Liking your Truth

[henryp]

A weird coincidence that seems to typically occur is that people are happy with whatever they reason is the truth.

Religious people really like an existence with God.
Non-religious really dislike the idea of an existence with God, but love their Godless existence.
Humanists love them some humans.
Animal rights activists happen to love them some animals.

Non-religous people think "eternal happiness?  meh."  and "Dying isn't so bad."
Religous people think "God's plan is good, even if it has bad stuff."

So here's what strikes me as weird.  Why don't people if they are searching for the Truth, ever seem to find Truths they don't care for.   Like a person who loves animals, but recognizes it's just a stupid dog, and treating it like a human is dumb.  Or atheists that really would like heaven.  Religious people that think God's plan is shitty.

My two discussion questions are: 
1) Does your interpretation of truth include a lot of things that you wish weren't true? (other than other people thinking stupid things are true).

2) What do you think is happening that makes this occur.  Is it that we psychologically adapt to our environment so we can make the best of it.

Bonus question:  If everybody likes their version of reality, why do you think so many people are depressed?

[Chad32]

An unpleasant truth for me is that generosity and giving someone the benefit of the doubt isn't always a good thing. It's true, and I don't like it.

You can't always trust people in positions of power.

There are many unfortunate truths that people don't like, but must accept to protect themselves.

[Mystic]

I assumed the most beloved of basic assumptions, even perpetual identity, maybe false at one point.

I was at a state of ultimate confusion: http://www.christianforums.com/threads/y...n.7699661/

I didn't take anything for granted. I was highly distressed to know the truth with certainty, but admitted I didn't. 

I realized somethings I don't care to know if true, but there is somethings that are essential for me to know to be true.

God is the basis of certainty in those essential things.

[Confused Ape]

My truth is that I haven't the faintest idea what THE Truth about the universe is.  Theoretical physicists have come up with many different models but are unlikely to figure out which is the right one in my lifetime.  I find this very annoying at times but it's still fun looking at all the different ideas.

[paulpablo]

A weird coincidence that seems to typically occur is that people are happy with whatever they reason is the truth.

Religious people really like an existence with God.
Non-religious really dislike the idea of an existence with God, but love their Godless existence.
Humanists love them some humans.
Animal rights activists happen to love them some animals.

Non-religous people think "eternal happiness?  meh."  and "Dying isn't so bad."
Religous people think "God's plan is good, even if it has bad stuff."

So here's what strikes me as weird.  Why don't people if they are searching for the Truth, ever seem to find Truths they don't care for.   Like a person who loves animals, but recognizes it's just a stupid dog, and treating it like a human is dumb.  Or atheists that really would like heaven.  Religious people that think God's plan is shitty.

My two discussion questions are: 
1) Does your interpretation of truth include a lot of things that you wish weren't true? (other than other people thinking stupid things are true).

2) What do you think is happening that makes this occur.  Is it that we psychologically adapt to our environment so we can make the best of it.

Bonus question:  If everybody likes their version of reality, why do you think so many people are depressed?

I think this is a good question.

Personally when I was young my first fear about death was still terrifying with or without god.  I was told we would be in heaven forever and the idea of forever scared the shit out of me.  Then I was told there might not be a heaven and it might just be nothing forever, this also scared the shit out of me.  So whichever perspective I looked at it I was going around depressed for a portion of my childhood thinking about this.

Right now my thoughts on this are slightly more optimistic, I think the human brain is just not designed to cope with the mechanics of time on a scale longer than a century or so and we have already experienced nothingness forever because of the time we spent not being alive before we were conceived.

I suppose my version of the truth has a lot of stuff I don't like.  Life is unfair, there's probably no punishment in the afterlife, there's no simple explanation for everything and no simple rules.

I can't possibly wish for heaven to exist though because the concept doesn't make sense to me.

There's a place where you go to forever, the concept forever scares the shit out of me, you will definitely be happy when you're there all the time though, so we will be placed in a constant state of mind control, everything you like is there, well I like naked women, long guitar solos and Chinese food but that's only because I have balls, ears and a stomach, will my stomach balls and ears go to heaven with me?

[Jenny A]

A weird coincidence that seems to typically occur is that people are happy with whatever they reason is the truth.
. . . here's what strikes me as weird.  Why don't people if they are searching for the Truth, ever seem to find Truths they don't care for.   Like a person who loves animals, but recognizes it's just a stupid dog, and treating it like a human is dumb.  Or atheists that really would like heaven.  Religious people that think God's plan is shitty.

My two discussion questions are: 
1) Does your interpretation of truth include a lot of things that you wish weren't true? (other than other people thinking stupid things are true).

2) What do you think is happening that makes this occur.  Is it that we psychologically adapt to our environment so we can make the best of it.

Bonus question:  If everybody likes their version of reality, why do you think so many people are depressed?

I know a number of atheists who would like for god to be true. He hasn't been around for a while, but JacobSmooth became an atheist while on these forums. He compared the process to a cold shower.

Personally, I'd like, if not eternal life, at least a lot more life. Wishing won't make it so. Knowing evil people are punished would be nice too, especially if they knew that before they did bad things. Wishing won't make that true either.

Quantum posted a Julia Sweeney video yesterday. Her journey was to find god. She found atheism instead. Then she had to grapple with real death.

Conversely, many theists are scared into believing.

[henryp]

I assumed the most beloved of basic assumptions, even perpetual identity, maybe false at one point.

I was at a state of ultimate confusion: http://www.christianforums.com/threads/y...n.7699661/

I didn't take anything for granted. I was highly distressed to know the truth with certainty, but admitted I didn't. 

I realized somethings I don't care to know if true, but there is somethings that are essential for me to know to be true.

God is the basis of certainty in those essential things.

That post of yours in the other forum was interesting.  I was in the same exact spot, and went the other way.  One of the a-ha moments for me was the realization that just because the world would be lousy if it was devoid of meaning/morality/purpose in no way affected the likelihood of it being true.  And once that happened, I just couldn't get past my belief in God boiling down mostly to some serious wishful thinking. 

Sadly once the genie is out of the bottle, there's no going back to a preferable irrational truth.  So not only is the journey all for naught, it's actually detrimental to me to have taken it.  There were plenty of stops along the way where I'd be a happier person.  It's one of the reasons I avoid talking about this stuff with people I care about, because I don't want them to end up where I am.  I certainly teach my kid a bunch of things I don't believe.  

That's why I'm curious about others, as you rarely hear about how people ended up discovering something they thought was awful was true.

[MTL]

I'm your Huckleberry.

I realized recently that the Truth is that my mother doesn't really love me,
and will allow my sister to excise me from the family.

It breaks my heart, but I recognize it as the Truth.

Where belief in God is concerned, I am officially Agnostic,
but I do allow for the possibility that God exists;

however, if He does, I think it is possible that He hates us or is at least indifferent to us.

I can readily accept that this entirely possible scenario may well be the Truth,
even though it makes me deeply miserable to ponder on it for too long.

And I would love to find out that Heaven exists.
I would love to find out God is real and loves us.

I'm not such a hypocrite that I would lie about that.

but I'm not going to deceive myself with sugary daydreams, either.

In my world, The Truth Hurts.

[henryp]

I wonder if people put on a happier face on an atheist forum (although that's not the case in this thread, or maybe I just get an inaccurate sample based on the threads I open), because of the Us vs. Them attitude with the Theists. Things like being scared of dying, or that evil people prosper is kind of shoved in the closet as Atheists tout how great not believing in God is?

[henryp]

but I'm not going to deceive myself with sugary daydreams, either.

In my world, The Truth Hurts.

I know you probably can't, but if you could would you deceive yourself?  Is happiness based on delusion less valid?  Again, that would require you to be able to fully delude yourself, and it's tough to put the reason train in reverse.