Talk:Doubt

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment

This article is or was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Bellasantiago.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 20:16, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment

This article is or was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): FordBri0908. Peer reviewers: Ssteveson, Lsolomon002.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 19:47, 16 January 2022 (UTC)

Proposal to merge dubious with doubt

I have no objections ot a merging. --Atrahasis 04:00, 23 December 2005 (UTC)

I think they are different- 'dubious' is just a possible resultant state from the phenomenon of 'doubt'. Analogy: Depression is not the same as 'withdrawn' (often a result of depression). In the english language they may look heavily related, but I'm sure in some other languages, they are less connected -- Asher L (Jan 6, 2006) aaled1@monash.edu.au

I have an objection... the words share a meaning but also have several unique definitions. Comment by anon user 64.12.116.198

• Merge them. If anyone comes up with something fundamentally different between the two then it is trivial to split them again. But in the meantime I am struggling to see much potential for real content in the dubious article, other than a definition and Wikipedia is not a dictionary. Jll 10:41, 29 April 2006 (UTC)
• Merge. As an encyclopedia we discuss concepts, not the finest differences between words with nearly the same meaning. gidonb 12:35, 1 May 2006 (UTC)
• Merge - Jak (talk) 01:38, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
• Merge - and expand notions of dubious in the contexts supplied in this doubt article Drakonicon Drakonicon 15:34, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
  • Merge complete - Jack (talk) 00:20, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Adding Synonyms?

I would like to add this line, "The term 'to doubt' can also mean to question one's circumstances, or life experience." I want to do this because the concept of doubt is one of the featured headings listed in the glossary under the word question in 1979 Penguin Edition of Roget's Thesaurus that i own. My intention by adding the line is to create a viable link to the question wiki-article. Because doubt is a metaphysical, emotional, and psychological concept contained within one word, i am seeking to 'unpack' the word doubt by giving it a broader sense as noted in Roget's Thesaurus. What do you think? Can we do this?Drakonicon 18:26, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

Ok i did it. I can see how it is a good precirsor to the talk about fear, and psychological states, and buddhist faith... all discussion about doubt in different contexts of life experience. I hope you like it.Drakonicon 18:36, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

Also going to add the word-link question] to the See also section. I see that skepticism is listed there, so I believe that a questioning spirit can add a balanced tone to possible meanings and outcomes of 'doubt'. Especially in light of the second last line about '"Doubt: A History", traces the role of doubt throughout time, all over the world, particularly regarding religion'. Doubt is a state of mind where the experience of questioning arises. I know this sounds like original research. It is derived from Roget's Thesaurus, and the whole article sentence by sentence could be referenced if it was asked for. I dont think we need to do that to this article, the way question has been plagued by citation needed tags.Drakonicon 18:56, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

(Non-sentence)

"Anything that is questionable or causes doubt, especially an argument or a claim." This is the beginning of the third paragraph in the Philosophy and Ethics section. Not only does this not make sense, it is not even a sentence. I'm just a casual Wikipedia user, so I won't presume to fix it, but someone should. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.7.69.159 (talk) 21:09, 25 November 2006‎

Amusing

Does anyone else find it amusing that the article on doubt has statements that are doubtable in it? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.79.16.48 (talk) 18:45, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

Dude, this has to be irony, it can't be possible. 177.105.94.73 (talk) 22:53, 27 May 2024 (UTC)

Relating to Dealing with Doubt

Recognising Doubt

Dealing with Doubt : Releasing Doubt Overcoming Doubt

Knowing versus Doubting

Creating Doubt Dealing with Doubt Creators —Preceding unsigned comment added by Wezamuntkee (talk • contribs) 08:57, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

What about this movie?

I found http://www.doubt-movie.jp/

What about this? WhisperToMe (talk) 04:51, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia you've done it again!

"bringing into question its purported status in some circles as the word of God, and propounding alternative explanations (such as a work of mythology like Homer's ancient Greek epics the Iliad and the Odyssey)."

I love all the amateur theologians who hide behind this website. Only the anonymity disguises their pseudo-knowledge. This statment shows Wikipedia's true bias. Wouldn't expect more from a site that houses 4 times more atheists than in the real world. This is all you have....get over it.

Oh and I guess I won't try to remove that statement...some anonymous, self-proclaimed internet nerd "professional" has determined that it is "constructive." LOL. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.252.186.190 (talk) 03:22, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

I didn't understand exactly what you meant, and honestly I don't want to strain my brain to understand a comment from someone random who I have no idea who are, on Wikipedia. 177.105.94.73 (talk) 22:57, 27 May 2024 (UTC)

If you wanted to make personal attacks, I'm sorry to say, but that's not appropriate. 177.105.94.73 (talk) 22:59, 27 May 2024 (UTC)

This article should be removed

I don't believe this should be a separate article at all, it's rather ridiculous. This is an encyclopedia, not a dictionary. If this sort of material belongs anywhere on Wikipedia, it's in an article on psychology or similar. This is stupid, the logical extension is to have an article on every word in English. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.11.72.4 (talk) 08:26, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

This article is a complete mess

This is one of the poorest quality articles I've seen. Much of the article doesn't make any sense. When the word doubt is used, only the first section is useful, but that’s nothing that’s doing the job of a dictionary. The rest would be more useful as a series of stubs pertaining to doubt over the specific subjects but that can't be done either. "Impact on society" tells little, if any information about what doubt is. It's a short quip on physiological and political effects of doubt, which are covered in other articles, more thoroughly, and relevantly. [1][2]"Phycology", is badly done. None of the information is relevant to the word doubt. If anything, what it says is nothing that isn't covered in more specific articles. I might say it's worth isolating to a "Doubt (Psychology)" stub, if it weren’t for its lack of sources. "Philosophy" section is way too specific. The word doubt is too general to be directly relevant to what is discussed. "Religion" is useless, as we have articles on atheism and agnosticism for a reason. Not to mention there are only two sources, neither references anything directly relevant to the word doubt but something that is too specific for this article. “Spirituality” suffers the same problems as religion, though, to a lesser degree. “Law” is the only one worth making its own article because of its specificity. I’m wondering if there is an article discussing this information, so, if anyone knows of one, please tell me. This would be something better put on a disambiguation page. I’m suggesting one of two things. 1. We delete it, as the only information on the word doubt should be done by a dictionary. 2. Someone completely rewrites it, and we go from there. I want to know what others think though. It seems like several people agree with me. Somebody, please do something. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Soobtoob (talk • contribs) 10:21, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

The article can be gradually improved - particularly the psychology & impact on society sections. 'Doubt' certainly deserves a wiki page of its own and isnt covered off by atheism and agnosticism articles - you can doubt an atheistic position, an agnostic position or a deistic/theistic position and this can lead you either towards or away from that position. There are numerous sources that discuss doubt and its meaning and relevance in a context - for example the Kierkegaard section I added. The problem with the article is that (1) it lacks citations (2) it fails to cover off the significant amount written on this topic.124.188.100.205 (talk) 09:47, 18 September 2009 (UTC)

"Between belief and disbelief"

For the sake of philosophical riguor, does anyone think we should do something like wrap the word "between", in the introductory sentence, in quote marks? 77.193.115.23 (talk) 22:25, 19 January 2010 (UTC)

Improvement

The article is okay but I think that there is room for improvment [sic]. Some of the material in this writing do not seem completely accurate so maybe doing a little more research and backing up your data. --Svines (talk) 14:37, 16 September 2011 (UTC)

First, it's "improvement", not "improvment". Next, I'd suggest that this sentence at the head of the article, "This article has multiple [sic] issues," be changed to read, "This article has several issues." The adjective mulitiple is overused throughout Wikipedia and is an example of how the worst of journalese has infiltrated serious writing. Autodidact1 (talk) 03:00, 5 December 2012 (UTC)

I don't know why they hate this article, it just showed what it knows, take it easy, guys, take it easy, please! It's not one of the best, but it's an exaggeration to say it's horrible, we're on Wikipedia, make this place better, without fights, without exaggeration, because it will never get better like this. 177.105.94.73 (talk) 23:08, 27 May 2024 (UTC)

I'm sorry if I offended anyone, but I can't, constructive dialogue is impossible this way, I only see people with aggressive words, it makes me so disappointed in you. 177.105.94.73 (talk) 23:11, 27 May 2024 (UTC)

Science News (SN) resource

The Probabilistic Mind. Human brains evolved to deal with doubt. By Laura Sanders October 8th, 2011; Vol.180 #8 (p. 18), excerpt examples ...

• "New studies suggest that 1-year-olds are already tiny probabilistic machines who, in many situations, assess statistical input and perform optimally with ease."
• "“We’re going to continue to try to understand these processes,” says Eero Simoncelli, a computational neuroscientist at New York University."
• "Though the value of considering priors is still a matter of dispute in the statistics community (SN: 3/27/10, p. 26), the brain is chock-full of them. And humans constantly mediate a tug-of-war between those priors and current evidence."
• "So far, some scientists have turned up hints that movements, smells, hearing, cognition and the ability to perform easy addition problems may be based on Bayesian techniques. And these abilities might be present well before a child learns 2 + 2."
• "Sixteen-month-olds can make correct assumptions when faced with complicated data, cognitive scientists Laura Schulz and Hyowon Gweon of MIT reported June 24 in Science (SN Online: 6/28/11)."
• "In tests, Bayesian models closely predicted this actual owl behavior, the researchers reported in the August Nature Neuroscience."

Nerve cells exhibit enormous flexibility. Constantly readjusting to input, interacting with neighbors and changing firing rates can lead to incredible adaptability, a prerequisite for Bayesian learning, Simoncelli says. The more scientists understand about nerve cell function, “the more we find they’re not fixed, dedicated devices that operate the same way throughout your lifetime,” he says.

See Bayesian probability, probabilistic reasoning, University of Rochester, University of Geneva, Thomas Bayes, Psychologist, computer scientist, University of California, Berkeley, University of Texas at Austin, Journal of Vision, École Normale Supérieure, Albert Einstein College of Medicine, Auditory processing disorder, Prior knowledge for pattern recognition,

99.181.140.213 (talk) 05:52, 26 November 2011 (UTC)

Smoking

Why is the icon on this page smoking? I suppose it may suggest an image of the leisured gentleman philosopher who has the time to ponder (and doubt about) all kinds of questions, or maybe it's meant to represent smoking as a nervous habit that some people suffering under doubt might turn to. But more than anything it seems to me to be a distraction. Would anyone like to change it? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 155.247.166.28 (talk) 15:33, 31 August 2015 (UTC)

Doubt isn't just an emotional state

The lead seems to say that doubt is an emotional state of indecision. That is only one meaning. Doubt can also be straightforwardly rational in that the a probability is rated as not certain. Dmcq (talk) 12:43, 7 July 2016 (UTC)