Well, 99.xxxx% of beliefs are irrational. For instance, I believe in the existence of this planet called "Jupiter," and that it is really, really big and largely composed of gas. I have never actually seen Jupiter, but I have read about its existence and heard about it from people who I believe are in a position to know about such things. My belief in the existence of Jupiter, and my ideas about its nature, are based entirely on things I have heard from people I recognize as authorities. It is no different, subjectively, from the attitude of a medieval peasant taking the words of a cleric as authoritative.
--- Ted Winslow <egwinslow at rogers.com> wrote:
>
> The fact that superstitious beliefs are almost
> universally accepted by
> a population doesn't demonstrate they're not
> paranoid.
>
> Where the life conditions of the vast majority of
> individuals are
> those that lead to the development of an
> individuality characterized
> by paranoid superstitions, the vast majority will be
> characterized by
> such superstitions.
>
> The working of group psychology will reinforce this.
>
> Similarly, though it's an advance when individuals
> become to some
> degree open to rational critique as in your
> Ukrainian peasant example,
> this too doesn't demonstrate that they do not remain
> to some
> significant degree irrationally superstitious.
>
> Hegel points out that Hamlet is more rational than
> Macbeth because
> he's not completely convinced by his delusions,
> i.e."'The play's the
> thing / Wherein I'll catch the conscience of the
> King.'" Hamlet,
> however, is still to a significant degree
> delusional.
>
> Ted
>
>
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