Theism, Agnosticism, & Atheism: Which Is Logically The Weakest?

[Tiberius]

Hmmm no, that would mean 'agnostics' are part of that. They are different ideas.

The agnostics would be those atheists who do not claim to know for a fact that there is no God.

If you gathered all the theists together, those who do believe in God, you'd find some agnostics in there as well. They would be the believers who say that even though they believe, they do not know for a fact.

 

[Tiberius]

Theists don't get to define what atheism means. So atheists don't get to decide what God means.

How many times have you heard atheism is "the denial of the existence of God" ?

Probably as many times as I've heard an atheist claim unless God is experienced in the exact right way then God doesn't exist.

Well, if the theists could provide a clear and uniform definition of what God is, maybe we atheists (at least those of us who enjoy debating this topic) wouldn't be under the impression that you keep redefining it to mean whatever suits you at the time.

 

[blü 2]

Absolute truth about reality... dogma..
you have to be gentle, realizing these are
the only terms in which such can think.

Er, there are no absolute truths about reality. Truth is simply our best opinion for the time being. But the tests for truth are objective ─ or as objective as we can make them ─ so we can go on exploring reality and improving the accuracy of our statements about it.

There being no objective anythings in the supernatural aspects of religion, the same can't be said of those.

There is so much outside of that mental
cage!

It's not a cage, it's an open window. But sure ─ we can engage with survival and breeding, the things we're actually shaped for by evolution. Then there's art and literature, sport, dining together, community efforts, charities, and so on. They're important, no argument.

But it never hurts to keep the question, What's true in reality? somewhere close to hand. And to remember that the opposite of 'skeptical' is 'gullible'.

 

[blü 2]

God is that which underlies all existence

What does that mean in real terms? Where is God in external reality?

Because if God doesn't have objective existence then God exists only as a concept ─ and there'll be at least as many different concepts around that word as there are brains holding that concept.

If I think I've found a real god, what real test will confirm to me that it's God?

that which is the source of all the universe

That equates God with physics. Why not just say 'Physics'?

 

[Willamena]

I am 100% certain that 1+1=2, and that's not a belief (at least not in the same way that people who are 100% certain that God exists have a belief).

Yes, it's a belief.

What you are implying is that you don't believe that people actually believe in God.

You state "1+1=2" as a fact because you actually believe it. If you didn't actually believe it, you wouldn't state it as a fact.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

I'll have to disagree.

Agnostic simply means you aren't claiming to have knowledge of it. Gnostic is claiming to know for sure.

FYI: the use of "Gnostic" to describe absolutely anyone who claims knowledge annoys me. The Gnostics were a specific religious movement. Etymology is not definition. Calling anyone who claims to know something "Gnostic" makes no more sense than calling anything that's supposed to be universal "Catholic." It just creates confusion.

If you can't say that you know for a fact how many groceries stores there are, then you are agnostic about it to some degree.

But anybody who has put some thought into the matter knows that all human knowledge is imperfect... and that the existence of a grocery store is subject to uncertainties even beyond that. Still, even people who realize all this don't go around saying that they're "agnostic" about these sorts of claims.

Do you regularly assign uncertainty to this sort of thing? When your significant other asks you to pick up some bread and milk on the way home, do you respond with "sure" or "I hope I can?"

Pretty much the only people I know who acknowledge this sort of uncertainty are observant Muslims who habitually say "inshallah" ("God willing") after their expectations about the future.

Wherever you put your personal line on the "certainty scale" where anything above it is certain enough that you don't feel the need to say you're "agnostic," if you call yourself "agnostic" about gods but not about other routine things still subject to uncertainties because of the limits of human knowledge, you're saying to the world that the existence of gods is uncertain to a higher degree than all those other things.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Hmmm no, that would mean 'agnostics' are part of that. They are different ideas.

Agnosticism and atheism overlap.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Me too.
Atheists do not understand how we know though.

Your utter failure to explain how you "know" is a big factor in that.

It's also a big factor in me not giving any weight at all to your claims to know.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

God is that which underlies all existence, that which is the source of all the universe, whether one experiences Him as an intelligent being, or experiences it as some sort of force such as Brahmin or Tao. This God denotes a specific thing in that it can be experienced.

Of course, in the other thread, you were arguing that God is the thing that commanded you to circumcize your children as part of a covenant you made with him.

I don't see a whole lot of correspondence between that and the God you describe here, that has no hint of intelligence, communication ability, or the capacity to enter into agreements.

 

[blü 2]

I am 100% certain that 1+1=2, and that's not a belief (at least not in the same way that people who are 100% certain that God exists have a belief).

1+1=2 is a set of concepts which, being abstractions, have no objective counterpart.

This is clear if you look at any instantiation of it. Before there can be a sheep plus another sheep in your back yard, you have to decide that you're going to count, and that what you're going to count is sheep, and not just any sheep but the sheep in your back yard. Subject and field. Someone must define these before there can be a counting. They aren't part of nature.

And 1+1= 2 need not be true in practical reality. If I take one pint of water and pour it into a 1.5 pint container, and if I take another pint of water and pour it into the same container, 1+1=1.5. So 1+1=2 is only a true generalization in the (wholly conceptual) realm of mathematics (and only there can you require the extra half to be taken into account).

 

[Bob the Unbeliever]

Right off the bat you are wrong..

Nope-- but I bet you have a twisted reason for your wrong view.

Atheists belief system is built on the belief of philosophical materialism or realism. .

Strawman. Atheists do not have a "belief system", you see-- an atheist is anyone who answers the statement "god is real" with "prove it".

So again, you are wrong, wrong, wrong.

Atheist may actually have the worst possible dogma of any belief system since most atheists are so strongly convinced their own dogma is absolute truth. .

Garbage Straw Man not-an-argument.

Also projection of a false claim.

There is no room for any doubt or alternative belief systems to coexist with atheism.

Wrong. Again. See above.

Wow. I did not think you could get worse-- but you managed it. Good Job!

 

[Bob the Unbeliever]

I am absolutely sure God exists. God is just a word. What the word God represents is every possible thought and experience possible that has happened or will ever happened. Unlike the Flying Spaghetti Monster, God is the word with the largest possible semantic footprint possible.

You can choose to think God does not exist. But no matter how much you cry about God the idea of God remains.

Word Salad. Meaningless. You do not get to re-define things into some sort of Woo, just to suit your wrong world-view.

Sad.

 

[Bob the Unbeliever]

Theists don't get to define what atheism means. So atheists don't get to decide what God means.

How many times have you heard atheism is "the denial of the existence of God" ?

Probably as many times as I've heard an atheist claim unless God is experienced in the exact right way then God doesn't exist.

So you are in a religion of ONE. Ain't that cute?

 

[Bob the Unbeliever]

1+1=2 is a set of concepts which, being abstractions, have no objective counterpart.

This is clear if you look at any instantiation of it. Before there can be a sheep plus another sheep in your back yard, you have to decide that you're going to count, and that what you're going to count is sheep, and not just any sheep but the sheep in your back yard. Subject and field. Someone must define these before there can be a counting. They aren't part of nature.

And 1+1= 2 need not be true in practical reality. If I take one pint of water and pour it into a 1.5 pint container, and if I take another pint of water and pour it into the same container, 1+1=1.5. So 1+1=2 is only a true generalization in the (wholly conceptual) realm of mathematics (and only there can you require the extra half to be taken into account).

To further your analogy? Take a pint of pure water in a largish container. Add a pint of pure ethyl alcohol. Do you get 2 pints of liquid? No, you do not.

Or try this: Take a pint of really hot water. Pour in a pint of pure granulated sugar. Mix well. Do you have 2 pints at the end? Nope.

 

[dfnj]

So you are in a religion of ONE. Ain't that cute?

If religion were like mathematics, I find most atheists understand of religion is like a second graders.

 

[Bob the Unbeliever]

If religion were like mathematics, I find most atheists understand of religion is like a second graders.

Well, without mental telepathy, to read your mind (which seems to change from second to second)? Who could keep up with your changing the meaning of common words?

On second thought, I cannot be bothered to take the 3.14 minutes it would take to read. Not even a short story, really...

... and so commonly boring, it'd not get published anyway.

 

[Bob the Unbeliever]

If religion were like mathematics, I find most atheists understand of religion is like a second graders.

In truth? Seeing as how much you project what you want a person to be, which occludes in what passes for your mind, from what they actually are?

I highly doubt you even know an actual atheist in real life.

 

[Falvlun]

First of all, I'd propose that we could talk about something else rather than God, since we are having a discussion about believing in a thing, not necessarily religious faith. Bertrand Russel used the example of a teapot in orbit near Mars, and that will suffice. I think that will make it easier to have a discussion about believing things and why we believe them without introducing religious faith into the mix. So, I'll use the teapot.

Secondly, I disagree with your definitions. I find the following diagram much closer to how I would phrase things.

With this, I would be somewhere in the bottom right section. I lack belief in God, and I'm very confident of my position, but I wouldn't say 100% confident.

As such, it seems to me that agnostic atheism is a fairly strong position. It doesn't accept anything for which there is little to no reliable evidence, yet it does not rule it out. It remains open to the possibility, but it would require some pretty strong evidence to be convinced.

Going back to the earlier teapot analogy, I'm sure you aren't going around saying, "I absolutely INSIST that there is no teapot near Mars! I am absolutely convinced that such a thing is utterly impossible!!!" Such a position is analogous to what would be held by a gnostic atheist. The far more rational thing to say would be, "I don't believe that there is a teapot near Mars, since there's no explanation that I've been told of that holds up to scrutiny. However, I can't deny that there could be some explanation that I'm unaware of, and so I can't claim for certain that the teapot doesn't exist." That is the position of the agnostic atheist.

To continue the analogy, the gnostic theist would claim that there can't be any doubt at all that the teapot is there, it absolutely MUST be there, and anyone who can't see that is a fool. This is clearly a ridiculous position. And the agnostic theist would claim that even though there is no indisputable proof, it is clearly more likely that the teapot is there than not, so we should believe that the teapot is there, even without sufficient evidence.

However, assuming that you disagree with my criticisms of your definitions, I still don't see how atheism is the weakest in your original argument. If you are claiming that it is weakest because it is making an argument of certain knowledge, then theism must be just as weak.

This was a great post!

My only issue is that your agnostic theist and your agnostic atheist are not direct opposites, like the gnostic theist and gnostic atheist.

Your agnostic theist “believes in a god or gods but is not 100% certain”, while your agnostic atheist “lacks belief in god or gods but is not 100% certain”. I would phrase your agnostic atheist as “believes god or gods do not exist but is not 100% certain” just to keep it even.

 

[metis]

If you could rephrase the choices based on the definitions rather than your own confirmation bias you may get reasonable answers although not necessarily the answers you want.

And exactly how do you know I'm operating out of "confirmation bias" when I haven't even explained where I'm coming from and why?

Agnosticism : the belief that nothing is known or can be known of the existence or nature of God.

Atheism : disbelief or lack of belief in the existence of God or gods.

The two above definitions are so similar that the terms are basically interchangeable. This is why I used the word "belief" with the concept of atheism.

 

[metis]

Let me try a different example. Which of the following is the weakest position?

Unicornism: A belief hat there is at least one invisible pink unicorn

Agnosticornism: not knowing if there are invisible pink unicorns

Aunicornism: a belief that there are no invisible pink unicorns.

Of these, I would choose unicornism. How about you?

I don't usually deal with absurd questions, and that includes this time, other than saying that if one can't understand that there's differences between atheism, agnosticism, and theism, then that's their problem, not mine.