Agnosticism (again, but with a twist)
I have looked through older threads about Agnosticism but didn't feel like resurrecting those because they were lacking what I wanted to discuss. There are different definitions of agnosticism around and I first want to distinguish between two of the most prevalent:
Colloquial agnosticism (further denoted by the lower "a"):
The inner state of not knowing whether a god exists. (This is a weakened version of)
Philosophical Agnosticism (further denoted by the capital "A"):
The position that the existence and Nature of god is not known / can't be known.
Or, in a more flippant form: "I don't know what a god is - and neither do you."
Notice that the later not only makes a statement about an inner state but takes on a position about the state of the world. Thus Agnosticism has a burden of proof, if challenged. That makes it equal to a Theistic position. It also goes beyond mere atheism and is not just the "fence sitting" which is often the critique of agnosticism.
Do you agree with these definitions?
Are you an agnostic/Agnostic?
Colloquial agnosticism (further denoted by the lower "a"):
The inner state of not knowing whether a god exists. (This is a weakened version of)
Philosophical Agnosticism (further denoted by the capital "A"):
The position that the existence and Nature of god is not known / can't be known.
Or, in a more flippant form: "I don't know what a god is - and neither do you."
Notice that the later not only makes a statement about an inner state but takes on a position about the state of the world. Thus Agnosticism has a burden of proof, if challenged. That makes it equal to a Theistic position. It also goes beyond mere atheism and is not just the "fence sitting" which is often the critique of agnosticism.
Do you agree with these definitions?
Are you an agnostic/Agnostic?
Comments (100)
Check this out: Atheism, Agnosticism, Noncognitivism
I think Agnosticism is not related to "I don't know what a god is - and neither do you." as you said wrote previously, but in a neutral state of expression. An agnostic would not wonder if a particular God does exists because he respects all forms of divinities. I guess it is all about of not taking part in any religious dogma and respecting every representation of it.
I quickly did a research and I found the following trick which is so interesting:
Suppose you are to answer the following two questions:
If you say no to the first question, then you may be classified as a noncognitivist with regard to God-talk. If you say yes to it, thereby allowing that the given sentence does express a proposition, then you are a cognitivist with regard to God-talk. All theists, atheists, and agnostics are cognitivists, so the second question applies to them: is the proposition that God exists true or false? You are a theist if and only if you say that the proposition is true or probably true, you are an atheist if and only if you say that it is false or probably false, and you are an agnostic if and only if you understand what the proposition is, but resist giving either answer, and support your resistance by saying, “The evidence is insufficient”
"Theological noncognitivism is the non-theist position that religious language, particularly theological terminology such as "God", is not intelligible or meaningful, and thus sentences like "God exists" are cognitively meaningless.[1] It may be considered synonymous with ignosticism (also called igtheism)," - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theological_noncognitivism
So, Ignosticism would be a more accurate word for the position than Agnosticism?
I think both are correct because they are agree in one principle: God and the belief on it is meaningless or at least when they ask for proofs, are not sufficient
I mostly agree with your definitions. I would add, though, that an agnostic believes in the possibility that a god exists. The possibility of god is an equally untenable belief, in my mind.
I don't think about it as long as I don't get a definition.
But for the rest, yes, there is a possibility that god exists. I can even prove it to you. Regard this little syllogism:
P1: Clapton is god.
P2: Clapton exists. (And is real and there is evidence for that.)
C: God exists.
Pretty undeniable, don't you think?
I don't think that your terminology quite accurately depicts all the positions available with respect to the topic at hand. Firstly, I think that "Colloquial Agnosticism" can, in terms of its definition you proposed, be applied to many philosophical positions. So I would like to semantically note that holding the position "I do not know" is not merely restricted to colloquial speech.
Secondly, "Philosophical Agnosticism" seems to lump two drastically different claims into one, which I would argue thereby warrants two separate terms (at the very least): "god is not known" is not equivocal to "god can't be known". The former asserts a humbler position that we (or potentially "I") have not obtained knowledge of God existing nor not existing, whereas the latter asserts the impossibility of ever acquiring knowledge of God's existence: these are two very different claims. Consequently, "I don't know what god is- and neither to you" could be merely asserting the former or the actually asserting the latter, which would be vital to distinguish in a conversation (i.e. "I don't know what god is - and neither do you and neither will us both ever know").
Thirdly, I think your two terms are a false dilemma: either I accept that I am merely claiming "I do not know God exists", or I am obliged to accept "We do not know nor can we know God exists or his nature". But I could very well claim many other permutations of these positions, here's just a few:
1. We do not know God exists (implies we don't know his nature).
2. We do know God exists/doesn't exist, but do not know his nature
3. I do know God exists/doesn't exist, but do not know his nature
4. I do not know God exists (implies I don't know his nature).
5. I do not know God exists, but I believe a God exists.
6. I do know God exists, don't know its nature, but believe certain characteristics to be of its nature.
7. etc...
Fourthly, an agnostic only has a burden of proof IFF they are asserting they know that we or they can't know, which the only other option to this assertion is to take a "inner state" approach in your terms, which I don't think is the only other option.
To summarize:
I don't. I think generically agnosticism is the suspension of asserting either way pertaining to a knowledge claim, regardless of whether they believe either way.
I would personally use a two-dimensional labeling system wherein one axis is knowledge (and lack thereof) and the other is belief (and lack thereof). In such a system, I would most accurately label myself an agnostic atheist. I do concede that it is highly controversial, but nevertheless that's the closest representation of my views I have found to date. As of now, I cannot confidently assert I know god doesn't exist, but I do not believe it does.
I agree. And I said so in the OP. I was primarily focused on the distinction of inner state versus position.
Quoting Bob Ross
Agree again. The former is often referred to as "soft" and the later as "hard" Agnosticism. But both are only ever possible options for the Agnostic, not the agnostic.
Quoting Bob Ross
I also did before changing to / relabelling myself as Agnostic.
(And I also remain an atheist - by definition, not by choice.)
Quoting Bob Ross
I don't think so. It is a method I've seen often.
No, because the conclusion does not follow since your use of "god" and "God" are different.
According to you, what's the main difference? I guess "god" and "God" are just grammatical differences. You have to write God in capital letters because it is how language works.
No equivocation intended, nor do I see how you see one (except, as @javi2541997 noted, for grammatical reasons).
The argument has the basic form of A=B, ? B, ? ? A and is thus valid.
Words have meanings. The word "god" in P1 is not defined - and thus we cannot draw any conclusions from that statement. Consider these alternates:
P1: Clapton is a four sided triangle.
P2: Clapton exists. (And is real and there is evidence for that.)
C: Four sided triangles exist.
P1: Clapton is a fTyrtydfr.
P2: Clapton exists. (And is real and there is evidence for that.)
C: fTyrtydfr exists.
BTW - Big fan of Clapton's playing in Cream - Disraeli Gears, etc
That is fair. I was under the impression that Agnosticism and agnosticism were supposed to serve the purpose of being a terminology system (what you outlined I thought as the most prevalent distinction) wherein one is either accurately depicted as Agnostic or agnostic. My contention, I suppose, is that, although you do mention that there are many other definitions (as there always are), the terminology is incomplete. But if you are simply focusing on two distinctions among many, whereby conceding that the terminology does not represent a complete labeling system, then I simply misunderstood (I apologize if that's the case).
Before I comment, let me ask for some clarification: is your Agnostic vs agnostic distinction about whom the claim is indexically referring to? As in, when you say "god is not known" is "soft Agnosticism", do you mean "[no person knows god exists"? Whereas "god is not known" in an "agnostic" position would really mean "[I do not know god exists, but I do not know if any other person does or does not know god exists"?
very interesting, what made you decide to change?
And Blind Faith.
The word "god" gets defined by P1. "Clapton is god" is short for "I define god as Clapton." And since you obviously know Clapton and you know he exists, you now know god and you know he exists.
Exactly. (And for the agnostic there is no way to claim that s/he and only s/he is unable to gain that knowledge without special pleading. So there are no "hard" agnostics.)
Quoting Bob Ross
I realized that Agnosticism is a stronger position (really, a position instead of just an inner state) than mere atheism. It also puts me in the same position as a Theist since I now have a burden of proof. It's at the same time levelling the playing field and giving me a stronger attack.
(It also makes me lonely. Neither atheists nor theists know how to handle my arguments so they just ignore me.)
And theism or atheism does?
Only truth/falsity are relevant to decisions.
I agree.
And neither Theism nor Atheism are well formed propositions, thus can't have truth values.
Definitions have usage not meaning. I think it's often a rookie philosophy mistake to get too concrete about definitions.
I am an agnostic atheist - (atheism goes to belief, agnosticism goes to knowledge) none of the claims made about god/s are convincing to me, but I don't know. This would be similar to claims about Bigfoot or the Loch Ness Monster. We can't know that they do not exist, but we are not convinced by the claims which have been made.
Atheism is not a doctrine, it is a position on a single claim. These days atheists are often likely to say I don't accept the claim that god/s exist. They do not say there is no god (unless they are dogmatists).
:up:
Quoting javi2541997
I find a second-order approach – is theism (or its sine qua non claims) true or not true? – more reasonable.
• theists believe 'theism is true' (sound argument?)
• atheists disbelieve 'theism is true' (sound argument?)
• agnostics doubt 'the truth-value of theism is even decidable, or knowable. (Equipollence?)
Quoting ArmChairPhilosopher
Neither.
The problem is, claims about God are based on belief and not knowledge. Thus, the agnostic just refuses to make a decision.
:chin:
Only some say this. Many would say we don't know as things stand, but this may change. If god/s were to arrive in town, in full regalia, we would review our position, right? To make the claim knowledge of god is not possible is a rather extreme metaphysical position.
That's the definition I would use for agnosticism.
I am not. Every definition of agnosticism I have seen is based on the idea that there can be no knowledge of God to prove existence or nonexistence. But God is a function of belief, so I think the agnostic is wrong.
Believing in God or not is one thing. God's existence or non-existence is another.
It would be nice to be able to defend such a position but I can't (yet).
The only thing I can defend is that god is currently not known.
I think it is the same. The first Christian theologians posed God's existence as a proposition. Thus, the question is whether you believe God exists.
What does that mean?
Yes, Foghorn Leghorn. "I said, that's a joke, son!"
I don't think so. But it's a great metaphysical question, to say at least.
Of course it's interesting just what "existing" means as there are the intangible, the immaterial things that we do take to "exist". At least for their usefulness.
I think it is pretty straight forward for Christians. God as described in the Bible and supported by theology.
And of course the Bible is pretty clear that the issue is of faith, not of reason. That couldn't be said more clearly.
Short version: Theists don't agree what a god is.
Slightly longer version: Knowledge is transferable. If I know something, I can teach you, show you the evidence or the proof. I.e. if there were any objective knowledge about the nature of god, after several millennia Theists would have come to an agreement. They obviously haven't. (There are 41,000+ denominations in Christianity alone.) Thus, they obviously don't know what they are talking about.
And that is my point. I do not think agnosticism is a legitimate position. They choose to be undecided.
Mormons asked me this morning if I believed in God. I said no. Not in the sense you understand it.
It would be so much easier if the Theists could decide what they mean when they say "god".
I know what they mean. I just don't believe it.
Not at all. Christians are all over the place on theology or the Bible. I grew up in the Baptist tradition in Australia. We were taught that the Bible is an allegory and most of the stories myths. We were pro abortion, pro gay rights, pro feminism, etc. Christianity takes many forms and some, like theologian Paul Tillich even hold that we can't know god and he doesn't exist because by definition god is outside of the category of existence which is reserved for corporeal creatures.
Tillich's definition is pretty mainstream. What are the theologies you see as conflicting?
The properties of God Christians teach are:
1. All powerful
2. All knowing
3. Creator of universe
4. Spirit rather than physical entity
I hate to break it to you but you don't. You may have an illusion of knowledge, just as they do but if you put your "knowledge" to the test, you'll find it lacking.
I think your idea of objective knowledge is too strict. We could also say philosophers have been arguing about the existence of the external world, other minds, whether moral realism is a thing, whether we have control/agency over our actions etc for thousands of years, and therefore philosophers obviously don't know what they are talking about. Maybe we don't.
Honestly, when it comes to metaphysical claims about God, the existence of the external world, etc our traditional idea of "knowledge" comes into question. For instance, what does it mean to "know" whether God exists? Now, J J C Smart describes it in terms of probabilities
But how would one be able to assign a probability with any confidence about their belief in something, especially as it relies on other assumptions that may also have probabilities assigned to them? Furthermore, this probability is going to be conditioned based on whether or not I accept the existence of miracles, how I define god/God, whether I am a naturalist, etc.
Another way you can think about this is as a spectrum of god/God's knowability as well as one's position based on their belief on knowability.
[img]https://qph.fs.quoracdn.net/main-qimg-d6e2454572b02492b1a53526f0b81d28-lq/img]
Under this definition, I would be a De Facto theist or an agnostic theist. I don't think God's existence is even knowable/provable to humans (in the traditional, empirical sense) but I do believe in a God. For instance, there is a difference between me saying "I believe in God" and me claiming "God Exists" as a philosophical claim. There are interesting arguments on the theistic side as well as good rebuttals on the atheistic side so I do think the reasonable position is to be somewhat unsure unless you claim to have had a religious experience.
Fine, tell me what I do not know.
How so? Only because it can't be proved?
Those are superficial generalities. What differs is how we understand god's nature - what god wants from people, what behavior is moral, the extent of god's judgement. That's where the vast differences are located and the source of many conflicts between creeds.
Ok.
How many gods there are.
If it has the properties omnipotence, omniscience, omni benevolence, omnipresence.
If it is (perfectly) just, (perfectly) merciful, unchanging, jealous, ...
Most Theists wouldn't agree on those properties, not even most Christians and they won't be able to teach each other.
Yep.
Quoting Paulm12
An important difference. "I believe in god(s)" is not a debatable assertion. I could reply "I don't" but that would be the end of the conversation.
None.
No.
Quoting ArmChairPhilosopher
Your original P1: "Clapton is god" is a definition and as such is not a well formed proposition and doers not take a truth value.
Quoting ArmChairPhilosopher
OK. So we can re-phrase your syllogism to this:
P1: ArmChairPhilosopher defines/uses the word "god" to be equivalent to the word "Clapton".
P2: ArmChairPhilosopher (along with most folks) uses the word "Clapton" to refer to a existing person - in this case a well known English musician.
P3: When ArmChairPhilosopher uses the word "god" it is understood that (s)he is referring to the well known existing English musician.
This is a well formed syllogism. Both P1 & P2 are true propositions and P3 logically follows from P1 & P2. But this is obviously very different from your original syllogism.
On top of this you are using lower case "god" - not upper case "God" - and this whole conversation is about the upper case version. So even if you could reformulate your original P1 & P2 into expressing your original conclusion (P3), this particular line of reasoning has no relevance to the actual topic under discussion.
I think I am slowly starting to understand what you mean (and the meaningful distinction therein). I am not sure though how it would be special pleading for an "agnostic" to claim they cannot know God exists, while still refraining from postulating that is true of all other humans. Maybe another person's intellectual capacity greatly surpasses there own? Maybe someone has access to information that they will never obtain. These are all worthy considerations (albeit hypotheticals) that, I would say, at least at face value, would not be special pleading.
Without a doubt, claiming to know (or even believe) that (1) no one can know, (2) no one currently knows, or (3) "I" cannot know whether God exists is a position that produces a burden of prove (and, in that respect, is stronger for sure), but I am not really sure how this isn't a distinction of "hard agnostic atheist" vs "soft agnostic atheist", or something along those lines. Admittedly, I am starting to see how the two-dimensional labeling system needs a bit of refurbishment to more concisely and accurately represent such views as yourself (or maybe potentially a new labeling system may be required), but "soft" vs "hard" would accomplish such a distinction: wouldn't it? Or am I missing something? I think the only hiccup would potentially be your agnostic "inner state" distinction, but wouldn't that just be a "soft agnostic atheist" (or something like that)?
Also, on a separate note, I am still not sure why your terminology is "colloquial" vs "philosophical" agnosticism: although this is merely semantics, why is that?
Well that is disheartening indeed. I think I still need to really hone in on what you mean in relation to your terminology, but thereafter I would love to hear what those arguments are if you would like to share them.
"God" is not the name of any god, it is more like a title. Monotheists often forget that fact as their only god is identical to all titular gods they believe in. The gods of the Bible have names, El and YHVH (which got retconned into one when Judaism switched from henotheism to monotheism) specifically.
Quoting Bob Ross
I'm not sure but you seem to confuse the distinction of "inner state" versus "position" and "hard" and "soft". They are orthogonal. The former tells whether you are making a statement about yourself or the world, the later is talking about how something is (actuality) versus how something could (not) be (potential).
The stronger position would of course be the "hard" variant (we don't know and we will never know). I can't defend that position. In fact, I see my position being falsified one day. When the last-but-one theist dies or de-converts there is only one (valid) definition of god left and soft Agnosticism would be wrong.
"God" is a proper name. In a Christian culture everyone know it refers to God in that tradition.
When you travel to another country, lets say Sweden, does your name change into "Hansson"?
Another travel example. When you travel to India and ask a Hindu if they believe in God, do you think they will refer to the Christian God?
1. You didn't answer my question.
2. Do you? Or are they more likely to ask back "which one"? Referring to a specific god as "God" at least propagates confusion. I will use the proper names of the gods I'm talking about, Odin, Zeus or YHVH when I mean a specific god. I will use "god" and "it" when I refer to the diffuse concept of godhood.
Okay, got it.
What you described isn't quite what I was thinking by "inner state" versus "position". If the former is "talking about how something is" and the latter is "how something could (not) be (potential)", then I don't see how this relates holistically to an inner state. Claiming "I can prove X could be Y or Z" is not equivocal to "I just think X could be Y or Z". The latter is almost, but not actually, noncognitive insofar as it is assumed that there's nothing to negate nor affirm (it is just what I think), whereas the former is something which still asserts potentiality (could/ could not be) but is actually open to criticism (more cognitive in a sense). I was thinking "inner state" would refer not just to a noncognitive claim, e.g. an emotion, but any claims that only indexically refer to the individual at hand. In other words, I was envisioning both my X examples as inner states, but it seems as though you may mean it in a more in the sense of the second example, is that right?
I agree that the stronger position is that of a "hard" variant, but, as far as I am understanding so far, that would include some that refer to "could be" (as previously shown). On a separate note, I am not entirely sure how unified definition would disprove Agnosticism, but I am interested to hear why you think that is the case.
Correct, it seems we are on one page now.
Quoting Bob Ross
It wouldn't directly disprove Agnosticism but it would deprive me of my best Argument. The obvious existence of a myriad of contradicting descriptions of a god is evidence and proof that the believers don't know what they are talking about. (I discard atheistic views because they are biased.)
1. Yes
2. No
3. Don't know
3a. Unknown because of limitations in methodology and information
3b. Unknowable i.e. neither is there a method nor will omniscience help in determining the truth. Interesting, oui?
The unknown can be effectively tackled if we mathematize possibility as probability.
Insofar as "God" is undefined, this perennial question is incoherent.
I'm having extreme difficulty to understand why do you consider is undefined?
What is you argument for God being undefined?
The inability of god believers to come up with a consensus of the properties of "god(s)". There are 41,000+ denominations in Christianity alone. I did the experiment on another forum to try to distil only the common properties imagined of a god from a handful of Christians and the result was an empty set.
I'm baffled, but I got around this by doing some additional research to make sure I got things right...
I did gave link to definition, but I suppose o-o-o and necessary existence are not valid properties for you,
I assume the kind of properties that you seek are physical properties or those which could be empirically measured or observed?
https://www.gracenotes.info/documents/topics_doc/essence.pdf
But you must be aiming at:
https://philosophydungeon.weebly.com/definitions-of-god.html
Quoting ArmChairPhilosopher
I don't know how many denominations are there but these are all denominations of protestant church AFAIK, which is irrelevant for this discussion.
How so? Don't they believe in a god? What makes them unfit to partake in the debate? Which religions and/or denominations are competent to define godhood?
I didn't say they don't believe in God and I don't know if they are unfit to discussion.
Quoting ArmChairPhilosopher
Just because somebody says "I'm Christian" doesn't mean they are automatically fit to answer your questions.
Ask some theologian for answer, they will surely know it better than you or me or some random believer.
:fire:
God as undefined. You mean like how Rober M. Pirsig writes a 418 page novel titled Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance on quality but never really defines it anywhere in the book? We must, it appears, on occasion, beat around the bush.
You omitted another option
4) The question is incoherent. See here earlier in the discussion
Isn't there at least agreement that God had the ability to create a life-permitting universe?
Not very inspiring. I can read god's report card now, from when he was a little god at school. 'He has ability, but lacks discipline to complete tasks properly.'
I agree that the notion of god is incoherent and I think that this is the idea's strength for a lot of believers. You can fill the gap with whatever you need or may be lacking in your life. God then becomes a reflection of your personal preferences, like the ultimate invisible friend. God is whatever believers want it to be, which explains why believers are all over the place and so inconsistent in terms of doctrine and dogma and morality.
That question somehow didn't come up. I guess they would have agreed about that god could or did create the universe but they were already fighting over the how and when.
I'd call it more of a fuzzy concept: having a vague set of vaguely defined properties. One (fairly popular) vague property is the ability to grant wishes.
Ok. Not much different from saying it is incoherent. Incoherent meaning it is unclear, contradictory and muddled or fuzzy. :smile:
I am glad I am understanding you correctly (:
I am not sure how contradicting descriptions of god proves that, on an individual level, that one doesn't know what god is. At best, I would imagine that ample contradicting views would prove that society hasn't come to a consensus, but I don't see how that has any relation to whether or not someone can accurately describe god. As of now, although I'm sure your argument goes deeper than your brief explanation, I think it is totally possible that someone can describe accurately what "god" is and yet societally no one agrees. Just like how someone could have an elaborate grasp of Einstein's general relativity whilst the vast majority (1) have contradictory views to the real theory and (2) can't agree with one another.
I am not sure I am understanding you correctly here. What do you mean by "atheistic views"? Do you discard all of them? Why? I understand that every position possibly conceivable has bad arguments, but they tend to also (generally speaking) have much stronger ones (with at least some merit worth contending with).
Someone once defined knowledge as "justified, true, belief". Not the best definition but it will do for the argument. The other important thing is that knowledge is transferable. You can argue about a fact and you can convince an open minded interlocutor as is done in science all the time.
Theology had thousands of years to come to a consensus. The fact that it didn't shows that what you think is knowledge isn't justified.
Quoting Bob Ross
It is mostly a concession towards the theists. They might complain that atheists have a straw man vision of god. I don't require that theists convince atheists to acknowledge that they might have knowledge about god, just that they come up with a consensus among themselves. I think that is a fair criterion to falsify my position.
External/Internal Inconsistencies:
1. All 3 attributes, together, are incompatible with (the problem of) evil. The Riddle of Epicurus.
2. Omniscience is at odds with free will (connected to 1).
3. Omnipotence is self-contradictory (the stone paradox).
-"The position that the existence and Nature of god is not known / can't be known."
The main problem of this "definition" is that it includes a claim and a logical fallacy. (argument from ignorance). It uses the ill defined man made concept of "god" as an excuse to make a positive statement.
Quoting ArmChairPhilosopher
-Well what we do know about the god claim is that its an idealistic concept of an ultimate agent/entity. So the only actual nature(conceptual) we are aware of this claim is constantly excluded and ignored.
If we are aware and accept the criteria by which we define the existence of entities, then that concept doesn't exist in the world as a real one, like none of the idealistic concepts we strive for (morality, justicy, equality, etc) exist as entities in the world.
In order to render the existential claim of god unknowable, we cheat(special pleading). We don't use the same standards and criteria of existence that we would use in any other case. We even go further and suggest unfalsifiable realms to tuck the concept away from "public eyes".
So the one unwarranted assumptions brings another one and very quickly they start to pile up.
So we end up with a begging the question fallacy on a heavily poisoned well....by using the unattainable made up concept of Absolute Knowledge as an excuse and a faux facade of "epistemic humility".
Every Philosophical inquiry starts(should start) by getting familiar with our epistemology, what we know and how we know it. Agnosticism doesn't do that. It ignores how humans came to be "living" with this concept (the only nature that we can study) and uses the qualities of an unfalsifiable premise to promote an argument from ignorance.
Agnosticism is not a humble or virtuous position...its a red herring and an attempt to justify a begging the question fallacy on a Universal Negative. Its "I don't know if you stop beating your wife" type of scenario.
IT hides behind an other made up idealistic concept, already mentioned, that of Absolute knowledge, when the only type of knowledge accessible to us is limited by definition. Knowledge is an evaluation term. We accept as knowledge any claim that is in agreement with current facts and has instrumental and practical potentials (informs our syllogisms and actions).
We can only evaluate a claim based on the practical version of knowledge and this is the only meaningful way...if we want to avoid all the above fallacies.
Do we? There have been a plethora of gods in the past (and some in the present) that are claimed to be real. We don't have to look farther than Christianity which claims god (or some aspect of it) has been real in the person of Christ. So far for idealistic concept.
Quoting Nickolasgaspar
Agnosticism does exactly that. It questions the epistemology of itself and that of the believers. I'm OK with either convincing evidence for a real god or a consistent framework of an idealistic god. I'd even allow for a construct, given there is consensus. But the believers can't even agree on the category.
The fault in your logic is that you assume to know what god is. You don't.
Yes there have been, thousands of gods. Most of them are claims motivated by that same idealistic concept on an Ultimate agent. Others, like jesus, are attempts to unsuccessfully tie that concept on entities with a known existential status.( that is an indirect existential god claim more of an False equivalence).
The "plurality" of a claim(ad populum) doesn't benefit the epistemic or philosophical value of it.
I think you are arguing in favor of the narratives humans produced in their efforts to provide support to that initial idealistic concept. None of them has objective foundations or epistemic support or meet the criteria of "what it means to exist" or refer to the practical and real nature of knowledge (as a value).
Quoting ArmChairPhilosopher
-Not really, if it did it would be forced to adopt the default position set by the Null hypothesis. Because it ignores our epistemology and the scientific evaluation of god claims and basic rules and principles of logic, and embraces the unattainable goal of Absolute Knowledge, agnosticism gets to enjoy a place in our "philosophy".
Quoting ArmChairPhilosopher
- First of all I assume nothing about what god is. I can only address the claims about that concept. I only need to know what those who accept the concept think about.
You are confusing the territory with the map.
I don't have to assume anything about the territory ...I can only evaluate a map which has things on it that aren't compatible with how we define a territory or their identified properties.
Personally, I don't hold the contemporary epistemic views. As you kind of alluded to, it is an incredibly ambiguous definition and, subsequently is full of paradoxes. For the sake of conversation, I will likewise address your points in terms of that view.
I think the problem I would have here (even in the sense of using the contemporary epistemic views) is that knowledge doesn't have to be transferable. In terms of the contemporary view of knowledge, I don't think there's anything defined in it (traditionally) that necessitates that "justification" requires a tenant of "being transferable" (correct me if I am wrong though).
But I would presume that when you state "knowledge is transferable", it is implying (1) that you are arguing for that as an amended tenant of "justification" and (2) that it is transferable to quantitatively equivocal recipients in relation to the sender. For, I would presume that it would be a straw man to your argument that obviously knowledge cannot be transferable from, hypothetically, the sole human in existence to a rock: if one human remained on the planet, then that person wouldn't know anything (if we are taking "knowledge needs to be transferable to be justified" literally). At a deeper level, since I am presuming that is not what you mean, I still am not quite seeing yet why knowledge would need to be transferable, even amongst equivocal recipients: even if the last two humans on the planet disagreed on some subject S, one could possibly be right and other wrong even in the situation where they could be proven to have the same IQ (for example). Moreover, it is possible that one human obtains a legitimate proof of S but, due the major disparity between themselves and every other human being on the planet, no one agrees with them. Would they not "know" it then?
Likewise, "transferability" only necessitates that a message can be transmitted from a sender to a recipient, which has no bearing on (1) whether the recipient accepts the received message as true nor (2) that it be transmittable to multiple recipients. What I am gathering you to mean (if I am understanding you correctly) is more that it be transferable to the point of majority consensus within a given in-group, which I don't think is the same thing as "knowledge being transferable".
I think I was misunderstanding you: I was thinking "atheist views" in terms of epistemic positions traditionally voiced in terms of atheism, but you seem to be referring simply to the fact that you do not require a consensus amongst in-group and out-group, just in-group. Is that right?
Yes, it does. If not theoretically, then practically. In science we see a theory as accepted when there is a consensus. We don't require 100% acceptance but a reasonable threshold. And I wouldn't call it "ad populum" because we require the consensus among experts not the populus.
Quoting Bob Ross
Yes. (See above: consensus among experts.)
Quoting Bob Ross
You are confusing transferable (potential) with transferred (actual). True knowledge could be potentially transferred from the last human to the next sapient recipient (alien or evolved rat) in writing.
Quoting Bob Ross
"If you can't show it, you don't know it." as AronRa would say.
Suppose you wake up and you remember dreaming about raiding the fridge. Then you are not sure if that was real. Then you are convinced it was real. Do you "know" you raided the fridge or do you have an illusion of knowledge? To be sure, you have to show it (if only to yourself).
Another example: you have studied for a maths test. You think you know the formulas and how to use them. Do you "know" or do you have an illusion of knowledge. You will be sure after the test.
The principle works reasonably well in science.
Quoting Nickolasgaspar
There is no Null hypothesis is philosophy. And as long as we don't know if we have to tackle the god problem with science or philosophy, we can't require to use the Null hypothesis.
Quoting Nickolasgaspar
You did when you assumed that god is an ideal.
Quoting Nickolasgaspar
Exactly. And since I only get contradictory claims from the believers, I don't know how to address the claims. What I do know is that the claims are inconsistent. And I can't conclude that they must be talking about different things as one of the claims is that there is only one god.
That is right. I think it is fair to ask the believers to come to a common definition among their "in-group" before they address the "out-group".
And sorry, also to @Nickolasgaspar, for mixing your posts in my recent answer.
-Again you are promoting a fallacy. Consensus is not the criterion but the "symptom" of a successful theory. The epistemic value IS there and consensus follows...not the other way around. The popularity of a claim is irrelevant to its epistemic foundations.
Quoting ArmChairPhilosopher
Of course there is. Its like saying there is no logic in Philosophy....
The Null hypothesis is useful to evaluate your default position and avoid unwarranted assumptions in your philosophy.
-"You did when you assumed that god is an ideal."
-I ddin't have to assume that!God concepts describe idealistic agents.(all knowing all powerful, merciful etc etc etc etc etc). My remark was descriptive. I didn't assume gods existed or not, I didn't assume they have roles in reality or not...I only pointed out the only nature we are aware of.
-" Quoting ArmChairPhilosopher"
-And this is why we can only address the only thing we are aware of.... the actual concept in those claims! How can you ever go beyond the concept when you have nothing to work with, zero facts zero objective evidence zero methods capable to detect and verify the supernatural etc etc.
Even if there is not potential for transference, I would still argue an individual could know things. It depends on what you mean by "potential" though, because I would characterize the possibility of transmittance as requiring a receptor (whether actual or potential); If (1) there are no receptors and (2) there is no possibility of any receptor every actualizing, then technically (I would argue) there would be no consensus yet there could be knowledge. Even if it were literally impossible for anyone to comprehend my knowledge, i would still know it. This is because, I would argue, knowledge is that which is deductively ascertained (as opposed to abductively or inductively ascertained) and, therefore, can be acquired individually (although the dialectic is nevertheless important).
It depends entirely on what you mean by "show" whether I would agree with you or not. Something can be "shown" relative to the subject without ever having the possibility of being demonstrated to another being (e.g. contemplation whilst stuck in a coma). I could demonstrate, strictly to myself, that I have deductively ascertained something and, consequently, know it without necessarily having the capability to escape my own thoughts to write it down or speak it out loud. It could never have the possibility of even being transmitted and/or it could not have the possibility to be received (yet could be transmitted) and yet I would argue I can still "know" things. I don't base what I know on consensus.
My only point, as of now, here is that you could "show it" to yourself (as you noted) and never have the ability to demonstrate it to anyone else (which would entail it is not transferable nor transferred). Likewise, you could transmit it (broadcast it, so to speak) legitimately yet no one ever did nor had the possibility to receive it. Likewise, you could transmit it, somebody can receive it (possibly, potentially, or/and actually), yet it was never possible that that somebody could accept the contents of your transmittance as true (which is a completely separate consideration). What is most correct doesn't necessarily have to align with consensus, but, nevertheless, it tends to. Furthermore, on a different note, even after "showing it" to yourself that it either did or did not happen, you may still not know it: did you deduce that you did raided the fridge, or did you induce it? Without further context, I have no way of providing further elaboration.
You may or may not be sure after the test, if by "sure" you mean "know". Did you deduce that you did, in fact, comprehend the formulas appropriately or are you inducing such? It is entirely possible to induce a conclusion to another induction and mistake it for knowledge.
Sure, the scientific method works well. However, to clarify, that is not the only means of achieving knowledge: I do not subscribe to scientism.
Fair enough; however, my contention would be that consensus does not equate to knowledge.
No worries my friend! It did trip me up at first a bit, not going to lie, but no worries.
That's enough for my purpose. The lack of consensus is a symptom of an unsuccessful hypothesis.
Imagine the following scenario: on a conference 10 experts propose 10 different, contradicting hypothesis. Neither of the speakers can convince her colleagues. I can deduce that at least 9 out of those ten have to be wrong (don't know what they are talking about). The same goes for the experts. When they are honest, they have to admit that their hypothesis has as 90% chance of being among the wrong ones. So each single one has to doubt her hypothesis and can't be sure to know and as a group they have to admit they can't contribute to the body of knowledge. Even if one of the hypothesis turns out to be true, neither can be justified in believing that it's hers.
That's the state of affairs with god beliefs. I don't know which one is right - if any. And when they are honest neither can the believers.
Even if you are right, it is irrelevant to the topic at hand. We don't deal with the last man on earth, we deal with a myriad of god claims and the possibility of the claimants to communicate. And, as I explained in my answer to @Nickolasgaspar, none can, in good faith, be justified in his belief of knowledge.
What I am disputing is that a necessary tenant of "knowledge" is "transferability". If I am correct, holistically in what I said (not just merely the last man on earth analogy), then the disputes pertaining to a claim within an in-group only suggests there is not a proper consensus, but never that an individual in that in-group cannot "know" the claim they are specifically making. The last man analogy was meant to explicate the issue of "knowledge" having a necessary "transferability" characteristic, which does pertain directly to "possibility of claimants to communicate".
What I am trying to convey is that the non-consensus amongst an in-group simply entails that they haven't been able to get each other to agree, not that one doesn't know something: they are two very distinct things in my mind. Likewise, "in-group" would need to be further defined, because everything is contextually an "in-group" to some other "out-group", and I don't think a generic "theism" would suffice as a valid "in-group" to your critique (it is incredibly ambiguous to be placed in "theism" just as it is to be a member of "atheism").
I do not know what post you are referring to, but if you would like to invoke whatever argument you made with someone else, then please feel free to share that argument with me. Likewise, I have no frame of reference to what you mean by "none can, in good faith, be justified in his belief of knowledge". A subject can derive an epistemology and, in good faith, be justified in it. Also, deriving an epistemology is not necessarily grounded in a belief (mine is certainly not).
Quoting ArmChairPhilosopher
That, of course, assumes faithful actors and a will to share and gain knowledge and acceptance of equality. But given those, it is not a matter of taste when they don't agree. Each one of them has to assume that the others are wrong (or at least ignorant) but without arrogance, they also have to agree that they are in the same position as their peers.
Firstly, I think your deduction is incorrect: you cannot deduce that 9 out of 10 are wrong. You could hypothetically stipulate that for all intents and purposes, but it is not deduced via the fact that all 10 are proposing contradictory hypothesis: they could all be wrong. As your analogy is explicated in the above quote, there is therefore not a 90% chance that any given expert is wrong (nor a 10% chance they are right): as the analogy was given, there's an indeterminate probability (quantitative likelihood) of any given expert being right or wrong.
Secondly, regardless of whether we assume 9 out of 10 are wrong or that it is indeterminate as explicated thus far, they should always be doubting their hypothesis (their inductions) as, by definition, the premises do not necessitate the conclusion. In terms of anything they deduced, they would know it, but they still should doubt those as well. By "doubt" I don't mean incessantly deny ever knowing anything but, rather, that anything deduced is categorized as "knowledge" with the careful consideration that they have not obtained 100% certainty. There's never a point at which someone should think that they have 100% definitively obtained knowledge of anything possibly imaginable.
Thirdly, your analogy is conflating a subject's knowledge with societal knowledge: I think these are two very different contexts. I can know something of which you only believe (and vice-versa), because I may be able to deduce it while you induce it. Society is simply a collection of individuals and, thusly, societal knowledge requires consensus: maybe that is what you were referring to by "knowledge"? I don't think "knowledge" or "truth" or what have you is a real, objective, body in the universe. Societal knowledge is inter-subjectively agreed upon deductions. "objectivity" is, in terms of societal knowledge, an inter-subjectively agreed upon classification of a concept as an "object", and, in terms of individual's knowledge, that which is deduced by the subject (without any regard for what other may think). These are both knowledge.
Fourthly and finally, let's assume, as a hypothetical (which isn't deduced, but simply stipulated as a presumption), that only 1 out of the 10 is right (guaranteed)(9 out of 10 are wrong in other words). Then, at best, they must agree that they have no consensus (which I think that's what you are referring to by "good faith"), which entails that there is no societally agreed upon knowledge of the subject S. However, this is also stipulating that S is actually narrow enough of a context to warrant the agreement that there's no consensus. In terms of religion, all theists do not have to agree for there to be a consensus about "god" in relation to a specific definition of such. "God" is purposely an incredibly vague, ambiguous term. So this analogy, at best, would apply to a specific subbranch of theism (e.g. Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, etc), wherein none of the experts (1) agree and (2) they have contradictory claims. #1 and #2 are not necessarily the case in terms of disagreement. Either that or I think your analogy only is valid if one were to compare it to general "theistic" concepts of god, which do have a consensus.
That's why I wrote "at least".Quoting Bob Ross
We are not talking about absolute certainty or even only 1 ? certainty. In the example we have at least 90% uncertainty (in reality much higher). That means no evidence, no argument could convince another. Being able to maintain the illusion of knowledge under those circumstances requires a lot of arrogance (or a lot of stupidity).
Quoting Bob Ross
I addressed both:
Quoting ArmChairPhilosopher
Quoting Bob Ross
Well, yes, purposely or not, that's what I'm saying the hole time. And it's not even so that different religions have different definitions, the definitions vary within religions, often even within members of the same denomination.
And that inconsistency can't even be solved by agreeing on multiple gods. 1. The monotheists don't agree to that and 2. even then there would be disagreement whether an entity belongs to the category or not.
As long as you have "an incredibly vague, ambiguous term", you don't know - you can't know - whether a concrete example falls under the category.
I apologize: I did not see that you wrote "at least", which is indeed an important distinction. However, I still think your deduction is incorrect. At least 9 out of 10 does not equate to 90% uncertainty: this would only be the case iff 10 is holistically the denominator that accurately represented the entire set of possibilities on the given subject; however your analogy is not postulating those 10 experts as proposing the only 10 possibilities in relation to the given subject. In other words, deducing that at least 9 out of 10 experts are incorrect, does not mean that any given expert is 90% certain they are incorrect: there is not a 90% chance they are incorrect.
To really hone in on this, let's take a trivial example of probability. There's three cards: two kings and an ace. As you are well aware, if they are randomly shuffled, then the odds of picking a king is 66%. To choose to guess that the card will be an ace is to deductively know that there's a 66% chance one is wrong. Most importantly, I think you are trying to use this in your example but this is not analogous to what you proposed (in analogy). This is because the sole reason that choosing to guess ace has a 66% chance of being wrong is because we deductively know that the only possibilities are those 3 cards., whereas in your example the 10 hypotheses are not the only possibilities.
Again, this is not an accurate representation of knowledge holistically. It would, indeed, be either arrogant or ignorant (I would not say necessarily stupid) for any given expert in your analogy to claim that there is a consensus among them all; however, it would not be necessarily arrogant or ignorant if one were to claim they know X about subject S even though the other nine have proposed hypotheses that contradict it. There is not a 90% chance they are wrong. Furthermore, to be specific, I think that it is only possible to determine a quantitative likelihood (probability) of that which has a deductively ascertained denominator and numerator. In your example, we only have a deduced numerator, not a denominator: therefore the probability is indeterminate because the denominator is inductively ascertained.
I did not interpret it that way, but I apologize. If you are referring to individual vs societal in the aforementioned quote, then I think, although you are making such a distinction, you are misusing them. When you state "each single one has to doubt her hypothesis", I think you are suggesting (and correct me if I am wrong) that the absence of a consensus entails that they should doubt their hypotheses (as opposed to not doubting them if there was a consensus): it shouldn't matter how many people agree, if you didn't deduce it then you don't know it. A million people could collectively agree claim X about subject S and they are all incorrect. Quantity of agreement doesn't suggest that it is correct, it is the evaluation of the actual claim that determines whether it is knowledge or not in relation to an epistemology.
Likewise, when you state "as a group they have to admit they can't contribute to the body of knowledge", I am interpreting that as "knowledge" equates to societal knowledge: am I misunderstanding you? Just because 9 out of 10 must be wrong (at least) does not mean that a given expert cannot or should not claim to "know" their claim: what determines that is whether it was deduced or induced (abduced). If all 10 hypotheses are inductions, then none of them know. If they all, by their nature, necessitate that the others are wrong if one is correct, then if one of them is deduced then the other 9 are induced. If two or more are deduced (validly), then that would mean that they aren't contradictory after all (but in terms of your hypothetical, this has no bearing).
Moreover, it is possible that two are deduced but don't necessarily need to be agreed upon societally. For example, if one of the experts postulates that semantically "1" should refer to what we would consider (in terms of underlying meaning) 2 and another expert postulates that semantically "1" should refer to what we consider 3, then they can both know within their own individual contexts. It isn't that either one knows or the other, it's that they must understand that they haven't thereby gained any communal knowledge (inter-subjective agreement). Thusly, just because two hypotheses contradict each other societally does not entail that neither can know anything, which is what you seem to be claiming.
Firstly, I was referring to generic "theism" and why it isn't a suitable candidate for your claim in terms of in-group consensus. I would agree that there are many denominations and such, but they do agree on basic tenants which constitute them under that specific religion in the first place (so there is a consensus to a necessary degree amongst a given label and the more specific the label the less ambiguous the claim is). Even if, hypothetically, every theist had a completely contradictory view of "god" in relation to each other, this would not mean that no one knows anything. This is because of what I stated previously in this post: I can deduce something which holds individually which is contradicted by someone's else equivalent in their individual context: we both have knowledge, yet it contradicts. This is because it contradicts societally (which is a different context, which I am not claiming to know). At best, I would say, completely unique contradictory views of "god" would prove that we have no societal knowledge of "god", in the sense that we have no consensus. This is not "knowledge": it is one of two general subcategories of knowledge.
Knowledge is contextual. We may not know X inter-subjectively, but do know it subjectively.