The problem I have with this is that it suspiciously only seems to be an issue when we are discussing belief in gods. I would think that if you require certainty in order to have a belief, most people would end up having very few beliefs.
Which, of course, is not the case.
I think there is a general misunderstanding about what the word "belief" means. Belief does not necessarily indicate certainty (of truth). We use the words "I know" or "knowledge" or "facts" to indicate things we believe we are certain about. We use "belief" to indicate things that we hold to be true, but often are not positive about.
I am an agnostic about (almost) all things. With very few exceptions, like things like math and knowledge that I exist, I am not certain about much. But I have a whole bunch of beliefs, like that the Earth orbits around the sun, and that my senses are accurate, that Obama is a better choice for president, and that my mom loves me. I suspect most people have these sorts of beliefs too, and many more besides, but do you truly believe that you know them for sure? That your senses aren't tricking you, that you weren't misinformed, that your mother hasn't been lying to you?
So, saying "I believe that gods don't exist" does not necessarily indicate that you are 100% certain that gods don't exist. If you are 100% certain, that is gnostic atheism. If you are uncertain, that is agnostic atheism.
I suspect that most people who claim merely to "lack a belief" in the existence of god, truly fall under agnostic atheism.
I think you're addressing something i never actually said or implied. Possibly because of the choice of words some people choose when arguing what i argued (such as "uncertainty", "lack of knowledge"). Which while i think are valid words to express the idea, would be an understandable reason as to why you think what is being argued is that certainty is required for belief.
Of course belief does not in anyway require certainty. The only criteria i have for belief is that someone feels that there are good enough reasons (whatever they are) for them to embrace an idea, to whatever level, and actually do so (embrace it). Which almost always happens (if they feel these are good reasons), even if said reasons are recognized to be not in compliance with logic. Further, i consider certainty to be a considerably different mindset from mere belief. The usage of uncertainty though when describing the position in dispute here i think is meant to imply hesitance, lack of enough basis to choose upon etc..
To explain what i was saying again in that post, i think that there are varying positions towards ideas:
- Certainty of an idea.
- Strong belief in an idea.
- Belief in an idea.
- Weak belief in an idea.
- Uncertainty/lack of knowledge/ Neutrality/ lack of care towards an idea.
- Weak belief against an idea.
- Belief against an idea.
- Strong belief against an idea.
- Certainty against an idea.
Those who lie in the middle have - just like everybody else - differing reasons as to why they're there. In my personal case for example, i have some thoughts that play around the weak belief in the idea of god, and around the weak belief against the idea of god. I can't help those thoughts, i can't stop them. I don't recognize any of these thoughts however as valid or good enough reasons to go either way; embrace or oppose.
Based on that and t
he fact that i have thoughts or rationalizations that go both ways in itself, i am pretty much in the middle. I don't believe that there is a god, and i don't believe that there isn't one.
Considering the definitions of each position, what i described up there disqualifies me from both strong atheism and Theism in general. If Atheism was defined based on believing that there
is no god; then i would have been disqualified from both Theism and Atheism. But since atheism is at least in part or in one sense defined as lack of belief, then i am an agnostic atheist, instead of only agnostic.
If theism included in it hope, hope for more or hope for a god to exist etc.. then i would've qualified for it too, because i do have such hope. But to my knowledge, it doesn't. And that makes sense actually, as then i think the line between atheism and theism would be pretty blurred. The origin of both words Theism and Atheism might explain why Atheism includes in its definition the mere lack of belief in a god(s).
So both in definitions, and in reality, there is a distinction between belief that there is no god and between lack of belief in a god. God ideas are not the only ideas, by far, for which that middle ground exist neither.
