This should clear up any misconceptions.....

[cleanhippie]

[PETRUS]

1. Where are you?

[cleanhippie]

3. I think the better question is...

where are YOU?



seriously, what are you talking about?

[PETRUS]

4. Meaning, which quadrant.

To answer my own question: somewhere in the Agnostic Theist area, I guess.

[cleanhippie]

6. Ahh, sorry, brain freeze...

I'm so used to the nonsensical responses I usually see that I'm a tad bit defensive.


Agnostic atheist.

[PETRUS]

7. No worries! I've seen the pitbulls here, I understand. nt

[NMMNG]

2. It should

But I imagine all the people telling us what we believe (since they know better than we do) will be along soon.

[Sal Minella]

5. Yes.

We are all exactly the same flavor Xian as them, as soon as we've been adequately preached at, which they will proceed to do, if we don't depart posthaste.

[laconicsax]

11. They're already unreccing the OP. n/t

[Newest Reality]

8. Is one allowed to have a nuetral or

inclusive viewpoint as if staring at the chart and accepting all quadrants, yet without a particular bias or choice being required?

[cleanhippie]

9. I suppose you can have whatever you want.

but it seems to me that the choices are quite binary: you do or do not believe in a god, you are or are not certain of the existence of a god.

Am I missing something?

[RaleighNCDUer]

26. that would be described as the point of intersection fo the four quadrants

if you were to chart it on the graph.

[laconicsax]

10. Rec'd to zero n/t

[Speck Tater]

12. What about: "Unable to say whether I believe in God or not without a clear definition of "God"."

I suppose a person could have some kind of spiritual beliefs that most would not call "god", but which also do not deny the possibility of any such spiritual-type being or beings.

Like what if the electrical fields of the galaxy form a sort of conscious electromagnetic neural network, sort of like something you might encounter on Star Trek, yet that conscious entity was not, in any way, responsible for the creation of the universe. Most theists would say such a consciousness is not a god because to them "god" implies "creator god".

Yet others might consider such a vast consciousness god-like, especially if, being an inherent part of the structure of the galaxy, it might have knowledge of everything that goes on within it's "body", including your thoughts and mine,...

...well, anyway. You get the general idea. Without knowing what is meant by "god" it becomes impossible to take any kind of stand one way or the other.

[laconicsax]

13. What you're describing is (a)gnosticism.

(A)gnosticism is about knowledge and information. (A)theism is about belief. There may be energy-beings like in Star Trek, but knowledge of them is separate from belief in them.

It's possible to believe in such creatures (or not) without having the slightest bit of knowledge of whether they are real.

[cleanhippie]

14. YOU define "god" however you want to.

When it comes to YOUR definition, you are a theist (either gnostic or agnostic), but when it comes to OTHERS definition (say the christian one, for example) you are atheist, right?

[Speck Tater]

17. Well, I certain that some kinds of gods don't exist, like the Judeo-Christian one for example,

and I'm pretty sure the Greek and Roman gods don't exist either. So I guess Christians, ancient Greeks and Romans would consider me an atheist. And I'm fine with that. But I leave the door open just a crack for some other possibilities that I haven't accounted for. I'm not sure there is or is not something out there in the big bad universe that I, personally, might or might not consider to be a god, or god-like entity, or demi-god (or whatever, depending on what day of the week it is and whether it's raining and I'm feeling grumpy and contrary, or the sun is out and I'm feeling cheerful and generous).

So, in other words, the answer is "yes".

Wait.

What was the question again?

[laconicsax]

18. Sounds like you're an agnostic atheist.

You don't believe, and you don't think it's possible to know for sure.

[Speck Tater]

19. That sounds about right. :) nt

[Humanist_Activist]

20. I think the problem is when you extend the definition of god that much, it becomes relatively...

meaningless.

Let's forget about what's out there in the universe, and instead focus on us, as a species, humans first gained the ability to be able to destroy all life if we were crazy enough to do so, a power that was, until only the past century, reserved to gods alone. Now, in this century, we seem to be on the cusp of being able to create life from molecules, from scratch, as it were, another power that was reserved for gods alone. It isn't too far fetched to think that we can not only create new life, but even seed the galaxy with it if we so chose in the relatively near future. Does that then make us gods?

I don't think so, for frankly our traditional definitions and powers of gods were conceptualized while we as a species were just beginning to figure out how to purify metals for our own use. Now we can change environments to our own will, its not instant or miraculous, and takes hard work and many years to do, but the end result is being able to shape things to our will. We can destroy and create, the only limitations being we cannot violate the laws of physics as we understand them today, but in the future, who knows?

The gods are limited, even the Abrahamic one, to the imaginations of the people who first made them up. Now it seems the only thing left is being able to violate the laws of the universe at will as being the only reserve of gods, that and possibly creating universes. Then again, we might be able to do those in the future too.

It seems the only limits we have are those we impose on ourselves.

[amyrose2712]

24. That sounds like -Ignosticism -- I consider myself and Ignostic agnostic atheist...

because there could be something not yet describe that could be some sort of god to us. But as far as what has been describe so far. I can only say I am an atheist. Albeit an agnostic one, because nothing is ever 100% certain.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignosticism

Ignosticism or igtheism is the theological position that every other theological position (including agnosticism) assumes too much about the concept of God and many other theological concepts. The word "ignosticism" was coined by Sherwin Wine, a rabbi and a founding figure of Humanistic Judaism.

It can be defined as encompassing two related views about the existence of God:

The view that a coherent definition of God must be presented before the question of the existence of god can be meaningfully discussed. Furthermore, if that definition is unfalsifiable, the ignostic takes the theological noncognitivist position that the question of the existence of God (per that definition) is meaningless. In this case, the concept of God is not considered meaningless; the term "God" is considered meaningless.
The second view is synonymous with theological noncognitivism, and skips the step of first asking "What is meant by 'God'?" before proclaiming the original question "Does God exist?" as meaningless.
Some philosophers have seen ignosticism as a variation of agnosticism or atheism,<1> while others have considered it to be distinct. An ignostic maintains that they cannot even say whether he/she is a theist or an atheist until a sufficient definition of theism is put forth.

[edhopper]

15. I would say I am

a gnostic atheist.

[rrneck]

16. Most people would call me a gnostic atheist.

But it actually depends on the time of day.

[trotsky]

21. With respect to all gods that have been presented or even loosely defined to me,

I am a gnostic atheist. I have yet to encounter a definition of the word that is not hopelessly contradictory or so vague and equivocating as to be meaningless.

However, I am more than willing to analyze any new definitions for the word and judge the chances of existence of the postulated god on the merits thereof.

[Iggo]

22. It should. (n/t)

[amyrose2712]

23. Nice!Sending this to my BF! Thanks.

[Odin2005]

25. Great chart!