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"Agnostic"

Shrink726

The tolerant left? I'm the intolerant left.
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My feeling is that the term "agnostic" essentially has no meaning and, stripped of its semantic sophistry, is intellectually dishonest as it simply states, "I don't know." Well, if we're looking for dispositive proof of the existence or lack of existence of god(s), then there is none to be found, however, we don't live in a universe where patently absurd propositions are accorded possible viability until they are disproven (viz. Are there teams of invisible unicorns pulling chariots around the moons of Jupiter; perhaps Santa Claus travels from Alpha Centuri to earth a few times a year, etc.). No, we routinely dismiss such absurdities because they lack the slightest shred of evidence and are, thus, understandably regarded as absurd.
Regarding belief in god(s) using the term agnostic (i.e. "I'm not sure") places the pope and I in the same category. Neither of us can be sure but my position simply posits that it seems utterly fanciful and absurd in the absence of even the slightest evidence to think that there is any such thing(s). And for those who might challenge that by suggesting that I have no proof of the non-existance of any god, I would suggest that they brush up on simple logic which would inform them that it's impossible (and dishonest) to ask anyone to disprove a null hypothesis. Nope, the entire burden of proof here lies with those who believe to show that there is some basis for their belief. Absent that, the default position has to be that absurd claims lacking in the slightest shred of evidence are, definitionally false until proven otherwise.
The only real question then is whether you 'believe' there is a god(s), in which case you are a theist or believer or whether you don't, in which case you're an atheist. The term 'agnostic' is just some weird combination of intellectual laziness and cowardice.
 
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Sit in a chair and then TRY to stand up. That to me is the position agnostics choose to call their own. You can't try to get up, you either do or don't, period, there is no trying. You either believe in gods or you don't, there's no trying.
 
bongsaway said:
Sit in a chair and then TRY to stand up. That to me is the position agnostics choose to call their own. You can't try to get up, you either do or don't, period, there is no trying. You either believe in gods or you don't, there's no trying.
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Precisely! My point exactly.
 
Here we go again. I absolutely defend the idea that 'I don't know' not only has meaning, but that meaning is important in every single context. What we believe to be true, and what we know to be true are world's apart and it is a fool who refuses to recognise it. I am always fascinated when some atheists feel threatened by atheists like me who refuse to deny ourselves access to the distinction.
Yes it is virtue signaling. But if there was ever a subject where we need a little less arrogance, a little less pontificating, fewer pronouncements based on absolute certitude and infallibility, its wherever and whenever religion or its lack, theism or its lack, dominate a conversation.

I am proud to be an atheist who proclaims upfront that he does not know squat as an inviable fact when these topics come up. We could use more expressions of humility and doubt not less. Here is one topic where 'virtue signaling' is a very good plan. Intellectual arrogance is decidedly not.
 
And yet you haven't addressed any of the points I made in the OP. And, BTW, it's neither "virtue signaling" nor arrogance, it's simply a logical approach to the semantics at play here. When you have something constructive to add, feel free.
 
Loulit01 said:
The word has a meaning. You're entitled to your opinions but the word has a meaning. It's not sophistry. It's not intellectual dishonesty. The word has a meaning. You can look up the meaning.
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I did, and the meaning has no inherent meaning. Anything that leaves the pope and I in the same theological category is patently bullshit.
 
bongsaway said:
Sit in a chair and then TRY to stand up. That to me is the position agnostics choose to call their own. You can't try to get up, you either do or don't, period, there is no trying. You either believe in gods or you don't, there's no trying.
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This is stupid. Agnosticsm is not about trying to do anything other than expressing a lack of certitude/ knowledge about something I don't feel certain about knowing. I don't feel a need to change a position. I are comfortable with not knowing and I am please as punch to say so.
 
I have seen no logical or verifiable observable evidence of where any of this Universe came from, the nature of the Universe, or anything similar to that.

Until such time as some sort of satisfactory evidence is presented to me, then I propose that a "Magic Guy" is just about as believable and likely as anything else I have read or heard about it.

Why does this topic enrage you so?
 
bongsaway said:
Sit in a chair and then TRY to stand up. That to me is the position agnostics choose to call their own. You can't try to get up, you either do or don't, period, there is no trying. You either believe in gods or you don't, there's no trying.
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This is a pretty dumb statement IMO.

I'm sure that lots of people in a chair "try to stand up".

Some succeed, some do not, but pretty much all *try*.

bongsaway said:
there's no trying.
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Sure there is. Literally every person that stands up also tries to stand up. Some succeed. Some do not.
 
Shrink726 said:
And yet you haven't addressed any of the points I made in the OP. And, BTW, it's neither "virtue signaling" nor arrogance, it's simply a logical approach to the semantics at play here. When you have something constructive to add, feel free.
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You offered no points worth answering. I have never once felt the sentence 'I don't know' lacked merit in communication. I have always been glad when people tell me what they know and what they do not know. I have always been relieved when people are capable of distinguishing that concept, from what they believe and do not believe. Your 'argument' does absolutely nothing whatsoever to change squat. If you don't care about that distinction, or it is not useful to you. I would find that worrisome if I actually had dealings with you. But I don't. So you can be an atheist and I will be an agnostic atheist.

Chillax Shrink. You can rest certain that there is no God and pontificate your pronouncement as loudly and often as a gnostic theist can pontificate his. I like expressing something you are threatened by. 'I don't know' is a very logical expression of lack of knowledge on a topic where lack of knowledge is virtually guaranteed. I am very upfront about it.
 
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Shrink726 said:
The only real question then is whether you 'believe' there is a god(s), in which case you are a theist or believer or whether you don't, in which case you're an atheist.
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An intelligent person's confidence in the truth value of any given proposition can range from 0% to 100%. Or less formally, the range of our attitudes goes from disproving through denying, imagining, speculating, hypothesizing, opining, believing, knowing and proving. Seems to me that attempts to reduce that range of human cognition into such a simplistic, binary pair as 'believing' and 'not believing' are obviously going to lead to severe intellectual stunting right off the bat... along with introducing many of the same psychological biases of side-picking that helped popularize the Christian theology from which that black and white approach derives. Personally, I am particularly wary of such religion-inspired styles of thinking.

Shrink726 said:
Regarding belief in god(s) using the term agnostic (i.e. "I'm not sure") places the pope and I in the same category.
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Presumably the Pope has or at least would profess >99% confidence in the proposition that the specifically Christian deity exists. If you think - sorry - if you believe that you belong in the same category as the Pope, that's all on you. You are literally trying to argue (against a strawman of your own creation no less) that "Obviously there should be more than one category... therefore we should have no more than two categories!"
 
Shrink726 said:
I did, and the meaning has no inherent meaning. Anything that leaves the pope and I in the same theological category is patently bullshit.
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Its inherent meaning is clear. That you and the pope both do not know if there is a God may offend you, but that is a personal problem or yours, I don't happen to share.
 
PeacefulWarrior said:
Why does this topic enrage you so?
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Because I loathe intellectual laziness and dishonesty.

The issue is what someone believes to be the case.

As there is no proof one way or the other, this is the only question that's relevant. Someone else in this thread posted that he is "an agnostic atheist." If he is suggesting that absent any definitive proof one way or the other then we're all "agnostic atheists or believers." It's like adding a zero to both sides of an equation. It changes nothing and becomes thoroughly irrelevant.
 
btthegreat said:
Its inherent meaning is clear. That you and the pope both do not know if there is a God may offend you, but that is a personal problem or yours, I don't happen to share.
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It doesn't offend me at all. I'm just pointing out the intellectual absurdity and laziness of the term agnostic.
 
Loulit01 said:
The word has a meaning. You're entitled to your opinions but the word has a meaning. It's not sophistry. It's not intellectual dishonesty. The word has a meaning. You can look up the meaning.
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Are you an agnostic about the existence of teams of invisible unicorns circling the moons of Jupiter?
 
If one cannot absolutely prove the existence of God or lack thereof, and refuse to be swayed either way because 'belief'...
a person who believes that nothing is known or can be known of the existence or nature of God or of anything beyond material phenomena; a person who claims neither faith nor disbelief in God
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Seems a pretty simple, understandable definition.

Though if I'm not allowed to be agnostic, I guess I have to lean atheist. But WTF do I know? Nothing, AKA, agnostic.
 
It is easy to be atheist when it comes to Bronze Age mythology on God or Gods, there is no objective truth or fact to any of it.

But that said it is easy to be agnostic when it comes to the question of our universe and reality's origin. Because a prerequisite of science is doubt mixed with willingness to apply some process to obtain new answers, and I can see those who claim to be agnostic not really interested in the God or Gods debate but rather the interest in origin of all we do know so far.

If I am offering anything about the concept it is that time, or dimension in the reality sense of this universe, applied to what we do know still leaves a whole hell of a lot we do not know. and thus we can treat as still a a bunch of unknowns subjected to that doubt mixed with interest.

Does not mean all agnostics are on the fence with these stories of a bored old white haired guy who decided to create it all in a few days just to turn around later and kill just about everyone in a haze of anger and lunacy. Dispense with all that nonsense, subjective truth is all there is left to justify various religions. I doubt all that many are really on the fence on that and if they are odds are it is just not generating all that much time investment to think about it. Just means the conversation on existence, what was and will be long after all of us are dead, is far from concluded and might generate some of that time to ponder. All without subjective truths making a mess of it.

My suspicion on those who are at least some flavor of agnostic are more on the fence about all the things we do not know over a slew of Bronze Age mythology is really the point.
 
Thanks for your opinion.
I am agnostic.
 
holbritter said:
Thanks for your opinion.
I am agnostic.
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Great. According to the definition of the word, so am I and so is the pope.
Explains absolutely nothing.
 
My solution to this quandary of word meaning is to put them in context.
My worldview is one based on science, so “proof” can make a difference.
If you ask what I can prove, I say I am agnostic.
If you ask what I believe, I say I am an atheist.
 
Do you have any factual reason to believe in the Jesus/god thing? Or for that matter the trinity, not the one in New Mexico? Ten years of religion every day in Catholic school and when all was said and done, I believed not a drop of it. It took me quite some time to drop the guilt from not believing and when I did, I never looked back from that decision. To me you either believe in a Christian god here in America or you don't. If's to me only mean, just in case Jesus don't send me to hell for not believing.

There are no god's unless you are watching Jason and the Argonauts.
 
The only way you can " not know squat " is to be willfully, purposely ignorant. You choose to remain ignorant and then call that a virtue.
Let me ask, do you know of even one good argument for the existence of a god? Can you point to one verifiable bit of physical evidence that point out a god must exist? If you cannot then that is somethig you do know.
 
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