You may be surprised to hear how many beliefs you actually have. It could be in the millions, and maybe even much more than that. It’s true. You have a great deal many more beliefs than you realize. If this comes as a surprise, the explanation may be quite simple. People sometimes use the word belief to refer to an important conviction, as in these sentences:
They share the belief that stealing is wrong.
She holds the belief that there is a God.
It is his firm belief that democracy is the best form of government.
You have many important beliefs. But you also hold lots of fairly trivial beliefs as well. For example, you certainly believe that 1 is less than 2, that 2 is less than 3, and so on. You believe you are reading right now. You likely believe that m, n, o, and p are consecutive letters in the English alphabet. You likely even believe that the planet Mercury is not made of cheese, although you’ve probably never even thought of that possibility. But if asked, you’d know exactly what you believe about it. None of these beliefs are convictions that are crucial for the overall living of your life, but they are nonetheless beliefs. Of course, you also believe that you know these things, and lots more. Some beliefs fall short of knowledge; others count as examples of it. For more on the relationship between belief and knowledge, see the section “The complete definition of knowledge,” later in this chapter.
There are two sides to belief: a subjective side and an objective component. The subjective side is just the mental state of conviction, what’s in your mind, however unconsciously at any given time, when you have a view or opinion or even a felt certainty about how things are, or what is true. For example, you could have as one of your subjective mental states a belief that your friend is burning some cookies he put in the oven. You’ve detected the smell of something burning and you remember he put in cookies 30 minutes ago. So your subjective mental state now includes a belief that they’re burning. Imagine that he doesn’t yet have that belief, as a subjective state in his own mind, because he’s outside on the phone and can’t smell what you have detected. You’re in a subjective state of belief that has no counterpart yet in his own mind, until you call him in and he can see the smoke now coming from the oven. The objective component of your belief is the content of what is believed, a claim or representation about reality that philosophers refer to as a proposition. In philosophy, a proposition isn’t a suggestion, a deal, or a request (as in “I’ve got a business proposition for you”), but it’s the content of a statement or a factual representation or claim about the world, or something in it. When you believe the cookies are burning, you believe this proposition to be true: “The cookies are burning.” And that, like many beliefs, motivates you to take action and shout out to your friend as you move toward finding the oven mitts so you can save the baked goods while they still might be edible. Beliefs motivate actions, emotions, and attitudes.
Throughout this chapter and this entire book, whenever you come across phrases like “the belief that there is a God,” or “the belief in an objective moral order,” or “the belief in life after death,” these phrases will typically refer to the objective content, or the proposition believed, rather than the mental state of any particular person. When you and your friend do come to share a belief, it will be the objective belief content or proposition that you both assent to, or accept, or affirm.
The Importance of Belief
It’s crucial at the outset of this deep dive into belief and knowledge to realize that nearly everyone has an enormous number of beliefs about all kinds of things, including matters they’ve never even explicitly thought about. And if Chekov was even remotely right when he said that you are what you believe, then you have good reason to investigate whether you can be comfortable with your most important beliefs. You’d better examine them well and make sure you feel good about having them. Some of these beliefs, you are well aware of having. Others ordinarily may be hidden from view, but a little philosophical investigation can reveal what they are.
Beliefs are important for a number of reasons. Wars are fought over them. Deals are made or broken because of them. People gather together due to important beliefs they have in common. They also separate from each other because of divergent beliefs. It turns out that you will likely chart out your life in every way in accordance with your beliefs.
Many philosophers have analyzed typical human actions as a natural consequence of beliefs interacting with desires, in this simple formula:
Beliefs + Desires = Actions
What you do is a result of what you believe and what you want. If what you want is a consequence of what you believe to be good or pleasurable, then belief is indeed the ultimate wellspring of action. Having the right beliefs is then not just a matter of intellectual importance, but it’s of the utmost practical value as well.
And yet, here’s the problem. Everyone has some false beliefs. All human beings are fallible in this way and mistaken about some things. To err is human, and all that. No one is completely infallible or immune to getting things wrong. Even a traditional Catholic who thinks the Pope is infallible about matters of faith still realizes he could misplace his socks, believing they’re in the top drawer of his dresser when they’re not.
Smart people can often have false beliefs about even obvious, easy-to-check things like that. Imagine how nearly anyone can get things wrong about more subtle and complex matters.
SUPERSTITION: A TRUE STORY
False beliefs can creep into our minds in all sorts of ways. And they can affect our lives deeply. On September 13, 1996, I was flying across the country on a plane that was nearly empty. Shortly after take-off, I mentioned to the flight attendant how unusual it was to see all the unoccupied seats. She said, “Oh, that often happens on Friday the 13th. People are afraid to fly.” My seatmate, a gentleman I had just met, laughed loudly with a snort and said, “What superstitious nonsense! Unbelievable! Ridiculous!” The left lens of his glasses promptly fell out onto the cabin floor. He looked shocked and said, “Gee, I just lost a lens, and these glasses are less than a year old.” Reaching down to pick up the loose piece of glass, he launched back into his tirade against superstition, saying. “I guess I’m supposed to think that this happened because it’s Friday the 13th! Ha!” As he fumbled to insert the lens back into his frames, he looked up at me with astonishment on his face and said, “I’ll be damned. The frame just totally broke.” Indeed. It might have been enough to make a less philosophical man … superstitious.
