Agnosticism is NOT a system of belief.

[zorkuus]

Atheists say they know for sure that the theists are wrong.

No. That's a gnostic atheist you're talking about there. This has already been dealth with multiple times in this thread.

[haxartus]

What if the kid was theistic and the parent was forcing atheism on him?

Except it can't become a theist without someone making it one.

[Huatok]

Not the same. There are two different claims here to be rejected/accepted. If you reject the claim "the coin is not heads", then that's that, you rejected the claim. You then move on to the claim "the coin is tails", which again, you can accept or reject.

I see mis-spoke my point; let me restate. Your original statement:

"If you don't accept an idea, then by definition you reject it, whether you realise/want to admit it or not."

When you flip your coin and tell me it's not heads, I do not accept it. Does this mean I reject that it's not heads? No, I not would accept that it's not tails either, while still not rejecting that it is. I would reserve accepting or rejecting a result, until the hand was lifted and answer revealed.

[dsmania]

While I do proclaim myself as an agnostic.
When I was 18 years old I finished my studies in a catholic school before going to University, but we learned about wide variety of religions there.
At that point I got to started thinking that we're not able to know if God exists or not and it should besomething we'd not care about since it's not something we can "reach" or "manipulate". So my personal point was that we didn't really need to believe since... will that change anything?
Then, reading a bit that is close to some form of agnosticism, so I think I'm one of those.

[Badpaladin]

Except it can't become a theist without someone making him one.

Wrong, I can just as easily read the bible and choose to believe in Christianity as I can read the bible and decide it's a load of crap.

[Ägallar]

No, it is simply your inability to see things from his point of view, that is, the literal definition of the words.

But you're not offering any definitions beyond "I believe Sarcasm is correct." I could just as easily agree with RabbitPrime, and ignore Sarcasm's "definitions" and claim that the others are all false. If you're arguing with another set of facts, I don't see why you wouldn't try to point to a source for those claims, unless you're lacking the source which started the whole topic.

tl;dr - Armed with only Sarcasm's proposed "facts" is not enough to base degrading comments toward others on.

My basis for disagreement is American culture, which readily accepts Agnosticism to be the counter of Sarcasm's definition. As well as the accepted English definitions of (Webster) agnosticism, atheism, etc. which again run counter to Sarcasm's definitions.

[Eloona]

The thing that scares me about all of this is that if I go on in life without believing there is a God then I die, and there really is a God, I go to hell. If I do believe in God and I accept Jesus christ as my savior then I die, and there isn't really a God, nothing happens. Unless in fact I just chose the wrong faith and then I'm just screwed either way. There is no proof either way no matter what some of you people say.

I'd like to think that I am a Christian. When I was seven I asked for Jesus to come into my heart. I know I'm not a perfect person, but at least I have some comfort in what I believe. I want to believe that there is a heaven after I die. I want to believe that I don't have to worry about my problems because a higher being is taking care of me. So far it's worked for me. Until I see some proof that God doesn't exist, this is what I will believe.

You can bash me for all you want but I'm going to believe what I believe even if people like Shinshiva think I'm not intelligent because of it.

[Sarcasm]

No, you still don't get it. Here have another example.
You have 5 seconds to accept or reject this equation:

942*145*741*441*129*111-639128805416009 = 3

Do you believe this is true or not? Or do you wait until you know for sure before you make a statement?

5 seconds to reject or accept the equation? You're kidding right? That's like telling scientists at the LHC "You have one week to prove the Higgs-Boson exists, otherwise it obviously must not."

The evidence is there in front of me, and I can draw a conclusion based off of it. Putting a time limit on it is a childish way to try and trip me up. There's no such thing as a time limit when it comes to reasoning.

[RabbitPrime]

No, it is simply your inability to see things from his point of view, that is, the literal definition of the words. If it helps, write the four denominations out in a line, the "agnostics" fall in the middle, between gnostic theism and gnostic atheism. That's as close to a "middle ground" as there exists.

- Agnostic thiest: Believes in the existance of God(s), but does not claim to be able to prove their beliefs are fact. These are the "I know I can't prove my beliefs are true, but I have a feeling that they are" theists.

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. Textbook definition of agnosticism.

He's wrong in his model and so is wrong in everything else.

If you mean to tell me that he is only correct if I see things from his point of view, then you're telling me that he is not objectively correct and so is indeed wrong.

[Lysah]

But you're not offering any definitions beyond "I believe Sarcasm is correct."

Did you read the first seven pages? I've stated my points several times over.

@Rabbit
I'm saying he's always correct, but there is no argument left. We say "here is what the letter 'a' does to this word." You say "No, I don't want to believe that, here's some stuff I think is real instead." Where is the discussion, then?

[chani666]

Which, when it comes to religion, makes you atheist.

Sarcasm, odd forum name by the way to start such a topic... The above statement is the whole point in the word agnostic, and many many other words in the series of certainty.

While you may think, because either there is god or there is no god, so if someone doesnt know (in your terms knows from his belief) that god exits he is an atheist. But thats just not true, at last in philosophy, were the term agnostic comes frome. There different degrees of certainty you can have to a specific statement, espcially but not limited to the question "is there a god"

This is quoted from Wikipedia, and should underline what I want to say:
Inductive reasoning, also known as induction or inductive logic, or educated guess in colloquial English, is a kind of reasoning that constructs or evaluates inductive arguments. The premises of an inductive logical argument indicate some degree of support (inductive probability) for the conclusion but do not entail it; that is, they suggest truth but do not ensure it.


TL,DR: Only a Sith deals in absolutes... ;-)

[Cephyid]

The thing that scares me about all of this is that if I go on in life without believing there is a God then I die, and there really is a God, I go to hell. If I do believe in God and I accept Jesus christ as my savior then I die, and there isn't really a God, nothing happens. Unless in fact I just chose the wrong faith and then I'm just screwed either way. There is no proof either way no matter what some of you people say.

I'd like to think that I am a Christian. When I was seven I asked for Jesus to come into my heart. I know I'm not a perfect person, but at least I have some comfort in what I believe. I want to believe that there is a heaven after I die. I want to believe that I don't have to worry about my problems because a higher being is taking care of me. So far it's worked for me. Until I see some proof that God doesn't exist, this is what I will believe.

You can bash me for all you want but I'm going to believe what I believe even if people like Shinshiva think I'm not intelligent because of it.

You would be wise to read up on Pastafariasm. His noodly appendage will save you from hell.

[BlackwingHecate]

Wrong. When you're saying "I neither accept nor reject as each side seems perfectly valid", you're dealing with two different claims. If we take "God is real" as a claim for example, you can either accept or reject this. There is no middle. You accept this claim or you don't. If you reject this claim, your options for the claim "God is not real" are open. You can choose to accept or reject this claim as well. There is no middle.

You seem to be operating under the assumption that one has to accept one and reject the other. Several people have said as much, and you have yet to come up with an acceptable reason that this is true. There IS a middle ground. Neither accept or reject either. There. middle ground.

[phoenixbow]

for the third time: theres no such thing as gnostic theist or an agnostic theist. your website is full of misinformation.

these things are DEISM and FIDEISM.

there is also no such thing as an "athiest gnostic" as that is an oxymoron.

gnosticism is the belief that there IS a god-like creator of everything. you people are working with the wrong definitions of gnosticism as defined by the mistaken OP.

Deism has absolutely nothing to do with the whether or not one believes in a god. Deists, by definition, must believe in a god to be a deist. They just don't believe that god interacts with our world in any way, shape, or form.

Fideism maintains that faith is independent of reason. Once again, it doesn't have anything to do with gnostic/agnostic. The doctrine simply states that faith is superior to reason when trying to determine truths. It still results in someone claiming to "know". IE, "Credo quia absurdum" ("I believe because it is absurd").

[Deleted]

Wrong. When you're saying "I neither accept nor reject as each side seems perfectly valid", you're dealing with two different claims. If we take "God is real" as a claim for example, you can either accept or reject this. There is no middle. You accept this claim or you don't. If you reject this claim, your options for the claim "God is not real" are open. You can choose to accept or reject this claim as well. There is no middle.

You forgot that Zuthos said "so I am with-holding my opinion until I have more information."
Here's another analogy for you.

There's an unopened wine bottle in front of you. You don't know what it tastes like and if it tastes good. Therefore, you can neither accept nor reject the claim that it tastes good.

If what you're saying was true and we're dealing with two different claims (1. the wine tastes good and 2. the wine tastes bad)... if we take claim number 1 for example, you can either accept or reject that wine tastes good. How can you do that if you simply do not know until you taste it?

[BlackwingHecate]

5 seconds to reject or accept the equation? You're kidding right? That's like telling scientists at the LHC "You have one week to prove the Higgs-Boson exists, otherwise it obviously must not."

The evidence is there in front of me, and I can draw a conclusion based off of it. Putting a time limit on it is a childish way to try and trip me up. There's no such thing as a time limit when it comes to reasoning.

But you are also putting a time limit on it.

[haxartus]

Wrong, I can just as easily read the bible and choose to believe in Christianity as I can read the bible and decide it's a load of crap.

And how would you get this bible ? Most likely someone will give it to you or you will hear about it from someone.
I read some parts of the bible when I was around 10 years old, and I decided it was a complete nonsense.

[Landwhale]

Because the scientist, a man of fact, who distorts fact to fit his goals is present in this world, and far more dangerous than the preacher who distorts scripture to fit his goals. Most scientists don't do this, which is a good thing, but some do and their impact causes a lot of harm, more so than the fundamentalist preachers who tell people what to believe. At the end of the day, if a man of faith tells you what your faith should be, you're more likely to question it than something a man of fact tells you is true.

as a member of the scientific community, i can assure you that scientists who do distort facts and actually DO get their work published usually have their work reviewed and the falsity of it comes to light. checking research methods and procedures etc happens all the time.

a good example of this is when a pyschology professor wrote an entire book (and got it published!) about how penis size affected intelligence. he claimed that the larger the average penis size of a given race is, the lesser the intellectual caliber of members of that race.

this is obviously false, and was subject to many reviews and was quickly revoked as reputable research.

[Sarcasm]

Let's go back to the watches instead (as it is an excellent analogy) you're asked to pick between watch A and watch B. Group A says that watch A is superior than watch B. Group B says that opposite, that watch B is superior to watch A. Both sides present many arguments and theories and logical arguments, but neither one can conclude which watch is superior.

You choose not to wear either watch, but to leave them on the table until one is definitely superior to the other. That's agnosticism.

Except that's actually choosing between two different objects (or two different religions). Atheists don't argue that "atheism is correct", they're arguing that religion is not correct. That's all atheism is. Choosing neither watch is rejecting both watches, which is being atheist, because you can't decide which religion is superior.

[Espe]

Gnostic - Claim of knowledge
Agnostic - Claim of not knowing

Theist - Believes there is a God
Atheist - Believes there is no God

An atheist believes there is no god or creative force in this reality, they have already made the claim that they reject the idea of an intelligent creative force at work.

A gnostic atheist would says "I know there is no god." An agnostic atheist would say "I don't think there is a god." Both claims take just as much faith as any theist stance.