Agnostic atheism: a reasonable position on spiritual matters, or the only reasonable position...

[gcomeau]

59. Again...

"Maybe a more assertive position would be a simple refusal to believe or disbelieve in matters of a deity"

Belief or disbelief in a deity are irrelevant to whether you are an agnostic. Doesn't have one single thing to do with agnosticism. I know many agnostic theists and many agnostic atheists. Those two things are completely and totally decoupled.

Agnosticism is a belief about the nature of deity according to how it is defined and described (regardless of whether that entity being described is real or fictional), not about the existence of deity.

And to continue on since your comment seemed to imply it, atheism is not disbelief in said existence. It is lack of belief, which is significantly different. Agnosticism is not the neutral ground between theism and atheism because there is no ground whatsoever to occupy between theism and atheism. They describe a binary solution set. You either possess a belief that a deity exists, or you do not possess that belief. It's just that simple.


People who try to claim otherwise almost inevitably end up being person 2 in the following conversation:


Person 1: "So are you a theist or an atheist?"

Person 2: "I'm an agnostic."

Person 1: "Ummm... ok. But are you a theist or an atheist?"

Person 2: "Neither, I'm an agnostic."

Person 1: "Those have nothing to do with each other, that's like saying 'neither, I'm an accountant'. Do you believe a deity exists?"

Person 2: "I don't know."

Person 1: "What do you mean you don't know? How can you not know?"

Person 2: "Nobody really knows if a deity exists."

Person 1: "I agree. But I didn't ask you 'Does a deity exist?'. I asked you "DO YOU BELIEVE a deity exists?'"

Person 2: "I said I don't know!"

Person 1: "When you were answering the wrong question. How can you not know if you have a belief? I'm asking you about the content of your own thoughts, how can you not know the content of your own thoughts? That's the one thing in the entire universe you should have no problem having knowledge of. Do you have multiple personalities and you think one of the other ones might be hiding a belief in a deity from the rest of your personalities or something???? Because otherwise yes you do know."

Person 2: "Well what if I'm just not sure? A person can't just be not sure?"

Person 1: "Of course they can. But I didn't ask you if you were sure either. Theism isn't being SURE God exists and atheism isn't being SURE God doesn't. Belief has nothing to do with surety. You either have a belief or you don't. Do you have a belief that a deity exist?"

Person 2: "I don't know!"

Person 1: "Oh FFS..."


Etc, etc, with Person 2 consistently refusing to answer a simple yes/no question that there's no way they don't actually know the answer to... because they rather transparently only desire to avoid being identified as belonging to either group.

I have had the above conversation more times than I care to count, and it always goes almost the exact same way...