Four: Doubt Avoidance Tendency

 

The brain of man is programmed with a tendency to quickly remove doubt by

reaching some decision.

 

It is easy to see how evolution would make animals, over the eons, drift toward

such quick elimination of doubt. After all, the one thing that is surely

counterproductive for a prey animal that is threatened by a predator is to take

a long time in deciding what to do. And so man’s Doubt- Avoidance Tendency is

quite consistent with the history of his ancient, nonhuman ancestors.

 

So pronounced is the tendency in man to quickly remove doubt by reaching some

decision that behavior to counter the tendency is required from judges and

jurors. Here, delay before decision making is forced. And one is required to so

comport himself, prior to conclusion time, so that he is wearing a “mask” of

objectivity. And the “mask” works to help real objectivity along, as we shall

see when we next consider man’s Inconsistency-Avoidance Tendency.

 

Of course, once one has recognized that man has a strong Doubt-Avoidance

Tendency, it is logical to believe that at least some leaps of religious faith

are greatly boosted by this tendency. Even if one is satisfied that his own

faith comes from revelation, one still must account for the inconsistent faiths

of others. And man’s Doubt-Avoidance Tendency is almost surely a big part of the

answer.