Taking Issue with Le Poidevin’s New Agnosticism

Abstract

AbstractLe Poidevin’s ‘new agnosticism’ concerns partaking in religious life while being uncertain whether religious discourse is fictional or not. Le Poidevin has offered two distinct versions of the new agnosticism, ‘semantic agnosticism’ and ‘meta-linguistic agnosticism’. I suggest that the first, ‘semantic agnosticism’, should be rejected, mainly because it involves a highly questionable view of truth and fails to properly distinguish fictional existence from real existence. The second, ‘meta-linguistic agnosticism’ seems acceptable as a view of religious discourse but not as a foundation for a religious life. A meta-linguistic agnostic will not be able to take the proper attitude towards religious propositions, since what is the proper attitude varies greatly between realism and fictionalism. Even more importantly, she will not know when it is rationally permissible to perform religious actions, because she will not know whether real-life concerns should take precedence or not. Le Poidevin’s meta-linguistic agnostic is also a truth-agnostic, and I conclude that adding meta-linguistic agnosticism to truth-agnosticism only complicates matters without offering any benefits.