Whats an Agnostic to do in a lackers world?

I understand it this way. There are three terms describing two different concepts encased to two different verbs. 1. to know. 2. to believe. I am an agnostic atheist. I do not believe in the existence of God or Gods so I am an atheist. I lack belief. I disbelieve. I am an atheist I use them interchangeably and it is a choice I make in view of what I see as a lack of evidence.

I do not know if there is or is not a God or Gods. I do not think we can know if there is or is not a god or gods. I am therefore an agnostic.

An agnostic theist would be someone who agrees that he does not know there is a God, does not think we can know that there is, but believes that a God exists as a matter of choice.

All you have to accept to understand this, is that the human mind can choose to believe or not believe in something even if there is no claim to know or even that it can be known.

Post script. I am not in here to debate these concepts or definitions. You can agree or not. I don't care. I thought my restatement might be useful for clarity.

 

where do you people dredge that garbage up from anyway?

"agnosticism is the view that human reason is incapable of providing sufficient rational grounds to justify either the belief that God exists OR
the belief that God does not exist".[2] (wiki)

Webster Definition of agnostic
1 : a person who holds the view that any ultimate reality (such as God) is unknown and probably unknowable; broadly : one who is NOT committed to believing in either the existence OR the nonexistence of God or a god

An agnostic is one who believes it impossible to know anything about God or about the creation of the universe and refrains from commitment to any religious doctrine. An atheist is one who denies the existence of a deity or of divine beings.
Agnostic | Define Agnostic at Dictionary.com

Seriously? are all neoatheists to ignorant to comprehend such simple sentences? It seems to be an epidemic, where did you dredge that up?

So how can you be an atheist and not take a position like an agnostic at the same time? Can you go left and right at the same time? If you can then being an agnostic atheist or an agnostic theist would be possible, if you cant you are **** out of luck.

 

this just keeps getting better with every thread!

Gnosticism (from Ancient Greek: γνωστικός gnostikos, "having knowledge", from γνῶσις gnōsis, knowledge) is a modern name for a variety of ancient religious ideas and systems, originating in Jewish-Christian milieus in the first and second century AD. These systems believed that the material world is created by an emanation of the highest God, trapping the divine spark within the human body. This divine spark could be liberated by gnosis. Some of the core teachings include the following:

1. All matter is evil, and the non-material, spirit-realm is good.
2. There is an unknowable God, who gave rise to many lesser spirit beings called Aeons.
3. One evil, lower spirit being is the creator who made the universe.
4. Gnosticism does not deal with "sin", only ignorance.
5. To achieve salvation, one needs to get in touch with secret knowledge.
   
   

 

Like i said, it I semantivscs, so you embarrass yourself with your ridiculous tirade. I could find and post a definition of atheism as "one who does not accept a belief in gods", but why bother? Your athoritative foot stomping is based on your personal preferences . Your transparent attempts to support your claims with definitions you prefer is a dog and pony show.

 

why should I be embarrassed explaining someone elses errors?

So what? Not accepting belief is belief not or disbelief.

No its not a tirade, its a well known debate technique called crayola'ing to help support comprehension related issues

 

it always seems to come down to misuse of grammar, the whole foundational premise of neoatheists

http://www.politicalforum.com/index...-true-religion.536312/page-14#post-1069470224

and not surprising the british oxford assinine dictionary is the leader in poiltical definitions that are not typical usage what so ever, in stead promoting their politically desired new usage.

 

Please use the quote function, or I don't see the responses. I came across this by accident, but I wouldn't want to be accused of avoiding arguments, so I will respond. Better late than never, I suppose.

We agree that fish cannot tap dance. If you took a fish and put it on land (or for that matter, observed it in water) and said "this fish is tap dancing", you would be lying (I assume that we ignore things like cartoon fish or genetically engineered fish with feet). The fish is indeed incapable of tap dancing. This is not the matter of the discussion at hand.

The question is whether the statement "this fish is not tap dancing" (or "this fish does not tap dance") is true, given the fact that whatever it does cannot be said to be tap dancing. I.e. does "not doing something" imply that you are capable of doing that something but choose not to, or simply that it is not the case that you do that something, regardless of your capability/choice?

I agree with the definition of believe here (or at least, that's not where the core of our disagreement lies). I also agree that rocks are incapable of believing, and arguably that they are incapable of any action (although I think the word "action" is a bit ambiguous but I'm not adamant about that point right now).

However, your last sentence here, which you "crayola"d, does not seem to follow from the definition above. The definition of believe which you have pasted says nothing about what it means to not believe.

Not believing is not an action, so rocks not believing is consistent with the idea that rocks cannot take actions.

"An atheist is a person who does not believe in god" is equivalent to "An atheist is a person of whom '(s)he believes there is a god' would be a false statement". Just like "A homeless person is a person who doesn't have a home" is equivalent to "A homeless person is a person of whom '(s)he has a home' would be a false statement".

Hypothetically, would any of the disagreements you have remain if we replaced the definition of atheist with "An atheist is a person of whom '(s)he believes there is a god' would be a false statement"?

 

Why do you even care? I am an Agnostic Atheist even though you tell me I am not and there is no such thing but I simply do not care what anyone else thinks.

I am Atheist because I do not believe in any of the Gods humans have made up over the years. I am Agnostic because I am not stupid enough to pretend I actually "Know" what might be out there.

Maybe a new designation like Atheognastic…..Agnotheist?

 

well, wading through your grammar issues, I imagine you are saying something that I actually agree with. The default setting for atheist is simply not accepting a belief in Gods. You literally just admitted my only point, and the point that you have been railing against for 30 pages. I suggest you go somewhere for a while and collect your thoughts and get them straight, before starting any more tthreads.

 

Newspeak is all the rage, in Progresso World. It cannot be avoided, and it frustrates anyone trying to rationally discuss anything.

I don't know the solution.. i usually just repeat historical and logical definitions, to no avail. It is tilting at windmills, but that's what we do, here!

 

Well since you have repeatedly claimed that that not believing in god is athiesm and not believing in no god is believing in god then the middle ground of agnosticism is impossible.

 

He also admits that simply not accepting a belief in gods is atheism. He can't keep his story straight.

 

A random walk through a vacant space.

 

I still don't get whwt the problem is, with the historical definitions.

I believe in God/supernatural = theist
I don't believe in God/supernatural = atheist
I don't know = agnostic

What is the point in muddling them up with vague obfuscation and redefinitions?

Its all about belief. The certainty or dogmatism with which the belief is held does not alter the basic belief. They are subjective opinions, about the nature of the universe.

 

The point is a better understanding, which some people actually value.

 

Thats actually correct, The default setting for atheists is the rejection of any belief in any God.
To not believe is to reject.

Agnosticism is a legitimate 3rd option.

Seems its you who cant keep it straight as I said rejecting God means you are an atheist.

Makes you wonder why I put up with it at all

 

The problem is that atheists know they have nothing substantial to argue, so instead try to push their bruden of proof on to everyone else and will stoop to any means to accomplish that end, or at least get people to 'believe' in their rationally superior egoism through redd herrings and word salad approach to a debate.

 

To some extent I agree. There isn't any inherent problem with any definition, as long as we talk to others who use them the same way. The problem arises when people like Kokomojojo takes statements that have been made with one definition and interprets them using another. It's not a question of whether we should muddle it, it's a question of who's interpretation counts as muddling.

Says who? The distinction is not a matter of dogmatism, you can have a very adamant agnostic and person who wishy-washily believes there is no god. In this case, people have found a very useful and often talked about idea which is the rejection of religious ideas without necessarily espousing the idea that there is no god.

Now just like orange can be both a fruit and a colour, there's nothing wrong with using either definition, only to mix them up.

 

ah pot calls kettle black I am not the one who tries to make distinctions that dont/cant exist.

I seen about enough when you said that rocks have the ability to do something beyond nothing as in sit where they lay, so stop trying to bait me into wasting my time with another one of your indefensible quagmires.

 

Right, which ia not the same as asserting that no gods exist. As everyone knows, including you.

 

A theist is one who believes in gods or a god
An atheist is one that does not believe in a god or gods
An agnostic is one who can't make up his mind

 

I know those are very conventional definitions, but I challenge them. An agnostic simple claims not to know if there are gods are not. But every agnostic is therefore atheist, if atheist is defined by not accepting belief in gods.

I say there are only theists and atheists. You either accidentally belief in gods, or you do not. Just as there are adeists and deists. And not all deists are theists, just as not all atheists are adeists. (Jefferson, Payne, et al)

The default atheists are 'agnostic atheists', who are atheist simply by virtue of not accepting belief in gods. This is now a redundant term, as all agnostics are atheists.

The atheists who assert there are certainly no gods are gnostic atheists, the stronger form of atheism.



.

 

Good to see you are back to posting wrongisms.

Pretty close, you got the first 2 correct.
Keep in mind neoatheists are trying to hijack everything not nailed down as a theist and call it for their religion.

This is false assumption and bad logic with poor reasoning on their part.

An agnostic does in fact know where they are at, they neither affirm or deny either side, which is purely neutral, they take no side.

neoatheists pretend there is only atheism or theism and no other choice despite they full well know abstaining from a vote (agnostic) is a bonafide religious position.

There is no such thing as abstaining from taking a position (agnostic) and taking a position (atheist) at the same time any more than you can walk left and right at the same time.

and the default condition is agnostic since a new born has no knowledge and takes no position but that is far too difficult for neoatheists to put round pegs in round holes and square pegs in square holes.

 

Language evolves as people use it. That's why we use "you" instead of "thou" these days. Sticking to the historical definition is not the obvious solution, nor is it any more logical than any other definition (at least not by virtue of its historicity).

The problem with Newspeak was that it was a controlled language. Someone (Ingsoc in the case of 1984) thought that they had a more correct understanding of what the language should mean than those trying to express themselves in it, just like you and Kokomojojo seem to indicate that you think that the your favourite definitions have a more correct understanding than those whose usage you comment on. Of course, that's not to say that I accuse you of doing anything tantamount to 1984 Newspeak, I'm just saying that accusing people of Newspeak just because one disagrees with their language use misses the mark.

The meat of the matter is that the majority of people who discuss atheism today are not frustrated by this. They use the same definitions as each other and successfully and accurately communicate with one another. If we are interested in rationally discussing, then what is the problem with figuring out what definition are in use and then using those?

 

And I do love asking the JW's an awkward question on the Bible when they come round. Something I know is outside their indoctrination. I'm still waiting for an answers to questions - 12 months later.