I'm always amazed when I hear this, what do you think agnostics are 'afraid' of? Adopting a commonly held position that nobody cares about or would think less of them over? That a belief may make life easier to lead is not sufficient reason to adopt it. It's about a pursuit of truth, adopting any position for any reason other than an honest belief that you've acquired that truth, shows a lack of intellectual integrity.

This is similar to the whole 'flip flopping' thing with politicians. It infuriates me that it's somehow become culturally bad to not commit to an answer when the information is unclear. That kind of skepticism and openness is an absolute requirement of intellectual integrity IMO, and generally a sign of intelligence. And I'm certainly not saying that any given a/theist can't be in a position where their viewpoint has that integrity, perhaps they've seen or realised something that I haven't. But for anyone who doesn't have any extra insight, and who has just chosen that position to commit to something or avoid being weak-willed - to me that is an idiotic reason to adopt a belief system.

It's certainly true that the life well led should involve risk taking, but that's concerned with actions, not academic positions. There is no black and white with most philosophical questions, but on the God issue, I suspect most agnostics would say we aren't even close to having access to the sort of info to decide.