Expert: Philip A. Stahl - 6/13/2011

Question
Hi,

I recognize myself as an atheist.
But I would like to know a bit about agnostic belief. I ask you this question because there are currently no experts in the agnosticims section.

As far as I know, agnosticism says that God is impossible for the human intellect to decipher (am I right in saying that?) and so we should be undecided on the question of wether he does exist or not.

And the typical atheist argument against this would of the sort that, even fairies lie beyond human knowledge, but we don't reserve judgement in that case and are almost certain (though not absolutely), that they don't exist and so on for an infinity of other possibilities aprt from fairies and god...

I would like to know what are the typical agnostic arguments against this atheistic argument, if any.

Thanks

Answer
Hello,

Agnosticism often causes more confusion than atheism because people aren't sure what it means or what the limiting parameters are. I tend to go by the outlook of George Smith in his monograph: Atheism: The Case Against God (p. 9):

"Properly considered, agnosticism is not a third alternative to theism and atheism because it is concerned with a different aspect of religious belief. Theism and atheism refer to the presence or absence of belief in a god; agnosticism refers to the impossibility of knowledge with regard to a god or supernatural being.

The term 'agnostic' does not, in itself, indicate whether or not one believes in a god. Agnosticism can be either theistic or atheistic. The agnostic theist believes in the existence of a god but maintains the nature of god is unknowable. The agnostic atheist maintains any supernatural realm is inherently unknowable by the human mind. And further - not only is the nature of any supernatural being unknowable, but the existence of any supernatural being is unknowable as well"

Thus, by virtue of the preceding, your take would have to be adjusted. For example, one would not say "agnosticism says that God is impossible for the human intellect to decipher".

Rather, theistic agnosticism would assert the exact nature of a deity could not be known (and btw, this 'deity' or God has to be defined specifically in the context! For example, is it a monotheistic one? Is it pantheistic? What exactly defines it?)  

Meanwhile, atheist agnostics would just assert NO supernatural entities can be known and since "God" falls in this category, It can't be known either.

This is why it's dangerous to refer to a "typical atheist argument" without any clarification. For example, the strong or explicit atheist would largely base his or her argument on probability as opposed to a dogmatism about fairies. Also, he would argue that the claims for existence by the orthodox theist (or zero knowledge of the divine nature by the agnostic theist) don't hold up because the nature of the Christian deity is everywhere described in books of the Bible, or in assorted theological texts and even invoked as proofs! Thus, the strong atheist would query any claimed agnostic theist as to why he doesn't simply disavow all religion then. (If he already does, it's not so much of a problem).

Of course, the agnostic theist might argue in return that he himself declares God's nature is impossible to fathom, hence he meets his obligation and furthermore, allies with no organized religions (so doesn't subscribe to what they write about the nature of the deity). In this way, he can surely make his limited case, though the atheist may chide him for not simply going all the way and rejecting all supernatural entities anyway.

To press his case, the strong atheist may well cite Pascal Boyer's (Ch. 2), ‘What Supernatural Concepts are like’, p. 51, in his book ‘Religion Explained: The Evolutionary Origins of Religious Thought’, Basic Books)in terms of what is required to have a supernatural concept to even assert can't be known :

“the information contained in key tags of the statement or concept must contradict information provided by the ontological category”.

Note here that information and knowledge are not the same thing. For example, I may have information about dark energy (i.e. its equation of state: w = (p/rho) = -1 where p is pressure and rho is energy density) yet not KNOW anything about it. I.e. what it really IS. Its nature.

But the strong atheist may suggest to the agnostic theist that if he can't even apply information to arrive at even a generic supernatural concept (as Boyer indicates) he could as well just exclude it from the realm of real probabilities (since probabilities ultimately are based on information, say how many times heads turns up when a coin is flipped 1,000 times)

If excluded from the realm of real probabilities, it becomes superfluous, or redundant. It has about as much use as teeth on a chicken. Thus, in the end the strong atheist can best most agnostics by showing they can't even meet the most diluted claims of what a supernatural concept is. So how can the agnostic theist claim he "believes in God but can't know its nature" if he can't even articulate the basis of a supernatural concept? Of course, this applies to any generic agnostic as well. If that agnostic can't even formulate a basis for what it is he professes no knowledge of, how may we ascertain he has knowledge of anything - even the validity or consistency of his own thoughts!