Knowledge, belief & agnosticism (Agnosticism)

by Carl, Sunday, July 20, 2008, 21:23 (5751 days ago) @ dhw

Many strongly held positions begin in the gut and then rely on the brain to come up with the appropriate justification. Dawkins seems to fall in this category. His gut tells him there is no god, so he overdrives his reasoning to justify it.
The beauty of science is that, in the final stage, ideas must be taken to the lab for proof by observation. In the case of God's existence, no one has succeeded in bringing it to the lab. The distinction between natural and supernatural is the reason. Science can only deal with the natural.
One source of knowledge that I have not seen mentioned in your discussions is divine revelation. If a personal God exists, then divine revelation is perfectly reasonable. Atheists will never completely understand theists unless they allow for divine revelation. I suppose it would equate to the gut level ideas mentioned above, but without the need to go to the lab, since it is validated by authority. It sometimes takes the form of mental telepathy. Then the question becomes who has had it, who has imagined it and who is faking it. If you throw out divine revelation, then you can throw out the Bible, since, without God's direct editing, the Bible is just another very old book.
To say there is no way to prove God's existence is incorrect. If God would simply appear before a panel of esteemed scientists and perform miracles on request, he could prove his existence. He could also answer their questions about the Big Bang, quantum mechanics and creating living organisms. This would indisputably be divine revelation.
My personal gut feeling is that all knowledge is suspect, especially scientific knowledge. It can be overturned with another trip to the lab. Color me agnostic.

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