when asked are you an agnostic or an atheist russell replied agnostic of course atheists are like christians that is both dogmatically mantain that we can know whether or not there is a god the christian holds that god does exist the atheist holds that god does not but the agnostic knows that we simply do not possess sufficient grounds either to affirm or deny the existennce of a supreme being so i believe that although the existence of god is not impossible it is improbable quite improbable a more clarifying answer as mentioned above can be found in am i an atheist or an agnostic where russell states 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 that 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 regards