Agnosticism Quiz

Agnosticism: The View That the Existence of God or the Supernatural are Unknown or Unknowable

• Agnosticism is a belief that the existence of God, the divine or the supernatural is unknown or unknowable.
• The term was coined by Thomas Henry Huxley in 1869, but earlier philosophers like Sanjaya Belatthaputta and Protagoras had expressed agnostic views.
• Huxley presented agnosticism as a form of demarcation, stating that a hypothesis without objective, testable evidence is not an objective, scientific claim.
• Philosopher William L. Rowe defines agnosticism as the view that human reason is incapable of providing sufficient rational grounds to justify either belief that God exists or does not exist.
• George H. Smith promotes broadening the definition of atheism and narrowing the definition of agnosticism.
• The term agnostic comes from the Greek word gnosis meaning knowledge, but Huxley used it to describe a method of skeptical, evidence-based inquiry.
• Scottish philosopher David Hume contended that meaningful statements about the universe are always qualified by some degree of doubt.
• Hinduism has a strong tradition of philosophic speculation and skepticism.
• Charles Darwin was raised in a religious environment, but he eventually doubted parts of his faith and stated that he was an agnostic.
• Robert G. Ingersoll, an orator in 19th-century America, was referred to as the "Great Agnostic."
• Demographic research services do not differentiate between various types of non-religious respondents, so agnostics are often classified in the same category as atheists or other non-religious people.
• Agnosticism is criticized from various standpoints, with some atheists criticizing the use of the term agnosticism as a "middle ground" between theism and atheism.Agnosticism: Views from Theistic, Christian, Atheistic, and Ignotistic Perspectives

Theistic perspective:

• Theistic critics claim that agnosticism is impossible in practice.
• A person can either live as if God did or did not exist.

Christian perspective:

• Pope Benedict XVI believes strong agnosticism contradicts itself.
• Agnosticism is a choice of comfort, pride, and utility over truth.
• The Catholic Church is historically opposed to full denial of human reason to know God.
• Blaise Pascal argues that it is a safer "bet" to choose God.

Atheistic perspective:

• Richard Dawkins believes that a distinction between agnosticism and atheism is unwieldy.
• Dawkins identifies two categories of agnostics: Temporary Agnostics in Practice (TAPs) and Permanent Agnostics in Principle (PAPs).
• Dawkins considers PAP a "deeply inescapable kind of fence-sitting".

Ignostic perspective:

• Ignosticism is the view that a coherent definition of a deity must be put forward before discussing the question of the existence of a deity.
• If the chosen definition is not coherent, the ignostic holds the noncognitivist view that the existence of a deity is meaningless or empirically untestable.
• Some philosophers see both atheism and agnosticism as incompatible with ignosticism.