ABSTRACT
The difficulty of distinguishing between some hallucinations and delusions leads us to the question of belief and the general conditions which help to determine the development of beliefs. It has sometimes been stated, and more often been held, that the beliefs of our own culture are built on a system of logical coherence and consistency. Those which are inconsistent with the body of accepted facts which we have built up through our own experience, and which we have been led by our education to accept as established by the work of philosophers and scientists, we tend to regard as untrue. New beliefs which we can test by direct perception, by the use of instruments, by the processes of logical inference, or by reference to a scientist or philosopher of established reputation, and which we find to be consistent with our accepted body of beliefs, we tend to accept as true. Occasionally, however, a discovery may be made which, if true, would oblige us to revise many of the fundamental beliefs we already hold. In such cases we are only prepared to accept the new discovery, with all its implications, after its validity has been established beyond question by a number of independent workers, and after its truth has been accepted by individuals who are specially qualified to pronounce a verdict on the question.
