"Believe"

[marnanel]

During a conversation with a friend this evening, I discovered we were using the word "believe" at cross-purposes. When I said "believe", I meant having any internal perception of an external fact, whether or not accurate (e.g. I believe that my desk is in my room since I can currently see it). But she meant having a hypothesis about something which has not yet adequately been confirmed (e.g. I see the desk and now I know it's there, I no longer believe it's there). I wonder how common this difference is, and how much disagreement it causes.

Comments

[amaebi]

It is very common indeed, and particularly in the realm of religious faith.

[pseudomonas]

I think it's pretty common, though I share your use of it. In her use of the term, do you believe less and less and less as more evidence accumulates that the desk is indeed in the room?

[desh]

I also find fascinating the construct of "I [don't] believe in X", where X is something indisputably true but a thing that the speaker is expressing a moral judgment on. Compare "I don't believe in God" vs. "I don't believe in sex before marriage". How did we end up with the latter construction?