How God influences our behavior (and how we can influence each other) Part 1
"When the sentence of a crime is not speedily carried out, people's hearts are filled with schemes to do wrong." Ecclesiastes 8:11
Listen to the very first words of God to the first man, "You may freely eat from the trees in the garden, but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for on the day that you eat of it, you will surely die." Genesis 2:16-17.
Notice two things:
1. First, God gives Adam a positive command or blessing, what he could do: Eat from the trees of the garden, including the tree of life, which would lead to eternal life. God gave Adam a positive incentive. Freely eat from any and every tree you want, including the best tree in the garden. Then God gives Adam one, and only one, limitation, the second thing to notice.
2. Second, God gives a specific prohibition with very specific and immediate negative consequences: You shall not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Don't do that, or this will happen: you will surely die on the day you eat of it.
God was, and is, very effective in influencing our behavior without violating our free will. In the book, The Influential Mind, Tali Sharot writes about the effectiveness of using rewards to influence active behavior (to influence doing something good), and punishments to influence negative behavior (to influence NOT doing something bad.) She points out that rewards are more effective than punishments for getting people to do something because our brains were made by God to move towards a reward. (Sharot doesn't attribute this to God, she attributes it to evolution. I am attributing it to how God made the brain, not to the brains "evolution.") Tarot also shows how it is more effective to use punishments or negative consequences to get people to refrain from an undesirable behavior, especially foreseeable negative consequences in the present. (This, again, is because God made our brains to avoid pain and to approach pleasure.) The farther away the negative consequence, the less impactful the threat of a punishment. For example, if we tell someone to wash their hands or they may get sick, this is an uncertain future event that may or may not happen, at least in the person's mind that you are warning. But if a hospital staff was promised daily points that would lead to pay raises, this would most likely have a higher impact on influencing them to wash their hands.
(Click HERE for part 2.)
Listen to the very first words of God to the first man, "You may freely eat from the trees in the garden, but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for on the day that you eat of it, you will surely die." Genesis 2:16-17.
Notice two things:
1. First, God gives Adam a positive command or blessing, what he could do: Eat from the trees of the garden, including the tree of life, which would lead to eternal life. God gave Adam a positive incentive. Freely eat from any and every tree you want, including the best tree in the garden. Then God gives Adam one, and only one, limitation, the second thing to notice.
2. Second, God gives a specific prohibition with very specific and immediate negative consequences: You shall not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Don't do that, or this will happen: you will surely die on the day you eat of it.
God was, and is, very effective in influencing our behavior without violating our free will. In the book, The Influential Mind, Tali Sharot writes about the effectiveness of using rewards to influence active behavior (to influence doing something good), and punishments to influence negative behavior (to influence NOT doing something bad.) She points out that rewards are more effective than punishments for getting people to do something because our brains were made by God to move towards a reward. (Sharot doesn't attribute this to God, she attributes it to evolution. I am attributing it to how God made the brain, not to the brains "evolution.") Tarot also shows how it is more effective to use punishments or negative consequences to get people to refrain from an undesirable behavior, especially foreseeable negative consequences in the present. (This, again, is because God made our brains to avoid pain and to approach pleasure.) The farther away the negative consequence, the less impactful the threat of a punishment. For example, if we tell someone to wash their hands or they may get sick, this is an uncertain future event that may or may not happen, at least in the person's mind that you are warning. But if a hospital staff was promised daily points that would lead to pay raises, this would most likely have a higher impact on influencing them to wash their hands.
(Click HERE for part 2.)
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