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Belief and Disbelief
Belief and Disbelief
Dissuasion-Persuasion
Article
Souran Mardini Ph.D
Our assumption in this essay is: “Man exists in order to choose between belief and disbelief in a creator-cause”.
This presupposition postulates that man has to confront an enigmatic in presence, structure, form, material, origin and finality. Man is forced into being exemplified in a life-cycle in which he undergoes birth, development, aging and death. He has a specific form and a specific structure and a mind to think. He finds himself surviving in precise conditions without which life is impossible.
He realizes his role is limited to an observer in a world that provides every condition for survival.
In all this he plays no role in bringing about the universe neither in his own being.
He is simply forced to exist.
He has no idea where did he come from, what is he doing
In this world and where is he going to.
He is made up of precise systems constituting the totality of his physical, mental, psychological and spiritual (for some) being.
He has no choice in being what he is, neither in choosing his life-cycle nor in choosing the world he is in. No one asks him his opinion, whether he would like to be or not. Nobody gives him a choice in coming into this world, having a certain form and a fixed duration of time. No one asks him whether he would like to go through the process of aging or not. He cannot possibly stop his development or the process of aging. From the first cell to his form of man adult and mature, he simply has to submit himself to the program, whether he likes it or not. Finally, when death comes, he is forced to exit. Nobody asks him whether he would like to stay in this world or not. No one asks him whether he would like to die or not.
He seems to have a programmed destiny without the least role or choice in his existence.
He has no guarantee of security for his life or for his death.
What is even more astonishing, he does not have the least idea of who he is. A being among other beings (two million living species); a dimension of matter in time. Neither matter nor time is identified scientifically or otherwise. He is made up, like every other object-phenomenon of atoms, neutrons, protons, quarks, strings and the chain might be endless. These elements are put together to form every object constituting the universe.
He finds himself constantly confronting the universe where he has to live. He finds himself on a planet where conditions of survival are fully provided for him, air, soil, water, atmospheric pressure, the sun, food. He is but one manifestations of life. He discovers his relatively short existence (estimated at 8-9 millions of years) compared to the age of the universe (estimated at 13.3-20 billion light years)
Confronting the universe an inevitable constant obligation where man has no choice but to survive, discovery and knowing. Endowed with the mind (a mysterious organ mad up of 80-120 billion neurons) in which man has no role in bringing about, nor in its development nor in its form, structure and function. Facing the universe he confronts an unfathomable enigma of one hundred billion galaxies and one hundred billion stars in each galaxy. He has no idea of the origin neither of the universe nor in his own origin, neither in his presence nor in his destination.
Facing such an already finished work, and in order to explain it, emerges the idea of a creator-cause, or many.
If order and organization in the universe are admitted then man demands where do these come from? And who has the commanding control?
The presence of the universe and life impose the question of causality and creation as well as planning and order. How did the universe come about, in such an infinite precision and infinite features? If matter is composing the universe (whether solid, or energy, white or black) then what is matter?
Where did matter come from and how did it come about in its present shape? Why should man exist and what for he has confront the universe? It is very difficult to tell, if not impossible, at the present time. Is there a creating force? Or is the universe eternal, repetitive, or parallel? Is everything brought about by hazard and chaos, as so many persons think? If so, then it must be a very intelligent and creative hazard and chaotic force that are in command.
Lack of any proof, evidence, reference, index or even a solid argument for the presence of such a creator-programmer, man is faced with an unfathomable dilemma.
He finds himself, with all his ability to discover and to know, unable to answer the question and unable to find evidence for his convictions.
Confrontation between man and the universe leads to no evidence, none whatsoever, for a presumed programmer-creator. This sterility of thought forces him to coils back to his faculty of belief.
Lack of proof, or even any solid argument, man is obliged to resort to his personal convictions. Personal convictions are not better than any conjectural thinking. No scientific knowledge advances any evidence for such a creator-cause. Neither religion nor metaphysical thought or experience can provide for such evidence. Man remains standing in front the wall of the unknown. Like death and the limit of matter (the Wall of Max Planck), no one has any accessibility behind the wall.
At this very cross roads, where man is forced to recoil upon his faculty of belief, lack of proof for or against such causality, that man enters into the dilemma of conjecture. If any evidence could be produced either way the mankind would definitely belief or disbelief. But it is not so easy for evidence cannot be established.
At this point man is torn in between by the ‘fors and cons’.
Should he belief or disbelief in such a causality, or finality, whether internal or external, a creator-cause, a God, or not? This is the question.
Lack of evidence for such a presumed causality renders the choice between belief and disbelief inevitable.
It is because of lack of evidence that the choice is subject to persuasive and dissuasive factors that decide the final decision.Persuasive and dissuasive factors become as complex and multiple as there can be humans and thoughts.
Every single thing, object, phenomenon, event or concert of objects and events play a role in the final decision of the individual person to believe or to reject belief.
What is more surprising is that the same phenomena can be used in support for the arguments of both believers and disbelievers alike. Gnostics and agnostics, theists and atheists as use the same argument for their points of view, defending and attacking the other side point of view. The cross-sectional rectangular stone is simply ‘lack of evidence’ for either belief or disbelief.
To attempt such a schematic typology would be an exercise in futility. Nevertheless; the exercise is perhaps worthwhile view the difficulty and importance of the question.
One way to do it we can divide up peoples convictions according to their constituent systems. A human being is a total enigma in which no answer is given yet as to his presence, reason of being, origin and finality. Accepting the multifaceted composition of man we can admit what is commonly known namely, the physical, the psychological, the mental and the spiritual (for some) aspects. We should not forget the moral, instinctive, ethical, para-psychological and aesthetical aspects.
It should be clear that we consider here that man has to make a choice between belief and disbelief and this is inescapable. For, if man abstains to make judgment and refuses to take either decision, like scientists do, he has already committed himself to disbelief. The logic here denotes that ‘disbelief is maintained as long as belief is not admitted.’
An overall typology of factors or ‘forces’ of persuasion and dissuasion for belief and disbelief can be perhaps, in the probability of general reference, reduced to the following experience:
The physical experience, where the individual is exposed to the sensible-perceptible aspect of the encounter between man and the universe (e.g. scientists, organists, mechanicists). Here the individual person does not believe in an extra-being i.e. external finality that is unseen and not subject to empiricism. Here the individual judgment decides to reject the idea of the existence of such a hypothesis.
But the argument of the sensible-perceptible is two edged weapon. The fact that we do not see or empirically establish evidence for such a hypothesis does not at all prove that it des not exist. In fact, we can argue to the contrary and present ‘what is’ as an argument for the necessity of a creator-programmer. The fact that the universe exists indicates such a conclusion, but this remains purely hypothetical,
The mental experience, where the individual is exposed to the perceptible, examines it and renders it to the intelligible. Here the individual confronts the object, or phenomenon, on an intellectual reasoning level. By examining through reason the presence of form and structure, the aspect of the ‘how’ is analyzed to conclude.
The impact of this reasoning results in confronting the same question of explanation and lack of evidence. The individual is forced by the nature of confrontation itself to face the enigma and ultimately face belief and disbelief.
The moral experience motivates the individual to take either side (Kant necessitates a God by moral need while Nietzsche rejects God denying any morality).
The spiritual experience. Here the spiritualist acknowledges finality while the non-spiritualist organicist rejects such finality and is contended with the atomistic-mechanicist-organic explanation.
The aesthetic experience where the individual realizes a state of aesthetical response of admiration leading to acknowledgement of a creator. The same phenomenon (a rose, a landscape) may produce in another individual a sense of admiration but does not lead him by necessity to believe in a creator.
A meditative state where the individual is an inseparable totality of these experiences can be experienced giving the confrontation between man and phenomenon a direct seizure of its presence and meaning, but always allowing the individual to choose between belief and disbelief. Buddhists for example use this ‘wholeness’ of man to meditate but in the final analysis reject the idea of the existence of a God. Other meditative persons like mystics, ascetics and Sufis acknowledge the existence of a God through meditation.
Then, life itself with its vicissitudes and opposite paradoxes: change, insecurity, good and bad, life and death, confronting all phenomena, offers man in his life journey to react favorably or unfavorably towards the idea of God.
It is worthwhile mentioning that if statistics are to be held half of world population can be classified as disbelievers and the other half nearly can be classified in the opposite category of believers.
Although influences of persuasion and dissuasion can be collective as in religious, ideological, political or social communities, the fact remains that the individual person, in all these communities, has always the freedom of choice and the will of arbitration between belief and disbelief.
The individual is subject during his life to infinite forces of persuasion and dissuasion, but the fact remains that he, or she, must take the final decision of either belief or disbelief in a creator-cause before death strikes.
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