Positive Aspects of Agnosticism?

[jcrichton]

Hey!

I’ll start by saying that I admire the rational thinking and intellectual honesty of the authentically agnostic. Most who claim the title are actual atheists that wish to cloak themselves with the rational superiority of Agnosticism. So I tip my cap :tiphat:

From what I imagine as the agnostic position, the “sin” is the perpetual self-exclusion from membership in greater groups that provide meaning for your life. While the metaphysical is-and-always-will-be completely unproveable in any empirical sense, that doesn’t necessarily mean that religious ideas lack some unambiguous merit.

For my best example, I get my concept of “right and wrong” from my faith, as we can probably agree that those ideas are purely metaphysical conjecture. The closest we get to those ideas in other species is “normative behavior” like we see with dolphins and apes. As a result, my concept of “right and wrong” mashes reasonably well with those of Abrahamic persuasion as well. Thus I can start to establish a sense of “tribe” with those people. And in order to further strengthen my desire for tribal membership, I concede to Western Christianity (specifically Catholicism) as that religious view is clearly the source of the moral code for the majority of the western society in which I live.

To be sure - when I see an atheist like Penn Jillett (sp?) object to religious morality with a quip such as “I DON’T NEED GOD TO KNOW GENOCIDE IS WRONG”, I am certain that his belief is simply the residue of the western society he grew up in as well (which was founded with Christianity as it’s moral source). If you were to press him on “why” genocide is wrong, his answer would necessitate an appeal to some sort of abstraction similar to the concept of “god” - which is also subject to the same critiques that Penn uses to debunk “god”.

Sure, he might spout something about the “golden rule”, but upon the lightest of analysis, the “GR” is merely a call to consistency. If you think poor people deserve to starve, then when you starve you must refuse offerings of food And as long as you’ll abide by that, the GR can be safely used to let poor people starve to death.

Really, the only morality that nature unambiguously gives us is “right of might”. As a tiger, if I’m hungry and I’m capable of hunting and killing you, then you should be my next meal. And you should be “ok” with that. After all, if a tiger can’t kill, it can’t eat and will die.

In sum, consider Christianity because it’s the source for the moral fabric of the world you live in - if you’re a westerner. If you lived in Japan, the rationalist in me would strongly suggest Shinto. In that way, a Japanese man can be more fully Japanese and a westerner can be more fully western and thus derive more meaning and satisfaction from their lives as those beliefs allow them to more fully interact with the fellow members of their society.

As to the positives of agnosticism? I think I provided in the top of my post.

And a note to the hardcore Catholics who will blast me for this post - I’m trying to meet him where he is. Not where I am. Chill out.

Hi!

…why do you fear you’ll be blasted by hardcore Catholics?

…I would suspect hardcore Agnostics and Atheists… since you are redefining their terms and removing the veil!

Maran atha!

Angel

 

[jcrichton]

I forgot to make it known from the start that I am a ‘weak’ agnostic. The difference between weak agnostics and **strong agnostics is that the latter would assert that God is unknowable, while weak agnostics would only assert that God is currently unknown **(not enough facts/evidence is in to make a decision). As a weak agnostic, I am still searching so it’s not as if I’m not interested in being convinced. I’ve read and listened to many arguments from both sides (atheism and theism) and I am still not convinced either way, yet.

Hi!

…but the challenge is not that God cannot be Known… the challenge is accepting God’s Revelation…

We know that science, medicine and technology (amongst so many other things) did not simply appear when the first human rational thought took place…

…we also know that man’s mind has been theorizing from zilch… coming up with things such as the atom, photography, rocket fuel…

…we also know that these theories have risen simultaneously, throughout the world, in the mind of many (along with the applied sciences/methodologies that would accompany the various discoveries)…

…so even if one would gulp down the irrational “Goldilocks effect” of emersion of life and the advent of the universe (matter out of nothing and order out of chaos) a rational and thinking mind must hold suspect the thousands of prodding’s and inexplicable infusion of unaccountable knowledge that has been seeping into the mind of man… how big is the atom again?

Maran atha!

Angel

 

[jcrichton]

I don’t think atheists have an objective moral foundation either, even as they generally seem to want one. After all, openly subjective morality fails to satisfy the “mission” of morality itself - to create a set or norms that are transcendent: a set of rules we can “hang our hat on” and know that “good and bad” are real.

I wouldn’t consider the existence of bad behavior (corruption, wars, sexual depravity, etc) as proof that objective morality doesn’t exist. Those are the products of “free will” acting in contra to known moral behavior. Their “badness” may even be evidenced by your ability to point them out as “bad”.

A society fares in this state by creating a justice system. And where that justice system occasionally fails (as all complex systems do), the Christian society benefits from the idea of having a “Divine Cop” that gets the bad-boys in the end.

Even if that’s not factually true, it creates a workable peace within society. Without it, there would be an immoral arms-race where people very reasonably think “Well, if HE benefits from disobeying the rules then screw it! I’m not following the rules either.” Thus enters the anarchy of absolute egoism. The Right of Might enters the land!

The great boon of religion isn’t objective fact. It’s metaphysical meaning. And people undeniably crave it. Which is why atheism will never fully solidify as a real global “religion”. If your rules don’t come from a god, then they must come from the state. The 20th century showed us how that worked out. The “State-Atheism” of the 20th century racked up a higher body count than all the purely religious wars of history combined.

Nietzsche predicted this 70-some-odd years before it happened, interestingly.

Hi!

…I think that, to some, embracing futility and defeatism is grander than validating the existence of a Greater Being: God!

Maran atha!

Angel

 

[HabemusFrancis]

I honestly can’t think of any, and Im not a huge hardliner.

Agnostocism just seems kind of lazy to me. At least atheists are committed and principled. Agnostics just seem to prefer not to think about it IMO.

 

[Vonsalza]

I honestly can’t think of any, and Im not a huge hardliner.
Agnostocism just seems kind of lazy to me. At least atheists are committed and principled. Agnostics just seem to prefer not to think about it IMO.

Well, atheists think they’re principled, anyway…

Agnosticism is the view that theistic existence is undefined either way. They have the benefit of being unassailable in that regard because both Aristotelian logic and hypothesis testing also operate using “uncertainly” as the “null”, or “default value”.

Theists have the burden of proving their positivist claims of god(s).

Classically, atheists also had the burden of proving their positivist claims of no-god(s).

Around the 1970s, a lot of atheist academics centered around Oxford reached a critical-awareness that they couldn’t meet the same same burden of proof they thrust upon Christians. I forget the guy that wrote the famous thesis that really got it moving, but it’s unimportant here.

In the next 20-30 years, academic literature saw definitions of atheism move closer and closer to agnosticism with every textual revision. Now linguistic contradictions of “Agnostic-Atheist” are commonly tossed about by those who want to claim there is no god, but don’t want to be bothered with the charge to rationally prove it.

They define it (roughly) as “The belief that there are no gods, but there may be gods we are unaware of.” as though that was providing something not already encased in classic agnosticism… If you ask then if those unknown gods can include “Yahweh”, they often balk in a revealing way.

Genuine agnostics, in my experience, have been fantastically honest, rational people. There’s one positive aspect I’ve anecdotally encountered with some frequency.

Agnosticboy is one such example you will encounter here on occasion.

 

[AgnosticBoy]

I honestly can’t think of any, and Im not a huge hardliner.

Agnostocism just seems kind of lazy to me. At least atheists are committed and principled. Agnostics just seem to prefer not to think about it IMO.

I’m assuming that you’re referring to independent agnostics, as in those who tend not to identify with the atheist or theist label.

I can’t speak for all agnostics but I think some confusion toward us tend to arise when many identify commitment to a side, especially if it’s the atheist/skeptic side, as being an indication of someone who did their homework. This is not always the case at all. I think you’ll also find that some do their homework on the God debate or some aspect of it and conclude that no one side convinces them more than the other - as in there are good points/evidence for both sides of the issue. You might follow up with that and say that only one side can be true in reality so that therefore everyone must choose a side. But then I’d respond that I can only be convinced and choose accordingly after I encounter good evidence and/or logic from my search. It’s a two-step process and the amount of time of going from step 1 to step 2 (decision or conclusion) varies from person-to-person.

Well, atheists think they’re principled, anyway…

Agnosticism is the view that theistic existence is undefined either way. They have the benefit of being unassailable in that regard because both Aristotelian logic and hypothesis testing also operate using “uncertainly” as the “null”, or “default value”.

Theists have the burden of proving their positivist claims of god(s).

Classically, atheists also had the burden of proving their positivist claims of no-god(s).

Around the 1970s, a lot of atheist academics centered around Oxford reached a critical-awareness that they couldn’t meet the same same burden of proof they thrust upon Christians. I forget the guy that wrote the famous thesis that really got it moving, but it’s unimportant here.

In the next 20-30 years, academic literature saw definitions of atheism move closer and closer to agnosticism with every textual revision. Now linguistic contradictions of “Agnostic-Atheist” are commonly tossed about by those who want to claim there is no god, but don’t want to be bothered with the charge to rationally prove it.

They define it (roughly) as “The belief that there are no gods, but there may be gods we are unaware of.” as though that was providing something not already encased in classic agnosticism… If you ask then if those unknown gods can include “Yahweh”, they often balk in a revealing way.

Genuine agnostics, in my experience, have been fantastically honest, rational people. There’s one positive aspect I’ve anecdotally encountered with some frequency.

Agnosticboy is one such example you will encounter here on occasion.

Good post! Thanks for the compliment, as well. I don’t expect for all to agree with my conclusions or views, but I hope that most will appreciate my process of thinking which tends to lead me to spot the gray areas and to reason from there.