The Misconception of Doubt

I am a Skeptic. I give myself the label as proudly as one would if they were to call themselves a Saint or a Celebrity.

I doubt.

I will never stop doubting, either. Doubting has been given a rather bad rap over the course of history, but it is the stuff revolutions and emancipations are made of. Do I really need to elaborate on the ways in which doubt has been the savior of humans and humankind? Unfortunately, I think I do.

For starters, I think I shall rename doubt and call it intuition. You can read the following scenario with the two words being interchangeable:

Your little girl has been invited to a sleepover. She’s been looking forward to going all week and you’ve agreed to let her. The night arrives and you drive her to the home of her friend. You walk your child to the door and meet the father at the door, but a strange feeling overwhelms you upon introducing yourself. You doubt this man is someone you want to leave your little girl with. You can’t put your finger on why, but your intuition (i.e. your doubt) tells you not to leave her with him. When you make up an excuse as to why it’s suddenly important she not stay, she throws a fit. The feeling is so strong, however, that you insist she come home with you. Weeks later, the man is discovered to have been abusing his and others’ children for months, perhaps even years. You’re glad you listened to your doubt/intuition.

The above is merely one example of how doubt should be construed as positive and not negative. In fact, there are few instances where it should ever be viewed negatively. If you’re hoping to win the lottery but doubt your chances, this is because you’re chances are actually very low. You already know this to be true and it’s not necessarily because you’re being negative. The facts are what they are and no amount of sugar-coating or wishful thinking will change them. If anyone ever wins, it’s because statistically someone must win; Luck did not target them specifically for the fortune.

You can hope to win while still doubting your chances, but your feelings on the matter will not change the outcome. The thing is hope shouldn’t be in the same category as doubt at all. Hope has nothing to do with intuition and merely to do with wishing. Sure, it can help you through a difficult time; perhaps inspire you to survive just a while longer. Allowing yourself to doubt doesn’t necessarily mean that you have to deny yourself hope at the same time. If all you’re investing into the lottery is a dollar, you won’t lose much by not winning… but you can still hope you will, because you might.

Besides, I’m mostly talking about the kind of doubt or intuition that is essentially the voice in the back of your mind that says, “There’s something off here; something doesn’t add up.” Sometimes we know what doesn’t add up (like our chances of winning the lottery), but we don’t always know what’s “off” until we look more closely. In either situation, at some point, you should know.

The Bible has demonized doubt, and so has our culture, but didn’t someone doubt that blood-letting was actually beneficial? Didn’t someone doubt that the women they were burning en masse at the stake were actually witches? Didn’t someone doubt that human beings should be bought and sold as slaves? Didn’t someone doubt that Hitler’s plan for world domination was good? Didn’t someone doubt that they should leave their child with a pedophile? Didn’t someone doubt that David Koresh was sane?

Obviously, I could go on and on infinitely, but I hope you get the point. Most advances in medicine, science and technology are the result of someone doubting. When the majority said there was no other way, some brave soul pressed forward, sometimes at the expense of their own life. We depend on doubt as a civilization and it should be exercised more frequently!

I will never stop asking questions, and I will never stop pressing people to do the same. If we are not completely satisfied with our current standard of living, DOUBT the methods implemented… try to come up with better ways. That is what progress is! When something inside you says, “I think this is wrong”, don’t suppress those feelings. Investigate them. You have all the faculties that any thinking human has ever had or will ever have. If nothing else, do not doubt your own ability to obtain answers to the questions that plague your mind. Never, ever let anyone tell you to just “trust the authorities” and don’t question them. Those “authorities” did exactly that before they became the alleged experts on the matter.

Doubt!

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Comment by Dinah on January 3, 2009 at 10:40pm: very nice post! =) love it, it really encourages me =) thank you =) yes, people are developing and we need to use our brain, what is our brain for.. if not for using it, and not to be a little robot for the "authorities"

Comment by Sniz on January 4, 2009 at 1:40pm: Considering how doubting and following intuition has led to some of the most revolutionary changes in thought in history (heliocentric solar system, round earth, the female orgasm, etc), it is sad to see how blind faith has become the prized attribute these days. Poor, deluded sheeples.

Thanks for this post!

Comment by The Everyman's Critic on January 4, 2009 at 1:52pm: Agreed.

"Believe those who are seeking the truth. Doubt those who find it."
-Andre Gide

Comment by Morgan Matthew on January 4, 2009 at 10:15pm: Great post Cara this blog post is now featured.

Comment by Cara Coleen on October 7, 2012 at 12:56am: interesting to read my old blogs ha

Comment by Physeter on March 20, 2013 at 5:43pm: I stumbled onto this post right after I'd made a different point about doubting in the forum... I basically said "Why do Christians think doubt is such a good thing?"

Here's what I mean. A lot of Christians I've dealt with don't "demonize" doubt outright. In fact, they seem fine with doubts, and that has come to baffle me.

"Here, I'm struggling with doubts, I don't see why God would do this or this." .."Oh, that's all right, everyone struggles with doubt. Just pray to God and ask that he'll help you through this."

If everyone struggles with doubt, doesn't that tell us something VERY IMPORTANT about our belief in God? So many Christians seem utterly unaware that their belief system does not look like other beliefs that are true. I don't doubt that my microwave is going to work when I put in food. If you have a good relationship with your spouse, you don't doubt that she loves you or that she cares, do you? You don't doubt that the sun is coming up in the morning.

I guess that was the point of your original post. It's just odd to me how Christians twist the meanings of words--you end up with "doubts are okay, as long as you keep ignoring them." It makes me want to scream, no, doubts are not okay!

Comment by Cara Coleen on March 20, 2013 at 10:13pm: Doubts are great if you pay attention to them; they reveal that something is wrong... like a little alarm in your head. Dismissing doubts is the problem, just as dismissing a fire alarm in your house would probably be a problem. The alarm itself is a life-saver! If it's going off, it's because there's fire... and you need to take action, not just ignore it.

Christians seem to think the alarm is put there by Satan. It undermines their sense of security. They don't want to get to the source; they just want to ignore it and pretend it isn't an indicator of danger or something being wrong.

So, I do think both doubts and alarms are good things. What isn't good is ignoring them and not dealing with whatever issue they're trying to bring your attention to. We should never try to squelch doubt. It's our critical thinking trigger. "Hmmm... something feels wrong about this. Let me investigate further!" And absence of doubt does not mean things are fine, either. You may have just dulled your senses to such a degree your mental alarm doesn't even go off anymore... which is what I think has happened to many Christians. I think that's their goal, actually. They all hope for the day when they just believe everything wholeheartedly, and those pesky doubts never try to lead them astray anymore.

Comment by Physeter on March 22, 2013 at 4:21pm: EXACTLY! They think it's just peachy to have a fire alarm going off all the time--but if you start looking for a fire, they will gently or not-so-gently try to pull you away from such forbidden inquiry.

Comment by Cara Coleen on March 26, 2013 at 12:47am: Indeed... very true. I wonder how well received that message would be. I get so frustrated that I can't effectively convey these concepts to Christians. Well, I guess they're not usually willing students. *shrugs* Oh well.

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