Belief?

[Darwinian]

Religion has grown up with humanity and has evolved along with us. From the early days when humans huddled around the camp fire and stared into the night sky wondering what powerful beings were making those lights in the sky, all the way to the highly organised religions of today.

Presumably then religion has (or had) an evolutionary advantage in those early tribal days giving some sort of structure to a group and helping them bind together in a collective manner. This would also suggest then that 'belief' itself is in some way hard wired into us which itself leads me to ponder a couple of questions.

Did religion grow up because of a desire to believe or was it the other way around and, does anyone here have any beliefs for which there is no evidence and may never be?

[dagda]

We all belive in something, or we would be dead. The human race needs to belive, it is who we are. In the begining, religion(true or false) filled this gap but in our increasingly secular society, other things find there way in. Wheather this is political ideology, a philosophical theory or anything else depends on the person.

[josef rosenkranz]

In my opinion it is much more to that from point of view of belief in supranatural forces.

We the members of this forum debate philosophy on academic levels no matter if we are experts in physics or byology or arheology or just people who find it funny to be involved in philosophy.

Only that the vast majority of people of our countries even from the Western world are not aware or very little interested in philosophy.
They hold dear the tradition inherited in their family ,the hollydays which bring families together,the sense of brotherhood which gives them the regular visit to places of worship,the sense of being backed in their lives by an allmighty force,all these and much more oter aspects of belief are pulling people towards religion.

RD in his famous TGD anlyzes the pros and the cons of religion ,in my opinion, in a too academic way,as if you could weigh feelings of humans from a cold perspective of usefullness .
I think as an error of atheism to consider religion with contempt even whilst we are sure in our disbelief in God.
As long as religion does satisfy people in their mode of thinking and helps them in their dayly struggle ,no matter what atheist will say,religion will continue to survive in the minds of millions.

[Jason Jarred]

We all belive in something, or we would be dead. The human race needs to belive, it is who we are. In the begining, religion(true or false) filled this gap but in our increasingly secular society, other things find there way in. Wheather this is political ideology, a philosophical theory or anything else depends on the person.

I think you misunderstood Darwinian's post, from what I read he was making a distinction between belief which is soundly based on logic and reason, and belief which is irrational and serves more to calming our fears and appeasing our emotions (ie religion).
There is a huge difference living your life based on one compared to the other.

[dagda]

'from what I read he was making a distinction between belief which is soundly based on logic and reason, and belief which is irrational and serves more to calming our fears and appeasing our emotions (ie religion).'

The thing is it is an odd person who does base there life on the former rather than the latter. Communism, for example, is completly unparctical to implement and, yet, has millions of followers. The same can be said for all out pascifism (despite Gandhi being one of my hero's, it is). There are Platonian philosophies which are the same, and yet people follow them. I doubt there are many that will trully have a logical ideology to lead there life.

[Jason Jarred]

I don't disagree with what you've written above Dagda, it just came across (to me) in your first post that you were justifying belief in unicorns, fairies, leprachauns and all manner of non existent beings on the basis that it makes people feel better and gives their lives meaning.
Perhaps I once also held the same view, but I have come to the point where I think that having beliefs based on fantasy can be detrimental to the way we live our lives, and the effect we have on others. False beliefs are dangerous if they are allowed to bear fruit.

When I stopped believing in Santa Clause I matured, I was ready to accept Jesus and the true meaning of Xmas into my heart.
When I stopped believing in Jesus I matured, I was ready to accept natural human joy and altruism into my life.

Some never get to this point of maturity, which I find depressing for them.

[dagda]

That is not the impression I wished to put forward. Chalenging belifes are healthy for both participants in the argument. That is how we advance as, both, a people and individual. What I was hinting at was that all humans belive in something mearly because it gives them the will to go on. A rather extreme example-although an effective analogy I think-is that Bob belives(despite being 90) that he will awaken from his sleep tomorrow. There is no proof to suggest one way or another but Bob will always belive he will wake up. Why? Because to go to sleep each night beliving you will die is depressing and few people would survive long, I think.

[Ace Otana]

Why? Because to go to sleep each night beliving you will die is depressing and few people would survive long, I think.

I do not believe in an afterlife and I know that one day I will die and I'm not worried nor should I be.

Death is just the end of biological function. There's nothing complicated about it.

It's because we understand that when we die, we vanish that we begin to fear it and dream as if it wasn't true.

I know it's true and I refuse to deny it. I would be more affriad trying to deny it than accepting it.

Death is death. Beliefs cannot change reality.

You will die and so will I. I'm not worried at all. Because it's perfectly normal. When your dead you won't have anykind of conciousness, So it would be like I was never around in the first place.

So, I'm not worried. Also I'm happy with it, many others are too.

[dagda]

That was a tangent. I mentioned the after-life not once. I did not say Bob was afraid of dieing, he just planed his day to concider that he would not die in the night through pure belife

[Meatball]

That was a tangent. I mentioned the after-life not once. I did not say Bob was afraid of dieing, he just planed his day to concider that he would not die in the night through pure belife

I wouldn't say that's accurate. We have evidence to believe we will wake up in the morning. We have woken up every other morning we can remember, haven't we? It would illogical to assume we will not wake up every time we go to bed.

Even further, I think you could say that <99.99% percent of the time, when people go to bed, they wake up in the morning.