One of the strengths of the blogging medium is the ability, long withheld from authors of all persuasions, of posing a question in print, and actually receiving an answer. Taking advantage of this capability, I am posting a series of (at least to me) thought-provoking questions, in the hopes that anyone reading this blog will offer their perspective. This is post #2 in the series.
Inter-temporal consumption choice under liquidity constraints, binary preference relations, statistically correlated stochastic error terms in systems of identified equations... I've been dealing with the knowledge I spent the last year acquiring. Mostly as a matter of exam preparation, but also as a way of exploring how these experiences have affected who I am.
It makes complete sense that I am thinking and relating to the world more and more from the mindset of an academic economist, as that's what I have been spending my time and energy developing. But it got me wondering about how world-views change. It seems that I don't decide the lens through which I view the world. I can't just choose to not believe what I do, can I? Can I choose to believe that when I place my hand on hot coals, it won't hurt? Can I just choose to believe that Jesus of Nazareth is merely a man? It's part of my world-view.
But if we don't directly choose our beliefs, how do they change? I think it is a matter of what we expose ourselves to. When we expose ourselves to things that are thought provoking, we take our minds into completely new areas and dwell there for a while. When we expose ourselves to things that are emotionally stirring, we allow our hearts to be swept up by joy and pain, those two great interpreters of reality. These two things combine to produce the aching need to respond, the essential element of any true change in world-view.
How do we know what thought provoking and emotionally stirring experiences to expose ourselves to? This conundrum is one of the great tests of wisdom, and here I cannot make claim to any great wisdom.
What experiences do you expose your heart and mind to? How do you choose? Where does the wisdom to decide come from?
HOW I FEEL WHEN I’M TWO WEEKS OUT FROM QUALS
9 years ago
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2 comments:
My question: if you really believe something fundamentally, can it change? I would argue that it cannot, except of course supernaturally.
In my view, that depends entirely on what we mean by "fundamentally." I'm sure we would agree that belief (or un-) in Jesus is quite fundamental, but what about predestination, or miraculous gifts of the Spirit? Where does my belief in gravity fall? Or my belief that human beings act on the strongest desire at the time? There must be some gradation here, and there are certainly important things we believe that can and do change without supernatural intervention (or at the least, with intermediate means at work).
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