Sunday 20 March 2016

Semi-strong agnosticism

Whilst strong agnosticism states that "I cannot know whether a deity exists or not, and neither can you", and weak agnosticism states that "I don't know whether any deities exist or not, but maybe one day, if there is evidence, we can find something out", I propose a middle ground: semi-strong agnosticism.

Semi-strong agnosticism states "it is probably the case that I cannot know whether a deity exists or not, and neither can you, but there is a possibility that my mental model of the certainty of information is flawed, and hence there is a possibility that it is possible to know for certain whether a deity exists or not".

My belief in strong agnosticism stems from my general stance on what I can know (I first thought this after spending some time thinking about Descartes' I think therefore I am):

That which I perceive exists, but I cannot know the nature of its existence.

So, I perceive myself, but I cannot know the nature of my existence, for example I cannot know whether I have free will. I perceive the world around me, but I cannot know whether it is real, a dream, an illusion or a simulation.

Hence, I may perceive a deity but given that I cannot be certain that I'm not in a dream, I cannot be certain that the deity is not merely a figment of the dream.

However, I have to accept the possibility that my general stance on what I can know might be wrong, and therefore have to accept the possibility that there could be some kind of mathematical proof of the nature of what I perceive, and hence of a deity.

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