awol71 is offline awol71 Post #91  August 4,2009, 4:52pm
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TaoShaffer wrote :
It's more like a refusal of the question much like the refusal of the question of the existence of orange flying elephants, teapots orbiting mars, and flying spaghetti monsters...
No, it isn't. When you refuse the question, you don't answer it. You say, "It makes no sense to ask whether god exists or not." You don't answer the question and say, "God doesn't exist." And proceed to call the people who answered the question in another way "delusional".

The reason someone becomes an agnostic is either that they really refuse the question altogether (and so, without a question, there can be no answer). Which is perfectly sensible because, as shoelace has been arguing in the other thread, it is certainly not an extremely well defined question.

Alternatively, the agnostic can allow that it is sufficiently intelligible (you can get an idea, however vague, of what god could represent), but that the numerous arguments on either side don't show us a clear winner. It is quite obvious that there is no strong (deductive) logical argument that applies. The fact that some much better minds than yours or mine have given interesting arguments for either side is also a good indicator here.

Alternatively again, agnostics can say that whatever the case may be, it makes no difference practically (i.e., the golden rule applies, etc. etc., whether there is a god or not). So, we can very well live a good life without taking sides on the issue.

Some of us feel that, taking those three things together, it seems rather clear that choosing a side is pretty much a personal decision (how your personal experiences have shaped you to feel about yourself and the arguments available to you). We feel that it doesn't really matter what you believe in, as long as you act responsibly. We take offense when extremists (whether theists or not) proceed to demonstrate how irresponsible they can be by calling each other names and hurting each other just because they disagree on this issue.
 
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