is the belief of God rational?

Question

What makes something rational to believe it? Does it require proof always? Take for example I have no proof that my mother is acutally my mother, I have only been told as far as i can remember that she is
my mother. There are also many reasons that which can confirm why she might not be my mother (why God might not exist however there is no reason to confirm the non-existance of god) such as she might not look like me, we do not have many things in common and ect. Belief in a monster when you are 5 years old after watching a scary movie does not make the child a irrational child but a rational one. Being rational has nothing to do with truth Please do not get this question confused with God's existance.

Answer 1

It can be scientifically proven that you were the off spring of your mother, your belief or reliance on what someone said is irrelevant to the facts.

We rely on logic and rationality to make sense of the world....the objective world of reality. To do otherwise, is using CAVE MAN logic or reverting to you child hood fantasies and beliefs. Nuroscientists and anthropologist have already determined that there's a scientific reason for the belief in god, demons, angels, etc. It's based on our primitive instincts developed eons by our barbarian ancestors.

Obsolete genes do not die overnight, so we'll be seeing a distorted world view for some time come.

Answer 2

Rational, is a very abstract word, by definition, simple because it encloses all the senses into assisting the Brain altogether, in an effort to achieved a pure and true definition that the Word it self, was mining to described. Ratio, that first part of the word, can tell you that rational could just well be, a part of something, or a something of a whole,(all), a good thesaurus will explain a lot better, what I mean that even though the word Exist, its impossible to use it, into just accept God existence, first you need to accept the word, which could mean ignorance a/o intelligence, all depend for what is been use, a/o apply. as you say, in the child metaphor, been scare doesn't make the child irrational, but rational, such is the only way you can apply such description and if God accepted (of course if his existence is valuable and validate? perhaps believing in nothing will be a lot more rational, Although to my knowledge, if he exist and I believed I be a head of everyone else non believers, and if he doesn't exist, believing will not affect me, what so ever. and I can steal use my own powers of reasoning, disregarding my senses, almost in its totality. are the Ten Commandments a rational condition to impose a Universal Law?, to my knowledge yes they are., Be rational and don't toss this, my opinion by the window

Answer 3

"If so, then why does religiousness decline in open and free societies with educated populations?" This is like a popularity contest. It's not the way you determine truth. If you can prove that God doesn't exist or that He exists but cannot be found or He exists but is not good, then you might be able to say that a belief is not rational. You could try to make the case that a belief is not reasonable and there you would have to show that the worth of finding our Creator is not worth the effort even if He does exist. I think that's hard to do also.

Answer 4

Interesting. I would restate your premise by replacing "rational" with "understandable". Then I'd agree with it. Rational thought can mean "reasonable" or "sensible" thought. In this sense, I suppose it can be sensible to believe in god. For example, if you lived in a society where athiests were killed, it might be sensible to convince yourself (i.e. do the "faith" tautology") that god exists. You'd be less likely to be caught in disbelief and drowned or something.

On the other hand, if you take rational as "endowed with the faculty of reason", then I'm afraid that you're stuck with realizing that god is fictional. When you're first forming as a social human being, there are parents who take care of you... for all intents and purposes, your parents are your gods. When you grow up, and you no longer have that protector, it's certainly understandable that you might fall into the religion trap. It does replace the missing parent. But take a few hours to read
Richard Dawkin's "The God Delusion" and you'll see just how absurd a belief in a personal god is. (If you dare).

Note to C. D. You forget the anthropic principle, which utterly destroys your attempt at logic. I note your reference to the 747 Jumbo Jet analogy. That argument has long ago been refuted. No-one has ever found a trait of human beings or any other living creature that is "irreducibly complex". The old standard statement that the eye is IR, is easily refuted. Take a look at the nemotode which has a primative light sensor and numerous other animals with progressively better seeing apparatus. I would again ask you to read "The God Delusion" by Richard Dawkins. Or, if it's more comfortable for you, keep your head in the sand. Perhaps that way you could avoid an existential crisis.

Answer 5

I don't think it's rational.

Rational, in my terms, means "ends that justify the means" or having a better outcome than the cost. For example, if someone was wearing a cross around their neck and had a gun to your head and asked you, "Do you believe in God?", it would be RATIONAL to say "Yes, I do."

I don't think the belief is rational. Beliefs cloud thoughts - if you strongly believe in something, you shut out thoughts that oppose it, therefore hindering progress. There's nothing to gain from believing in God except the supposed going to heaven, but you can't be sure that God is benevolent.

I think that believing in God is not rational, but since it doesn't really harm you, belief in God isn't irrational either.

Answer 6

i like your question.
Rationality, however is not always helpful.
Consider this, you can be entirely rational, and still be problematic to yourself and fellow man.

Rationality is entirely a "social construct" in a sense it would not exist without our objectivity to perceive such a concept.

So if you were not told, such an action is rational, it would not be so.
For example to fill your car with gas before a long journey is only rational because of your positioning within your reality.

I hope this doesn't confuse you!

i agree with you, i've been complained at by new people, when they ask," hey what's your name?" and my reply is "well my birth certificate says . . . . "
For some reason, (most probably following rational thinking) this answer seems to be unsatisfactory for most.
So my rational thinking says: i cannot rely on anything other than the evidence presented to me, however conversely their rational thinking says: this dude's a weirdo as he won't say his name!

Who wins on the rationality front?
Again, like my aforementioned point, our sense of rationality is defined by those around us.

Answer 7

Well i do not think that you need proof for something to be rational at all.Such as aliens they may be real or may not be real but you do not need proof to explain how they might be a more advanced race than the people on planet earth.I do not believe you need proof for something to be rational because at one time nobody knew the truth until someone found an answer.

Answer 8

You've got a point. We believe in scientific theories based on their affect on the things around us.

Many believe in the Origin of the Species when we've never found a single fossil to prove any species ever became another. I believe in the Quantum Theory, but like all scientific theories, we just don't have all the facts. The theories work in most cases, but they're just theories.

Anyone who says the phrase "proven scientifically" obviously never studied science at a higher than high school level. Nothing is ever proven, just theorized.

So believing in God is not any more irrational than believing in global warming or evolution. No proof, just faith.

Nothing wrong with that, but we should all be aware.

Answer 9

Yes, but it fits more in line with relative than rational thought. An individual who has the need to know there is a certain amount of security and stability in the world can fulfill that need by believing in a leader or force which takes control of such stability.

Here, the individual surrenders all concern for the nature of that which is stable and instead, focuses upon that which is important to that individual's livelihood. For your example, believing in your mother makes sense because the priority of a 5 year old is to learn and explore the world. Trusting your mom as "your mom" makes this task much simpler (not to mention how it provides you with the opportunity to grow by trusting in her nurturing abilities).

Believing in God allows an individual to enjoy life more since he doesn't need to discover all of those mystical universal truths that may occasionally be questioned. Instead, he can just focus on his life and be done with understanding the deepest parts of existentialism.

Answer 10

Why must something be rational in order to believe it? The history of mankind is human's belief in things they could not prove. Sure, many were proved later (and many were not), but it didn't make a difference at the time. As well, many rational beliefs were proven to be untrue, as you can come to rational conclusions without specific proof. So, you could come up with a rational reason to believe in God. But why bother? Belief in God is about faith.