Live data from Hacker News

Poll: How religious is hacker news?

news.ycombinator.com

21–30 of 168 posts

Re: Poll: How religious is hacker news?

#21

You can be an Agnostic Atheist. Agnosticism is about whether you believe you can prove the existence of God or not. Atheism and Theism is about actual belief in God. One can be an Agnostic Atheist or Agnostic Theist. Agnostic atheist= I don't know whether we can prove God exists but I don't believe in God Agnostic theist= I don't know where we can prove the God exists or not but I do believe in God. Being an agnostic…

That's not what agnostic means. Most people who believe in God wouldn't say they can prove God exists, and they aren't agnostic.

No, that is exactly what it means. It doesnt take very long to look something up (eg. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agnosticism ).

Agnosticism is not about being uncertain, it's the position that the answer is unknowable or unknown - which is much stronger than merely being uncertain.

Re: Poll: How religious is hacker news?

#22
I chose "other" because even though I do believe in God and follow the teachings of Jesus, I don't align myself with modern Christians who seem determined to be the opposite of what he taught. Hate, especially irrational, pointless hate, is something I simply don't understand and don't want in my life. I know a lot of it is politics instead of faith, but that's no excuse; in fact that makes it even more despicable.

Re: Poll: How religious is hacker news?

#23

You can be an Agnostic Atheist. Agnosticism is about whether you believe you can prove the existence of God or not. Atheism and Theism is about actual belief in God. One can be an Agnostic Atheist or Agnostic Theist. Agnostic atheist= I don't know whether we can prove God exists but I don't believe in God Agnostic theist= I don't know where we can prove the God exists or not but I do believe in God. Being an agnostic…

[deleted]

Re: Poll: How religious is hacker news?

#25

So do Mormons get to check two boxes? Mormons are Christian.

Mormons do call themselves Christian. http://www.mormon.org/faq/mormon-christian

Many mainstream Christian religions disagree, citing various conflicts with Christian doctrine. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mormonism_and_Christianity#Chr...

In any case we could get bogged down in definitions and semantics, but if you come down on the side that Mormons are Christian, they are still probably the most interesting subset to break out into their own subcategory.

Re: Poll: How religious is hacker news?

#29

Really, only one other Buddhist? I guess that makes sense with only 13 Christians as of this posting. I took the precepts, don't know that I particularly consider myself religious but I still subscribe enough to check the little up arrow. Edit: nevermind, poll took off;) Edit 2: zenjzen, you also appear to be hellbanned.

I'm an atheist buddhist.

Re: Poll: How religious is hacker news?

#30

You can be an Agnostic Atheist. Agnosticism is about whether you believe you can prove the existence of God or not. Atheism and Theism is about actual belief in God. One can be an Agnostic Atheist or Agnostic Theist. Agnostic atheist= I don't know whether we can prove God exists but I don't believe in God Agnostic theist= I don't know where we can prove the God exists or not but I do believe in God. Being an agnostic…

Inevitably any internet thread about religion has the "what does agnostic mean" argument. It's dumb, nobody cares. People who call themselves agnostic usually do so because they are too scared to call themselves atheist for whatever reason. (Fear of religious friends judging them, fear of losing pascal's wager, etc.) Or because they think they are clever and think atheists are foolish for asserting there is no God with such certainty. (When in fact the burden of proof lies elsewhere.)

These people should just suck it up and call themselves atheists.

Post reply on HN