Agnosticism Is No Midpoint: Metaphysics and Epistemology as Separate Dimensions of Religious Cognition

Agnosticism is often discussed in ways that muddle its philosophical underpinnings, and measured in ways that introduce unnecessary methodological artifacts. We address these shortcomings by recognizing that agnosticism and atheism are not mutually incompatible irreligious identities, but are rather endpoints of orthogonal psychological dimensions derived from fundamentally different branches of philosophy. Atheism (versus theism) describes one’s religious metaphysics: what one thinks about the ultimate nature of our religious reality. Is there a god or not, if one had to bet? Agnosticism (versus gnosticism) is a question of where one stands on religious epistemology: what one thinks about the ultimate state of knowledge about a god’s existence. Can we truly know if gods exist? We illustrate the utility of separating agnosticism about gods from belief in them using survey data that reveals distinct psychological profiles of people who independently differ along their religious metaphysics and religious epistemology. For example, agnosticism – even among devout theists – predicts a more open cognitive style and less hierarchical social views. We urge researchers to refrain from using measures that force false dichotomies (e.g., viewing atheism and agnosticism as mutually incompatible identities, rather than entirely compatible answers to distinct philosophical questions) or false midpoint answers (e.g., placing agnosticism as a midpoint between atheism and theism). Agnosticism is not a midpoint between faith and atheism, nor is it incompatible with either of them. Agnosticism is a distinct dimension of religious cognition that maps neatly on longstanding philosophical questions about the state of human knowledge.