The Rationality of Faith
Tue Jul 24, 2007 at 03:47:45 PM PDT
Crossposted from SmokeyMonkey.org
While beliefs are nothing but cumulatively accepted opinions, faith is an entirely different matter. I have often argued the merits of any given belief based on its applicability to the real world. However, faith has evolved in the human species, and it must, therefore, have at one point in our evolution offered some advantage. Whether that advantage is still being conveyed, we are, as a species, saddled with our evolutionary baggage, and I believe it is a worthy question to ask whether religion is such baggage or whether religious beliefs somehow continue to confer a selective advantage.
It is Daniel Dennett's book, Religion as a Natural Phenomenon, that encouraged me to think more in this direction. Yet I have always harbored a fascination with the connection between the evolution of paradigms (sets of beliefs, if you will) and the evolution of the species. Religion has always been an excellent example of that connection.
The difference between belief and faith
The evolutionary value of society cannot be underestimated. I don't mean human Society, but rather societies in general in the natural world. By evolving specialized functions, certain members of the society (think ants, bees, and wasps, for instance) forsake individual reproductive advantage 'for the good of the hive', if you will. Despite this sacrifice in viability, somehow the society retains them for their benefit to the society.
Can it be said that an ant colony preserves what would otherwise be unproductive members of society (drones, for instance, that are sterile or asexual) in a belief that it benefits the society as a whole? The word may seem inappropriate but it is not in a technical epistemic sense. I will not ascribe "belief" to evolution, but there is a clear selective advantage to a society in preserving many members that individually would not be viable. Otherwise, how would we find such societal species?
Dennett makes the point in Chapter 8 of the book mentioned in the introduction that it is not exactly beliefs that need to be bolstered in order for them to survive; it is rather the belief in belief that is relevent. I think to eliminate confusing repetition of a word that means so many things, I would rather call this faith. It is not so much that a religious institution (as in those established today from ancient texts) requires everyone to believe everything they say, but that they appreciate the value of belief in society, that they have faith in religious leadership. That is, that they believe there is, in fact, an advantage conferred to the society for retaining faith.
Is there an evolutionary benefit for having faith?
Of course there is, many would say. Most of the religious people I've talked to would say that their religion helped them cope with adversity. There are, of course, many benefits to such psychological tools. It is Dennett's purpose to study religion in that sense. Is religion a beneficial tool for society, or is it evolutionary baggage that may once have been relevent to creating society as we know it?
Sam Harris attempts to answer that question in his book The End of Faith. Harris understands religion to be not only baggage, but a scourge that we must rid ourselves of as a society. He claims religion is responsible for grave injustices which a rational society should not tolerate. I think that his rhetoric is excessive, if amusing, but certainly his argument runs astray when he accuses Islam of being inherently violent. This, however, is a decent summary of one argument.
Our 'freedom of belief,' if it exists at all, is minimal. Is a person really free to believe a proposition for which he has no evidence? No. Evidence (whether sensory or logical) is the only thing that suggests that a given belief is really about the world in the first place. We have names for people who have many beliefs for which there is no rational justification. When their beliefs are extremely common we call them 'religious'; otherwise, they are likly to be called 'mad,' 'psychotic,' or 'delusional.' Most people of faith are perfectly sane, of course, even those who commit atrocites on account of their beliefs...
It takes a certain kind of person to believe what no one else believes. To be ruled by ideas for which you have no evidence (and which therefore cannot be justified in conversation with other human beings) is generally a sign that something is seriously wrong with your mind. Clearly, there is sanity in numbers.
Summary
I cannot ascribe to the view that the religious are insane. Instead, I believe we are all ignorant of the how and why of religious faith. Religious belief in, for instance, creationism does not interfere with scientific inquiry so much as a faith in creationism that excludes anything that might compromise belief in those beliefs. It is the insistence that belief is somehow more important than knowing the reality of the situation that leads extremists in their religions astray.
It is far more dangerous for an insane person to grasp onto religion than it is for a sane and rational one. With the justification of a faith in belief, an already irrational person has free reign over their delusional world. The rationality of faith for the normal, sane, human, however, is not understood.
Some previous essays
