Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site opus.UUCP
Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!floyd!harpo!seismo!hao!cires!nbires!opus!rcd
From: rcd@opus.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.religion
Subject: Re: Let's hear from OTHER agnostics!
Message-ID: <321@opus.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 4-Apr-84 20:35:09 EST
Article-I.D.: opus.321
Posted: Wed Apr  4 20:35:09 1984
Date-Received: Sat, 7-Apr-84 05:49:34 EST
References: <6697@decwrl.UUCP>
Organization: NBI, Boulder
Lines: 43

<>
(I apologize if you're not getting my real name.  Our postnews puts it in
the header, but some software seems to ignore or delete it.   -Dick Dunn)

Still on the topic of the positions of atheist, agnostic, theist - Ken
Arndt give a definition for agnostic:
>          "Someone who believes that there CAN BE (italics mine) no proof
>           (remember our argument, please read "evidence") of the existence
>           of God but does not deny the possibilty that God exists."
>...
>Therefore, it seems to me that we might simplify the argument as follows:
>                     God is (theist)
>                     God isn't (atheist)
>                     No way to tell (agnostic)
>
>Again, "isn't" falls because it claims too much knowledge...
>...
>"No way for anyone to tell" falls for the same reason...

But in each case, Ken misses a fundamental point:  The positions of all
three (if you go back to definitions) are BELIEFS, and a belief is not
equivalent to knowledge.  No claim of absolute knowledge is made in any
case.

Ken is right when he implies that there is a certain weakness in either the
agnostic or atheist positions - they are unlikely to be able to "prove"
their points, whereas a simple existence proof suffices for the theist's
case.

However, he errs in saying:
>...there are evidences for the existence of God...
simply because the evidence has not been found acceptable to either the
agnostics or the atheists.  (If it had, they would by definition have
become theists, however grudgingly.)

>We ALL live by faith in the last look.
...which is a fair statement.  Even the atheist's position is based on a
"belief" - a belief in certain principles of reasoning and deduction plus
the belief that certain interpretations of evidence from the universe are
valid.
-- 
Nothing left to do but smile, smile, smile.
{hao,ucbvax,allegra}!nbires!rcd