atheism vs agnosicism

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The atheist believes that there are no gods whatsoever. He has that certainty in life.
The agnostic doesn't know - and lives with the unknown.

Wanna have a go at it - and talk about agnostics and atheists?

The word atheist. It has that -ist at the end. An -ist of something, is a follower of an -ism of that something. An -ism is a belief system. Ergo an atheist follows atheism an means the belief in no god.

The word agnostic. Is doesn't have an ism, it has an -ic. Now, no -ist, no -ism. An -ic designates a condition (as in autist-ic). Ergo the agnostic is some on who does not know.

The agnostic is also tired of the atheist trying to enlist him in his hairbrained holy war to ruin chistmass, and other traditions of religious origen....

*mutter* *mutter* *mutter*

You do realize that agnostic is a short form of agnosticist, don't you?

Atheism = Lack of belief
Agnosticism = Lack of knowledge (gnosticists assert that they have knowledge, that is)

The terms are not contradictory.

You have it sort of backwards. Agnosticism is just the adding of -ism to Agnostic. The word agnostic was aperantly coined by Thomas H. Huxley in 1870...

See its all on the internet (agnostic heaven)....

http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=agnostic

Here is the important part

Yes, obviously. But an individual agnosticist can either believe or not believe, you seem to be of the mindset that all atheists deny god.

Oh, and I kind of prefer the term Secular Humanism to describe what I believe in.



Oh, and I obviously don't want to ruin Christmas, I just want it to be secular. The Christians stole it from the Norse, anyway.

Hmmm.... I see mistakes here...
Here, let me fix that for you:
Atheism = no god belief
Agnosticism = no knowlege conditon belief

The terms are mutually exclusive.



There - thats better.

Hendrikson, there may be a third axis to your diagram, and I think it has to do with "Active/Passive" or "Dogmatic/Pragmatic" ... or maybe the diagram requires four axes ... ?

... brain hurt ... need lie-down ... back soon ...

Atheists range from those absent theist beliefs, to those who believe that no deities do or have ever existed.

Agnostics range from those who view that there is a necessarily unknowable (to humans) "greater power", to those who view that if there is a deity it is not knowable to them personally.

There is clearly overlap; the two are not mutually exclusive.

Mutually exclusive? well, not exactly, I tend to agree with Henriksson's diagram, showing the spectrum, sort of speak, with the strong-weak atheism and strong-weak theism, which makes sense.

if you are an athiest - then by virtue of your faith (i.e. that there is no god), you have gnosis of god - even if it is only the gnosis of his nonexistence.

the agnostic cannot have a gnosis of this 'nonexistence of god' - lest in taking the gnosis he becomes an athiest and ceases tobe an agnostic.

You can't be both.

An Agnostic admits that he/she doesn't know, while an Atheist claims to know for sure that we were all created by nothing. If we are the only thing in the known universe that has been created from nothing it goes against all known laws of science, yet atheists cling to their faith in materialism. They are either being dishonest with themselves, or they are delusional because no one really knows what dwells in the realm of dark matter or where we all came from.

It is possible to have become a Bible scholar - a seminarian, perhaps - and to come out of it completely convinced that it's all hogwash, yet still be able to discuss theology in theory as well as any other gnostic.

In other words, it's possible to learn all that humankind can know about God, and still believe with absolute certainty that He does not exist. Without a direct encounter with God, belief in Him is mere delusion, based on hearsay and apocryphal records.

It's not possible to learn everything about God. Even the most advanced Mystics from various religions will say that there are only moments where they make direct contact with the Creator.

Atheism is the denial of religious fundamentalism, but to say that they know anything about the mysteries of creation is just wishful thinking or delusion or plain old lying.

Gnosis means knowledge, Agnosis means without knowledge. Atheists back their opinions by faith. Nothing they claim can be proven. The same goes for the religious or spiritualists. We rely on faith. Only our Faith relies on esoteric knowledge and not merely the exoteric knowledge that the Atheists cling to. We both claim that the other clings to something that doesn't even exist.

I said, "... it's possible to learn all that humankind can know about God...", which implies human limitations on what can be learned about God.


So they say... unfortunately, their claims can not be proven, and without proof, their irrelevant claims can easily be ignored. Claims require proof; exraordinary claims - the existance of God, for example - require extraordinary proof ... of which there is none.


No, it's the denial of the existance of a god or gods. Atheists do not deny the existance of religion in any of its forms, but only the existance of those gods that the religions claim to be real. Again, lack of proof for claim means that the claim itself becomes irrelevant, and thus the claim can be ignored.


Many of us have realized that which creation theory - or creation myth, for that matter - is the most valid just does not really matter in the human context. We humans are just not capable of duplicating the creation event(s), even if creation has a true beginning, so it doesn't really matter at all how the universe came to be.


Atheists - more often than religionists - tend to back their theories with repeatably verifiable facts, instead of personal attacks, distorted quotes, wishful thinking, and pleasant feelings that are based on rumor and legend of execreble veracity.


Oh, scientific claims it can be proven, alright. Unfortunately, one might as well perform stage magic on skid row for all the good it does. A person has to be capable of understanding the science being demonstrated in order to be able to fully appreciate the truth behind it. This means that a person must have some education in higher mathematics and the physical sciences, rather than just the collected episodes of "X-Files" and all the books in the "Harry Potter" series.


Fortunately, the world runs on the understanding of this "exoteric" (a.k.a., "Scientifically Derived") knowledge you speak of, and not on crystal balls, tarot cards, horoscopes, and shady con artists portraying themselves as "psychics." Faith, whether religious or spiritual, relies on wishful thinking and improvable fantasy, while science relies solely on repeatably verifiable "Cause-and-Effect" laws and principles, and the proofs thereof.

I once read a member write there is no such thing as an agnostic because a person cannot neither believe nor not believe. However, I find it to be the best way I have ever heard to describe it. I neither beleive nor not believe.

(... psst ... Claire ... Caribou Barbie!)