The Search for God Page 3.2.2
Agnosticism literally means without knowledge. “A” for without and “gnosis” for knowledge. We can be agnostic about all sorts of information. Being agnostic can be a euphemism for “I don’t care.”
Often people rest in their agnostic state, comfortable with ignorance. Some people are without knowledge but wish to seek further enlightenment.
Seeking for enlightenment
Gaining knowledge
Since this section is a philosophy section and the overall book is about searching for god, I will address agnosticism regarding ultimate reality, absolute truth, and god. We have already established that humans cannot know ultimate reality and absolute truth.
Obtaining such information would require a being with all-knowledge.
- Where might such a being exist?
- Who could this being be?
- Will we ever find such a being?
Many people remain agnostic for their entire lives, never feeling or thinking they have acquired enough information to be able to adequately leave the agnostic state.
In fact, because there is so much evidence and competing evidence, it is often easier to retreat to “I have my truth, and you have yours, so let’s not even discuss these matters.”
In addition, because there are so many different fields of knowledge trying to answer the “big” questions we find ourselves easily distracted. How do we resolve the agnostic state?
We have already covered the issues with the search for ultimate reality and absolute truth and came to a conclusion again; we must search for the being we have labeled god. Now I wish to leave the agnostic state and gain knowledge about god.
Two Types of Knowledge
There are two types of knowledge we are dealing with. There is mental knowledge and physical knowledge. Mental knowledge is what we have covered when we attempted to determine what attributes we expect god to possess.
We use our senses and our reason to gather information based on universal principles like the laws of logic, causality, and morality. But can we say that we “know” god?
I could research the current president, gather all the facts about his life, and know details of his personality, but could I say to my friends I know the president? Could I walk up to the security guards and say, “I know the president, let me in”? Of course not.
There is also experiential knowledge. This type of knowledge has an intimate quality of friendship. This type of knowledge is also relational, where the other person knows us as well.
So when we say we are seeking god, why? Are we hoping to have knowledge or a relationship? We can have knowledge about god, but not know god.
Knowledge and Relationship
When I began my search for god, I did not understand this distinction and never even considered a relationship as a possibility. But I see now the difference between Immanuel Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason and the Critique of Practical Reason.
There is so much knowledge available about god and about his character, but we will never know god without one of the following:
- God communicating with humankind
- God wanting a relationship with humankind
I can walk up to the cute girl, sit by her in class, write notes, and daydream about our future together every single day. She might say “Hi” or even give me the time of day, but without return communication, do I know her?
Once again, just like our issue with transcendence, humans have a problem reaching god with our senses and reason alone. In fact, we cannot.
So, just like how I quickly turned from atheism, so too I realized to resolve my agnosticism, I would have to explore world religions and see if god communicated with man, because I knew enough to know that many religions claim god spoke to mankind.
So even if I view Christians as hypocrites or Buddhist monks as weird, I needed to evaluate this information. But what should I look for? What signs or words should I consider?
This is where I had to return to the attributes I should expect god to possess. What would those abilities look like to humans? If I was god, how might I reasonably manifest those traits?
So, before I even considered religions, I again began some thought exercises about godly attributes, which we will explore in the next few articles.
What Next?
- What is the crucial concept?
- We cannot have knowledge of ultimate reality and absolute truth without god, and we cannot know god without him desiring a relationship and communication with us.
- Why is that significant?
- Humans must look to places where somebody says god spoke.
- If you agree, the next steps.
- If you disagree, please consider reading.
References and Links
- Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy – Atheism and Agnosticism
- Britannica – Agnosticism
- Got Questions – What is agnosticism?
- Philosophy basics – Agnosticism
- National Library of Medicine – Defining patient’s experiential knowledge