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This is my understanding.

If you believe there are gods or a God, you are a theist.

If you believe there is no God or gods, you are an atheist.

Everyone else, who is neither certain there is a God or gods, nor certain that there isn't or aren't, is agnostic.

An agnostic has not ruled either possibility out.

The Christian who starts to doubt is an agnostic.

The person (likely calling themself sn atheist) who is pretty sure there is no God/gods but states they would change their mind with proof, is an agnostic!

All of you who did not choose 100% or zero on the belief question, are agnostics.

As for myself, I don't care. Not having an opinion and not even thinking about it, makes me agnostic.

There may be more useful ways to blend these categories for various reasons. For instance, the agnostic who is just a questioning Christian has a lot more in common with the theist, than with the almost atheist agnostic who claims they would believe with proof. That agnostic has 99% in common with an actual atheist. But I think it is important to remember or understand that most people here are agnostic. And I also want to say it is not useful to claim someone isn't an agnostic because they lean theist.

Thoughts?

LionMousePudding 6 July 24
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24 comments

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6

This one has more nuance....I like how it points out "born here."
Pick whichever quadrant, circle, or oval that best describes you...or not...because most agnostics (at least the ones I know) aren't into labels anyway. lol

@Anne-95209 Excellent. Fascinating. So the improvement to my bare bones definition is indeed to divide into groups, with some terms I was not aware of. I will have to study to see whether my very basic understanding is contradicted; or if it is elaborated upon.

Not only are there groups, each has its own continuim. That makes it much more difficult to put into words, thus the misunderstandings between people using the same vocabulary. Let us know what you find.

@Anne-95209 perfect. These misunderstandings are what I wanted to clarify. I was not even close in my imagination of the complexity of these solutions.

I have also been very much enjoying responses to my bare bones theory, such as it is.

5

You're using "atheism" here to refer only to positive atheism — and that's a common misapprehension. You may want to research negative atheism and the distinction between it and positive atheism. The way I think of it is a little oversimplified, but works to keep it in mind: positive atheism is the assertion that no God or gods exist, negative atheism is a rejection of the claim that God or gods exist (which might sound similar but has an important distinction), and agnosticism is the notion that the existence of God or gods is unknown or unknowable. I'd agree that most theists and atheists are agnostic, but there's still overlap in these terms (because language / definitions aren't mathematically precise applications of set theory). There are other related terms, like "ignostic," that you might want to look up as well, if you're interested in all viewpoints on the subject.

Thank you ?

4

I follow your logic here, but the reason I'm inclined to disagree is that 100% number. To be 100% sure, one must have complete knowledge of the given subject. In the case of knowledge of the existence of god(s) or lack thereof, that would require complete knowledge of the universe. (I KNOW there is no god because I KNOW the universe and he/she/it does not exist therein.) No human has that knowledge, at least to my own knowledge. And to take the argument to it's logical conclusion, any person that DID have that knowledge would themselves qualify as a god (at least in the sense on omniscience). Stretch..? I don't know, you tell me.

By my system, those people who think that way are not atheists. Atheists know. Or believe they know. Once you get into the realm of "I can't know," you are doubting again.

Perhaps the actual atheist then, combining your thoughts and mine, is naive.

Everyone, I an NOT calling atheists naive. I am exploring the implications that certain theories would bring one to!

4

It is nice for discussion to make the distinction, but does it really matter to the individual. You are what you are. What bugs me are those who have no idea what they know but believe that one has to make a choice to make them happy. Personally I cannot argue that a Christian God exists as the literature makes no sense to me. If an idea is based on literature or some written document then the topic can be discussed. For many it seems to me they may have the bible memorised but have no real idea of its content.

3

I am an atheist. I KNOW there are no gods.
Unless and until I am shown credible and verifiable evidence to the contrary, I have no reason to change my position

@Qopel Unless and until credible, verifiable evidence exists to prove the existence of any god, I am quite confident that there aren't any.
I KNOW there are no gods.
Prove otherwise and I'll change my mind.

3

Almost 60 years ago, I realized I was agnostic, stopped being religious, and thought that was the end of it. But, my study of physics led to the understanding that all we see is not as it appears an a microscopic scale, and our knowledge is limited about everything. We don't know if we live in a real universe or a simulation. We are ignorant, naked apes. Data is abundant, information is rare, knowing is impossible. We have information about energy and mass, E=mcc. However, we don't know what energy is, what mass is, or why the speed of light is what it is. I am generally agnostic; in other words, I am skeptical we know anything about anything.

EdEarl Level 8 July 25, 2018
3

Honestly if you want to describe Atheists as those that believe that that no god exists, there is a slight difference in my understanding. I am an Atheist because no evidence has been brought forth that a god does indeed exists. They can't prove that there is a god, and I can not prove that one does not exists. But I can say That there has been no emperical evidence that has been brought forth to prove that indeed a god does exists. So my default has to be that I can not believe in something that has not been proven.l

But does not the fact that you say you will believe with evidence mean you are not sure? I would never say I will believe that cats have six legs if I am given evidence. I am sure that cats have four or fewer (in case of injury or mutation) legs. No one will ever convince me otherwise; so I would not even entertain the thought that I would believe it if anything.

On the other hand, such profession can be not an actual belief but a challenge; or the reason.

What do you think?

@LionMousePudding Just because we don't have evidence right here and now that there is no god doesn't mean that one day that evidence won't be found. I am convinced that one day there will be cures for different cancers. I am convinced because science has shown that it continues to grow, it tests and re-tests until the evidence is conclusive. So although we can't know conclusively this moment that there is no god, I am sure that one day we will look back at this stage of religious believers and laugh approarously.

3

I would also add that theists on the whole believe in an interactive god—one who takes an interest in humanity and will, on occasion, act. This I do not believe. But there may also be a ‘middle ground’ in deity ideology: Deism. My avatar, like a number of his Revolutionary contemporaries, was a deist who believed that the creator (or nature's god), having made this universe and the laws governing it, moved on to other things, never to be heard from or observed.

Thomas Paine eschewed all faiths. To him, religion was a fabrication of man, utterly lacking in moral authority, and it is left entirely up to people to right wrongs and make a better world. Consider a world of Deism without holy books, no prophets, no doctrines or creeds, no miracles and no clergy. Now I could live with that!

Interesting!

3

This is the best description I've seen that describes the relationship between (a)gnostic and (a)theist. It's in chart form, which is an added bonus.

The emojis were a surprise. I typed the letter a in parentheses, and got halos. Love the irony!

@Anne-95209 Sadly, as I have learned, there a many things we cannot type on this blog without creating some stupid new emoji!

Fortunately for me, the emojis worked well in context. lol

2

@LionMousePudding -- Sorry, but no cigar. I am an evidentialist/atheist/agnostic and there is a reason why that combination works. First, I have no belief whatsoever in any god or gods. I have no belief in anything not related to objective reality. The reason I have no belief in anything supernatural is because there is no evidence to support any such claim.

Allow me to clarify an important issue. I hold no beliefs in anything other than the mundane things we all use to navigate through the day without cognitive overload. I require evidence for anything else. Hence the term atheist is a correct description of my position. If you want to know what I mean by mundane beliefs, ask me.

Since I follow the epistemology of evidentialism, I must remain open to any evidence from any source at any time. It is also because of this that, though I hold no belief in any deities or other supernatural ideas, I must consider any evidence offered to support the notion of god(s) or anything else that has been unknown before the evidence is presented. It is because of this that I cannot make the claim that "...there is no ...........................(fill in the blank)," even though I have no belief in whatever. To make that claim would require that I have the evidence needed to support the claim. Since I do not have that evidence, I am an agnostic in relation to such a claim.

2

The way it's been explained to me, which I think makes sense, is that theism involves belief whereas gnosis involves knowledge. Which means that everyone is a combination of both. I'm an agnostic atheist because while I don't believe there is a supernatural anything, I don't know whether there is one.

2

So yeah everyone is agnostic. Christians, Muslims, Jews, atheists. Everyone is agnostic because no one KNOWS 100 percent there is or isn't a god. You cannot possible know everything about the cosmic relm. I personally do not call myself an agnostic atheist because it is redundant. I call myself an atheist. Someone who doesn't believe in god/God's because there is a severe lack of evidence to support religion. Again, no one can be 100 percent sure no matter what you say because you cannot possible know everything. There very well could be a god that just decides not to present himself. That's why I chose 99.9 percent. Because I fairly damn certain there is not an intelligent creater but again I can't be 100 percent.

Jjones Level 4 July 24, 2018

See above. And remember, we are talking philosophy at this point.

I know 1,000,000,000,000,000 percent that there are no gods, I am definitely not agnostic, I am Michael and I am an atheist, hell, I am an antitheist, as the American Atheist Organization puts it, I am an atheist. Just because I don't know the whole universe story from the Big Bang to the present doesn't mean I haven't seen enough to make a final judgement about our Universe, There is so mauch supporting evedence.

@LionMousePudding maybe I am not interpreting what you are saying but atheism is not about knowledge but deals with the disbelief in a god/gods.... Agnosticism is dealing with knowledge. Agnosticism doesn't apply to just religion. It applys to essentially everything seeing as no one can for sure know all the outcomes of a certain situation. Are you saying that I cannot be atheist because I say there is a .01 percent chance there could be a god? Just to sum up my thoughts, you can be both agnostic and atheist. You cannot be Christian and atheist. But you can be Christian and agnostic. Because religion and knowledge are two complete separate things.

@Jjones @MichaelAllan57 I concede ??

2

Gnostic and agnostic is about knowledge. Theist and atheist is about beliefs.
An atheist doesn't believe in God and a theist
does.
An agnostic doesn't know if there is or isn't one and a Gnostic knows there is or isn't one. In truth all people, theist or atheist are really agnostic because there is no way to know for certain.
But to break it down.
Gnostic atheist: I know there is no god (s)
Gnostic theist: there is a god and I know it for a fact.
Agnostic atheist: I can't say there definitely isn't but I don't believe there is.
Agnostic theist: I can't say there definitely is but I believe there is.
Gnostic in either case is an untenable position because there is no possible way to be sure of the knowledge without being a god themselves. All people from the pope to Dawkins are agnostic.

The gnostics would disagree that their position is untenable, as they define it differently.

@Anne-95209 true, they would...doesnt change reality though.

No their not! One can know for a fact that their simply no immortal beings, this is just plain fact one can and should arrive at using one's own intellect, the facts, so so so very many of them causes one to arrive at this simple and obvious answer, if one only will apply one's intellectual Powers.

@MichaelAllan57 in order for something, anything to be a fact it must be objectively verifiable. That is what defines a subject as fact. The existence of a god is not objectively verifiable one way or the other. Specific gods such as the Christian or other claimed mono and polytheistic gods can be logically proven to be falsehoods that is true. But to claim as fact that there is none cannot. That is as much as a falsehood as those who claim there is.
Logically in all probability you are correct there are none but that is not a fact because it is not objectively verifiable, the only way to verify that as a fact would be to you yourself, be omnipresent and omniscient. The universe is immensely vast, not to mention possible multiverses. To state as fact there are none at all anywhere is an untenable position to hold. I myself hold to the belief there isn’t, or more accurately I don’t believe there is. But that cannot be verified therefore it is not a fact.
Ultimately though the question itself is a moot point. Weather or not a god or gods exist is irrelevant, should they not well....they don’t. Should they exist then they have created an existence that requires no intervention on their part to function thereby rendering themselves irrelevant. The worshippers are the true problem, regardless of the gods existence or lack there of.

2

If, "As for myself, I don't care. Not having an opinion and not even thinking about it, makes me agnostic". Then why the post?

Gonna have to agree here. I don't know if it's the OP's intention, but this comes across pretty abrasive and at least once makes an attempt at unilaterally defining the terms for all of us, completely paying neither attention nor consideration to the dozens of variations of this conversation already on this site which have, if I'm being completely honest, contained much better general definitions for all of these terms without ducking directly into directly stating that anyone who didn't answer a certain question with one of two exact answers is wrong and has to follow this prescribed definition.

I don't care whether there is some sort of God object thingy. I do care about the usage of words, and the differences in definition people use and assume. I have my own assumptions; I have laid them out for you. I am asking 1. What you think of my definitions, and 2. What yours are, and 3. Why there is a difference. I am a linguist and a philosopher.

If you are actually offended that my belief system is "I don't care," I ask you why that is not valid. Does every agnostic have to study and pore and examine and obsess? What in that case would be your definition of agnostic, if not "one who is not certain there is, and is not certain there isn't? Why is my definition wrong? What criterion or criteria do you add to my extremely basic and broad definition?

@geist171 I am laying out my own thoughts and asking about yours. I do believe, until otherwise convinced, that anyone between 1 and 99 is agnostic. But you do not have to be offended by the fact that I have this belief. People have different beliefs. Being offended every time someone has a belief which could extend to you, is going to keep you offended a lot.

And I have the question. If you do not like the fact that I posted, why did you comment? Just click past the posts you do not want to read. Or are you blaming me for the time it took you to read it? You could have figured out pretty quickly that you disagreed.

I have laid out the intent of my text. What is the intent of your comment? Who is your audience? Me? Am I supposed to feel chastened by your opinion? Why would you waste your time making that little bit of negativity in the world? Or is your audience other readers, who need to know that you don't like the very fact that I posted? Is it to collect other people who do not like it? So your goal is to multiply chasten me in a group? Or is your goal to let the world know that you don't like that you disagree with the very fact that I posted? Why do they need to know that?

When it comes to writing on the Internet, before pressing enter you should think about these four things:

  1. I can have a thought and not write it down.

  2. Who is my audience?

  3. What is my goal in writing this? Am I informing? Am I trying to add a little negativity to the world? Am I trying to insult someone; and is that a good goal?

  4. What might the effect be? Is this something better avoided?

@LionMousePudding The purpose of my comment was to agree with the previous comment. I believe you are being at least one degree of magnitude more confrontational than is necessary for the conversation you're trying to have. Your sentence structure, use of punctuation, and word choice all indicate these statements are coming from a place of anger, which you are directing more or less at members of the community who do not immediately agree with your very semantically limited explanation of three belief systems. And you are absolutely welcome to your beliefs, opinions, and philosophies. And you are equally welcome to share them. But intention and interpretation are different sides of a coin.

Intention of a statement is 100% in the realm of the speaker.
Interpretation of that statement is 100% in the realm of the audience.

You are welcome to say what you want, and we are welcome to interpret what you are saying and how you are saying it. My issue is far less with what you're trying to say, and far more with how you're trying to say it.

I do not believe this level of animosity, defensiveness, and confrontational verbal posturing is congruent with a group of people who are, for all intents and purposes, in at least some form of agreement with the ideas you're espousing, but you're doing it in the most abrasive way possible, and I'm not sure that's the best angle. It's just my opinion, you can not like it if you want, but I am just as welcome to speak my opinion as you are to speak yours.

@geist171 I see that my writing and perhaps thinking style do not please you.

@LionMousePudding It's entirely possible. I place a lot of value on the how, sometimes more than the what. I am perfectly happy to agree to disagree in that instance.

1

Months ago I removed Agnostic from my self description. I KNOW (zero belief + piles of evidence that they are fabrications borne of fear, ignorance, selfish and often purely malicious desire for control over others) that the gods of all religions don't exist. As for some sort of deistic god, what does it matter? If such an entity exists or once existed, it is without any doctrines or dogma. It's interesting to speculate, but why label yourself based on something which is inconsequential. It clouds the issue and is a waste of time. I bet that the majority of theists have some doubts if they are being honest. That's why they call it faith. Yet most of them do not identify with the word agnostic. Yet I have no doubts that all religions and their gods (the only things that matter) are false. So why should one label themselves according such a thing. I think it slows progress, lacks practicality the way it's commonly used, and provides too much comfort and shelter for those who would promote irrational beliefs or are too afraid of offending. And ultimately, IS ANYTHING AT ALL ABSOLUTELY KNOWABLE?

1

an agnostic doesn't believe so default she must be an atheist.

I trust science. So at the moment we are at the place where the origin of the universe can be explained without a god. But of course it can't be proved there is NO god. So by default, I put 95% sure there is no god because no one can prove one way or the other there is no god. However I prefer to round up and so can call myself an atheist.

I think this is false. If you look it up on science sitesthey have no explanation for the earliest fractions of a second of the universe. They say their science can't explain it. Yet. And the yet part is pure conjecture.

@CallMeDave No more so than a deist god explanation. But to move from a deist god to a theist god of religions is pure confabulation.

@CallMeDave there are some gaps but since everything else can be explained without supernatural events, it would be highly unlikely that it would be used to fill in the gaps.

1

Pretty cool thread ... love the insights and personal interpretations of atheism and agnosticism... my basic fall back on my being an atheist rather than any agnostic tendencies is the simple fact that you cannot prove a negative.... god bless...?

1

Y’all are making such awesome, complex, fascinating points! I am so glad I posted! It will take a lot of reading and thought before I ever state my opinion again ❤️❤️

I for one would be proud of that post.. I realise you chance of sarcasm regarding not posting your opinions again without scrupulously fact checking.... Is most likely tongue in cheek. .. look at your thread. Though...you got people writing... And Lionmousepudding.......I like it..

@Seriousreason ..on this topic, I should say ?. In other words, I have a lot here to study and learn before I ask another question.

Thank you! I am nicknamed Mouse, strong as a lion, and sweet as pudding ??

1

Good question since agnostic just don't see any evidence of a god which every Christian could say but yet always refer to the bible, a man made object as the evidence. It's just a belief. It's the role of science that has begun to explain those bible fables; chariots of fire are meteors, acts of god destroying cities were earthquakes or volcanoes erupting. Their theological theory is this planet is over 6,000 years old from evaluating the bible's timeline. How one woman was created from a man's rib and their 2 son's had wifes. So where did their wifes come from? That dinosaur bones were made by man to discredit their religion; the earth is flat and we are the center of the universe which everything revolves around which was the belief over 2,000 years ago; man faked the moon landing, the rapture, Noah's Arc put 2 of each animal on board to repopulate the earth and with only his family to have survived. Let's say that happened 2000 years after Adam and Eve so it's been over 4,000 years to have all these people we have now. Mose's parted the Red Sea with his staff and Mary getting pregnant without having sex. Then there are the pyramids worldwide and Stonehenge as early examples that are well over 6,000 years old and nowhere near the earliest examples. This shows how ignorant, gullible and easily brainwashed we are as the so called intelligent species here. We really can not trust ourselves. The brain is so overrated and misunderstood at this stage in our evolution. The teaching of creationism has fooled our ability to understand who we really are and how we really came to be. Until we, who think differently, stand up to stop these misguided humans for their 2000 years old fictional concept of life and start teaching people the facts that science has showed us to be more real and easily believed. Gotta love mathematics. It will be a long uphill battle to live in the real world. We will be our own demise if we don't stop this madness. My brain hurts just from thinking of the level of blind-minds we are dealing with. And that's just from one religion. Others have the same god but a different justification for how he came to be and then there are the ones with multiple gods. And each religion hates the other thru their extremists. We will need alot of psych wards in the future though I think putting them all on the moon is the best option with only one tv channel, the Science Channel.

It frustrates me that in for instance OKCupid, the same men who understand science; are intelligent; and are agnostic or atheist; will still say that creationism should be taught side by side with evolution. Can they not see that they are swallowing the framing of the dominant religion? Can they not see that this is a violation of separation of church and state? And of course the next question is why are we teaching the Christian theory of the start of life? Why not the Buddhist theory? Or maybe there are turtles all the way down?

0

There are terms for dividing atheists, theists, gnosts and agnosts.

Gnostic: claims surety
Agnostic: claims lack of surety
Theist: Belief in existence of God(s)
Atheist: disbelief in existence of God(s)

Gnostic Theist: Has no doubt inf god(s)
Agnostic Theist: Believes in existence of god(s), but doesn’t claim to know for certain
Gnostic Atheist: Absolutely certain there is no such thing as deity
Agnostic Atheist: doesn’t believe in god(s), but will change their mind if they are given sufficient evidence.

0
0

What do you all think about this?

"Religion for the Nonreligious"

[waitbutwhy.com]

Especially @EdEarl @ghettophilosopher @MsDemeanour @Roadglider @RaySchuler

Thank you for sharing both the article and that web site. First off this article made me feel not as lonely with my thoughts. I did consider myself to be a "Realist" since I was trying to be Real with my thinking but I see now that "Truthist" seems more true and accurate of who I am and the way I prefer to see the "bigger picture" thats around me. As I read I began to feel small, then tiny, and then i felt like the "Incredible Shrinking Man". I just kept getting smaller as I saw the bigger picture of this writer's words. I do think that there is different levels in the natural order of life which we call mother nature that guides simple life to mature thru evolution to the complex of the creation of stars within the universe. Now as to the possibility this is one universe amongst many like bubbles in a tub is yet to be known though I am curious. I have considered the "Matrix" as one possibility to what place in reality we might be. I'm really not sure what our universe, as a whole, truely is or where it is. I've also consider the multidimensional concept and that is still beyond me. The possibility of "Others" in this universe who are far older then our species as being somewhere out there I have not doubted. As to whether we have been "visited" by such, I don't think so but I also do say "anything is possible". I think articles like this is what should be taught in school, discussed and debated constantly as a guideline to help people find their "rational" selves. I was going to say "logical" selves but I'm not sure about using the word "logical" after reading that. What a fantastic read.

0

While I do rule out all-powerful, all-knowing "gods" as depicted by humans in their religious practices, I don't rule out alien scientists who mixed their DNA with the hominids that evolved a hundred thousand years ago thus creating a hybrid that was "human" and then stuck around to see how the experiment did....and gave the humans little shoves toward civilization when they needed it in the early myrietes hence ending up in the mythologies and folklore as the "sons of the heavens" that came down to earth.... "Let us make man in OUR image"....

0

That verbiage omits deism.

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