On 12-7-2009 8:04, Patrick Elliott wrote:
> andrel wrote:
>> I think the difference is significant. "I don't know" implies that you 
>> can still look for an answer, whereas "I can't know" means that the 
>> search ended. The former means that you are open to suggestions from 
>> others who claim that they know more, whereas the latter is a sound 
>> basis to build your own ethics.
>> I don't like the "I don't care".
> 
> On the contrary, how is "I can't know" a grounds to build anything?

Easy. If you are convinced that you can not know if God exists or not 
(which is what agnosticism is about, all your other examples are 
irrelevant here), it means that you have to build an ethics that will 
work in both cases. You can not assume there is someone else that knows 
better (a god or her representative on earth), nor can you be certain 
that you won't be judged after death on what you did in your entire 
life. That means that you have to think about what you are doing and you 
will have to make the right choice everytime by yourself. With 'right' 
defined by a much broader spectrum of ethics than that of a single 
religion. E.g. simply defining another group as non-human won't work. 
(i.e. if your current social environment allows you to recognize this as 
an item, but that is a whole different discussion.)

Believe me, simply being one in a crowd of atheists or believers is much 
more simple. (BTW I am not an agnostic, in case you are wondering).

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