So I've seen in recent threads that the definition of an atheist isn't quite agreed on here.
So I'm asking those of you who call yourselves atheist and agnostic. What is an atheist and how is it different from the normal societal definition?
For the record I'll put what I've always understood to be an atheist vs agnostic.
"a person who disbelieves in the existence of God or gods." vs "a person who claims neither faith nor disbelief in God."
I've always understood that to be atheist you had to take the firm stance that there is no god, and that the half stance of maybe there is one, or we aren't sure was agnosticism. Thus I've identified myself as an agnostic atheist, someone who is open to the possibility of God or gods but definitely not the one in the judeo-christian bible.
An atheist is someone who disbelieves in deities. The issue is people trying to define it as "someone who does not believe in deities," which is too broad as it may also include those who neither believe nor disbelieve in deities.
There are those, however, who would argue that the latter are also atheists, which I find to be absurd and an example of people trying to lump people under their particular banner that do not subscribe to their beliefs.
An atheist is someone who disbelieves in deities. The issue is people trying to define it as "someone who does not believe in deities," which is too broad as it may also include those who neither believe nor disbelieve in deities.
It's not "too broad". That's what disbelieve means.
Merriam-Webster:
Simple Definition of disbelieve
: to not believe (someone or something)
Full Definition of disbelieve
transitive verb
: to hold not worthy of belief : not believe
intransitive verb
: to withhold or reject belief
Dictionary.com:
verb (used with object), disbelieved, disbelieving.
1.
to have no belief in; refuse or reject belief in:
to disbelieve reports of UFO sightings.
verb (used without object), disbelieved, disbelieving.
2.
to refuse or reject belief; have no belief.
The Free Dictionary:
v. -lieved, -liev•ing. v.t.
1. to have no belief in; refuse or reject belief in.
v.i.
2. to refuse or reject belief.
Wiktionary:
1. To not believe; to exercise disbelief.
2. To actively deny (a statement, opinion or perception).
He chose to disbelieve the bad news as inconceivable.
3. To cease to believe.
I've always understood that to be atheist you had to take the firm stance that there is no god, and that the half stance of maybe there is one, or we aren't sure was agnosticism. Thus I've identified myself as an agnostic atheist, someone who is open to the possibility of God or gods but definitely not the one in the judeo-christian bible.
Atheism and theism address the question of what you believe. Agnosticism and gnosticism address the question of what you know. They are answers to different questions, and most people who are being intellectually honest about something like the question of god will admit to being agnostic. Agnostic atheist is extremely common.
There are certainly atheists who actively believe that there are no gods, but it is not a requirement for the label. A distinction is sometimes made between "weak atheism" (do not believe in any gods) and "strong atheism" or "anti-theism" (believe there are no gods). Both theists and antitheists have a burden of proof, as they are making a claim. The weak atheist position is not making a claim, it is simply rejecting the theist claim.
Read enough works of fiction and you will know the bibble for one
Look at all the opposing religions/belifs and you will know how they are made like mind/pesonality crutches
What you dont have evidence for isnt true, no matter how it would be pleasant for it to be
No, Lithl, to actively disbelieve in something is different from merely lacking belief, because, as stated before, one can neither believe nor disbelieve, and this also qualifies as "lacking belief."
A person can believe, disbelieve, or neither believe nor disbelieve in the existence of gods. Atheism is the second.
Atheist literally means non-theist. Theist, in its broadest sense, has come to mean someone who believes in (and thus worships) one or more deities. More strictly, it might mean someone who believes in only a single deity, or one who believes in a particular kind of 'creator' deity. An atheist is not a theist, thus making them someone who does not believe in deities.
Highroller, I'm not sure what you mean by someone who simultaneously lacks belief and disbelief (for deities). Can you explain how such a thing is possible? I think perhaps you're trying to describe agnosticism? Agnosticism is related to atheism (or theism) in that it concerns deities, but it's not a label that addresses the same question - it addresses knowledge of deities, rather than belief of deities. It's better to think of these terms on separate axis, as in the attached image. The lower left chart maps 2 axes concerning deities: belief and knowledge. As Lithl mentions, it is indeed quite possible to be an agnostic atheist, for example.
Also in the image is another axis that relates deities, but refers to conviction in one's belief - see the upper right chart. A 'strong atheist' might say "There are no gods", whereas a 'weak atheist' might prefer instead to say "I lack belief in any gods".
Not42, you may find the 3rd chart (lower right) interesting. You say you are open to the idea of God or gods, but still identify as atheist; you might consider yourself implicitly atheist (while also being agnostic).
No, Lithl, to actively disbelieve in something is different from merely lacking belief, because, as stated before, one can neither believe nor disbelieve, and this also qualifies as "lacking belief."
To disbelieve means to not believe. Therefore there is no difference between the two. "Neither believe nor disbelieve" becomes redundant, and a misuse of the "neither/nor" construction..
There are multiple definitions of the term atheist used by different people for their own reasons. As simple definitions they are all equally valid, so the question is only which is most useful.
The main two definitions I think are:
A conscious lack of belief in gods
A belief in the nonexistence of gods
An important question to consider is for the second definition, what level of certainty is required?
Technically the atheist is 100% certain there is no god, whereas the agnostic is uncertain to some degree. Neither actively believe in god.
But in common conversation I've found most people blend the two and just mean "doesn't believe in god" when talking about an atheist, even though that could refer to either an atheist or agnostic.
An atheist is someone who disbelieves in deities. The issue is people trying to define it as "someone who does not believe in deities," which is too broad as it may also include those who neither believe nor disbelieve in deities.
There are those, however, who would argue that the latter are also atheists, which I find to be absurd and an example of people trying to lump people under their particular banner that do not subscribe to their beliefs.
Almost everyone I hear use the lack of belief definition does not belief in the nonexistence of gods, so if anything, they are trying to lump themselves in with others. More accurately I think, is that the 'atheist' community is dominated by people who don't really believe in the nonexistence of gods, that there are relatively few people who do. Most from what I have seen simply find the idea implausible.
For instance, virtually every nontheist I see on this site is 'agnostic atheist', and most of the public figures of the movement like Christopher Hitchens (formerly ) , Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, and so on.
This is not to say there's anything necessarily wrong with the alternative definition, but it is I believe the main reason the lack of belief definition has become popular especially among self described atheists.
Read enough works of fiction and you will know the bibble for one
Look at all the opposing religions/belifs and you will know how they are made like mind/pesonality crutches
What you dont have evidence for isnt true, no matter how it would be pleasant for it to be
Atheist literally means non-theist. Theist, in its broadest sense, has come to mean someone who believes in (and thus worships) one or more deities. More strictly, it might mean someone who believes in only a single deity, or one who believes in a particular kind of 'creator' deity. An atheist is not a theist, thus making them someone who does not believe in deities.
Highroller, I'm not sure what you mean by someone who simultaneously lacks belief and disbelief (for deities). Can you explain how such a thing is possible? I think perhaps you're trying to describe agnosticism? Agnosticism is related to atheism (or theism) in that it concerns deities, but it's not a label that addresses the same question - it addresses knowledge of deities, rather than belief of deities. It's better to think of these terms on separate axis, as in the attached image. The lower left chart maps 2 axes concerning deities: belief and knowledge. As Lithl mentions, it is indeed quite possible to be an agnostic atheist, for example.
Also in the image is another axis that relates deities, but refers to conviction in one's belief - see the upper right chart. A 'strong atheist' might say "There are no gods", whereas a 'weak atheist' might prefer instead to say "I lack belief in any gods".
Not42, you may find the 3rd chart (lower right) interesting. You say you are open to the idea of God or gods, but still identify as atheist; you might consider yourself implicitly atheist (while also being agnostic).
There is no real difference between belief and knowledge. The difference in how people understand the two words simply has to do with the type of evidence that supports the conclusion, or the degree of certainty. But, there is no difference in terms of the logical proof, the philosophical argument, so forth, between belief in a premise and knowledge of it. Seeing as how Atheism and Agnosticism discuss exactly those things, I'm not inclined to believe that people are using two different terms just to differentiate their degree of certainty or the basis of their conclusions. They are beliefs in two different ideas.
Your question about how it’s possible to simultaneously lack belief and disbelief is what I think is critical to the discussion here. Some are saying that’s Atheism and it's the same as disbelieving something, others are saying it’s not, or that this state of belief isn’t possible. To take another crack at the red pen analogy from the other thread, suppose I’m holding my hands behind my back and I tell you that I’m holding a red pen. You could draw (at least) three different conclusions about that premise, analogous to Theism, Atheism and Agnosticism.
One, you believe that I’m holding a red pen. You’ve taken in the evidence of my statement, and any other sources of evidence you might have, and form that conclusion.
Two, you believe that I am NOT holding a red pen. You take the evidence of my statement as probative of the opposite conclusion. For example, maybe you have reason to believe I’m untrustworthy, or I’m prone myself to misunderstanding what spectrum of light pertains to red, what a pen is, so on. But, you take the evidence and conclude that the premise of me having a red pen is NOT true.
Three, you don’t believe that you have any information to conclude one way or the other. Suppose you didn’t hear what I said, or you don’t understand my language, or maybe I didn’t say anything. Or maybe you just don't consider people's statements about themselves as being evidence of anything. In any event, you can’t conclude that I’m holding a red pen, but neither can you conclude that I’m not. At least, no more than you can conclude at any time that any given person not in your view is not holding a red pen. Someone asks you about this red pen of mine, and you have no idea. This is the state of neither believing or disbelieving something.
Alternatively, take another example. If you’re familiar with advanced math or computer programming, you’ll understand the difference between a value of “1”, a value of “0”, and concepts used to indicate that there is NO value, such as undefined, empty set, or null set. A zero or a one will lead to some calculation, but an undefined variable is not operable.
In fact, in the history of the development of mathematics in prehistoric cultures, you can find those cultures who are said to have “invented” the concept of Zero, and those who didn’t. It’s an idea that’s really not just intuitive. Suppose we view an empty slate as the “default”, there are advantages to denoting a value of Zero instead. It’s making an affirmative statement about a numerical value, whereas the empty slate is not. That allows conclusions to be made and calculations to go forward. So, every culture that was exposed to the difference between that and the concept of Zero went on to adopt the Zero. Here, Atheism is being put forward as the “Zero” or belief in no God, while it’s being pointed out also that it’s possible to have neither belief in God nor belief in no God, which would be an empty slate.
The difference in how people understand the two words simply has to do with the type of evidence that supports the conclusion, or the degree of certainty.
Granting this premise for the sake of argument, why couldn't people apply the labels "atheist" and "agnostic" to the distinction? You seem to be arguing that because the distinction isn't "real", it can't be what people use to define these terms. And that doesn't follow at all. People define terms based distinctions far less real than this, all the time.
In fact, in the history of the development of mathematics in prehistoric cultures, you can find those cultures who are said to have “invented” the concept of Zero, and those who didn’t. It’s an idea that’s really not just intuitive. Suppose we view an empty slate as the “default”, there are advantages to denoting a value of Zero instead. It’s making an affirmative statement about a numerical value, whereas the empty slate is not. That allows conclusions to be made and calculations to go forward. So, every culture that was exposed to the difference between that and the concept of Zero went on to adopt the Zero. Here, Atheism is being put forward as the “Zero” or belief in no God, while it’s being pointed out also that it’s possible to have neither belief in God nor belief in no God, which would be an empty slate.
There are two binary logic switches at play here: "I affirm that there is a God" and "I affirm that there is no God". (1, 0) is theism, clearly, and (0, 1) is at least one form of atheism. (0, 0) is variously described as agnosticism, another form of atheism, or both. (1, 1) entails a logical contradiction*, but people affirm logical contradictions all the time, so it's not a possibility that can be discounted offhand.
There are multiple definitions of the term atheist used by different people for their own reasons. As simple definitions they are all equally valid, so the question is only which is most useful.
The main two definitions I think are:
A conscious lack of belief in gods
A belief in the nonexistence of gods
An important question to consider is for the second definition, what level of certainty is required?
This seems like the essence of the positions here.
So my follow up question. How is 1 different from agnosticism and for 2 what are peoples feelings on the required level of certainty of belief? If you aren't certain of something do you actually believe it? is belief an all or nothing, what are the varying degrees and how do they differ?
There are multiple definitions of the term atheist used by different people for their own reasons. As simple definitions they are all equally valid, so the question is only which is most useful.
The main two definitions I think are:
A conscious lack of belief in gods
A belief in the nonexistence of gods
An important question to consider is for the second definition, what level of certainty is required?
This seems like the essence of the positions here.
So my follow up question. How is 1 different from agnosticism and for 2 what are peoples feelings on the required level of certainty of belief? If you aren't certain of something do you actually believe it? is belief an all or nothing, what are the varying degrees and how do they differ?
#1 is different from agnosticism, because agnosticism is not answering what you believe about a proposition, but what you know about a proposition. Atheism answers what you believe about the existence of deities. Belief and knowledge are related, but they are not the same thing. (The philosophical definition for "knowledge" is generally something along the lines of "justified true belief", making knowledge a subset of belief.)
You can absolutely believe things without 100% certainty, and I would say the only things you can be 100% certain about are the logical absolutes, things directly derived from them, and the processes of arbitrarily-defined systems (such as mathematics).
In fact, in the history of the development of mathematics in prehistoric cultures, you can find those cultures who are said to have “invented” the concept of Zero, and those who didn’t. It’s an idea that’s really not just intuitive. Suppose we view an empty slate as the “default”, there are advantages to denoting a value of Zero instead. It’s making an affirmative statement about a numerical value, whereas the empty slate is not. That allows conclusions to be made and calculations to go forward. So, every culture that was exposed to the difference between that and the concept of Zero went on to adopt the Zero. Here, Atheism is being put forward as the “Zero” or belief in no God, while it’s being pointed out also that it’s possible to have neither belief in God nor belief in no God, which would be an empty slate.
There are two binary logic switches at play here: "I affirm that there is a God" and "I affirm that there is no God". (1, 0) is theism, clearly, and (0, 1) is at least one form of atheism. (0, 0) is variously described as agnosticism, another form of atheism, or both. (1, 1) entails a logical contradiction*, but people affirm logical contradictions all the time, so it's not a possibility that can be discounted offhand.
I can agree with this too. I was also saying that some people see a contradiction or impossibility with the (0, 0), due to one of those binaries being the negation of the other. But this way of describing it also recognizes that there is no such contradiction.
I’m not sure what the existence of Epistemology proves.
But to go a bit down that rabbit hole of what I think you're getting at, I’ll just clarify by saying that the logical proof of an idea is independent of Epistemology’s definition of “knowledge”. So if Epistemology defines “knowledge” as beliefs that have both sound evidentiary justification and are objectively true, you just have to recognize the implicit premise there that some objective truth exists. It might not, and people would still believe things. In other words, people still believed things before Descartes said, “I think, therefore I am.” So, what you have is either the acceptance or denial of premises that are increasingly basic. And, Epistemology does accept a certain set of premises, like whether we are conscious or in a dream, etc. The act of defining this set of premises as narrowly as possible is the whole endeavor of Epistemology. But, it does involve the acceptance of them, and then defines those and others based on them quite subjectively as “knowledge”, as according to the pertaining definition.
But if you throw aside any implied ontological premise, which you should if you are discussing anything different from Epistemology, then all you have is the logic. At that point, things that you believe, know, suspect (or any other synonym) follow some logical pattern, such as: X, therefore Y. Logic doesn’t and cannot specify what degree of certainty knowledge, beliefs, etc, are held. The premise X is either true or false. The logical construction is either valid, or it’s not. There is no logical construction that proves a belief, versus one that proves knowledge.
That was my point in regards to the premise of the existence of God. You have points of evidence (or non-evidence), and you either accept them or you don’t. You have conclusions that the evidence is offered to support, and you either consider the reasoning of those arguments valid, or you don’t. The degree of certainty for each is outside the bounds of that discussion. Atheism and Theism, in my mind, relate to the content of those posited ideas and the arguments they support.
The difference in how people understand the two words simply has to do with the type of evidence that supports the conclusion, or the degree of certainty.
Granting this premise for the sake of argument, why couldn't people apply the labels "atheist" and "agnostic" to the distinction? You seem to be arguing that because the distinction isn't "real", it can't be what people use to define these terms. And that doesn't follow at all. People define terms based distinctions far less real than this, all the time.
Well, I didn’t intend to be arguing in proof of that. People could be using the terms to describe degree of certainty. All I’m saying is that I don’t think that this is how the terms are used, based on the character of the statements of those who are widely considered “Atheist” or “Theist”. Someone could come to a different use of those terms.
I’ll have to fill in later the support for why I think these terms are widely understood that way.
In so far as how I've seen the terms commonly used, it typically goes Agnosticism is maybe, Atheism is no, and Theism is yes on the scale of deities. Though even then I've seen wiggle room on how they're used, but at least that's typically what I get when the question comes up. I'm fine with using the chart as well, I kind of liked that as a way to simply sum up my stance, but it's definitely not something that I've seen debated that way prior to this board.
I'd say an atheist is someone who chooses to not believe in God.
I'd say you can't choose your beliefs. You can certainly choose what you profess to believe, but I don't think you can simply choose what you actually believe.
I have been told I am an atheist. What I believe is that science is God. The laws of gravity, the Laws of Newton, what explains the universe and helps us understand its creation is God. The phenomenon that led to life, and consciousness is God. Is there a physical being? A sentient figure? No. But, there are rules that the Universe must follow that I believe is God.
So I'm asking those of you who call yourselves atheist and agnostic. What is an atheist and how is it different from the normal societal definition?
For the record I'll put what I've always understood to be an atheist vs agnostic.
"a person who disbelieves in the existence of God or gods." vs "a person who claims neither faith nor disbelief in God."
I've always understood that to be atheist you had to take the firm stance that there is no god, and that the half stance of maybe there is one, or we aren't sure was agnosticism. Thus I've identified myself as an agnostic atheist, someone who is open to the possibility of God or gods but definitely not the one in the judeo-christian bible.
There are those, however, who would argue that the latter are also atheists, which I find to be absurd and an example of people trying to lump people under their particular banner that do not subscribe to their beliefs.
Merriam-Webster:
Dictionary.com:
The Free Dictionary:
Wiktionary:
Cambridge English Dictionary:
Oxford English Dictionary:
Macmillan Dictionary:
Google:
Atheism and theism address the question of what you believe. Agnosticism and gnosticism address the question of what you know. They are answers to different questions, and most people who are being intellectually honest about something like the question of god will admit to being agnostic. Agnostic atheist is extremely common.
There are certainly atheists who actively believe that there are no gods, but it is not a requirement for the label. A distinction is sometimes made between "weak atheism" (do not believe in any gods) and "strong atheism" or "anti-theism" (believe there are no gods). Both theists and antitheists have a burden of proof, as they are making a claim. The weak atheist position is not making a claim, it is simply rejecting the theist claim.
Two Score, Minus Two or: A Stargate Tail
(Image by totallynotabrony)
Look at all the opposing religions/belifs and you will know how they are made like mind/pesonality crutches
What you dont have evidence for isnt true, no matter how it would be pleasant for it to be
Corny as it might seem this is the allegory that shows it off http://www.thematrix101.com/contrib/darrod_wpwyttrotb.php
A person can believe, disbelieve, or neither believe nor disbelieve in the existence of gods. Atheism is the second.
Highroller, I'm not sure what you mean by someone who simultaneously lacks belief and disbelief (for deities). Can you explain how such a thing is possible? I think perhaps you're trying to describe agnosticism? Agnosticism is related to atheism (or theism) in that it concerns deities, but it's not a label that addresses the same question - it addresses knowledge of deities, rather than belief of deities. It's better to think of these terms on separate axis, as in the attached image. The lower left chart maps 2 axes concerning deities: belief and knowledge. As Lithl mentions, it is indeed quite possible to be an agnostic atheist, for example.
Also in the image is another axis that relates deities, but refers to conviction in one's belief - see the upper right chart. A 'strong atheist' might say "There are no gods", whereas a 'weak atheist' might prefer instead to say "I lack belief in any gods".
Not42, you may find the 3rd chart (lower right) interesting. You say you are open to the idea of God or gods, but still identify as atheist; you might consider yourself implicitly atheist (while also being agnostic).
Two Score, Minus Two or: A Stargate Tail
(Image by totallynotabrony)
The main two definitions I think are:
RUNIN: Norse mythology set (awaiting further playtesting)
FATE of ALARA: Multicolour factions (currently on hiatus)
Contibutor to the Pyrulea community set
I'm here to tell you that all your set mechanics are bad
#Defundthepolice
But in common conversation I've found most people blend the two and just mean "doesn't believe in god" when talking about an atheist, even though that could refer to either an atheist or agnostic.
Almost everyone I hear use the lack of belief definition does not belief in the nonexistence of gods, so if anything, they are trying to lump themselves in with others. More accurately I think, is that the 'atheist' community is dominated by people who don't really believe in the nonexistence of gods, that there are relatively few people who do. Most from what I have seen simply find the idea implausible.
For instance, virtually every nontheist I see on this site is 'agnostic atheist', and most of the public figures of the movement like Christopher Hitchens (formerly ) , Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, and so on.
This is not to say there's anything necessarily wrong with the alternative definition, but it is I believe the main reason the lack of belief definition has become popular especially among self described atheists.
RUNIN: Norse mythology set (awaiting further playtesting)
FATE of ALARA: Multicolour factions (currently on hiatus)
Contibutor to the Pyrulea community set
I'm here to tell you that all your set mechanics are bad
#Defundthepolice
I defined what an atheist are/"belive" in, how is it spam? in direct response to "What is an atheist?"(thread tittle)
Are we using the "I dont agree or It rubs in the wrong way therefore its spam" rule here?
[CENSORED AND REDACTED by ABUSIVE MODS, im OUT]
There is no real difference between belief and knowledge. The difference in how people understand the two words simply has to do with the type of evidence that supports the conclusion, or the degree of certainty. But, there is no difference in terms of the logical proof, the philosophical argument, so forth, between belief in a premise and knowledge of it. Seeing as how Atheism and Agnosticism discuss exactly those things, I'm not inclined to believe that people are using two different terms just to differentiate their degree of certainty or the basis of their conclusions. They are beliefs in two different ideas.
Your question about how it’s possible to simultaneously lack belief and disbelief is what I think is critical to the discussion here. Some are saying that’s Atheism and it's the same as disbelieving something, others are saying it’s not, or that this state of belief isn’t possible. To take another crack at the red pen analogy from the other thread, suppose I’m holding my hands behind my back and I tell you that I’m holding a red pen. You could draw (at least) three different conclusions about that premise, analogous to Theism, Atheism and Agnosticism.
One, you believe that I’m holding a red pen. You’ve taken in the evidence of my statement, and any other sources of evidence you might have, and form that conclusion.
Two, you believe that I am NOT holding a red pen. You take the evidence of my statement as probative of the opposite conclusion. For example, maybe you have reason to believe I’m untrustworthy, or I’m prone myself to misunderstanding what spectrum of light pertains to red, what a pen is, so on. But, you take the evidence and conclude that the premise of me having a red pen is NOT true.
Three, you don’t believe that you have any information to conclude one way or the other. Suppose you didn’t hear what I said, or you don’t understand my language, or maybe I didn’t say anything. Or maybe you just don't consider people's statements about themselves as being evidence of anything. In any event, you can’t conclude that I’m holding a red pen, but neither can you conclude that I’m not. At least, no more than you can conclude at any time that any given person not in your view is not holding a red pen. Someone asks you about this red pen of mine, and you have no idea. This is the state of neither believing or disbelieving something.
Alternatively, take another example. If you’re familiar with advanced math or computer programming, you’ll understand the difference between a value of “1”, a value of “0”, and concepts used to indicate that there is NO value, such as undefined, empty set, or null set. A zero or a one will lead to some calculation, but an undefined variable is not operable.
In fact, in the history of the development of mathematics in prehistoric cultures, you can find those cultures who are said to have “invented” the concept of Zero, and those who didn’t. It’s an idea that’s really not just intuitive. Suppose we view an empty slate as the “default”, there are advantages to denoting a value of Zero instead. It’s making an affirmative statement about a numerical value, whereas the empty slate is not. That allows conclusions to be made and calculations to go forward. So, every culture that was exposed to the difference between that and the concept of Zero went on to adopt the Zero. Here, Atheism is being put forward as the “Zero” or belief in no God, while it’s being pointed out also that it’s possible to have neither belief in God nor belief in no God, which would be an empty slate.
Granting this premise for the sake of argument, why couldn't people apply the labels "atheist" and "agnostic" to the distinction? You seem to be arguing that because the distinction isn't "real", it can't be what people use to define these terms. And that doesn't follow at all. People define terms based distinctions far less real than this, all the time.
There are two binary logic switches at play here: "I affirm that there is a God" and "I affirm that there is no God". (1, 0) is theism, clearly, and (0, 1) is at least one form of atheism. (0, 0) is variously described as agnosticism, another form of atheism, or both. (1, 1) entails a logical contradiction*, but people affirm logical contradictions all the time, so it's not a possibility that can be discounted offhand.
*Or does it?
candidus inperti; si nil, his utere mecum.
So my follow up question. How is 1 different from agnosticism and for 2 what are peoples feelings on the required level of certainty of belief? If you aren't certain of something do you actually believe it? is belief an all or nothing, what are the varying degrees and how do they differ?
#1 is different from agnosticism, because agnosticism is not answering what you believe about a proposition, but what you know about a proposition. Atheism answers what you believe about the existence of deities. Belief and knowledge are related, but they are not the same thing. (The philosophical definition for "knowledge" is generally something along the lines of "justified true belief", making knowledge a subset of belief.)
You can absolutely believe things without 100% certainty, and I would say the only things you can be 100% certain about are the logical absolutes, things directly derived from them, and the processes of arbitrarily-defined systems (such as mathematics).
Two Score, Minus Two or: A Stargate Tail
(Image by totallynotabrony)
I can agree with this too. I was also saying that some people see a contradiction or impossibility with the (0, 0), due to one of those binaries being the negation of the other. But this way of describing it also recognizes that there is no such contradiction.
I’m not sure what the existence of Epistemology proves.
But to go a bit down that rabbit hole of what I think you're getting at, I’ll just clarify by saying that the logical proof of an idea is independent of Epistemology’s definition of “knowledge”. So if Epistemology defines “knowledge” as beliefs that have both sound evidentiary justification and are objectively true, you just have to recognize the implicit premise there that some objective truth exists. It might not, and people would still believe things. In other words, people still believed things before Descartes said, “I think, therefore I am.” So, what you have is either the acceptance or denial of premises that are increasingly basic. And, Epistemology does accept a certain set of premises, like whether we are conscious or in a dream, etc. The act of defining this set of premises as narrowly as possible is the whole endeavor of Epistemology. But, it does involve the acceptance of them, and then defines those and others based on them quite subjectively as “knowledge”, as according to the pertaining definition.
But if you throw aside any implied ontological premise, which you should if you are discussing anything different from Epistemology, then all you have is the logic. At that point, things that you believe, know, suspect (or any other synonym) follow some logical pattern, such as: X, therefore Y. Logic doesn’t and cannot specify what degree of certainty knowledge, beliefs, etc, are held. The premise X is either true or false. The logical construction is either valid, or it’s not. There is no logical construction that proves a belief, versus one that proves knowledge.
That was my point in regards to the premise of the existence of God. You have points of evidence (or non-evidence), and you either accept them or you don’t. You have conclusions that the evidence is offered to support, and you either consider the reasoning of those arguments valid, or you don’t. The degree of certainty for each is outside the bounds of that discussion. Atheism and Theism, in my mind, relate to the content of those posited ideas and the arguments they support.
Well, I didn’t intend to be arguing in proof of that. People could be using the terms to describe degree of certainty. All I’m saying is that I don’t think that this is how the terms are used, based on the character of the statements of those who are widely considered “Atheist” or “Theist”. Someone could come to a different use of those terms.
I’ll have to fill in later the support for why I think these terms are widely understood that way.
An agnost is someone who simply doesn't care.
If my post has no tags, then i posted from my phone.
Do You Believe In God or not?
Anyways, I'd say an atheist is someone who chooses to not believe in God.
No, I'm basically an atheist.
Two Score, Minus Two or: A Stargate Tail
(Image by totallynotabrony)
Okies.