the.com/agnosticism
The intellectual shrug that refused to pretend certainty where there is none.
means The position that the existence of God or the ultimate nature of reality is unknown or unknowable, so judgment is withheld rather than forced.
from Coined in the late 1800s by biologist Thomas Henry Huxley, who built it from Greek 'a-' (without) plus 'gnosis' (knowledge). He wanted a label for his own refusal to claim certainty on questions he felt couldn't be settled — reportedly inspired partly as a counterpoint to the confident 'gnostics' of early Christian history, though his real target was the overconfidence of both believers and atheists around him.
- coined by
- Thomas Huxley, 1869, as a joke on dogma
- not atheism
- doubts knowledge, not existence itself
- etymology
- from Greek agnostos, meaning unknowable
- common dodge
- lets people avoid Thanksgiving arguments gracefully