Relation to the world· Philosophy of religionnamed middle

Agnosticism (Huxley)

Axis: Existence of God — Does God exist?

We can neither prove that God exists nor prove that he does not: the question exceeds what we are able to know. Rather than affirm or deny, the agnostic suspends judgment and holds it more honest to say I do not know than to settle the matter for lack of proof.

Who holds this position

Philosophers 2

Sextus Empiricusexplicit

Sextus lines up the dogmatists' arguments for and against the existence of the gods, shows that they balance, and concludes to suspension: one can establish neither that the gods exist nor that they do not. More radical than ordinary agnosticism, which asserts undecidability as a thesis, he will not even rule for the unknowable. In practice, however, following custom, he says the gods exist, honors them and holds them provident, without dogma. It is this lived suspension, not a doctrinal agnosticism, that the median position marks here.

Outlines of Pyrrhonism, III, 2-12 (on the gods) · Against the Mathematicians, IX, 13-194

Show inferred positions (1)

Pyrrhoinferable

The indeterminacy of all things extends to the divine: since neither the existence nor the non-existence of the gods can be established, the sage does not decide. This suspension is more radical than agnosticism, which asserts undecidability as a thesis, since Pyrrho does not even posit that the divine is unknowable. In practice, following the custom of his city, he honors the gods like everyone else, without attaching dogmatic belief to it. It is this lived suspension, and not a position of balance between faith and atheism, that the median value marks here.

Diogenes Laertius, Lives of the Philosophers, IX, 64 and 108 · Sextus Empiricus, Outlines of Pyrrhonism, III, 2 (on the gods)

Arguments and objections

ArgumentNeither prove nor refute — The proofs of God's existence and of his non-existence have all been contested; and it is not right to assert more than the evidence allows. Suspending judgment is not indifference: it is the exact measure of what reason can do.

For centuries proofs have piled up on both sides: cosmological arguments, design, the wager on one side; evil, silence, projection on the other. None has ever compelled an honest, informed mind, or the debate would be closed.
Now intellectual honesty requires asserting no more than the evidence allows: to hold as certain what is not, one way or the other, is to decide where one does not know, and to mistake one's desire, to believe or to deny, for knowledge.
Suspending judgment is therefore no lukewarmness: it is recognizing that the question exceeds what experience and demonstration can reach, and reserving one's assent for what deserves it.

Therefore So "I do not know" is no fallback but the exact position the evidence licenses: agnosticism is reason's honesty on the question of God.

ObjectionAttacks the position Thought experimentPascal's Wager — Uncertainty does not justify neutrality: living already stakes a bet, and with stakes so asymmetric, suspending judgment is itself a wager, the worst one.

The agnostic is right on one point: reason can neither prove nor refute God's existence. But he concludes that one may abstain from choosing.
Yet one cannot not play: to live is already to stake. Whoever suspends judgment lives, in practice, as though God did not exist; his neutrality is a wager that does not speak its name.
And the stakes are asymmetric: to bet on God is to risk a finite stake for an infinite gain; to bet against, to risk a finite gain against an infinite loss. Faced with such a gap, the calculation leaves no room for unscathed neutrality.

Therefore So uncertainty does not ground suspension: since one must stake, prudential reason counsels betting on God, and agnosticism ceases to be the fallback position it took itself to be.

Problems

Descriptive
A God beyond words
If God exceeds every concept, can one even affirm or deny his existence, or does the question wrongly assume he is one object among others?
God
Practical Thought experiment
The wager of belief
Even without proof, is it not in our interest to believe, since we would have everything to gain if God exists and little to lose otherwise? But can one decide to believe by calculation?
to believe
PrescriptiveExistential
Does meaning need God?
Without God, does life lose all meaning, or can meaning be built entirely on a human scale?
a life
PrescriptiveMoral
Does morality need God?
Does the good owe its value to God's will, or is it good independently of him? If God did not exist, would everything be permitted?
morality