How do experiences involving qualia differ from religious experiences?
We like to suppose everyone experiences qualia. But does everyone? And are our experiences really all the same? Or are they more like religious experiences, deeply influenced by our culture and expectations? I'm not sure how else to put it--I'm starting to lose faith in qualia. Consider the following similarities with my religious experiences:
I was raised in a religion that firmly believes God is real.
My denomination taught me to interpret confirmation bias as confirmation from God. (I am aware this is not a universal teaching.)
I believed it. My belief grew into absolute certainty.
Of course, I could not prove it to other people. I had no physical evidence to point to.
But I certainly could "prove" it to myself. All I would need to do is pray, and I would have another interpersonal experience with God.
I could not understand people who thought God was a mere subconscious mental construct.
One day, I learned about confirmation bias.
I began to realize subjective experiences were not physical evidence, personal certainty was not public knowledge, and no level of confidence about my position would ever advance science. In short, my "absolute certainty" was indistinguishable from having deluded myself, and it only established me as a hindrance to people who actually wanted to make progress.
My faith in God began to crumble.
Even now, I do not *know* God is imaginary. I am willing to give consideration to the possibility that he might be real. But I think it is best to move forward supposing he is not real and I have just deluded myself. My former religious denomination was doing nothing productive. So if God is real, I think he would want me to be an atheist anyway, at least until he manifests in some manner I am not capable of fabricating.
Now, let's compare this with how I experience qualia:
I was raised in a society that firmly believes qualia is real.
I was told my subjective experiences prove qualia is real, meaning they are more than just a subjective experience. (I am aware this is not a universal position.)
I believed it. My belief grew into absolute certainty.
Of course, I could not prove to other people that I had subjective experiences. I had no physical evidence to point to.
But I certainly could "prove" it to myself. All I would need to do is look around, and I would have another personal experience involving qualia.
I could not understand people who thought qualia was a mere subconscious mental construct.
One day, I learned about illusionism.
I began to realize subjective experiences were not physical evidence, personal certainty was not public knowledge, and no level of confidence about my position would ever advance science. In short, my "absolute certainty" was indistinguishable from having deluded myself, and it only established me as a hindrance to people who actually wanted to make progress.
My confidence that qualia was more than just a hallucination began to crumble.
Even now, I do not *know* qualia is an illusion. I am willing to give consideration to the possibility that it might be something more. But I think it is best to move forward supposing qualia is just an illusion and I have just deluded myself. The people who obsesss about the "Hard Problem of Consciousness" are doing nothing productive. So if qualia is real, I think we will find it faster by ignoring it and focusing on cognition, at least until we understand the brain well enough to give us some real traction with qualia.
That's a lot of similarities, isn't it? So what are the substantive differences? Are there even any?