jTaby

Hey, this is my first time posting in this forum. The reason I got the account is because I wanted to know if I should consider myself an agnostic, or simply an athiest...or some mix of the two.

I feel like agnosticism acknowledges religion, but doesn't make assumption about god. Personally, I don't believe religion has any divinity, although I don't deduce from that the fact that God doesn't exist.

More than a year ago, I started a small stream-of-consciousness blog about what I thought..it's fairly poorly written (first draft), but should give you an idea of what I believe... http://jtaby.blogspot.com/

so I'm wondering, what kind of group doesn't believe in religion, but makes no assumptions about God.

xxkayxx

Agnosticism can have many forms of beliefs. Personally, i wouldn't worry too much about the labeling. Choose what YOU feel is a right path for yourself. Don't 'become' something to follow its path, but rather 'become' something because of the path you follow.

There are many different types of agnostics on here from what I've seen. I think it's mostly because theres no written set of laws that you have to follow, like with religions (bibles, torahs). If you stick around long enough, I think you'll be able to decide for yourself if Agnosticism is right for you. Hope that helps. =)

As for assumptions about God, I don't think too many of us do have any, just opinions or hypotheses.

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If a million people say a foolish thing, it is still a foolish thing

AB517

It is not believing or not. It is understanding religions place/roll for you.
religion does not equal god any more than a country represents the world.

romansh

Welcome jTaby,

There is a whole continuum of grey regarding the use and definitions of agnosticism.

A simplistic approach might be:

If you can answer "yes" to either of these two questions:

Do you believe god exists?
Do you believe god does not exist?

then you might not be an agnostic.

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There is a theory which states that if ever anybody discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable. There is another theory which states that this has already happened. ........... Douglas Adams

NotConvinced

I think I'd replace "believe" with "know."

I think Agnostic has to do more with knowledge than belief, and Atheist(ic) has to do more with general belief.

"Well hey NC, what's the difference between knowledge and belief?"

I'd say knowledge is very strong belief. Like...you may believe someone when they're telling you how a TV works, or you might Know how it works after repairing them for 20 years.

Many people like to equate knowledge to something you can absolutely know for sure....but alas, absolute truth seems to be an illusion. Many people like to equate agnosticism with being right in the middle of the spectrum as far as belief in God, however it's more like a range. If you like seeing things mathematically, like I do, then picture a spectrum from 1 to 7. 1 is believing without a doubt that God exists, you Know he exists. 7 is Knowing God doesn't exist. Now anyone who is 2 through 6 is technically agnostic. But say you're a 5, so you're leaning toward believing that God doesn't exist, but you're not strong in this belief; in this case you'd be an Agnostic Atheist.

Or if you're a philosophy buff, being Agnostic is knowing that you know nothing.

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cejuan

Hi jTaby

It sounds like you have beliefs similar to a lot of agnostics. I have views similar to yours and I call myself agnostic when the situation is right. However, I've decided that its not important to decide whether I am agnostic or atheist because the difference doesn't matter in my everyday life. None of my day to day decisions involve any need to know whether god absolutely doesn't exist or if he could exist. God's existance wouldn't impact my decisions unless I knew some of the details about god. I've never heard any credible claims as to knowledge of the details so I make my decisions based on what I do know.

pseudonous

jTaby,

It seems to me you are still forming your position on these matters so I thought I would offer a few links to papers you might want to read. The first is Agnosticism and Christianity by Thomas Huxley. This is the guy that coined the term Agnosticism.

http://aleph0.clarku.edu/huxley/CE5/Agn-X.html

Here is probably a lesser known paper, Why I am an Agnostic by Clarence Darrow.

http://www.infidels.org/library/hist..._agnostic.html

And one more paper What is an Agnostic by Bertrand Russell.

http://humanum.arts.cuhk.edu.hk/humf...l/agnostic.htm

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"One is most dishonest to one's god: he is not allowed to sin." - Nietzsche

jTaby

thanks for the replies guys...i just bought The Agnostic Reader from Amazon, gonna see if that helps anything out.