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what religion am i if i believe in some sort of god/creator..

Agnostic just means you're unsure about it. You can actually be a believer or an unbeliever and an agnostic at the same time. The agnosticism just means your position on the issue isn't certain.

The opposite of agnostic is gnostic: you are certain. You don't just believe, you know.
 
don't feel the need to fit a label.. express and explore your spirituality and religiousness without predefined restraints
 
i don't think the op is agnostic. the definition of agnostic is one who holds the view that god is unknown and probably unknowable; one who is not committed to believing in the existence or nonexistence of god.

the op believes in a creator therefore he is not agnostic. i would say he is a theist, the definition of which is one who believes in the existence of god or gods.

alasdair
 
alasdairm said:
i don't think the op is agnostic. the definition of agnostic is one who holds the view that god is unknown and probably unknowable; one who is not committed to believing in the existence or nonexistence of god.

the op believes in a creator therefore he is not agnostic. i would say he is a theist, the definition of which is one who believes in the existence of god or gods.

alasdair
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This is a common misconception, and what you're saying is indeed how folk philosophy typically has it. Allow me to clarify, though:

[a]theism and [a]gnosticism are actually two independent variables. The first depends on whether or not you suspect God is real. The second is how much certainty you have in that hunch.

A gnostic theist feels certain God exists.
An agnostic theist believes in God, but isn't entirely sure, and is willing to admit he could be wrong.
A gnostic atheist feels certain God does not exist.
An agnostic atheist leans toward God not being real, but isn't sure, and is open to the possibility.

Based on this schema, I'd deem the OP an agnostic theist.
 
MyDoorsAreOpen said:
This is a common misconception, and what you're saying is indeed how folk philosophy typically has it. Allow me to clarify, though:

[a]theism and [a]gnosticism are actually two independent variables. The first depends on whether or not you suspect God is real. The second is how much certainty you have in that hunch.

A gnostic theist feels certain God exists.
An agnostic theist believes in God, but isn't entirely sure, and is willing to admit he could be wrong.
A gnostic atheist feels certain God does not exist.
An agnostic atheist leans toward God not being real, but isn't sure, and is open to the possibility.

Based on this schema, I'd deem the OP an agnostic theist.
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My question is, do [a]theism and [a]gnosticism always go together? I usually hear of a person being one or the other.
 
^ No, they don't. That's my point. They're independent variables. One is what you believe, the other is how certain you are about it.

People use 'agnostic' to mean 'in the middle' or 'undecided' or 'I don't care', but that says only that you're unsure, and nothing about whether or not you would, or ever do, entertain the notion of God.
 
MyDoorsAreOpen said:
^ No, they don't. That's my point. They're independent variables. One is what you believe, the other is how certain you are about it.

People use 'agnostic' to mean 'in the middle' or 'undecided' or 'I don't care', but that says only that you're unsure, and nothing about whether or not you would, or ever do, entertain the notion of God.
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Yeh, I guess I would consider myself an agnostic atheist though I just tell people agnostic.
 
MyDoorsAreOpen said:
This is a common misconception, and what you're saying is indeed how folk philosophy typically has it. Allow me to clarify, though:

[a]theism and [a]gnosticism are actually two independent variables. The first depends on whether or not you suspect God is real. The second is how much certainty you have in that hunch.

A gnostic theist feels certain God exists.
An agnostic theist believes in God, but isn't entirely sure, and is willing to admit he could be wrong.
A gnostic atheist feels certain God does not exist.
An agnostic atheist leans toward God not being real, but isn't sure, and is open to the possibility.

Based on this schema, I'd deem the OP an agnostic theist.
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Why are those seperate groupings necessary though? The term agnostic can classify any version of "not feeling sure". Chances are that anyone who is in any way uncertain is going to waver between beliefs over the course of their life, so wouldn't the simple classification of agnostic be appropriate?
 
Well, no religion really. If you believe in a creator or a God, first you must define it. If you're creator is in fact a law of the universe then, you are not really religious at all.
To me I run into a wall when trying to accept a God because most people come to conclusion that "If the universe is complex, it must have a creator"
By that same logic, God is infinitely complex, and therefore the question comes who made God? And who made Gods creator? Etc etc. Once you run into circular logic, its unprovable, so I don't bother.
 
Why do you feel the need to label your spirituality? Spirituality, imo, is very individual and doesn't fit into a simply labeled box.

To me I run into a wall when trying to accept a God because most people come to conclusion that "If the universe is complex, it must have a creator"
By that same logic, God is infinitely complex, and therefore the question comes who made God? And who made Gods creator? Etc etc. Once you run into circular logic, its unprovable, so I don't bother.
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I definitely don't understand that logic... I do believe in God, but just the phrase "creator" implies that the universe has a beginning. What if the Universe, God, all of it just IS. Why does it have to have been "created" at some point.

People are always confused by my spirituality because I do believe in God, but I believe God IS the Universe. This isn't to say that I think any less of God.... the universe is amazing. God is amazing. But you can believe this way without believing in a linear chain of events such as "someone created god, god created the universe, god created earth, god created man, etc". I don't personally believe in linear time at all. I believe it's an illusion based on the perspectives we have from within our human ego mind driven life.... I believe it just is... linear time is the 4th dimension, and I tend to view things from a higher dimensional perspective most of the time.

If anyone knows much about string theory, a lot of it aligns well with my spiritual beliefs.
 
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MynameisnotDeja said:
Why do you feel the need to label your spirituality? Spirituality, imo, is very individual and doesn't fit into a simply labeled box.



I definitely don't understand that logic... I do believe in God, but just the phrase "creator" implies that the universe has a beginning. What if the Universe, God, all of it just IS. Why does it have to have been "created" at some point.

People are always confused by my spirituality because I do believe in God, but I believe God IS the Universe. This isn't to say that I think any less of God.... the universe is amazing. God is amazing. But you can believe this way without believing in a linear chain of events such as "someone created god, god created the universe, god created earth, god created man, etc". I don't personally believe in linear time at all. I believe it's an illusion based on the perspectives we have from within our human ego mind driven life.... I believe it just is... linear time is the 4th dimension, and I tend to view things from a higher dimensional perspective most of the time.

If anyone knows much about string theory, a lot of it aligns well with my spiritual beliefs.
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I'm on board with you regarding the pantheistic ideas (very Buddhist or Hegelian depending on where you want to come from haha), I've come to think much the same thing in the past couple years.

Gotta ask though, where does string theory come into play? I know depending on which theory you look at you're dealing with 10 or 11 dimensions, but my understanding is that those are all dimensions that expand our notion of a 0-dimensional point, not expand 'above' our experiential 4, so to speak.
 
Maybe I don't fully understand string theory, I probably shouldn't have even brought it up since I'm not an expert, but I saw an interesting video on it awhile ago and it aligned with how I see the "dimensions" in my mind. Your right that "higher" maybe it's the right word. I'm not sure how to word what I mean, gah, it's frustrating. But basically I see things from this 5th dimensional place, where there isn't linear time, and all possibilities exist. I believe we can move from reality to reality within that dimension, and that is how law of attraction works (attracting yourself into the dimension where whatever you want happens).

That probably makes no sense, lol. I have this whole idea of the universe in my mind that I don't know how to put into words at all. But when I watched that string theory vid, I was like wow! That fits! I'll see if I can look up the vid.
 
But basically I see things from this 5th dimensional place, where there isn't linear time, and all possibilities exist. I believe we can move from reality to reality within that dimension, and that is how law of attraction works (attracting yourself into the dimension where whatever you want happens).
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this is what leary and all the hippie psychedelic philosophers wrote about time after time. please elaborate because i still am not sure i understand though

i don't think we can will ourselves towards certain probability-futures just by thinking/being attracted to them. our bodies are moving through spacetime according to the laws of physics. we can often have very intense attraction yet the object of the attraction is completely unobtainable
 
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