agnostic
pronunciation
How to pronounce agnostic in British English:
UK [ægˈnɒstɪk]
How to pronounce agnostic in American English:
US [ægˈnɑstɪk]
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- Noun:
- a person who doubts truth of religion
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- Adjective:
- uncertain of all claims to knowledge
Word Origin
- agnostic
- agnostic: [19] Agnostic is an invented word. It was coined by the English biologist and religious sceptic T H Huxley (1825–95) to express his opposition to the views of religious gnostics of the time, who claimed that the world of the spirit (and hence God) was knowable (gnostic comes ultimately from Greek gnōsis ‘knowledge’). With the addition of the Greek-derived prefix a- ‘not’ Huxley proclaimed the ultimate unknowability of God.The circumstances of the coinage, or at least of an early instance of the word’s use by its coiner, were recorded by R H Hutton, who was present at a party held by the Metaphysical Society in a house on Clapham Common in 1869 when Huxley suggested agnostic, basing it apparently on St Paul’s reference to the altar of ‘the Unknown God’.
- agnostic (n.)
- 1870, "one who professes that the existence of a First Cause and the essential nature of things are not and cannot be known" [Klein]; coined by T.H. Huxley (1825-1895), supposedly in September 1869, from Greek agnostos "unknown, unknowable," from a- "not" + gnostos "(to be) known" (see gnostic). Sometimes said to be a reference to Paul's mention of the altar to "the Unknown God," but according to Huxley it was coined with reference to the early Church movement known as Gnosticism (see Gnostic).I ... invented what I conceived to be the appropriate title of 'agnostic,' ... antithetic to the 'Gnostic' of Church history who professed to know so much about the very things of which I was ignorant. [T.H. Huxley, "Science and Christian Tradition," 1889] The adjective is first recorded 1870.
Example
- 1. National and international proposals to reform pay at regulated financial firms are similarly agnostic .
- 2. His colleagues eventually came clean , but he refused to believe them and called them agnostic .
- 3. Well , ibm is what we analysts might call " client agnostic " or " endpoint agnostic . "
- 4. Therefore , in regard to the olympic gods , speaking to a purely philosophical audience , I would say that I am an agnostic .
- 5. He argues that banks in britain must be free to pay as much as those elsewhere , but says he is " agnostic " about what that level should be .