Is it better to have a false belief help achieve a main life

Let’s say a person wants be happy and believes something that’s not true, which makes them happy.

Is that better than not having the false belief but not being happy?

Why or why not?

In my view, the far more intriguing question always revolves around what individuals come to believe is true in regard to conflicting goods.

In other words, when it cannot be determined [by scientists and philosophers among others] what is in fact true and thus whether one’s happiness in believing it is true is warranted.

To wit:

Jane wants to be happy and what makes her happy is living in a place where citizens are permitted to own guns.

John wants to be happy and what makes him happy is living in a place where citizens are not permitted to own guns.

Mary wants to be happy and what makes her happy is living in a place where religious beliefs are encouraged. Even rewarded.

Mark wants to be happy and what makes him happy is living in a place where religious beliefs are discouraged. Even punished.

Then the part where, in regard to value judgments, I root both truth and happiness subjectively/subjunctively in dasein rather than objectively in an argument it is said that all rational people are obligated to share.

Other than the double negative - I think that is the best question I have ever seen on this board. It will be interesting (although slightly predictable) how people respond. :smiley:

Well…what’s your answer? :slight_smile:

What is yours? :smiley:

It’s a tie, probably.

You?

:laughing:
Mine is flexible. :smiley:

I guess that really deserves an explanation - so -

I adopted something called “MIJOT” as “the highest priority in life” (actually due to a former philosopher from this board). It is basically an Earthly version of heaven - a “heaven on Earth” mandate. And even though that priority and belief never changes (and probably never could) - it allows for the acceptance of false beliefs that are very restricted to assuredly supporting MIJOT - in fact almost (almost) requires it. Knowing real truth is extremely difficult - life could not exist if that was required - and so “sinning” is inevitable.

I call those false but possibly beneficial beliefs - “bubbles of belief” that provide hope to float upward and protect from drowning in the sea of life’s issues. When such bubbles of belief happen to reach the real surface and have to face the Sun - the light of reality - they most often burst - depression and even suicide can result - so I am not in a rush to burst anyone’s bubble of belief (depending).

Everyone has their bubbles of belief - there are very very few truths that can be absolutely certain to be both irrefutable and also beneficial to believe. I suspect MIJOT to be one of those. :smiley:

Here’s what I do.

Given any belief, I ask myself: do I really want to hold it? The slightest doubt means that I shouldn’t (which also means that I shouldn’t act upon it.) In that case, I am obliged to restrain myself from holding it and acting upon it. Otherwise, if there are no doubts, I am obliged to embrace it.

Often enough, the belief that I don’t doubt and that I am obliged to embrace by the above law will be a false one. At best, it will be a partial truth. At worst, it will be a complete falsehood. But such is never an argument against the law.

It is in this particular sense that there are times when it is better to adopt a false belief over a true one. When a false belief is precisely what is approved from within, it is exactly the belief that you are supposed to embrace. The passage of time may eventually change what is approved from within, but at that particular moment, it’s precisely that false belief that you’re obliged to embrace.

Still, the law is not particularly concerned with happiness. Often enough, a belief that makes me happy is a belief that is resisted from within. On the other side, beliefs that I’m obliged to side with are rarely, if ever, painful. In quite a few cases, the belief that is approved from within is one that causes no particular feeling and thus can be said to be positioned somewhere between pleasure and pain – perhaps lying exactly at the middle point between the two.

There’s also the insight that no feeling of happiness that is resisted from within is pristine – in each case, without exception, it is a mix combining happiness with unhappiness with the feeling of happiness most frequently being the stronger feeling which is why the overall feeling is commonly associated with it.

K: once again, assumptions all over the place…who says the point of
existence has anything to do with being ‘‘happy’’ or ‘‘happiness?’’

there are many ‘‘values’’ we could be pursuing besides ‘‘happiness’’’

for example, in no particular order, we could pursue knowledge, wisdom,
love, peace, joy, contentment, the very meaning of existence, hedonism,
drugs-sex-& rock&roll…just to name a few possibilities…

so the question becomes, why happy and not other values?

Kropotkin

It’s just an example.

K: once again, assumptions all over the place…who says the point of
existence has anything to do with being ‘‘happy’’ or ‘‘happiness?’’

there are many ‘‘values’’ we could be pursuing besides ‘‘happiness’’’

for example, in no particular order, we could pursue knowledge, wisdom,
love, peace, joy, contentment, the very meaning of existence, hedonism,
drugs-sex-& rock&roll…just to name a few possibilities…

so the question becomes, why happy and not other values?"

FS: It’s just an example.

K: it isn’t being pedantic asking about specifically about happiness…
if you don’t mean happiness, then your statement/post makes no sense…

if I am searching for knowledge or truth or wisdom, then I am not interested
in seeking examples of “false knowledge” or holding in belief in something that
is not true…the search for truth requires, demands that we seek what is true
and deny what is false or not true…in other words, your question isn’t a very
good question… and that is true of most people, they ask questions that
doesn’t lead them anywhere…for example, the question, “What is the meaning of life?”

that question doesn’t benefit us at all because it is way too vague…what does
the word, “meaning” mean? and my life? your life? our life individually or collectively?

what you need to work on, as with most people around here, is working on
the questions, not the answers…why was Newton or Einstein or Nietzsche
great at what they did? Because they asked the right questions… it wasn’t an
engagement with the answers that made them great but an engagement with
the right questions that made them great…the great philosophers are great
not because of their answers, but they are great because of their questions…

ask the right question and you are half way to the truth…

Kropotkin

He merely asked whether it’s better to hold a false belief and be happy or to not hold a false belief and be unhappy.

I think it is a very very significant question - especially on a philosophy forum - perhaps the most important of all.