Introducing Cognitive Dissonance

This article is meant to introduce the concept of Cognitive Dissonance and how it relates to Christianity.
Cognitive Dissonance is a term in psychology that describes the feeling of tension experienced by a person when they hold two conflicting beliefs. When this happens to a person they feel uncomfortable and they start trying to figure out a way to reconcile the beliefs so they don't seem to conflict anymore and / or the discomfort is relieved. Dissonance is more likely to happen if the major idea is about who we are. To better explain this concept some examples of situations that introduce cognitive dissonance follow.

- People who think they are smart, moral or competent and they make a mistake that would indicate otherwise.
- People with addictions that know the behavior is harmful but want to continue to do it anyway, such as smokers, overeaters, compulsive gamblers, alcoholics
- People that are genetically disposed to Mental Illness have difficulty in reconciling their actions with their conscience
- People that cheat on or find ways to reduce their taxes either unintentionally or intentionally.
- People that make excuses for the 'embarrassing' or trouble-making member of the family.
- People that automatically start 'playing the blame game' and pointing fingers.
- Politicians, in fact there is a book out on this right now that is referenced at the end of this article.
- Subordinates that have to justify enforcing policies they don't support, in business, government, military, etc
- Salespeople that have to sell a product they don't particularly care about, but have a need to exaggerate its value to the customer
- Professional people that have made a mistake that impacts their self image, such as a prosecuting attorney that wrongly convicts someone who is subsequently shown through something such as DNA evidence to be innocent. The attorney doesn't want to believe they have made this kind of mistake.
- People that want to believe in things that are not supported by strong evidence such as Superstitions, UFO's, Bigfoot, The Loch Ness Monster, Ghosts, Psychic phenomena, faith healing, etc
- People that have to reconcile why they hold a certain Religious belief rather than another
- People that have to reconcile events in their religion that they do not like, such as the many anecdotes in the Old Testament.
- People that have to reconcile why an all powerful and loving god would create the need to permit so much apparently needless suffering in the world.
- People that have to reconcile why Jesus mother and family thought he was crazy as described in Mark.
- People that have to reconcile why an all powerful loving God uses principles that are shown in day to day life to be flawed.

Once you understand the concept of Cognitive Dissonance and Self-Justification, you can see examples of it literally hour to hour, and especially in Movies and in TV where authors have to introduce conflict as quickly as possible to set the premise and give the characters something to do. It seems to be a mechanism, or drive related to self-preservation. The brain is wired for self-justification. It has been identified in every major culture. It shows up in fmri brain scans. Drew Weston showed that when a person is experiencing dissonance, the thought processes shut down and when the subject starts reducing dissonance the brain centers that show pleasure become activated. The problem is that it is a means of utilizing bias and ignoring evidence that prevents finding the truth or resolution of a problem. Once a person is experiencing Cognitive Dissonance it is very difficult for another person to interrupt the process. Attempts by another person to interrupt the process will result in the intensifying of the process and the resolve of the person experiencing dissonance to continue attempting to reconcile it.

An episode in a series of Psychology videos explains bias and cognitive dissonance very well. Follow this link Learner.org Part 11: Judgement and decision making. Registration is free to watch but you will have to create an account and I recommend it as 'safe' because i haven't received any spam since i did.

Of the many things the video talks about is a seminal experiment by Leon Festinger and Carl Smith.
Leon Festinger conducted one of the first experiments to introduce conditions that reliably induce dissonance. In the experiment the subjects were told to perform boring tasks. Afterwards they were given the opportunity to receive payment if they could influence others to participate in the experiment. Some subjects were given a twenty dollar payment, others only a one dollar payment and some were not given the offer. When asked to rate the tasks, the group that was paid one dollar rated them more highly than the group that was paid twenty. The group that was paid twenty dollars had an obvious external justification fortheir behavior, but those that were paid less had to internalize it. The researches theorized that the one dollar group did not believe they had sufficient justification to lie about the tasks so they were forced to changetheir attitude to relieve the stress. The process allowed the subjects to genuinely believe the tasks were enjoyable. Here is a link to the original paper.

Another similar experiment was done by Elliot Aronson where two groups were picked to join an organization with a initiation tasks. The organization turned out to be boring and uninteresting, but those that had the harder initiation felt more loyalty to it than those that had the easy initiation.

Leon Festinger summed it up in the video as "we come to love what we suffer for".

Carol Tarvis and Elliot Arronson (the researcher noted above) wrote a book on this subject called Mistakes Were Made (But Not By Me): Why We Justify Foolish Beliefs
In an interview with Carol Tarvis on Point of Inquiry, the Podcast of the Center for Skeptical Inquiry she was asked if Cognitive Dissonance is manifested in religious belief and the following summarizes her response.

Q: There are religious people that don't demand proof for their beliefs, is this a way of relieving their cognitive dissonance?
A: The more important a particular belief is to us the more strongly we will ignore or reject evidence suggesting we are wrong. Religion is central to what gives many people meaning and purpose in life. This type of belief will be defended at all costs. Examples of dis-confirming evidence creating Cognitive Dissonance are Evolution, the Holocaust and disasters.
Most religious people are not threatened by evolution. They find a way to fit it into their beliefs, but some cannot fit it into their beliefs and they will go to great lengths to try to refute the dis-confirming evidence.
How do Jews deal with the Holocaust? The Jews believe they are the chosen people, and god is looking after them. How could a good loving god have permitted genocide? Students of Cognitive Dissonance Theory would predict that people would become more religious and their faith would be strengthened. What most people do is not lose their faith in God but reduce the dissonance by saying God is responsible for the Good in the world, human beings are responsible for the Evil or God is testing faith. The Christian response to the question of how Jesus could permit enormous suffering to happen is to believe that it is to test faith. Anything that is not consonant with a belief in God is reinterpreted to make it consonant. For example after a terrible disaster the survivors will say something like "god was looking after me" but discounting the fact that God was not looking out for other people that died.

Another interesting interview related to cognitive dissonance is from the radio show "All in the Mind". They interviewed Phillip Zambardo, the lead researcher involved with the Stanford Prison Experiment. The experiment had to be cancelled because it got out of control. The participants started self-justifying doing terrible things to each other and it had to be stopped. He was the expert witness for the defendants in the Abu Ghraib trial, explaining how situational factors can make good people do bad things using cognitive dissonance to self-justify their actions. It is described in his book
The Lucifer Effect. It made me think about slavery, the crusades, Old Testament atrocities and William Lane Craigs defense of killing pregnant mothers with a sword. (thanks Steven Carr!)

I suffered severely from dissonance and when I decided to subject my religious beliefs to the same type of criteria and scrutiny that I used for my day to day life, I discovered that I could no longer hold a belief in God. I Know that it is likely that I am not going to convince any christian that there is no God, but what I can do is, through the use of rational discussion, point out the weakness in their arguments and principles that their arguments depend on to introduce cognitive dissonance in their mind.

People use different criteria for reasoning based on the context of the situation. They are called Spheres when the the concept is applied to a group and "compartmentalizing" when applied to an individual. This concept is discussed in Stephen Toulmins "Introduction to Reasoning" and Richard D. Reinke and Malcom O. Sillars "Argumentation and Critical Decision Making". The difference in the spheres and compartments can be seen very well when comparing Scientific reasoning, Legal Reasoning, Religious Reasoning, Artistic Reasoning, and Business Reasoning. I am sure these are not all the spheres that can be identified but they are useful for this discussion. The difference between them is the weight that each places on types of evidence and principle. And often one type of reasoning taken out of context and applied in another sphere or compartment breaks down. For example, the type of anecdotal evidence used in Legal reasoning would break down when applied to science, just as Religious witness testimony breaks down when applied to Legal Reasoning. These facts insulate poor reasoning and can be used to Justify poor conclusions. However, when comparing the principles that conclusions depend on, it is not so easy to justify poor conclusions. For example, the concept of evidence is fundamental to all the types of reasoning but the type of evidence is not. However, if we say the type of evidence needed to justify a Christian belief is not sufficient to justify a Muslim, Hindu, Jewish (etc) then the principle breaks down and we can say the conclusion is flawed.

If you watch this blog long enough you can see people wrestling with this concept as illustrated here in this recent exchange between me and a commenter. We were talking 'embarrassing moments' in the bible and whether or not they are useful to build a case for authenticity. The argument goes that by including the 'embarrassing moments' in the bible it adds authenticity to it.

Lee:
I wouldn't even add it [argument for authenticity from embarrassing moments] to my portfolio to make a cumulative case. The reason why is someone like me would turn it around and point out, like I did in my first post, that in the beginning, Jesus as god was not the consensus. These things put in there were not threatening to that idea. Over time they became threatening. I would turn this argument around and say that it better supports Jesus lack of divinity because the anecdotes are not consistent with what should be the case if a god walked the earth, and if anyone should know it would be his mother. It better supports as ed points out that the further away from the event the larger his divinity grew which is more consistent with the creation of a legend than historical authenticity.

Commenter:
I would ad it [argument for authenticity from embarrassing moments] considering that it contributes in a positive way, even if it is neither necessary nor necessarily sufficient to make a case. Historical inquiry demands that I take it into consideration. The alternatives, while plausible, are not very strong in my opinion since they argue from silence and are based on hypotheticals.

What I want to point out is that while he asserts that the principle i am using to build my case is flawed he is happy to use it for his argument. Namely that the alternatives that I am using are not very strong and based on hypotheticals. His argument was too. And I claim his are based on them to a much larger degree since I have precedent on my side. In any case, I didn't use this example to declare that I am right, I simply used it as the most recent example of cognitive dissonance that I have experienced. If you watch this blog day to day, you see it almost every day.

The truth will stand up to scrutiny and the truth will set you free. People just have to decide to break down the walls between those compartments and identify and eliminate sources of bias because they will not be convinced by anyone otherwise.

REFERENCES not all inclusive, refer to the body of the article for more.

* Point of Inquiry podcast with Carol Tavris interview.
* Science Friday podcast interview with Elliot Aronson
* Mistakes Were Made (But Not By Me): Why We Justify Foolish Beliefs
* Wikipedia on Cognitive Dissonance
* Stanford Prison Experiment
* The Lucifer Effect

Solomon Asch conformity experiments
* Solomon Asche
* Conformity Experiments
* YouTube video

Drew Weston
* Discussion of his experiment
* His book "The Political Brain: The Role of Emotion in Deciding the Fate of the Nation"

Solomon Asch Conformity Experiments

Watch YouTube Video
This article is intended to show how people will conform to peer pressure against their own convictions and in what conditions. It is relevant to the influence exerted in the church community among its members. There is significant pressure in the church to prevent the expression of doubt or critical questioning of the properties of the religion. People would rather conform than go against the group. Since people are evolutionarily tuned to be social animals, the perceived benefit of belonging to the group should outweigh the benefit of dissension. I am grateful to Matthew, one of our readers, for submitting this and his kind sentiment. Click on the Link above to show a short video documentary on them. Click on the Link below to read a short summary from Wikipedia.

From Wikipedia
Solomon Asch "became famous in the 1950s, following experiments which showed that social pressure can make a person say something that is obviously incorrect.

The way he did this was through an experiment in which participants were shown a card with a line on it, followed by another card with 3 lines on it labeled a, b, and c. The participants were then asked to say which line matched the line on the first card. At first, the subject would feel very at ease in the experiment, as he and the other participants gave the obvious answer. Shortly after, the "participants" in front of the subject would start all giving the same wrong answer. Solomon Asch thought that the majority of people would not conform to something obviously wrong, but the results showed that an alarming number of participants gave the wrong answer. See Asch Conformity Experiments"

REFERENCES

Debunking Christianity
The Role of Persuasion and Cognitive Bias In Your Church
The Role of Persuasion in the Question of The Holy Spirit
Suspension of Disbelief
All Lee's Persuasion Articles

Wikipedia
Solomon Asch
Asch Conformity Experiments

YouTube
Asch Conformity Experiments Video from YouTube

"When Our Vices Get the Better of Us"

This article weakens the claims regarding Gods Justice, Mercy, freewill and Human Accountability.

As humans, we have limited resources to control ourselves, researchers say; all acts of control draw from one source. So when using this resource in one domain, such as dieting, we’re more likely to run out of it in another domain, like studying hard.

www.world-science.net

Inzlicht and Gutsell asked participants to suppress their emotions while watching an upsetting movie. The idea was to deplete their resources for selfcontrol. The participants reported their ability to suppress their feelings on a scale from one to nine. Then, they completed a Stroop task, which involves naming the color of printed words (i.e. saying red when reading the word “green” written in red), yet another task that requires selfcontrol.

The researchers found that those who suppressed their emotions performed worse on the task, indicating that they had used up their selfcontrol resources while holding back their tears during the film.

An electroencephalogram (EEG), a recording of electrical activity in the brain, confirmed the results, they said. Normally, when a person deviates from their goals (in this case, wanting to read the word, not the color of the font), increased activity occurs in a part of the brain called the anterior cingulate cortex, which alerts the person that they are offtrack. The researchers found weaker activity in this brain region during the Stroop task in those who had suppressed their feelings. In other words, after engaging in one act of selfcontrol this brain system seems to fail during the next act, they said.

If we are expected to make moral decisions and are going to be held eternally accountable for them, we have a poor mechanism to do it with. Our brains design is such that it is more likely in any given situation that we will make an error in judgment.

Reasonable Doubt about the Problem of Evil

I challenge the whole premise of the problem of evil on the grounds that is not consistent with gods character as described in the bible. (surprise)[irony]
Personally I think this effectively refutes the Problem of Evil as a test and the assertion that it creates a greater good.
- god is all powerful,
- god is all knowing,
- god is perfectly good,
- god is perfectly merciful,
- god doesn't like to see us suffer
- the problem of evil creates a greater good

So a solution that is consistent will all the premises is that god would have breathed people into existence as they would have turned out as if they had suffered through the 'test'.

To say that it is more important to actually do the work and suffer when the same result could be achieved in another way which avoids needless suffering is logically inconsistent with several premises:
- god is all powerful
- god is perfectly good
- god is perfectly merciful
- the problem of evil creates a greater good

If god were not all powerful, then the problem of evil as a test might make sense as an argument from ignorance, but even then the evidence to the contrary is overwhelming.

To say that we are ignorant of gods motives means that the bible does not accurately describe god and we can't really know anything about him with certainty. Since the bible is the only authoritative descriptive evidence for god, then nothing else about god can be learned. That is to say that any conclusion about god is uncertain and nothing further can be learned. This is anoalogous to saying "I conclude this, but I am not sure, and I don't know how to know, but I deny evidence to the contrary".

Obviously my solution negates the need to create the universe, the world and us, therefore the problem of evil is refuted by our existence.

Stinky Piles of Rhetoric and Flawed Principles

This is a response that spans two articles and three people. I am making an article out of my responses because they are avoiding answering my questions and I'm hoping that I can get some feedback from others. Their comments are bold and italicized. I have referenced the articles at the end so anyone interested can follow the context.

In a nutshell I am challenging the principle of the original sin, the human sacrifice which depends on the principle of original sin and I am challenging the principle of the the problem of evil as a test and I am asserting that Christians have no concept about what properties an all powerful, all knowing, all good god should have. They have no concept of the infinite. Infinity has a lot of problems with paradoxes and if you look, you see that God has inherited those same problems.

david,
For you example, if you were to sacrifice your son so that others may live, I don't think anyone would call you terrible. The fact is, the sacrifice of your son cannot save anyone. The substitution of names in this case flawed.
It might be flawed, but it depends on your answer to this question (and honestly I don't think I would kill my son to save the world, or even a bus load of people).

What would you think of me if I crucified myself because I was punishing myself for a rule I made up? Sounds crazy doesn’t it?

If it sounds crazy then I would be killing son for nothing right? God could have changed the rules, he did it with the new covenant, he could have thought that human sacrifice was justifiably abhorrent and decided to handle it a different way. I would have.

Human sacrifice, killing yourself because of a rule you made, claiming to be a human, a son and a god all in one body, It is insane.

How do you know that jesus was really his son? mary's word? If jesus was an immaculate conception why didn't mark mention it?

God gave you a brain right? use it! why is it that these principles that supposedly came from a god seem so flawed? The principles don't translate into the real world. Why is that? Its what the bible tells us! Where did the bible come from, why does it say this?

Do your home work. Do some serious bible study. Look for the original texts. Study the history of the near east from the last ice age on, they call it the agricultural revolution.

get busy!

drsimrak
In regards to suffering, I would say that there is something that is to be gained in suffering. Once again, I come to my own lack of understanding, Why suffering? I don't know and the more I think about it, the more I realize that isn't the point.
You have not considered what an all powerful, all good, all knowing god should be able to do.
God should be able to do anything. In a breath, he could have spoken all christians into existence with their varying traits exactly as they would have turned out with without all the needless suffering. If he were really a loving god he should have made it so we could avoid the suffering and he could have avoided the 'pain' of having to sit on the sidelines and watch and just instilled the alleged virtues that result from suffering. This would not make us robots because the result is the same, only the process is removed. He could make them like he needs them. And I dispute that suffering makes us better than not suffering. That stands to be shown through something other than anecdotal evidence. In fact, I can show you that stress causes damage in people at the molecular level and causes the onset of depression and other harsher mental disorders. Just keep your eye out, you'll see me posting things about the brain, mind and behavior.

The point is that the world around us is collapsing and falling apart. The world around us bears witness that it is in need of a savior. All of mankind is dying and God has provided himself as our Savior in Jesus Christ. How ridiculous would it be if a drowning man to chose not to accept help from someone because he didn't like the shirt the rescuer was wearing.
This is completely subjective and as prup answered you, completely one sided and it avoids several qualifiers that make that untrue. The most you can say is that there are good things and bad things, and while we are evidenlty suffering from global warming due our screw ups, we can have a better quality of life, relatively disease free, to enjoy it with. (irony, i put that in there because some people have a hard time picking it up)

It's a question of faith and a matter of the heart. After all, it is with the heart that man believes unto salvation not with the mind. The true question is, do you need saving? If you think your fine or that you don't need or want the help of a God you view as cruel then so be it. But that doesn't change reality.
People believe with thier heart and not with their mind? What level of school did you make it through? Your self is a result of molecular electrochemical interactions in that chunk of meat in your skull and a good neurosurgeon could go in there and make you have a religious experience and think that god was in the room behind you as well making you think you had two arms on one side. You need to get a grip on reality. What is it about me that needs saving? I say that most people are good people, its just that minority percentage that ruins it for the rest of us!


What is to be known of God is made manifest in creation. But man chooses to deny that power. It's because of the hardness of men's hearts that they are given over to their own desires. If we want salvation we can have it, the choice is ours.
This is one of those piles of rhetoric that you guys leave behind every now an then. Theres no response to it because it so totally ignores reality. Once again lets all say it together, "it does not follow that because there is a world, there is a god that created it and that God is the christian God."
And there's that heart again, my heart is fine, no attacks yet. My mind is fine too, my morals and attitudes seem to be fine as I have a lot of friends that seem to like me as I'm sure is the case with most non-christians. Look, behaviour is not totally a matter of free-will, there are biological reasons for behaviour, and since that is the case your degree of free-will is limited, whether you want to belive it with your heart or not. I suggest thinking about it in your mind a little more. Thats what its best at.


Questioning what you believe and why is a good thing. Questioning to prove that you too can be like God is foolishness. The question is, who is God? Will we exalt ourselves as gods or will we humble ourselves and submit to the one true and living God even though we don't always understand?
Before you go submitting to something you better make sure it exists, because if everybody did that, that would be a lot of wasted resources with regards to labor that could go to making the world a better place. And no one is saying anything about wanting to be like god or be god, so you can just toss that stinky red herring out of here!

david,
Pain and evil are just part of the fabric, Christian or Atheist. But it is not right to say God is unjust if He Himself suffered.

rich,
People overcome great odds all the time. Why should it be easy? Why should we be handed something we didn't work for? Everyone would like it to be easier, even Christ in the gardin asked that the cup pass over him. He knew it couldn't be and he went through with it even though he asked not to, and he left it up to the Fathers will. A little less suffereing would sure be nice, making it easier to do what is right would be nice, but neither are our reality, so we accept it and do our best, that's all were asked.

With this kind of attitude there is never going to be resolution to pain and suffering because you are just giving to god, but you are not thinking that even if you do, it all happens in gods time right? So stop praying cause he already knows what you want and get off your butt and do something about the 'terrible world' you live in. Go volunteer at assisted living facilities, hospitals, homeless shelters, donate money to the organizations that handle disasters, volunteer at schools, go pick up trash on the side of the road. If you are already doing those things BRAVO, I take my hat off to you.


REFERENCES
Five Big Rocks

Schizophrenia Candidate Genes Affect Even Healthy Individuals

Schizophrenia Candidate Genes Affect Even Healthy Individuals

This is an article providing information about Biological Bases for Behavior.
It is intended as evidence to weaken the doctrine of punishment for sin as a result of freewill and the concept of an absolute freewill.

ScienceDaily.com

In the largest study of its kind to date, scheduled for publication in the October 1st issue of Biological Psychiatry, researchers sought to examine the impact of a few particular genes, known to be associated with a diagnosis of schizophrenia, on a healthy population.....
.....
In other words, they found that the healthy individuals who possessed the risk variants within the DNTBP1, NRG1, and DAAO genes exhibited small reductions in their cognitive performance and had atypical experiences that might be associated with schizophrenia.....
.....
Dr. Stefanis, explaining the importance of this study, comments that "these findings support the notion that even at the general population level, the genetic liability to psychosis may be expressed as minute and 'undetected to the naked eye' alterations in brain information processing capacity and behavior." Dr. Krystal adds, "Consistent with a growing body of evidence, this study suggests that there may be subtle cognitive impairments that are present when these common risk gene variants are present in the general population." Clearly, these findings will have an important impact on the future genetic work in this area.

I couldn't have said it better.

This casts doubt on the principle of punishment for sin is a better principle than nurturing remediation. Where is god when you need him? Oh yea, everything happens in gods time.
And the check is in the mail.

References
Sciencedaily.com: Mind and Brain
Scienceblogs.com: Brain and Behavior

Reasonable Doubt about The Atonement: Psychopathy

This is intended as the first of a series exploring Biological Bases of Behavior and its implications for Christianity. The focus of this article is on Psychopathy and its implications regarding the Atonement.

It explains that psychopathy is regarded alternately as an emotional disorder and/or a genetically selected sub-population of people that cannot feel love, empathy or remorse. It shows that it is inherited and likely has a genetic component. It discusses the correlation with differences in amygdala function between this population and the mean. Considering Matt. 22:37s commandment to love God with all your heart, soul and mind, the question becomes, what happens to the psychopath in this process? According to the explanation of the Atonement, it may cover their sins, but they cannot meet the requirement to love God, and repent.

This link provides a great overview of Evangelical views of Atonement. It was written by John W. Loftus to show how viewpoints of Atonement are linked to the cultural values of their period. And here is a different article from another blogger with a similar topic to this one. It argues that modern cognitive science leaves little room for the existence of a "soul."

Christianity depends on the belief that Christ died for our sins. From the perspective of the Evangelical all the sins of all of the people in the world past, present and future went onto Christ and when he died, he died as atonement for the sins of the past, present and future people of the world. People are predisposed to sin rather than follow Gods law. People are predisposed to behave in a way that is not consistent with Gods law.
How did people get that way? Was it the original sin of disobeying Gods law in the garden of Eden or was it something that happened as a result of the way we are made?

Allegedly Jesus died for us so we won’t have to, yet people are predisposed to sin for biological reasons as much as for “moral” reasons. For God to have gone to the trouble to become Man and go through the crucifixion it seems like he should have eliminated biological bases for behavior that make it likely that people will disobey Him. If he had done that it would have become purely a moral question.

God created humans along with the world. So it follows that he made us this way. To say that he didn’t infers that something changed the initial state of our nature. If something changed, what was it? If we stipulate that Adam and Eve were real, and if we say that the decision to eat the Apple was made by Adam and Eve, how did the thought even arise in them to disobey God unless it occurred naturally? If it would not have occurred naturally but it was the result of a deception by Satan, then either they had no clue what they were doing and we are suffering the problem of evil for their stupidity or they had the mechanism built in to disobey God. The circuitry was in place to entertain the idea of disregarding the importance of obeying God. I’m sure if they had more life experience or had a concept of what the implications would be they would not have done it, but that is an argument for another time. So it appears that we had the propensity to disobey God built in. Let’s call it freewill.

To say that Humans choose to disobey God infers that we know what God wants in the first place. I will stipulate for the purpose of this article that we should be able to understand how God wants us to behave from scripture.

What does God want from us?

"Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. 38. This is the first and great commandment." Matthew 22:37

And some others follow.
Love one another as we love ourselves, to act justly, to love mercy, to keep the commandments, obey God, believe God, trust God, know God, seek God, repent, strive to overcome our nature and have faith.

These words were written by people that did not understand the properties of the brain. These words were written before the discovery of principles that demonstrably affect behavior such as not being able to process emotional information or being genetically predisposed to disease. Severe mental disorder was thought to be the result of spirits. These words were written before anyone knew that the emotional disorder of Psychopathy was possible.

If we know that mental processes can be affected by influences other than internal thoughts, then that casts doubt on the whole concept of absolute free will. If we stipulate that there is a non-absolute type of freewill available to everyone, then we can see that there is a varying degree of freewill accessible by everyone. What degree of freewill does a Psychopath have? What degree of free will does a Sociopath have? What degree of free will does a person with depression have? What degree of freewill does a person have that has a tumor that affects mental processes? What degree of free will do you have? The functioning of the Brain can be altered by chemicals and trauma as much as it can by a persons internal thought processes, environment and culture. Decision making processes including those relating to morality can be handicapped by the structure of the brain itself. One aspect of freewill is accessibility to options. When your options are limited by the environment or by your cognitive abilities, your freewill is limited proportionally.

If you can force a Psychopath to behave according to Gods Law, you can’t change his "heart" (motivation), because he is born that way and there is no known therapy to counteract it. There is no way to get him to feel love or loyalty to God so from the start, the biblical mechanism for redemption for the psychopath is flawed. There is no scriptural mechanism for the salvation of the psychopath.

A popular rebuttal to this problem is that God can save anyone he chooses to through his grace. He will save those that are incapable of understanding that allegedly Jesus sacrifice on the cross was their way to salvation. There are several problems with that view.

First, typically Evangelicals, believe in the Doctrine of Original Sin, that we are born into sin such as described by David in Psalm 51:5. We do not need to learn how to sin, it comes naturally through Adams sin. Only learning about Jesus and believing saves you. Jesus was the Second Adam. Non-Evangelicals will point to an interpretation about Davids baby and a belief that god will do the right thing. However nowhere is this problem specifically addressed in the Bible. Scriptural evidence better supports the assertion that they are not saved.

Second, non-Evangelicals believe that passages such as 1 Cor 7:14 can be interpreted that children will be saved if they die before they can understand the Gospel. But the Evangelical understanding of that passage does not mean saved. It means being made ritually clean in the sense of Jewish law in the case that an believer marries an unbeliever. They are made ritually clean, and the marriage and children are acceptable to God, which is not the same thing and significantly less important than salvation.

Third. Romans 2:14 - 15 talks about the law written on our hearts. Commonly called "the law of conscience". It is a type of Universal Moral Law written on our hearts as a result of being made in Gods Image. It is independent of the saving grace of Jesus, it is enough to condemn however, and it supports the view of Original Sin.

Fourth, allegedly Jesus as the "the perfect sacrifice" was ultimately pleasing enough to god to forgive everyones sin and give them a fresh start. They are still born into sin but they the get the chance at salvation because of His sacrifice on the cross. Psychopaths are incapable of repentance or loyalty to God. However, since psychopaths exist, then that means the sacrifice while maybe technically perfect, wasn't effectively perfect.

Now with these premises in mind, lets discuss some outcomes.

If say that we don't know what god will do with babies and the psychopath, then we have fundamentally weakened the concept of the Atonement and Original Sin. It was supposed to be the way to salvation for everyone, a reconciliation with god.

So if Non-Evangelicals are right and we are qualified to say that God will do the right thing and save the 'incapable', it raises the question of "the right thing" by whose standards? Ours or His? I see this view as contradicting the Christian "Test" solution to the Problem of Evil/Suffering; that even the rape and murder of children work out for the greater good but we can't know how that happens, and also that good is defined by god and we can't understand that either, and that is why so many acts of god look evil to us. It undermines the idea that the Evil in the world is a test for us. If God can save anyone he wants, and the Psychopath, or the criminally insane can run around and do hideous things with no remorse and still get saved, then this view of salvation is terribly unfair. The freewill of the innocent, or not so innocent can be undermined by a sub-group of people that can do anything and still be saved. If we say that god will do the right thing in principle by saving babies and the psychopath then we have set a precedent to say that we are competent to judge when god would do the right thing. Using that warrant I will say that raping and murdering children is not the right thing and does not lead to the greater good therefore the Problem Or Evil cancels God out because a benevolent God should not permit that.

If we are going to say that god will not save the psychopath or baby, then most people would find that unconscionable, we can add to our list of Problem of Evil grievances, and we have fundamentally weakened the concept of the Atonement and Original Sin because it was supposed to be the way to salvation for everyone, a reconciliation with god.I think the problem of unsaved babies, and the psychopath, is an unhandled exception that halts the system.

Through research in psychology, psychiatry, neuroscience and genetics it is becomingly increasingly clear that behavior is not only a matter of wanting to do the right thing, it depends on having an internal mechanism that supports it.

I used a podcast by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation as a basis for this article. The podcast was called “Inside the Mind of a Psychopath”. The reason I chose Psychopathy as the first topic for this series was because Psychopathy is clinically considered an emotional disorder that disrupts empathy. Psychopaths are not able to Love and therefore not able to follow the First Great Commandment from Matt. 22:37.

In the synopsis of the interviews that follow, the various researchers give their perspectives on Psychopathy.

Dr. Robert Hare says the psychopath is not what the media portrays. They are individuals that are intact but at the core, lack emotional concern or empathy for other people. They don’t understand that other people have rights. They don’t feel remorse or guilt. They lack a conscience and this can’t be explained in intellectual deficiency, psychosis, mental illness or brain damage.
Traits that make up a Psychopath are shared with Psychotic and Sociopathic personalities but some traits make them distinct from each other. Psychotic personalities are considered delusional, and Sociopathic personalities have the ability to feel remorse or guilt.

Psychopaths know exactly what they are doing but they just don’t care. Psychotics are not aware that what they are doing is wrong. The term Sociopath describes the “hardcore” criminal. Some psychopaths are also sociopaths, or hardcore criminals, but they don’t feel remorse.

Traits that collectively describe a Psychopath are a shallow emotional life, they are fairly superficial people, they use deceit to intimidate and control other people, they tend to be fairly dominant in controlling people, they have enormous sense of entitlement (they believe everything is due to them), they are fairly impulsive in a controlled sense, they lead a nomadic lifestyle, they commit a lot of irresponsible behavior, promiscuity, lying and they have a need for excitement. None of these traits individually warrant the diagnosis of psychopathy, but collectively they do. All these traits make up the personality of a person that would find it easy to violate social norms of behavior but not necessarily to the degree of criminality.

Dr. James Blair believes that psychopathy is an emotional disorder, comparable to depression and anxiety. He is convinced that their behavior is a result of the difference in how their brains work. Types of emotional learning are impaired. They don’t process emotional information properly. The way that emotions interact with attention to process objects in the environment, and the way that emotions interact with decision making is interrupted. They are not as good at recognizing facial expressions as non-psychopaths.

Some children exhibit psychopathic tendencies. Dr. Blair is performing MRI studies on them to see the differences in their brains. Children are less likely to have had strong environmental influences in their behavior. One of the tests is to recognize facial expressions. Children with psychopathic traits show a reduced response in the amygdala compared to children without psychopathic traits. The amygdala are also important in feeling fear. So it may explain why psychopaths are not afraid of getting caught if they commit a crime, and their apparent lack of conscience. If a person has trouble interpreting how someone else feels, it would be almost impossible to have empathy, and learn the difference between good and bad behavior.

Dr. Blair believes that since psychoapthy is an emotional disorder, and since emotional disorders respond well to pharmacological treatments, once the systems that cause psychopathy are understood, it is likely that it can be treated pharmacologically.

Dr. Essi Viding says that children with psychopathic traits differ from children with anti-social behavior. They lack empathy for people they offend and rarely feel bad about what they’ve done. Children with psychopathic traits will deliberately hurt other children especially if they are perceived as being weak or needing protection. Sometimes they will hurt other children for amusement and not feel bad about it. If they feel bad, they feel bad about getting caught. They usually blame others for their own actions, they can be cruel to animals and they seem to have a slightly odd emotional profile. They are superficially charming in an attempt to manipulate people to their own ends but don’t actually show sincere affection and can change their loyalties quickly. She conducted studies on twins that show that the traits are largely inherited. She and her colleague are planning to look for genetic markers in DNA to identify risk factors for psychopathy in the same way that certain gene combinations identify risk factors for heart disease.

Dr. Marnie Rice believes there is a genetic basis for psychopathy and believes that it was evolutionarily selected for. While she acknowledges that psychopathic behavior is outside the mean for average human behavior, she sees it not as a disorder but as a natural variation within the human genome. In some ways it made for an evolutionarily “fitter” person. She thinks psychopaths have evolved to fill an evolutionary niche. The only required behavior to make evolution work is to successfully pass on your genes. Promiscuity and lack of empathy are traits of psychopaths and this leads to mating and reproduction. They tend to start having sex earlier, and tend to move between partners frequently. Barring any inhibiting factors, psychopaths are likely to have more offspring than non psychopaths. Dr. Rice’s research into psychopathic sexual preferences show they are selectively interested in post-pubescent females. They are not as likely to be interested in the same sex or children. Psychopaths are most successful in environments where they can remain anonymous and jump from mate to mate. The city is a perfect place for that behavior.

Changing the behavior of psychopaths using typical therapy doesn’t work. Some traditional therapy makes them worse. After treatment they have a higher likelihood of repeating the offending behavior. They use what they learn in therapy to gain an advantage to increase the successful outcome of their subsequent behavior.

In summary, I repeat, if a psychopath can be forced to behave according to Gods Law, his motivation (“heart”) can’t change, because he is born that way and there is no known therapy to counteract it. There is no way to get him to feel love or loyalty to god so from the start, the biblical mechanism for redemption for the psychopath is flawed. There is no scriptural mechanism for the salvation of the psychopath.

REFERENCES

Atonement Theories and Cultural Understandings.
The Soul: A Rational Belief?
CBC Radio: Inside the mind of a psychopath (scroll down to the bottom of the page when you get there)
Wikipedia on Psychopathy
Dr. Hares webpage
Dr. Blairs webpage
Dr. Viding’s webpage
Dr. Rice’s book on this topic
The Society for the Scientific Study of Psychopathy
Dr. Porters Webpage

Cognitive Dissonance and the Problem of Evil

This article is a summary of a portion of an interview with Social Psychologist Carol Tavris on Point of Inquiry, the Podcast of the Center for Skeptical Inquiry. She and Social Psychologist Elliot Aronson are the authors of a book on Cognitive Dissonance called Mistakes Were Made (But Not By Me): Why We Justify Foolish Beliefs and how it affects us in everyday life. It covers the manifestation of Cognitive Dissonance in prosecuting attorneys, law enforcement officials, politicians, smokers etc. In the interview she was asked if Cognitive Dissonance is manifested in religious belief and this article summarizes her response.

In the beginning of the interview she talks about characteristics of Cognitive Dissonance and how it manifests itself in Attorneys that have discovered they have wrongly prosecuted someone, law enforcement officials that are trained to believe the person being questioned is just as good as guilty thereby justifying whatever means necessary to elicit a confession, and politicians that support policy that is shown over time to be wrong but will not change their position. She uses the resulting situation of the Iraq War and the position of the Bush Administration as an example of a manifestation of Cognitive Dissonance.

Q: There are religious people that don't demand proof for their beliefs, is this a way of relieving their cognitive dissonance?

A: The more important a particular belief is to us the more strongly we will ignore or reject evidence suggesting we are wrong. Religion is central to what gives many people meaning and purpose in life. This type of belief will be defended at all costs. Examples of dis-confirming evidence creating Cognitive Dissonance are Evolution, the Holocaust and disasters.
Most religious people are not threatened by evolution. They find a way to fit it into their beliefs, but some cannot fit it into their beliefs and they will go to great lengths to try to refute the dis-confirming evidence.
How do Jews deal with the Holocaust? The Jews believe they are the chosen people, and god is looking after them. How could a good loving god have permitted genocide? Students of Cognitive Dissonance Theory would predict that people would become more religious and their faith would be strengthened. What most people do is not lose their faith in God but reduce the dissonance by saying God is responsible for the Good in the world, human beings are responsible for the Evil or God is testing faith. The Christian response to the question of how Jesus could permit enormous suffering to happen is to believe that it is to test faith. Anything that is not consonant with a belief in God is reinterpreted to make it consonant. For example after a terrible disaster the survivors will say something like "god was looking after me" but discounting the fact that God was not looking out for other people that died.

Another interesting interview related to cognitive dissonance is from the radio show "All in the Mind". They interviewed Phillip Zambardo, the lead researcher involved with the Stanford Prison Experiment. The experiment had to be canceled because it got out of control. The participants started self-justifying doing terrible things to each other and it had to be stopped. He was the expert witness for the defendants in the Abu Ghraib trial, explaining how situational factors can make good people do bad things using cognitive dissonance to self-justify their actions. He talks about it in his book The Lucifer Effect.

It made me think about slavery, the crusades, Old Testament atrocities and Craigs defense of killing pregnant mothers with a sword. (thanks Steven Carr!)

REFERENCES
Point of Inquiry podcast with Carol Tavris interview.

Science Friday podcast interview with Elliot Aronson

Mistakes Were Made (But Not By Me): Why We Justify Foolish Beliefs

Wikipedia on Cognitive Dissonance

All in the Mind

Stanford Prison Experiment

The Lucifer Effect

The Role of Persuasion in the Question of the Holy Spirit

This article takes one of the examples in the "Reasonable Doubts about the Holy Spirit" article and explores it further to show that there is no possible way for a person to come to an informed belief based on the guidance of the Holy Spirit, the alleged interference of Satan or the stubbornness of Humans and that the beliefs that we form about ambiguous subjects are results of factors of persuasion in our environment.

2b. If Tom has the potential to be influenced by the Holy Spirit when Evan tells him about Jesus, Tom should recognize the truth and accept Christ. Along the way he adopts the belief that the gifts of the Holy Spirit are valid today for everyone. Stipulating for a moment that the Gifts of the Spirit were ONLY valid in the time of the apostles, he lives happily ever after. His Spirit evidently did not pick up on the discrepancy. Is it possible that he made a conscious decision to disregard what the Holy Spirit was telling him and didn't know it?

In this situation at least three premises present themselves to Tom before he forms a belief one way or the other.
1. The Holy Spirits gifts are Valid today.
2. The Holy Spirits gifts are not valid today.
3. Maybe some are valid and some are not.

Stipulating for the sake of argument that the Gifts of the Holy Spirit were ONLY valid at the time of the Apostles I'll assign some claims to some entities.
1. Satan says that The Holy Spirits gifts are Valid today
2. The Holy Spirit says that The Holy Spirits gifts are not valid today.
3. Tom comes up with a compromise that some are valid and some are not.

So How does Tom decide between any of these claims. He is no expert. He stands alone with these thoughts. He can find scripture to support arguments for and against, but his cultural belief in fair play give him the idea that both may be right in certain circumstances. Usually when you have to make a decision or decide what you think about something, it is based on evidence and logical inference. This is true in the day to day interactions in the world. One can see evidence of certain things and one can see if it fits with what the claims are and one can make an informed decision. He knows people that speak in tongues, but he also has a feeling that it may be just a show for attention. However in this case, the evidence is in the Bible, and it seems to be ambiguous on the issue. Usually when one is faced with making a decision and one isn't qualified to make an informed decision, one has to rely on experts.

So now who is an expert? If both arguments have support in the Bible, then how does anyone, even an expert make an informed decision? If they make the decision on a feeling, then how does anyone know where the feeling came from? Holy Spirit, Satan, or the self? If both parties ascribing to different side of the issue make their decision on a feeling that they describe as the Holy Spirit, who can argue? How do they know it was the Holy Spirit? Does this "Holy Spirit Feeling" ever manifest itself in situations where you wouldn't expect any "Holy Spirit Guidance", like at the mall for example? This is where good old fashioned Persuasion and Rhetoric comes into play when you don't have enough information to make a decision about an issue that is ambiguous.

Some factors of Persuasion are in the incomplete list that follows.
- People are naturally terrible at estimating probability.
- People are naturally terrible at perceiving and interpreting probabilistic data.
- People "remember the hits and forget the misses"
- People like stories and are willing to give the teller of the story the benefit of the doubt about the truth of it.
- People are more likely to believe a story if it comes from someone they like.
- People are more likely to believe a story if it is believed by the larger group.
- People are more likely to believe a story if it comes from an authority.
- People will change their evidence based viewpoint if it contradicts the viewpoint of the group.
- People overestimate the degree of belief in others.
- People are more likely to believe a story if it fits with what they already believe or want to believe.
- People look for confirmation of what they already believe and disregard things that contradict.
- People are likely to use the precautionary principle as illustrated by Pascals Wager in minimizing risk.
- People fill in the gaps in information naturally, stories, blind spot in the eye, movies, music etc
- People will come to believe what they hear the more it is repeated to them.
- People are more likely to believe a story that is accompanied by symbols or imagery.

When there are good arguments on both sides and you don't have any evidence to make an inference based on Logic, then you always have your friends, family, church and culture to give you a feeling about the truth of an issue. This is the how the industry of marketing and advertising work as well as politics.

Does anyone just pick a church at random and make it their church home? No, they shop around, and visit other churches till they find one that 'feels' right. Why does it feel right? The Holy Spirit, Satan or self? How do they know? They decide from the factors listed above. The decide based on the influences in their environment.

To say that one follows the Holy Spirit based on a feeling is a case of special pleading. There is no way to validate it even for the person having the feeling. Therefore, the teachings in the Bible that are ambiguous, logically must not be important and can be disregarded until they can be substantiated in principle and evidence.

REFERENCES

- Cialdini, Robert. 2001. Influence: Science and Practice. Boston. Allyn and Bacon.
- Gilovich, Thomas. 1991. How We Know What Isn't So. New York. The Free Press: A division of Macmillan, Inc.
- Okeefe, Daniel J. 1990. Persuasion Theory and Research. Newbury Park, California. Sage Publications.
- Cialdini's Six weapons of influence
- Elaboration Likelihood Model of persuasion.
- Why Do Christians Believe?
- From an Atheists Perspective
- ChangingMinds.org

Persuasion Videos from Debate Central.
- Speaking to Persuade
- Objects of Persusion
- Theories of Persuasion
- Strategies of Persuasion

Reasonable Doubt About the Holy Spirit

This article is an exploration of some stated and less disputed characteristics of the Holy Spirit. I purposely tried to avoid claims about the Holy Spirit that were disputed between denominations and Churches. I use these relatively undisputed claims as my core premises to construct the argument in favor of the Holy Spirit in order to express doubt about it. By using commonly accepted claims about the Holy Spirit, and my experience as a former Christian I hope to avoid the charge of misrepresentation or "straw man".

P1a. The Holy Spirit is God
P1b. God is omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, etc.
P2. The Holy Spirit informs the Unbeliever as to the truth of Jesus when being told about it.
P3a. The Holy Spirit is in every Christian
P3b. Every Christian Accepts Christ
P3c. Every Christian should be favorable to Holy Spirit Influence.
P4. The Holy Spirit helped write the scripture
P5. The Holy Spirit helps interpret the scripture
P6. The Holy Spirit gives understanding (informs).

Conclusion: The Holy Spirit is effectively God, it wrote about itself, it lives in every Christian giving guidance about what it helped write about itself therefore there should be no disagreement on any characteristic of the Holy Spirit or interpretation of Scripture.

Many of the claims about the Holy Spirit are not falsifiable, but premises P5 and P6 are. For example, some early pre-Nicean Christian Church leaders rejected the Trinity. They were closest to the source, which infers that if the principles regarding the Holy Spirit were valid, then they of all people would know if it was a proper way to describe God or not. Yet the validity of the Trinity as a proper description of God seems to be in doubt by some denominations. Additionally some other characteristics of God aka The Holy Spirit seem to be in doubt. Some Christians say the Holy Spirit is a female entity, and some say it is male. Some say it is a person and some say it isn't.

Why can't all Christians agree on any of this if they are all getting guidance from the Holy Spirit? But quite counter-intuitively one Christian in one church has their point of view and another Christian in another church has a different point of view. They both believe they have the Holy Spirit inside and are getting guidance (informed). But what is the manifestation of this guidance? Is it a feeling, or verbal thoughts, or images or something else? Its obviously something personal and individual.

You who are Christian, how does the Holy Spirit manifests its guidance to you? The next time you are in a disagreement with another Christian over some aspect of scripture, do a little introspection and have some humility. First, recognize that you may be wrong. Second, if you don't come to agree with the other person, do some introspection. Look for its manifestation and see if you are getting any guidance from the Holy Spirit. See if you can distinguish what your thoughts are from the guidance of the Holy Spirit. If you can distinguish, and you are certain you're expressing the point of view of the Holy Spirit, then the person you are having the discussion with should agree with you if they are a true Christian and have the Spirit indwelling. If you can't distinguish then, ask yourself, is this person getting guidance from the Holy Spirit and if so how do they distinguish? Maybe you should ask them, how the guidance of the Holy Spirit manifests itself to them because if they can distinguish their thoughts from the Holy Spirit, then you need to adopt their way of thinking right away. If they can't and you can't either, then maybe you should stop worrying about the initial disagreement and start worrying about why neither one of you are getting guidance from the Holy Spirit. If you are convinced you are getting guidance, and they are too, then you are at an impasse, and logically this should not be possible. One of you must be wrong about receiving guidance from the Holy Spirit. But why would you think you were getting guidance if you weren't? In any case you'll need to get another opinion, but how do you ultimately know who's interpretation of scripture is correct and who's isn't. Hopefully the Holy Spirit will let you know who you can trust. However that doesn't seem to be the case in some churches. Churches that have had Pastors such as Ted Haggard, or a community in Uganda, Africa are sorely missing that type of guidance.

If the Holy Spirit informs, and a true Christian has it living inside and it lives inside because the person should be favorable to its influence then how can there possibly be Christian on Christian crime? I Bet William Tyndale, who created the first English translation of the Bible and was subsequently charged with heresy was wondering something similar as he was praying "Oh Lord, open the King of England's eyes" shortly before being strangled and burned. If a person can't tell when the holy spirit is giving them guidance, what good is it? How is it supposed to work?

During my research for this article (hardly any of them scholarly or academic sources) I noticed that some web sites talked about the lack of good commentary on the Holy Spirit and one speculated that it was probably because people were afraid of Blasphemy against it. In my opinion, the lack of commentary is because they are afraid to take a position on it out of fear of criticism. Most of them just quoted scripture and never provided any mechanism for how it worked but did provide a lot of ambiguous Emotional Persuasion Dialogue aka Rhetoric with no way to validate it. This is an indication that it is not very well understood which is not what you'd expect if the principles written about it are true.

The following are some situations I created using the principles of the Holy Spirit to explore their implications. I purposely worded them redundantly so the impact of the argument would not get lost. In each case the presumption is that the Holy Spirit informs or gives guidance to facilitate a decision to accept or reject.

How it should happen.
1. If Tom has the potential to be influenced by the Holy Spirit when Evan tells him about Jesus, Tom should recognize the truth and accept Christ. He does and lives happily ever after.

How it should not happen.

Tom Believes the Gifts Were Only Valid For The Apostles:
2a. If Tom has the potential to be influenced by the Holy Spirit when Evan tells him about Jesus, Tom should recognize the truth and accept Christ. Along the way he adopts the belief that the gifts of the Holy Spirit were only valid for the Apostles. Stipulating for a moment that the Gifts of the Spirit are NOT only valid in the time of the apostles, he lives happily ever after. His Spirit evidently did not pick up on that discrepancy. Is it possible that he made a conscious decision to disregard what the Holy Spirit was telling him and didn't know it?

or the opposite situation happens

Tom Believes the Gifts Are Valid For Everyone Today:
2b. If Tom has the potential to be influenced by the Holy Spirit when Evan tells him about Jesus, Tom should recognize the truth and accept Christ. Along the way he adopts the belief that the gifts of the Holy Spirit are valid today for everyone. Stipulating for a moment that the Gifts of the Spirit were ONLY valid in the time of the apostles, he lives happily ever after. His Spirit evidently did not pick up on the discrepancy. Is it possible that he made a conscious decision to disregard what the Holy Spirit was telling him and didn't know it? This argument is discussed in detail here

Tom Becomes an Apostate:
3a. If Tom has the potential to be influenced by the Holy Spirit when Evan tells him about Jesus, Tom should recognize the truth and accept Christ. He does and learns more about the bible and Christianity. He has questions that are not resolved in his mind. He makes no conscious decision to disbelieve anything that he thought was rational. Everything that bothered him, bothered him exactly because he thought it didn't make sense. He becomes an apostate later in life, living happily ever after. Was the Holy Spirit giving him guidance to cause him to find fault in the Bible or Christianity? If not, then if the Holy Spirit was giving him guidance and it didn't make sense to him then is he culpable when he rejects Christianity on those grounds? On the other hand how do you love something you have doubts about? If he grudgingly keeps professing his faith, gods not going to be fooled and he's as good as an apostate.

or the opposite situation happens

Tom Hangs Onto His Belief Despite Doubts:
3b. If Tom has the potential to be influenced by the Holy Spirit when Evan tells him about Jesus, Tom should recognize the truth and accept Christ. He does and learns more about the bible and Christianity. He has questions that are not resolved in his mind and he makes no conscious decision to disbelieve anything that he thought made sense. Everything that bothered him, bothered him exactly because he thought it didn't make sense. He wrestles with these questions for the rest of his life professing his faith and NOT living happily ever after. Was the Holy Spirit giving him guidance to cause him to find fault in the Bible or Christianity? If not, how is it that the Holy Spirit didn't intervene on behalf of itself to the point that he would not have to make a choice to disregard conflicting information that he honestly believed was valid? Here is a link to a DC article called "Christians Who Struggle With Serious Doubts" that talks about this.

Tom Doesn't Accept Jesus At First Contact
4. If Tom has the potential to be influenced by the Holy Spirit when Evan tells him about Jesus, Tom should recognize the truth and accept Christ. But he doesn't because he is not convinced. What could be going on in inside Tom to cause that to happen? Doesn't Tom realize that the Holy Spirit is working on him to influence him to believe? How is Tom supposed to recognize the fact the he is being informed by the Holy Spirit? Is Tom consciously disregarding information that is informing him from the Holy Spirit? Can Tom distinguish between what are his thoughts and what is the guidance and understanding of the Holy Spirit?

Tom Accepts Jesus But Doesn't Become A True Christian:
5. If Tom has the potential to be influenced by the Holy Spirit when Evan tells him about Jesus, Tom should recognize the truth and accept Christ. Evan is in the Catholic Church, or Protestant, or Church of God, or Jehovah's Witness or Church of Latter Day Saints. Tom likes what he hears and accepts Christ. But the other Churches out there are saying that those churches aren't made up of real Christians, kind of like the Pope did on July 10, 2007. So if these are not real Christians, why didn't the Holy Spirit pick up on this and over time put Tom in a position to have to make a conscious decision to disregard information about itself that he new was valid and accept information that he did not know was valid? There was no informed decision possible.

Where are the real Christians? In what church?
* The Catholic Church? or any of the other versions of Catholicism?
* Protestant Evangelicals? or any of the many other protestant churches?
* Jehovah's Witnesses?
* Latter Day Saints?
* Church of God?

Since it seems apparent that the Holy Spirit does not help interpret scripture or give understanding, Reasonable Doubt about the Holy Spirit is justified.

For effect I listed the staggering number of Christian Denominations from Wikipedia and after that, the staggering number of theological disputes between them.

List of Christian Denominations from Wikipedia
1 Catholicism
1.1 The Catholic Church: Churches in communion with the Bishop of Rome
1.2 Other Churches that are Catholic, But Who Are Not In Communion With Rome

2 Eastern Churches
2.1 The (Eastern) Orthodox Church
2.2 Western-Rite Orthodox Churches
2.3 Other Eastern Orthodox Churches
2.3.1 Assyrian Church of the East
2.4 Oriental Orthodoxy
2.4.1 Oriental Orthodox Communion

3 Anglicanism
3.1 Anglican Communion (in communion with the Church of England)
3.2 Independent Anglican and Continuing Anglican Movement Churches

4 Protestant
4.1 Pre-Lutheran Protestants
4.2 Lutheranism
4.3.1 Presbyterianism
4.3.2 Congregationalist Churches
4.4 Anabaptists
4.5 Methodists
4.6 Pietists and Holiness Churches
4.7 Baptists
4.7.1 Spiritual Baptists
4.9 Apostolic Churches - Irvingites
4.10 Pentecostalism
4.11 Oneness Pentecostalism
4.12 Charismatics
4.12.1 Neo-Charismatic Churches
4.13 African Initiated Churches
4.14 United and uniting churches
4.15 Other Protestant Denominations
4.16 Religious Society of Friends (Quakers)

5 Messianic Judaism

6 Restorationism
6.1 Stone-Campbell Restoration Movement
6.2 Southcottites
6.3 Millerites and Comparable groups
6.3.1 Sabbath Keeping Churches, Adventist
6.3.2 Sabbath-Keeping Churches, Non-Adventist in north Pennsylvania
6.3.3 Sunday Adventists
6.3.4 Sacred Name Groups
6.3.5 Other Adventists
6.3.6 Bible Student Groups
6.4 Anglo-Israelism

7 Nontrinitarian Groups
7.1 Unitarianism and Universalism

8 Religious movements related to Christianity
8.1 Manichaeism
8.2 The New Church also called Swedenborgianism
8.2.1 Episcopal
8.2.2 Congregational
8.3 New Thought
8.4 Christian mystery movements

9 Ethnic or syncretic religions incorporating elements of Christianity

10 Christianism

With help from John, Prup, and an Ed Babinski article, here are a list of some disputed topics. I wanted to list as many items as possible to give a graphic representation of how unreliable the principles of the Holy Spirit are.

- Trinity or no?
- Arianism
- The disputes that drove the creation of Protestants.
- Denominations of Protestants
- Denominations of Catholics
- War between Catholics and protestants
- Holy Spirit male or female?
- Holy Spirit is a person or not?
- Salvation, faith or works
- Baptism
- Infant Baptism
- Hell is real and fiery or not?
- Purgatory
- Snake handling
- Once saved always saved?
- Where do Suicides go?
- Speaking in tongues
- Blasphemy of the Holy Spirit
- New covenant theology
- The 'two natures' in Christ.
- The Ordination of Women
- The attitude towards gays
- The various parts of the Bible that seem to be later additions, such as the 'story of the woman taken in adultery' and the 'Great Commission' that ends Matthew, etc.
- The Rapture
- Slavery
- Biblical inerrancy
- Christendom
- Papal Infallibility
- Double Predestination
- Just War Theory
- Penal Substitution
- God as a Male
- Sin
- Unforgivable Sin
- Second coming has already happened
- The point in time that the holy spirit indwells and fills you
- Gifts of the spirit given to everyone or different people at different times
- 'pre-Nicean' controversies

What Would You Do With $800,000.00 or 55,000 People for 12 Hours?

On July 7, 2007 55,000 people at a cost of $800,000.00 got together in Nashville for twelve hours of swaying, praying and fasting to influence God or other people or maybe it was just a pep talk to turn the country around. It was intentionally held on 7/7/07 because “Biblically, the number seven is the Lord's number," said Scott MacLeod, who helped organize The Call and is founder of Provision International, an inner-city ministry in Nashville. “All through the Bible, there are a series of sevens. So, when you get three sevens to line up at once, you know something's up.”

Can’t argue with logic like that. God knows there is more potential energy in those prayers than the combined effort of 110,000 hands laying on tools or brainstorming on different ways you could use $800,000.00 or 55,000 people to do something useful.

Lee's Non-Atheistic Recommended Reading

As a contributor to DC, obviously, I am agnostic and, additionally, a former Bible study teacher and Born Again Evangelical Christian. I didn't get that way by reading content on sites like this. In fact, I didn't have any interest in anything atheists had to say until I stood alone with a lack of belief in a god that I acquired after a couple years of truth seeking. Not "God Truth", but "Practical Truth". The kind of truth you need to find before you purchase health products, or make decisions at work. When I applied that to my Christian beliefs, they didn't stand up very well...

At that point I wanted to see what 'the other side' had to say so I subscribed to the Infidel Guy and spent a year downloading and listening to debates and interviews. I also listened to a years worth of Robert Price's Bible Geek show. Then I listened to a Sam Harris Lecture promoting his book "The End of Faith" and got motivated to do something to help make the world a better place. A year ago I started a blog that was a last ditch effort to get God to participate in this relationship we were supposed to have and intervene. All I got was a madman posting a bunch of crap on it. Thats when I decided to Join DC and be part of a team and leave the moderation of loons up to someone else. My point in this increasingly blathering document is that applying the type of practical reasoning that people must necessarily use in every day life will in some cases weaken the perceived validity of the content of the Bible.

Along with the Atheistic books you see posted for sale on this blog, I recommend some books on the topic of reasoning and innoculation to persuasion. I am no teacher but I am a compulsive self-learner and I have read some text books that I want my children to read and I recommend to you. They are High School Senior level and above. I am sure there are better ones out there, and I have some of them unread on my shelf, but until I get to them, this is the best I can do. Maybe some of you out there are Educators and can suggest some others. In any case, reading these books will help you in other areas of your life such as dealing with the boss, coworkers, subordinates, your teens, tweens, kids, sales people and the news.

They fall into two categories; Reasoning and Persuasion. Some associated topics are Argumentation and Rhetoric, and while I am interested in both those topics, I won't recommend any of those books here because they fall outside the scope of this article. I include persuasion because people need to be aware of how people are 'hard-wired' to trust and believe things without much thought.

On the topic of Reasoning.
* Introduction to Reasoning by Stephen Toulmin, Richard Reike, Allan Janik
* How We Know What Isn't So by Thomas Gilgovich
* How to Think About Weird Things: Critical Thinking for a New Age by Theodore Schick and Lewis Vaughn
* Logical Self-defense by Ralph H. & J. Anthony Blair Johnson
* Informal Logic by Douglas Walton.
* Practical Reasoning by Douglas Walton.
* Abductive Reasoning by Douglas Walton.

A word about Douglas Walton. He is a philosophy professor and researcher that is heavily involved in research for artificial intelligence and is helping to derive algorithms for use in computers to simulate human reasoning.

On the topic of Persuasion.
* Influence. Science and Practice by Robert Cialdini.
* Persuasion by Daniel J. O'Keefe.
* The Art of Deception by Nicholas Capaldi

Suspension of Disbelief

Changingminds.org is a site devoted to the study of persuasion. A post I discovered today discusses the suspension of disbelief to enjoy a movie or book and how people enjoy this behavior. I think this can be applied to religion to help explain a facet of it.

Below is an excerpt of the key point of the article.
"In his study of happiness, Csikszentmihalyi (1990) showed that being able to let go of the sense of self has a paradoxical effect of creating a state of happiness that perhaps relates to the one-ness of the neonatal phase. In suspending disbelief in their stories, authors thus help their readers feel good."

I highly recommend keeping an rss feed to this site. You can find a ton of good information about how people persuade each other and react to persuasion. It might help immunize some of you "fence sitters" from evangelicals and give you a fighting chance to resist while you are listening to LSAT Logic in Everday Life, honing your critical thinking skills.

Another excerpt from the "About" page on the site follows.
"You might also be the victim or target of persuasion, as we all are, many times each and every day. Because if you can detect a trick or technique coming your way, you can avoid it, expose it, or play with the trickster, doubling back the deception and outplaying them at their own game. For this is the great leveller: if you try to deceive someone and they discover it, then the game ends there and then, and they may never trust you again."

Additionally, here is a link from their blog on seven rules of religion.

There's also a lot of good Human Resources Department type of information at changingminds.org as well.

Why I am an Agnostic: The Bible as a Domain of Knowledge

"In my walk with God, I thought I found him but I was wrong. If he were there I would have found him, unless he were hiding."

I present this diagram and explanation because I have seen several times Believers lamenting that they just want to see how an atheist thinks. While I don't consider myself an Atheist, I definitely have properties of one, so the label fits well enough for practical purposes. I can't speak for everyone but this is how I think. Johns Book review and follow on Article gave me the impetus I needed to come to grips with an idea that had been bubbling on my back burner for a while. I had alluded to it several times in articles and comments but had never made it coherent. It was an internal thought process that I had never tried to put into words or explain before. Hopefully this will show, contrary to claims from believers, that I do not want god to be a trick pony, and that there is evidence that would convince me of his existence and why it is not reasonable for me to commit to the Idea of a god.

If we say that the Bible represents a domain of Knowledge (A) and it contains knowledge that we can perceive (B) as well as knowledge that we can't perceive, then there is a portion of the knowledge of A and B that we can validate. If we set about a process of validation then the parts that we cannot validate or are shown to be false will fall outside our sphere of commitment (C). As we validate, invalidate or find inconclusive, our sphere of commitment will move either inside or outside the Domain of A. There will come a time when the sphere or commitment falls far enough outside the Domain of A that the person cannot reasonably commit to the domain of A. This depends on the acceptance of the types of evidence that the person is willing to commit to. In my case, the kind of evidence that I require prevents my sphere from moving towards A. I think my requirement for evidence is pretty simple. I want a god to be non-ambiguous and/or irrefutable. Not that I want it to make me a robot, but I do want it to present its case or evidence so that it would be unreasonable for me not to accept it. I have to say that my walk with god was a lot like a walk with chance. That idea occurred to me while I was praying one day.

Now this raises the question, if I am wrong, is god justified in sending me to hell. He has the burden of proof. Compared to a god I am stupid, worthless and weak. I should be easy to convince.

Here is how to say it in a more nerdy way. It is a reprint from a comment I made in Johns follow on article.

In an inquiry, when an argument from ignorance has investigated a domain looking for a true proposition and does not find one, then the argument from ignorance turns into an argument from knowledge.
The more you search through a knowledge base, the more you know about it until you know enough about it to say whether a given proposition is true or not.

- If I had an older brother I would know about it. Robert C. Moore calls this type of reasoning Autoepistemic Reasoning.
- I did not find my dog in my house, if he were in my house, I would have found him.

Another way to say it is as follows.
D is a domain of knowledge, K is a knowledge base in D.
It has not been established that all true propositions in D are contained in K.
A is a special type of proposition such that if A were true, A would normally or usually be expected to be in K.
A is in D.
A is not in K.
For all A in D, A is either true or false.
Therefore it is plausible to presume that A is false (subject to further investigations in D).
Walton, Douglas N. 1996. Arguments from Ignorance. Pennsylvania State University Press. P.149.

The Bible as Truth?

If a truth is real, shouldn't it be able to be verified? Once a truth is verified shouldn't it become a fact? Once a fact is verified as the truth, shouldn't it stand up to scrutiny and always be found to be true?
If we can't verify a fact, should it be a truth? If we can't verify a truth can it really be considered a truth?
(I am updating this article with new links and references as they come to mind.)

In my post on the bible as a faulty premise I showed that the bible does not appear to be the product of one mind, a Gods mind, and there is no corroboration for it, therefore its claim to be 'god breathed' is likely to not be valid. Its validity is based on circular reasoning. What is circular reasoning and why is it important with reference to the Bible? In laymans terms circular reasoning is when you state your claim and then, usually after rewording it, you state it again as your reason for your claim.
Here is a link to Wikipedia that explains it and I have also provided some analogies to help explain it which follow.
- Tom says he doesn't lie, therefore he doesn't.
- The company that makes motor oil says theirs is better than all the rest.
- A childs parents tell them not to do something because they said so.
- God exists because the Bible says he does and the Bible is the word of God.
- The Quran is a revelation from God because it says it is.
- Formula one auto racing is the best kind of racing because they go faster and use complicated tracks, and any race that goes faster and is more complicated must be the best.
- A Pharmaceutical company says their drug will help this or that and is safe.

Hopefully these analogies will show why it is important not to overlook the fact that a thing should not be considered valid until there is some other way to measure it or validate it.

Circular reasoning is not an acceptable kind of reasoning in our day to day life. When we submit a resume, the employer always asks for more than one reference. In courts, people are not convicted on the testimony of one individual. We tell our kids not to talk to strangers, or get in the car with strangers. Should we tell them that the exception to the 'stranger' rule is when they find one that says they are honest?

If we accept the concept of circular reasoning as valid reasoning, we open ourselves up to all kinds of fraud. In fact billions of dollars are spent every year in law, medicine and insurance because circular reasoning is not a practical type of reasoning for ensuring fair and equitable circumstances for a population.

So if we shouldn’t accept the Bibles claims simply because it claims them, maybe we should find out where it came from. If it is the truth it should be verifiable and stand up to scrutiny.

What else could corroborate the bible?
Archeology, Anthropology, Textual Criticism, Biblical Criticism.

I recommend some impartial university courses on Comparative Religions and Ancient Civilizations concentrating on Near Easter Civilizations and I urge people to give a serious look at their mythology.

There is good reason to believe that the Tanakh (The Old Testament) has roots in Near Eastern Mythology. Here is a website from a scholarly author that talks about his research and his books. He is one of many since the 15th century that have observed this phenomena.

Here are some links to information (from Wikipedia) about that time period. They are not intended to prove anything but are intended to be a quick reference for a better understanding of the Bible.
Phonecia
Ugarit
Fertile Crescent
Canaan
Palestine
Israel
Judea
Assyria
Persia
Babylonia
Egypt
Flood Myths, Epic of Gilgamesh
The Bible
Validity of David and Solomon, interview with archaeologist/author Neil Asher Silberman
Excerpt from Biblical Archeology Review with Israel Finkelstein from MSN Groups

Alan Dundes, a famous Folklorist, says that academics are at risk for questioning the traditional understanding of the bible. "It turns out that studying the content of the Bible could prove to be a risky proposition, definitely dangerous to ones health or professional standing"(Dundes, 20). He goes on to cite some cases. His Book "Holy Writ as Oral Lit: The Bible as Folklore" was published at the end of his career and a few years before his death. There is significant pressure in academia not to criticize the Bible. This is not the case in other fields of study. In other fields of study, criticism is expected and necessary to weed out the ideas that don't work from the ideas that do.

In a addition to the general information links listed above, below are some references material that are useful for a study of the Bibles validity.

REFERENCES

Callahan, Tim. 2002. Secret Origins of The Bible. California. Millennium Press.

Davis, Kenneth C. 2006. Don't Know Much About Mythology: Everything You Need to Know About the Greatest Stories in Human History but Never Learned. New York. Harper.

Dundes, Alan. Holy Writ as Oral Lit: The Bible as Folklore. Lanham, Maryland. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers.

Finkelstein, Israel and Silberman, Neil Asher. 2002. The Bible Unearthed. New York. Simon and Schuster Free Press

Frazer, James George. 1975. Folklore in the Old Testament. New York. Hart Publishing

Friedman, Richard Elliot. 2003. The Bible With Sources Revealed. 2003. New York. HarperCollins.

Helms, Randel. 1988. Gospel Fictions. Amherst, New York. Prometheus Books.

Matthews, Victor H. and Benjamin, Don C. 1997. Old Testament Parallels: Laws and Stories from that Ancient Near East. New Jersey. Paulist Press.

Smith, Mark S. 2002. The Early History of God: Yahweh and the Other Deities in Ancient Israel. Dearborn, Michigan. William B. Eerdmans Publishing.

Interesting link, but I'm not sure of its credibility:
Torah, Ugaritic Bible