The Agnostic’s Exit Strategy (Agnosticism)

by dhw, Monday, June 23, 2008, 20:55 (5995 days ago) @ Cary Cook

Cary is trying to "formulate a definitive final statement of spiritual location for agnostics". - Behind the inimitable carycookiness of your style ... which I really enjoy by the way ... there's a lot of meaty stuff for discussion, raising several major issues. I'd much rather we spent our time on these than on arguing over definitions, but we can do both, so I'll get back to you later on the other thread. - Points for discussion: - 1) "how much of life's resources should be bet on each [of the possibilities]?" - The idea of the bet ... your own development of Pascal ... is a problem for me because of the fact that we disagree over the nature/definition of belief. I can't force myself to "believe" something (= have an inner conviction that it is true) just because it might be to my advantage to do so. It would be great if there was a fatherly God who would forgive me for doubting him, would reward me for my good deeds with an eternity of bliss, and would compensate all victims of life's cruelties with a similar reward. That, I presume, is the "just afterlife" you are betting your socks on. But for me there is no bet. Nor is there a "strategy". There is only the question: could it be true? - 2) No afterlife: "whoever has the greatest ratio of happiness over unhappiness for the duration is the winner." Not sure about "the winner", but otherwise yes. Your question "was it worth it?" is more helpful. Everyone has to decide for himself, and your ratio will certainly be a decisive factor in settling the answer. You mention "the most toys" and "loving relationships" (though "warm fuzzy stuff" suggests a disturbing cynicism) as possible sources of happiness. This might be a fruitful topic, especially if linked to that of ethics. - 3) Afterlife: you bet on reincarnation. I am totally unaware of any previous life, and as I find it very doubtful that my individual history would have begun with me if there is reincarnation, I don't see much point in the concept. If I'm to take another form after I die but I don't know I was me, where's it going to get me? I might as well disappear (no afterlife). I find it more likely that if there is an afterlife, I'll be a spirit me, retaining the identity that has been contained within my now dead physical body. - 4) If a worthwhile afterlife is possible, you ask: "what criteria determine who gets what?" And the possibilities are 1. luck, 2. judgment. But you rightly ask who is the judge, and if the judge has different criteria of justice from mine, I'd regard myself as unlucky (and the judge would regard me as an arrogant so-and-so). You say that if justice is the criterion, "it would make sense to invest as much as you can afford [in doing good stuff]". I don't like this idea of calculatedly investing, just as I don't like the bet. I live my life according to what I consider to be ethical standards (see the humanist code I quoted under 'How do agnostics live', on 5 June at 21.02), and I do so because I've found that they help me to feel as happy as I can reasonably expect to feel. You rightly say we can't know if there is justice, but I would specify that if there is justice, we can't know if God's concept of justice is the same as ours. "Kissing the judge's ass" won't work if the judge knows why we're doing it. "By their deeds ye shall know them" ... which is not actually what Matthew wrote, but I wish he had ... seems a much fairer way of finding favour. - Your take on Christianity ("worship Jesus for ever, and you're forgiven ... which throws it back into the ass-licking category") is not quite how I would phrase it, but until our Christian friends can convince me that they put humanistic considerations before prescriptions laid down by subjective interpretation of man-made texts, I will go along with it. - To sum it all up: if there is no afterlife, I agree that the ratio of happiness to unhappiness will decide whether life was worth it. If there is an afterlife, I personally would favour the spirit hypothesis, but I would not change my way of life to fit in with any particular concept of God's justice. I simply hope that it will be the same as mine. I also hope that we will be provided with an explanation and compensation for what I see as the injustices imposed on humanity by the systems God created, and also compensation for the victims of man's systems, since these derive at least in part from God's. Hope, however, does not lead me to belief (my definition, not yours).