That's the thing about "absolute truth", it is a very confusing thing indeed. The argument that humans cannot know they know absolute truth is one based on logic.
By simple definitions, a being that is capable of knowing whether something is absolute truth or not is an omniscient being. An omniscient being can be seen as one who knows everything, or one who knows which statements are absolute truths and which are not. Thus an omniscient being does not necessarily need to have any prior "knowledge" to be omniscient, but when given a question in the form "Is X true?", they will always know whether it is or not. To elaborate, an omniscient being does not need to know that my name is Adrian, but when someone asks this being "This man is named Adrian, is that true?", the being will know that it is so.
The argument continues that as humans are not such beings, and are fallible, we cannot ever say that something we "know" is true. It might be true, but there is no way of knowing with 100% certainty that our justified belief is absolute truth. This is because we are subjective, and there is no objective way of viewing reality (as of yet) that doesn't succumb to some kind of subjectivity.
As for your assertion that agnosticism is a strong absolute truth claim, I disagree. Agnosticism is a belief, a way of thinking, nothing more. It is the same kind of system as skepticism, a way of thinking about truth claims, rather than a truth claim itself. I believe (because of the logical arguments I've presented) that humans are incapable of knowing whether the knowledge they posses is absolute, but I do not claim that as an absolute truth. Indeed, as you pointed out, this would invariably lead to a contradiction.
As I am open to the existence of Gods, I am open to humans having such an ability as to know the truth value of certain claims (or all claims for that matter). Show me a method for doing so that doesn't involve subjectivism, and nulls the arguments presented, and I will gladly throw agnosticism out the window.
By simple definitions, a being that is capable of knowing whether something is absolute truth or not is an omniscient being. An omniscient being can be seen as one who knows everything, or one who knows which statements are absolute truths and which are not. Thus an omniscient being does not necessarily need to have any prior "knowledge" to be omniscient, but when given a question in the form "Is X true?", they will always know whether it is or not. To elaborate, an omniscient being does not need to know that my name is Adrian, but when someone asks this being "This man is named Adrian, is that true?", the being will know that it is so.
The argument continues that as humans are not such beings, and are fallible, we cannot ever say that something we "know" is true. It might be true, but there is no way of knowing with 100% certainty that our justified belief is absolute truth. This is because we are subjective, and there is no objective way of viewing reality (as of yet) that doesn't succumb to some kind of subjectivity.
As for your assertion that agnosticism is a strong absolute truth claim, I disagree. Agnosticism is a belief, a way of thinking, nothing more. It is the same kind of system as skepticism, a way of thinking about truth claims, rather than a truth claim itself. I believe (because of the logical arguments I've presented) that humans are incapable of knowing whether the knowledge they posses is absolute, but I do not claim that as an absolute truth. Indeed, as you pointed out, this would invariably lead to a contradiction.
As I am open to the existence of Gods, I am open to humans having such an ability as to know the truth value of certain claims (or all claims for that matter). Show me a method for doing so that doesn't involve subjectivism, and nulls the arguments presented, and I will gladly throw agnosticism out the window.
