I just took it. My issue, which I haven’t seen mentioned yet, is with the use of “agnostic” as a midpoint on the scale between theism and atheism. I realize that’s a common colloquial use now but I don’t get how it’s a meaningful category—unless it’s meant to refer to negative atheism, and the “atheism” answers refer to positive atheism? And in the historical use of “agnostic” I think it’s a separate category altogether that could overlap with both atheism and theism.
Overall I found the questions very interesting though, and I’m curious to see the results.
It makes sense if one means by “agnostic” not “cannot be known” but “I don’t know” or “I’m unsure.” This makes sense in a general context and even more so in a a Bayesian context. In that context, one would have something like theists mean people that P(God exists) is high, atheists estimate that P(God exists) is low, and agnostics are in the midrange.
To some extent, but not everyone may have a specific probability. And different people may outline the specific probabilities differently. Asking it as theist/agnostic/atheist also is implicitly asking about sociological, psychological, and epistemological norms at the same time due to the connotations of each of those terms.
I agree that it could be asking about which label people identify with and how that reflects those various norms, and that would also be an interesting question—but in that case it should have been worded differently, or there should have at least been an “other” category. The way it was presented suggests an exhaustive scale.
I just took it. My issue, which I haven’t seen mentioned yet, is with the use of “agnostic” as a midpoint on the scale between theism and atheism. I realize that’s a common colloquial use now but I don’t get how it’s a meaningful category—unless it’s meant to refer to negative atheism, and the “atheism” answers refer to positive atheism? And in the historical use of “agnostic” I think it’s a separate category altogether that could overlap with both atheism and theism.
Overall I found the questions very interesting though, and I’m curious to see the results.
It makes sense if one means by “agnostic” not “cannot be known” but “I don’t know” or “I’m unsure.” This makes sense in a general context and even more so in a a Bayesian context. In that context, one would have something like theists mean people that P(God exists) is high, atheists estimate that P(God exists) is low, and agnostics are in the midrange.
OK, that makes sense. But then isn’t this just a less-accurate version of the P(God exists) question?
To some extent, but not everyone may have a specific probability. And different people may outline the specific probabilities differently. Asking it as theist/agnostic/atheist also is implicitly asking about sociological, psychological, and epistemological norms at the same time due to the connotations of each of those terms.
I agree that it could be asking about which label people identify with and how that reflects those various norms, and that would also be an interesting question—but in that case it should have been worded differently, or there should have at least been an “other” category. The way it was presented suggests an exhaustive scale.
I don’t like that practice. “I am an atheist” is not a good proxy for “I am a Communist.”