Your philosophical world view and your life

[David Colin Gould]

How much does your philosophical world view impact what you do in your life - the decisions that you make, the tasks that you undertake and the relationships you seek out and nurture?

What about struggles against your own world view? In other words, are there times when you do things that are not in accordance with your world view/philosophy?

Now, obviously, world views change over time, sometimes slowly and sometimes quickly. In my case, I have gone from being a Christian who believed in free will and never thought much about what the 'I' was to an atheist who does not believe in free will and thinks very much about where the 'I' comes from and what it is. Interestingly, these large changes in world view have led to only what I would call subtle alterations in behaviour.

Obviously, I no longer go to church and I read Biblical and other religious texts in a different way than when I was a theist.

I also now have a different view of punishment and reward, and for example seek significant prison reform. I also think about - and educate about as a mathematics teacher - science as one of the most powerful force for improving the world and defend it as such, while recognising that because it is powerful it can also - and will also - lead to new dangers.

But in my day-to-day life, I am not that different to how I was when I was a Christian. I go to work, I spend time with my family, I watch television, I argue about politics and religion, and so on. Obviously, I live in the wealthy and relatively free West, and so my discussions on philosophy are not the matter of life and death (personal and professional) that perhaps they are in other parts of the world.

What about you? How does your world view shape your life? What do you do as a _ that you would not do otherwise?

 

[Eudaimonist]

How much does your philosophical world view impact what you do in your life - the decisions that you make, the tasks that you undertake and the relationships you seek out and nurture?

A fair amount.

It's not that I live some kind of non-human life. I still have work or look for work, have friends or seek them out, have romantic relationships or seek them out, have pet animals or seek them out, etc.

However, the standards that I use to judge their value and prioritize them, which even influences how I feel about them, differs from my previous standards. I might prefer to have certain sorts of people over others in my life.

The most noticeable impact is probably in the way that I see politics and vote for political candidates. I prefer libertarian candidates these days, and I support small government, pro-free market, pro-individual rights policies. I would have been more hesitant to support such candidates when I was Catholic. I shudder to think that, if I had stayed a Catholic, I might have felt that I had to support Pope Francis's awful politics.

What about struggles against your own world view? In other words, are there times when you do things that are not in accordance with your world view/philosophy?

Yes, I suppose so. Mainly it's just fear or discomfort getting in the way of doing something that might bring me out of my comfort zone. Some bad habits might be difficult to break as well.


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[juvenissun]

How much does your philosophical world view impact what you do in your life - the decisions that you make, the tasks that you undertake and the relationships you seek out and nurture?

What about struggles against your own world view? In other words, are there times when you do things that are not in accordance with your world view/philosophy?

Everyone does and will continue to do that no matter what the world view is or will be.

You need to ask: why is that?

 

[Eudaimonist]

Everyone does and will continue to do that no matter what the world view is or will be.

You need to ask: why is that?

Mainly what Aristotle called akrasia, or a lack of self control. It's just a natural part of being human.


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[juvenissun]

Mainly what Aristotle called akrasia, or a lack of self control. It's just a natural part of being human.

eudaimonia,

Mark

Identify and describe a problem, then give it a name is one thing. It is the first step.
Identify its origin is another thing. It is the second step.

Are you satisfied to stay at the first step?

 

[quatona]

David, that´s an interesting thread!

I´m not sure how to answer it, for several reasons:
- I can´t even say for sure what of my convictions count as "world view".
- I don´t want to go too far into the details of my convictions.

That said, I find my philosophical convictions to be at odds with every day normal life. When I talk "normally", I say things that I do not really believe in all the time. E.g. I don´t believe that an "I/me/self" exists, and I am convinced that thinking of reality in terms of processes rather than in terms of objects would be more appropriate. However, the way our languages are constructed, they don´t allow to use them this way (at least not without running into contradictions).

Most of the time, I don´t perceive this conflict (or this disconnect between two different ways of thinking) as a serious problem. Cultural concessions, if you will.

 

[David Colin Gould]

David, that´s an interesting thread!

I´m not sure how to answer it, for several reasons:
- I can´t even say for sure what of my convictions count as "world view".
- I don´t want to go too far into the details of my convictions.

That said, I find my philosophical convictions to be at odds with every day normal life. When I talk "normally", I say things that I do not really believe in all the time. E.g. I don´t believe that an "I/me/self" exists, and I am convinced that thinking of reality in terms of processes rather than in terms of objects would be more appropriate. However, the way our languages are constructed, they don´t allow to use them this way (at least not without running into contradictions).

Most of the time, I don´t perceive this conflict (or this disconnect between two different ways of thinking) as a serious problem. Cultural concessions, if you will.

I have the same issue regarding the self. It is convenient to use the language that we have, but it is a barrier to communicating about this (and sometimes, I find, to understanding myself on this issue). I often find myself thinking about this when talking to students or other teachers, but I generally just ignore it and focus on the top-level content of our discussions. One thing that has altered in the last few years is that I have become more interested in animal rights and have become a vegetarian. My thinking on consciousness and the self has been to some extent responsible for this change, although other things fed into that.

 

[David Colin Gould]

A fair amount.

It's not that I live some kind of non-human life. I still have work or look for work, have friends or seek them out, have romantic relationships or seek them out, have pet animals or seek them out, etc.

However, the standards that I use to judge their value and prioritize them, which even influences how I feel about them, differs from my previous standards. I might prefer to have certain sorts of people over others in my life.

The most noticeable impact is probably in the way that I see politics and vote for political candidates. I prefer libertarian candidates these days, and I support small government, pro-free market, pro-individual rights policies. I would have been more hesitant to support such candidates when I was Catholic. I shudder to think that, if I had stayed a Catholic, I might have felt that I had to support Pope Francis's awful politics.

Politics is something where it has affected my decision-making. However, perhaps not to such a large extent, as I have always been a bit of a leftie. Keeping religious and conspiracy thinking at bay is one of my main efforts, and that influences who I vote for a lot.

Yes, I suppose so. Mainly it's just fear or discomfort getting in the way of doing something that might bring me out of my comfort zone. Some bad habits might be difficult to break as well.


eudaimonia,

Mark

Becoming a vegetarian meant breaking a lot of habits for me. That was hard early on, and I am not a fanatic about it even now, although I am generally successful in avoiding meat.

The principles that I find myself breaking sometimes are to do with free will and blame. I should explain my reasoning a bit more to people, particularly students, but find that I do not want to get sidetracked from what the take away message should be - which might be, for example, 'You stuffed up on this test because you did not study. If you want to do better next time, study!' I would like to be more nuanced than that, but given the goal ...

Doing things that I consider to be wrong, or at least not helpful, is rarer. For example, I do not normally swear, and try to get students not to. But sometimes a swear word slips out, which is annoying. Obviously I must do worse things than that on occassion, but that is the most common example.

 

[David Colin Gould]

Everyone does and will continue to do that no matter what the world view is or will be.

You need to ask: why is that?

Because humans have conflicting desires. You do not need supernatural forces to explain that conflict. Just thinking about short-term and long-term desires should show that. 'I need to study for the test next week. But there is something on YouTube that I want to watch.' Short-term desires will often lose out to long-term ones without discipline or the creation of short-term rewards.

 

[AlexDTX]

It seems your question needs to be addressed on two levels: our conscious world view which is ever changing and our heart world view which changes slowly with experience in time. On my conscious level I have read enough material to believe that cutting back on animal flesh is better for me while increasing plant consumption. However, I still eat meat because of convenience and cravings. I don't like thinking about the death of those poor creatures that I consume. It is a cognitive dissonance that requires mental separation.

I speak as a Christian. I have often said that I get more out of that chicken who gave his life for me as a picture of Christ than I do eating a cracker and grape juice.

And as a Christian my conscious world view changes as I meditate on what the Bible says compared to what actually happens in my life as a believer, and I discover that much of what I am told about Christianity and the Lord is wrong compared to my own real experiences with Him.

Like the other writers in this thread I lean towards Libertarianism and more towards biblical anarchy regarding politics and business as I have come to understand what the human powers that be have done to us in the west. And, sadly, the organization called the church has bought and swallowed much of their manipulation. I am much more interested in the organic Church, which are all believers who have been transformed by God's grace through Jesus Christ, than the pulpiteers looking to make their living off the flock. As Jesus said, they are hirelings who care not for the flock. Only Jesus is the
Good Shepherd (Pastor) all the rest are hirelings. That is not to say that there are not people who are organic pastors. There are many, but they tend not to be in the pulpit but in the congregation. They are truly people who care about others and seek the welfare of others above their own.

This is a very good thread and I have benefited from reading everyone's comments. Thank you.

 

[2PhiloVoid]

Because humans have conflicting desires. You do not need supernatural forces to explain that conflict. Just thinking about short-term and long-term desires should show that. 'I need to study for the test next week. But there is something on YouTube that I want to watch.' Short-term desires will often lose out to long-term ones without discipline or the creation of short-term rewards.

Tell that to the users of Ashley Madison..... Is what they're doing short-term or long-term?

 

[David Colin Gould]

Oops - I meant the other way round! Long-term desires lose out to short-term ones ...

 

[Eudaimonist]

Identify and describe a problem, then give it a name is one thing. It is the first step.
Identify its origin is another thing. It is the second step.

Are you satisfied to stay at the first step?

The origin is evolution. I did say that this is natural to us.

There is no reason why evolution would guarantee that complex brains such as ours would have perfect rational self-control, especially given the way that structures build on prior structures. We have bad backs as well, which is likely due to the recent (in evolutionary time) adaption to standing upright. There is no mystery here.


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[juvenissun]

Because humans have conflicting desires. You do not need supernatural forces to explain that conflict. Just thinking about short-term and long-term desires should show that. 'I need to study for the test next week. But there is something on YouTube that I want to watch.' Short-term desires will often lose out to long-term ones without discipline or the creation of short-term rewards.

Of course. But it is NOT an explanation. But you atheists usually stopped there and satisfied.

WHY do humans have conflicting desires? Why can't we have consistent or conformable desires? Do animals have conflicting desires too?

 

[juvenissun]

The origin is evolution. I did say that this is natural to us.

There is no reason why evolution would guarantee that complex brains such as ours would have perfect rational self-control, especially given the way that structures build on prior structures. We have bad backs as well, which is likely due to the recent (in evolutionary time) adaption to standing upright. There is no mystery here.


eudaimonia,

Mark

So a chimp can tell good from evil?
Don't cheat yourself.

 

[David Colin Gould]

Of course. But it is NOT an explanation. But you atheists usually stopped there and satisfied.

WHY do humans have conflicting desires? Why can't we have consistent or conformable desires? Do animals have conflicting desires too?

Animals other than humans do have conflicting desires. For example, there are the desires for food and for safety, but to get food animals need to take risks. Animal brains do not always make optimal decisions here - their desire for food now overcomes their fear when it should have been the other way around. Or their fear now overcomes their desire for food when they should have grabbed the food that was available.

Humans are imperfect at predicting the consequences of their actions. We are also very bad at probability - in other words, we are bad at estimating risk and reward. And what we experience now has much more weight than the things that we may or may not experience in the future.

Many people will much rather take $100 now than $110 in a week's time, despite that not being rational.

 

[Job8]

How much does your philosophical world view impact what you do in your life - the decisions that you make, the tasks that you undertake and the relationships you seek out and nurture?

A Christian's worldview is determined by Christ and God. That would be mine also. So everything must revolve around the will of God and of Christ, which is primarily the establishment of the Kingdom of God in our hearts and on this earth. All else is vanity.

 

[David Colin Gould]

A Christian's worldview is determined by Christ and God. That would be mine also. So everything must revolve around the will of God and of Christ, which is primarily the establishment of the Kingdom of God in our hearts and on this earth. All else is vanity.

Okay. So how does that affect the decisions that you make in your life? What do you do to help establish this Kingdom of God?

 

[David Colin Gould]

It seems your question needs to be addressed on two levels: our conscious world view which is ever changing and our heart world view which changes slowly with experience in time. On my conscious level I have read enough material to believe that cutting back on animal flesh is better for me while increasing plant consumption. However, I still eat meat because of convenience and cravings. I don't like thinking about the death of those poor creatures that I consume. It is a cognitive dissonance that requires mental separation.

I understand. Cognitive dissonance such as this affects everyone, I think.

I speak as a Christian. I have often said that I get more out of that chicken who gave his life for me as a picture of Christ than I do eating a cracker and grape juice.

And as a Christian my conscious world view changes as I meditate on what the Bible says compared to what actually happens in my life as a believer, and I discover that much of what I am told about Christianity and the Lord is wrong compared to my own real experiences with Him.

I find the changing world view thing to be of great interest, as I have undergone a number of significant changes in my thinking over the years. How do these changes in world view affect the things that you do in your life?

Like the other writers in this thread I lean towards Libertarianism and more towards biblical anarchy regarding politics and business as I have come to understand what the human powers that be have done to us in the west. And, sadly, the organization called the church has bought and swallowed much of their manipulation. I am much more interested in the organic Church, which are all believers who have been transformed by God's grace through Jesus Christ, than the pulpiteers looking to make their living off the flock. As Jesus said, they are hirelings who care not for the flock. Only Jesus is the
Good Shepherd (Pastor) all the rest are hirelings. That is not to say that there are not people who are organic pastors. There are many, but they tend not to be in the pulpit but in the congregation. They are truly people who care about others and seek the welfare of others above their own.

This is a very good thread and I have benefited from reading everyone's comments. Thank you.

I imagine that you seek out people who fit your picture of how the organic Church should think. In terms of putting the welfare of others above your own, do you take actions based on that philosophical position?

 

[quatona]

Of course. But it is NOT an explanation. But you atheists usually stopped there and satisfied.

...and your theistic explanation is?

WHY do humans have conflicting desires?

Basically, because situations and conditions change.

Why can't we have consistent or conformable desires?

Like which one?

Do animals have conflicting desires too?

Non-human animals? Sure looks like they do.