This is why intelligent people only have a certain amount of time (measured in subjective time spent thinking about religion) to become atheists.
Just a data point. I spent over twenty (20) years, thinking multiple hours every week about subjects related to my religion. I was deeply confused, but I needed too badly for it to be true to go earnestly looking for evidence that is was false. Which reminds me of another Yudkowsky quote:
Existential depression has always annoyed me; it is one of the world’s most pointless forms of suffering.
If my religion was false, not only would it mean that the people around me were horrifyingly delusional for believing it, but it would also mean that the wonderful future I was told about would be replaced with the utter destruction of my soul—and everyone’s soul—at death.
“The telestial kingdom is so great, if we knew what it was like we would kill ourselves to get there.”—Joseph Smith, Apocryphal (the telestial kingdom was the lowest tier of the afterlife, i.e. hell)
As the years passed, very slowly and inevitably, I lost faith. But why did it take me over 20 years between the onset of doubt and my decision to leave the religion? It’s easy to yell out “confirmation bias”. But everyone has that. I think the real problem is that in all that time, no one gave me a link to cesletter.org. I heard lots of atheists hurling cheap insults at believers, belittling them, talking about how obvious it was that they were right and we were wrong. I heard precious few people making strong but fair and compassionate arguments of the sort I needed to hear.
I know it’s been 4 years since your comment, but if I’m reading this many years later there will be others later still.
Another former Mormon here. I also encountered the infuriating prevalence of destructive criticism.
Also of note is the toxicity of places like r/exmormon. A significant portion of those who frequent exmo-specific groups tend to be those who are angry, bitter and still blame the church for everything bad in their life even decades after leaving.
Those with a more healthy outlook tend to move on and find better things to do.
Those with a less healthy outlook also seem to be more likely to produce Mormon-critical media and infect others with their own biases, dispite having otherwise valid criticism.
Back when I was a questioning member, encountering exmo groups was counter-productive because it only served to feed the confirmation bias of “wow, all these ex-mormons sure are miserable, just like I’ve been told!”
Just a data point. I spent over twenty (20) years, thinking multiple hours every week about subjects related to my religion. I was deeply confused, but I needed too badly for it to be true to go earnestly looking for evidence that is was false. Which reminds me of another Yudkowsky quote:
If my religion was false, not only would it mean that the people around me were horrifyingly delusional for believing it, but it would also mean that the wonderful future I was told about would be replaced with the utter destruction of my soul—and everyone’s soul—at death.
As the years passed, very slowly and inevitably, I lost faith. But why did it take me over 20 years between the onset of doubt and my decision to leave the religion? It’s easy to yell out “confirmation bias”. But everyone has that. I think the real problem is that in all that time, no one gave me a link to cesletter.org. I heard lots of atheists hurling cheap insults at believers, belittling them, talking about how obvious it was that they were right and we were wrong. I heard precious few people making strong but fair and compassionate arguments of the sort I needed to hear.
I know it’s been 4 years since your comment, but if I’m reading this many years later there will be others later still.
Another former Mormon here. I also encountered the infuriating prevalence of destructive criticism.
Also of note is the toxicity of places like r/exmormon. A significant portion of those who frequent exmo-specific groups tend to be those who are angry, bitter and still blame the church for everything bad in their life even decades after leaving. Those with a more healthy outlook tend to move on and find better things to do. Those with a less healthy outlook also seem to be more likely to produce Mormon-critical media and infect others with their own biases, dispite having otherwise valid criticism.
Back when I was a questioning member, encountering exmo groups was counter-productive because it only served to feed the confirmation bias of “wow, all these ex-mormons sure are miserable, just like I’ve been told!”