26/09/2022
Atheist or Agnostic? What is the difference?
Bertrand Russell (1947)
"I never know whether I should say "Agnostic" or whether I should say "Atheist". It is a very difficult question and I daresay that some of you have been troubled by it. As a philosopher, if I were speaking to a purely philosophic audience I should say that I ought to describe myself as an Agnostic, because I do not think that there is a conclusive argument by which one prove that there is not a God.
On the other hand, if I am to convey the right impression to the ordinary man in the street I think I ought to say that I am an Atheist, because when I say that I cannot prove that there is not a God, I ought to add equally that I cannot prove that there are not the Homeric gods.
None of us would seriously consider the possibility that all the gods of Homer truly exist, and yet if you were to set to work to give a logical demonstration that Zeus, Hera, Poseidon, and the rest of them did not exist you would find it an awful job.
You could not get such proof.
Therefore, in regard to the Olympic gods, speaking to a purely philosophical audience, I would say that I am an Agnostic. But speaking popularly, I think that all of us would say in regard to those gods that we were Atheists. In regard to the Christian God, I should, I think, take exactly the same line."
— Bertrand Russell, Am I An Atheist Or An Agnostic? A Plea For Tolerance In The Face Of New Dogmas (1947)
Image: Bertrand Russell, 22 November 1950.
• Background: Bertrand Russell disputed the existence of deities early in his life doubting their reality in his early teens. Although Russell held philosophy alone could not prove or disprove the existence of supernatural beings, he strongly thought that the world's seemingly countless religions were based largely on superstition.
Russell held that a religious outlook essentially impeded scientific knowledge and increased dependency. Russell also thought the particular "philosophical possibility" for the existence of the Judeo-Christian-Islamic god was on the same footing essentially as any other supernatural deity, and frequently used the Homeric gods as his personal example.
