(no subject)

[pengke.livejournal.com]

I’m sure everyone has read someone’s post on this community or read a comment that made you stop and think, “I don’t believe you.” If you haven’t, either you don’t read the threads very closely or you work very hard not to think critically about anything you read here, because there have been some very outrageous claims made here over the years. (But that’s an entirely different discussion.) I want to know what people think when they come across one of these statements that they just can’t believe.

Do you:

A) Think the person is lying.
B) Think the person is knowingly role playing
C) Think the person believes that they are multiple but is probably unintentionally role playing or some other form of imagination
D) Think the system is lying about the experiences
E) Think the system is knowingly or unintentionally role playing the experiences
F) Think the system is adhering to the community’s cultural norms/trying to fit in
G) Think the system probably honestly believes their claims even though another explanation seems more logical to you
H) Think the system probably started out making things up but has since convinced themselves that their claims are true
I) Worry that you might be making things up too or that someone else might think you are
J) Think something else entirely – please share

Also, do your thoughts change depending on why you can’t believe the statement? For example, is there a difference between someone claiming to do/be something that you think is impossible and someone contradicting themselves or claiming that something happened in real life that could not have happened?

Comments

[thehumangame.livejournal.com]

...

If I want to claim that x is objectively true, I say "x" or "I think x" or "I believe x".

If I want to claim that x may or may not be objectively true, but that it is a useful metaphor for me or that I have an internal experience in which it seems that way to me, I say "x is a useful metaphor for me" or "I have an internal experience in which it seems x".

In my view, making the first sort of statement when you really mean the second is just dishonest.

[ridetothesea.livejournal.com]

But there are many people who could say that "I believe x" and still have x not be objectively true. Most beliefs still have subjective connotations, which is what makes them beliefs and not facts. Which is one reason why it is difficult to talk about anything completely in terms of objective or subjective. I don't think it's possible.

Of course if you're talking about things like "I believe in gravity" and the like, things that can be backed up with facts, I'm just misreading what you wrote. Those things are purely objective, obviously.

[thehumangame.livejournal.com]

"I believe x" means "to the best of my abilities, I determine that x is objectively true". I'm really not sure what else 'believe' could mean that is logically coherent. >.>

Some people are obviously meaning something that is not what I mean, but I don't know what it is or what to make of it.

[kiya]

I don't see a point in believing in facts. Facts don't care whether or not I put my trust in them, they just are, and if I'm wrong about them, they bite me on the ass. No amount of belief that they are or are not the case will make the slighest bit of difference. :}

[thehumangame.livejournal.com]

...

Can someone please explain to me this odd sense of 'believe' that does not mean "I think x is objectively true"? Because seriously, that's the only way I've ever heard 'believe' used off the Internet.

[kiya]

I would define it more as "I trust this to be the case", or "I think this is so". If there is certainty, I wouldn't use 'belief', because 'belief' is something that is done in cases of insufficient fact (or insufficient memory of fact). Dictionary I look at has "accept as true or real", "credit with veracity", and "to expect or suppose", all of which I would consider provisional. If something is known as a certainty or a fact, why say one believes it to be so? Just say it is so.

I'm also reminded of a Terry Pratchett quote. "Witches don't believe in gods. It would be like believing in the postman."

[luwana.livejournal.com]

Hrm. Mostly as above. a lot of people don't apply belief to facts (whether they use the phrase believe or not) simply because it seems a bit silly. "I believe in my coffee mug." Why? It's there.

I think the idea is that belief requires some sort of *faith*, and that fact supposedly doesn't.

that may not have been coherant but I tried.

Sure, you *do* believe in the postman. but one (sometimes) connotation of belief is that of faith/effort, not dissimilar to that you would place in God. Believing int he postman is not an active thing.

[pengke.livejournal.com]

There's also a difference between someone who says they're a dinosaur when they know full well that they're not a dinosaur verses someone who says they're a dinosaur, with or without the appropriate qualifiers, because they tend to think of themselves in terms of being a dinosaur or view their personal self-image as being that of a dinosaur, ect.