Worldview Categories

Worldviews can be categorized in several ways.  One is to categorize worldviews into two broad types - atheism and theism - as shown below:

A second way to categorize worldviews is shown below - into atheism, monotheism, and pantheism - where theism (shown above) has been separated into two categories - monotheism and pantheism. Most major worldviews fit into one of these three worldview categories. However, some worldviews do not neatly fit into any of these. Traditional Buddhism, for example, does not include a belief in a single, supreme God, but holds to the existence of the spiritual realm and of spiritual beings.

Another way to categorize worldviews is by their location of origin. Two broad categories are western worldviews and eastern worldviews, as shown below. A western worldview is one that has its origins in or west of Persia (modern day Iran), whereas an eastern worldview is one that has its origins east of Persia.

Agnosticism - Agnosticism is more of a belief than a worldview, since worldviews are comprehensive in nature. Per Wikipedia, “Agnosticism is the view or belief that the existence of God, of the divine or the supernatural is unknown or unknowable. Another definition provided is the view that ‘human reason is incapable of providing sufficient rational grounds to justify either the belief that God exists or the belief that God does not exist.’”1 A person who identifies as an agnostic may not describe their belief as stated above, but may simply say they don’t know if God exists or not.

1 Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agnosticism, accessed 3/14/22.