The religious philosophy (not really a religion) I follow is Agnosticism.
Agnosticism: The belief that it is currently impossible to prove any religions right or wrong.
This keeps your options open, doesn't offend anybody with half a brain, and is sadly true. Therefore, i believe this is the best religion. feel free to disagree with me, I need an arguement.

[This message has been edited by sharpandreckless (edited 12-15-2002).]

If sitting on the fence is your thing, who are we to tell you what you should or shouldn't do?
Humpty Dumpty sat on the fence(or wall) and look how well he turned out.

Humpty dumpty is also as real as super man... agnosticism is the way to go.

, because.... (?)

I believe in the existance of a god, but I don't have a religion that I follow. I can't seem to think of the name of that philosophy right now.

If there isn't a god, how is it possible that you are alive? Something had to of created you, otherwise you wouldn't even be here.

That is the question i've thought up when I decided whether I believed in the existance of a god.

the theory of a god solves the question of 'why is anything here?', but it brings up another question of 'why is god here?'.

Some say he willed himself into existance, if god can will himself into existance then why can't matter will itself into existance without needing a god to create it?

James, please tell me you didnt base it souly on that?

Agnosticism is the politically correct religion. I think that humans are supposed to figure out all the secrets of our universe. We observe things and then make theories as to why things are they way they are. These theories are either proved or disproved, and we then come up with more theories. Agnosticism makes no assumptions, and is therefore useless to us in discovering more about our universe. At least religions and atheism make some kind of statement about the way things are. Agnosticism can never be wrong, but it can never be right either. It's useless.

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Originally posted by JamesTheGod:
If there isn't a god, how is it possible that you are alive? Something had to of created you, otherwise you wouldn't even be here.

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Well, maybe you're different, but as for me I'm pretty sure my mom and dad had a hand in it.

Ytrewq, agnosticism is not useless. What's useless is some vague notion that's in no way based on fact. Such as religion.

How are assumptions useful in learning more about the universe? Do you mean theories, that is, ideas that CAN be tested and based on some kind of objective truth?

James your logic is flawed, look.

Your point is Something had to create you right? Meaning something had to start existance. Well that means that the something had to have been created by another something. And it would go on forever. If you think about it, either we dont exist, or we never began to exist, because we always have, either way we can never end. We just are.

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Originally posted by Nyk:
Ytrewq, agnosticism is not useless.

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Agnosticism makes no effort/explainations to better understand our universe. In that context, I consider it useless. It may have use in other areas, like in not offending other people. But other than that, how is it useful?

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How are assumptions useful in learning more about the universe? Do you mean theories, that is, ideas that CAN be tested and based on some kind of objective truth?

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Yeah, I admit my wording wasn't very good there. I mean they provide theories that are testable through observation. My basic premise was that religions/atheism make assertions that can be either proved or disproved. They are attempting to explain why things are the way they are. Agnosticism doesn't do this.

I'm an agnostic and I think you people have an incorrect view of agnosticism. First of all agnosticism is not a belief and it has no dogma or code of conduct or any specific views on the universe, agnosticism is an intellectual principle. By saying that agnostics are dedicated to any one thing is false because each agnostic develops their own personal view of the universe. To my understanding the only thing that ties agnostics together is a single intellectual principle: Explore new ideas. Any one who calls agnosticism a passive, sit-on-the-fence philosophy does not truly understand the active, intellectual nature of agnosticism. Agnosticism is not a set of defined beliefs, it is an intellectual principle employed to explore the world around us without the bias of a belief system.

I'll be agnostic until somebody proves me wrong.

Quantized, the majority of Agnostics I've ever talked to repeat primarily one idea "It can't be proved or disproved," which suggests a set-on-the fence point of view.
Maybe some of the agnostic beliefs aren't like that at all, but the people who follow them are.

What are the ideas worth when the people following them rip them apart?

in other words all egnostic ppl r lost and comfused

Not quite.
A lot of agnostics don't give a shit, in the same way that a lot of atheists can't be bothered following a religion.

Personally, I think agnosticism is a good attitude to have while you're searching for something that's right.

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Originally posted by Quantized:
To my understanding the only thing that ties agnostics together is a single intellectual principle: Explore new ideas. Any one who calls agnosticism a passive, sit-on-the-fence philosophy does not truly understand the active, intellectual nature of agnosticism. Agnosticism is not a set of defined beliefs, it is an intellectual principle employed to explore the world around us without the bias of a belief system.

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You have to hold some things as truths in order to move forward. Others would say 1+1=2 and then move on to 2+2=4. Agnostics would say 1+1=2 maybe but they can't be sure. They cannot move on. I realize this is probably not a very good example. I don't really think agnostics are that unsure of basic mathematics, but it's just an example. I'm just saying that, in general, agnosticism isn't useful to the building process that discovery requires.

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Originally posted by TigerJK:
Personally, I think agnosticism is a good attitude to have while you're searching for something that's right.

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I'd agree with this, as long as the person is actively searching.

agnosticism acts as stable platform for some people to stand on and attack and defend the beliefs you build on it... this happens when you question your beliefs and then you lose your footing and search for something safe.


next you could start questioning agnosticism.
next you could start questioning _______
next you could start questioning _______
next you could start questioning _______
next you could start questioning _______
next you could start questioning _______
next you could start questioning _______

Well said Quantized.

Ytrewq, your analogy is flawed. 1+1=2 has been proven to everyone's satisfaction except professional smartasses and people who have done so many psychedelics they're of no use to anyone. Relating something like that to proof of god's existence is, to say the least, stretching it.

The point of being agnostic is not to be politically correct (that's like saying christians have their beliefs because they are sadistic cannibals). It is not a set of beliefs or dogma either. It is ONLY the intellectual freedom to explore reality and truth without the urge to validate anything else at the same time.

In another thread, I was defending Islam from someone who was making inflammatory, unsubstantiated claims about it. Once he calmed down and started citing real sources, I was satisfied. If I had some religious creed, I would have felt the urge to passionately (and not very reasonably) defend or attack his position purely for the sake of doing so. Instead, the use of reason and fact in the discussion were most important to me.

All I ever wanted was to find those universal truths (if that's even possible). Agnosticism is the lack of theological inhibition that has best allowed me to fully explore all sides. Otherwise discussion ALWAYS degrades to:
"God exists!"
"No, god does not!"
"Yes he does!"
"No, he doesn't!"
"Yeah-huh!"
"Nuh-uh!"

(btw Volar, if you read this, the reason I was arguing only with you was because you seemed at the time to be the only person who might listen to reason. I'd post this on that thread, but it's getting too close to my above example for me to want to bother.)


[This message has been edited by Nyk (edited 12-17-2002).]

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Originally posted by Nyk:
Ytrewq, your analogy is flawed. 1+1=2 has been proven to everyone's satisfaction except professional smartasses and people who have done so many psychedelics they're of no use to anyone. Relating something like that to proof of god's existence is, to say the least, stretching it.

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Yeah, I said that was probably a bad example. I just needed something simple to use. I don't really believe agnostics refute basic mathematics.

What I'm trying to say is that understanding our universe is a building process. We observe something and then come up with a theory that's consistent with our observation. Later on, we may be shown to be right or wrong. If we're right, we have more reason to believe that our theory represents some kind of truth about our universe. If we're wrong, we build a new theory to describe the observation. This is the very core of our scientific process. Agnostics are making no theories about what they observe, and are therefore useless to our scientific process. Note that I'm using the agnostic term in general here. The person may be agnostic about the existance of god or just about anything else.

Like I said before, it allows you to make any number of assumptions, limited only by your own discretion.

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Originally posted by Nyk:
Like I said before, it allows you to make any number of assumptions, limited only by your own discretion.

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Yes, it does. But you can never build off of those assumptions. Because you can never have an assumption that you yourself believe to be true. You're stuck.

Sure you can. It's like doublethink (there's a thread about that around here somewhere). If you think something is valid enough to form other assumptions based on it, then you do. It depends on the person, though. Two people who consider themselves atheists probably hold very different beliefs.

Anyway, maybe we should agree to disagree. I suspect we're the only ones still following this thread.

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Originally posted by Nyk:
Sure you can. It's like doublethink (there's a thread about that around here somewhere). If you think something is valid enough to form other assumptions based on it, then you do.

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But, by definition, you're not agnostic then. No one can ever say something is 100% true. They could possibly be wrong, but their certainty is enough to say it is true. If someone is saying that something is "valid enough" to form assumptions, then they're saying that it is true. That's not agnosticism.

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Anyway, maybe we should agree to disagree. I suspect we're the only ones still following this thread.

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Ahawww!! So you concede defeat. I win! I win!