Did you ever find yourself deeply changing your beliefs?

I think we can all agree that we are living in troubled times. I myself think that the world is on the verge of or is undergoing a massive change - alas I do not know into WHAT exactly or even if it's good or bad.

The economic crisis and and seeing its effects on people all over the world, along with a few other events prior to that has made me realize for the first time in my (in retrospect somewhat sheltered, something which I fully blame myself for) life just how dazzlingly complex the world is. I've learned things that perhaps I was too blind or even unwilling to see, namely how much injustice there is in the world. This last point really embarrasses me because I believe that I should have realized this MUCH earlier but the fact that some of the MUCH older people around me are annoyingly naive in that regard (almost to the point of Just-world delusion) make me think I've made some progress.

Anyway, you guys are an interesting bunch so I want to hear your stories: what moments in YOUR life changed your beliefs? Or did said events reinforce them further?

edited 31st Jan '12 3:37:42 PM by Psyclone

It was when I was still a little kid. See. I grew up a hardcore christian in one of the more crazy sects (the 7th day adventists). But as I grew up, I was also a voracious reader and loved science and literature and all that, and over the course of years, I realized the vast majority of what the church espoused didnt just ring false to me..it range as hateful and exclusionary. But I think the momejnt that really killed it for me was the day my parents left church because my mom caught some of the other adults teling one of the kids who had misbehaved that it didnt matter, as long as he tithed generously to the church, he'd go to heaven.

Stuff like that is what shattered my faith and sent me on the road to Deism.

edited 31st Jan '12 2:07:20 PM by Midgetsnowman

I went through a brief period of my life where I was incredibly harsh towards Christians. Largely because of lack of research into the matter and my blocking out the Christians I knew personally. Most of whom I would judge to be decent people. This seemed to be largely caused by my existential crisis I had around then. I was confused and angry and needed something to bitch about and Christianity, which I learned that I didn't quite fit, seemed the perfect target. I didn't fit in it. Certain Christians are homophobic and champion things like Prop 8. Clearly hating them is the right way to go.

I'm not exactly sure when I got over this however save that it happened in high school. Around this time I was also reading heavy amounts of Nietzsche and beginning to research Buddhism. I focused my senior project around the subject, took on a mentor, and began visiting a wat in addition to my readings. I also made another attempt on reading The Bible. In particular Ecclesiastes stuck with me. Other events that may have influenced change could involve my counselors and therapist who I talked about this subject with at length.

By the end of high school I had remained highly critical of religion, but also had a great amount of respect for it and a desire to defend it. While I'm certainly not "FUCK YEAH BUDDHISM IS NEVER WRONG", I complain at length about the Bhikkhuni issue as an example, I generally have a positive view of religion and will defend it. I also wasn't fucking retarded anymore and lacking in research. I'm still hideously underlearned, but eh.

If someone wants to accuse us of eating coconut shells, then that's their business. We know what we're doing. - Achaan Chah

Well, I went from Basic Christian to Atheist, main hit came during the confirmation, we have this camp were we are supposed to learn the Bible(My parents aren't religious, but the camp is more like a social event than brainwashing event now days. Even our priest was gloated into telling his first sexual experience to us and joke about masturbation) I concluded "This is b***shit".

My political views have also moved, from Democratic Capitalist to Social Democrat, also from idealism and trust in peoples good will to "World is fucked and there ain't hope to fix it any time soon. However, we could at least try to leave it in better shape for ur children and not repeat mistakes of our fathers..."

I don't...think I ever did. I was always REALLY stubborn as a kid, so I don't think I ever radically did a 180 or anything.

It makes me convinced I'm going to turn into one of those senile people convinced that all the new values are a scourge upon humanity.

Read my stories!

No. I'm generally a sentimentalist, so if what I feel to be right doesn't match with logic, I change my beliefs only as little as necessary, to resolve the contradiction, but generally continue in the direction that I feel right.

For example I was raised in the same church as Midgetsnowman, but I still believe in God, and I'm still going to the church every saturday, though yeah, the adventist-specific dogma itself is mostly b.s., but the sermons are mostly really moral, and there are quite a few intelligent, educated pastors who can talk about these while avoiding the other b.s. ones that only the crazy old ladies care for, so I guess it's not a particularly bad belief system, and in general, this one pleases me.

I guess some people would call these "conformism", but that's not exactly the case. It's not that I don't care what I believe in, I think about these things a lot, but I always honestly end up close to home.

Eh, not really, it's called realizing the usefulness in what you're learning and knowing how to pick out what is best out of what's essentially a chaotic sea full of imperfect human influence instead of automatically believing everything you're told. And also realizing that you might be wrong and so take adjustments one step at a time. It's essentially the philosopher and thinker's approach to religion, learn from what's been done and make improvements on it yourself as you chase after the ideal that you seek.

The emotions of others can seem like such well guarded mysteries, people 8egin to 8elieve that's how their own emotions should 8e treated.

Penn and Teller fixed me but good on the death penalty. Everything else was pretty gradual.

Hail Martin Septim!

@Ever9: fair enough. I think for me it was more realizing my specific area branches were corrupt moneygrubbers than deciding all of christianity was flawed. Hell, I still have quite a few christian friends. I just dislike when they get all preachy.

edited 31st Jan '12 4:30:00 PM by Midgetsnowman

I used to be rather black and white in my morality. I'd guess that has to do with the media I consumed back then. There were good guys and bad guys, never anything else. When I grew up and became more aware of the world I shifted into moral relativism.

I also used to be religious, sort of. Never anything formal but I did believe in there being "something" out there. Much like my belief in Santa Claus, I've since decided that such an idea is, silly, when all the evidence is considered. Not impossible, mind you, but silly enough to not warrant much belief.

Is using "Julian Assange is a Hillary butt plug" an acceptable signature quote?

I'm too strong of will to be fooled into thinking its all doom and gloom just because people tell me so. Same reason I can't be hypnotized. So the only times I've ever had "eye-openers" like you describe is through epiphany.

I've had three such moments. The first one happened at a time in my life where everything was falling apart. I had told my parents that I had found work when I was actually unemployed and living out of my car, but I was too disappointed in myself to face them and tell them the truth. I also was convinced that everything was going to hell, not just my own personal situation but the planet. And while I was distracted by all of this, I was driving to the next town, hoping to find employment somewhere.

At a stoplight, I noticed a single yellow butterfly fluttering across the intersection, and somehow felt a connection with the creature, like he and I were both in the same situation - both trying to make it through a difficult situation. Then a semi truck pulled through the intersection, and smashed the butterfly on it's windshield. I think I screamed, and I definitely broke down into tears. But when I looked up, the semi truck was gone - and the butterfly was still there, floating along as if nothing had ever happened. And I knew everything was going to be alright. I've always been a little optimistic ever since, and when I find myself slipping back into pessimism, I remember that butterfly.

The second time, I was out in Africa, and we were sitting around watching all of these water buffalo stampeding past us. Then it hit me - for every buffalo, there must be thousands of pounds of plant matter. I realized that plants weren't objects, they were living, breathing things, just as intricate and complex as any animal. And then I could feel it, the emotion and energy of the planet. It was sort of like how, after taking enough tai chi, one becomes aware of their own chi and how it flows, except I was becoming aware of the chi of the entire world, all flowing around me in its power and splendor. And then, I went back to the city, and lost it. It was like hearing the first few beautiful notes of the greatest song ever written, but then going death before the end. And I think that is what is truly wrong with our society - its that we can no longer hear the chorus of the Earth. And its something that, somehow, I want to show people, to make them understand. Because if people understand this, then we can start over again, build a civilization in tune with this music of life.

The third time this happened, I was watching the anime Planetes, and realized just how lonely outer space truly is. It bothers me, that if you only go two miles up, everything turns to nothingness and cold. No sound. No life. Not even any warmth. Thinking about this made me realize that it wasn't enough to just save the planet - we had to drive back the cold dark nothingness, by spreading life throughout the universe. That it was the duty of intelligent beings such as ourselves to make life bloom on ten thousand worlds and then make it bloom on ten thousand more, until every planet in all of the universe that can have life does, even if said life is no more than a thin film of bacterial crust in the soil.

Wow...

Thought it was Crapsack World, but realized it was Your Mileage May Vary. Still mostly Earn Your Happy Ending.

edited 31st Jan '12 6:00:46 PM by Natasel

The only thing about my religious beliefs that have really changed was the label I attached to it. When I was a kid my mother dragged my younger brother and I to church every Sunday, but we hated it so much it soured us on the experience. The only part that didn't bore me to tears was getting to shake the priest's hand at the end, because we thought he was cool.

As the years went by I cared less and less about religion as I realized that it had no significant impact on my life at all, and once I entered my teen years I started to question everything about it, especially when I really learned about evolution and everything else that could be explained with science, at which point I started to realize that religion was unnecessary. My belief in god was never strong, but I called myself a Christian for a long time just because I was baptized Catholic and didn't really care. But then I learned more about religion and saw it for the hypocritical war-starter that it was, and this magnified when I really stopped to think, "How could anyone be the son of god? The Adam and Eve story has to be crap, because you can't get a population of 7 billion after starting out with only 2, and talking snakes don't exist." Not only that, but people called snakes the devil because of that damn story, and I like snakes.

So I now realize I'm an apatheist, although in hindsight I see that I've always kind of been one.

However, I'm ashamed to say that during my middle-school and early high-school years, I was something of a homophobe who didn't believe homosexuals had any right to get married. Then I started caring about freedom, which I now hold as the absolute most important value in life, and now I'm a firm supporter of gay rights. So in my mind, I guess I performed something of a Heel–Face Turn during my junior year of highschool.

I think the biggest and most abrupt change in my beliefs was when I was twenty-one. Previous to that, I had come to near-complete nihilism as a result of my Deep, Thoughtful Study of Life, the Universe and Everything; short form, I was taught critical thinking at right around the phase I was asking "why?" "why?" "why?" to everything, and then I took that mindset into poorly-taught middle-school philosophy classes.

Anyway, fortunately I had a philosophy textbook when I was twenty-one that got me back on a useful*

track for philosophical development. Ironically, my teacher didn't teach its section on the concept of value, but it's that section that got me thinking. My conclusion was essentially that first principles and value judgments are arational, not irrational; they're simply not subject to deductive analysis, but that doesn't make it wrong to have values. And thus, I discovered my personal variant of Existentialism, though I didn't know the term for a few more years, and it's changed my life fairly little (it solidified me on my current path toward mediocrity, actually).

So if I sound like I'm from outer space sometimes (and don't most of us tropers?) that's part of the reason. ALL HAIL OUR SPACE ROBOT OVERLORDS!

I despise hypocrisy, unless of course it is my own.

I used to have rather noble opinions on what we should do to people that appeared to be in need. That we should help everybody, make sure third world countries and our own homeless folk had food, water, shelter, protection. But a few things changed that and jaded my considerably.

The opinions of many Afghani's I talked to, and the way they behaved towards us often, such as taking any aid we offered without the slightest bit of thanks, and then turning around and shooting at us on the way out and seeing the barbaric ways of the Taliban. Afghanistan is the only third world country I've been to, but my perception of what we should do to help developing countries was extremely jaded afterwards, and is to this day. Sink or swim, I still believe. The Afghans are victims, not really victims of us, but victims of people like Al Qaeda, the Taliban, and ambitious local Warlords, but I don't really have any of the bright ideals towards reconstruction that I once did.

Then on our own homeless folk, I encounter them regularly at my civilian job pulling security. I used to do them favors despite bending the rules and try to chat with them and get to know them. But every time they were doing something they shouldn't, I'd tell them to stop and they'd give me every assurance in the world that they would, only to go back to their behavior as soon as I turn my back. If there's anything that I absolutely loathe, it's me having to catch you doing something I just told you not to do. Now I regularly get the police involved and don't give second chances, I just have them arrested for trespassing and tell them they aren't welcome on the property anymore.

I just kind of look out for me and my own now. Every group I've ever been sympathetic to always had a darker side that disgusted me, and I just don't have the emotional ability to invest in kindness very often anymore, because the type of people who actually appreciate it are so few.

As far as religion/church goes I was raised Roman Catholic, and confirmed when I was 13-14, but had fallen out with church in general by my late teens. Used to be that I enjoyed church, visiting with people, singing in the choir, etc. but when time came for confirmation... well, let's just say that the group I was with was made out of hate and spite. Even looking back after fifteen years, I can't think of any excuse for these kids' behaviors. They were just rotten little shits, and they were never reprimanded for the pranks and bullying they pulled on me, even though it was in plain sight of the priests, nuns, and various youth leaders. That began my falling out with organized religion, and every little thing after that pushed me farther and farther into complete abandonment. The final straw that had me dropping out of the choir and pretty much refusing to go again (unless my Mom pulled out the doe eyes, and only because I love her) was when the sermon included the line "we must stamp out individuality in our children so they can better worship God". Good-bye, church. I won't let the doors hit my ass on the way out. I wouldn't go so far as to say I'm atheist, but I almost never give religion a thought in my day-to-day life.

Only other thing I can think of was finally really getting how small the earth was when looking at the Hubble Deeps Space pictures. I think I had a little BSOD.

i. hear. a. sound.

...

Edited by fanty on Sep 28th 2019 at 2:07:57 PM

My family doesn't go to church but consider themselves christians (more or less)

The rest of my family is very religious and tried to make me religious.

For a long while I was just a weak christian.

But one day I spoke to my family about other religions and such and their beliefs that anyone not in their fan club would suffer in hell for eternity basically made me agnostic, not to mention no evidence to support anything they believed in... I have a problem with faith in general it seems.

However the thought of death and hereafter scares the living shit out of me.

Cessation of Existence scares the living shit out of me. Completely.

edited 1st Feb '12 10:35:54 AM by Thorn14

The doctrine of hell and a loving god are pretty difficult to reconcile.

In attempting to reconcile these things, I came to a moral dilemma even more difficult: is it actually possible to deserve eternal punishment? The only reasonable answer, I think, is no. (If you are tempted to argue, try to remember this is eternity here. Somewhere millions years down the line you've gotta have suffered enough.)

And if no one can actually deserve it, then no one can be trusted with the power to mete it out. This evolved into a generalized belief that the capacity for abuse of power beyond a certain threshold (one far from met by any Earthly institution) is too great. If such beings exist, then it is a moral duty to oppose and if possible destroy them. No one, no matter how righteous or wise, may be trusted with omnipotence.

And that's how I ended up atheist. At least until somebody proves the existence of a divine being, in which case it's time to break out the nukes and give it the old college try.

Nous restons ici.

My beliefs tend to change gradually, not to make discrete steps.

When I was in Middle School, I was a tiny elitist idiot — I basically despised the vast majority of humankind, because they did not have my Vast and Superior Intellect. I actively refused interacting with people who I did not believe were sufficiently intelligent for my tastes, and I was sort of embarrassed that my father (who, by the way, is definitely the most intelligent person I know) was a middle school dropout.

Yeah, if I had a time machine, the first thing I would do would be to go back fifteen years or so and give myself the spanking of a lifetime.

But I cannot tell of a single moment in which my beliefs flipped and I had "oh, wait, I am a bloody moron" kind of realization. It happened gradually.

edited 1st Feb '12 11:31:47 AM by Carciofus

But they seem to know where they are going, the ones who walk away from Omelas.

Well, in my early teens I used to be the near only theist/deist among a vast majority of apatheists, but this changed 180° in my late teens, when I became a very convinced atheist. Blame Carl Sagan

Apart from that, yeah, it's been mostly gradual changes for me, too. On the abortion debate I've shifted gradually from "moderately pro-life but still ending up siding with the pro-choicers most the time in debates because my god are most pro-lifers awful" to, well, "pro-choice". I've also gone back and forth on the issue of gun law and regulations.

Unbent, Unbowed, Unbroken. Unrelated ME1 Fanfic

I used to be fairly agnostic tending towards atheism. Then I had a few experiences which broadly convinced me that the naturalist explanation of the universe is so much horse droppings.

I found myself in a situation where I could believe the opinions of people like Carl Sagan - who are far more expert than I am - or I could go with my own experience. I decided in the end that not going with my own experience would mean I was falling prey to the argument from authority.

Anyway, after a meander through deism and stuff, I ended up becoming an Anglican Christian. Though my default position is still 'rational explanation' (and St. Thomas is my favourite saint) - if you ask me about talking snakes, I'd say that I think it's a metaphor.

It ain't over 'till the ring hits the lava.

When I grew out of god. I refuse to capitalize that. Anyone who does is a fool in my opinion. Religion is the single biggest lie that mankind has told to itself. Born out of a fear of the dark way back when we had just begun to think. Thing is, those who think are dangerous to those who feel and belief is just another word for feel. And those who think must be crushed for the feelers to feel good about themselves. I do not believe in anything that I have no concrete evidence for. Therefore I pretty much do not believe in anything. If you tell me it is raining outside, I will stick my head out of the window to check. If you tell me the sky is blue I will do the same and look. I trust few people living. None of them are politicians of any sort, religious leaders or climate change propogandists. Most of those three categories worship Goebbels. You can tell that by the magnitude of the lies they tell.

I don't think I've ever had any drastic, sudden shifts in my beliefs. They've definitely changed over time, but I can't think of any single moments where I realized that one of my core beliefs was completely wrong. Also, the changes have mostly been refinements, where I realize that I was oversimplifying or failing to account for something, rather than a change in the fundamental assumptions of my worldview.

For example, on the matter of religion, I was raised in a fairly non-observant Jewish family; I assumed for a while that God existed, but I became agnostic shortly after I first gave the matter significant thought. (For a short time, I prefixed thoughts addressed to God with wording along the lines of, "Assuming that God exists and is listening to this...") Later, I decided that the label "atheist" fit my views better.

Similarly, I've had a fairly strong sense of justice since a young age, so I probably implicitly held just-world beliefs when I was younger. However, I gradually lost those views as I learned more about history, politics, and so forth. There wasn't really a single time where I thought, "Wow, it looks like the world really isn't inherently just after all! I'll need to totally reverse my opinion!" It was more a series of realizations, mostly implicit or subconscious, that perhaps my previous views were too optimistic.

Do you believe in science? Also, Godwin's Law much?

edited 1st Feb '12 1:41:34 PM by Enthryn