BellaOnline Forums Religion and Spirituality Atheist The 'B' Word

'Because' is an incredibly revealing word as far as religions or personal belief systems go.

I love it because...
I did it because...
I hate it because...
I got angry because...
I believe it because...
God killed them because...


I've been reading some Daniel Gilbert articles where he discusses the power in the word 'because'. I thought this was an interesting experiment he mentioned.
"For instance, when experimenters approached people who were standing in line at a photocopy machine and said, "Can I get ahead of you?" the typical answer was no. But when they added to the end of this request the words "because I need to make some copies," the typical answer was yes. The second request used the word "because" and hence sounded like an explanation, and the fact that this explanation told them nothing that they didn't already know was oddly irrelevant. there are at least two problems with this explanation.

Explanations that rely on the inexplicable are not explanations at all. They have the form of explanations, but they do not have the content. Yet, psychology experiments reveal that people are often satisfied by empty form."

So basically, just by using the magic word - 'BECAUSE' - you can drastically increase your chances of getting what you want.

It made me wonder what would happen if religious books didn't have all their 'becauses'. Would they do so well?

Cool -- what a clever trick! Like those people waiting in line didn't need to make copies...

Hm... Future scene at a theme park, "Can I get ahead of you, because I need to get on this ride."

I'm not sure I understand about not using the word 'because'

Don't we have a reason for everything we do? Why not state the reason?

The experiment concluded there was a general lack of critical thinking. Most people took the 'because' to be meaningful 'because', as reflective beings, we're conditioned to accept the meaningfulness of the word 'because' from a young age. 'Because' was the magic word which enabled the experimenters to go ahead of (I'm assuming)reasonably intelligent people in the line-up.


I'm still curious about what the result would be if we removed from religious books all the non-sensical 'becauses' which are mostly contradictions, justifications and excuses packaged as unquestionable holy truths, facts and acts.