“People don’t believe because they “repeat” something, they believe it because they experience it for themselves. This is completely different to your example of people ‘believing’ in a psychological or sociological theory.”

People indwell in the performance they experience and that commitment is reinforced by like-minded others. Muslims tend to Arabs. Christians in the West tend to follow the basic Christian teachings of the Eleventh Century, yet after that century’s Great Schism people in Russian follow alternative Christian interpretations. Brits tend to be Anglican and the French & Germans Catholic. Why? Before the before advanced religions (before Sumer), people followed animist traditions. People in Japan, especially before the1950s, saw their Emperor as semi-divine. Why? The Ancient Egyptians, believed in Amon-Ra, the Ancient Greeks, Zeus and the Romans, Diana. People tend to follow the beliefs of their own society. Had the Spanish Armada (1588) succeeded, chances are people would have repeated the teachings of the Catholic Church, in England, for centuries thereafter. Perhaps, up until the present. Our Queen might be taking a Coronation Oath that she believes in the Holy Catholic Church and Transubstantiation.

Behaps there is a universal survival instinct (etic) which manifests intelfs in different religions (emic). Emics being culturally reinfornced.

“We are not discussing whether “belief in a personal God” is logical in philosophy, we are discussing whether the existence of widespread belief suggests that God may exist.”

The two are enjoined. To qualify belief by the use of the word “widespread” adds nothing. It is fallacy.

Busy, Must leave it here.

[What if those ten people had a particular motive to make you believe that it was snowing outside, even though it was warm and sunny?]

Thats part of the "pending further enquiry" Day was talking about. Based on the statement, you'd believe them.

[You - and Sells, and many others - have a strong motive for wanting to believe in your religion.]

1. That's rubbish.

2. Even if I granted it as true, many atheists are like minded in the opposite direction, as has been proven uncategorically by many atheists themselves in their writings. There's also a case to be made for cognitive dissonance in explaining atheist beliefs. Explaning away belief using psychoanalysis can work both ways. Either way, it doesnt get us anywhere. Its simply a useless red herring, really.

[Compared with ten people coming indoors? That deserves a gold star for chutzpah.]

The point was the majority, not the number. If ten people walked in the same door, you'd have a pretty good indication from them, of what the weathers like outside.

Actually Trav, the more accurate analogy would be: you asked to ten people who had been locked in that room (with no windows) with you for years what the weather was like outside and they all said that it was snowing, then that suggests that 'pending further investigation' it was snowing outside. Now that sounds silly doesn't it? Since the people who believe in God actually have no way of knowing he actually exists (ie they have never been "outside"), then widespread belief is suggestive of nothing other than the fact that humans tend to believe things, many of them without evidence.

Also, you have no motive for wanting to believe your religion? You mean you looked at all alternatives and found that the religion you follow was the only rational and logical choice over all others without emotional motives factoring in? Really?

It gets even better when you go to the next room and find 15 people who insist that it's hail which is falling and another room where they insist it's fine but windy outside.

Time to have a look outside for yourself and see what's happening.

R0bert

You're beginning to twist yourself into some rather unnatural shapes here, Trav.

First up, you have to admit that the arrival of ten people who all tell you it's snowing, has not altered in any way shape or form the actual weather outside. So to use their statements as evidence for the existence of snow is illogical.

But closer to your analogy, my understanding of their motives will absolutely determine whether I believe them or not. If I know that their fear of skin cancer motivates them to stay indoors, I would not hesitate to disbelieve them.

Similarly, since I know that Christians are highly motivated to believe in their religion, you cannot use their willingness to hold those beliefs, as evidence of the materiality of those beliefs. It only suggests their personal investment in the existence of a God, and in no way suggests that one might actually exist.

You might like to expand on this a little:

>>There's also a case to be made for cognitive dissonance in explaining atheist beliefs<<

Cognitive dissonance, says Wikipedia, is "an uncomfortable feeling caused by holding two contradictory ideas simultaneously."

Which two ideas did you have in mind, and what discomfort are you making a case for?

>>The point was the majority, not the number<<

Once again, you are trying to have it both ways, aren't you? Do you remember this?

>>Four year old girls are a small subset of the population<<

But the vast majority of them believe in fairies.

So is it the majority, or is it the number?

>>Millions [of Hindus, suggesting the existence of Brahma] is, again, not widespread in the same context as the original statement.<<

But if I plonked you down in dwelling in a place of my choosing in India, I could be pretty certain that 100% of the people walking into your room would be Hindu. So - as with your "it's snowing" analogy - you would necessarily be comfortable, would you not, with the suggestion that Brahma exists.

Admit it, Vox Day got it badly wrong.

Just walk away from it.

The way I read the statement, means that any mention of Brahma/Allah/Yahweh is meaningless because the question doesnt specify "which" God.

I note that in the comments section, Vox Day agrees that widespread belief in Allah "suggests" that Allah exists, meaning he has, like you, taken the statement to be applied specifically to specific Gods. But as I said, I don't read it like that. I read it in that "some kind of" personal God exists.

That really makes your Brahma statement meaningless to me, because it's irrelevant, the way I understand the statement. I should've clarified this earlier.

However, if you, like Vox are to read it as specifically referring to a particular God, you'd have to get into how "widespread" you mean it. I would then argue that belief in Allah and Yahweh is widespread, whereas the belief in Brahma is almost exclusively in India, and in much fewer numbers overall, meaning you can't apply "widespread" to that scenario.

Either way, the point remains that, pending further enquiry, without any other factors present, based on the statement alone, the rational response is still agree or strongly agree. Considering that more Christians had that answer than atheists, meaning Christians are more rational and open minded than atheists on the question of God's existence, countering one of Oly's earlier points.