- #71
cronxeh
Gold Member
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Naturalist, I do believe you are referring to iconoclasts. Yea you don't want those around your local church
hypnagogue said:These points have been covered here before, but an explicit summary might be helpful.
Agnosticism and theism/atheism, strictly speaking, are not positions that lie along a continuum (although they can be taken that way colloquially, as loseyourname has pointed out). Agnosticism is an epistemological view about what we can know about God's existence, and (a)theism is a metaphysical view about whether God does, in fact, exist. For instance, consider the following statement: "God exists." Agnosticism is a position on whether this statement can be justified, and (a)theism is a position on whether this statement is true. These are evaluations of the statement along two independent dimensions. For instance, one might conjecture that Fermat's Last Theorem is true (or false), while simultaneously believing that it cannot (or can) be proven. The matter of belief in the theorem's truth or falsity is separate from beliefs about whether it can be proven (at least while no conclusive proofs have yet been demonstrated).
Thus, whether a person is agnostic or not has no logical consequence upon whether s/he is theist or not. Rather than thinking of theism, atheism, and agnosticism as lying along a continuum, we should think of them as being orthogonal to, or independent from, each other. If we decide to differentiate between strong and weak atheism, then we have six possible views arising from the possible combinations on the metaphysical and epistemological stances. In the following, let b(x) mean "believes that x," and let G be the statement "God exists."
agnostic theist: b(G); believes that neither G nor ~G can be justified.
non-agnostic theist: b(G); believes that either G or ~G can be justified.
agnostic weak atheist: ~b(G); believes that neither G nor ~G can be justified.
non-agnostic weak atheist: ~b(G); believes that either G or ~G can be justified.
agnostic strong atheist: b(~G); believes that neither G nor ~G can be justified.
non-agnostic strong atheist: b(~G); believes that either G or ~G can be justified.
Note that ~b(G) does not imply b(~G) if we allow statements to be evaluated in ways other than "true" (T) or "false" (F). For instance, we might allow a third possibility sitting on the fence between truth and falsity, along the lines of "not enough information to decide" or "no commitment either way" (call this N). Then ~b(G) means that an individual evaluates G as either F or N, but not T. By contrast, b(~G) means that an individual evaluates G as F.
Also note that taking a definite stance on G does not require one to believe that the converse cannot proven. For instance, a non-agnostic strong atheist might firmly believe that God does not exist, but might nonetheless be open to changing his mind upon presentation of what he would consider sufficient evidence that G is true.
Let's clarify the issue.
The agnostic position says they don't know if there's a god or not.
Like it or not, that is a correct definition, hypnagogue was just elaborating, and did a fine job, but you cannot pretend the definition of "agnostic" is wrong.Jameson said:I started this thread because of this stance on agnosticism. This is not the definition of agnosticism, read the above post.The agnostic position says they don't know if there's a god or not.
Well, I'm an athiest so I will bow to superior knowledge, but can you seriously decide whether or not to take a leap of faith? It makes no sense to me. If it's reasoned then it's not a leap of faith. A leap of faith requires putting aside doubts and uncertainty and commiting yourself to believe in something without empirical evidence. Since an agnostic has these doubts and uncertainties, and seeks to resolve them before making a leap of faith, the agnostic position is illogical. What do you mean by "how far to go"?Tigron-X said:Uhhh... except for the fact that one has to evaluate what he/she discovered each step of the way and then decide whether or not to take that next step and continue on the path with the ever pressing question, "how far to go?" Yeah, the first time you do it, it is referred to as a leap of faith, but eventually one sees it as walking in the light or finding enlightment.
So you're saying theists believe for selfish reasons? "I'll only believe in God if I get something out of it!" Hmmmm.Tigron-X said:But before you even get there, you have to figure out what all you're risking to take a leap into the unknown, and whether or not you're able to do it because it will change you for better or for worse.
Taking a leap of faith does not 'prove' God's existence. That's absurd.Tigron-X said:People that want proof of God's existence need to take a leap of faith, otherwise there's nothing to talk about because there's no other way. If there was an easier way, then don't you think someone would have mentioned it by now?
El Hombre Invisible said:Well, I'm an athiest so I will bow to superior knowledge, but can you seriously decide whether or not to take a leap of faith? It makes no sense to me. If it's reasoned then it's not a leap of faith. A leap of faith requires putting aside doubts and uncertainty and commiting yourself to believe in something without empirical evidence. Since an agnostic has these doubts and uncertainties, and seeks to resolve them before making a leap of faith, the agnostic position is illogical. What do you mean by "how far to go"?
That's one way of putting it, but your implication might be a bit off. We're all selfish to a point. Some more than others, and that can be bothersome depending on one's point of view and the judgment he/she passes. And, that can cause issues, one-after-another. But anyhow, yes, I believe in God because I get something out of it, but my reason for believing in God is to have that connection of openness; without that, it wouldn't matter what I get because it would be limited by my heart. And, I prefer my heart to be limitless. If I'm going to be selfish because of that, then that's the type of selfishness I have no problem dealing with. If people don't like it, I don't care. They can go get there own or do whatever.El Hombre Invisible said:So you're saying theists believe for selfish reasons? "I'll only believe in God if I get something out of it!" Hmmmm.
I know. I never claimed that it did. I'm saying if you want proof then that's where you need to start. A b*tch ain't it? Kind of kills the anticipation of horns blasting, *DUN-DUNT-TA-DUN* with God swooping down "HERE I AM! GOD TO SAVE THE DAY!" or some crap like that. "YOU FOUND ME! Now, pass GO and collect $200."El Hombre Invisible said:Taking a leap of faith does not 'prove' God's existence. That's absurd.
I may be out on a limb here, but that is not, to my knowledge, what a leap of faith is. A leap of faith is what is required to have faith, i.e. to except truths with no evidence. It is not, in any context I have ever seen or heard the phrase used, a journey in which you explore the unknown and decide how far into it you want to go. Quite the opposite.Tigron-X said:LOL... "A leap of faith," is a metaphor that basically means take a chance and explore the unknown with openess by using nothing but imagination and self awareness.
the_truth said:So it's settled then.
You can neither prove or disprove god and it is illogical t oassume something which cannot be proven in the first place exists, so it is logical to assume god does not exist until proved otherwise.
Jameson said:I'm sorry to keep this discussion going, as I was satisfied with it a while back, but your statement is just not universally true. Maybe it's settled in this forum that God cannot be proven/disproven, but their are many people who believe otherwise. There is a famous book titled "Atheism: The Case Against God" in which the author states that he believes God can be disproven and I personally say he does a good job of.
This leads me back to the original topic of this thread, agnosticism. You believe that God cannot be proven/disproven, so you are an agnostic.
Jameson
El Hombre Invisible said:I may be out on a limb here, but that is not, to my knowledge, what a leap of faith is. A leap of faith is what is required to have faith, i.e. to except truths with no evidence. It is not, in any context I have ever seen or heard the phrase used, a journey in which you explore the unknown and decide how far into it you want to go. Quite the opposite.
It is, on its most basic level, the point at which you cease using reason to arrive at a conclusion, and instead take truth 'on faith', be it in the appraisal of another human being, or the subscription to a religion.
As a cynical non-believer, I'd explain it better as the point at which you opt out of the great existential crisis but pretend you're not. But no theist would ever agree with that, fair enough. But that's how I'd describe it to another non-believer.
the truth said:People are usually wrong so this isn't a very compelling argument, you have't proven otherwise, tell me how this author proved that god does not exist. Maybe you made a mistake and in fact this author reasonned that it is illogical to believe in god as I have done, we'll have to see. I am also not an agnostic, I assume agnosticism is correct, but if I came across evidence which is contrary to agnosticism I would not ignore it.
NoGeniusJustSensible said:...and one can say YES and be questioned prove it, to which they'd have no idea how...
It's a bit like asking "when did you stop beating your wife?"Jameson said:I used to claim I was simply agnostic, but I realized this is not logically possible.
When asked the question, "Do you believe in God?", one cannot answer "I don't know". If you do not explicitly express a belief in God, then you are an atheist. There is no middle ground on a yes or no question. You can be a strong or weak atheist, or even an agnostic atheist. Agnosticism pertains to believing that the concept of God can be proven or not. There are agnostic theists and agnostic atheists.
Any thoughts?