Belief Maps

Objectives

The objective of Belief Maps is to present a belief system in a way that facilitates:

• Clear understanding: Belief Maps can help you to understand both the nature and role of your own belief system on a particular subject. They can help you to understand its nature by forcing you to uncover all of the assumptions and arguments that underpin your beliefs, which you may not have been consciously aware of. They can help you to understand its role by forcing you to uncover the facts that it helps you to explain.

• Testing its truth : Belief Maps can help you to analyse the logical coherence of your belief system in explaining facts, which is the test of its truth. You can then compare its Coherence Quotient with other belief systems that try to explain the same facts, and if it compares badly either try to increase its coherence or change your belief system.

• Clear communication: Belief Maps enable you to clearly communicate the nature, role and coherence of your belief system to others. Belief Maps are therefore the first step if you want to pit your belief system against others in a debate. See Belief System Debate for more information.

Elements of a Belief Map

A Belief Map consists of different coloured boxes that represent different types of belief, and different kinds of lines that represent different kinds of connection between them. These different elements are shown in the diagram below, with the meaning of each explained within the box.



To highlight some points from this:

• Logical argument: this is represented by the black block arrows. See Coherent Explanation of Facts for what is meant by a logical argument, and Belief System Analysis for an explanation of how this is represented graphically.

• Facts to be explained: these are purple boxes (purple for mystery). See Coherent Explanation of Facts for what is meant by this. The connection between a fact to be explained and its explanation is given by a single black line.

• Facts for support: these are in grey boxes (grey for boring). They are facts (see Coherent Explanation of Facts for the definition of a fact) that do not need to be explained or justified by the belief system and which it can use to justify its beliefs. This is a shortcut to keep the size of the belief systems to a minimum.

• Definitions: technical terms used in the belief system are defined in pink boxes, with the term itself given in capital letters. When these terms are used in beliefs they are also put in capital letters so that you know there is a special definition for them and can then look it up. It made sense to do this rather than to use arrows between the definitions and the beliefs that use them, since many beliefs may use the same concept and it would be visually too complicated. If a definition cascades, with the definition using concepts that themselves have a special meaning, the definitions of sub-concepts are linked by black line arrows.

• Incoherence: areas of incoherence are shown in red (red for error or warning). Logical inconsistency between beliefs is shown by a red line between the beliefs in question. The lack of a belief to be logically justified, is shown by the belief being outlined in red. This may be either because there is no argument for it or the logic of the argument is not valid

To see how this all fits together in practice, see the example of Nietzsche's belief system.


Layout of a Belief Map

Belief systems can be complicated, so the layout needs to ensure that they are presented in a clear way. If the belief system also has a value system associated with it, the position of this also needs to be taken into account. I suggest that this can best be done by having clusters of similar beliefs, using the Cluster function within the Visual Concept programme. The following would seem to constitute the most useful clusters:

• Epistemology: this means the philosophy of knowledge, and so this cluster would comprise beliefs about what is truth and how it can tested. Although the method of Belief System Analysis itself is justified by a particular view of truth and how it can be tested, the belief systems that it is applied to should have the freedom to specify their own epistemologies. This is because for some belief systems their epistemology is central and it is differences in epistemology that make debate between them so intractable, e.g. between atheists who insist on the scientific method and theists who argue that it is not appropriate for religious questions. This means that normally they cannot productively debate with each other because they even disagree on how arguments may be justified. Belief System Analysis gets round this seemingly intractable problem by seeing how coherently each belief system uses its epistemology to explain the facts.

• Explanations and Theory: this cluster is a bit of a catch-all that comprises all beliefs other than definitions, values and beliefs concerning epistemology. I have experimented with splitting it up but no further classification seems to make sense and just adds additional complexity.

• Value System: this comprises all value statements i.e beliefs which state what has value or what ought or should be done. For more on these, see Value System Analysis.

• Definitions: this comprises all definitions of terms that have a meaning specific to the belief system. It makes sense to cluster these together, because these are not connected to other beliefs by arrows and so do not need to be near those beliefs that use them.

These clusters are arranged in a Belief and Value Map as follows:

This imagines that Epistemology contains the most foundational beliefs that inform the Explanations and Theory, while Explanations and Theory form much of the basis for the Value System. Of course, one could look at it in a different way and see the Value System as foundational, including the value of truth. But it has to arranged in one way and this arrangement seemed to work best for the example of Nietzsche's belief system. The Defintions cluster can be placed anywhere, but the top made sense since it is probably the first place one looks.

This layout of clusters has implications for the layout of the beliefs within the clusters:

• Epistemology: the arguments for the test for the truth should run from bottom to top, so that the belief stating the test for the truth is closest to the Explanations and Theory cluster. It is then easy for it to link to the Explanations if necessary.

• Explanations and Theory: the purple boxes containing the facts to be explained should be placed along the bottom of the cluster, with the explanations and general theory developing on top of them. Those beliefs that are needed to help justify the Value System should be placed at the top of the cluster, while those theoretical beliefs that are equally important for both the explanations of facts and also for the Value System can go in the middle of the cluster.

• Value System: see Value Maps.

• Definitions: general concepts go along the top, with definitions of sub-concepts cascading down.

Again, to see how this all fits together in practice, see the example of Nietzsche's belief system.


Process for creating a Belief Map

When you want to create a Belief Map of a belief system, in theory you could start at any part of the Belief Map first, and work out from it to the others. But in practise, it is probably best to start with the facts to be explained. This is because it is the explanation of these facts which defines the subject of the belief system, and so working from them ensures that you keep focused on the subject at hand when developing the Explanations and Theory cluster. Also, having to come up with the explanations of the facts will lead you to uncover the assumptions you are making about the truth and how to find it, which will enable you to fill out the Epistemology section.

What you consider to be facts for support, others may not agree with. For instance, I am aware that for Nietzsche's belief system I have put beliefs in grey which seem plausible to me but may not to others. It is therefore worth asking people who hold to other belief systems on the subject to check that they agree with the facts for support that you are using.

The same applies to the areas of incoherence. It is again worth asking people to look over your Belief Map to check the validity of the logic.

In fact, if you really want to develop your Belief Map in a rigorous manner, you should use it to have a debate with others. This is because in a debate environment others will subject it to a high level of scrutiny that you would not get elsewhere. See Belief System Debate for more information.

In a sense, the process of creating the Belief Map never ends. All the while that there are any areas of incoherence, you can continue to work on it to eliminate them. There are also likely to be new facts to be explained emerging all the time that you will need to incorporate. It therefore provides a useful framework for guiding your further thinking on a subject.