The Nature of Agnosticism: Part 4.3
What Causes Religious Belief? Narrative, Doubt, and Obedience This is a continuation of the topic "what causes religious belief". So far we have been analyzing mechanisms internal to theistic belief systems that cause them to persist. This is a continuation of that analysis. The two mechanisms examined here are best understood together. Narrative can help form and reinforce a worldview by organizing experience into memorable, emotionally compelling causal stories. Once that worldview is established, the moralization of faith, obedience, and doubt can make revision socially and psychologically costly. The central question is therefore not simply why people believe, but how a belief system can acquire its own mechanisms of reinforcement and protection. The argument proceeds in two stages: first, from narrative transportation and testimony to the problem of evaluating stories as evidence; second, from the moralization of doubt and obedience to apologetics, social pres...