I'm ignorant, hence I'm an atheist!!!

[paarsurrey]

I agree. Anyone who claims to "know" that God exists is, in actuality, saying that they have a strong belief that God exists. "Knowing" that God exists is merely an illusion brought about by overconfidence.

Not necessarily. I have met some with whom G-d had talked. They are/were/would be qualified definitely at # 1 on Dawkins Scale
Regards

 

[leibowde84]

If one ignores the reality or truth and does not struggle appropriately to acquire it one would remain ignorant and if persisted one' ignorance will increase.
Is it wrong? Please
Regards

I agree with your statement, but he didn't say "does not struggle to appropriately acquire [truth]". He merely said "ignoring truth = ignorance", which is incorrect.

 

[leibowde84]

If science does not claim that it would; why overburden it?
Regards

That's the thing ... science doesn't know either. It does not make the claim that it can, and it does not make the claim that it will not be able to in the future. There really are no "claims" made by science anyways, but I think I understand what you are saying.

 

[leibowde84]

I had come to see the irony in spending half a day typing posts in an attempt to save time in the future. If you will refer to #92 you will find my response to the same question you asked.

That is not the context where the problem is. If someone has the label of atheist there is no possible way for me to know whether they deny God or merely lack belief. In some cases that can make big differences in burdens and contexts. If I am lucky enough to have them to have filled in their religious title I have to then ask additional question to understand their world view. This would not be the case using my methodology. Not every included their religious stance, and very few include the subcategories. If they did then there would be no need for my method. BTW I am proud to see that both you and I did include detailed stances in our religious titles, though even with the details yours still through me off for a while.


I did not say that to not believe, is to know it is untrue. I said to know is to believe. I do not know how to not believe what I know.

If you need this information, you are asking the wrong question. That is on you. Atheism does not require any active belief. So, if you would like to know a person's positive beliefs, you have to ask them. Remember the saying ... don't assume, it makes an *** out of you and me. It is incredibly unreasonable and foolish to assume that the classification "atheist" means that an individual holds positive beliefs about God not existing. As "theism" does not give you much in terms of what religion or belief system a person adheres to (as it only means that a person believes in the existence of God), neither should "atheism".

 

[leibowde84]

Not necessarily. I have met some with whom G-d had talked. They are/were/would be qualified definitely at # 1 on Dawkins Scale
Regards

I don't doubt that they think they would, but, in actuality, they merely strongly believe that they spoke to God. It is not possible to "know" that you have an experience with God, as human consciousness has been shown time and time again to be flawed in this area. This is what I mean by being brought about by overconfidence.

 

[1robin]

Although the Roman Empire spread Latin initially, I don't think it is relevant what kind of culture they advocated. The ONLY CONNECTION between the Roman Empire and this discussion is that their common language was the root of the language we have today. We are talking about the English language, which came from latin, but it is in no way dependent on the Roman Empire or its ideals. So, I would have to say that your mention of the Roman culture is irrelevant to this discussion. And, while I would say that even latin is not the objective standard for any language today, the rules concerning prefixes and what they indicate about a term most certainly are an objective standard which work to strengthen your stated purpose. You claim to promote clarity, yet you are fine with abandoning basic linguistic rules. Doing this does not only effect terms having to do with belief, it would confuse the entire language. Prefixes are a necessary way to organize an extremely convoluded language. Can you really honestly claim that abandoning linguistic rules such as this would not cause more confusion, wreaking havoc on the limited clarity present in the English language?

Nice info but it makes no difference in this context. Definitions of words are purely subjective. There is no transcendent standard to settle whether my, your, Latin, Koine, or Chinese is right. That was my point. I was offering a subjective definition I think is better than the one you are supporting.

To your next point, I fail to see any lack of clarity. I think that you are creating futher confusion by erroneously making a general term fit your purpose. If someone claims to be an atheist, those that make the assumption that they actively hold a belief that God does not exist or, worse yet, cannot exist are in error. It is necessary to ask further questions, if you are asking about what a person actively believes. In other words, you are making a false assumption and asking the wrong question. It creates absolutely no more confusion apart from those who hold an incorrect definition of the term. The same goes for theism. The reasson why subcategories like agnosticism, deism, polytheism, monotheism, strong-atheism, etc. exist is so that when someone claims to adhere to one of these, we know what they believe. If you expect to get this information from a general term like "atheism" or "theism", that is your fault alone, for you are expecting an unreasonable amount from a general term. It is in no way added confusion, but, on the contrary, provides added clarity.

Since as has been defended Atheism and Gnosticism have an overlapping magisterium, simply saying your an atheist comes with two potentially huge standards. If they mean by that
they believe the set including reality lacks any God's then that is a claim to knowledge and carries the burden of proof (and a whole list of dependent view points), if by it they simply mean a lack of belief then that lacks that burden and all it's dependencies.

 

[oldbadger]

Finally something we can all agree on! @lewisnotmiller is ignorant.
.................................................................................

........ so come over to Deism.

Sod the no-proselytizing rule, here we go..........

Deists are cool, chilled out and laid back types.
Deists are sexy. If you wanna pull....... come over to Deism......
Deists are so so intelligent.........

Try this, wear a T-shirt for one day with 'Atheism makes sense' and see what kind of reaction you get from folks.
Next day, wear a 'Deism! Ain't Big-G Cool?!' and see the difference.......
.....there....... sorted.

 

[1robin]

Here is problem with this. We can't have a meeting with every person who speaks english to come to a determination of what "atheism" and "theism" SHOULD mean. It is unreasonable to think that we could even attempt such a feat. That is why it is for your own benefit to go with the generally accepted (most inclusive) meanings of these general terms rather than making assumptions that may or may not be correct. In other words, not making assumptions will provide more clarity to conversations such as these.

Well "I have a dream". Actually I was pointing out the merits of something, I was not considering the practicality of adopting it. As it is I have two choices in most cases. Make an assumption (and it invariably will be the wrong one), or ask a series of questions if it is helpful to know the other persons world view. My suspicion is that as soon as I assume anything and by doing so set up a playing field (some) people simply blur the boundaries to make their options more pliable. My standards would make neither necessary, practical to adopt or not.

 

[1robin]

I endorse you here.
Regards

I concur with your endorsement. Thanks.

 

[suncowiam]

Finally something we can all agree on! @lewisnotmiller is ignorant.

I thouht it was because you're Australian??

 

[Marisa]

Please give there names. I would request them to come forward, if it is not personal, and if they like to.
Regards

Beg pardon? Why don't you ask atheists here, on the forum, and any you may know in real life. I'm not in the habit of selling out my friends. Alternatively, there are a literal plethora of atheists who blog, atheists who make YouTube videos and atheists who produce podcasts. Google at your leisure.

 

[1robin]

If you need this information, you are asking the wrong question. That is on you. Atheism does not require any active belief. So, if you would like to know a person's positive beliefs, you have to ask them. Remember the saying ... don't assume, it makes an *** out of you and me. It is incredibly unreasonable and foolish to assume that the classification "atheist" means that an individual holds positive beliefs about God not existing. As "theism" does not give you much in terms of what religion or belief system a person adheres to (as it only means that a person believes in the existence of God), neither should "atheism".

A debate always has certain starting positions. Usually a proposition and a resolved side, versus what ever the opposite resolved is. And they usually take place between people representing very specific world views. Formal debate is very rigorous.

 

[lewisnotmiller]

The connotation of "ignorance" is overwhelmingly negative in our culture, and I think we should bear that in mind.

Yeah, I agree. But seeing ignorance as negative, is off the charts on the ignorance scale. Ironic.
Suffice to say I speak about such things here, and with some people in RL, but in terms of common usage around people I am less sure of, I'd generally assume 'ignorance' is met with negative connotations.

Other than that, I think it's worth thinking about what creation mythology is really about. On the superficial level, a level that a fair number of people never move past thinking about, origin stories are about explaining the reasons for something. This is the manner of thinking about mythos that literalism originates from, but it is also the manner of thinking that ends up considering mythos as if it is some sort of proto-science. On the deeper level, what these stories are really about is conveying lessons about our relationship with the world around us, or how different parts of the world relate to each other. That manner of thinking is non-literal, and instead more aesthetic, symbolic, or ethical. Ideally, all who hold to creation mythos should move on to this way of understanding the stories, because it's that level that produces the deeper meaningfulness that is characteristic of a useful religion, or way-of-life/seeing.

Whether I explained it well or not, this is pretty much how I see things. Religion is a key method of carrying culture. I find both wisdom and worry in religion, due to this, just as I would in any other cultural transfer. Hence I am in no way anti-theistic. I'm all for looking beyond the literal in terms of religious stories, and try to accept wisdom where I can find it.
In my more idealistic youth I kept a book of quotes and snippets of wisdom. It's fair to say it was highly eclectic. Philosophers rubbed shoulders with the Smashing Pumpkins, and there was more than one Biblical quote despite my atheism.

Oh, I understand. You know I can't resist throwing a spanner into the works, though.

I like it. Too hard to deal with all situations in an OP, but I'm all for extrapolating out from there. And your particular brand of spanner is always about broadening and contributing to a view. What else are we trying to do here? Spanner on.

I think it would be worth investigating how "unusual" flexible approaches really are, though. Within my peer group, it's the norm. It's normal in contemporary Paganism, and it is normal in Unitarian Universalism, and it was even normal with respect to how my parents (both of whom hold to one of the Abrahamic religions) approached mythology. I know that for one of my parents, God represents the numinous qualities of existence, and that would stand regardless of creation mythos (this parent holds more to evolutionary science as "creation mythos" than the Bible in any case). Maybe that brings up another important point - how evolution fits into this. For the theists who accept evolution, it seems necessary that their acceptance of a god-concept into their lives would be less connected to their acceptance of mythic creation stories. Which again, may not be as uncommon as we sometimes think?

Off the top of my head, it depends how you define 'usual' I guess. For example, atheists are kinda unusual. But I live amongst plenty, being an Australian, and no-one even raises an eyebrow at my atheism (with the occasional exception more or less proving the rule).
But it's fine. The sort of separation you are speaking of, to my mind, is an admittance of ignorance. If people are clear with themselves (regardless of if they are clear with me) about what they KNOW and what they SUSPECT/HOPE/BELIEVE I think it's a solid start to more mutual acceptance of other positions. That being the case, I'd be kinda ridiculous to assert that all people who are honest with themselves are going to reach the same conclusion as me. It's enough (I think) that they're honest with themselves.

Really, the main point is to understand that there are many reasons why someone may or may not accept a god-concept into their lives. The more and more I've looked at it, the more and more it seems purely semantic, as shaped by the overculture. Beneath all the words and the language, it seems to me that the fundamental stuff we all do holds a common grounding. It expresses itself in all sorts of wild and wondrous ways, which are frequently not held in common, though. I think we fuss far too much over words sometimes, and I feel this urge to physically facepalm every time I see another one of those threads around here arguing about how theism-atheism are defined. Blargity blarg blarg blah...

I would agree that the terms are meaningless. At BEST they are merely high-level labels which tell us little about the breadth of belief beneath.
I suppose the point of this thread was to try and explain why I'm an atheist, in my own opinion (or, perhaps more clearly, why I hold nothing sacred, nor worship anything) in a slightly different manner to what is usually done. No need for me to belittle theism or even prove it wrong to be an atheist, is kinda my point.

 

[lewisnotmiller]

I think you would be an agnostic. Atheism is the positive case that God does not exist.

It's actually not. I have no theism, ergo I am an atheist. It's really that simple. I don't need (for example) to disprove God, since that is frankly impossible. Ask @Quintessence what God is, and then try and work out a way for me to disprove it. Or @oldbadger . Or @Oribit .
These posters all have different views of God than you do, and all are effectively unfalsifiable.
I have no theism...I am an atheist.

Agnosticism is the neutral case that you do not have enough evidence to be persuaded there is a God. If Atheism is not a positive claim then it is a redundant word and either it or Agnostic should be done away with.

There are many different ways of defining these words, unfortunately. Much like 'God' has a variety of meanings.
All I can do is try to explain MY beliefs, and non-beliefs, and use the available words in the clearest manner possible.

Agnostic, in and of itself, is a poor description for my position. IN common usage, it would be seen almost as a mid-point between atheism and theism, which is a complete misrepresentation of my position. I have no theism. I am an atheist. As are rocks, incidentally, although I find such a description as ridiculous and unhelpful. But it perhaps clarifies my position.
I would declare myself an agnostic-atheist since I don't have interest or intent, or believe it is possible to disprove God. I see no reason...absolutely zero reason...to believe there is a God. It's an important difference.

Now, if there is a God...Gods...something more...I'm as close to positive as honesty allows me that the God is nothing like anyone here believes or understands anyway. I thoroughly reject all theistic beliefs I've ever encountered. Perhaps one is right, and there are obviously bunches I am ignorant of (there's that word again) but until I adopt one, I remain atheist.

Ant-theism implies your resentful of the concept of God. I do no think that you are that one. Then of course to make a position seem less embarrassing or more emphatic people invent soft atheism, and hard atheism labels but I think that's overkill.

I'm not an anti-theist. Theism can be a positive or negative force, and the impact is contextual. In other words, I'd look at it more on a case by case basis.

 

[lewisnotmiller]

Religion of Buddha as revealed on him by G-d in its origin (not as depicted by the present Scripture of Buddhism or by Buddhists) .
Religion of Krishna as revealed on him by G-d in its origin (not as depicted by the present Vedas or by Hindus).
Religion of Zoroaster as revealed on him by G-d in its origin (not as depicted by the present Scripture of Zoroastrians ).
Religion of Moses as revealed on him by G-d in its origin (not as depicted by the present Torah of Judaism or by Jews).
Religion of Jesus as revealed on him by G-d in its origin (not as depicted by the present Gospels of Christianity or by Christians).
Religion of Socrates as revealed on him by G-d in its origin (not as depicted by the books written after him. ) .
Religion of Muhammad as revealed on him by G-d in its origin in Quran (not as depicted by different denominations of Muslims).
Etc., etc., etc.

Regards

They are not accessible religions, though, are they?
What you are effectively saying is that at the moment of reveal by God, there is truth, and then this is neccessarily corrupted by the touch of man.
Cool. So if God reveals religion directly to me, l'll have the truth, and until he does, I'll make my own calls.

 

[lewisnotmiller]

........ so come over to Deism.

Sod the no-proselytizing rule, here we go..........

Deists are cool, chilled out and laid back types.
Deists are sexy. If you wanna pull....... come over to Deism......
Deists are so so intelligent.........

Try this, wear a T-shirt for one day with 'Atheism makes sense' and see what kind of reaction you get from folks.
Next day, wear a 'Deism! Ain't Big-G Cool?!' and see the difference.......
.....there....... sorted.

I suspect there is a little truth in that (re: t-shirt reactions).
People are always looking for the cool new thing, even if 'new' is just an indication that they've never heard of it.

But you're forgetting a few things;
1) My uber-coolness comes from not caring about coolness.
2) I'm happily married, so fighting hotties off with a stick actually gets tiring.
3) I'm Australian...sexy, intelligent, chilled and laid back are givens.

 

[lewisnotmiller]

I thouht it was because you're Australian??

The reasons for my ignorance are plentiful.
The fact of my ignorance is unassailable.

 

[paarsurrey]

I don't doubt that they think they would, but, in actuality, they merely strongly believe that they spoke to God. It is not possible to "know" that you have an experience with God, as human consciousness has been shown time and time again to be flawed in this area. This is what I mean by being brought about by overconfidence.

I don't agree with you. They were normal people, it will be wrong to deny their conversation with G-d. We are having conversation with one another, it will be wrong of me if I deny your existence, similarly it will be wrong for you to deny my existence.
Am I right.
Regards

 

[paarsurrey]

Beg pardon? Why don't you ask atheists here, on the forum, and any you may know in real life. I'm not in the habit of selling out my friends. Alternatively, there are a literal plethora of atheists who blog, atheists who make YouTube videos and atheists who produce podcasts. Google at your leisure.

There are Atheists here in this forum, they are welcome to come forward.
Regards

 

[Willamena]

I will admit I have some issues with this whole non committal thing. Sure we can play semantics, but at the end of the day when we tuck ourselves into our little hidey holes, and rest far away from from those whom might debate, is there really a middle ground? I do not believe my lost keys are in the room is really saying that I believe my lost keys are outside the room. I suppose it is technically possible to be in a non committal state, but can anyone sit in such a state beside the "implicit atheist?"

Just so. You can take sides or not, but if you do its committal.