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What is your process for belief formation? (beehaw.org)

submitted 1 year ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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This question can inspire levels of fury beyond my understanding, which is why I couldn’t have casually posed it on Reddit. This seems like a more good faith kind of crowd so I’ll ask it here.

This is a question I’ve put a lot of thought into for myself since 2020. I’m interested in my ideas being criticized and perhaps to criticize the ideas of others (Note: Not criticizing people or their character. Only ideas). I’m going to post my own answer in the comments.

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

I absolutely agree that to a large degree this is a subjective process which depends on the nature and nurture of the individual forming the belief. It's likely that the vast majority of the things I believe gained that status due to an automatic process which I am unaware of.

I should specify that the process I detailed is what I would intentionally apply to form a basis for highly consequential personal or political decisions. When it was first posed to me and upon studying the psychology involved, I have wondered whether I would have behaved like the average German did in 1938 despite the official ideology being so obviously vulnerable to scrutiny of any kind. I observe a similar method of epistemology being deployed now notoriously against certain minority groups today which I might have gotten caught up in as a teenager due to my upbringing but know better than to fall for now. I may edit my post to specify forming a belief when one is aware they are forming a belief when multiple interpretations of reality are present which may not even be based on the same set of "facts."