Can people comprehend assertions without believing them? Descartes (1644/1984) suggested that people can and should, whereas Spinoza (1677/1982) suggested that people should but cannot. Three experiments support the hypothesis that comprehension includes an initial belief in the information comprehended. Ss were exposed to false information about a criminal defendant (Experiments 1 and 2) or a ...

There is a well-known opposition, about the ethics of belief, between the "Victorian" position heralded by Clifford's famous maxim:"It is wrong, always, everywhere, and for everyone, to believe anything on insufficient evidence", and the so-called "pragmatist" view put forward by William James in his essay "The Will to Believe", according to which believing may be under the control of the will,...