After my post on how internet search results often come with a worldview, I fielded this question on Facebook and will be posting the response here as it may be of broader interest. Here’s the question:

I was reading your blog post about Google searches and I’m curious. How do you explain a “world view” to your kids?

From my point of view the Bible and organised religion of any kind is a “world view”. Some world views have more validity than others.

It would seem to me that if the world view of the Bible is not discussed in the context of the existence of multitudes of available worldviews and providing reasons why your family chooses one world view over another, then a fully formed picture of the world is not occuring.

Like I said I’m curious. An interesting link - Worldview - Wikipedia

I’m actually going to take this in (at least) two posts. In this post, we’ll take a brief look at what a worldview is, and then in a subsequent post I’ll look at how this relates to teaching our kids and how we approach helping them understand other worldviews and developing a broader picture of the world.

My correspondent referenced the Wikipedia article on worldviews, which is somewhat helpful, though its definition of a worldview may not be that helpful:

A worldview or world-view is the fundamental cognitive orientation of an individual or society encompassing the whole of the individual’s or society’s knowledge and point of view.

I’d define it something more like this (drawing in part on ideas from Nancy Pearcey’s excellent book Total Truth):

Our worldview is the basic, fundamental lens through which we view society and the world around us, and try to make sense of reality. It poses and answers key questions about life and purpose, and lies behind our approach to everything.

In other words, our worldview underlies our approach to the world, and may not always be a conscious thing. No one has the ability, time and resources to build up an entire system thought from scratch purely based on evidence; we all start with certain fundamental assumptions or ideas we take as givens and go from there. Our “worldview” begins with those deep seated assumptions or ideas and then builds a more complete picture of the world. Wikipedia is helpful on this point:

Worldviews are often taken to operate at a conscious level, directly accessible to articulation and discussion, as opposed to existing at a deeper, pre-conscious level… However, core worldview beliefs are often deeply rooted, and so are only rarely reflected on by individuals, and are brought to the surface only in moments of crises of faith.

Pearcey makes the point that worldviews help us make sense of the reality we see around us, and fit it with a system of thought. Thus, they’ll often address certain key questions which, with Christian terminology, I would state this way:

  1. Creation: How did we come to be here? How were we, and the world, meant to be? What is life about? Why are we here?
  2. The Fall: When we look life, and the world around us, they are broken. There are many problems, terrible wrongs, and great evils. Why? What has gone wrong?
  3. Redemption: What can be done about the fall, the brokenness around us? How can things be made right?

Here’s a blog post summary of some of these ideas from Pearcey’s book if you want to read a bit more.

Wikipedia’s summary of a worldview (citing Apostel) touches some of these same elements, framed in a different way. A worldview involves:

  1. An explanation of the world
  2. A futurology, answering the question “Where are we heading?”
  3. Values, answers to ethical questions: “What should we do?”
  4. A praxeology, or methodology, or theory of action: “How should we attain our goals?”
  5. An epistemology, or theory of knowledge: “What is true and false?”
  6. An etiology. A constructed world-view should contain an account of its own “building blocks”, its origins and construction.

This puts it less in Christian terms, but the same ideas are there — what is the world about? What is it like now and where is it going? What should we do? What is truth?

I like Pearcey’s explanation a bit better, probably in large part because it’s easier for me to wrap my head around and remember three key elements of a system of thought (creation, fall, redemption) than six, though I don’t disagree with the six point version.

My correspondent also highlighted this aspect of worldviews:

Some world views have more validity than others.

Worldviews are our fundamental lens through which we understand life, so it’s rare for most of us to spend much time reflecting on their validity or truthfulness. Typically, we see reality through our worldview, rather than test our worldview against reality. As Wikipedia noted:

… core worldview beliefs are often deeply rooted, and so are only rarely reflected on by individuals, and are brought to the surface only in moments of crises of faith.

Still, my correspondent is right: Not all worldviews are even potentially valid; some are demonstrably false, and when we bring ourselves to test them against reality, we find them wanting. That may ultimately drive us to change our worldview or to adopt a different one.

In my view, for most of us, it’s not that we choose our worldview because we feel the evidence is compelling. We have a worldview already, whether we know it or not. However, evidence or a crisis of faith (to use Wikipedia’s term) may drive us to change our worldview.

In all, it’s important we recognize key elements of worldviews, I think. It helps us better understand other people’s perspectives, where they are coming from, and how they make sense of reality. It also gives us more of an opportunity to test our worldview, other worldviews, against reality.

In my next post, I’ll talk more about how teaching our children about worldviews and helping them interact with the worldviews around us in the world. But I think the first step of that, and one Maura and I take our kids through early, is teaching them that people have worldviews and not all worldviews are the same. People’s worldviews shape how they view reality, how they explain reality, and how they present reality. Movies and books, too, convey people’s worldviews, so it’s often important to take a step back and ask, “What worldview is this conveying? Do I agree with that worldview? Why or why not?” I might really enjoy a movie even if I disagree with its worldview, but what I take away from it might be different depending on whether I agree or disagree with the worldview behind it.