General / Off-Topic To Atheists, which great Atheist thinker do you allign with ?

[Iskariot]

It isn't a lack of a belief. It is the belief that there is no deity or higher power of any kind.
It is a claim that cannot be proven as much as any religion's creation story.

No that is not how the term atheist is used in philosophy or among atheists at all.
If you had been active in the atheist community you would know this.
Just view a few major debates between theists and atheists or read a few books about atheism and it becomes clear almost immediately, because we atheist have had to defend ourselves against that weird notion of theists all the time... ever since the term got introduced.
Theists always try to drag us down to the same level and we have always resisted it.

"Atheist" is the label you don when you do not believe in god claims.

An a-theist is not-theist.
He does not believe in a god.
This does not mean you claim that you know for sure that there are no invisible magical god beings at all.
Simply because that is not a rational, valid claim.
It is a claim that cannot be supported or proven in any way.
Just like you can't disprove the nonexistence of any invisible magical being (pixies, elves) that hides itself for real beings like humans.

The default is not having formed an opinion of either, indifference.

No, philosophically the default is always not believing in claims of magical existences until proven otherwise.
That is what people do in most situations (even theists themselves), unless they are brought up in a certain type of irrational faith.
Indoctrination tends to override basic rationality.
Theists are always critical of magical claims, unless these claims are brought forth by by their own theistic faith.
In that case they throw every sensible rational thought process out of the window.

There are many indifferent atheists, but they are still atheists, because they have no theistic god belief whatsoever.

I just have an issue with the terminiology.
It is a negative belief opposed to the positive belief

That is where you go wrong.
Atheism is lack of belief.
It is not a belief, it is not a system. It is a simple single notion: I do not believe in that invisible magical god thing.

Theists are most often atheists themselves as far as gods of competing religions are concerned.
Theists have no problem at all to think rationally about god claims of other, competing religions.
They just do not apply that rationality to their own outrageous supernatural claims.

Having said that: there are atheists who do claim that there are no gods. Atheists make mistakes too.
Personally I strongly believe that there are no theistic gods at all, but that is not a knowledge claim that I would ever make.
Because if I did I would sink to the same irrational level as the theists.

 

[hairychris]

You cling to a dogmatic position where lack of faith is a "belief", and hence atheism is perfectly analogous to religious belief. This is categorically false. It tends to be the case that a person raised in a dogmatic system cannot fathom a mindset not based on dogma. To the religious mind atheim looks like a religion. This does not make it a fact.

Yep.

Faith and belief are very much loaded words, and is used differently by religious (Western Christian for sure) and non-religious people. The arguments about dictionary definitions is pretty funny because the fact that there are multiple usages tells us that we need to define the underlying concepts as opposed to get hung up on the precise word used, as the words have baggage.

Hebrews 11:1 KJV illustrates this "Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen."

If I, as an atheist, say that I have faith in something then what I actually mean is that I have a reasonable expectation that something will act in a certain way based on experience or knowledge on how reality works. Faith for a believer also includes the religious aspect including supposed miracles, claims in holy books, etc.

Belief runs in a similar fashion, although it has been argued that what you actually believe about a subject is not voluntary and depends on your entire epistemology. My lack of belief in any gods (and active disbelief of specific ones) isn't isolated but very much tied in to my disbelief in the supernatural, reading of historical literature, a bit of knowledge of how brains work, and so forth.

Hence, IMO, to get anywhere we need to define our terms.

Which, ironically, is another one of the reasons that "god" is a problem - what does that word actually mean?

 

[Monk]

No that is not how the term atheist is used in philosophy or among atheists at all.
If you had been active in the atheist community you would know this.

Attempts to participate in the community have generally been met with toxicity and elitism. I may be ignorant here because I've chosen to not engage with people who treat atheism like a dogma (not you) in the same way my former priests have. For those reasons, I align with Humanists.

Just view a few major debates between theists and atheists and it becomes clear almost immediately, because we atheist have had to defend ourselves against that weird notion of theists all the time... ever since the term got introduced.
Theists always try to drag us down to the same level and we have always resisted it.

"Atheist" is the label you don when you do not believe in god claims.

That is a smart way to put it that I've not heard

An a-theist is not-theist.
He does not believe in a god.
This does not mean you claim that you know for sure that there are no invisible magical god beings at all.
Simply because that is not a rational, valid claim.
It is a claim that cannot be supported or proven in any way.
Just like you can't disprove the nonexistence of any invisible magical being (pixies, elves) that hides itself for real beings like humans.




No, philosophically the default is always not believing in claims of magical existences until proven otherwise.
That is what people do in most situations (even theists themselves), unless they are brought up in a certain type of irrational faith.
Indoctrination tends to override basic rationality.
Theists are always critical of magical claims, unless these claims are brought forth by by their own theistic faith.




That is where you go wrong.
Atheism is lack of belief.
It is not a belief, it is not a system. It is a simple single notion: I do not believe in that invisible magical god thing.

Theists are most often atheists themselves as far as gods of competing religions are concerned.
Theists have no problem at all to think rationally about god claims of other, competing religions.
They just do not apply that rationality to their own outrageous supernatural claims.

Having said that: there are atheists who do claim that there are no gods. Atheists make mistakes too.
Personally I strongly believe that there are no gods at all, but that is not a knowledge claim that I would ever make.
Because if I did I would sink to the same level as the theists.

This is where I'm left a bit unconvinced. The way I'm seeing it is Atheism is a lack of belief in theistic doctrines. The reason I choose ignorance or indifference as the default position is because when presented with the idea of deities you've yet to go with belief or disbelief. From that decision you are either a theist or atheist. How can someone be an proclaimed atheist (lack of belief in theism) without first knowing of the idea of god(s) and then concluding against it?

 

[Iskariot]

Attempts to participate in the community have generally been met with toxicity and elitism. I may be ignorant here because I've chosen to not engage with people who treat atheism like a dogma (not you) in the same way my former priests have.

I agree about the toxicity.
That is why I dropped out a few years ago.

For those reasons, I align with Humanists.

I very often call myself a non-believer to avoid all the misconceptions associated with the word atheist.

This is where I'm left a bit unconvinced. The way I'm seeing it is Atheism is a lack of belief in theistic doctrines.

It is not about the doctrines as such. It is a much more basic lack of belief.
Someone tells you that he believes in the existence of pink-flying-elephants. He is a pink-flying-elephantist.
You say you do not believe in them (because he has no convincing evidence to support his believe). You are an a-pink-flying-elephantist.
That is all there is to it.

Theistic doctrines are a step further. Atheists don't ever need to go there at all. Everything ends at the basic rejection of the theistic god claim. All theistic doctrines become pointless fantasy after that.

The reason I choose ignorance or indifference as the default position because when presented with the idea of deities you've yet to go with belief or disbelief. From that decision you are either a theist or atheist. How can someone be an proclaimed atheist (lack of belief in theism) without first knowing of religion and then concluding against it?

Well you can always formulate your personal definitions, but that will cause confusion.

And someone who is ignorant or indifferent is by definition an atheist too, because he obviously does not believe in a theistic god at that stage.
I know several people who were not brought up in theism and never even considered the topic until they met me. Being an ex-christian I did not even know something like that existed .
These people were completely ignorant about the topic and had very little to say about it except that they had no belief in any god type things.
They did not believe in a god however and were therefore atheists by default.
You do not have to actively reject a god claim to be an a-theist.
It is enough to not believe in such magical god beings without ever wasting any more thoughts on the subject.
They were non believers just as I am, but for very different reasons.

My atheist position is a much stronger one, because I was brought up in a very religious community and I really had to think about the subject and actively free myself from religious indoctrination and irrationality. That is why I have strong opinions about the subject and might under certain circumstances even call myself an anti-theist.

 

[Arry]

I believe that if I don't get on my mat, face Sol and pay homage to the Goddess of Minions; at least once a day. The NPCs will come and get me.

 

[Don Alvarez]

I believe that if I don't get on my mat, face Sol and pay homage to the Goddess of Minions; at least once a day. The NPCs will come and get me.

Don't forget to also turn toward the engineer stars of the Cosmos at night, and offer sacrifices to the RNGods.

 

[Adept]

I just have an issue with the terminiology.

It is a negative belief opposed to the positive belief

In my eyes, that is believing in something. Believing that the evidence is sound and leads to the conclusion that there is no god.

Evidence is nothing if no one believes it, no matter how logically ironclad it might be towards a particular conlusion.

Further, the definition quoted says it is one who denies existence of a supreme being. Denial requires belief in or acceptance of some position or argument.

A society must buy into to science, we must be convinced to believe that what science produces is true. We must believe that the evidence is true and not manufactured.


I guess my point is...never assume moral or logical authority. You are a flawed human just like me. We all need a little convincing

But here's the thing. A scientist will not say something is 100% true, in general. The very essence of the scientific world view is that every theory is tested by new evidence. The weight of evidence is massive in this case, and there is nothing in the observed universe that would reauire a literal god particle or prime mover.

But Atheism is not an ironclad "I can prove there is no god" claim, at least not from a scientific point of view. It also doesn't need to be. God is like Russel's Teacup (sorry if I remember this one wrong). We don't know for certain that there isn't a giant teacup orbiting around Jupiter, but it's so unlikely that we can safely ignore the possibility.

If we find evidence of such a teacup, then it's time to figure out how that came to be. If we find evidence of the supernatural, then we'll figure out what is going on. So far there's no such evidence.

- - - Updated - - -

psychics, math and chemistry, but the lesson works for all).

Epic typo that

 

[Boomer Kay]

Epic typo that

Lol.
Bear with me, I'm not allowed to wear my tinfoil cooling hat at the office.

(at least it wasn't psyChicks - my usual misfire when talking about ESP )

 

[Boomer Kay]

"... who touch an elephant to learn what it is like."

That's what they claimed.
That's what they always claim.
[squeeeee]