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Comments (27)
Translating to your terminology, belief in belief concept states that:
And it is way more Occam-Razor-compilant, while explaining the same evidence. "Binary Beliefs" is a clearly redundant category; all of its content can be seen as high-confidence quasi-bayesian beliefs.
As for choosing beliefs: I never chose to believe that the Sun is going to rise tomorrow; in fact, I can't remember a single "choosing to belief" act of mine. You either think that something is true, or not, and it isn't a matter of choice, but of plausibility estimation. One can try to override his belief system, but it's hard, and people usually fail that, ending up with belief in belief, since convincing yourself that you believe in something is easier than convincing yourself that something is actually true -- it requires less overriding.
I'm not sure you understand my point about choosing to believe something. The point is that there are many elements of your behavior that most people would call part of believing something, which are entirely voluntary. For example, you say that you never choose to believe that the Sun is going to rise, but if you say that the sun will rise, you do indeed choose to say so, and if you wanted you could choose to say it will not.
We have beliefs in our heads without having to speak them and most people consider it possible to say "The Sun isn't going to rise tommorrow" without having a corresponding belief.
I agree. I pointed this out myself and said that more is required for the belief than just saying the words.
I don't think saying the words is required to have a belief. It's neither sufficient nor necessary.
Then I can't see any significant difference between your model and belief-in-belief model, which you claim to oppose.
Now it seems to be the definition of belief-in-belief, written in obscure terminology. Replace "quasi-Bayesian belief" to "actual belief", and "holds a binary belief" to "acts as if he had a belief" and that's it.