The Greatness of Agnosticism

            Being an agnostic is not easy. Religious people believe that you are so lost you can’t even declare yourself an atheist. Atheists believe that agnostics are people who have realized that God doesn't exist, but haven’t reached its logical conclusion. I have been both an atheist and a believer, but in this essay I will explain why I have changed my mind and demonstrate why agnosticism is not only a valid position, but a valuable one as well.

Labels carry too much preconceptions, so instead of letting others define my position, I will do it myself. My definition of an agnostic is the following: he who is inclined to disbelieve in deities or any other supernatural existence, but does not deny that their existence is a possibility.

The bigotry of the nonbeliever is for me nearly as funny as the bigotry of the believer. 

An agnostic is open minded and a free thinker. An agnostic acts just like an independent voter considering who will receive his vote by weighing each candidate objectively, without any favoritism for a party and by recognizing that each side has its strengths and weaknesses. Whether in politics or in religion, independent thinking is very admirable.                               

                              

Both atheists and theists agree that there are many, many things in the universe and even in our body that are still beyond our knowledge.  If you have never seen, heard or felt something and someone enquires to you about that something, the obvious position to take is to humbly accept one’s ignorance about the matter. Well then, shouldn’t an agnostic search for the answers? Yes, I have and I still am searching, but I believe that some things are beyond our understanding, at least for now.

Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people living life in peace

I am not a believer in God for the following reasons. I have no direct proof from my experience that can confirm the existence of a deity. And I don’t rely on indirect accounts for this matter because they do not seem reliable. Why believe in a Christian image of God and not a Hindu one? Why throw away the gods of Ancient Greece, the spirits of early tribes or the alien worshipping religions? I am convinced that they believe their accounts are true, but they can’t all be right. It seems more logical to consider that the variety of supernatural entities corresponds to how different cultures respond psychologically to phenomena they can’t explain.

What about inferring God’s existence?  It is typical of theists to ask non-believers who created the universe if not God. They argue that the universe had to come from somewhere, that it can’t exist out of nowhere. Well, the same argument applies to God. Where did he come from? It makes just as much sense to say that the universe, or the multiverse*, has always existed without any origin, as it does to say that God had no origin.

 So far both explanations seem to be equally possible, but as we will see, they really aren’t. First, Occam’s razor tells us that when two explanations equally explain something, we should choose the simplest. The simplest explanation is that the universe has always existed, because believing in a God requires believing that there is a metaphysical being that is beyond our senses which adds an unnecessary and extra level of complexity to the explanation of why the universe exists. Secondly, the existence of the traditional God, an omnipotent and omnibenevolent being, cannot be logically inferred. My argument was brilliantly summarized by Epicurus:

“Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?”

If God is omnipotent and perfect then he has no reason or need to create us. Even if he did create us, why did he make us imperfect? How can something imperfect come from something perfect? To those who say that we are imperfect, because God gave us freedom I ask the following: given that our freedom is limited, and we are not omnipotent, why would he give us the choice of doing evil  instead of leaving it beyond our possibilities, as he has done with so many other choices?  Some people say that God lets evil exist so that we can learn, so that we love him more, so that we can appreciate goodness or to let us earn a place in heaven.  An omnipotent and omnibenevolent God would be capable of making free humans, who learn, love him, who appreciate goodness and earn his rewards without the suffering and pain that exists in the world.        

Then my believing friends would answer that we can’t know God’s reasons for making the world the way it is. How is it that believers can give this unknown metaphysical being so many qualities and with so much certainty, but non-believers cannot point out that these qualities are contradictory? The following scenario would make more sense: imagine if a friend told you that “X” person is physically immortal no matter what. “X” dies the next day. Now your friend still try to defend the contradiction between his words and reality by saying that “we don’t really understand death”.

Epicurus

            Now here is why I am not an atheist either. Atheists have failed to give a good explanation of why life exists. How is it that from an inorganic universe, a group of molecules started reproducing and trying to survive? Even though atheist biologists will deny it, there is a zero probability that something inert became alive because it interacted with other inert forces and substances, no matter how much time and randomness you factor into the equation. It is silly to theorize that life just randomly appeared out of a bunch of molecules.

            Besides, atheists do not have a good explanation for consciousness and the mind either. They claim that our existence is confined to our body and our brain, but that doesn’t explain why we seem to exist beyond that. How is it that a bunch of neurons have gained awareness of themselves? How is it that a small part of the universe (the atoms that make up our bodies) has become conscious of its own existence?

       Finally, even if scientific and natural explanations are found to the previous questions, who are we to deny with certainty all supernatural entities because we haven’t experienced them? It is one thing to say that it is probable, even practical to believe that there are no supernatural beings or forces, but to say that it is certainly true is a mistake. It’s just as absurd as saying that there definitely weren’t, aren’t and never will be any aliens just because we have yet to prove their existence. Although it is reasonable for now to go through daily activities assuming that one won’t encounter an alien, that presumption can’t be generalized to billions of years and billions of galaxies. For all we know, we might be tiny cells that make up a huge alien. Again, the most probable explanation should be chosen, until there is reason to believe otherwise.

            Agnosticism is a stage in my development and that of humanity. Until we have more information and more answers, it is a stage in which I choose to believe what is most likely, which is the inexistence of deities, at least until given reason to believe otherwise. Perhaps the next stages will be reached in a few years or they might not even exist. If I stay at this stage for the rest of my life, I will remain curious about the universe but I see no reason to be upset or to believe that I am somehow stuck in my development. Agnosticism gives me the best of both worlds. It gives me the rationality, the practicality, the realism, the objectivity and the down-to-earth mentality of atheists as well as their usual drive to enjoy life to the most, in case there is nothing else after death. On the other hand, agnosticism also gives me the capacity to be spiritual without a religion, the opportunity to take risks with a leap of faith that something or someone out there might be guiding and helping me, the hope that there is a meaning to my existence, to humanity and to pain and pleasure, and the chance to entertain the possibility of an existence beyond the body and of life after death.

"Being an agnostic means all things are possible, even God, even the Holy Trinity. This world is so strange that anything may happen, or may not happen. Being an agnostic makes me live in a larger, a more fantastic kind of world, almost uncanny. It makes me more tolerant." -Jorge Luis Borges

                                  

            For all these reasons, agnosticism not only is a valid position, but I believe it is the one that provides the best answers, the right attitudes and the greatest emotional, intellectual and spiritual satisfaction. It puts together the best of each of the alternatives and throws out the worst. And that is why I am proud to be an Agnostic.

            

For a list of famous agnostics click here!

*Multiverse: is the hypothetical set of multiple possible universes (including the historical universe we consistently experience) that together comprise everything that exists and can exist

Nietzsche: Fighting Fire with Fire

In the 19th century, Nietzsche argued that since Plato, Western Civilization has been too concerned with the Apollonian aspect of the world. The Greek god of light, Apollo, represents order, structure, rationality, the direct opposite of Dionysus, god of ecstasy, drunkenness.  Examples of Dionysian energies are the arts and other creative pursuits.

Ourorobos: Greek symbol for "eternal recurrence"

The German philosopher also claimed that religions and other beliefs such as Plato´s theory of forms were a severe flaw in humanity´s thinking because they dealt with speculation and were concerned with "other-worlds" instead of reality. Nietzsche argued that the weak used these ideas as an escape, due to their incapacity to deal with life. If a person is willing to live in a cyclical universe of "Eternal  Recurrence" where life is repeated over and over again, that would prove that he or she has come to an absolute acceptance of reality.
Perhaps Friederich Nietzsche´s most controversial idea is the idea of the Übermensch or Overman. The Overman is a new creature that he believes will result from the overcoming of humanity´s defects and its evolution into something greater. This new being is characterized by its "self-confident, self-reinforcing, self-governing, creative and commanding attitude" which has also come to reject all forms of morality and emerged even more powerful from the resulting nihilism.

One example of the overcompensations made by this philosophical giant is illustrated by his excessive admiration of the individual in opposition to society, the Dionysian over the Apollonian, which if  implemented into society would result overtime in an opposite, but equally flawed reality. However, his awareness that he is not a Übermensch suggests that he knew that he was an imbalanced thinker as well and that someday his excesses would be overcome.

His adamant opposition to "other-worldliness" is also unbalanced. It is not unreasonable for him to challenge people´s obsession with Heaven, alternate realities and additional "other-worlds" as a reason not to live present life, the only certain one, to the fullest. If one is strict, there is no place in Nietzsche's philosophy for plans for a better world, which is in its essence an "other-world". However, he proves himself wrong with his prediction of the Overman, because it is a "detachment" from reality too. It is impossible to live only in reality without considering, to some degree, other possibilities.

Further evidence of Nietzsche´s imbalance is the Nazi´s use of his ideas to justify their actions and promote their ideology. Although it is true that Nazi Germany distorted and cherry-picked Nietzsche idea´s, his extremist positions, without any clarification that moderation is needed, facilitated their abuses and crimes.

Did Hitler believe he was the first Overman?

Nietzsche goes overboard in his deconstruction of morality. It is perfectly fine to challenge morality to the smallest detail and to submerge into a nihilism, but only as a temporary state of transition between inherited values and the Overman. Nietzsche predicts a new mentality with the overcoming of nihilism and morality but provides very little help about how humanity can reach that new stage.

Nietzsche´s philosophy can be seen as an intellectually violent reaction to the excesses and deficits brought by idealism, religion, reason, morality and his own psyche. Nietzsche was raised in a very religious environment which understandably led to his rebellion against religion. The culture he lived in had become too stiff in regards to all these elements he opposed, but he sometimes failed to recognize that the ideas he condemns once started off as reactions to problems of the time and later became an imbalanced force. Religion and morality were a reaction to the savageness of a prehistoric man. Rationality and order were used to overcome superstition and anarchy. Nietzsche failed to see that his ideas could suffer a similar fate too.

Wicks, Robert. "Friedrich Nietzsche." Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Summer 2011. Web. 11 Dec 2011. <http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/sum2011/entries/nietzsche>.