Author Topic: Atheism and Agnosticism  (Read 37146 times)

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Offline An4ximandros

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Re: Atheism and Agnosticism
 Your unconditional slavery. It is the human thing to want.

I wonder in how many ways will this post be interpreted?

 

Offline AtomicClucker

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Re: Atheism and Agnosticism
Henceforth why I've sided with many of the agnostics and detractors of certain strains of Atheism: we fail to discuss the underpinnings of what constitutes belief, and it is actively discouraged because many atheists don't have a good grasp of linguistics and paradoxical studies especially when much of it can only ride upon a framework built of contextual understanding.


Yeah but that's quite the perpendicular to the point we were discussing. No doubt some people will have a more narrow view of any given subject. If that's an argument, it's an argument for anything, which is to say for nothing at all.

Simply put, even the science, math and logic at the end of the day cannot prove whether a deity exists or not: but it raises the problem of how we confirm our beliefs every day. Tarski and Godel found similar results in two separate fields, and we use a meta-referential force to confirm out beliefs. And I discovered the magic: us. We are the magic, the gods, the belief. We manufacture it all in our heads. It's sounds completely asinine, stupid, and childish, but I think that's the beauty of it. Despite what science says and does, it is nothing more than a collection of tools to confirm what we hold to be true: what we hold to be true actually exists in a precarious state. So therefore, I concluded that it's not so much whether deities exist or not: but it is the matter of how we continue to fabricate our every day existence.

Science cannot do that, we do. Gods don't do it, we do. The problem is it replaces an answer with a question. Agnosticism to an extent answers that being sitting on the fence, and to my chagrin, is actually a more valid and logical answer when we discuss the philosophy and logical arguments of belief. I don't buy positivism one bit, simply because you encounter problems and situations that are not resolved in a yes or no fashion.
« Last Edit: July 05, 2013, 05:48:27 pm by AtomicClucker »
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Offline Luis Dias

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Re: Atheism and Agnosticism
No.  I don't bet at all.  You'll note I said "afford it equal status" and not "afford it equal probability."  The wording choice is intentional.

I don't think it is equal status by merely being able to make an apparent semantical and logical equality. If you are going to say it's "equal status" then every single unfalsifiable silly question phrased in the same manner will have to have "equal status".

Quote
I'm curious why you fellows seem to all want to lump my position with yours.  Trust me, I am neither rich, nor famous, nor particularly above-average in looks, and while my wife seems to enjoy it I don't know that I'm particularly more skilled in the bedroom than the average man.... WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM ME! =)

Don't get it personally! I'm really trying to check if my way of seeing atheism and agnosticism is really able to survive your attacks or not. By far you have presented the clearest case why agnosticism is better than atheism, and I couldn't disagree more with it. That is all.

Also, see that video I posted up here from 46:20 to 49:00. Less than 3 minutes. If after watching that you reach the conclusion that Hitchens is an agnostic, slap yourself!

 

Offline AtomicClucker

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Re: Atheism and Agnosticism
Quote from: Luis Dias

Also, see that video I posted up here from 46:20 to 49:00. Less than 3 minutes. If after watching that you reach the conclusion that Hitchens is an agnostic, slap yourself!

Ah, that thing. Hitchens was unique, but I've always wanted to see him take on the Liar Paradox and come out a sane man at the end of the day. Pity the fact he's not with us anymore.
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Offline Luis Dias

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Re: Atheism and Agnosticism
He had a knack for irony so I suspect he would be just really amused by that question.

 

Offline swashmebuckle

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Re: Atheism and Agnosticism
You might not associate it with atheism, but that's pretty much what atheism is in practice. Read the hard strident voices about it. If you ask them in this a lot more "open" philosophical sense, they will pretty much admit quite a lot of possibilities. The problems arise then that these possibilities are just unpreachable by men, and that's the main point.
Hehe, atheism in practice.

As I said before, I'm not gonna harp on people for what they choose to call themselves, but I will point out that the divide between someone who unequivocally asserts that there can be no gods and someone who will admit quite a lot of possibilities if pressed looks pretty wide from over here. A gnostic divide, you might call it.

Perhaps we need a new word for agnostics who lean heavily and enjoy sticking it to theists? :D

Also, lol at the MP-Ryan peer pressure subplot. Good stuff.

 

Offline An4ximandros

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Offline Luis Dias

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Re: Atheism and Agnosticism
Perhaps we need a new word for agnostics who lean heavily and enjoy sticking it to theists? :D

No we don't. Those are called "atheists" (or just antitheists like an4 rightfully says). Pay attention.

 

Offline Lorric

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Re: Atheism and Agnosticism
Perhaps we need a new word for agnostics who lean heavily and enjoy sticking it to theists? :D

Antaganostics?  :)

 

Offline An4ximandros

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Re: Atheism and Agnosticism
Here is another thing I found about that... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maltheism

 

Offline swashmebuckle

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Re: Atheism and Agnosticism
Antaganostics?  :)
Nailed it.

Seriously though, if atheists get to acknowledge the plausibility of beings that are functionally the same as God and still be called atheist, then we should have a fundamentalist subcategory or something like that for people who are actually willing to assert that no such thing exists. Those guys are the real badasses.

 

Offline Luis Dias

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Re: Atheism and Agnosticism
No those are just dumb nitwits. I know no one like that anyway.

 

Offline Bobboau

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Re: Atheism and Agnosticism
I have no idea what you're trying to say.

seeing as I had it ready to go when the first thread was locked...

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Offline karajorma

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Re: Atheism and Agnosticism
I think the problem here is the use of the words belief and god. Especially the former. I'm pretty much of the opinion that the word itself is toxic to this sort of discussion as it has way too many meanings. So I'm not going to use it. I'm going to use a synonym instead.

Faith.


Stop me if I'm being unfair but I don't think any religious person is going to have a problem with me describing them as someone who has faith in a higher power. This makes the definitions much easier to understand. A theist is someone who has faith in a higher power. I think I can use this definition for theism and probably not move anybody who would be a theist under the old definition outside of the group. So it's a reasonably fair definition.

As I pointed out earlier, amoral means a lack of morality, asexual means a lack of sexuality, astigmatism means a lack of focus, asymptomatic means a lack of symptoms. All these words mean a lack of something. So why should our definition for atheist mean a rejection of something? Why shouldn't it just mean a lack of something? So by definition an atheist becomes someone who lacks faith in a higher power. This fits the most inclusive definition for atheism I posted earlier.



Now ironically the argument I'm about to give is the same one that MP-Ryan had on the political compass thread. One of people insisting on defining themselves on an inadequate one axis scale when a two axis one has been provided. Given the above, the second thing that defines peoples belief in a higher power is how certain they are of the evidence. This forms the second axis and is a scale with absolute certainty that the evidence proves the existence/non-existence of a higher power at the left extreme, and absolute certainty that the evidence can never prove it at the right extreme. The middle is what MP-Ryan and others have been describing as agnosticism and also is the position of anyone who has never thought about whether there is a higher power (If you've never thought about it, you have no certainty).

Doing that, you end up with definitions like this.

Theist + Left on second axis = Religious = Pretty much any of the major religions.
Theist + Middle = Weakly Agnostic Theist = Deist / Believer in higher powers but not in religion. / There is a higher power, but none of the religions have got it right.
Theist + Right = Strongly Agnostic Theist = Anyone who has faith that there is a god, but we'll never know who or what it is.

Atheist + Left = Very Strong Atheist = There is no god.
Atheist + Leftish = Strong Atheist = There probably is no god / There may or may not be a god, we should act as if there isn't one until proof is found.
Atheist + Middle = Weak Atheist, Agnostic Atheist, Agnostic, Implicit Atheist = There may or may not be a higher power, but I have no faith. / I'm a baby and thus have never thought about it.
Atheist + Right = Strongly Agnostic Atheist = I have no faith in God cause we'll never know what God is.

The position between theist and atheist are basically transitional. It's not possible to remain there. You only end up there during a crisis of faith. Note that every crisis of faith doesn't result in a transition though. Someone losing faith in their Christianity may transition from religious to weakly agnostic theist.

I am pretty sure that none of those arguing that atheism and agnosticism are in fact the same thing can say they accept the possibility that gods exist and afford it roughly equal status as the possibility that gods do not exist, which is precisely the position of agnosticism.

Actually I'm quite inclined to give the whole life is a computer simulation theory quite a bit of credence. It quite neatly answers why I bump into people I know thousands of miles away from my home. What I lack is faith that it is correct. So there you go, an atheist giving the possibility of a higher power equal status. I can give other examples if you need them.

I'm curious why you fellows seem to all want to lump my position with yours.  Trust me, I am neither rich, nor famous, nor particularly above-average in looks, and while my wife seems to enjoy it I don't know that I'm particularly more skilled in the bedroom than the average man.... WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM ME! =)

It's not that we want you. It's that you do atheism a disservice. You keep claiming that your view is more scientific than atheism despite your view actually being largely the same thing as atheism. If you were claiming your view was less scientific than atheism, no one would have given a ****. But by elevating your position above that of atheism, you're going to get right up the nose of anyone who is an atheist and considers their position to also be the most scientific. Especially when you've continually misrepresented what atheism actually is.

That's why I spent a lot of time explaining above what atheism is. Cause you kept taking a fairly warped definition of strong atheism and insisting that was the correct one. It's not. And that's why you've got all the atheists upset at you. Your view sounds pretty much the same as mine but expressed differently. But even if I'm wrong about that, I take great exception to you claiming your view is more scientific than mine. I'm an agnostic atheist and as far as I'm concerned, you don't get more scientific than that.

I'm not picking on you. I see a discussion with Luis where I'm on the same side as you winging it's way towards me. :p
« Last Edit: July 05, 2013, 10:46:46 pm by karajorma »
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Offline NGTM-1R

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Re: Atheism and Agnosticism
I don't think it is equal status by merely being able to make an apparent semantical and logical equality. If you are going to say it's "equal status" then every single unfalsifiable silly question phrased in the same manner will have to have "equal status".

The repeated use of this conceit fascinates me, because it really makes no sense. You've phrased it as "surrender" before, too, and now you're using "equal status" as though we must give it ~serious consideration~ and form our opinions respectfully towards it.

The problem is it doesn't do that.  Equal status in this case is "equal status with the null thesis", and by omitting those words you're radically twisting the meaning of the phrase from "this is possible but as a condition that cannot be experimentally tested for it has no detectable impact on the observable world either way thus I am effectively ignoring it" to "we must respect unfalsifiable beliefs". That's more than a little dishonest of you.
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Offline karajorma

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Re: Atheism and Agnosticism
Given that quite a few of us feel that the other side is twisting what they say, let's not start accusing anyone of dishonesty or the thread will get closed again.
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Offline Luis Dias

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Re: Atheism and Agnosticism
More than a little dishonest from me? Really. I appeal to the audience here. Already in the other thread we were told by MP-Ryan that agnosticism is the superior position because it does not attempt to answer something unanswerable, and now you are saying that Agnosticism concludes we should just "ignore" it altogether. MP talked about the great mindset that could make some atheists crawl up the walls in insanity which is this Schrodinger's position of both being and not being true, and you now summarize it as "ignore it". Who's being "more than dishonest" here.

I'd rather have you not produce these kinds of accusations from nowhere. I'd admit that I could have made (and still might have made) some interpretational error. This subject is subtle after all and I might misread here and there. But nowhere did I accuse anyone here of bad faith.

Further, I was precisely trying to hammer down your own point, namely that because the question is unfalsifiable, then we should not give it the respect it tries to assert, and downright deny it. Just like we deny the existence of Goblins, Fairies, Fire Dragons, Demons, etc., etc. Because, this is ****ing obvious, should we be "agnostics" on those idiocies as well? Should we go all "Well, technically, we should all be Schrodingers about Angels and magical dwarves"? The answer is an obvious ****ing No.

All truth is temporary and tentative, even this last one, but we cannot go on lingering in Schrodinger's terms in everything. We do have an arbitrary point of certainty to which we do say "This is enough for me, I take it to be true with this finite set of evidences", and when we ask ourselves if unobserved things exist, we say "No they don't, until we have evidence of them existing". That's the most correct, Ockhamzian, efficient and dare I say sufficient way to deal with the truths and problems of the world.

 

Offline karajorma

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Re: Atheism and Agnosticism
Since you're here Luis, and obviously an atheist. I'd like to ask if you have any issues with my definitions above.
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Offline Luis Dias

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Re: Atheism and Agnosticism
So I didn't get what was the use of the vertical axis in your graph, since you even state that there is no middle ground between those states.

But if that's true, then why couldn't it be rendered as a one dimensional axis where both sides would be joined in the most agnostic parts? It would be pretty much akin to the Dawkin's own graph.

I envision something more like a grid, not a graph, consisting of four squares. Something really really similar to your graph:

                       AGNOSTIC            GNOSTIC
                     -------------------------------
ATHEIST        agnostic atheist   gnostic atheist

THEIST          agnostic theist    gnostic theist

The first one (aa) is someone who does not believe in the religions nor in any portrayed gods. An atheist out and out, maybe even an anti-theist, always ranting about the stupidity of it, etc. However, he won't ever say there are no Gods, absolutely. No, just against any mammal referencing, representing such a creature;
The second one (ga) is someone that not only does not believe, but actively believes this to not be the case. He will affirm that he knows this to be absolutely true, due to several pieces of argumentation (for instance, logical or mathematical, even metaphysical, etc);
The third one (at) is someone who does not know if God exists, and may well agree that the question is unanswerable philosophically, but he holds faith that he does and believes;
The fourth (gt) is someone who knows that God exists. Perhaps by mathematical proof. Perhaps by sheer conviction, he just knows it.



Most religious people are of the (at) kind, but I do know very smart (gt) types of people. I have yet to meet gnostic atheists myself.

 

Offline NGTM-1R

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Re: Atheism and Agnosticism
Further, I was precisely trying to hammer down your own point, namely that because the question is unfalsifiable, then we should not give it the respect it tries to assert, and downright deny it.

Because denial is missing the point.

It's not about denial. Making a denial of an unfalsifiable claim is, in itself, intellectually dishonest of the denier in the purest possible sense. You cannot provide evidence of why it should be openly denied because you cannot prove either the positive or the null. That's what unfalsifiable means. You cannot honestly assert or deny the claim on intellectual grounds.

"I am ignoring your claim on the basis it is unfalsifiable" is different from "I am denying your claim on the basis it is unfalsifiable". One of them does not engage; the other one engages directly in a meaningless battle because it acknowledges, in itself, that there is no win condition. The distinction is important because it leads directly to behavior like yours here, where you've engaged in a discussion that is by your own admission probably one of non-opposing viewpoints seeking some kind of victory that can't be won. You want to waste your time and energy in this fight making claims that we should deny things when you have openly admitted you can't prove those claims and provoking people who might otherwise be your allies, because you want to deny rather than ignore.

That's why MP-Ryan has made the claim his position is superior: it does not lead to this kind of nearly-fratricidal bloodshed and the assertion we should do things for which evidence cannot be provided. The more you choose to argue this point, the more he's proving correct.
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