For atheists only - do you believe in a soul?

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I'm always intrigued by the 'maybe' option. In belief situations either you 'believe in' or you don't. I never quite get my head around "I maybe believe".
I suspect it comes from treating belief questions as if they were, "Is it possible that ... ". hmmmm... nope, those seem to require a yes or no also. What would "maybe possible" conceivably mean?
Ok, somebody help me here. What does 'maybe believe' mean?

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When you're not sure whether you believe or not? Just a guess.

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"I don't know."

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Seems strange a person wouldn't know if they believed in something, my head starts hurting just trying to reach that place.
If the question is "Do you believe in X, " and you don't believe ( think it is true) then that's a "no, I don't".
Even if the question is, "Can you conceive that some day you could, given suffient evidence, believe in X?" then a person answers "Yes, I can " or "No, I can't".
Iow, I'm trying to figure out what question a 'maybe' answer thinks it is replying to. It never seems to be the question as posed. Yes, No, leaves out no positions in a belief question.

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You seem to assume that self-knowledge is transparent. If there's a subconscious then there are all kinds of things we might believe but not know we believe. If your mother mistreated you as a child you might still believe you love her, when in fact you hate her for what she did to you. Or you might have always thought that your mother loved you, until you start remembering how she treated you as a child. In a case like that there can be times when it makes perfect sense to answer a question like "Do you believe your mother loves you" with an "I don't know." It can simply be unclear to you whether she loved you or not, and so the honest answer could be something like "maybe."

Also, it's not necessary for someone to actually have a thought "that p" in order to believe "that p," or to be reasonably attributed the belief "that p." For example, someone who's never literally had the thought "Australia exists" might still be reasonably attributed the belief that Australia exists.

No. I have always been suspicious that such a belief was some form of manifestion related to schizophrenia. I don't think I am paranoid [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img] but there are a lot of weird people around. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

[imported_luckyme]

I'd wondered[ QUOTE ]
Iow, I'm trying to figure out what question a 'maybe' answer thinks it is replying to.

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thanks Philo for - [ QUOTE ]
It can simply be unclear to you whether she loved you or not, and so the honest answer could be something like "maybe."

[/ QUOTE ] Yes, I suspected they were answering the unasked 'fact' question, rather than the 'belief' question.
"Does you mother love you?" "I don't know" seems a normal answer. From that follows the answer to the belief question, framed as the OPs was, "Do you BELIEVE your mother loves you" Well, since you just answered the fact question that you don't know, then it follows that it's be a weird pyschotic state that allows you to answer "yes, I believe she does." to the belief question. Thus, the honest answer to the Belief question is "No".
Or, we could even just answer the fact question, if asked, " I believe I don't know." which perhaps makes it clearer that the answer to the belief question is "No".
thanks again for the suggestion, luckyme