I can’t tell, from your post, what kind of propositions you are trying to convince yourself of. If it’s an attempt to win competitions, then you’re putting your effort in the wrong place. Whether you win any given competition is largely going to be determined by who else shows up to compete. Improving your chances means reducing the number of people who can reliably beat you, and that only happens through research and practice (since murdering competitors is generally seen as bad sportsmanship).
Other than that, it sounds like you’ve discovered the flaw in Pascal’s original wager (well, one of its flaws anyway). You can decide it’s rational to believe something, but actually believing it is a different matter. In religion, actual belief is key, and therefore Pascal’s wager isn’t going to make a lot of true converts, even though it’s a beautiful piece of reasoning.
I am having a similar issue, and am currently dealing with it by developing better acting skills. As long as I do and say things consistent with the belief set I wish I had (and don’t), my ends are achieved regardless of whether I actually hold that belief set. This may or may not be applicable to your situation.
You can actually believe it, if you want to. If you are doing and saying things consistent with it, the last step (as I posted earlier) is to say the same thing to yourself, internally, and completely avoid saying to yourself the opposite or things that imply the opposite.
It sounds like you are saying to yourself things like “I wish I believed that X, but unfortunately I know that it is isn’t true because of Y...” If you decide to do so, you can simply stop telling yourself things like that, and instead tell yourself things like “X. X is true. It really is.”
If you do that, I assure you that you will indeed begin to believe that X. Of course, in reality even if you say you wished you had that belief set, you might not really wish you had it, given that the cost is losing the truth. So this may explain why you refuse to take this step.
I can’t tell, from your post, what kind of propositions you are trying to convince yourself of. If it’s an attempt to win competitions, then you’re putting your effort in the wrong place. Whether you win any given competition is largely going to be determined by who else shows up to compete. Improving your chances means reducing the number of people who can reliably beat you, and that only happens through research and practice (since murdering competitors is generally seen as bad sportsmanship).
Other than that, it sounds like you’ve discovered the flaw in Pascal’s original wager (well, one of its flaws anyway). You can decide it’s rational to believe something, but actually believing it is a different matter. In religion, actual belief is key, and therefore Pascal’s wager isn’t going to make a lot of true converts, even though it’s a beautiful piece of reasoning.
I am having a similar issue, and am currently dealing with it by developing better acting skills. As long as I do and say things consistent with the belief set I wish I had (and don’t), my ends are achieved regardless of whether I actually hold that belief set. This may or may not be applicable to your situation.
You can actually believe it, if you want to. If you are doing and saying things consistent with it, the last step (as I posted earlier) is to say the same thing to yourself, internally, and completely avoid saying to yourself the opposite or things that imply the opposite.
It sounds like you are saying to yourself things like “I wish I believed that X, but unfortunately I know that it is isn’t true because of Y...” If you decide to do so, you can simply stop telling yourself things like that, and instead tell yourself things like “X. X is true. It really is.”
If you do that, I assure you that you will indeed begin to believe that X. Of course, in reality even if you say you wished you had that belief set, you might not really wish you had it, given that the cost is losing the truth. So this may explain why you refuse to take this step.