When "Belief" Becomes "Delusion" (Part One)

The last couple of weeks I've spent quite a bit of my time arguing with those of the religious persuasion. The arguments have included a variety of topics, including why I consider the "We believe in God" principle of the Glenn Beck 9/12ers to be divisive and unnecessary in the fight for less government and fiscal sanity, the effectiveness of prayer, the existence of Jesus, "God" as a delusion, and even the nature of the "real world". Each culminated, just as they usually do, in either the incredibly weak "it's all about belief/faith" rationalization/surrender or the "agree to disagree" compromise.

(Note: henceforth, I'll use the words "faith" and "belief" interchangeably, since the two are equivalent within the context of this discussion. Also in the context of this discussion, I will be using the following definition of the word Faith: firm belief in something for which there is no proof (i.e. blind faith), and NOT - Faith: complete trust (i.e. contingent faith), which the religilous love to falsely equivocate.)

The common thread I see among each of these arguments? : how "benign belief" (i.e. imagination, open-mindedness) can mutate into "benign delusion" (i.e. dogma, true closed-mindedness), and ultimately, provide the scaffolding for "malignant & destructive delusion" (i.e. flying planes into skyscrapers, undermining public school science classes with creation myths, electing fking morons to the U.S. Presidency)

Now, the simple cognitive act of believing in the possibility of something, i.e. the existence a god, gods, evil alien overlords that populated the earth by dropping souls into volcanoes, or alternate states of reality, is not, in and of itself, delusional. All of us have some degree of imagination, and simply positing the existence of something is harmless...life would be pretty boring if Gene Roddenberry had never imagined the world of Star Trek, Joss Whedon had never believed in the possibility of the Firefly universe (or simply 'Verse, as we Browncoats like to say), or the Wachowski brothers hadn't challenged our notion of "the real world" by positing The Matrix (and subsequently flubbing the sequels). Accepting the possibility of these and other products of the imagination that might be is benign belief. This is using one's imagination. THIS, is open-mindedness.

However, one begins descending into "benign delusion" and true close-mindedness when the "possibility" clause is removed from the notion of benign belief. When one starts actually believing that Lord Xenu populated Earth with(whatever the fk Scientologists believe), The Matrix is actually real, or that unseen deities actually exist and control our fate...again, actual belief without a shred of creditable evidence to support the belief(which is now a truth claim)...one has, by definition, become delusional.

So is the individual's delusion benign, or malignant? The delusion is relatively benign as long as the delusion motivated actions of the individual do not infringe upon the life, liberty, and property of other individuals who do not share the delusion. Building conceptual models of alternate realities, prayer, attending church, abstaining from sex, drugs, and rock n roll...all benign. Unfortunately though, when an otherwise benign delusion begins to be spread and shared amongst groups of individuals, the scaffolding for malignant delusion begins to manifest.

I'll tackle "malignant & destructive delusion" in Part Two of When "Belief" Becomes "Delusion". Right now, I'm hungry.