How does one distinguish a 'belief' from a delusion?

[Mudinyeri]

Delusions are a subset of beliefs. How, then, can they be differentiated?

 

[FrumiousBandersnatch]

In order for all to be free from delusion there would have to be an objective truth that we can all agree is true and correct.

There's no need to explicitly state it - the objective truth is that the delusion is false - that's what 'delusion' means. You don't have to explicitly replace the delusion with another belief, you just stop believing it.

If you must have it expressed in terms of another belief, then it would be replaced with the belief that the delusion is false. For example, "I used to have the delusion that there were secret messages in car registration plates; since my successful treatment, I now believe that is not the case." [an old friend of mine did actually suffer this delusion].

 

[Chriliman]

There's no need to explicitly state it - the objective truth is that the delusion is false - that's what 'delusion' means. You don't have to explicitly replace the delusion with another belief, you just stop believing it.

An objective source of what's actually true has to effect the subject who is deluded, otherwise they'll remain deluded. One cannot just stop believing false things, there needs to be an objective source of truth that causes the correction.

If you must have it expressed in terms of another belief, then it would be replaced with the belief that the delusion is false. For example, "I used to have the delusion that there were secret messages in car registration plates; since my successful treatment, I now believe that is not the case." [an old friend of mine did actually suffer this delusion].

The objective source of correction was whoever helped him get treatment or whoever administered the treatment, otherwise he would have stayed deluded.

 

[FrumiousBandersnatch]

An objective source of what's actually true has to effect the subject who is deluded, otherwise they'll remain deluded. One cannot just stop believing false things, there needs to be an objective source of truth that causes the correction.

It depends on the delusion and how it came about. There are delusions due to ignorance of demonstrable matters of fact can be shown false by demonstration of the facts (objective truth). There are some delusions that cannot be demonstrably falsified (e.g. Russell's Teapot) but only rationally argued, and there are some deluded who are refractory to rational argument and/or demonstrated matters of fact.

The objective source of correction was whoever helped him get treatment or whoever administered the treatment, otherwise he would have stayed deluded.

There was an objective source of correction to his brain function (an anti-psychotic, not itself an objective source of truth) that enabled him to realise the falsity of his delusion for himself. This realisation would also apply to a success of rational argument (however rare!).

 

[Abraxos]

@SteveB28

I'm not trying to be condescending, but I already stated that we are theistic by default, not atheistic, and there is evidence and logic to back this up. So with that in mind, it would appear that your own perspective on things is a delusion. Consider, you believe you came from a fish, or a worm; with that reasoning what makes you think that your brain would be precise in making philosophical perceptions, or any moral judgements at all? Your brain is just a byproduct of sludge that turned into a fish brain, etc. Even Darwin himself touches on this,

"With me the horrid doubt always arises whether the convictions of man's mind which has been developed from the mind of the lower animals, are of any value or at all trustworthy."

If atheism be true that there is no God, then there is no perception of right and wrong. Why would your perception on delusion be more valid then the next persons perception on delusion? In an atheistic worldview, there are no absolutes, no rights and no wrongs, no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but pitiless indifference.
"If a person doesn't think there is a God to be accountable to, then whats the point of trying to modify your behavior to keep it within acceptable ranges?" ~ Jeffrey Dahmer. A serial killer, cannibal, atheist.

Why would his "reality" be less valid than yours?

 

[HitchSlap]

@SteveB28

I'm not trying to be condescending, but I already stated that we are theistic by default, not atheistic, and there is evidence and logic to back this up. So with that in mind, it would appear that your own perspective on things is a delusion. Consider, you believe you came from a fish, or a worm; with that reasoning what makes you think that your brain would be precise in making philosophical perceptions, or any moral judgements at all? Your brain is just a byproduct of sludge that turned into a fish brain, etc. Even Darwin himself touches on this,

"With me the horrid doubt always arises whether the convictions of man's mind which has been developed from the mind of the lower animals, are of any value or at all trustworthy."

If atheism be true that there is no God, then there is no perception of right and wrong. Why would your perception on delusion be more valid then the next persons perception on delusion? In an atheistic worldview, there are no absolutes, no rights and no wrongs, no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but pitiless indifference.
"If a person doesn't think there is a God to be accountable to, then whats the point of trying to modify your behavior to keep it within acceptable ranges?" ~ Jeffrey Dahmer. A serial killer, cannibal, atheist.

Why would his "reality" be less valid than yours?

Oh good lord, quit trolling already.

 

[SteveB28]

by testing the "evidence" against the bible and what evidence the bible says will be there.

To what evidence and what tests are you referring? You do realise that the Muslim and the Hindu would make similar claims about their holy books? How do you know that you are believing in accordance with reality, while they are obviously incorrect?

If the Bible which claims to be the very word of God is not the authority for that God, then we are using some other authority for some other god.

I don't see how any of that follows. It is entirely possible that ALL the claims made in ALL holy books about ALL gods are incorrect.

The only right answer to the question is based on what Scripture tells us the fruit of the Spirit, the guarantee of our salvation, really is. Unfortunately most of the modern day church fail to teach what scripture does say thus even many who show the evidence don't realize they are.

Again, this sounds like very introspective, personal analysis. How would you know that it reflects reality and is not simply a concoction of the mind?

 

[SteveB28]

Of course, I think we all need help in some way.

Good.

In order for all to be free from delusion there would have to be an objective truth that we can all agree is true and correct. What is it?

I don't accept your premise. To be free from delusion, one simply needs to hold beliefs that closely comport with reality. For example, data from the real world informs us that our planet is ancient, that ghosts do not exist, that living things appear to have common ancestors, that dead things stay dead, that consciousness is a cerebral function that ceases upon death, that intercessory prayer has no unique positive effect, and so on.

Now, each of those indications from the real world may, in fact, be incorrect. There may be ghosts, the earth may only be very young, dead things may resurrect, etc. BUT, the evidence we have to hand suggests otherwise and no conflicting evidence has ever been produced that can withstand scrutiny.

Moreover, even if we could demonstrate that ghosts do sometimes exist, for example, how would an individual person undergoing such an experience be able to know that they had seen a 'real' ghost and not been deluded, given that they are unable to draw upon any external evidence to support their belief?

Do you think I'm delusional because I believe in God? If so, what objective truth will help me? If you have no objective truth to help me, then what makes you conclude that I'm delusional for believing in God, if indeed that is what you think?

I made no such claim - you appear overly defensive. I merely ask the question, how would you know?

 

[SteveB28]

@SteveB28

I'm not trying to be condescending, but I already stated that we are theistic by default, not atheistic, and there is evidence and logic to back this up. So with that in mind, it would appear that your own perspective on things is a delusion. Consider, you believe you came from a fish, or a worm; with that reasoning what makes you think that your brain would be precise in making philosophical perceptions, or any moral judgements at all? Your brain is just a byproduct of sludge that turned into a fish brain, etc. Even Darwin himself touches on this,

"With me the horrid doubt always arises whether the convictions of man's mind which has been developed from the mind of the lower animals, are of any value or at all trustworthy."

If atheism be true that there is no God, then there is no perception of right and wrong. Why would your perception on delusion be more valid then the next persons perception on delusion? In an atheistic worldview, there are no absolutes, no rights and no wrongs, no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but pitiless indifference.
"If a person doesn't think there is a God to be accountable to, then whats the point of trying to modify your behavior to keep it within acceptable ranges?" ~ Jeffrey Dahmer. A serial killer, cannibal, atheist.

Why would his "reality" be less valid than yours?

Good grief - I think that condescension is the least of your troubles! Misattributions of quotations, the erection of strawmen, false accusation, poor knowledge of atheism and evolution.....and to top it off, you fail to address the question!

I wouldn't be concerned with not trying to be condescending......I'd be focusing on trying to get your arguments straight.

 

[SteveB28]

Delusions are a subset of beliefs. How, then, can they be differentiated?

By following my definition at the outset. I am classifying delusions as those beliefs which fail to comport with the evidence from the real world. That's the differentiation.

 

[Abraxos]

Good grief - I think that condescension is the least of your troubles! Misattributions of quotations, the erection of strawmen, false accusation, poor knowledge of atheism and evolution.....and to top it off, you fail to address the question!

I wouldn't be concerned with not trying to be condescending......I'd be focusing on trying to get your arguments straight.

The point I made was that your premise isn't of any value because you assert an atheistic perspective that isn't tangible with reality; therefore holds no weight. This is what atheism entails, it hijacks components of the theistic view on absolutes, then flip-flops around proclaiming a position of validation when they have none. Bertrand Russell acknowledges this by calling himself an atheist on the streets for people to see, but defers to himself as an agnostic when confronted by Christian philosophers. It's nothing personal, it's just how reason and logic goes, and I don't see why atheists have or are able to have any merit when it comes to philosophical questions. Atheism is as fragile as a snowflake, which would explain the defensive mechanisms in place to protect a belief that is in decline.

Though, I suppose atheism do have some talents...
http://www.conservapedia.com/Essay:_Proof_and_evidence_that_atheism_is_true

 

[SteveB28]

The point I made was that your premise isn't of any value because you assert an atheistic perspective that isn't tangible with reality; therefore holds no weight. This is what atheism entails, it hijacks components of the theistic view on absolutes, then flip-flops around proclaiming a position of validation when they have none. Bertrand Russell acknowledges this by calling himself an atheist on the streets for people to see, but defers to himself as an agnostic when confronted by Christian philosophers. It's nothing personal, it's just how reason and logic goes, and I don't see why atheists have or are able to have any merit when it comes to philosophical questions. Atheism is as fragile as a snowflake, which would explain the defensive mechanisms in place to protect a belief that is in decline.

Though, I suppose atheism do have some talents...
http://www.conservapedia.com/Essay:_Proof_and_evidence_that_atheism_is_true

If you persist in being unwilling to address the question at hand, please leave this discussion.

 

[HitchSlap]

The point I made was that your premise isn't of any value because you assert an atheistic perspective that isn't tangible with reality; therefore holds no weight. This is what atheism entails, it hijacks components of the theistic view on absolutes, then flip-flops around proclaiming a position of validation when they have none. Bertrand Russell acknowledges this by calling himself an atheist on the streets for people to see, but defers to himself as an agnostic when confronted by Christian philosophers. It's nothing personal, it's just how reason and logic goes, and I don't see why atheists have or are able to have any merit when it comes to philosophical questions. Atheism is as fragile as a snowflake, which would explain the defensive mechanisms in place to protect a belief that is in decline.

Though, I suppose atheism do have some talents...
http://www.conservapedia.com/Essay:_Proof_and_evidence_that_atheism_is_true

Where did you copy pasta this from?

 

[DogmaHunter]

Oh hi.

It's rather simple really, God had embedded eternity into our hearts (Ecclesiastes 3:11), which is why we tend to think we have a sense of a reality beyond our subjective experience. Human beings are theistic by default, not atheistic. The brain reacts to man-made creations the same way as to natural creations, in other words we exercise the abstract principle of probability way more than any animal ever could, with the properly basic assumption that immaterial minds dictate material objects.

"immaterial minds"?

How did you conclude that the "mind" is immaterial?
Last time I checked, brains are rather physical...

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/rel...re-born-believers-in-God-academic-claims.html

Pretty much all animals are prone to superstition.

So it's not a call to blind leaps of faith. It's a call to very sensible and intelligible small steps which leads to faith. Faith can be strengthened the more we learn and experience, which most adhere to.

Clearly, faith can also be heavily negatively impacted the more we learn and experience, since at times we learn now things that simply invalidate previously held beliefs and show them to be incorrect.

This is, for example, why men of the north no longer worship a thunder-creating god called Thor.

You can't have true faith through a false ambition. That is indeed where blind faith leaps of blind faith comes from, where initially delusion receives it's roots.

You don't seem to understand the point being made.

That point is simply this:
Beliefs can be wrong. The question is, how would you find out that your beliefs are wrong. The answer to that question is evidence, falsifiability, testing, etc.

But therein lies the problem... religious "faith" isn't achieved through evidence, falsifiability, testing, etc.... So how can such "faith" be shown to be wrong then?
Not through evidence etc, because a believer always has a get-out-of-fail freecard...
There's lots of pathways to avoid the obvious...

The most common one is a reïnterpretation of scriptures. Usually followed by "see, so our scripture was saying this all along, we just didn't understand it yet".

And if all else fails, there's still the good ol' "god works in mysterious ways".



EDIT: I just noticed that I misspelled "get-out-of-Jail freecard..."... but I'm not gonna correct it, because the misspelling turned out to be quite hilariously ironic

 

[DogmaHunter]

This assumes there is objective truth that can free us from delusion. Do you know what that objective truth is? If not, shouldn't it be your top priority to figure it out in order to help others in their delusions?

Things are a certain way. Reality is what it is - no matter if our beliefs match it or not.

Your beliefs either reflect reality or they don't.

The question being asked here is, if they don't match reality, how would you find out?

 

[DogmaHunter]

An objective source of what's actually true has to effect the subject who is deluded, otherwise they'll remain deluded. One cannot just stop believing false things, there needs to be an objective source of truth that causes the correction.

That is ridiculously false and easily shown to be so.
You don't need an "alternative belief" in order to let go of a false belief.

For example... let's say I have an air-sealed room to which I only have access through robot arms. With those, I can light a match in the room.
I could have a belief that there is oxygen in the room.

I could then test that belief by trying to light a fire. As it turns out, it doesn't work. Fire will not burn. I can now confidently state that the belief that there was oxygen present is now falsified. Without having an "alternative" present to know which gasses are present in the room.

Another example....
Suppose I have a glass of water. I have this colorless chemical that would make the water turn blue if mineral X is present in said water. I have a belief that mineral X is in the water. I add the chemical. Nothing happens.

My belief of mineral X being present is now falsified. So I stop believing that X is present.

Do I now know which minerals ARE present?

Nope. I just know that if any are present, X won't be one of them.

My belief was shown wrong, and I wasn't given an alternative belief.

 

[DogmaHunter]

The point I made was that your premise isn't of any value because you assert an atheistic perspective that isn't tangible with reality; therefore holds no weight. This is what atheism entails, it hijacks components of the theistic view on absolutes, then flip-flops around proclaiming a position of validation when they have none. Bertrand Russell acknowledges this by calling himself an atheist on the streets for people to see, but defers to himself as an agnostic when confronted by Christian philosophers.

I suggest your first learn that "agnostic" and "atheism" are two different answers to two different questions, one about knowledge and the other about belief, and that they aren't - by any means - mutually exclusive, before you start making points that make absolutely no sense.

It's nothing personal, it's just how reason and logic goes, and I don't see why atheists have or are able to have any merit when it comes to philosophical questions. Atheism is as fragile as a snowflake, which would explain the defensive mechanisms in place to protect a belief that is in decline.

Atheism is not a belief. It's the exact opposite. And it deals with only a single issue.

Your entire argument rests on a strawman.

 

[OldWiseGuy]

Most of us here know objective truth. It's you who seem hopelessly confused by the nature of reality.

A good test for objective truth is the value it brings to the table. That takes it out of the material realm into the spiritual realm. One could say that leaving one's shopping cart sideways in the 'corral' provides more work for the store employees. Others believe that placing it neatly frees up their time for more productive tasks.

 

[Chriliman]

That is ridiculously false and easily shown to be so.
You don't need an "alternative belief" in order to let go of a false belief.

For example... let's say I have an air-sealed room to which I only have access through robot arms. With those, I can light a match in the room.
I could have a belief that there is oxygen in the room.

I could then test that belief by trying to light a fire. As it turns out, it doesn't work. Fire will not burn. I can now confidently state that the belief that there was oxygen present is now falsified. Without having an "alternative" present to know which gasses are present in the room.

Another example....
Suppose I have a glass of water. I have this colorless chemical that would make the water turn blue if mineral X is present in said water. I have a belief that mineral X is in the water. I add the chemical. Nothing happens.

My belief of mineral X being present is now falsified. So I stop believing that X is present.

Do I now know which minerals ARE present?

Nope. I just know that if any are present, X won't be one of them.

My belief was shown wrong, and I wasn't given an alternative belief.

You were given a new belief, the new belief is that you were wrong in your previous belief.

 

[razzelflabben]

To what evidence and what tests are you referring? You do realise that the Muslim and the Hindu would make similar claims about their holy books? How do you know that you are believing in accordance with reality, while they are obviously incorrect?

I would totally expect them to say the same thing about their books and I would absolutely agree. The problem isn't with the claim but with the inconsistency of many that accept let's say...the Quaran as the authority on Allah but refuse to accept the Bible as the authority on God.

What evidence...scripture tells us that the evidence that God has given us as to our salvation is the HS. The evidence of that HS is a changed life. It is a desire and goal of righteousness, it is Love, Joy, Peace, etc. Galatians 5, the fruit of the Spirit for those that might want the full list. When these things are present and in the form that the Bible tells us is consistent with the HS, we have tangible evidence of our salvation. It may not be measurable as in X number of inches or Y ounces, but it is measurable in light of who we were before and who society is at large. Without that evidence, we simply can't be sure if it is your religious belief or your salvation.

How do you know that you are believing in accordance with reality, while they are obviously incorrect? Test. The Bible tells us to test the spirits, to test things, not just accept them because it is what you were taught. I have been a believer for almost 50 years now. Over that 50 years I have taken very serious the admonition of the Bible to test and interesting enough, I have yet to find one claim that is actually made in the bible to be false. Some haven't yet happened, some we can't be sure, but of all those left, I haven't come across one false one yet. But this also goes back to the claim that the Bible is the authoritative word of God. You see, this is where many people get all crazy. They listen to teachers of God tell them what the Bible says and never look at it themselves. Just had a discussion about this yesterday over the topic of overcoming. The Bible tells us that in Christ we are more than overcomers (one way to measure) yet when I brought that up to a "christian" that is one who claims belief but lives like an unbeliever, they were upset to even think that anyone (refused to even acknowledge scripture says it) would suggest not allowing our abuse to define us was a good thing much less do able. Yet I know of people who live above their abuse and I am one of those people. Evidence of the Living God of the Bible. Take all that evidence and add it together and you have a very strong case for knowing truth from delusion.

I don't see how any of that follows. It is entirely possible that ALL the claims made in ALL holy books about ALL gods are incorrect.

that would be why we should test them to see.

Again, this sounds like very introspective, personal analysis. How would you know that it reflects reality and is not simply a concoction of the mind?

Because other people see it too...when I first came to Christ, I prayed that if there was truth to be had, people would notice a difference without me even saying anything. Low and behold, without me saying a single word, people started noticing a difference. This is one of many measurable ways to know truth from delusion when it comes to what one believes.