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Fort & Faith; Three Questions

Tunn11

Justified & Ancient
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Nov 23, 2005
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Under the highest tree top in Kent
I was thinking about the role faith plays in our acceptance or otherwise of various phenomena.

I have known two people with a strong Christian faith, a work colleague and the father of a friend. Both were very open about their faith but it was personal to them. They would happily talk about it and about religion but never tried AFAIK to influence any others. I am actually quite envious of those people as their faith helped them through difficult times.

I have met others who would claim, and perhaps do, have faith but which seems to me to be more akin to indoctrination. It is always along the lines of “Here is the truth, you should accept it and not question it.”

So, question one. These examples relate to religious belief but some Fortean incidents bear a similarity to religious experience and I wonder whether there is something in these experiences which somehow triggers this, for want of a better term “faith reaction” in people?

Question two. How much is faith a product of a need for a comforting belief? Religion is a huge comfort to many; a caring deity is a comfort, as is humanity being saved by aliens. Is it reassuring in some way to think that psi powers exist or that large bipedal apes wander the American North West.

Question three. Are we losing the personal experiences that prompt this reaction to the vicarious internet media experience? I’ve known people to have an awed, almost spiritual reaction to, observing Saturn through a small telescope or the transit of Venus. Compared to the images from Hubble Huygens, etc. available on line these observations are hardly spectacular but being personal had a far greater effect. Are these phenomena somehow meant to be experienced personally, not filmed and shared?
 
I was thinking about the role faith plays in our acceptance or otherwise of various phenomena. ..

So, question one. These examples relate to religious belief but some Fortean incidents bear a similarity to religious experience and I wonder whether there is something in these experiences which somehow triggers this, for want of a better term “faith reaction” in people?

Question two. How much is faith a product of a need for a comforting belief? Religion is a huge comfort to many; a caring deity is a comfort, as is humanity being saved by aliens. Is it reassuring in some way to think that psi powers exist or that large bipedal apes wander the American North West. ...

Here's how I'd put it ...

We are "thrown into" the world, and must deal with it wherever, whenever, and however it presents itself within our experience. As we age (and hopefully "mature") we forget the extent to which anything / everything was once wondrous. This means we also forget the amazement - and even outright awe - associated with our first experiences and / or tentative understandings of new things. Awe induces considerable emotional / psychic impact, and the more an instance of experiencing it staggers us the more we feel motivated to somehow absorb it with some form of acceptance, if not understanding.

The human mind - either intrinsically or as a species-specific peculiarity - can't help but try to see "beyond" the immediate novelty and contextualize it with regard to cause(s), implication(s), and prospects. The context we use to explain things becomes an orientation or opinion in which we invest "faith" as we move on.

Satisfying this need for contextualization is attempted via mythologizing in any of a number of ways - e.g., ranging from "primitive" animism and superstition through all-powerful deities' universal plans to abstract "scientific" laws and principles.

The comfort of which you speak starts with the relief you feel once you've convinced yourself you haven't slipped into delusion or dementia. If your ongoing beliefs solidify into something you can cling to in the face of weirdness this comfort becomes a long-lasting aspect of your life. If you share the beliefs with others the prospective comfort extends to your wider social sphere.
 
Any subject that includes religion mixed into the equation is like swimming in water with sharks all around you.

On the mix of forteana and religion is like the Miracle of Fatima or figures of the Mother Mary crying tears.

My opinion, as a child your parents will tell you what religion you are going to believe in and you will probably accept this situation without question.

You will probably grow up and decide for yourself how much of your religion that you want to believe in.

I usually stay away from anything that has the title “ ultra orthodox “ .

I am supposedly just a normal person, but what has haunted me is what caused episodes of paranormal events that came and searched for me.

I am not rich and I don’t think my religion had anything to do with it.

I just don’t know.
 
I was thinking about the role faith plays in our acceptance or otherwise of various phenomena.

I have known two people with a strong Christian faith, a work colleague and the father of a friend. Both were very open about their faith but it was personal to them. They would happily talk about it and about religion but never tried AFAIK to influence any others. I am actually quite envious of those people as their faith helped them through difficult times.

I have met others who would claim, and perhaps do, have faith but which seems to me to be more akin to indoctrination. It is always along the lines of “Here is the truth, you should accept it and not question it.”

So, question one. These examples relate to religious belief but some Fortean incidents bear a similarity to religious experience and I wonder whether there is something in these experiences which somehow triggers this, for want of a better term “faith reaction” in people?

Question two. How much is faith a product of a need for a comforting belief? Religion is a huge comfort to many; a caring deity is a comfort, as is humanity being saved by aliens. Is it reassuring in some way to think that psi powers exist or that large bipedal apes wander the American North West.

Question three. Are we losing the personal experiences that prompt this reaction to the vicarious internet media experience? I’ve known people to have an awed, almost spiritual reaction to, observing Saturn through a small telescope or the transit of Venus. Compared to the images from Hubble Huygens, etc. available on line these observations are hardly spectacular but being personal had a far greater effect. Are these phenomena somehow meant to be experienced personally, not filmed and shared?
Question one: I have seen this faith in people who have not had any experiences, they read books and stories and they need something to believe in, maybe religion has failed them or they never got indoctrinated, so they follow these stories and make them real in their minds.

Question two: I think almost all of faith is based on fear of what people don't want to accept, indoctrination only works using fear. A lot of people walk away from what ever indoctrination their families gave them when they become adults, but if they take the fear with them they have to find a new outlet, a new belief. Some go all the way into insisting they have no belief at all because the betrayal of that indoctrination attempt was too much to bear. Some work their way back to some type of belief, either supernatural, paranormal, alien, but I think we all do need some proof or belief that we are more than the sum of our physical parts.

The internet has not changed this beleif structure, except to maybe increase the number of people who want to beleive anything they read. I remember in the 70's and 80's many believers of all kinds of stuff like big foot, aliens from outer space, fairies, etc. Very few of them had any actual experience, they just read books and wanted to believe.
 
I used to give these things a lot of thought. Now, the only thing I can think to say is that religion seems to be almost unique in being an area of human belief in which we not only admit to basing our beliefs on faith rather than evidence, we're proud of it.

I used to spend a lot of time in online science denial debates, and I began by assuming, and for a long time continued to assume, that they were debates between rational, scientifically literate people and irrational people who believed whatever had become hardwired into their brains. I ended up feeling that even a large proportion of the 'pro-science' side, the debunkers, were operating more from an emotional need to believe in something than an interest in the science. And we all seemed to have more of a drive to win an argument than to get closer to the truth.

My feeling is that the human need for control is powerful, and believing in something gives us that, irrespective of whether what we believe is true. A lovely afterlife is no doubt comforting but, in past beliefs, not all afterlives were very pleasant, and while i could give a rational argument for atheism, I'll admit I'd find it comforting to know, to really believe, that only oblivion awaited me rather than some unknown afterlife. I can't rule out that the terrifying thought there might be something after death and we can't possibly prove what (and we can't) may make a materialistic outlook emotionally more appealing to me, and may make what should be a plausible hypothesis more like a belief. I don't think it matters what one believes, but I'd bet everyone believes in something.
 
I was thinking about the role faith plays in our acceptance or otherwise of various phenomena.

I have known two people with a strong Christian faith, a work colleague and the father of a friend. Both were very open about their faith but it was personal to them. They would happily talk about it and about religion but never tried AFAIK to influence any others. I am actually quite envious of those people as their faith helped them through difficult times.

I have met others who would claim, and perhaps do, have faith but which seems to me to be more akin to indoctrination. It is always along the lines of “Here is the truth, you should accept it and not question it.”

So, question one. These examples relate to religious belief but some Fortean incidents bear a similarity to religious experience and I wonder whether there is something in these experiences which somehow triggers this, for want of a better term “faith reaction” in people?

Question two. How much is faith a product of a need for a comforting belief? Religion is a huge comfort to many; a caring deity is a comfort, as is humanity being saved by aliens. Is it reassuring in some way to think that psi powers exist or that large bipedal apes wander the American North West.

Question three. Are we losing the personal experiences that prompt this reaction to the vicarious internet media experience? I’ve known people to have an awed, almost spiritual reaction to, observing Saturn through a small telescope or the transit of Venus. Compared to the images from Hubble Huygens, etc. available on line these observations are hardly spectacular but being personal had a far greater effect. Are these phenomena somehow meant to be experienced personally, not filmed and shared?
Thoughtful posting! I must add some wisdom from other solid sources: https://military-history.fandom.com/wiki/Victor_Goddard

WWII Officer Victor Goddard studied many cases of non-human contact. “On May 3, 1969, he gave a talk on UFOs at Caxton Hall in London, in which he said: …. ‘The astral world of illusion, which (on psychical evidence) is greatly inhabited by illusion-prone spirits, is well known for its multifarious imaginative activities and exhortations. Seemingly some of its denizens are eager to exemplify principalities and powers. Others pronounce upon morality, spirituality, Deity, etc.’”

John Keel’s “The Mothman Prophecies,” and at least two of his other books, address the “need for deceit,” (Keel’s words), that entities have, as shown by the use of deity names from ancient cultures (especially Greco-Roman) as well as reflecting back upon the human experiencers the very fears and concerns of the current times. For example, the post-war Men in Black and their hostile questioning and telephone “games” reflected Cold War fears and their own seeming concern over nuclear proliferation and the Space Race. :) Thank you for continuing the informed, ongoing dialogue; may we never join any of the occasional groups waiting on hilltops for the Good Space People to take us away or give us all The Answers.
 
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Here's how I'd put it ...

We are "thrown into" the world, and must deal with it wherever, whenever, and however it presents itself within our experience. As we age (and hopefully "mature") we forget the extent to which anything / everything was once wondrous. This means we also forget the amazement - and even outright awe - associated with our first experiences and / or tentative understandings of new things. Awe induces considerable emotional / psychic impact, and the more an instance of experiencing it staggers us the more we feel motivated to somehow absorb it with some form of acceptance, if not understanding.
I think that that is similar to Richard Bach's underlying conviction in a lot of his stories.
 
I go by the theory that personal experience shapes one's perception and acceptance of phenomena. We then try to fit those phenomena into the world using one's spiritual* worldview. Thus, one persons alien is anothers angel ... or demon.
The wonders we witness take this into account - humans like things neatly explained even if that explanation is, well, insufficient.

* I think people can have spiritual views without subscribing to a supernatural religious doctrine.
 
Religion has no real effect on my field, cryptozoology, unless you are creationist nut.
But is there a need to believe? A sort of comfort in the idea that there are still discoveries to be made, that maybe dinosaurs still splosh about somewhere in an African swamp? Are those that believe Nessie to be a plesiosaur relying on faith rather than evidence whereas perhaps those looking for Orang Pendak or British ABCs may have a more rational approach?
 
But is there a need to believe? A sort of comfort in the idea that there are still discoveries to be made, that maybe dinosaurs still splosh about somewhere in an African swamp? Are those that believe Nessie to be a plesiosaur relying on faith rather than evidence whereas perhaps those looking for Orang Pendak or British ABCs may have a more rational approach?
Creationists bring the field into disrepute. Few think there are any non-avian dinosaurs. I'm a cryptozoologist not because i want to believe but because i think these things need proper investigation.
 
One thing I have never understood (and with no disrespect intended to anyone of a religious persuasion), and this is just my personal view, but I have never understood when people say "I am not religious, so I do not believe in the paranormal." I am agnostic, and for me, paranormal events have no bearing on religion at all, and - probably precisely because I am agnostic - I struggle to understand why anyone would think paranormal events do have any link to religion / god.

I believe, for instance, that 'ghosts' are time slips into the past, and that 'aliens' are time slips into the future. I have yet to come across anything paranormal or unexplained that requires me to have a belief in religion to believe (or equally to not believe) in.
 
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