During his dialogue-debate with Rowen Williams (the archbishop of Canterbury, head of the Anglican Church under the Queen of England), Richard Dawkins was asked by the moderator why, if he admits that He cannot disprove God’s existence, he doesn’t just call himself an agnostic. Dawkins response was, “I do.”
This is interesting, particularly in light of his past identification as an atheist, as well as his remarks that on a scale of 1 to 7, with one being “I know God exists” and seven being “I know God doesn’t exist,” he ranks himself a 6.9. He is only 0.1 away from being absolutely certain God does not exist, and yet he thinks that is good reason to adopt the agnostic label. I disagree.
The presumption here is that to be an atheist one must be 100% sure that God does not exist, and if one is not 100% sure then they are agnostic (Christians often make this same mistake in reasoning). But since when has atheism described the level of certainty one has regarding the non-existence of God? Atheism describes the position of those who think the proposition “God exists” is false, regardless of their level of confidence that this is so. Whether they are 99% or 51% sure the proposition is false, it is the mere fact that they think it is false that makes them an atheist. While we can debate the exact percentage of certainty one should have before they conclude that a proposition is true or false, it is ludicrous to suggest that one must be 100% certain about the truth-value of some proposition X before they can conclude that X is either true or false. Reasonable people will agree that if we are not 100% certain that X is true, we should hold our conclusion with an appropriate degree of tentativeness, but there is no reason to suspend judgment.
Those who suspend judgment regarding the truth-value of some proposition X are called agnostics. Two good reasons to suspend judgment is because one does not have enough information to make a judgment, or because the evidence for the truth of proposition X is nearly equal to the evidence for its falsity. Clearly Dawkins is not suspending judgment, is not lacking in information, and does not see the evidence as evenly divided for and against the proposition “God exists.” That is why it is intellectually dishonest of him to identify as an agnostic. This is an improper and confusing use of an established label.
If one must be 100% certain that God does not exist before it is appropriate to designate one’s position as “atheism,” then I think most philosophers would agree that no one could be an atheist. After all, apart from identifying something that is logically incoherent about the very concept of God, it is impossible to prove a universal negative such as “God does not exist.” And if it is impossible to prove, then it is impossible to be 100% that God does not exist. If one must be 100% that God does not exist before they are properly identified as an atheist, and such certainty is impossible, then it is impossible to be an atheist. Clearly there is something wrong with that line of reasoning, and what’s wrong with it is the false, unrealistic, and historically ignorant definition of what constitutes an atheist.
If we must presuppose that “atheist” is only applicable to someone who is 100% sure that God exists, then presumably it is equally true that “theist” is only applicable to someone who is 100% certain that God does exist. I would venture to say that the vast majority of theists experience some level of doubt about the existence of God from time to time. If we were to rate them according to Dawkins’ scale, perhaps we could say they rank a 1.1. Given Dawkins’ reasoning, because they are not 100% certain that God exists, they should be called agnostics rather than theists. This means the person who thinks God probably exists, prays, reads the Bible, and thinks Jesus was raised from the dead and the person who thinks God probably does not exist, does not pray, does not read the Bible, and denies that Jesus rose from the dead are both agnostics. As you can see, the range of beliefs represented by the label “agnostic” becomes so broad as to be virtually meaningless. Labels are meant to clarify what someone believes, not be applicable to virtually opposite and incompatible beliefs. That is why we should reject the notion that one is not an atheist unless they are absolutely certain God does not exist, and that is why we should still continue to call Dawkins an atheist.
See also:
Thinking to Believe 
March 2, 2012 at 6:22 pm
Yes! Dawkins is referring to the common definition of agnosticism. However, should one take agnosticism as pertaining only to the epistemological, indeed he is agnostic as atheism refers to metaphysics.
Those agnostics who bray that no one can know whether He exists or not, themselves reek of dogmatism!
We ignostics-igtheists,however, find the God term factually otiose, and thus, He lacks existence as does a square circle. On the basis of analysis, not by a priori or by dogmatism, and thus, not having to traverse the Cosmos nor have omniscience ourselves can flatly declare that He cannot exist any more than that square circle or married bachelor, and no category mistake committed, and note also that He carries those convoluted ,ad hoc assumptions,that thus He plays no more a valid explanation than demons or gremlins
Thus, I’m a number 8! Yet, my fallibilism and skepticism require me nevertheless to admit that why, I might be wrong!
He does that on a probabilistic basis, to which I can also do ,but I do more so on an analysis of the term per [Google: the ignostic-Ockham.].
And then we also hear from agnostic theists who aren’t sure as to His attributes., which sounds like apophatic theology instead of the kataphatic theology demonstrating them.
John Haught maintains that faith adds certitude to belief so that he’s a number one. We naturalists and fallibilists have to be more tentative as far knowledge is concerned. I find that as factually otiose, God is no element of knowledge, and thus, we don’t have to be tentative about His very existence.
Ah, then it’s up to supernaturalists to approach our points without blinders on as we have to with theirs.
Incompatibility arguments support our finding Him otiose.
We find apopathic theology as affirming ignosticism!
Ti’s what says the evidence instead of our feelings of certitude that counts,despit Haught. HIs and Alister Earl McGrath’s definition of faith as evidence overpowering our entie beings as I phrase the matter. Either way, that’s makes for blind faith in the end,it seems to me!
Let’s then concentrate on the arguments themselves.
Limbaugh deserves all of our castigation! He wrongly describes that young woman, and wrongly describes her subject that women need that medicine for health reasons period!
Blessings to all!
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March 5, 2012 at 12:47 pm
Griggs,
You seem to be claiming that the concept of God is incoherent, and thus God’s existence can be disproven. Is that your position? If so, what is your basis for this claim?
I agree that the terms “atheism” and “theism” involve metaphysics, but that cannot be divorced from epistemology either because these are the names we give to two radically different answers to the question “Is the proposition ‘God exists’ true or false?” To answer that question one must engage in epistemology, and the answer they provide will describe metaphysics (i.e. what exists).
The problem with Dawkins’ definition is that he assumes one must be 100% sure that God does not exist in order to be an atheist. But this is false. To be an atheist one need only believe that the proposition “God exists” is false; not that they know with absolute certainty that it is.
You are talking all over the map. What does Limbaugh have to do with anything? Stay on topic please. Also, the constant name-dropping of scholars without elaboration makes it difficult to follow you a lot of times.
Jason
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March 5, 2012 at 2:27 pm
That the amount of certainty is irrelevant you win, he loses. Thank you.
Actually, certainty for us skeptics is not the point but instead the tentative nature of science. Whilst evolution itself is unassailable, its components can vary as to their strength to each other, and new evidence will call for new interpretations.
John Haught, in a contrarian way, suggests that the believer requires faith for her certitude. He is an advanced Catholic theologian. He has taken us gnus on and failed.
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June 19, 2012 at 9:01 am
I totally agree with your statement. A lot of Atheists lately try to take a cop out of their position. Of course no one is 100 percent sure either way. To be an Atheist, you must lean more towards to possibility of no God than a God. Dawkins is trying to play both sides of the court on this one. I believe that any Theist or Atheist who believe they are 100 percent sure are only lying to themselves. And for Dawkins to take this stance, is a let down for me. If you want to argue for the non-existance of God, stick to your point and quit trying to ride the fence. He is a prominent figure for Atheists and to take that stance is confusing. Great article.
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June 19, 2012 at 10:31 am
Jason,
From your other comments on other articles, it appears that you and I have radically different views on the world, so I’m glad to hear that you agree with me on this point. It is a shame that so many atheists are trying to redefine the standard terms in their favor, or set up criteria that is impossible to meet. Beliefs do not require certainty, and atheism is a belief about the truth value of a particular proposition.
Jason
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January 16, 2014 at 11:17 pm
[…] that God’s existence is improbable or impossible. While they may not be certain of this belief (certainty is not required), they have certainly made a judgment. They are not intellectually neutral. At the very least, […]
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October 17, 2014 at 8:32 am
Jason,
“atheism is a belief about the truth value of a particular proposition.”
That’s you’re opinion, which many people justifiably do not share. The most common definition of atheism is disbelief in the existence of gods, or rejection of the claim that gods exist. Disbelief is the inability or unwillingness to believe… just as rejection (in this context) is the refusal to accept as true. At no point must I come to a definitive conclusion regarding the truth value of a statement in order to dismiss it as unworthy of my belief. I can make judgements based on epistemic probability, but I need only go so far to achieve disbelief.
I’m not sure why you’re adamantly committed to dropping the “strong” from Strong Atheism, but there is a valid separation. If Atheism was the denial of individual gods, then almost everyone could refer to themselves as a selective atheist… rendering it useless. If Atheism was the denial of all possible variations of the concept of god, then it leaves behind the very many genuine atheists who (consistent with our criticism of faith) are unwilling to accept as true a statement for which there is insufficient evidence or justification. While Yahweh and Allah are as logically contradictory as Zeus and Pele, all I know about the indescribable, inscrutable, unattributed vague concept of a prime mover entity is that the logical arguments for its existence fall flat and are unworthy of belief. But is that grounds for a positive belief to the contrary?
Atheism doesn’t have a singular, objectively true definition… it is historically, culturally and etymologically ambiguous. But it provides a significantly more meaningful, relevant and useful distinction when atheism describes “disbelief”. And that’s how most of us have been using it for quite some time.
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