Here is a list of some paradigms that influence how people decide what to believe about things. The list that follows won’t describe any particular person, but a useful profile of a person could be built by observing which of these paradigms affect them, and in what measure, and regarding what types of beliefs.
Rather than to prolong the description, let me just get to the list, which will be somewhat instructive in its own right.
Some prefer to believe:
- Nothing, unless they have to.
- Everything, until they have a reason not to believe it.
- Whatever helps them make it through the day.
- Whatever they’re told.
- Nothing they’re told.
- Whatever their trusted experts/authorities tell them.
- Nothing that experts/authorities say.
- Whatever they have a notion to believe in the moment.
- Whatever they already believe.
- Whatever is closest to what they already believe.
- Nothing that contradicts one of their existing beliefs—or an existing belief that’s really important to them.
- Whatever will please others who are important to them.
- Whatever will aggravate certain other people.
- Whatever “feels right”.
- Whatever “makes sense”.
- Whatever seems “positive”, and nothing that seems “negative”.
- Whatever seems “negative” and nothing that seems “positive”.
- Whatever seems to explain other things they’ve been wondering about.
- Whatever is new or exciting.
- Whatever is intriguing or defies normal explanation.
- Whatever makes them feel personally special or important.
- Whatever makes them feel like their own camp is special or important.
- Whatever will keep them from getting in trouble with the authorities that are important to them.
- Whatever seems consistent with their established beliefs.
- Whatever seems to overturn their established beliefs.
- Whatever they can confirm to be true.
This is neither a perfect nor a complete list. (I’m not smart enough to write a list like that.) Rather, this is an exercise in thinking through some fairly common paradigms.
Regarding the last item on the list—which I believe to be one of the best paradigms—people who are strong in this paradigm seem to learn to keep a lot of ideas (and beliefs about them) in “provisional” status, as it’s just not practicable to be able to vet everything we hear. So they’ll say things like, “Well, this is what I’m thinking for now, but I still need to look into this further.” They grow accustomed to a world in which not everything is settled, whereas some others may prefer to feel settled about their beliefs, even if it means believing them without first being sure—or reasonably sure—that they’re true.
