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Agnostic vs Atheist
Sorry to rake up this seemingly old one up again but there have been so many posts on this that one more won't do much harm.
Until I joined this site it was not a question that bothered me much. I don't believe in god and that's that. However, there are some points that have been brought up on the agnostic side of the debate that I take umbrage with.
1, You cannot know for sure
2, You cannot prove a negative
I deal with both of these with the "Where are the scissors Darling?" argument. We have all been there and it goes,
"They are in the draw"
"No, they are not, I've looked, twice"
The scene will continue till either the 2nd party coincides by looking in the draw or the 1st pulls out the draw and shows them. But both will know 100% that the draw is scissor-less (or not).
There are lots of other cases where a negative can be proven. Litmus paper can prove the absence of acid. Gieger counters radiation and a cheap mains testers' electrical current, to name a few.
Agnostics claim it's a Schrodinger's cat situation. But in practice, even that is provable. We could use x-rays, thermal imaging or even just listen to hear if the cat is alive or dead.
Okay but a diety is different. It has no mass or energy and cannot be subjected to the same tests. To this, I say that there used to be thought that there was a substance called the ether. It was what light was believed to travel in space though before we knew that light had a very tiny amount of mass. After that, the ether was dispensed to the realms of scientific history. No longer needed on voyage as it does not do anything, is not detectable, and if we never thought of it in the first place then we would not be talking about it now. Does that sound familiar? In other words, agnostics argue on behalf of the possibility of an intangible pair of scissors in the draw. I for one would not run with that.
Now there is another reason for this post and it goes to motive. Why leave the door open? Even if it is only a chink? Like a spurned lover, do you cling to a straw? Readers will recall the character in the movie "Dogma". Who when told by the hot chick that he has no chance, badgers her to admit that if the universe were about to end then she would have sex with him. Is that the real reason that agnosticism? That when you die there might be an afterlife after all? Why else would you give it any thought at all?

273kelvin 8 Aug 12
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37 comments

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1

I think we have to acknowledge that we are (born) all partly agnostic/ignorant, but we should have the freedom to improve our knowledge by a life-long moral, non-toxic Education. We also can admit that Humans and all Terrians can be called Gods, Deities, that is Superior Beings. All Terrian Life, small and big, is Superior in some way, able to learn benefic things, and should participate to the necessary TerraProtectivity. #terriantimelimitedtime #allhumanodeityforterraprotectivity

tipi Level 7 Aug 17, 2019

I would like to disagree with the use of Superior while considering one form of life over another. That, in my opinion, is egocentric for us to think this as we have no idea how any other critter thinks and they have been here, for the most part, longer than we have. They have not tried to ruin where they live. Just a thought.

@dalefvictor All gods and goddesses are simply magnifications of human faults and vices.

@dalefvictor @Lizard_of_Ahaz In the sense that any Terrian Life can be somewhat superior to death.

@Noemi I read the post again and I misread the intent. I totally agree with your argument.

1

Just like organized religion, there are denominations among atheists and agnostics. I was born Roman catholic in France, I have some memory of the nuns with rulers, my family left France before my 4th birthday. Later in life, when I was Jr. High, I made a lot of friends, all religions and those without. Most were actually Christians / Catholics even at our ages then, we were all the same. Most of them went to same high school as me. Their parents changed, my Christian friends parents changed for the worst to the point they would abuse their kids pretty badly for what all teens went through at that age. Some of my best friends were were hospitalized and some did not live. This is when I started literally losing friends nearly annually for the next 25 years of my life, this started me losing whatever faith I had in the concept of God and Christ. These young followers, my friends closer than family, killed so young by their parents worshipers of God and Christ. I was going through suicidal stages every time I lost a friend, I became atheist, but I was this way only at home. I had to change when i was around my friends and others. When conversations about religion, politics with anyone around me (away from home) arouse, I would curse about religion. It wasn't until I was in Jr. College, when someone who came to talk to me when I was crying after losing yet another very close friend. That person stayed with me, others came they were just asking questions about myself, my opinions and so forth I unloaded everything on all of them. No one spoke for no less than 3 minutes, most were shocked, the first one to speak started telling me I'll get through this like before. As an ice breaker someone asked about my bloodline, from birth father I'm from the Moors from mother the Vikings. That started a different conversation of Norse mythology, in which I do believe in, some were confused by my answer, stating Christianity comes from Norse Mythology. After doing some research on that, most sources were saying the same thing creation is in every mythology. Basically agnostics have always been around but not necessarily atheists, they were dealt with. The stereotype of an atheist is the other extreme of evangelicals. I tell people I'm agnostic and I add religion is not for me. I'm 46 yrs old now, I have met some very friendly party like Christians who felt everyone is entitled to believe whatever they want as long it doesn't encroach unto other people's beliefs. I had begun to use that for myself, that's what it's all truly all about.

1

Your second statement is false to fact.... History and archaeology​ both show that religion is made up and recycled bullshit from previous myths and legends....

1

I merely do not claim to know what I can not show to true.
I can not show there are no gods. But I can most definitely show that theists are lying or contracting themselves, which is a very good reason to not believe anything they say about their gods and live my life free of such fantasies.

2

i know for sure there are no gods, i am 100% sure about this, why? because all gods that ever existed were and are all man made, and as i have said many times before, i do not give a flying fuck about who chooses to believe in what or not, not my business ergo I don't care

3

i've answered this question before. i consider myself an atheist b/c i don't believe in a personal god but i don't totally discount the possibility of superior beings out there which would compare to us as we compare to a protozoa.

I wouldn't call them superior. Just "other"

0

I'm an atheist. It means without a god. I don't call myself an agnostic because it often implies uncertainty. Could the Universe be part of a super particle? Sure. But it's not worthy of considering given that the reason to think that there is comes from anything worthy to pursue it.

I don't have a worthy reason to believe that God exists anymore than the super particle. Agnosticism would mean there is a super particle.

0

Agnosticism is a lack of knowledge that a god exist. Not all agnostic believe there is an afterlife. I'm an agnostic atheist.

1

Like I said somewhere else:

Supose you tell me you can lift a truck with your mind. I'm 100% sure you can't, cause this is impossible. Magic is not real.

It's up to you to try to prove me wrong, but until then I give your claim absolutely no value.

Edu_0 Level 4 Aug 13, 2019
0

Wrong type of scissors.

0

With regard to the scissors if it was a ‘boy’ look they probably are in the drawer!

Lol. Can't count the times a kid insisted they weren't in the drawer when they were sitting there in the drawer in plain sight.

8

I love these conversations. Sometimes I get into debates with church folk who fear that what I say will make them dissolve into dust if the listen to me. They adamantly push their opinions and beliefs on me as if being inn their presence is something that I should hold onto. I tell them the same thing that I tell both sides. Fact: "We don't know shit" Fact: For every possibility that we could ever think up we are left with nothing more than belief" Until I can extend my life long enough to see some form of truth, I am left with with more tangible things like living daily life and survival. I recognize that proof one way or another doesn't change life for me. I'm here on this site because it's a community that I feel very comfortable in and the knowledge that we all feel similarly helps me make it through the day. That's really all it's about, yes?

Well said! I agree.

Exactly.

3

I agree that negative assertions can be proven, but IMO no proof is absolute. If a person is interested in whether or not God exists he should concentrate, not on proof or disproof but on searching. Belief, disbelief and proofs are for people who just want to argue—muddy the water so they don’t have to look at something.

The God concept does not lend itself to proof because we are talking about ultimate reality. Existence at that higher level is beyond our puny little intellects, which are mired in the sensory dreamworld of illusion. The very concept of time is an illusion according to quantum gravity theory, and therefore any question about existence, creation, immortality or selfhood as a body is meaningless.

Besides atheism and agnosticism, someone here has pointed out a third option: ignosticism. Ignostics claim that it is meaningless to argue for or against God because the word can not be defined in a clear and acceptable way.

0

Possibilianism is something I subscribe to overall. Possibilianism is a philosophy which rejects both the diverse claims of traditional theism and the positions of certainty in strong atheism in favor of a middle, exploratory ground.
To quote who came up with the term "Our ignorance of the cosmos is too vast to commit to atheism, and yet we know too much to commit to a particular religion. A third position, agnosticism, is often an uninteresting stance in which a person simply questions whether his traditional religious story (say, a man with a beard on a cloud) is true or not true. But with Possibilianism I'm hoping to define a new position — one that emphasizes the exploration of new, unconsidered possibilities. Possibilianism is comfortable holding multiple ideas in mind; it is not interested in committing to any particular story."
I apply this not only to religion but everything. Evidence for/against, hell we think we have little left to prove and discover but a picture of a black hole and scientists making vaccines much more expensive, scientists who got past our fear of resistant bacteria by creating, from horoscopes to stardust theory, this disproves things like healing crystals but explores as a species are learning how to use placebo and better understand the effect. Dieties are extremely improbable and forms of atheism have been around as long as religion. Evolution is prov
I think a lot of agnostic people aren't comfortable with either idea. The more I learn the more 'atheist' I become but also the more full of wonder I become. An issue I have is people stay surface level and stops at the first step of no god.

4

Yes, negatives can be proven. In fact, ten of the fifteen valid forms of the classical syllogism have negative conclusions. For example, premises “All A are B” and “No B are C” prove the universal negative, “No A are C”; and premises “Some A are not B” and “All C are B” prove the particular negative, “Some A are not C.” Likewise, in propositional logic, the premises “If A then B” and “It is not the case the B” prove the negative proposition, “It is not the case that A.” What holds in each case it that you can’t prove a negative conclusion without having a negative premise. And the same is the case with the scissors example. That is, from “There are stamps [paper clips, etc., etc.] in the drawer in cannot be concluded that “There are no scissors in the drawer” without the negative understanding that “There is no other place in the drawer where the scissors could be.”

3

Great comments and I have nothing to add that has not already been said. TY for posting and providing an enjoyable morning with coffee read. 🙂

I will say it is more likely just an individual thing. My Dad was raised Catholic, stopped 'believing' at an early age and claim to be atheist. Then decided agnostic was a better way to define things.
Sadly I never really got to sit down and talk with him about all this before he passed as I moved away when I was 20 and well many know how it is when relationships with one or both parents is strained. I think that is my greatest regret, the missed time chatting with a very intelligent human.

5

A deity has no mass or energy. How would we know this? I think pixies are living in my shoes. In fact, they are in there even when my feet are in there.

4

Is there a fairy called Mehitabel living at the bottom of my garden?

Can I PROVE she's not there? No. Can I PROVE she is there? No. I therefore do not believe the case for, or against, the existence of Mehitabel the Fairy is provable - making me a 'Mehitabel Agnostic'.

That said, do I actually believe Mehitabel IS there? No - of course I don't. The whole concept of Mehitabel existing makes no sense. I therefore do not believe in the existence of Mehitabel - therefore making me a 'Mehitabel Atheist'.

Atheism and Agnosticism are descriptions of two DIFFERENT AND INDEPENDENT perceptions of reality. One about the existence of god himself, and the other about the possibility of proving the matter.

You can be an Atheist without being an Agnostic - "I do not believe in the existence of god, and I further believe the matter is provable".

You can be an Agnostic without being an Atheist - "I do not believe the existence of god can be proven, but I believe he exists".

You can be neither Atheist nor Agnostic - "I believe in the existence of god, and I believe that existence is provable".

Or you can be both Atheist and Agnostic - "I do not believe in the existence of god, but I believe the matter unprovable."

It's two entirely separate questions:-

DO YOU BELIEVE IN THE EXISTENCE OF AT LEAST ONE GOD? Answer 'Yes' and you're a THEIST, answer anything else (ie, you don't actively believe) and you're not a theist. The word for 'not a theist' is ATHEIST. There is no option 3 - you're either one or the other.

DO YOU BELIEVE THE EXISTENCE OR NON-EXISTENCE OF GOD IS PROVABLE? Answer 'Yes' and you're a GNOSTIC, answer anything else (ie, you don't actively believe the matter provable) and you're not a gnostic. The word for 'not a gnostic' is AGNOSTIC. Again, there is no option 3 - you're either one or the other.

Personally I'm an Agnostic Atheist.

0

I don't basically disagree with you but I think that the "Where are the scissors Darling?" analogue is not a good one. The real equivalent should be. "There are no scissors in an unknown draw somewhere perhaps on a distant planet." Which is the real meaning of you can not prove a negative, it does not refer to specific cases, but only to generalized negatives, using only logic not evidence.

We do not live in a hypothetical world. We live in a real-world with real causes and effects. If I look in the draw and find no scissors? I can say that no scissors exist in the only draw I can look at. When I look at the world and all its history and find no evidence of a god that was believed to exist. Then I can say that he is not here.
As for the possible existence of scissors in another place that I have no access to. They are of no use to me and it just does not cut it.

@Bobby9 I think he meant analogy - I have the same problem.

@273kelvin, @silverotter11 You may use either, but I used analogue, because it implies a more exact match than analogy.

@273kelvin Yes very true, scissors or gods do not cut it with me at all either. But the draw far off in space is often the last retreat of the theist. Especially when pressed by reasoning to which they have no answer. So that it is that god or scissors that we are usually asked to address.

@OwlInASack That's it.

0

The only thing up for debate is what started the universe. But it seems very likely to me one day or species will figure that out too. Thus, I'm atheist.

1

No, you can't prove a negative and no, you can't know with 100% certainty. The latter claim is easily shown by the possibility that everything might be an illusion, a matrix scenario, brain-in-a vat etc. You can't even know 100% that the draw exists, so how could you say that it is scissor-less. There is always a tiny possibility that something might be wrong.
Now the former claim. In your example with the draw you don't prove a negative when showing it to be empty. You make a positive claim about the inside of the draw. If we could observe the whole universe at once somehow we could prove that something doesn't exist but only observable things that are inside of the universe and prove only in relation to the observation that could be faulty.
The difference between agnostic and atheist is most often only a definitional difference. Agnostics don't hold the believe that a god exists, which in my book is an atheist. 'Agnostic' only means that you can't know it. But some people for whatever reason don't want to call themselves atheist.

Dietl Level 7 Aug 13, 2019
1

"Why else would you give it any thought at all?"..... My only observation is that it seems to me that you just did that.

1

I am perfectly happy to be a staunch atheist who knows that there is no divine authority as alluded to by all sorts of religions.
Religious people are true agnostics because they just believe rather than know.

2

I am really rather tired of this somewhat artificial division between the two words. I was always of the opinion that the arguments between the two were similar to dancing on the head of a pin. However, since joining this site I have revised my view of those who are adamantly agnostic, a group I hitherto though of as less certain of their disbelief than those like me who are atheist. I use the word “adamant” deliberately...because I have only discovered these more militant agnostics here on this site. I find their arguments to be uncompelling, as they use the same arguments for their agnosticism as the religious do for their beliefs.

Thank you, Marionville. Which is why I question their motives

@273kelvin I find them tiresome....some I believe are still indecisive on whether they do or don’t believe in god, as they can’t let the idea go completely despite no evidence. The ones who say they are scientists baffle me most,

Adamant agnostic, huh? That's new. Not seen any. But I did take a prolonged break from this site (January 2018 - June 2019), so quite possibly stuff went down while I was away.

For me - both atheist and agnostic, and someone who prefers to call myself an atheist bc it's simpler - the debate can be tiresome, and it's usually initiated, as in this case, by a gnostic atheist, seldom if ever by an "adamant agnostic" (what is that? It sounds like an oxymoron).

I participated in this debate, however, and thought it went rather well, by which I simply mean "civilly." So your comment about adamant or militant agnostics took me by surprise. Are you sure you're not simply talking about tired or frustrated agnostics weary of explaining to gnostic atheists that the two axes address completely different questions?

(I'm mostly kidding. I believe you. I just find the idea of a militant agnostic utterly weird, and I wanted to make sure you weren't talking about any of us on this thread.)

@vertrauen I have been on this site for 14 months and have run into quite a few whom I would consider to be “adamant “, perhaps even aggressive in their agnostic views. There are some here on the site at present whom I would describe as such, but that is from a purely personal viewpoint and others may not agree with me, but feel sure some do.

1

A negative can be proven if the affirmation is falsifiable or if there is no intern consistency in the proposition.
3 different cases here
If it is falsifiable all you need is to perform the experiment.
If it lacks internal consistency, the proposition is proving itself wrong
BUT it it is internally consistent and NON falsifiable then you can't prove or disprove (but also is a meaningless proposition in terms of logical knowledge).

There is a 4th where the experiment is impossible like mathematical formulas that work with all numbers you tested, but there is no prof that will work forever, or the case of the black swam that can always be hidden somewhere you haven't looked yet.

The non falsifiable and the impossibility to complete the test are the cases where a negative can't be proved.
But in the case that there are no positive evidences the logical way is act as if do not exist because you can say an infinitude of swam colors exist, we just haven't met it yet, and for practical purposes this kind of proposition has no meaning.
And THAT is the agnostic position, something that can't be tested and at the same time can be proposed with an infinitude of variations (colors of exotic swams or gods) have no meaning in the objective world and can be ignored or treated as non existent.

I agree with this. It is both true and more useful to call myself an atheist, so I do. I don't understand, though, why gnostic atheists spend such energy arguing with agnostic atheists. It's a waste of both our times. The agnostic position isn't a backdoor to any religion. It's just about a theory of the nature of knowledge.

@vertrauen problem here is that most people that have doubts call themselves agnostics...
Agnostic is not a doubt, it is a strong and firm position that the question is meaningless if no evidence is presented...
IS saying that I do not need to choose or believe in the non existence to act as if does not exist.
A god that does not interact with the reality and give no evidence of itself is for al purposes the same as a non existent god, this is the Agnostic position.
I do not have to evaluate all the propositions of god, the proponent needs to give me an evidence for me even start to consider...

@TheMiddleWay the proble is that you can make an infinite number of non-falsifiable claims of a god-like entity, they all have the same weight if the definition is at least internally consistent, the garage dragon is a perfect example of it.
So is not about deciding it do not exist, it is acting as if it does not, because for logic or you take into account infinite amount of non falsifiable beings or none of them, and most of them do not admit the existence of the other.
In the end it will be arbitrary to choose your favorite imaginary friend and randomly pointing a finger and say that that specific version of one exists.

It is different from string theory (actually string hypothesis to be scientifically correct), we do not have the technology to test it yet, but there are ways to test it, we are developing theoretical knowledge and technology to be able to test it, we already know that the current standard model fails in some places and we will need a new one at some point.

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