Thursday, December 1, 2011

Agnosticism Vs. Atheism


Why not Agnosticism?

What is the difference between the agnostic vs. the atheist? First of all let's be clear about one thing: No human being can prove or disprove, with empirical evidence, and absolute certainty, that god does or does not exist. There is no smoking gun, no piece of evidence, tangible or not, that anyone can present to another, and say "Ah-ha! This proves I'm right!".

That being said, every argument for and against the existence of god, is an argument of probability. That is to say, given the amount of knowledge and evidence that exists, what is most probable, what is most likely truth, that god exists or that god does not.

Now the agnostic looks at the evidence for and against god, and comes to the conclusion that none of it is compelling in either direction. He basically sits on the fence saying that the evidence is about equal and could go either way. Or, in the absence of proof, he says the truth cannot be known, and therefore remains ambivalent. Some argue that agnosticism is the rational position to hold. However, we would all then have to be an agnostic on everything that we didn't have absolute proof on, and we would never ever be able able to take a position.

The atheist sees the evidence, and concludes that it is overwhelmingly more probable that god does not exist. The atheist does not have to prove empirically that god does not exist to hold his position, no more than the theist has to prove that god does exist, to maintain his position. They each see the evidence as being skewed towards their position.

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