On “Agnosticism”

By Jenn Smith

Agnosticism is failed logic. As Bob Dylan said in one of his songs, “you either got faith or you got unbelief, and there ain’t NO neutral ground.” Jordan Peterson loves to toss that word around, but it is a pile of horse manure. You either believe in God, or you don’t. Saying “I have not decided” is just another way of saying “I don’t believe… but I may think about it more later.” As one writer on agnosticism wrote: “the agnostic’s point that we can’t know whether or not God does not exist, is not a very interesting one. There are lots of things we don’t know for sure. We don’t know that Mars isn’t populated by fairies. Of course, we are not remotely inclined to believe that it is, but still we don’t have conclusive proof. Nevertheless, we don’t describe ourselves as agnostics about Martian fairies….not having conclusive proof does not make God’s existence just as probable as his non-existence. Moving from ‘not certain’ to ‘50/50 chance either way’ is what we might call the agnostic fallacy.” So the next time somebody says they are “agnostic,” just say, “so you are an atheist?”

Jordan Peterson also says he is “agnostic” on Jesus rising from the dead, which again is just a way of saying he does not believe it — it is in essence a cowardly evasion of answering the question. He says, “well I can’t rule it out because I do not know the limits of human possibility,” but Jesus rising from the dead has NOTHING to do with human possibility, and him even saying that just confirms he does not get it or is deliberately avoiding it.

Agnostic is a nonsense term. You either believe in something, or you don’t. Reserving the possibility that you might believe it later is still not believing. So the correct “agnostic” position (at least how most people use it) would be to say, “no, I don’t believe, but I may change my mind later.”

Those that say “knowledge of God is impossible,” have quite another argument, but even that is still saying that you do not believe — you are just adding the caveat that it is impossible to believe. It is bizarre how this word has been allowed to be used as a cop-out. It is used by people that do not want to admit they do not believe.

Although, I should say, for my own part, I do not believe in God — I know God exists.