Agnostic: a pointless term?

[AFTT47]

Agnosticism is the only scientifically valid position you can arrive at. It is a fallacy that asserting gods do not exist is somehow better than asserting they do as there is an absence of evidence either way.

Personally I am happy to acknowledge that my assertion there is no god is a leap of faith, I am content that scientific endeavour is my system of belief, I have no problem with that at all. I find it really odd and counter intuitive that other people do have a problem with it.

MM

Agreed. I'm also happy to acknowledge that any hunch I may communicate regarding the existence of god, is not up to my highest standards of knowledge claims. I may exclaim that there is no way I get dealt a straight flush in the next hand of poker, but I realize there actually is a very, very small chance it will happen. Nonetheless I'm folding my shitty starting cards without a worry.

The situation with god claims is much, much worse than for being dealt a straight flush. With the latter, we all understand what a straight flush will look like, and its probability is not zero. If anyone ever turns one over, we'd all recognize it. No one knows what a god would look like, and there is little or no agreement between those few who do claim to know. I'm fine with dismissing god claims without careful examination. However that doesn't mean I believe no gods exist, and I know full well I have no argument for their non-existence. I just carry on as if that were true as a practical matter as I have better things to do, no expectation of that a good case for god's existence will ever be found, and no interest.

Practical strong-atheism. This is the same thing Christians do with every other God concept out there.

The thing that galls me is that none of these fine variations on disbelief amount to squat in the real world. Regarding how he or she carries on with his or her life, a non-believer is a non-believer. Our morals, our political stances, our philosophies are not changed the slightest by it. Whether we are strong-atheist or traditional agnostic, we carry on as if God does not exist. No practical difference.