Honestly, “it’s easier than explaining” is doing a lot of heavy lifting here 😅
Sithrak is the only one true god.
May you water always be salted
Ramen
… and piracy! yeah
As in the R.E.M. song: “boobs are my religion”
Why agnostic? Like… If there’s no proof, why believe in the existence of a deity at all?
Atheism just means without theism. If you aren’t theist, you’re atheist. Agnostic describes the position of lacking belief one way or the other. A lack of belief is not the same as a belief in a lack. The vast majority of atheists are agnostic atheists, because the belief that there are positively no deities is just as baseless as the claim that there are deities.
Theism is belief in gods; atheism is the opposite of that: non-belief in gods.
Gnosticism is knowledge of gods; agnosticism is the opposite of that: no knowledge of gods. (There is also a religious movement called gnosticism. That doesn’t relate here.)
The first is about belief and the second is about knowledge.
These are not incompatible. You can believe in something and claim to have knowledge of it (gnostic theism) or you can believe and claim to not have knowledge of it (agnostic theism). I have encountered Christians of both varieties.
For atheists, many (perhaps most) claim to have no knowledge of gods (agnostic atheism), and some claim that gods certainly do not exist (gnostic atheism). The latter demonstrate that the Christian exist, because logically an omniscient and omnipotent God can’t also be omni-benevolent, since suffering obviously exists.
Atheism is just another belief
Reading comprehension ain’t your strong suit, is it?
What’s the proof that there is no deity at all?
For me personally, atheism is saying ‘there is nothing more to the universe or reality, what you see is what you get’ which is extremely pretentious. Agnosticism is admitting to the possibility that there’s something going on here, but we don’t know and would likely be incapable of understanding what it is.
we don’t know and would likely be incapable of understanding what it is.
So aliens.
I mean… No? Maybe? Certainly not aliens as in biologically evolved creatures from another planet are involved, what is so hard to understand about that? Alien as in something completely foreign and unrecognizable to the human brain, sure.
Atheism: I don’t believe in the existence of god(s)
Agnosticism: I haven’t seen any proof for god thus can’t believe in one
It’s the same thing really, but without the “negative” connotations usually attributed to atheism or atheists. “See, I’m not really an atheist but agnostic. It means I’m not to be expelled from this community as a heretic”
It’s the same thing really, but without the “negative” connotations usually attributed to atheism or atheists. “See, I’m not really an atheist but agnostic. It means I’m not to be expelled from this community as a heretic”
This, basically. At least that’s how I used it. As a kid living in the bible belt, admitting you were an atheist was, in their eyes, literally no different than being a cannibalistic devil worshipper. Agnostic was easier for them to swallow (albeit because odds are high that most of them didn’t even know what it meant, and figured it was some sect of Christianity they were unfamiliar with).
When I got older, and escaped the institutional bigotry woven into nearly every facet of society down in the bible belt…the lovely place where our biology teacher also headed the bible club and refused to teach evolution yet somehow still had a job as a biology teacher in the public school system, as a small example…that was when I finally gained the confidence to self-describe as an atheist.
It’s the same thing really, but without the “negative” connotations usually attributed to atheism or atheists.
Atheists and Agnostics would obviously disagree. There’s a core philosophical difference between being convinced in the negative and being unconvinced in the affirmative.
That said, what are the consequences of being a Theist, an Atheist, or an Agnostic? I might argue that Theists and Atheists have history of leveraging their confidence into an active policy of discrimination and bigotry. Whether you’re a Chinese Communist cracking down on under-18 church attendance or an Israeli Zionist conducting a pogrom against Palestinians, there’s a habit of imbuing your personal beliefs with political teeth.
“See, I’m not really an atheist but agnostic. It means I’m not to be expelled from this community as a heretic”
The flip side of this being, “I’m not expelling you from the community for excessive display of religious ferver”.
It’s easier to sympathize with avowed Atheists in nations where atheism is a disenfranchised minority. But as soon as you give someone like Christopher Hitchens or Sam Harris an ounce of political capital, they start cheer leading a genocide.
That, I think, is a real tangible difference. Agnostics tend not to begrudge other ideologies in the same way.
Who says that atheism involves being convinced of the negative? I’m an atheist because I’m not a theist. I’m agnostic because I’m neither convinced of the negative nor the affirmative. Both labels apply to me.
“See, I’m not really an atheist but agnostic. It means I’m not to be expelled from this community as a heretic”
I identity with this. When I was younger I identified as agnostic, as I saw it as a more socially acceptable option than atheism which allowed me to not have to pretend to be religious.
But I’ve identified as atheist for many years now. In my case by the time I did, everyone of significance in my life was nonreligious.
Eh, I think there’s a decent semantic dispute for it. It’s of course dependent on your definition of deity and is mostly an exercise of pedantry. However, with the size of the universe I think there’s a pretty decent chance that there exists an intellectual being that could be interpreted as being god-like to the human perspective.
Now I’m not making claims that this proposed being has ever had anything to do with humans, nor are they responsible for any universal creation. Just that the universe is big enough for the existence of something significantly more advanced than humans. That being said, the size of the universe that allows for the possibility of this proposal also makes it possible existence mostly pedantic.
But agnostics don’t believe in the existence of a deity. Are you maybe confusing it with deism?
You can be an agnostic deist. Agnostic just means you have no firm belief. Most people who identify as “nones” in polls are technically agnostic, even if they personally believe in a higher power. Its a lack of certainty.
Most atheists are also technically agnostic atheists. A gnostic athiest would be someone who holds the absence of any higher being or spirituality as an almost axiomatic belief. Though they merely can be so certain that the small chance they’re wrong seems irrelevant to them.
For simplicity, I’ve always explained agnosticism as the belief that “I don’t know and neither do you”.
I was an agnostic for a very long time.
My main view of things - I couldn’t know if there was a god or if there wasn’t. But all that ultimate judgement shit never made any sense for me. If you’re just behaving decently because of fear of ultimate judgment, then you’re not a decent person. Ok if god would want me not to be an asshole, I’d need to be that out of my free will. And if a god demanded adherence to some random rules out of the blue - that god wouldn’t have a moral compass and I wouldn’t want to have to do anything with them in my life, being smitten down at the end would have been a consequence for me anyways.
I just want to be no asshole. So the question of there’s a god or not. I don’t care. God is irrelevant.
Thus: agnostic
I started staying I’m an atheist somw time ago, as that’s just quicker and I can go by without explaining.
Still - if there’s a god around, which is possible but improbable - I’m making sure I make fucking good use of the free will they gave me.
I’ve always considered agnostics to be atheists who just don’t wanna debate. At least that’s why I used to call myself an agnostic when I was younger.
I used to say agnostic because at that point all the atheist discussion I saw in public was aggressively anti-theistic, and I found it equally stupid to very strongly believe in either direction about things there’s simply no way to know. Now I just say atheist because it doesn’t mean only “I hate religion with passion” anymore
i call myself a devout agnostic. the justaposition of those words is inherently absurd since part of agnosticism and identifying as such is believing there is value to studying theology even if you yourself don’t believe the theologies you’re studying because ultimately prior to colonization, religion was how groups of people encoded and passed along their wisdom. however saying “devout agnostic” throws people enough off balance enough to introduce them to these concepts since so many say with their whole chest that they’re something when traditionally these terms have meant something else to the people who use them.
for example, an astounding (at least to me) number of people say quakers and unitarians aren’t christians. when you dig down on this you often find that this position is rooted in a believe (both positive and negative) that the fundamental mechanism and experience of christianity is trauma. however, when you look at the broader world of religion, you find that that’s mostly only Christian denominations rooted in the theologies of the roman empire such as roman catholicism and the various european orthodoxies like Greek and russian. however, the oldest denomination, Ethiopian Orthodox, would i think to the people who say quakers and unitarians aren’t christians, seem very unchistian. for that matter, i think so would Native America Christianity, Oriental Orthodox, and Armenianism. (fun fact, the Unitarian church is rooted in Oriental Orthodox, which is either the second or third oldest christian denomination)
im torn between tst and secular buddhism. Luckily they are not mutually exclusive or demand they are the only way.
I’ve encountered several TST members who also practice Buddhism. It seems to be the religion that overlaps the most. It seems odd to me, because I thought Buddhism rejected the material world while TST embraces it, but I’m probably missing something.
embracing the material world is a different satanism. tst has the seven tenents which are mostly about human rights.
I serve the Omnissiah.
Blood for the blood god.
From the moment I understood the weakness of my flesh…
And the piracy, of course.
If this is you, consider joining or supporting The Satanic Temple. This is why they exist, and they do more meaningful and practical good than a meme religion.
“We don’t like religious symbols in public space, so let’s put more of these, yay!”
“Proselytism is bad, so we need to recruit more people to fight it.”
“The guy at the top is not a Nazi anymore, so it’s fine.”- statements dreamed up by the utterly deranged.
Someone missed the point
We don’t like religious symbols in public space, so let’s put more of these, yay!
Yeah, they try to put non-religious things instead like cool Dante’s inferno statues. End result is that the religious symbols are banned, or if they aren’t, that there are other non-religious symbols around them. As much as they are a religion legally, they are atheists and their symbols are not religious, just fancy branding.
Proselytism is bad, so we need to recruit more people to fight it.
Yeah, what’s weird about that? Fire is bad so we need to recruit more firefighters to fight it. TST does not proselytize, as they don’t try to convert you into any religion. The are just an NGO.
They did try to put a baphomet statue in front of a 10 commandments monument in Arkansas. They are fighting for a plurality of religion, not secularism.
If I wanted to contribute to a secular cause, I would much rather contribute to a secular organization to begin with.TST does not proselytize
But the only times you hear of them is when people are trying to get more folk implied (or when they send a lawsuit, but that’s an other story). TST plays the card of a non profit when they don’t want to be associated with religious weirdos, and the card of religion when they want a special treatment. In the end it’s a knockoff religion that hijacked the name “satanism” while replicating what they denounce of christians.
Fire is bad so we need to recruit more firefighters to fight it.
It’s much closer to putting up advertisement against advertisement.
They are just an NGO.
That’s not true. It’s a bunch of for-profit organizations coupled with a recognized nonprofit church so they can be exempted from taxation. See here : https://the.satanic.wiki/index.php/The_Satanic_Wiki . Also, as a supposedly non-profit org, they do not disclose their financial information, which is usually a big red flag.
But the only times you hear of them is when people are trying to get more folk implied
Yes, and that’s plain old recrutiment/advertising of their cause. Proselytization refers to trying to convert someone to a religion, which they don’t do.
It’s much closer to putting up advertisement against advertisement.
Correct.
That’s not true. It’s a bunch of for-profit organizations coupled with a recognized nonprofit
Yes, so an NGO. Where did I say they are a non-profit?
Proselytization refers to trying to convert someone to a religion, which they don’t do.
They do claim it’s a religion. It is legally a religion. When they are recruiting, it is proselytism. Also, proselytism is part of the definition of a church in most countries, that is why, for instance, the Church of Satan is not legally a church in the US, because they do not proselytize. By their own saying and by the government, TST is a religion and they do proselytize.
Where did I say they are a non-profit?
You said it is just an NGO. I mean, yeah, but you could say that about pretty much anything. But clearly there is something more to it than the average NGO, with them being both a church and a couple for-profit organizations.
I’ve never heard of TST proselytizing. When and where have you seen this?
Also, proselytism is part of the definition of a church in most countries, that is why, for instance, the Church of Satan is not legally a church in the US, because they do not proselytize.
Please post evidence for this.
The US government is pretty hands-off when it comes to deciding what is and isn’t a religion. It’s that whole First Amendment thing.
Well, here and now, with the original comment asking to join them. I do have some anecdotes but they aren’t really relevant here, I guess.
Here is the CRA rule and the IRS one
Both state that “advancement of religion” is a requirement, which is quite close to proselytizing (promoting and manifesting religious belief).
The thing is that both countries were funded by christian people, so their definition of religion is biased towards it, so you can’t really have an individualistic religion like satanism be recognized.
We can also note that Canada is discriminating against non-theistic religions and asks quite explicitly to “support and maintain missions and missionaries to propagate the faith”. Canada is still a religious state, after all.
One of the core tenants of Pastafarianism is being too lazy or broke (or both) to actually contribute
I remember watching an interview with a mushroom man, he posited that humans have receptors built in for magic mushrooms because humans used to have an organ that provided hallucinogenic euphoria. This allowed humans to survive in groups without killing eachother, then religion eventually evolved socially and replaced it. Now that we have technology and modern governments thats slowly replacing religion.
It was a neat idea anyways. Its also neat to think about how religions could be a form of evolution, even though they arent technically biological changes.
Have you ever done mushrooms? This theory makes no sense.
If you’re into that kind of speculation, you might enjoy “The Cosmic Serpent” by Jeremy Nearby.
I’d rather trip tbh
You can just call yourself an atheist. Hell, if you call yourself a pastafarian you are basically an anti-theist.
I’m anti-theist and I want to slay all gods.Atheist and agnostic are not synonyms.
The words do not mean the same thing, but they often refer to the same people.
That is, most self-labeled atheists would be best described as “agnostic atheist” and most self-labeled agnostics would also be best described as “agnostic atheist.”
all agnostics are atheists because they dont believe in god
No, but if you also find all religions audacious and absurd, then wouldn’t atheist be a more accurate term anyway?
Out of curiosity, when you say “all religion”, does that include the many atheistic religions?
Just out of curiosity, who is this question directed at?
The person who posted the meme.
And you expect them to answer questions about the philosophical beliefs of the artist?
It’s a philosophical meme. I’ll try not to assume people stand by what they post next time.
Good idea.
Oh look, the old “aThEiSm Is A rElIgIoN” trope.
Seriously, you guys need some new material. If Jesus were real he’d be looking for new writers.
Dodged the question without even first processing it.
Ninja shit.
I never said atheism is a religion. There are many religions such as Buddhism, Jainism, Confucianism and Satanism which don’t believe in god but are still considered religions.
I’m aware of how my original comment came across so I should probably specify that I myself do not believe in a supernatural god.
Buddhism can definitely be theistic. Satanism is defined as “non-theistic”, which means it is not about the existence of a divinity in the usual meaning, so there could be atheistic and theistic satanists. Confucianism is kind of tricky because, if I recall right, it is mostly considered as a philosophy before a religion, even though it does include rituals and dogmas.
But I do agree with you, people will see the bad things coming from major and enshitified religions and ignore that other views, other options exist.
Buddhism technically does have gods, but they’re not creators and are not all-powerful. Buddhism is mainly about understanding suffering, escaping the cycle of rebirth, and achieving enlightenment.
As for Satanism, allow me to correct one small detail. There are theistic forms, but they’re not “Satanism”. The Church of Satan, founded in 1966 was the first religion in history to explicitly organize itself under the name “Satanism”. They deify the self, and there is a lot of psychodrama/ritual involved. It was heavily influenced by Ayn Rand but fused with ritual, symbolism, carnality, elitism, and psychodrama. Many LaVeyan Satanists consider this to be the one true form of Satanism. That’s part of the reason The Church of Satan and Satanic Temple hate each other. (Fun fact, one of the founders of the Satanic Temple, formerly a LaVeyan Satanist, left because he said TST “isn’t satanism”. His name was Brian Werner in case you want to fact check that yourself.)
I myself do not believe in a supernatural god.
So do you lean more towards sacrificing still beating hearts to our father the Sun or are you more into hugging trees and dancing naked in the moonlight?
What?
Well, you weren’t into supernatural gods, so I figured you might be into natural gods ;P can’t get more natural than the Sun and nature.
Let’s not pretend your previous comment wasn’t supposed to be a thinly veiled insult. If i’m not into supernatural gods then I must believe in some other woo-woo. And you phrased it in a delicately ridiculous way.
Let’s not pretend your previous comment wasn’t supposed to be a thinly veiled insult.
Well no, it was meant as a stupid joke, because let’s face it; nobody sacrifices inca-style anymore and most people look at you weirdly if you mention naked dancing for your religion.
And you phrased it in a delicately ridiculous way.
Yes I’m well aware, this was intentional.
You mean like Pastafarian?
Sort of. Pastafarianism is technically a religion, but it started as a satirical protest. I’m talking about religions which do not believe in a supernatural god.
Eastern religions like Buddhism?
Buddhism, Jainism, some forms of Taoism, Secular Humanism, Satanism etc.
This is very offensive to me. I’m Eastern Orthodox, that’s not spaghetti that’s lo-mein with fish balls. Heathen degenerate.
Agnosticism is weird. It’s just atheism for cowards.
So you’re atheist? You have unwavering faith in the unknown then. No proof, just feelings and opinions. Just like theists.
Being honest about the uncertain nature of the mystical experiences of our world is a cowards move now? P sure that has been a marker of wisdom for many great thinkers in the western canon, eg well over 2000 years
Atheism is not about treating the nonexistence of gods as more certain than mathematical theorems. It’s about recognizing that just because the theist ideas are put into words doesn’t mean we should treat them as any closer to the truth then the virtually infinite potential strings of characters - meaningful or otherwise - that were not “fortunate enough” to be put to writing.
Agnosticism is the centrism of the theological world.
People seem to think belief (or lack thereof) is a one dimensional line.
Theism - Agnosticism - Atheism
But it’s more like the political compass with Theism - Atheism on one axis and Gnostism - Agnosticism on the other.
Theism/Atheism is a comment on whether you believe in god(s).
Gnostism/Agnosticism is a comment on how strongly you hold that belief (or lack of belief).
Are you absolutely certain there’s no god? Then you’re a gnostic atheist. Believe in god in sort of a wishy-washy way? Then you’re an agnostic theist.
I’m a die hard atheist, but I also consider myself an agnostic. Because although there’s no evidence of a god it’s also impossible to prove a negative.
To be a gnostic atheist would actually take a leap of faith I’m not willing to risk.
