Ambiguous Evidence for God

Abstract This chapter argues that there is a sizable population of individuals with ambiguous evidence for the God of minimal theism. It does this by supporting arguments for a limited version of agnosticism that claims that the total public evidence for God neither strongly supports God’s existence nor strongly supports God’s nonexistence. To support agnosticism in this way, the chapter evaluates the intrinsic probability of minimal theism, a sample of theistic and atheistic arguments, and higher-order evidence about the evidence for God. Included is an updated discussion of the author’s own previous proposed solution to the gap problem facing theistic arguments. The chapter also introduces and defends a version of higher-order agnosticism, which claims that the publicly available evidence for God strongly supports that it neither strongly supports God’s existence nor God’s nonexistence. A variety of pathways whereby individuals may acquire ambiguous evidence for God is thereby identified.