Why I am a Latter-day Saint

[_Bazooka]

Bazooka, once again you're putting words in my mouth that I never spoke. I didn't assume in advance that my "experience was unique and special and nobody else's was."

Okay, I'll give you the chance to put words in your own mouth:
What, specifically, is your take on people asking God the same question you asked and receiving a different answer?
For instance: People asking God if the Mormon Church is true who are told no, it isn't. Or People asking God if the <insert name of any other faith> church is true and being told, yes, it's true.

[_KevinSim]

I wouldn't call it an "instance of cognition"; that seems to imply that I experienced something persuasive, and I really didn't; I just underwent a very affirmative feeling.

Kevin, you really don't see the inherent self-contradiction in your response, do you?

This = "I didn't experience something persuasive"
Is contradicted by this = "I did experience something very affirmative"

<sarcasm>Self-awareness and irony may not be my strong points, but at least I know the difference between an affirmative statement and a persuasive statement.</sarcasm>

Take a question. Are there exactly two solutions to the equation x^2 + 2 = 3x?

Affirmative answer: yes.

Persuasive answer: the equation can be factored to result in (x-1)(x-2) = 0, which indicates that the two solutions are precisely x = 1 and x = 2.

In other words, an affirmative answer simply states that the answer is yes, while a persuasive answer explains why the answer is yes, in an attempt to persuade someone that the answer is yes.

Confirmation bias (also called confirmatory bias or myside bias) is the tendency of people to favor information that confirms their beliefs or hypotheses.[Note 1][1] People display this bias when they gather or remember information selectively, or when they interpret it in a biased way. The effect is stronger for emotionally charged issues and for deeply entrenched beliefs. People also tend to interpret ambiguous evidence as supporting their existing position. Biased search, interpretation and memory have been invoked to explain attitude polarization (when a disagreement becomes more extreme even though the different parties are exposed to the same evidence), belief perseverance (when beliefs persist after the evidence for them is shown to be false), the irrational primacy effect (a greater reliance on information encountered early in a series) and illusory correlation (when people falsely perceive an association between two events or situations).

A series of experiments in the 1960s suggested that people are biased toward confirming their existing beliefs. Later work re-interpreted these results as a tendency to test ideas in a one-sided way, focusing on one possibility and ignoring alternatives. In certain situations, this tendency can bias people's conclusions. Explanations for the observed biases include wishful thinking and the limited human capacity to process information. Another explanation is that people show confirmation bias because they are weighing up the costs of being wrong, rather than investigating in a neutral, scientific way.

Confirmation biases contribute to overconfidence in personal beliefs and can maintain or strengthen beliefs in the face of contrary evidence. Poor decisions due to these biases have been found in political and organizational contexts.[2][Note 2]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation_bias

Kevin, in what material way(s) was the response you got...

"Neither the question asked nor the answer received were audible. I remember swinging my mind toward God, asking, as nearly as I can translate it into English, "Is it?" But I was referring to the LDS Church, and what I wanted to know was whether it was true or not. I was immediately overwhelmed by a huge rushing, sort of shivering sensation that completely blanketed me. Granted that sensation didn't really say anything in so many words, but it was a clear yes in the same sense that a major chord sounds like a yes, while a minor chord sounds like a no."

... identifiably different from an episode of confirmation bias?

The description mentioned ambiguous evidence; there was nothing ambiguous about the answer I got; it was as clear a yes as if God had thundered an affirmation from the sky. Also, I think it's an error to assume that beliefs in favor of the LDS Church were even present, let alone "deeply entrenched." I was trying to find out if the LDS Church was true, not trying to confirm already held beliefs.

[_canpakes]

... I think it's an error to assume that beliefs in favor of the LDS Church were even present, let alone "deeply entrenched." I was trying to find out if the LDS Church was true, not trying to confirm already held beliefs.

If you were already LDS when you attempted to 'find out' if the LDS Church was true by asking God, then you were trying to 'confirm already held beliefs'.

[Guest]

Bazooka, once again you're putting words in my mouth that I never spoke. I didn't assume in advance that my "experience was unique and special and nobody else's was."

Okay, I'll give you the chance to put words in your own mouth:
What, specifically, is your take on people asking God the same question you asked and receiving a different answer?
For instance: People asking God if the Mormon Church is true who are told no, it isn't. Or People asking God if the <insert name of any other faith> church is true and being told, yes, it's true.

It's possible to wonder if God always gives a consistent answer to questions asked God about the truthfulness of various churches, without assuming in advance that God always gives consistent answers. That's where I am right now.

It would certainly be more convenient for me if God always told people that the LDS Church was true, and always told people that other churches were not true. I don't know if God has granted that convenience for me or not. I'm certainly not going to tell God how God needs to answer questions people of other churches ask about their churches; that's entirely up to God, and God can tell them anything God wants to tell them.

At times I have wondered if maybe the seeming paradox is a result of God wanting me in the LDS Church but wanting other people in other churches. I don't know if that's the solution or not.

I still think it's a huge exaggeration to imply that people of <insert name of any other faith> ask God if <insert name of any other faith> is true and get told that it is true. For one thing, many of the faiths you're including there believe it's a mistake to ask God if their faith is true; how then can you argue that people of those faiths ask God if their faiths are true and get told their faiths are true? After all, their faiths instruct them not to ask.

If you're willing to confine your consideration to a much smaller group of faiths, then you might have more of a point. Some time back someone of a faith that had broken off of the LDS Church stated that the way to find out if his faith was true was to ask God if it was. It was that case that I found worrisome; after all, how could I tell him that his faith was wrong, when he had just as much reason to believe that God endorsed his faith as I had to believe that God endorsed mine? In the end I simply told him that I had prayed about the LDS Church, and that God had told me that the LDS Church was true. Now what this man should have done was recognize that we were at an impasse, which was pretty much what I had already recognized. But he didn't. He proceeded to try to discredit the answer that I had received. Which was more believable, he asked, someone who had asked God who understood the Gospel or someone who didn't? (These weren't precisely his words, but they're as close as I remember.) It became clear very quickly that while he said that the way to find out if his faith was true was to ask God, he didn't really believe that that was the way to find out. All of a sudden I got really excited; if he didn't really believe that asking God a question was the way for someone like me to find out God's will, then maybe there was no conflict after all.

[_KevinSim]

... I think it's an error to assume that beliefs in favor of the LDS Church were even present, let alone "deeply entrenched." I was trying to find out if the LDS Church was true, not trying to confirm already held beliefs.

If you were already LDS when you attempted to 'find out' if the LDS Church was true by asking God, then you were trying to 'confirm already held beliefs'.

That ignores the dynamics of the LDS youth program. The Young Men / Young Women program of the LDS Church is filled with kids that are genuinely curious as to whether the faith they were raised in is true or not. I was no different. I didn't feel particularly LDS; I just wanted to know if God supported it or not.

[_canpakes]

That ignores the dynamics of the LDS youth program. The Young Men / Young Women program of the LDS Church is filled with kids that are genuinely curious as to whether the faith they were raised in is true or not. I was no different. I didn't feel particularly LDS; I just wanted to know if God supported it or not.

Interesting statement, but I'd wager that the condition may be quite a bit different than you are suggesting.

If you are engaged in the youth program as a member of the Church (and presumably being a member since birth), then you are 'in the only skin' that you've ever been in. You may not have felt particularly LDS at the time, as you put it, but that's because your frame of reference and identity had been built within the Church. You'd just as soon be saying that if you spent your entire life wearing nothing other than jeans and cotton t-shirts that your clothing didn't feel 'particularly cotton', when considering if cotton is any different than wool.

On the other hand, consider the case of someone who becomes a member after spending their life outside of the Church. This is someone who has built a frame of reference that can then be compared to the LDS experience, and a relative difference between 'feeling' LDS - or feeling anything else - can be experienced distinctly.

In your situation, when you asked God for confirmation of the Church, then you asked for confirmation of the frame of reference that you were aware of. You basically asked if what you knew as your reality - the sum of your religious and life experience - was true. But you asked it from within that built referential construct. Absent any information that would speak to the contrary (the types of so-called 'anti-mormon' things that may not align with the reality built up through your initial years in the Church), you would likely come to only one conclusion... a confirmation that the LDS Church is 'true'.

[_Themis]

It would certainly be more convenient for me if God always told people that the LDS Church was true, and always told people that other churches were not true. I don't know if God has granted that convenience for me or not. I'm certainly not going to tell God how God needs to answer questions people of other churches ask about their churches; that's entirely up to God, and God can tell them anything God wants to tell them.

I always love the argument that God is confusing and inconsistent. I suppose when you want to use subjective experiences that one cannot really know if they are self generated or not you are always going to have this problem.

It would certainly be more convenient for me if God always told people that the LDS Church was true, and always told people that other churches were not true.

I am not sure what the problem is for God to give clear unmistakable answers with these kind of questions from people who are sincerely asking he/she/they about.

[_KevinSim]

On the other hand, consider the case of someone who becomes a member after spending their life outside of the Church. This is someone who has built a frame of reference that can then be compared to the LDS experience, and a relative difference between 'feeling' LDS - or feeling anything else - can be experienced distinctly.

In your situation, when you asked God for confirmation of the Church, then you asked for confirmation of the frame of reference that you were aware of. You basically asked if what you knew as your reality - the sum of your religious and life experience - was true. But you asked it from within that built referential construct. Absent any information that would speak to the contrary (the types of so-called 'anti-mormon' things that may not align with the reality built up through your initial years in the Church), you would likely come to only one conclusion... a confirmation that the LDS Church is 'true'.

Canpakes, i see what you're trying to say, but I've got to disagree. If I had asked God if the LDS Church was true and had gotten a negative response, it might have been difficult to leave the LDS Church, but I feel quite confident I would have done it.

[_KevinSim]

It would certainly be more convenient for me if God always told people that the LDS Church was true, and always told people that other churches were not true. I don't know if God has granted that convenience for me or not. I'm certainly not going to tell God how God needs to answer questions people of other churches ask about their churches; that's entirely up to God, and God can tell them anything God wants to tell them.

I always love the argument that God is confusing and inconsistent. I suppose when you want to use subjective experiences that one cannot really know if they are self generated or not you are always going to have this problem.

Themis, first let us establish that the problem exists. I say that if someone goes to God in prayer, in pursuit of a kernel of truth s/he can use as a certain foundation for her/his own personal theology, and if this someone asks God a question ready to base the whole rest[/b' of that someone's life on [b]whatever answer God provides, that God will give that someone the kernel of truth s/he is looking for. So the first step is to establish that people have gone to God as described, and have received answers that contradict the answer that I got.

[_canpakes]

On the other hand, consider the case of someone who becomes a member after spending their life outside of the Church. This is someone who has built a frame of reference that can then be compared to the LDS experience, and a relative difference between 'feeling' LDS - or feeling anything else - can be experienced distinctly.

In your situation, when you asked God for confirmation of the Church, then you asked for confirmation of the frame of reference that you were aware of. You basically asked if what you knew as your reality - the sum of your religious and life experience - was true. But you asked it from within that built referential construct. Absent any information that would speak to the contrary (the types of so-called 'anti-mormon' things that may not align with the reality built up through your initial years in the Church), you would likely come to only one conclusion... a confirmation that the LDS Church is 'true'.

Canpakes, i see what you're trying to say, but I've got to disagree. If I had asked God if the LDS Church was true and had gotten a negative response, it might have been difficult to leave the LDS Church, but I feel quite confident I would have done it.

My point is that you would not have received a negative response. You could only have received no response or something that you interpreted as a positive response. It was the latter because the existence of God was assumed by you prior to asking, God's nature was assumed by you before asking, the nature of the response was determined by you to be correct regardless, and your interpretation of the response as being of God was assumed correct.

Wrap all of that up within the only theological environment that you've ever experienced, and there is only one possible outcome that you would allow.