We all believe in things. Sometimes these things are so important as to be core values, such as a belief in God or the Golden Rule. Other beliefs may be further down on our belief hierarchy, like believing we look better wearing green rather than red.
Ironically, one of the unfortunate byproducts of our information society is that beliefs can easily be skewed by misinformation. A paraphrased quote, attributed to former Pres. Richard Nixon, urged us to trust but verify. This may be especially pertinent in today’s world.
Even what many of us believe to be common knowledge may in fact be grounded in nothing. Ever heard that you should drink eight glasses of water per day? When you research this maxim, you find it has little or no medical or scientific basis. What experts tell us is that we should drink when we are thirsty, and not follow any prescribed pattern or quantity of liquids.
And as our nation and our world become in many ways more sophisticated, in other ways we find ourselves sliding backwards. Are there more Americans today that believe that the world is 6000 years old than 40 years ago? Science is being manipulated and perverted by those who need to market products, create better public opinion about their activities, or score political points. For a species that little more than 40 years ago guided our own kind to the moon and back, using tools as sophisticated as a “Pong” game for computers, many have sadly learned to distrust science, and to rely instead upon pundits or chat rooms.
So the next time you find yourself believing something, especially when it is something that places a value judgment upon another, or another’s activities, ask yourself: from whence did that belief come?