Posted by Matt Berry on June 17, 1998 at 16:37:26:
In Reply to: Scientific Pantheism: "God of nature" vs. "God is nature" posted by Matt Berry on June 16, 1998 at 16:38:44:
The other point: I think that popular "agnosticism" (as opposed to Huxley's scientific "method") is a stopping place for religious discussion.
A) What do you believe?
B) I'm agnostic ... and belief or disbelief in a supernatural God is impossible to know.
Case closed, since B's position is unassailable. The agnostic stops all inquiry within the sphere of the typical religious word-set. However, what is really happening here is that one side is using a belief word-set, and the other a science word-set. Huxley's "Agnosticism" constitutes scientific method and not a belief, as such. (This you suggested in your previous post. I.E., Deism and Huxley-Agnosticism are not opposed: one is a belief and the other is a method.) But in my not so humble opinion I believe that the Theist is confused about the nature of language and so, for genuine communication to take place, I have to speak their language, and not expect them to communicate within a language they have not yet learned.
Another popular conversation,
A) What do you believe?
B) I'm a pantheist and God ...
In continuing the conversation the use of the word "God" is made possible -- albeit for B nothing would have been lost if he had said he was an atheist, an agnostic, or a pantheist (since his present use of the word "God" is an affirmation of reality) ... However, this is a pickup point for A, who perhaps as a Theist, does not believe in God so much as he believes in his Grammar and his Word designations ... but a starting point exists here. For the theist, as with the Boy Scouts, as long as you can use the word "God" you are OK. And it is only a hop-skip-and-a-jump to show how "God" must match up with reality, provided one accepts the premise that "the approach to truth is the approach to God."
However, beginning with the word, "Atheist" or "Huxley's Agnostic," would be as if someone had set the door afire and then asked the Theist to enter ... since the Theist still has superstitious beliefs surrounding words, and the word, "atheist," is the gateway to Hell. (We only need ask blue to confirm this.) Words are magical incantations. The Theist believes that he can actually sponge away or alter reality. (Evolution is sponged away in order to protect the "Word of God," for example. The words used "make this so." This is akin to belief in magic. Another example, the Book of Mormon places iron into early America, ... etc.).
The atheist, pantheist and agnostic look beyond words (and other aspects of cultural inheritance) for confirmation in reality. Interestingly, enough premises exist within the believer's word-set to show him that this "cultural transcendence" may just be what many of the ancient prophets have been suggesting anyways. The Theist must either follow this grounded reasoning or succumb to muddled-thinking.