A Manual for Creating Atheists (8 page)

Interesting lines of research by Sampson, Weiss, and colleagues illustrate this phenomenon in the context of psychotherapy (Curtis, Silberschatz, Samp-son, Weiss, & Rosenberg, 1988; Gassner, Sampson, Weiss, & Brumer, 1982; Horowitz, Sampson, Siegel-man, Weiss, & Goodfriend, 1978; Norville, Sampson, & Weiss, 1996; Sampson, 1994; Silberschatz, Curtis, Sampson, & Weiss, 1991; Weiss & Sampson, 1986.) Researchers posited that short-term psychotherapy helps individuals escape from pathogenic beliefs. A pathogenic belief is a belief that directly or indirectly leads to emotional, psychological, or physical pathology; in other words, holding a pathogenic belief is self-sabotaging and leads one away from human well-being. Examples of such beliefs are, “I’m unlovable, I’ll always fail in romance,” “I’m pathetic, weak, and worthless, and without Christ’s love I couldn’t quit drinking on my own,” and “Without Scientology and auditing, I’ll never be able to limit the effects of the trauma ruining my life.”

Based upon data with human subjects, psychiatrists have posited that therapeutic interventions work by creating an environment where the therapist continually frustrates a pathogenic belief; this causes the patient to redouble their efforts to prove the pathogenic hypothesis. For example, a patient’s pathogenic hypothesis is that people don’t like her. She goes to her therapist, sits down in her office and says, “It’s such a cold room in here. You never have flowers. My other therapist had cut flowers.” She expects or even wants the therapist to confirm her pathogenic hypothesis and respond, “Well, I don’t like you either,” but instead the therapist says, in proper psychoanalytic technique, “Tell me more about your feelings of coldness here.” This response causes the patient to further redouble her efforts to seek a rejection, and she becomes even more wedded to her pathogenic hypothesis. Consequently, the patient might say, “I’m really disturbed by the fact that you don’t have flowers. That’s incredibly thoughtless of you.”

The patient’s verbal behavior makes it appear that she’s getting worse, but actually she’s getting better. While she appears to double down and become more strident, she’s actually becoming more self-aware. (We see this in Book I of
The Republic
with Thrasymachus, toward the end of the
Meno
with Anytus, in the
Hippias Major
with Hippias, in the
Gorgias
with Polus and Callicles, and in the
Euthyphro
with Euthyphro. In the
Clitophon
, often rejected as non-Platonic because it’s so uncharacteristic, Clitophon denounces Socrates for not really making people virtuous. In the cave allegory at the beginning of Book VII of
The Republic
, Socrates says that those in the cave will become angry at the one who tells them that all they see are shadows—and will try to kill him if they can lay their hands on him. Through Socrates’s questions people become more assertive the more they doubt, or rather the more assertive they become the more reason one has to suppose they are unsure.)

For the Street Epistemologist, the conclusion to draw from increasingly resolute verbal behavior is that if you make headway into someone’s epistemic life—in helping them to question their beliefs, and the way they come to acquire knowledge—you may observe the opposite in their utterances and behavior. Once you expose a belief or an epistemology as fraudulent, you’re likely to hear statements of greater confidence. It seems that Street Epistemology has made your client more doxastically closed, when in fact this strident verbal behavior indicates a glimmer of doxastic openness.

If you’re worried that your intervention has made someone’s epistemic life more disconnected from reality because they seem more resolute after treatment—don’t be. Their verbal behavior is a natural and expected consequence of Street Epistemology. What appears to be doxastic closure is really doxastic openness.

BELIEF, EPISTEMOLOGY, AND “ACTING ACCORDINGLY”

“No one goes willingly toward the bad.”

—Socrates in
Protagoras

Helping someone value and use an epistemology that brings their beliefs into alignment with reality is no guarantee that their behavior will follow suit; this failure to see behavioral change can dishearten nascent Street Epistemologists. You’ve invested time and energy helping someone abandon their faith, and then to your surprise they mention they were just at temple last week. How is it someone can recognize they have a flawed epistemology but fail to act by not changing their behavior? (An answer perhaps is the supportive community surrounding the faithful.)

Having a reliable epistemology doesn’t guarantee that one will act accordingly. There are many reasons people might not act upon their conclusions. Chief among these are:

1. Moral disengagement
   . Canadian-American psychologist Albert Bandura developed interesting research around what he termed moral disengagement (Bandura, 1990, 1999, 2002). For Bandura, one could know what to do, but then not do it because one morally cut oneself off—disengaged—from the action. For example, I’d really like new headphones. While in the changing room at the gym, I see a new pair of unguarded headphones. I’d feel bad about taking them, but I shut down and divorce myself from what I know I should do and take them anyway. This is an example of moral disengagement because I knew what the right course of action was, but morally I cut myself off from doing what was right to instantly get what I wanted.
   
2. Akrasia
   . The ancient Greeks used the word
   akrasia
   , which means “lack of command over oneself” or, in common parlance, “weakness of will.” One could know what one should do—not cheat on one’s spouse, for example—but one may not be able to muster the will to do so.
   
3. Social benefits and pressures
   . People adhere to certain behaviors so that they can receive benefits like respect, recognition, friendship, and solidarity from their community. For example, a person in a public restroom plans to immediately leave after urinating, but when someone comes out of a stall they feel compelled to wash their hands. In this instance a person may also exhibit a behavior in order to avoid shame.
   

In many cases, individuals may also be pressured into participating in faith rituals. Failure to acquiesce may mean being stigmatized (Jehovah’s Witnesses call this “disfellowshipping” and “shunning”) or worse (Scientologists denigrate apostates by calling them “squirrels,” and countless fallen members have reported instances of relentless harassment, including aggressive legal action).

Sooner or later in your practice as a Street Epistemologist, you’ll disabuse someone of their faith and they’ll behave as if nothing happened. Do not let this deter you. There are many factors that prevent one from leaving a faith tradition, pull one back into a faith tradition, or, even after one has abandoned faith, push one to stay connected with a religious community. These factors are largely outside of your control.

What is not beyond your control are the number of people you engage and your desire to constantly improve your interventions. By making Street Epistemology your default communicative interaction, you’ll reach more people and improve the effectiveness of your interventions. Over time, failure to engender doxastic openness will become increasingly rare.

Intervention 1

I was at a natural food store waiting in line when the woman ahead of me struck up a conversation. She was in her late 30s, had wavy hair, and wore relaxed clothing (RC). The conversation started when she asked me something, twice, but I didn’t hear her.

PB
: I’m sorry. I didn’t hear you. I’m deaf in one ear.

(We briefly discussed her initial question regarding moving the item divider.)

RC
: May I ask, were you born deaf or did something happen?

PB
: Sure. Funny you should ask. A few years ago I woke up and couldn’t hear out of my left ear. I just assumed it was wax. I asked my wife to check it out—she’s a medical doctor—and she told me to see a specialist right away. I was diagnosed with sudden, unilateral, idiopathic hearing loss.

RC
: I’m really sorry to hear that.

(We briefly talked about living with hearing loss and treatment.)

RC
: Have you tried acupuncture? I ask because I’m an acupuncturist.

(She handed me her card. I took it and read it. She was a Doctor of Naturopathic Medicine.)

PB
: No. I haven’t tried it because it doesn’t work.

(I held the card.)

RC
: Oh, it works all right. I know it works.

PB
: Really? How do you know it works?

RC
: Because I’ve cured people of illnesses. I’ve seen it work.

PB
: Do you think selection bias has anything to do with that?

RC
: No.

PB
: What illnesses have you cured?

RC
: Everything. You name it, I’ve cured it.

PB
: Parkinson’s, Ebola, autism?

RC
: I’ve never treated anyone with those.

PB
: But if someone came in with one of those illnesses, could you cure them?

RC
: I don’t know. I could try.

PB
: Let’s take something more pedestrian, like my hearing loss. Could you cure it?

RC
: If I did, would you believe me?

(I was at the cashier and RC stood off to the side.)

PB
: Yes. And once you did, I’d personally fly you out to every children’s hospital in the world. Frankly, if you could cure these illnesses it’s monstrously immoral not to and should be a criminal offense. My feeling is that you’re a decent and kind person. I don’t think you’d withhold inexpensive treatment from people who needed it. If you really believe acupuncture works, why don’t you volunteer your services?

RC
: There are acupuncturists at hospitals all over Portland—

PB
: You’re right, there are. And acupuncture still doesn’t work.

RC
: I don’t understand why you’re so confident it doesn’t work.

PB
: Because there’s no evidence for it. In fact, there’s actually evidence
against
it. You should read Bausell’s
Snake Oil Science
(Bausell, 2007).

RC
: There are
a lot
of studies that support acupuncture. I’ve seen them and I know from my experience it works.

PB
: Name one.

(Pause)

RC
: I can’t think of one right now.

PB
: But yet you’re confident that there’s literature out there that supports the efficacy of acupuncture.

RC
: Absolutely.

(End of the conversation)

Intervention 2

I had the following discussion with a professor (OM) who teaches at an evangelical university. He’s smart and Christian, and surprisingly he claims to base his religious beliefs on evidence. The conversation begins in medias res.

PB
: So I just want to be clear. You’re 100 percent sure that Jesus Christ is the Son of God—

OM
: Yes.

PB
: You’re also certain that the claims in the Bible constitute sufficient evidence to warrant belief. I don’t want to mischaracterize your position. This is correct, yeah?

OM
: Yes, that’s correct.

PB
: Okay. Just so that I can understand this, and I’m sorry if I’m not getting it—

OM
: You’re fine.

PB
: Okay, thanks. So, you think that there was an actual man named Jesus—

OM
: Definitely.

PB
: Okay, and he more or less behaved as it’s written in the Bible. Is that correct?

OM
: He did what the Bible said that he did. Yes.

(We discussed some of the alleged miracles Jesus performed and whether what’s written in the Bible constitutes reliable evidence.)

PB
: Okay, and this is the part I have a hard time understanding. You believe that there’s sufficient evidence to warrant belief in these things, right?

OM
: Yes, as I’ve said.

PB
: Okay, so for all evidence-based beliefs, it’s possible that there could be additional evidence that comes along that could make one change one’s beliefs. What evidence would you need to make you change your mind?

(Responding instantly)

OM
: The bones of Christ.

(Which would mean Jesus didn’t ascend to heaven and the myth would be exposed as such.)

PB
: The bones of Christ would make you doubt?

OM
: Absolutely.

PB
: But how would you know they were the bones of Christ?

(Long pause)

PB
: I mean let’s say a famous archeologist said, “We’ve found Christ’s bones in this ancient tomb in Israel.” Wouldn’t you ask how he’d know they were the bones of Christ?