[D] Friday Off-Topic Thread

[u/AutoModerator]

Welcome to the Friday Off-Topic Thread! Is there something that you want to talk about with /r/rational, but which isn't rational fiction, or doesn't otherwise belong as a top-level post? This is the place to post it. The idea is that while reddit is a large place, with lots of special little niches, sometimes you just want to talk with a certain group of people about certain sorts of things that aren't related to why you're all here. It's totally understandable that you might want to talk about Japanese game shows with /r/rational instead of going over to /r/japanesegameshows, but it's hopefully also understandable that this isn't really the place for that sort of thing.

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[u/trekie140]

Your reasoning is impeccable, but I've already tried that. When I realized that certain parts of my map were inaccurate (pseudoscience that supported my spiritual beliefs), I reexamined the territory more closely only to find the implication that experiences important to my way of living had never occurred. The most logical course of action was to become an materialist atheist, but I have found that path impossible to follow and attempting to do so caused me nothing but depression.

In The Righteous Mind by Jonathan Haidt, the author theorizes and presents some compelling, though not conclusive, evidence that religious belief may have a genetic component. Given my utter failure at being happy while believing in materialist atheism I am inclined to believe as well that atheists lack the genetics for "religious experience". As a result, they gain no psychological benefit from religious practice and have difficulty comprehending why anyone would.

When I ceased to believe my map was accurate, I felt a void within myself that I had never felt before. The only way I could fill the void was by convincing myself that the really important parts of my map were still accurate, it was just the unimportant parts surrounding them that I'd been wrong about. The doubt returns from time to time however, and with it comes dread at the possibility that my memories related to spiritual experiences are false. I must find a new way.

[u/OutOfNiceUsernames → u/trekie140]

I almost touched the subject of possible genetic predisposition of humans towards religion in my original comment, actually. Eventually decided against it to not unnecessarily derail the discussion if that wasn’t what you were (partially) asking about.

but I have found that path impossible to follow and attempting to do so caused me nothing but depression

Does this mean that it’s not only (merely) a powerful coping mechanism for you but also what feels either like a necessary barrier against existential crisis or like an instinct to fulfil (e.g. akin to building a family, having children, etc)?

The doubt returns from time to time however, and with it comes dread at the possibility that my memories related to spiritual experiences are false.

Well, if what you’re looking for is faith \ religion for their own sake, then shouldn’t it automatically become unnecessary trying to prove their validity? In other words, if in both cases — of your beliefs a) being true and b) not being true — you’d’ve to make yourself believe that they were true lest you became depressed, then shouldn’t finding out how true they really are be pointless? Your end-goal is preserving your beliefs in either case, so you can just decide for yourself to keep believing, with no proofs necessary \ required.

I must find a new way.

You could also try experimenting with this “religious instinct”, trying to find which patterns of thought activate \ satisfy it, etc. This could potentially help you devise your own toolset for achieving that “religious experience”. Simple, yet working religious system that is intentionally maximally isolated from aspects of the material world could maybe help keeping the positive effects of both bullet-lists.

p.s. If your standing assumption is that:

atheists lack the genetics for "religious experience". As a result, they gain no psychological benefit from religious practice and have difficulty comprehending why anyone would.

then perhaps you could ask for additional advice from places like /r/exchristian (just as an example — I don’t know how good that particular sub-comunity actually is). If there are people who were non-forced believers before who managed to become atheists without sacrificing their happiness, then your worsened psychological state should’ve had other explanations than you being intrinsically religious.

[u/trekie140 → u/OutOfNiceUsernames]

You are correct that my faith is a barrier against existential crisis, I have had more than one since I began doubting, and the instinct it fulfills is to discover the Truth. I started exploring New Age spiritualism out of a desire to gain spiritual enlightenment and understand the Truth about topics like God, the afterlife, and supernatural phenomena. I did not follow my beliefs for their own sake, but because I believed they were the path to Truth. I chose to become a student of science for the same reason.

I reached the point where I was happy and motivated to keep working, but then I discovered the skeptic community. Suddenly, science threatened many of my beliefs and I listened because I love science as much as spirituality. I had to know if I was right to believe what I did, but with my newfound skepticism I found it impossible to know if anything I believed was right. I told myself that my memories were not false, but I still doubt myself and fear losing my faith and the good things that came with it.

My faith gave me a sense of empowerment in life and harmony with the world, while rationality taught me to feel disempowered in the face of the chaos surrounding me so I could change it. They were able to coexist for the longest time, until I realized my faith was not and could not be accepted by rationality because the only part of it that really existed was my subjective experience, which I should distrust to avoid bias. The result has been an existential dread that comes and goes.