"It doesn't matter what you believe"

[Cardinal]

Hoping this is a good forum for this…

Part of Roger Ebert’s review of “Secondhand Lions”:

The plot, such as it is, is hardly necessary. Yes, Mae turns up with the fiance from Vegas, and yes, he wants to get his hands on the money, but of course Hub can handle him. Even on the day he collapses and then checks himself out of the hospital, we see him punch out four louts in a local saloon, and then give them the special speech he always gives to young men. It has to do with being able to believe in something even if it’s not true, because the believing part is what’s important.

I’m assuming that the movie lets this statement pass as some sort of wisdom. I haven’t seen it. Even if I’m wrong, there certainly have been enough shows and movies to push this idea that it doesn’t entirely matter whether this one does.

This is monumentally stupid. Did the writers and producers give a moment’s thought to this, or this simply another example of “deep” Hollywood philosophizing?

Ok, if it doesn’t matter, then I’ll become a Hamas-volunteering suicide bomber. Or a nihilistic arms dealer, smuggling missles to communist rebels in South America with nothing to lose. Or, just to cap it off with the standard H-bomb of argument, I’ll become a Nazi. You see, it doesn’t matter what my religious or philosophical beliefs are, because they give me a strength to make me better. Or something.

[Reeder]

Isn’t that what faith is?

[Cardinal]

“Faith is the evidence of things unseen.”

A good quote that I like. You don’t have to believe the rest of the book it’s from if you so choose, but I think it’s a good summation of what real faith is.

I think I don’t get your real point.

[panache45]

This is exactly why faith is the greatest evil.

[Cardinal]

I just have to laugh.

[TVAA]

“Belief makes no difference to the truth.”

“Believe, and create the truth; but be careful what you believe.”

[CarnalK]

Well you gotta admit those Nazis have some “get up & go”!

Anyway I’m rereading “Cat’s Cradle” (which I highly recommend) and it warns early on:

[quote]
Anyone unable to understand how a useful religion can be founded on lies will not understand this book either.
So be it.

[quote]

A strong belief can lend you strength- do you dispute this? Just because some people use that strength to act like jerks doesn’t invalidate the concept.

[Cardinal]

The point wasn’t whether the belief lent strength, but whether it mattered if the belief was true.

I think we’d all rather that Pol Pot had chosen to be strengthened in a belief that actually wasn’t a crockpot of anti-intellectual paranoia.

[JThunder]

*Originally posted by Reeder *
**Isn’t that what faith is? **

Not by a long shot. Faith means believing in something that’s unproven. This is entirely different from saying that it doesn’t matter what you believe. In fact, a great many people of faith would absolutely reject such a notion. (I know that I do.)

In fact, the comment that “It doesn’t matter what you believe” is typically used as an argument against religious belief, rather than in support of it.

Originally posted by panache45
This is exactly why faith is the greatest evil.

Balderdash. The comment in question has nothing to do with faith.