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Richard Dawkins now slighty Agnostic

thephantom1

Though readers might be interested:
http://www.inquisitr.com/198162/atheist-richard-dawkins-slightly-agnostic-after-all/

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Zombrex

im invisible wrote: »

resurecting an old thread to make an old point, again

Surely its a line, with gnostic at either end, and a whole spectrum of agnostic in the middle??

edit pic in link

True, there are not degrees of gnostic. Though that is harder to draw :P

ShooterSF

dd972 wrote: »

Think the face in the middle of the illustration with the ''f**ked if I know'' expression says more than the statements surrounding it about the mysteries of God

How very monotheistic of you.

im invisible

Zombrex wrote: »

True, there are not degrees of gnostic. Though that is harder to draw :P

not really, 10 mins in photoshop (MSPaint)

Zombrex

im invisible wrote: »

not really, 10 mins in photoshop (MSPaint)

I stand corrected, what'cha what, a medal :P

Mark Hamill

im invisible wrote: »

not really, 10 mins in photoshop (MSPaint)

I dont see how thats correct, thats implying that agnostic atheist and agnostic theist are next to each other, and that you can be agnostic without being theistic/atheistic.

Michael Nugent

Another way of looking at it....

Agnostic and gnostic have to be applied to something.

You can't just be agnostic as an abstract position (unless you mean you are agnostic about everything).

Both 'scales' are actually binary positions.

Either you are atheist or else you are not atheist.

Either you are agnostic or else you are not agnostic (about being atheist or not being atheist).

The scales apply to the degrees of confidence or doubt with which you hold your positions on atheism, or your positions on agnosticism.

robindch

dd972 wrote: »

Think the face in the middle of the illustration with the ''f**ked if I know'' expression says more than the statements surrounding it about the mysteries of God

Very much what I was trying to convey

SeanW

I think the "cross" scale can be useful, but only if it does not try to pigeon-hole people into double-barrelled religious descriptions, such as Agnostic-Atheist or Agnostic-Theist or Gnostic whatever as you will find many people reject such labels as over-complications. The scale can be useful provided it allows people to take singular positions from it where they deem it so appropriate.

For example, if someone accepts the tenets of a particular faith, they could be simply described (and accept the simple description of) theist, or Christian or Buddhist or whatever. The scale posted here works if it allows that.

Another person who believes the negative, i.e. "there is nothing outside the physical realm" might, rightly or wrongly, describe themselves simply as Atheist, though the correct term might be Gnostic Atheist ... or something.

For me, I'm not really interested in God (I consider it a secondary, at best supporting question) more whether there is any kind of spiritual realm outside the physical world that we percieve. On that point, I am evenly split between "Yes" and "No."

For that reason, I consider myself to be agnostic, with no further qualification being either needed or helpful.

[Jackass]

Penn wrote: »

Belief and knowledge are two different things.

I don't believe in god(s). Can I be sure there is no god(s)? No, I just don't believe there are any.

Sometimes, the more absurd the claim, the more difficult it is to disprove.

And that is what I have learned from my experiences with time travel (and you can't prove that I haven't time traveled no matter how unlikely or impossible it may sound!)

ShooterSF

SeanW wrote: »

For me, I'm not really interested in God (I consider it a secondary, at best supporting question) more whether there is any kind of spiritual realm outside the physical world that we percieve. On that point, I am evenly split between "Yes" and "No."

For that reason, I consider myself to be agnostic, with no further qualification being either needed or helpful.

But if someone wanted to know your view on the likelihood of gods major religions follow existing rather than an unspecified possibly non-interfering spirituality how would you describe yourself?

frozenfrozen

I had to explain this to Bishop Trevor Williams last week when he visited my school. He was taking questions and somebody said something to the effect of "with science religion isn't relevant" and he talked around his answer to it, didn't really say much and then started talking about scientists, namely Richard Dawkins who he said was "a terrible scientist" because he "denies the existence of any God(s), and as a scientist you can't make a claim like that." And as a scientist he should hold an agnostic view, and not be an atheist like he is. And he went on and said that about 5 different ways, trying his hardest to talk down about him, and once he had finished I just put up my hand and just quietly said: "Richard Dawkins is agnostic. He labelled himself a stage 7 agnostic so in the same way he doesn't deny the existence of any Gods, he equally doesn't deny the existence of aliens, but would believe in anything if there was real scientific evidence" (As claimed by Dawkins in his book 'The God Delusion.')
And he just said; "Oh. I seem to have misrepresented him." And then there were about 20 seconds of awkward complete silence, followed by some laughter and then he awkwardly moved on.

He said "good boy" as I walked by him on my way out. Brilliant.

robindch

frozenfrozen wrote: »

And he just said; "Oh. I seem to have misrepresented him." And then there were about 20 seconds of awkward complete silence, followed by some laughter and then he awkwardly moved on. He said "good boy" as I walked by him on my way out. Brilliant.

Bully for Trevor. I think most people wouldn't be brave enough to admit in public they'd misrepresented somebody, especially somebody on the other side of a contentious debate.

SeanW

ShooterSF wrote: »

But if someone wanted to know your view on the likelihood of gods major religions follow existing rather than an unspecified possibly non-interfering spirituality how would you describe yourself?

On the matter of the Abrahamic God, I am in fact rather certain that He does not exist. Why?

Having been raised in the Catholic faith and been taught stories of (for example) the prodigal son, I see that the Abrahamic faiths, especially Christianity and Islam, are very heavy on recruitment and bringing people "into the fold" as it were, and very light on things such as proof, and evidence.

I can therefore conclude that the Abrahamic God is man-made.

im invisible

Mark Hamill wrote: »

I dont see how thats correct, thats implying that agnostic atheist and agnostic theist are next to each other, and that you can be agnostic without being theistic/atheistic.

yes..

Michael Nugent wrote: »

Another way of looking at it....
Agnostic and gnostic have to be applied to something.
You can't just be agnostic as an abstract position (unless you mean you are agnostic about everything).
Both 'scales' are actually binary positions.
Either you are atheist or else you are not atheist.
Either you are agnostic or else you are not agnostic (about being atheist or not being atheist).
The scales apply to the degrees of confidence or doubt with which you hold your positions on atheism, or your positions on agnosticism.

no, still not convinced, as i said earlier (was going to quote the post, but i just realised it was you i was arguing with before)

two things about this forum (the people in it?) really annoy me, one is the above, the other is

ShooterSF wrote: »

But if someone wanted to know your view on the likelihood of gods major religions follow existing rather than an unspecified possibly non-interfering spirituality how would you describe yourself?

someone saying 'duh, you dont believe in x, y, z, i just dont believe in one more god than you' thinking that thats somehow, i dont know, enlightened, that someone will realise 'oh gosh, you're right, how could i have been so stupid'

i mean if you dont understand that every religion on earth, is man trying to understand God/ to make sense of the god question/ whatever, and that just because they're all wrong, dosn't mean that this thing that we're trying to understand dosn't exist, well i dont know

Mark Hamill

im invisible wrote: »

yes..

So are you agreeing with me or disagreeing with me?

im invisible wrote: »

someone saying 'duh, you dont believe in x, y, z, i just dont believe in one more god than you' thinking that thats somehow, i dont know, enlightened, that someone will realise 'oh gosh, you're right, how could i have been so stupid'

i mean if you dont understand that every religion on earth, is man trying to understand God/ to make sense of the god question/ whatever, and that just because they're all wrong, dosn't mean that this thing that we're trying to understand dosn't exist, well i dont know

Thats not the point of the 'i just dont believe in one more god than you' argument. The point of the 'i just dont believe in one more god than you' argument is that the criteria that believers use to disregard other gods besides their own, actually apply to their own god as well. If they were being honest in their application of that criteria, they should disregard\their own god as well.

ShooterSF

im invisible wrote: »

yes..

someone saying 'duh, you dont believe in x, y, z, i just dont believe in one more god than you' thinking that thats somehow, i dont know, enlightened, that someone will realise 'oh gosh, you're right, how could i have been so stupid'

i mean if you dont understand that every religion on earth, is man trying to understand God/ to make sense of the god question/ whatever, and that just because they're all wrong, dosn't mean that this thing that we're trying to understand dosn't exist, well i dont know

While Mark did a great job responding I felt it best if I get back to you personally. I'm not that interested in if there is a non-descript god out there that no one understands. It's the most likely version of a "god" in my eyes; Rhough I don't believe in it myself. My issue is with the people who think their religion is right and they need to impose it on me and even then I won't go so far as you to say "they're all wrong" though I believe that statement to be very likely.

B9K9

I consider it helpful to state one's disbelief: in all proposed gods thus far, thereby saying no ruling out some future explanation that might/could stand to reason. This makes me gnostic atheist in the present, while being open to some amazing revelation or insight sometime hence. First question to that putative plausible being: "kindly explain your silence and implied lack of concern over past millennia"

Zombrex

im invisible wrote: »

someone saying 'duh, you dont believe in x, y, z, i just dont believe in one more god than you' thinking that thats somehow, i dont know, enlightened, that someone will realise 'oh gosh, you're right, how could i have been so stupid'

i mean if you dont understand that every religion on earth, is man trying to understand God/ to make sense of the god question/ whatever, and that just because they're all wrong, dosn't mean that this thing that we're trying to understand dosn't exist, well i dont know

This thing we are trying to understand does exist, it is called "theory of mind" and "hyperactive agency detection", and is an evolutionary quirk in humans that causes them to imagine that there are agents in nature causing different things to happen.

It is sort of like a much more elaborate example of the stare at a white page trick (which itself is a quirk of the human vision)

For most of human history we have explained this habit of humans imagining agents in nature through the use of the notion of gods and other supernatural beings. We now know different, that these things don't actually exist but we know why we imagine them anyway. We know why humans invent them, why inventing them makes humans happier and makes it easier for them to process the world around them.

Like so many things in life the actual answer ends up explaining things so much better than previous attempts.