"Agnostics are Nowhere Men"

[Ron_Tomkins]

What types of gods do you believe in?

I believe in the same God that Carl Sagan and Richard Feynman believe in. That is: The sum of all the laws of physics.

 

[Alan]

No, never said it was. I am an agnostic atheist. I just get annoyed by people telling me that being agnostic makes me a fence sitter. Maybe it's because I hate people who try to tell me what I ought to think, or because I hate people who see things only in black and white, or maybe it's because I can't stand people who try to tell me my position is wrong when they can't justify their own.

I did not suggest you did say it was. I was asking what you thought about it out of genuine curiosity. Thank you for the response.

 

[Alan]

I believe in the same God that Carl Sagan and Richard Feynman believe in. That is: The sum of all the laws of physics.

Would you say you have theistic beliefs because you believe in the laws of physics?

 

[JoelKatz]

No I'm not.

Ok, so how can you reject the possibility that YEC is right and that a god capable of miracles created the Earth 6,000 years ago exactly the way science would predict it would have been at that time?

If there can be a god that can perform miracles, then the young Earth creationists can be right. How can you reject the possibility of YEC while not rejecting the possibility of a god capable of performing miracles? What justifies the place where you draw the line between these two claims? It certainly looks like you are treating the two claims differently.

 

[MikeSun5]

I just get annoyed by people telling me that being agnostic makes me a fence sitter. Maybe it's because I hate people who try to tell me what I ought to think, or because I hate people who see things only in black and white, or maybe it's because I can't stand people who try to tell me my position is wrong when they can't justify their own.

Very well said.

And I do not think that concepts related to this topic should be taboo just because some people might be insulted that somebody who does not believe in any gods is an atheist, just because they also happen to be agnostic. It might ruffle feathers? Oh dear! Won't somebody please think of the agnostics?

Okay.... I used the term "ruffle feathers" in place of what I was really thinking... I think atheists try to say agnosticism is really atheism not to ruffle agnostic feathers, but really to swell their atheist numbers. This is a form of atheist evangelism, but instead of asking you if you'd like to join their cause, they simply say you're already part of it. Your opinion does not matter to an atheist like that. There. You made me say it.

Darat made an oft-ignored point about atheism dealing with belief and agnosticism dealing with provable knowledge. I call myself agnostic because I do not know if this universe was created by a deity or some natural event. Right now, science can't tell me either way, so I don't know. When asked what I believe, it really pisses atheists off to hear me say, "I haven't decided yet," or "I don't care either way." I guess some people are unable to handle that...

 

[Alan]

I was not saying that all agnostics are atheists. People can believe in gods and consider it to be unknowable.

I have been saying the same as Darat has been regarding the knowable/testable and belief questions being different.

But if a person does not believe in any gods, they are atheists regardless of where they are on the knowable/unknowable axis. It's a matter of definition: atheists are people who do not believe in gods.

 

[Ron_Tomkins]

Would you say you have theistic beliefs because you believe in the laws of physics?

Don't know, don't care.

See why these discussions are an intellectual waste of time?
You're basically arguing pure semantics now.

 

[MikeSun5]

I was not saying that all agnostics are atheists.

I know, but some are. That rant wasn't directed towards you.

But if a person does not believe in any gods, they are atheists regardless of where they are on the knowable/unknowable axis. It's a matter of definition: atheists are people who do not believe in gods.

I understand this. I've said many times, I completely understand the point that atheists are trying to make, as well as the definitions of the word. The problem is atheists leave absolutely no room for an answer other than "yes" or "no." That is not right, IMO.

Answers like "I'm not sure," or "I don't know," or "I haven't made a decision yet," are all met with an incredulous gasp from the atheist that is eerily similar to the gasp that escapes a Jesus-freak when someone tells them they're an atheist. "How can you not know what you believe??" <--- I was asked that once by a hardcore atheist. I told him it's as easy as knowing.

 

[HghrSymmetry]

Why?

It's just another refusal to answer the question and avoid being called an atheist.

Not if you understand the Ignostic and theological noncognitivist position.

Some theological noncognitivists assert that to be a strong atheist is to give credence to the concept of God because it assumes that there actually is something understandable to not believe in. This can be confusing because of the widespread belief in God and the common use of the series of letters G-o-d as if it is already understood that it has some cognitively understandable meaning. From this view strong atheists have made the mistaken assumption that the concept of God actually contains an expressible or thinkable proposition. However this depends on the specific definition of God being used.[3]

As with ignosticism, the consistent theological noncognitivist awaits a coherent definition of the word God (or of any other metaphysical utterance purported to be discussable) before being able to engage in arguments for or against God's existence.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theological_noncognitivism

 

[Ron_Tomkins]

Not if you understand the Ignostic and theological noncognitivist position.

Quote:
Some theological noncognitivists assert that to be a strong atheist is to give credence to the concept of God because it assumes that there actually is something understandable to not believe in. This can be confusing because of the widespread belief in God and the common use of the series of letters G-o-d as if it is already understood that it has some cognitively understandable meaning. From this view strong atheists have made the mistaken assumption that the concept of God actually contains an expressible or thinkable proposition. However this depends on the specific definition of God being used.[3]

As with ignosticism, the consistent theological noncognitivist awaits a coherent definition of the word God (or of any other metaphysical utterance purported to be discussable) before being able to engage in arguments for or against God's existence.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theological_noncognitivism

Dead on.

 

[HghrSymmetry]

 

[wollery]

Ok, so how can you reject the possibility that YEC is right and that a god capable of miracles created the Earth 6,000 years ago exactly the way science would predict it would have been at that time?

If there can be a god that can perform miracles, then the young Earth creationists can be right. How can you reject the possibility of YEC while not rejecting the possibility of a god capable of performing miracles? What justifies the place where you draw the line between these two claims? It certainly looks like you are treating the two claims differently.

No. Maybe you should try reading and quoting the whole post, instead of just picking out one response.

If YEC is based in science, i.e., it makes testable claims about what should be observed in nature, then it can be tested and proven false or true. There is no need to be agnostic about this form of YEC.

If YEC states that god made the world to look older than it actually is, then it is just faith, it cannot be tested, and cannot be proven false or true. One can be agnostic about such a god, and such a situation.

The first is knowledge based, the second faith based. Knowledge based is testable and knowable, faith based isn't.

Seriously, how hard is it to wrap your head around such simple concepts?

 

[Alan]

I'd also say it is silly to take such suggestions seriously. That is a value judgement.

 

[JoelKatz]

If YEC states that god made the world to look older than it actually is, then it is just faith, it cannot be tested, and cannot be proven false or true. One can be agnostic about such a god, and such a situation.

Okay, so you are agnostic about YEC. You are unwilling to reject the possibility that God created the Earth 6,000 years ago.

 

[Alan]

I can not reject the possibility that the universe was created midway through this sentence and made to appear precisely as if that was not the case because of magic.

I can, however, disregard it as a stupid idea not worth any attention.

 

[wollery]

Okay, so you are agnostic about YEC. You are unwilling to reject the possibility that God created the Earth 6,000 years ago.

Once again you quote only part of my post.

Do you enjoy quote mining and misrepresenting other people's position?

It's nothing to do with my being willing to do something. I am not able to reject the possibility of it, because it is an untestable claim. Personally I think that the probability of the Earth being 6000 years old and created to look like it is 4 billion years old is vanishingly small.

Are you suggesting that the probability is zero? If so then how did you arrive at that conclusion? How did you test it? This is a question of knowledge. How do you know with 100% certainty that the Universe wasn't created last Tuesday?

 

[JoelKatz]

I can not reject the possibility that the universe was created midway through this sentence and made to appear precisely as if that was not the case because of magic.

I can, however, disregard it as a stupid idea not worth any attention.

Consider any absurd claim that one can only test probabilistically -- say that saying "greenburg" once a day reduces your chance of getting cancer. What would it take for you to "reject" this claim? Would a test of 100,000 people over 50 years that showed no reduction in cancer rates, coupled with the arbitrariness and stupidity of the claim, be sufficient for you to reject it?

Or is it just be a stupid idea not worth any attention? After all, the cancer reduction could be slight. Or some defect in the testing protocol might have messed up the results. Or any of a number of things.

I submit that you're unjustifiably granting theistic claims a special status you wouldn't grant to any other claim. *Any* other claim with the same status as far as evidence, arbitrariness, and test failures, would result in you rejecting the possibility. Yet you don't do this for theistic claims. For some reason, you insist on leaving the door open for these claims and no others.

 

[wollery]

Consider any absurd claim that one can only test probabilistically -- say that saying "greenburg" once a day reduces your chance of getting cancer. What would it take for you to "reject" this claim? Would a test of 100,000 people over 50 years that showed no reduction in cancer rates, coupled with the arbitrariness and stupidity of the claim, be sufficient for you to reject it?

Or what it just be a stupid idea not worth any attention? After all, the cancer reduction could be slight. Or some defect in the testing protocol might have messed up the results. Or any of a number of things.

I submit that you're unjustifiably granting theistic claims a special status you wouldn't grant to any other claim. *Any* other claim with the same status as far as evidence, arbitrariness, and test failures, would result in you rejecting the possibility. Yet you don't do this for theistic claims. For some reason, you insist on leaving the door open for these claims and no others.

How do you test the claim that the Universe was brought into existence 6000 years ago but looking perfectly in every detail like it formed naturally 4 billion years ago?

Go on, how do you test it?

 

[Alan]

How do you propose I test whether what I wrote is true? It is a claim that was intentionally developed to be unfalsifiable, just like the YEC claim that things are just made to look exactly as if the universe is billions of years old.

When a claim of this nature is unfalsifiable and has no plausibility (for example there aren't connected things that ARE falsifiable), I think it is ridiculous to take it seriously and I am not leaving the door open in terms of belief. But I can not claim as a matter of fact that something unfalsifiable is true or not true. My assumption for any unfalsifiable, implausible thing is that it is NOT TRUE.

Can you overthrow the scientific method and find a way that unfalsifiable claims can be shown to be false?

 

[JoelKatz]

How do you test the claim that the Universe was brought into existence 6000 years ago but looking perfectly in every detail like it formed naturally 4 billion years ago?

Go on, how do you test it?

I reject these kinds of claims completely, on many different grounds including that a claim that cannot be tested even in principle is incapable of being true. Someone who "claims" that the universe is a particular way as opposed to another way that is indistinguishable in principle from the first way is not actually making a claim but rather a pseudo-claim. It may have the form of a claim, but does not actually *claim* anything.

I am not agnostic with respect to apparent claims that do not meet the requirements for being a potentially true claim. I reject them. This is one of the reasons I am a strong atheist.