Dear "agnostics": please stop perpetuating your label

In my first post, "The Default Position," I discussed the meanings and uses of labels of theism and gnosticism. I just got done reading a post where several self-proclaimed agnostics claimed they weren't atheists. Now, I normally don't care about labels people choose to put on themselves. In fact, I would prefer that we didn't need labels at all. The only reason why this label irks me is because it is an unnecessary segregation of two groups of people who have far more in common with each other than they even realize.

First of all, consider this question: do you believe in a god or gods? If the answer is yes, then you are a theist. Any other answer (including "I don't know") makes you an atheist. That's right, agnostics, most (if not all) of you are actually atheists. Remember, atheism is no belief in a god, not belief there is no god. Sure, some atheists take a stronger stance than others on the existence of a god, but the label of atheist still applies to those that take the less certain stance.

Agnosticism is not a step down to a nicer, easier-to-digest form of atheism. No, it is an entirely separate category that identifies something different than belief in a god: knowledge. In fact, someone who was truly "agnostic" to the existence of gods would have to believe that all claims were equally viable. Zeus is just as likely to exist as Yahweh, or Neptune is just as likely to exist as Anubis. It is clear that not all claims are equal.

Perhaps someday we will live in a world where these labels are no longer necessary. After all, atheism is only a necessary label because of theism. It is a response position to theistic claims, and the term would not be necessary if there was no theism. Because theists exist, people who do not support the claim of the existence of a god must therefore be atheists. My message to people who call themselves to agnostics: remember, the label of atheist most likely applies to you, too. I understand that the term atheist can provoke stronger feelings in the minds of certain people - images of evil devil worshippers conspiring against God - and that using the label atheist for yourself can be frightening. But the sooner we vanquish this old misunderstanding of what atheism is, the sooner we can start working together for our common goals.

Indoctrination

Sometimes it's easy to forget how impressionable children are. We are, apparently, evolved to listen to adults and do as they say. The child who listens to a grown-up when they say not to jump into the crocodile-infested waters has a far greater chance of surviving than the child who does not listen, and becomes some reptile's dinner.

But this very mechanism that keeps us out of harm's way - this nearly devout respect towards the advice of our elders - has another different, entirely unintended affect. In my mind, it is one of the chief reasons that religious thought and superstition are still so pervasive, even in a time where human understanding is greater than ever before. An adult tells a child that there's a god watching over all of them, the god of their clan, who empowers them to defeat their tribal enemies. The adult warns that the child should never, ever doubt this god or blaspheme against him, because he is wrathful and will bring harm on the child and the child's family. What is the child to do, except to take the advice as truth? When the child grows up, the ideas that he or she was raised with becomes inseparable from truth, and so the new adult teaches the children all the advice that was given all those years ago: stay away from the crocodile-infested water, don't jump from a high tree, and don't forget to pay homage to the clan's god, or great horrors will be visited upon them all.

The longer a mind is enslaved to dogma, the harder it becomes to remove the shackles. Eventually, you come to love the chains, make excuses for them, and despise anyone who does not wear them. As history tells us, all too often, dogma (religious and secular) has always led to harm. Moral absolutists will tell you that right and wrong are predetermined and never-changing (strangely enough, they seem to forget that at one time, slavery, the subjugation of women, racism, and genocide were all at one point deemed to be "right" if done in a certain manner. Sadly enough, the subjugation of women still exists in the modern world, yet not even the women being subjugated seem to want to put an end to it).

Religion is not going away any time soon. Its backwardness will be with us for a long time, slowing down progress in education, critical thinking, science, medicine, human rights, and the abolition of the various vice laws that put harmless people into the prison system, costing us vast amounts of taxpayer money. Our best bet in deterring this malevolent (though well-meaning) force is by continuing to battle on behalf of reason and rationality. We must protect education at all costs; after all, those impressionable youth that will one day be adults are listening to what we say, intently, with wide and curious eyes. We could fill their heads with superstition and they would believe every word of it. Or we could teach them about reality and how the world works. I think the latter would ensure a safer and more enlightened society.

The Default Position

Welcome to "The Default Position." I hope you enjoy your time here and find that, at the very least, this blog is informative.

In this blog, I will attempt to analyze beliefs and the claims of the religious, and whether or not they hold any merit. One thing I will attempt to point out in many of my arguments geared towards religious claims is that it is proper to withhold belief in a proposition until it is proven reasonable. In short, it is the "default position" to lack a belief in a claim until there is reasonable proof to show the claim is viable.

I will begin my first post by defining some words I will be frequently using. First, I will refute the commonly held misconceptions between "agnosticism" and "atheism." It should be pointed out that gnosticism refers to knowledge and theism refers to belief. Being an "agnostic" is not a milder form of being an "atheist." These terms are not mutually exclusive, and I will elaborate on this.

To be agnostic is to "not know," and to be an atheist is to "not believe." Please note, that atheism does not mean "belief there is no god," but rather "no belief in a god." You can use gnosticism and theism terms together. You can be a gnostic theist, meaning you believe there is a god, and you "know" this as a fact; an agnostic theist, meaning you believe there is a god but you don't know for certain, or think that such knowledge is unknowable; a gnostic atheist, meaning that you do not believe in a god and "know" that there is no god; or an agnostic atheist, where you do not believe in a god but you do not know for certain there is no god, or believe that a god would unknowable.

I, as many atheists, am an agnostic atheist. I do not believe in a god, but at the same time I do not claim to know that there is no god. Now, does agnosticism towards the existence of gods mean that every claim about a god is equally feasible? Of course not. As Richard Dawkins has said, I am agnostic to the existence of gods just as I am agnostic to the teapot that might be orbiting Mars, or the fairies that live at the bottom of the garden. I don't know for certain that they aren't there, but I know that it's fairly likely that they are not.

I hope I have effectively explained my position on the existence of a god or gods. In the future, I will tackle subjects on religion, theology, spirituality, and the supernatural. I hope to show that, just like in all other fields of knowledge, the default position should always be to withhold belief until it is shown that the proposition is viable.