies, he would have to accept in a model in which there is some certainty about them. Can certainty come without proof?

In the mole example, I said that without seeing a mole, I couldn’t prove that a mole caused the tunnels. However, where I live, I have only ever seen moles make tunnels of this size and shape. Chipmunks also make tunnels, but every one I have seen them use has been a deep tunnel with no visible surface features besides the hole. I have never seen any other types of burrowing animals in my yard. Based on what I know, it seems likely that these particular tunnels were caused by moles. But, can I make claims of likelihood? Could I claim that it is not possible for any other animal to have caused the tunnels? Do I believe a mole caused the tunnels because I know something about these tunnels, or because according to my model a mole probably did it?

Let’s say that I have 95% certainty that a mole created the tunnels based on a vast study of peerless quality on tunnel causing events in my area. I then hop into a time machine and catch the animal while it digs the holes and find that it’s a weasel. Well, I didn’t claim 100% certainty, at least.

The point of all this is that no matter how well I test, how predictive and explanatory my models are, they offer no certainty unless I somehow know the answer. Yes, I agree that the purpose of science is to arrive at ever more accurate theories through rigorous testing and impeccable standards, but that isn’t what I’ve been going on about; I have been writing about belief and the justifications for it. So far, I’ve seen no reason to believe in anything but an open realm of possibility. But that doesn’t sound half-bad in a romantic sort of way.

More useless drivel coming soon…

Proving God Doesn't Exist or; I'm Right, You're Wrong

How do we know what we know? How do we know what is true? How do we know what is false? If I claim to know what you are thinking about at this moment, would you believe me? Could you authoritatively say that I didn’t know? If you answered “yes”, you would probably have done so based on the belief that people cannot know what other people are thinking without being told. Perhaps you have this belief because nobody has ever demonstrated the ability to read other people’s minds, or because someone you trust has told you so. But how would you know if you were correct? Like some, you may think it likely that I possess no such ability, but recognize the possibility that I do. Like some others, you may say that humans do not possess the ability to read minds and so it is impossible for me to possess it, either.

AC Grayling, a professor of philosophy at Birkbeck College, University of London, might believe the latter. In this excellent article, he writes about the foolishness of believing in fairies to show why certain people should study epistemology (study of knowledge).

http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/ac_grayling/2007/07/facts_and_fairydust.html

Dr. Grayling might have a point. As he says, it would be irrational to believe in something that can not be shown to exist; something unavailable for scrutiny. But what is a fairy? He seems to view them as a supposed classification of hominid with supernatural powers that are known to cause mischief or make shoes. Is that what they are? Could they be anything else?

There are several metaclassifications of phenomena for which we have come up with names and descriptions. There are physical objects, effects, unseen causes, ideas, and correlated organizations of the former. Dr. Grayling seems to be primarily concerned with fairies as physical objects, although he clearly recognizes the existence of the idea of fairies. However, the existence of fairies as a theory of causation for a classification of real events is a distinct possibility of their origin because people, by definition, only come up with descriptions based on prior knowledge. It is also a possibility that with a description from prior knowledge, people would attribute some of the known characteristics of the descriptor to the described phenomena. The addition of the latter does not invalidate the former.

Although I find it entertaining to analyze the possibilities, it does not help us to understand anything about Dr. Grayling’s argument about epistemology. Is he saying that the existence of fairies is impossible because they have never been proven to exist? It is doubtful that he is, although he may possess knowledge of their non-existence, in which case he would (by his own rationale) be required to show us his work. If Dr. Grayling has such knowledge but is incapable of proving it to be true, should we listen to him? What would it mean if he said we should? If someone saw a fairy that refused to allow themselves to be seen by anyone else, should they disregard their perceptions until they could prove it to others?

Back to the use of fairies as an explanation for real-world events; at one time, it was common for people to explain occurrences with beings that were seemingly unobservable. Why would people do this? One reason is that people simply believed that everything was caused by a being. The idea of a clockwork universe would probably have been beyond imagination at that time. Certainly, much of the knowledge we take for granted was unavailable to these people, so they came up with theories that fit what they knew about. Perhaps an astute individual would have asked about alternative theories. Could small animals cause these things? Could it be God? Could it be that mischievous beings are not the basis for causation?

Assuming that people did not see fairies, questioning the fundamental belief that small beings caused things to happen would have opened people’s eyes to other possibilities; but people are hard-pressed to give up their beliefs. Belief, as Dr. Grayling may agree, is very problematic and probably unnecessary. Or would he? I shall explore this possibility in my next entry.

Cheers!

Why would you do this?

Why do we do anything? Of course, in order to question the preeminence of science I must first postulate that science can't do some things. In order to reasonably postulate (ask) this, I would have to postulate (claim) that science can not do everything. It is indeed my belief that science has some limitations because science has a scope and I believe there are things (real things) outside of that scope. I will however work with the assumption that science has no such limitations because science has extreme value and as such its usefulness is not in question. In doing this, I will be attempting to feel out its weaknesses; the points at which it is not useful.

My working theory is that not only is science not useful for the entire realm of possibilities that the universe has to offer, but that scientists, who on the whole are delightful, bright fellows with quite a lot going for them, can make mistakes and fall into precisely the same types of beliefs that the common human does and can be just as stubborn when defending them. It is to the credit of scientists however, that their philosophy includes the distinct possibility (and perhaps the expectation) that they can be wrong and will have to change their opinions if they are. Cheers scientists! You're worthy opponents!

If you think I sound like a philosopher, you may be right. Technically your would be right; I can't dispute your thoughts and perceptions because they belong to and are solely accessible by you. That being said, if anyone reading this blog thinks I am crazy, dumb, or wrong and sees reason to say so, I only ask that you back it up with some evidence. I am open to a wide range of possibilities, am rarely steadfast in my opinions, and recognize that the possibility exists for the existence people out there who understand things so far beyond my comprehension that I am like a child to them (if any of you are like that, I humbly ask for your help), but I do expect to be shown solid evidence, outright proof, or to be backed into a corner with logic.

I think it will be fun. It certainly has been so far. And if I'm careful, honest, and earnest, I might just learn something.

Links pertaining to this post:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Science
http://www.gly.uga.edu/railsback/railsback_1122science1.html
http://megafoundation.org/CTMU/Articles/Theory.html
http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/
http://www.fallacyfiles.org/

Science

Science. Is there anything it can't do? It got us to the moon, gave us computers, helps us overcome our biological limitations, makes things better, faster, cheaper, more readily available, and can pretty much explain everything there is to be explained. If we don't know it now, we'll know it sometime in the future. Science is the future.

Or is it? Is it truly possible for science to explain everything? Is nothing sacred? Obviously science does something. It does lots of somethings. But could we have gotten where we are today without it? Is Richard Dawkins right? How do we know? Well, I can't answer any of these questions, but I intend someday to be able to answer them; and if I have the discipline and fortitude to weather the storm, I'll detail my journey to find that answer in this blog. If this first post to The Holoscope is still on the front page in 2008, you will know that I've failed. Failed to detail it on this blog. Never assume too much about what things mean. Whether or not this post ever makes it to page two, I will continue to find my answers. It's what I do.