Teapot Agnosticism (General)

by Mark, UK, Friday, February 08, 2008, 10:30 (5922 days ago) @ dhw

The issues are wholly separate. Evidence of design (if it existed) would still not provide evidence for a supernatural creator deity. Supernatural entities by definition cannot be proven by the natural sciences. Furthermore, if God is unknowable, then the idea of God becomes meaningless, being neither true nor false; an empty concept. - Agnosticism is "intellectually impoverished" for the reasons discussed in my original post here. Namely, how reasonable is it to be "sceptical" about things for which there is no evidence whatsoever? Assuming that you don't actively speculate about the about the (non)existence of fairies, unicorns or extra-terrestrial teapots, why is it then okay to single out 'God' for special treatment? At the very least it is inconsistent, at worst it is patently ridiculous. - Atheism and theism are not rival schools of belief. Neither do they do not exist on an imagined scale of belief / unbelief, leaving "agnosticism" to occupy the happy middle ground. This is a common mischaracterisation. Atheism is not the "opposite" of theism, just as "no tomatoes" is not the opposite of "some tomatoes". To put it plainly; atheism is the absence of belief, not the belief in absence.