What is Ignosticism?

[Angrboda]

Concepts don't have to be coherent to refer. An invisible pink unicorn is incoherent, but it's not at all unclear as to what it refers to.

[Belacqua]

I think we all agree that God as described by the bible cannot exist. Unless you can convince yourself that the 620 + contractions in the bible are just God not using his autocorrect properly. 

This rules out sola scriptura literalism. 

Which leaves us to deal with nearly all theology ever written.

---

Concepts don't have to be coherent to refer.  An invisible pink unicorn is incoherent, but it's not at all unclear as to what it refers to.

Yes -- an important thing to keep in mind.

I guess we need to consider whether the opposite (sort of) is also true: are there real things to which no human concepts usefully refer? 

Does an inability to conceive of something rule that thing out?

[robvalue]

You can't really compare the chair argument here.
No-one cares what type of chair. The type of chair is usually completely irrelevant to the story.
We all know what the general function of a chair is ... Because it is real. We all have and use one.

When a theist starts on about God, he had me at  "what the fuck are you on about now!"
God is no chair. He wishes!

Exactly. Chairs are indisputably real, there are millions of clear examples, and they share one specific quality: they are designed to be sat on. When someone asks me a question about a chair, details are very easy to deal with when they are important, but if they aren’t mentioned, there is no doubt what is being asked about. Gods share no such universally agreed quality, nor is it clear what makes something a god rather than just a "really powerful thing".

I should add that ignosticism is a technical position, and I’d use it only when suitable. If some random person asks me a quick question and it’s not going to lead anywhere, I’ll just say I’m an atheist. If however someone is looking to have a proper debate with me, then it’s important to nail down definitions immediately. They are going to later refer to my answers, and I don’t want them to piss me about. I need to know what question I’m answering, and I need a definition so that the theist doesn’t keep switching what "god" means during the discussion. In my experience, this is almost certain to happen.

It’s actually a charitable position for me to hold. I’m giving the theist a chance to be clear, I’m giving their idea possible merit and a platform, and I’m giving them the mental exercise of defining a word they have probably never even tried to define before. The alternative is for me to assume they are talking about a complete load of shit, an imaginary friend that happens to agree with them, that has attributes which morph depending on what part of the conversation we are at. I’m still better than everyone, but I like giving people a fair chance.

[vulcanlogician]

From my experience, everyone I have ever met means the same thing by "chair". The same goes for many other concepts. There are some words, however, that people vastly disagree about, and it’s those that I require clarification on. The irony is that even after years and years pursuing this question, that 4 part dissection is the best I can do. Most theists don’t even try to define it, in my experience, expecting me to debate myself I suppose!

You didn't answer the question.  I asked you how you go about determining what they mean.  And no, not everybody means the same thing by chair if there even is a good definition of it, which there really isn't.  What does the Platonic form of a chair look like?  Does it have three legs or four?  Or does it have any legs at all?

The Platonic Form of the chair doesn't "look like" anything. A Form is only intelligible through logic, not the senses.

To understand the Platonic Form of the chair we must ask, "What is a chair in principle?" Not "what are examples of chairs?" And not "what is the ideal chair?" (Although this latter question hits pretty close to the mark in regards to what Plato was getting at.) 

All would-be chairs partake in the Form of the chair. A two-legged failure of a chair would partake less in the Form of a chair than a three-legged chair. Why? Because, in principle, a chair is something that can stand on its own, which a two-legged chair could not. Another principle of a good chair is that a person sitting on it is able to rock back and forth without tipping it over (as, in principle, a good chair is something designed to comfortably seat a person at a table, and when people sit at a table, they often rock back and forth during the course of their meal). As such, a four-legged chair would be a better chair than a three-legged chair, perhaps. (Because you can rock back and forth on a four-legged chair without tipping it over more easily than you could on a three-legged chair). It really depends on whether the chair more resembles "what a chair is in principle" or not. And (in principle) a chair is a GOOD chair.

Also note that all Forms themselves are things that partake in the Form of the good. That's why considering Forms to be ideals is close to the mark. Because one chair can be "better" than another, a good chair partakes in the Form of the chair MORE than some shitty chair. Plato wasn't shy about asserting that some things were objectively better than other things. But he also argued that the discernment of "what is better" had nothing to do with opinion or subjectivity.

I don't personally agree with Plato's theory of Forms in its entirety. But I do think Plato was saying something valuable in his theory of Forms... something that most philosophers who followed him were too timid to say... namely that some things are objectively better than others, and that a true philosopher is one who sets out to determine these "objective goods."

[vulcanlogician]

I would add, that eccentric as Plato's theory of Forms may sound to modern ears... empirical scientific facts, are expressed mathematically. (Plato considered numbers more real than sensory reality)... and governing principles, such as general relativity... are considered more real than observed phenomena... for instance, gravity is considered "real" while the behavior of extant massive bodies is considered mysterious if they depart from the laws of gravity. An astronomer (if he/she observes such a thing) is inclined to say , the laws of gravitation are constant, while some other phenomena produced the deviation.

[Bucky Ball]

I have come up with a formula which does, I think, cover every god idea I’ve yet heard. Each definition can be split into one or more of the following groups:

1) A creative force that made our reality

2) Various special abilities and accolades for the creative force

3) Relabelling things that are already known to exist, or abstract notions that already have a well-used meaning

4) World salad nonsense

I’ll be happy to take the god challenge, and apply this to any definition that can be found. I’ll be interested to see if it holds up. Personally, I’d prefer everyone agreed on definition 1 only, as I find the rest of them to be pointless. Sadly this will probably only be the case for deists.

My responses to each section are generally:

1) I have no opinion about that

2) This makes such a thing extremely unlikely

3) We already have words for that / you're equivocating

4) I don’t understand what this even means

Re # 1 "A creative force that made our reality" ....

I disagree. 
It has to be (for a god to be worth it's salt) ... 
"A creative force that made/formed (all) "reality", (not just ours). 
....which is why Ignosticism makes sense.
A god that "exists" finds that it *must* participate in a portion of Reality,  not all of it, and Reality is and always was a larger "set" 
than that which the god participates in. Where did this Reality (in which the gods *must participate*) come from ? 
The gods don't answer the important  question.

Agnosticism gives the "god" concept far more value than it deserves.
Is it necessary to take a position towards every incoherent idea ? .... No
Do I have to be agnostic towards Pink Sparkly Unicorns ?

[The Grand Nudger]

The majority of gods are not creator gods.  They may not be "worth their salt", but that doesn't make them "not gods".

[bennyboy]

This is one of the reasons I declare as agnostic with regard to the God idea, but atheist with regard to every specific God idea I've been presented with.

When asked this question in general terms, it's very hard for me to answer. I first have to say, "What do you MEAN by God?" This is often followed up with: "Any kind of God. Do you believe in any kind of God at all?

Well, words fail us. Do I believe in Skydaddy? No. Do I believe in some deity or some mystical philosophical quantity which might be responsible for the existence of the Universe, or of conscious agency in it? Yes, but I'm not sure if this should be called "God" or not.

Given QM experimentation, I'm suspicious that the Universe itself is deeply conscious, and that we are of that consciousness and surrounded by it. But I'm not sure I'd say it's sentient, as in it wakes up in the morning, stretches, and decides it's time to nuke Sodom.

Let me say one thing, though. If there's a definition of "God" simple enough to be fully comprehended by chimps like us. . . then it's probably not talking about an actually existent entity.

[haig]

Wiki : "Ignosticism or igtheism is the idea that the question of the existence of God is meaningless because the term god has no coherent and unambiguous definition."

Ignosticism is really a silly concept. It is a philosophical position challenging the definition of god or stretching that definition to some irrelevant philosophical ambiguity. When someone challenges the existence of god, it is in the context of a conversation. The god in question, of that conversation is not unambiguous between the parties involved. We all know who the god is, who's existence is being challenged. To suggest otherwise is philosophical mumbo jumbo.

God by any definition is firstly a supernatural entity, and that is not unambiguous, and supersedes any unambiguous definition whereby the question of existence becomes meaningless.

[bennyboy]

God by any definition is firstly a supernatural entity, and that is not unambiguous, and supersedes any unambiguous definition whereby the question of existence becomes meaningless.

Well, we believe in a Big Bang.  What caused it?

Do you include extra-universal forces or entities as supernatural?