Why I am a Gnostic Atheist

[The Grand Nudger]

I'm sorry, but if you don't have your own working definition of what a "god" is, how can you be gnostic about such a thing?

-By asking another what theirs is before deciding whether or not you know anything about it.

For example, I have a simple working definition of a god. A narrative device or allegory-dump often employed in tales of the supernatural meant to amuse or origins/establishment myths and legends meant to form opinion.

In this scenario, there are thousands of them. I'm a big fan. However, when you ask someone with faith what -they- mean by the same they'll give you some bullshit about those same gods and their ability to escape the narrative. When Beowulf, Dracula, or Mr. Durden miraculously leap forth from the pages of the books that contain them I'll entertain the notion. Till then - it's pretty simple for me. It's just so silly it's hard to imagine why people give credence to the notion that you simply cannot "know". How many of those same people would offer an identical defense of Hogwarts - I wonder?

[Violet]

Oh... you can know anything. Being necessarily correct about anything you know, on the other hand...

For all my talk, I'm rather simple. I believe there might be 'something 'out there'', and that's it. Weakest diest in the world, that's me

And I'm a god 0.o

[fr0d0]

Violet = Fox Mulder

Who isn't god. Well, to most of us..

[Violet]

Violet = Fox Mulder

Who isn't god. Well, to most of us..

Hey now... if aliens abduct my Asha: I'm probably capable of xenocide in retaliation.

[Rhizomorph13]

I find the idea of gnostic atheism a weird concept. You can't logically prove/know that all possible concepts of god are necessarily not true. Gnostic atheism seems like an equally noodly concept as gnostic theism:

Gnostic theism: I know that there is some kind of God
Agnostic theism: I know that there is no kind of God

If there was a deistic sort of god than atheism would be untrue. You have to define god first then demonstrate which parts of that definition cannot be true. For example I am a Gnostic Atheist with regards to the Christian God because the bible claims that God works through the prayers of his people and there have been studies that have shown that prayer fails to produce any statistically significant results in reality. Therefore the Christian God isn't real, or at least is defined wrong in the bible. Which, is often how that goalpost is shifted.

On the general question of God/god or gods, I am an agnostic atheist and theological noncognitivist because those seem to be the most intellectually honest representations of what is possible to hold as knowledge. The concept of God/god or gods is poorly defined across the board and when pressed into a workable, testable definition often the concepts colapse upon themselves or members of the same sect will disagree about the esoteric meanings within meanings. So, in a game of "discuss the god" the ball changes shape, goalposts move, cats and dogs play together, and the lion sleeps tonight.

I assure you that even though one can express the claim that your "colorless green ideas sleep furiously" that doesn't mean that cognition happens when that sentence is spoken. One can also not "know" that the thing the speaker is talking about is ontologically nonsensical even though their sentence certainly is...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colorless_g..._furiously

[The Grand Nudger]

As a response to a specific conception of a god Rhizo, it's not noodly at all. For example, I'm comfortably "gnostic" about Zues the lightning chucker. My knowing that there are no gods does not conflict with my also knowing that there are thousands of them - it's a very simple dilineation between characters in a story and the "gods" that folks imagine are floating around over their heads or under their feet removed from the story. I'm not the one who created the confusion - the word is being used in two very different ways - one of which is full on retarded. I still don't understand why the subject deserves any more respect or consideration than this.

[Rhizomorph13]

Well thank you for the terse rehashing of my post. You do realize you basically said the same thing as me, point for point. If not, I guess my verbal skills need work or you need work on your comprehension.

[The Grand Nudger]

I suppose that the only difference in our opinions on the matter is that every single god ever described falls under the header of "any specific god" for me. The very notion of a god is just an aggregate of all these things. It's not something I feel uncomfortable claiming knowledge about. I didn't express that well or make myself clear. Apologies.

I'm not just "gnostic" with regards to a single god or collection of them - all of them, even the idea - once it's removed from the page. I'm not "agnostic" with regards to the notion in general - and I don't see what agnosticism offers that's more intellectually honest in this regard. None of this is to say that I'm right, but I'm wondering why you feel that way (re intellectual honesty).

[Rhizomorph13]

It's the black swan theory, only replace the color black with everything that can possibly be attributed to God/god or gods, and replace swan with any descriptor that could ever be attributed to a being in the category of "thing that <insert interaction with reality> the universe, or maybe just your teeth". Language fails to express the thing that may or may not exist and for that reason I am a theological noncognitivist. BUT, yes, the expressed beliefs in dieties... probably not true; but so far, wide, and nonspecific are the claims that there is no way to know that they are all wrong in the same way as you can know that the swan in front of you is not black.

To prove that a thing is not, the expressed thing has to be provably not, or the only logical course of action would be to shrug your shoulders and say, "I reject your idea".

For example there is a version of god, my favorite, the Invisible Pink Unicorn(BBHH) (yes I know she was created as a gaff against religion, but why couldn't she be real and her prophets are just confused? HMMMM?) She is said to be Invisible and Pink. You can't prove that she isn't real and when you point out that invisible and pink are mutually exclusive, a true believer will just say that the pinkness is transcendental so again, no proof!

More importantly and seriously, the deist god which is said only to have set the world in motion then sit back and see what happens. What makes that illogical? What makes that provably wrong?

I don't claim to be gnostic about much more that the most basic things in life, like the fact that a chair will support my weight, or that my car will start in the morning. Both of which have born themselves out to be false knowledge on a few occasions.

[The Grand Nudger]

I don't claim to be gnostic about much more that the most basic things in life, like the fact that a chair will support my weight, or that my car will start in the morning. Both of which have born themselves out to be false knowledge on a few occasions.

Here, I think, is where it gets confusing for me. You're comfortable claiming knowledge that a chair will support you based upon what (and as a point of interest..that particular phenomena isn't actually very basic- when you take a look at it)? Is that same apparatus or method not sufficient to assess a ghost story? I mean, I get that knowledge can be "born out false"..but isn't knowledge always conditional - and in that sense, your car not starting isn't really an issue of "being born out false" is it? Conditions changed between the one turn of the key and the next...and you would expect a different result, wouldn't you? Couldn't you even say, when you turned the key, that you -knew- something had malfunctioned? Or can you not know that either?

I mean personally, I know that when I turn the key my car is -supposed- to start.....but I never know whether or not it will.