Advocatus Atheist

Philosophical discussions can be daunting. This is because there are so many areas of philosophy, so many competing ideas, and so many concepts that really push one to think deeply about issues, sometimes trivial and sometimes important, that makes philosophy challenging. There was a time when I thought philosophy amounted to little more than sophistry, arguing over nothing, thinking deep philosophical thoughts about irrelevant questions, that it was all semantic word games and esoteric nonsense. I felt that anytime a philosopher gave their opinion they were obviously just full of it. About six years ago I began re-reading the works of Immanuel Kant at the behest of my friend John J. who recently became an ordained priest and is a theologian. At that time I was getting back into linguistics as well, so I picked up Ludwig Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations. I don't know what it was, but over the years my taste in literature matured and I developed a love for re...

A theist by the handle of  rockhound570 theist   has raised several objections to ignosticism.  About a month ago he raised a litany of issues he felt rebutted ignosticism or else felt showed where I failed to logically defend ignosticism. I would have responded sooner, but the truth is I've simply been too busy as of late to find time to respond (writing for a living takes up all my spare time reserved for writing!).  But, low and behold, I found a few moments to respond. So what follows will be my best attempt to reply as clearly and concisely to his long email comments as possible and to do my best to answer his criticisms and concerns.  Hopefully this exchange, taken in the spirit of a cordial discourse, will help clear up any confusion regarding ignosticism and, more importantly, may be of use to those who continue to grapple with the big questions.  (Just for convenience, I shall refer to our theist has "Rocky" while I will just b...