Millard J Melnyk

I've been working on this a long time. I'm satisfied it's incontrovertible, but I'm testing it -- thus the reason for this post. Based on actual usage of the word and the function of the concept in real-world situations -- from individual thought to personal relationships all the way up to the largest, most powerful institutions in the world -- this syllogism seems to hold true. I'd love you to attack it. Premises: [1] Epistemically, belief and thought are identical. [2] Preexisting attachment to an idea motivates a rhetorical shift from “I think” to “I believe,” implying a degree of veracity the idea lacks. [3] This implication produces unwarranted confidence. [4] Insisting on an idea’s truth beyond the limits of its epistemic warrant is irrational. Conclusion ∴ All belief is irrational. WHY IS THIS IMPORTANT? Because the gap between “I think” and “I believe” seems to be hallucinatory. You cannot create captive groups, cliques, cults, companies, “societies”, governments, nations, philosophies, or religions with just “I think”. If so, all those bastions of "civilized" authority and coercion turn out to be figments of psychotic (disconnected from reality), hallucinatory minds which invented psychotic, hallucinatory narratives. I’m not kidding or exaggerating even a little bit. This would be great news for those of us who want a truly human world. Big pill to swallow, though.