Becoming a Skeptic -- Were You Always?

[_Moniker]

Ahhhhh.... gotcha.... :)

[_cacheman]

I've always been a skeptic. From my earliest years that I can remember, I have been. The biggest mistake in my life that I have made was to try so hard to believe something simply to please or placate others. In short, I've lacked courage to be true to myself my whole life, and that trait ended up hurting me later in life.

cacheman

[_Blixa]

Sethbag, that was an utterly fascinating post. Of course I've understood the idea of compartmentalization, but I guess I've never seen such a clear and stark delineation of it. It's so entirely outside of my own experience and frame of reference, that it takes a kind of "leap of faith" to imagine myself being in similar position.

I never really believed in god. The whole concept never made much sense when I thought about it, but then as a small child I didn't think it about it that much. I didn't grow up in an active household: while my parents had some kind of god belief they didn't really stress it, and while my mother made my brothers and I go to Sunday School and Primary (and later MIA/Scouts/etc), they didn't attend unless one of their children was doing something (a talk, a performance, getting baptized, etc.) So visible belief was not required, thus I didn't give a lot of thought to pondering the existence of a deity. I gave much more thought to the existence of Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny and faeries. I had hard evidence of those (at least in my mind)---I saw faeries.

Everything about church turned me off. As I've detailed ad nauseum in my autobiographical posts on this board and my board blog, I had a visceral reaction against what struck me as its unrelenting ugliness and mediocrity. I was an early reader, and had easily read a good chunk of the "canon" in grade school. While my early aesthetic standards were naïvely traditionalist, they did provide a point of absolute contrast with what was on offer at church. As I got a bit older, the severe anti-feminism of late 60's and early 70's Mormonism, as well as priesthood ban on blacks, were enough to make me decide which side I was on.

I was probably in Jr. High school when I gave some more thought to the issue of Is There A God? I never "felt" like there was "somebody" there, and from my public school knowledge of science and history, abetted by own vociferous outside reading, it seemed like there was no explanatory necessity for belief. In fact, I remember in second grade how a My Weekly Reader article on DNA and genetics prompted me to consider the idea that "god" was a way of explaining things before people knew how they worked. Anyway, my Jr. High school brain was more focused on ethical issues and the Vietnam War (hey, anyone remember when the american media actually covered wars with journalism and photographs?) provided the rock on which any lingering idea of god finally broke for good. While the existence of god still made no rational sense to me, I didn't even care anymore because if He did exist, I wanted nothing to do with an entity so capricious and cruel.

Basically the whole thing never seemed remotely believable to me. I lasted a few more years in church, but mostly because of the general socal pressure of teenage fitting in. A different religion, one with a richer culture and more progressive social ideals might have kept me in longer, as a kind of not-really-believing-in-god-but-thinking-the-institution-did-some-good type that I think many church goers, across all denominations, are.

I've been a life-long academic and most of my close friends and those I socialize with are writers, journalists, artists, musicians, people who work in intellectual and creative fields. I rarely run into anyone who is a believer, the whole thing has been a complete non-issue the greater part of my life.

[_Gadianton]

I've always been a skeptic, just have always had a hard time believing in supernatural things, even when I was totally fooling myself and trying to be spiritual. But there is a twist, I differ in my take on evolution from my main man Seth, I disbelieved evolution, or shall we say, even after I had for the most part left the church and I accepted evolution (and the two are entirely contradictory) I just couldn't *believe* it until many years later. I'll admit, I had read Behe's book. Also, I had a college bio teacher who was militantly pro-evolution, highly lettered, but argued his points with false analogies and never with any good reasoning. So, I've always been kind of a skeptic, but, that somehow somewhat legitimately transfered unfortunately towards evolution. I think in my lack of belief in evolution I was probably a semi-proper skeptic. But, I can criticise myself for not being able to step back and dig deeper into pro-evolution arguments. I have to say, while Dawkins's book on evolution was good, not my fav, but he mentioned his own skepticism toward evolution in the beginning largely because of the awful way it is often presented. And I was glad to hear that.

I can't say I truly had a *testimony* of evolution until I read the book "Evolution: The remarkable history of a scientific theory" by Edward Larson. OMG, anyone who can read and comprehend that book, and still resist evolutionary theory is basically a shell of a human being.

[_Bond...James Bond]

I've always been skeptical. So much so that I think it's one of the main reasons I am so unsure of myself. I'm not able to keep the skeptical spotlight off myself.

[_CaliforniaKid]

I've always been skeptical. So much so that I think it's one of the main reasons I am so unsure of myself. I'm not able to keep the skeptical spotlight off myself.

Interesting, Bond. For what it's worth, I think you're a capital fellow.

[_Roger Morrison]

"...were you always a skeptic?" No i, and i believe all others to have been born non-skeptical. Skepticism is a product of nurture/conditioning at the hands of those who make up our learning environment--from cradle to the grave. Hence we might be as Bond describes himself as being unsure of himself...very unfortunate for such a knowledgable and helpful person. He probably expresses what many of us are reluctant to acknowledge about ourselves...

However JB doesn't seem to have clambered aboard the ship that appeals to most who feel that way about themselves?? Ya got more than you give yerself credit for Bro! :-)

I think Wade's question re "healthy & unhealthy skepticism" to be very "healthy", and quite probably the balance one requires to make good choices and wise decisions. It follows naturally to me to be skeptical until 'study' leads me to decide 'whatever', and do-it, or don't. I mostly "do" which tended to make my life one with more good stuff than bad.

Did belief/disbelief in "God" have anything to do with my successess/failures? Absolutely not. Belief in self, and understanding the forces of life, OTOH, were essential.

IMSCO, "God" is a mythical label attached primitively to the powers of the Universe. IF i were choosing a "God" it would be the SUN. To that 'object' we really do owe our existance--i think???

Warm regards, Roger PS: Don't forget to vote April 5th! Even women have the right/rite... Why not, eh?

[_mentalgymnast]

This has been an interesting thread to read. I grew up in a home with a father who was a skeptic. Sunstone and Dialogue available in his office. I partook. Grew up without really seriously questioning religious beliefs, and belief in Mormonism particularly. It was true, wasn't it? Went on a mission and while out in the field found out that my "mentor" back home had left the church. He'd been an institute director at a large university. This kind of blew me away at the time and I had to ask myself, why? I came home, went to BYU, married, and started raising a family. Then the internet came along. The light in my head came on and I realized the thinking had not all been done...on my part. Thus began years of soul searching study and reading of all kinds of materials online and in print having to do with, well, you know.

So I guess my skepticism really kicked in back in around 1993 or so.

It's been a long and arduous ride since. We all end up coming down somewhere. I came down on the side of patience, plausability, and hope in further light and knowledge that will help increase my understanding. I remain a skeptic. I have more questions than answers. The list is long. I remain, however, because I am not convinced that I should disbelieve in God. I remain because I don't see the evidence against the church as being overwhelmingly convincing. Troubling at times, yes. I remain because I have come to see the world with a much more multi-faceted, layered, and nuanced view.

I remember in a recent conference President Hinckley related a story where the final "punchline" at the end was, "It's true, isn't it?" I thought about that a lot.

It either is, or it isn't.

I suppose that I am of the opinion that as it is reasonable to believe that it *is*, it is then unreasonable to cast it all aside because the evidence is not all in and some of the evidence seems to demonstrate, at least to me, that the church is more than man made. It all comes down to the cost/benefit ratio for belief vs. unbelief. I am open to the possibility that life is an illusion and that we create our own reality...and that's it...period. But it may be otherwise. So I come down on the side of hanging in there with the saints.

I can empathize with the points of view and conclusions expressed for separating from the community of faith by those that have contributed to this thread and those that participate on this board.

You've put the period at the end of the sentence. I choose to use an ellipsis. There's more to come. I think I'd rather find myself within the community of saints rather than without...when it does...if it does.

Regards,
MG

[_wenglund]

I trust that even those who consider themselves as always having been skeptical are highly selective in their skepticism (both in terms of what they are skeptical about and the degree to which they are skeptical). Otherwise, they would be hunkered down in a cave somewhere waiting for the sky to fall. ;-)

I still would like to get people's thoughts on whether they think there may be unhealthy levels of skepticism or not, and if so how does one distiguish the unhealthy levels from the healthy?

Thanks, -Wade Englund-

[_antishock8]

Noooooooooooooo.... I'm inherently a very credulous person. I'm an accidental skeptic, though. I think it was all that public education that eventually rubbed off on me. You know... Things like reading eventually led to cognitive development which led to critical thinking. That's the rub. Critical thinking. Phew. Once that kicked in there was no going back. Oh, and the whole "The Glory of God is Intelligence" thing. I used to wear a BYU sweatshirt with that motto on it. That was nice. It was a white motiff on a white sweatshirt. Very glorious. Where was I....

Oh, so because the Mormon church emphasized truth-seeking and education I felt at liberty to read as much as possible. Plus, mom and dad would always supply me with books. I'm not sure I should have been reading Carnegie at 12, but I did and to this day I'm upset that I didn't turn into an industrialist like him. I guess I just wasn't confident enough. Or maybe I didn't pray enough. Where was I...

Oh, so one day I'm reading the Bible because intelligence is glorious and I realized that what I was reading was actually pretty vile. You know, killing babies at the behest of one's god just doesn't seem reasonable no matter how much you tell me that god is a hippie. That's when my nascent skepticism received a healthy dose of miracle grow. Heh. Miracle grow. That was clever. 10 years, one mission, one temple marriage, and many thousands of dollars in tithing later my little skeptical mustard seed grew into a big beautiful tree and I'm the full-blown atheist you see today.

Makes me emotional.