On Wednesday, July 9, 2003, at 11:23 pm, Jon Gabriel wrote:
It is impossible to prove that God either exists or does not exist somewhere, anywhere in the universe with the exception of anecdotal examples. Therefore, both belief *and* nonbelief in God are the result of faith and not scientific principle. So, one may accurately say that both Atheists and Theists rely on faith to support their conclusions. Only agnostics do not.
It seems to me it makes more sense to be agnostic about whether woolly mammoths are extinct than about whether god(s) exist. After all, we have evidence that woolly mammoths *did* survive until relatively recently, and the world is a big place...
There is no evidence at all that god(s) exist or ever did.
So why be agnostic about that and not woolly mammoths?
The reason I term myself Agnostic rather than Atheist is that though I have no doubt that there is no omnipotent, omnibenevolent god that watches over us and listens to our prayers, and absolutely no doubt that the idea of heaven is hogwash, I can't know without a doubt that there may be vastly superior beings - on the order of being gods. I have no way of being sure that the origins of life on this planet were not initialized by such a being either. I doubt it, but cannot verify my mistrust.
Doug
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