Agnostic
Based on the definition of “Agnostic” you believe that nothing is known or can be known about the existence of God. Stephen Colbert says that an agnostic is an atheist without balls.
I think there is a little more to this. God is suppose to be the most important thing in existence and yet there are two very popular words that define someone who does believe and someone who doesn’t know.
I think the moment you question God’s existence you are agnostic. Believers don’t question what they believe. Agnosticism seems to be a temporary place between making up your mind. On one side you the believer are part of some religious denomination and on the other side you’re a part of no denomination.
Agnostic doesn’t appear to be a choice but more a middle to full belief or non-belief. Have you ever questioned the Sun’s existence? No, Why? Because it’s a known an proven entity.
Someone who says they are agnostic must be searching for answers, otherwise they are just lazy. If you honestly think you’ve chosen agnosticism then you’ve decided to be ignorant and not even think about it. Maybe someone has convinced you that nothing can be known and you bought it.
Agnosticism is the same as kicking your heels off while your toes are still in the shoes.
Tags: Agnostic, Agnosticism
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October 6th, 2008 at 8:07 pm
When a friend of mine told me she was agnostic I was delighted (I really had no idea). We started talking about religion/atheism/theology and I can see that she was totally confused about it (to be fair, I was trying to reason with her and give her the extra push towards atheism).
I agree with your sentiment. It feels like, for some (like my friend), agnosticism is the “gateway” towards atheism while they start questioning religion. I know I was one for a very brief time before coming to realization that I don’t like the whole indecisiveness of being an agnostic. Just my character I suppose.
And for others, like Bill Maher, I think he only claims that he’s agnostic because being one isn’t nearly as bad as being a full blown atheist in the eyes of the religious fundamentalists -he’s having his cake and eating it too.
But in the end, I lump agnostics in to the same boat as my definition of atheists (you can dispute it if you like), anyone rational enough to question theism and believe that humans don’t need some asshole in the sky telling us what to do is fine in my book!
October 7th, 2008 at 12:02 am
Often, where being an atheist is considered offensive, claiming agnosticism is a safe way out. I know many agnostics whose beliefs are actually atheistic in nature but who claim label of “agnostic”. “Atheistic” to any good Christian versed in the Classics means “against god”, and is often looked at as a challenge—a throwing of the religious gauntlet, if you will.
That said, while I self-identify as “atheist”, if I’m completely honest with myself, I don’t know. I have experienced that which cannot be explained. I have not seen any proof for the existence of the divine, nor have I seen any proof for the non-existence of the divine. (I have seen plenty of evidence on both sides.) The only evidence that I can see that humanity is not hardwired to believe in the divine are those few people I meet who were not raised to believe—in their hearts there is no desire to seek for anything other than the known. I would love for the world to reach the point where more people see no need to invent a divine than people who would kill in the name of their divinity.
October 7th, 2008 at 2:05 am
You’re being pretty tough on agnostics, and unfairly, I think. Bertrand Russell was one, for example, and with well considered cause.
My concern is that you appear to be presenting a black / white concept of belief – either you believe, in which case you’re faithful, or you don’t, in which case you’re an atheist. If you don’t believe but don’t claim to be an atheist, you’re just indecisive or ‘on the path’.
Agnosticism is not simply lily livered atheism. It’s a sane and sound position of non-belief that incorporates the acceptance that it is not possible to prove through reason or empirical observation that God does not exist.
To me, as a student of philosophy, it’s atheism (taken as the belief that there is definitely no God) that requires faith of a sort to defend, as no evidence exists that proves the non-existence of God. Certainly, there’s no evidence for God’s existence, but that fact in itself is not evidence for God’s non-existence.
Agnosticism is simply the most intellectually honest position. That said, in most practical circumstances, its adherents behave the same as atheists. The one exception is that, when confronted with a believer making arguments for God’s existence, the agnostic restricts him/herself to criticizing the believer’s arguments, while the atheist may also criticize the believer’s fundamental belief.
I self identify as an agnostic – I assign a virtually zero probability to the existence of God, but I can’t prove there’s no God-like entity usings its omnipotence to fool me in order to force me to believe only through faith. Of course, that ideas seems preposterous, but I can’t disprove it, and that distinction is, I think, important.
October 7th, 2008 at 4:21 pm
Re: Ann. People who claim to be agnostic because they are afraid of others responses to atheism are short changing themselves and the rest of us.
Re: xJane. I never even considered myself agnostic even though I must have been when I began to question certain things. As far as I’m concerned I went from believer to atheist in an instant.
Re: Trond Nilsen. Maybe you should have read my other article first.
http://brandnewatheist.com/2008/07/29/im-100-certain-there-is-no-god/
I’m very much Black and White. Your reverse counter arguments only confuse people.
Being agnostic about god is like being agnostic about being able to blow things up with your mind. I might not know how to do it now but to that doesn’t mean I won’t ever be able to.
It amazes me that people are agnostic about one god and not all of them. See how that doesn’t make sense. If you’re going to claim to be agnostic about one god then you must treat all gods ever mentioned throughout history with the same level of probability.
October 22nd, 2008 at 2:42 am
I never got around to responding:
Agree that agnosticism can lead to confusion when discussed colloquially, particularly among people who can’t cope with shades of gray. In such conversations, I tell people I’m an atheist – it’s just easier.
If you’re going to talk about this seriously, you can’t assume things are black and white without saying so first. If your point was that people who claim to be agnostic to cover their arse while they try not to think, I’d be in agreement with you. But, it wasn’t – you’re painting anyone who accepts that their belief has uncertainty associated with it as being mealy mouthed and indecisive, which isn’t fair.
What I’m trying to argue, basically, is that:
a) believing that god does NOT exist is a belief (not a non-belief)
b) agnosticism is the coherent and legitimate position that occupies the space between being 100% certain that god exists and 100% certain that god does not. You even accept this above (for people at the god exists end), but don’t extend it to the god doesn’t exist end.
c) agnostics that lean towards the atheistic end are pragmatically the same as atheists.
I accept your point that people who are floating about in the middle and use the word agnostic to make it sound like they’ve got a point are disingenuous and to some extent cowardly.
I also accept that getting into epistemic details like this makes things complicated, and is thus unsuitable for use in general conversation. However, this was a written post on the subject that makes claims that this undercuts, so I thought it was worth addressing.
I don’t think there’s any substantive difference in our positions regarding the existence of God, the flying spaghetti monster, Great Cthulhu, or even Puedam. Rather, I think we just have different temperaments when it comes to philosophy.
Regarding the claim that someone is agnostic about the Christian god and not the rest: I think there’s probably a subtle distinction worth noting between things that one has considered (and assigned a truth value to), and things that one has simply never contemplated. So, you can be agnostic about the Christian God and undefined about the rest. But, to be agnostic about the Christian God and certain in your non-belief in the rest is inconsistent and makes claims of special knowledge.
October 22nd, 2008 at 8:58 am
Trond Nilsen, Awesome reply. You are correct, I wish things were more black and white, therefore I treat some things as is they’re black and white when they are not.
Let’s address these,
a) Not believing in god in not a belief. That’s the way a believer would look at it. Imagine someone on this Earth that was never indoctrinated, never told god stories and knows nothing of the bible (these people do exist), now ask them about god. They will not have a belief that god does not exist, they will lack any belief of its existence. When you become an atheist you return to the state of being that you would have had all along without your childhood indoctrination.
I do not have a belief that god does not exist. I lack any belief what so ever of its existence.
I’ll go along with the rest of your post, sometimes I act black and white about things that aren’t, my flaw. Your last paragraph right on.
November 1st, 2008 at 10:42 pm
You don’t have to be 100% sure of something in order to “know” it. You know that men have landed on the moon, but can you prove that it was not all a Hollywood hoax? Probably not. That doesn’t make your knowledge of the event any less real. If you require that atheists be 100% certain, in a deductive sense, of the truth of their belief, then the word is of no practical use. In practical terms, an atheist is someone who’s pretty sure there’s no god, and an agnostic is someone who’s not so sure. So if you don’t think there’s a god, go ahead and call yourself an atheist. If you’re not sure whether there’s a god, call yourself an agnostic.
December 10th, 2008 at 1:19 pm
I have to say that the atheism despise of agnosticism is a bit conceited if you ask me. There really is little difference between many atheists and fundamentalist Christians. They are simply polar opposites. I have pointed this out numerous times to my fundamentalist brother who makes statements about atheist which describe him perfectly.
The agnostic is a person who recognizes that he has no true knowledge of whether a God exists or not. An atheist flatly declares that one doesn’t but it is simply a matter of his belief.
One cannot disprove or prove that a God exists. To make a claim either way, it simply a statement of your belief with no true knowledge.
December 10th, 2008 at 3:43 pm
RA, You can’t live your whole life thinking anything is possible because it’s not. I bet you think you know for a fact that Puedam doesn’t exist. According to your own way of thinking anyone who discounts Puedam claims true knowledge. How is that any different than you claiming that all the gods that aren’t talked about anymore don’t exist. They have no more or less validity than the gods people talk about today.
I don’t have disprove anything, in thousands of years no one has been able to prove any god exists. Why would I think it might be real?
I disagree with the way you think. Everything isn’t grey, some things are black and white. Supernatural things don’t exist. If you follow the rule that supernatural things don’t exist then that will answer lots of questions for you.
I don’t have to remain open to every crazy ass idea ever invented to be a rational thinker.
December 11th, 2008 at 10:58 am
Don’t think so. I think you can discount that any god as described by a religious story exists. But it is not possible to discount that there may not be some type of supernatural force which created the universe. This is the one argument that the religious have that is somewhat valid. It is difficult to imagine that something comes from nothing. But then God has to be created at some point according to that argument.
In any case, there is much which is beyond explanation. Until one has a true understanding of how it all happened then there is no true knowledge and the atheist is just a clueless as the religious person. Even Einstein agreed on that point.
The agnostic simply recognizes that he has no knowledge and accepts it. The atheist claims to have a true knowledge which does not exist.
December 11th, 2008 at 11:17 am
There are some things that are grey. I cannot say for certain that there is not some God that was a creator so I cannot declare myself to be an atheist even though I do not believe in any religious story be it Christian or anything else. The one thing I know for sure is that man has no understanding or capability of understanding how the universe and life were created.
I certainly believe in evolution but it is hard for me to think that bacteria simply came into being through some type of spontaneous generation. I cannot explain it and do not feel the need to. There are some things which I can consider unknowable and do not have to make a guess at and declare it as fact.
How life started on earth is grey. It is not black or white. Science has no explanation for it other than a hypothesis.
December 11th, 2008 at 4:43 pm
Re: “The atheist claims to have a true knowledge which does not exist.”
That’s a total lie. Atheist know things that are true and don’t believe stuff that has never been proven.
WHY DO I HAVE TO CONSIDER THE VALIDITY OF SOMETHING THAT NO ONE HAS EVER PROVEN?
I don’t know what atheists you’ve been hanging around but when I say “God is not real” it’s because its existence has never been proven, not because I’ve proven that it doesn’t exist.
You’ve got your facts wrong and you’re making incorrect assumptions based on those facts.
December 11th, 2008 at 5:09 pm
Just because God is unproven does not mean that one does not exist. You can neither prove or disprove a God.
In your case, you seem focused more on a particular religious God as portrayed by a specific religion.
If God exists, I believe he or it is unknowable. So religions have nothing to offer.
But neither does anyone else because no one can explain how life began or the universe was created. It is a neverending circular argument regardless of which side is taken.
The atheist claims the mental high ground when no high ground exists.
The thought of agnostics looking for answers or being afraid to commit is simply a stereotype. It may apply in some cases. But I think it seldom does. It is much like the stereotype the religious person has of atheists. It is all imagination.
December 11th, 2008 at 6:40 pm
Re: “You can neither prove or disprove a god”
No one needs to disprove any god. And you’re mistaken about me focusing on a particular god or religion. All gods are made up and all religions are retarding.
Your logic means that you believe every god ever mentioned by the mouth of a human is possible because they cannot be proven or disproven. How many gods have you disproven? If your answer is none then you have a lot of gods to chose from. Don’t be like everybody else and pick the current one for this region. There are lists online of all the gods known to have been worshiped at one time.
You cannot possibly believe god is unknowable? If anything were ever truly unknowable then investing any time in it would be the hugest waste of time.
There is a “mental high ground”, just because you don’t believe it exists doesn’t that it doesn’t. Maybe the “mental high ground” is unknowable.
I don’t think I agree with anything you’ve said.
December 12th, 2008 at 11:42 am
That’s fine. I don’t agree with anything you have said but I don’t think we really disagree in the end.
When you say: “Your logic means that you believe every god ever mentioned by the mouth of a human is possible because they cannot be proven or disproven.”
That is totally wrong. I have said the opposite. I said humans have no ability to comprehend God so none of them is possible.
When you say: “You cannot possibly believe god is unknowable? If anything were ever truly unknowable then investing any time in it would be the hugest waste of time.”
Also totally wrong. But you are right that investing any time in it is a huge waste of time.
That is the agnostic position. God is unknowable and not worth wasting your time trying to determime if he exists or not because you cannot know.
The term agnostic is rather subjective which I think is the reason for all the debate.
We both basically believe the same thing. But I call myself an agnostic and you call yourself an atheist.
To my way of thinking, I do not believe in any religious God and do not even accept that a God exists. But I cannot say that one does not because I have no explanation for how the universe or life was created from nothing. So I leave open the possibility.
Since I have no knowledge of whether or not a God exists, I do not completely discount it, so I call myself an agnostic.
My idea of an atheist is someone who thinks they have knowledge that a God does not exist. When it comes to definition, I think agnostics have a higher bar for what an atheist is than many atheists.
So when I say that atheists say they have true knowledge that God does not exist, you call that a lie.
In my mind, the atheist view would be that God cannot be proven so he does not exist. When you say God does not exist that is a definitive statement. When someone asks how the universe and life came into being, an atheist would say I don’t know for sure but I KNOW it was not by a God. Knowing means you believe you have true knowledge which you dispute as the atheist viewpoint. So apparently we define atheism differently.
The whole debate is about the subjective view of what an agnostic or atheist is. Some atheists believe that no one can be an agnostic. You either believe or you don’t. Christians have that same basic view. If you do not believe that the Bible is true then you are an atheist.
Our definitions of what it means to be an atheist or agnostic are two different subjective viewpoints. So we can never agree on the two terms. I think that is really the difference between agnostics and atheists. Just how you define it.
As an agnostic, I do not take the position that because you cannot prove that God exists, you can say that he doesn’t. That is not definite proof. For you, it is proof enough. So in the end, I call myself an agnostic and you call yourself an atheist even though our beliefs are more or less the same.
December 13th, 2008 at 1:12 am
I’m not a gods scholar but You should invest more time in understanding why man invented gods. They were invented to answer questions that man didn’t have answers for. Like Thor, The God Thunder, you know why no one believes in Thor anymore? Because we know what thunder is. Thor was totally knowable. The smarter man got the more mysterious their gods had to be to exist. The idea that any gods exist is totally ridiculous because we made them up.
I think you’re hung up on the currently believed gods. There’s nothing special about Yahweh or Allah, if they weren’t as mysterious as they are no one would believe in them either. Makes you wonder just week early gods were. I don’t where you got this idea that something is unknowable, wait, yes I do, man. You’re using ideas of men do combat ideas of men.
Gods have evolved from strong men, to dead men, to mystery men. I’m not impressed.
December 13th, 2008 at 1:25 am
I’m going to try and explain this again. I don’t care if we’re talking about agnostic or atheist.
If something, anything that has been proposed but never proven then it doesn’t deserve the right to be unknowable. If something ever was truly unknowable then you wouldn’t even know about it to talk about it. Since we know about gods, then they don’t fall in the category of unknowable because we know enough to have a discussion about them.
I don’t need disproof of something to not believe in it. I need proof of something to even consider it.
If you propose something to me and are never able to provide proof, I’m not going to say that what you’ve proposed is unknowable. Do you see how ridiculous that would be.
By saying something is unknowable you’re validating it’s possibility even though no one ever provided proof.
I can say that god does not exist because no one has ever provided proof. I’m not the one proposing a god and it’s not my job to disprove it. Therefore, no proof, no god. It’s simple math.
December 13th, 2008 at 11:26 am
I understand all about why Gods were created. That is why I don’t believe in religion.
Your original post about agnostics was off base. You were attempting to define them and you missed the mark. I’m just trying to tell you what an agnostic is. I’m not telling you that you have to be one or agree with the thinking. But if you want to discuss agnostics, at least know a little something about it.
Let’s your review your conclusion again:
“If you honestly think you’ve chosen agnosticism then you’ve decided to be ignorant and not even think about it. Maybe someone has convinced you that nothing can be known and you bought it.”
No one has convinced agnostics of anything. They just recognize that they have no true knowledge about whether or not a God exists or how the universe or life was created. It ends there. The difference in agnostics and atheists is just a small matter of perspective.
December 13th, 2008 at 11:49 am
I think someone who believes in gods has fallen for a man made lie.
I think someone who believes gods are unknowable has fallen for a man made lie.
Agnostic’s that say god is unknowable have simply gone from believing one man made lie to another. The idea that something is unknowable is just as ridiculous as the idea of a god.
You say no one has convinced agnostic’s of anything, have you ever considered where the idea that something is unknowable came from?
Most likely it was a religious man that said god is unknowable, an atheist would never say that and if it were first said by an agnostic then they made it up just like the religious person.
I don’t claim to know things that have no evidence yet you’re claiming that god is unknowable. You see how you still sound like a religious person? Claiming to know something with no proof of it.
Thanks for the conversation, I’m enjoying it.
December 13th, 2008 at 1:14 pm
I would say that thinking you can know God is more a religious view. We disagree on that.
I think the atheist view point of knowing that there is no God is something of a religious view. In many ways, atheist are more religious in their thinking than agnostics. And some even argue that atheism is a religion of its own although I do not fall into that camp.
There are things that are unknowable. At least at this time. I have named two. How the universe was created and how life began from nothing. It can be speculated about but there is no true knowledge and likely never will be. When there is, the agnostic can become an atheist.
Until then, the atheist believes he has knowledge which does not exist.
December 13th, 2008 at 1:47 pm
In the words of Albert Einstein: The human mind is not capable of grasping the Universe. We are like a little child entering a huge library. The walls are covered to the ceilings with books in many different tongues. The child knows that someone must have written these books. It does not know who or how. It does not understand the languages in which they are written. But the child notes a definite plan in the arrangement of the books—a mysterious order which it does not comprehend, but only dimly suspects.
If what is presently unknowable becomes known, the agnostic may be able to become an atheist. I doubt that is ever going to happen. So both the atheist and agnostic will remain in the dark with one thinking they know more than the other but neither having any real knowledge.
August 14th, 2009 at 11:46 pm
Well, there you have it. The Questioning Christian has been Agnostic all along. Is it lazy to not be constantly thinking about religion or non-religion?? Then, I guess I’m lazy. My mind is calm.
August 15th, 2009 at 3:19 am
No, that doesn’t make you lazy. People spend time on things that fascinate them. I was fascinated by the fact that I actually believed there was an all knowing, do anything being who lived in the sky. That’s like being an adult and still believing in Santa Claus. I am losing my interest in writing about it but my feelings are the same.