People Only Believe What They Want To?

In Stephen Meyer’s recent interview on The Joe Rogan Podcast, there was a remark, I forget about when, from Rogan to the effect that Meyer, after claiming to simply want to know what was true, also wanted a certain paradigm to be true – namely, Christianity. Rogan did not tie this into a specific objection, that is, to suggest that Meyer was perhaps not entirely objective in his evaluation, but one could make that connection quick.

It’s a common objection either way.

You believe what you believe because you want whatever you believe to be true, not because you actually think it is true on the basis of evidence. Or something like that.

I claim it is a mistake for people, including philosophers, to claim they just want truth. Because the claim is often disingenuous. Yes, yes – many, if not most, want to know what’s true. No doubt. However, many, if not most, also want certain things to be true. And what we want may not align with what is, in which case, do we believe what we believe because it is true or because we want it to be true? The question in many cases is not easy to answer, including for ourselves.

Another interview I recently listened to was between William Lane Craig and Michael Ruse. Two respectable philosophers, though I was astonished to the extent Ruse seemed to believe things about God (to whatever degree a self-professed agnostic has beliefs about God; on this issue, Ruse is wildly inconsistent, not just in interviews but in his writings on the matter) simply on the basis of what he wanted to be true – he makes remarks along these lines when endorsing both process and apophatic theology (two positions ironically at odds), specifically. No reasoned argument was given for these beliefs. He just seems to like these perspectives. For a philosopher, this is concerning and refreshing. It is concerning because a philosopher should think about what’s true and pursue it aggressively; it is refreshing because many philosophers are a lot more like Ruse than they admit – and at least Ruse is admitting it. They believe what they believe because they want it to be true, not because it actually is true, and the philosophy comes afterward, if at all, as rationalization. Political commitments are the paradigm example, and haven’t we seen a lot of that lately?

Nevertheless, I do not believe a philosopher should be afraid to admit they want a position to be true, including the position they actually believe. They simply just need to make the case that because they want something to be true, that is not sufficient for them to believe it. In my case, there are many things I have wanted to be true, often very badly wanted to be true, that experience and research forced me to conclude were not. I wanted to believe my grandfather would survive his hematoma, but his corpse proved insurmountable evidence against this hypothesis. I wanted to believe acupuncture would alleviate my palmar hyperhidrosis, but alas. Moreover, as I studied different philosophies and religions there were many aspects of different systems I found quite attractive, but ultimately came to reject, like sophisticated forms of religious pluralism. These were all nice thoughts and, so far as I could tell, false. So, I failed to believe them.

On the other hand, there were times when what I did not want to be true I thought actually was true, and so I believed it – at least for a time. This was the case with my youthful adoption of metaphysical naturalism and atheism. I never really *liked* these positions – I thought they were grim and, in multiple ways, absurd. Nevertheless, for many years, I just thought that was how the world was, and that that is what sophisticated people believed, and was I going to count myself out as a sophisticated person? Surely not. So, I believed it. For a time…

Christianity – even more, Catholicism– was somewhere in the middle, I suppose. As a spiritually meandering philosopher who’d come to reject atheism, Christianity wasn’t my main interest for many years; I hardly considered it. (Typical don’t look at what’s in your backyard sort of thing; instead, you search around instead for whatever is exotic, new, and exciting). However, as I began to take Christianity as a serious live option, there were aspects I liked and wanted to believe (the promise of redemption, everlasting union with God, all that good stuff) and aspects I did not like and did not want to believe (like the required reformation of my personal character, particularly around sexual sin – I was a liberal for some time, remember, at least in how I lived). Nevertheless, overtime, I felt the evidence was in Christianity’s favor, and, overtime, I came to see the true beauty of Christianity. So, it would not be wrong to say, at some point, I definitely wanted Christianity to be true. Still, I am quite confident in saying that would not have been sufficient for belief; I also needed to believe it really was true, or at least probably true. (FWIW, Pascal’s Wager has only a rather weak effect on me; fortunately, I don’t think the Wager is required.)

The confident man should have no problem admitting they want certain positions to be true. I have no problem admitting I want naturalism to be false and Catholicism to be true. Why? Because I believe I have good control over my wants, at least enough to not let them override my evaluative capacity in what matters most. Maybe I am wrong about this, but so far as I can tell, I don’t believe that I am. Then again, I don’t want to be wrong about this…