This is from Part 3 of 6: I Know Because I Know in the series called Christian Belief Through the Lens of Cognitive Science over at the HuffingtonPost. I'll let some of Valerie's words speak for themselves, though I want to quote first the excellent point made at the end.

When we overstate our ability to know, we play into the fundamentalist fallacy that certainty is possible. Burton calls this "the all-knowing rational mind myth." As scientists learn more about how our brains work, certitude is coming to be seen as a vice rather than a virtue. Certainty is a confession of ignorance about our ability to be passionately mistaken. Humans will always argue passionately about things that we do not know and cannot know, but with a little more self-knowledge and humility we may get to the point that those arguments are less often lethal.

I agree with Valerie that certitude is a vice and arguments over things we do not know can be dangerous to our health, or at the least our mental health. Isn't it sad that ideas could be lethal? Here is a little more of the article worth quoting...

For many reasons, religious beliefs are usually undergirded by a strong "feeling of knowing." Set aside for the moment the question of whether those beliefs tap underlying realities. Conversion experiences can be intense, hypnotic, and transformative. Worship practices, music and religious architecture have been optimized over time to evoke right brain sensations of transcendence and euphoria. Social insularity protects a community consensus. Repetition of ideas reinforces a sense of conviction or certainty. Forms of Christianity that emphasize right belief have built in safeguards against contrary evidence, doubt, and the assertions of other religions. Many a freethinker has sparred a smart, educated fundamentalist into a corner only to have the believer utter some form of "I just know."

Does this mean that rational argumentation about religion is useless? The answer may be disappointing. Religious belief is not bound to regular standards of evidence and logic. It is not about logic but about something more intuitive and primal. Arguments with believers start from a false premise -- that the believer is bound by the rules of debate rather than being bound by the belief itself. The freethinker assumes that the believer is free to concede; but this is rarely true. At best the bits of logic or evidence put forth in an argument go into the hopper with a whole host of other factors. And yet each of us who is a former believer (we number in the millions) reached some point in our lives when we simply couldn't sustain our old certainties. Our sense of knowing either eroded over time or abruptly disappeared. So sometimes those hoppers do fill up.

Given what I've said about knowing, how can anybody claim to know anything? We can't, with certainty. Those of us who are not religious could do with a little more humility on this point. We all see "through a glass darkly" and there is a realm in which all any of us can do is to make our own best guesses about what is real and important. This doesn't imply that all ideas are created equal or that our traditional understanding of "knowledge" is useless. As I said before, our sense of knowing allows us to navigate this world pretty well -- to detect regularities, anticipate events and make things happen. In the concrete domain of everyday life, acting on what we think we know works pretty well for us. Nonetheless, it is a healthy mistrust for our sense of knowing that has allowed scientists to detect, predict, and produce desired outcomes with ever greater precision.

The scientific method has been called "institutionalized doubt" because it forces us to question our assumptions. Scientists stake their hopes not on a specific set of answers but on a specific way of asking questions. Core to this process is "falsification" -- narrowing down what might be true by ruling out what can't be true. And to date, that approach has had enormous pay-offs. It is what has made the difference between the nature of human life in the Middle Ages and the 21st Century. But knowledge in science is provisional; at any given point in time, the sum of scientific knowledge is really just a progress report.

Now go back and read the first paragraph I quoted that belongs after this last one. I am Agnostic because I do not overstate our ability to know such things.

I'm following this series called Christian Belief Through the Lens of Cognitive Science over at the HuffingtonPost. It's an exploration of religious belief that I think gives some very good ideas on why religions persist in the face of a lack of evidence or an honest assessment. I want to quote some passages from the series here and will pick it up with Part 2 of 6: Why God has a Human Mind.

Because our theory of mind is so rich, we tend to over-attribute events to conscious beings. Scientists call this hyperactive agency detection. What does that mean? It means that when good things happen somebody gets credit and when bad things happen we look for someone to blame. We expect important events to be done by, for and to persons, and are averse to the idea that stuff just happens. We also tend to over-assume conscious intent, that if something consequential happened, someone did it on purpose.

This set of default assumptions explains why the ancients thought that volcanoes and plagues must be the actions of gods. Even in modern times, we are not immune from this kind of attribution: Hurricane Katrina happened because God was angry about abortions and gays; the Asian tsunami happened because he was disgusted with nude Australian sunbathers. If gods are tweaking natural events, then we want to curry their favor. Around the world, people make their special requests known to gods or spirits by talking to them and giving them gifts. Athletes huddle in prayer before a game, just in case those random bounces aren't random. After a good day at the casino, a thank-you tip may go into the offering basket. Or it may be that the offering goes into the basket beforehand.

All of this builds on the idea that gods or other supernatural beings are akin to us psychologically. They have emotions and preferences. They take action in response to things they like and dislike. They experience righteous indignation and crave retribution. They like some people better than others. They respond to our loyalty by being loyal to us. They can be placated or cajoled. They like praise, affirmation, and gratitude. They track favors and good-will in a kind of tit-for-tat reciprocity.

Abstract theologies are a fairly recent invention in the history of human religion, and they tend not to govern religious behavior. Even people who describe their god as omniscient or who insist that everything is predestined actually behave as if they need to communicate their desires and can influence future events by doing so. The god of Christian theology and the god that ordinary Christians worship are two different creatures.

If the structure of our minds predisposes us to certain kinds of religious beliefs, it also precludes others. Nowhere in the world is there a supernatural being who exists only on alternate Tuesdays, or who sees everything but forgets it all in ten minutes, or who rewards us for ignoring and disobeying him. Nowhere is there a god who knows the future, but only the next hour, or a god who starves people to death whenever he is pleased with them, or who is exactly like an ordinary person in every way. Some ideas are simply not interesting to us. They may be counter-intuitive in ways that make them forgettable instead of "sticky." Maybe they don't make good stories or maybe we don't have good places to file them in our index of memories.

According to Pascal Boyer, a good religious concept must strike a balance between being interesting and expected. It must activate an existing ontological category (let's say "river"), add some counterintuitive tag (when dark and bubbling river turns to blood and heals people), and retain the default assumptions of the category except those that are otherwise specified (river is wet, flows, is longer than it is wide, has a bottom, etc.) We start with a familiar class of being or object then tweak it to pique our interest but leave intact our other basic assumptions about that kind of object or being. If the supernatural thing we are discussing is a conscious being, it also needs to have a basically human mind. Only under these conditions will it stick and get passed from one person to another. (Religion Explained)

Christian beliefs are highly successful at getting retained and transmitted. They fit our information processing structures and yet are counterintuitive in intriguing ways. They capitalize on our tendency to attribute events to human-like causal agents who have minds much like our own. They allow us to take machinery that is designed for processing social information and apply it to the problems of understanding inanimate objects and natural phenomena. They leverage our tendency to see patterns in ambiguous or random events. Consequently they are intuitive and broadly applicable and are easily remembered.

I know I keep touching on this subject, but it is a common topic among freethinkers to try to figure out if agnosticism really exists. I obviously believe it does so I like bringing in anything that speaks to that viewpoint. I found a good article at Atheism and agnosticism... again.

It starts with a criticism of the wishy-washy "weak" and "strong" labels for theists and atheists and an article showing these thrown on a 2-axis graph of belief and knowledge. I agree with the author's conclusion and reworking of the graph that I will copy here. (my thanks to John at ScienceBlogs)



The writeup from John on this graph is:

Each axis is in effect a question: can we know God or facts about God? (the Gnosis axis), and does god exist? (the Atheist/Theist axis). Here is my concern - can we say anything about God's existence or not if we deny that the question of God is a knowable one, which is the agnostic position or perspective? I say that we cannot. I have absolutely no idea what a "weak theism" could be - do they believe in God's existence but think that the question is unanswerable? It's not enough to say they have faith God exists but think that is not knowledge - they are taking a firm position, and that counts as an epistemic commitment.

If the axes are simple binary choices, then no theist can be "below" the line of knowledge. If they believe God exists, then they have implicitly or explicitly taken a position on the knowability of God. But more realistically, if we treat the axes as degrees of certainty or likelihood (from -1 for complete rejection to 0 for ambivalence, to 1 for complete acceptance) then anything "below" the line is agnosticism. And if you think that you cannot know what the strue about God (as I do) then neither atheism nor theism are positions you will take.

Why agnostics like myself reject the appellation of "weak atheism" is that we do not take any position on whether God exists or not, because we think it is simply an unanswerable question. And being told, as we are, by atheists who do take a position on the existence of God, that we are atheists is to basically deny our most fundamental commitment - that these questions admit of no reliable, knowable or testable solution. Hence, we get a bit snarky.

My usual attempt to get someone to wrap their mind around agnosticism involves simple binary choices as well. Usually I define it as 1 is belief, 0 is disbelief, and agnosticism is the variable being undefined. So when you look at this graph and arguments over the supernatural you see atheism and theism on opposite sides of a belief question with the agnostic up on their own axis of unknowing.

The one point I would differ on with John is the unanswerable question of the capital G version of God as he writes it. That one usually means the Christian God that's most often found in the english speaking world that would read this. That specific known definition of the supernatural and possible creator of the universe would be something the rational open-minded agnostic would have very good reasons to reject. We could very easily agree with the atheist position on the Christian God, Hindu gods, Norse gods, et al. as I do and still not be 100% atheist. The "god" that could exist up there on the agnostic scale for me that makes me not entirely an atheist is an unknown supernatural possibility of a creator that defies our ability to know or understand such a concept. I would not label such a concept as God since I don't believe in the God with a capital G.

Here's a good lesson in having an open mind without being gullible and believing everything. Do you really have an open mind? I believe open-mindedness would be a virtue for any Agnostic.

excerpt from the article The Agnostic Atheist at The Guardian UK.

His historical inaccuracy aside, however, Huxley's point remained valid (as the word's rapid adoption testifies). A-gnosticism was originally a stance against certainty, against those who would admit no doubt, who believed their theism or atheism was incontrovertibly true, and that those who disagreed with them were either damned or irredeemable. In this it was not so much a position as an attitude, a stance of intellectual humility in the face of the most important questions of life; an adjective rather than a noun.

Whether it was an adjective that was appropriate to Huxley himself is somewhat questionable. His account of its creation is apologetic and emollient in a way that the man himself rarely was. Darwin's Bulldog was not known for his humility or uncertainty.

And that points us to a difficulty with agnosticism. Attitudes are fine but they need to be about something. Adjectives need nouns. If Huxley was indeed an agnostic, he was an agnostic atheist, tending away from the divine but unwilling (so he claimed) to be too dogmatic about it.

Thus understood, we all need a dash of agnosticism – of appropriate intellectual reserve in the face of the big questions. The dogmatic alternative, familiar to us as "fundamentalism", is neither appealing nor helpful.

But we should not imagine agnosticism is a complete and sufficient metaphysical position. The question is not simply whether you are an agnostic, but what kind of agnostic you are.

Yes, I see that the agnostic label is most often used as an adjective and is usually the reason why atheists see it as a superfluous word with little value. The most proper use of it would be in the pairing of it as 'agnostic atheist' as I've pointed out many times here. An 'agnostic theist' means little since believers rely on faith rather than verifiable knowledge for the basis of their belief, so qualifying theism as not being based on knowledge is rather useless.

Even though 'agnostic atheist' is the most logical use of the adjective, I do imagine agnosticism as a complete and sufficient metaphysical position when used as a noun. Agnosticism as a metaphysical position means that knowledge is important in understanding the metaphysical so blind faith is a meaningless replacement for a lack of knowledge. We must be honest in our beliefs and ability to understand the metaphysical. Between theism and atheism as the only choices, atheism is the only logical choice for the agnostic as a noun to pair with the agnostic adjective.

However, I do not believe atheism is the final answer since it is merely a rejection of theism. The atheist noun doesn't properly answer for me the big questions of existence. Why does this Universe exist if there is a reason why? How did it come to be if there was a cause for it? Was there even an event we would call creation that put into motion everything I see around me today?

The theists believe in the idea of supernatural creation and give the cause a name and persona of some sort. The theist's supernatural creator ranges from a very human-like god with thoughts and emotions like ours to a very general view of the Universe itself as the god such as in pantheism. The theists tend to worship and revere their supernatural cause of existence.

Atheism, in rejecting theism and its various definitions of a supernatural creator for our existence, logically rejects the idea of supernatural creation. Any atheist that rejects all theistic beliefs must say they reject the supernatural creation concept in total, since they are completely without theism. The atheist must believe in a natural creation or no creation at all with their atheistic cosmological position.

Agnosticism holds that the answer to the question of creation is that we do not know and possibly cannot know the nature of creation. Creation could have a natural cause, supernatural cause, or may not even be an event in our existence. We do not have the knowledge or proof for cause so any claim that it is a natural cause or uncaused must be seen as a false claim. Likewise, any claims in regards to the belief in a supernatural cause must also be seen as a false claim.

Ultimately one of the cosmological viewpoints does have to be true in the end, but without the knowledge of that truth the Agnostic (as a proper noun, not adjective) stands for the ideal that the metaphysical is unknown to us and is possibly inherently unknowable. Agnosticism simply says that we know nothing of what may be beyond physical existence, whereas atheism and theism both attempt to take a stance on certain metaphysical concepts with the most profound concept being their beliefs concerning creation.

Mr. Deity and Larry discuss the finer points of religious fundamentalism and idealism.

Here's another pick of mine from Mr. Deity season two where they go through a list of items to decide what is good or not. If a deity is the source of morality then he would have to go through this process of deciding such things. It's a funny clip.

Mr. Deity and Lucy play a little game with Cain and Abel.

I had forgotten about this webshow and they've moved the newer episodes to a site called Crackle. This episode touches on a few funny points about Cain and Abel, the origin of their wives, and god actually being married to and in cooperation with Lucifer (Lucy).

The previous post on the question of asking if gods exist came from an e-mail. It was ambigiously written in such a way to imply the person was an unbeliever of some kind but I was not the least bit surprised by the return e-mail. I suspected it was from a typical religious liar that has to resort to lies, half-truths, and confusing information to try to open up a dialog. They do this to try to share their ideas with you in some vain attempt to validate their own beliefs by getting others to agree with them. He may not be certain in what exactly he believes but ultimately the person does believe in a god of some kind.

Here is part of the return e-mail:

I have been a bit deceptive to you because I came across as an atheist or agnostic - but I am neither. I am certainly not religious, but I do say that there is a God, with reasons (real reasons that you can see with your own eyes). You see, I used to be agnostic then deist - but then I put all beliefs aside and said to the night sky, "Whoever you are, please speak to me. I will assume nothing about you, and I will only accept what you tell me about yourself." This was my beginning (back in 2005). The kick in this is that I call God, "Yahweh", but not the warrior God of the past, but the ethical God you could only find written in Micah, Amos, Jeremiah, Habakkuk, Isaiah, Hosea, and a few others.... blah, blah, blah.

This person professes to annoy the religious by not being a believer in religion. He has a blog and quotes scripture in it even though he claims to not be religious so he obviously believes in these writings even though he's very selective in which ones. He apparently thinks he's special with some special knowledge about it all even though he's smart enough to say you can't take these religions as a complete truth and even knocks them as false idols. What's funny and sad is that he doesn't see that his belief is yet another false idol.

This is from his blog:

People would rather have a thousand beliefs and no proof, no evidence, no moving God - and they prefer an invisible stone to praise. It is certainly what God gives them over to. It is quite obvious that Yahweh has given people over to their invisible stones to save them in their days of trouble and death... which has proven to be no salvation at all. They would prefer to worship the useless magician/idol inhabiting their minds, and never know the living God who saves life and spares my bones.

It is quite obvious to me that this person is yet another religious person with his own invisible stone to praise that like the old joke is "unique like everyone else's". He's smart enough to see the useless magician/idol inhabiting the minds of others but because of his flawed perspective he doesn't see that his own "living God" is just more of the same. I still don't understand how these people are so willing to take that leap of faith to believe in a god they specifically define for themselves and at the same time say other believers are so very wrong in their own leap of faith. I always see this as more proof that none of the believers have any real knowledge and it's just more fiction and delusions.

I received an e-mail question that asks:

Let's say that we don't know if there is a God or not - or if there are many Gods, or if God is spirit, or if God is physical, etc. There are potentially a thousand questions we could logically ask, and not ignorantly accept a bunch of religious beliefs.

It is obvious that there is no God(s) on this planet, and definitely no God(s) to be found in religion. Religion is very philosophical, and emotional, and dogmatic, and certainly without any God(s) besides the ones that sit as quiet as a tree stump.

So perhaps you could try something different that religious people don't try. Perhaps you could ask God(s) if God(s) exists - and if God(s) does exist, perhaps you could ask God(s) to show you that He/She/It/They exists.

I think people that move from religion to disbelief of any kind do actually do this and I had actively done this myself over several years. Alone in a room or outside in the majesty of the natural world I have asked the questions and received no replies. I was open to whatever message or sign would come to me and still am.

I can definitely say that the only messages and signs I have ever received and see around me today are that the universe and our existence is the greatest mystery. The simplistic notion of a creator that is made in our own image complete with petty emotions and desires is an insult to the real mystery and power of the universe. Likewise, to simply be without such a creator does not say enough about my view because it says to me that the universe is a completely natural and random event. This is why I use the Agnostic label to say that my belief centers on the humble fact that I do not know.

Quoting Huxley: The theological "gnosis" would have us believe that the world is a conjuror's house; the anti-theological "gnosis" talks as if it were a "dirt-pie" made by the two blind children, Law and Force. Agnosticism simply says that we know nothing of what may be beyond phenomena.

Here's some good news from the very large ARIS 2008 survey with a margin of error down to under 0.5 percent, which is pretty darn good for a survey. From www.americanreligionsurvey-aris.org

The percentage of Americans claiming no religion, which jumped from 8.2 in 1990 to 14.2 in 2001, has now increased to 15 percent. Given the estimated growth of the American adult population since the last census from 207 million to 228 million, that reflects an additional 4.7 million "Nones." Northern New England has now taken over from the Pacific Northwest as the least religious section of the country, with Vermont, at 34 percent "Nones," leading all other states by a full 9 points. "Many people thought our 2001 finding was an anomaly," Keysar said. We now know it wasn't. The 'Nones' are the only group to have grown in every state of the Union."

Only 1.6 percent of Americans call themselves atheist or agnostic. But based on stated beliefs, 12 percent are atheist (no God) or agnostic (unsure), while 12 percent more are deistic (believe in a higher power but not a personal God). The number of outright atheists has nearly doubled since 2001, from 900 thousand to 1.6 million. Twenty-seven percent of Americans do not expect a religious funeral at their death.

Of course I detest their simplistic tags of "no God" and "unsure" as being completely inaccurate.