Confucius once said - and I am paraphrasing him - that life is beset with so many problems that we do not need to add another, but confused problem of figuring out whether there is life after life. How to live well is what many people do not know. And, this is a ‘clear’ and factual problem worth thinking about. Problems are created when we mix and treat false thoughts as though they were amongst the facts of living.
What are false thoughts? What are true?
They say that your destiny is written in the stars; that is, your destiny has already been determined before you even begin to act with consciousness. But, I do not know this for sure. No one does. I only know it to be an unsubstantiated belief.
Like all other beliefs, an unsubstantiated belief is another interpretation about the meaning of one’s meaning of life. However, I do know that, because I am conscious (I have consciousness), I can refuse to be defined by something above or below me. It is my free consciousness that I am able to rebel against any thought that belittles the free state of consciousness, be it mine or yours. So, I say, not only do I support the idea that life - here and now, between heaven and hell that I know nothing of -is worth thinking about, the fact that I am conscious of my acts and realize that I can change my attitude about them, I am after all a free, conscious being. With this consciousness, I am a rebel. This makes me side with the existentialists.
True, biology talks about DNA and other biological determinants. But it would be a logical mistake to jump to the conclusion that due to our physical appearance, our psychological make up, our natural inclination being biologically determined, it does not follow that the meaning of my life is similarly predetermined. These are parts, and parts don’t tell us the entire picture. In fact, we do not know even the entire picture of a person.
So, what is a false thought (or, belief) ? In my previous article, I stated that for a statement to be true or false, it has to be verifiable. That is, there has to be solid proofs to judge whether a statement is true or false. An unverifiable statement, then, would be neither true nor false, for no proof or evidence exists to back up one’s assertion. You will find a similar idea In the philosophy of Kant. According to Kant, a concept that has no way of being proven to be true or false, is an empty and hollow concept. God, for example, is such a concept. However, for Kant, knowledge must leave room for faith.For logical positivists, who uphold the principle of verifiability, God is a meaningless concept: neither true nor false. For Kant as well as for the positivists, a false thought or knowledge would then be verifiable. While positivists would, in the case of God, consider the concept meaningless, Kant, on the other hand, would leave room for faith. He makes a stand on the existence of God, without any proof or evidence to back up his decision to believe. Ironically, so do the positivists: they decided to not believe in a God.
In some cases, especially in the field of science, I would abide by the principle of verifiability. But, from the perspective of life, I - as in the case of Kant - need not wait for something to be verifiable to be able to make a stand on it. However, unlike Kant, I can still claim that a belief is false. You see, life forces everyone to pass judgment on a belief. There is no such middle ground from the perspective of life. So, how can I make such a claim that a belief can be true or false, if a belief can not be verified? Let us make it clear that for Kant, belief is neither true nor false. It is a choice. Yes, it is a choice; but we still can judge a belief to be true or false; however, not in the way logical positivists use these terms.
No knowledge of heaven or earth or what comes after life, can be definitively made - reflectively or unconsciously. It is a non verifiable belief; yet every individual has to make a stand. Life demands it. The best way to sense life’s demand is to observe it in its purity, without reflection: observe the flower, even after the storm; the child who has yet to be socially formed; the injured bird who fights to live; every living organism, in its non reflective stage, that is in its natural, prereflective stage, not knowing about heaven and hell, but the life that it lives: all testify to the fact that every living thing, humans or not, desire to continue its existence. This desire to exist is made conscious in humans in that every human being lives for a meaning. This meaning, therefore, complies to the desire to exist, meaningfully. Any belief that degrades the vicissitudes of, the trials and tribulations, the violent changes in, life, is, to me, a false belief.
Believe in a God, if you must, But a false belief in a God is a notion that God opposes self development, an expression of the desire to live with and in meaning. A false belief in a God is a notion that He will solve all human problems. A false notion of God is a notion that He punishes humans who opposes Him, and therefore deserves to die a violent death in the hands of his violent followers, his so called believers, who only have one agenda: to control other people.
But, a true belief is that which celebrates and embraces, therefore except all the changes, all the tests that life throws in his path. A true believer is one who does not seek to have a supreme being solve his problems, while he sits and prays and hopeless waits for a miracle. A true believer, on the contrary, is one who prays to his God - whom he has chosen to believe without waiting for verification - for strength, so he himself may solve the problems, or at least accept with courage the inevitability. A true believer is one who desires to exist with meaning, and therefore, focuses his energy and time on the here and now.
While everyone is entitled to his belief, we can still pass judgment on his belief. Life gives us that authority.
