Atheism the Belief

[RootsBooster]

I am unable to form an opinion on the location of your dog (or indeed if you even have a dog). I suppose you could say that I don't believe it is in any particular location, since I have no data.

There you go, you do not hold the belief that my dog is next to me, in your case because you simply don't have enough information to form such a belief. That doesn't mean that you believe my dog is not next to me (which would be a different belief).

Atheism of course does not mean a lack of belief, an inability to form an opinion.

It's an absence of belief, the "why", the reason behind it is irrelevant. It can be because you haven't been convinced, it can be because you hold the opposing belief that there are no gods, it can be because you've never really given the matter any series consideration and remained without belief since birth, it can be for whatever reason.

The only thing that matters is, if you are currently without belief in any gods, you are an atheist.

 

That's more akin to agnosticism

Although commonly misused as an "unsure" position, that's not what agnosticism is.

 

Atheism is a disbelief in a god, which obviously also means a lack of belief in god. Disbelief always encompasses lack of belief.

 

We're using quite a few different words here, all with slight variations. This happened back around post #110.

 

-Lack of belief is not necessarily an absolute, you can lack something in various quantities without it being totally absent. For this reason I don't use the term because it can lead to confusion in discussion/debate.

 

-Disbelief, if you interpret it as a refusal to believe, still does not mean that you have to believe in the opposite. It can simply mean "no, that's not convincing enough, away with thee and come back when you got summin' better".

This would be an absolute, you would be without that specific belief.

 

-Absence of belief is an absolute, it means that you are without that specific belief (for whatever reason). Importantly though, it does not mean that you have to hold an opposing belief.

 

A binary state means that there are two options only. Something is either there or it is not. There is no "neither".

 

With the question of belief it (belief A) is either there or it is not. If it is not there, then it may be replaced with another belief (belief B, belief C, belief D, etc). To say that you can hold neither position (neither have belief A or NOT have belief A) is false logic.

 

---------- Post added 29-09-2015 at 13:39 ----------

 

It presumes you can give an answer. For a binary question you can always answer, Yes, No or Don't know....

 

---------- Post added 29-09-2015 at 13:35 ----------

 

 

What if you were unsure? I personally would answer that one as "no I don't believe" as if I was unsure I couldn't say with all certainty I believed, ergo I don't.

 

A lapsed Christian who used to believe and is having doubts would probably prefer to answer "yes" until they were certain they didn't believe. It is all subject to human foibles in the end.

 

Well a belief is something you're convinced of. If you haven't been convinced, you don't believe. Binary.

[Cyclone]

You could argue that saying "I don't know" is not answering the question.

[Phanerothyme]

Atheists trying to arrive at a definition of belief. Love it.

[Obelix]

You could argue that saying "I don't know" is not answering the question.

 

It's a perfectly valid answer to a question - it just doesn't impart any useful information of course...

 

In formal logic such an answer naturally isn't permitted.

[Cyclone]

 

A binary state means that there are two options only. Something is either there or it is not. There is no "neither".

 

And that is the case with dieties. If you don't believe they are they, you believe they are not there. Unless you don't form an opinion, in which case you are not an atheist.

 

---------- Post added 29-09-2015 at 13:47 ----------

 

It's a perfectly valid answer to a question - it just doesn't impart any useful information of course...

 

In formal logic such an answer naturally isn't permitted.

 

It's a valid conversational thing to say in answer to a question, but it isn't an answer to the question.

[RootsBooster]

And that is the case with dieties. If you don't believe they are they, you believe they are not there. Unless you don't form an opinion, in which case you are not an atheist.

We're not talking about the binary state of dieties though, I can see how it could be confusing.

 

We're talking about the binary state of the specific belief in deities. The specific belief is either present or it is not. If it is not present, an opposing belief may be held in its place.

[billycee]

Atheists and Christians should get along fine...my mum and dad married each other, classic case of differing beliefs.

[RootsBooster]

Atheists trying to arrive at a definition of belief. Love it.

NO!

 

Absence of belief

[Cyclone]

We're not talking about the binary state of dieties though, I can see how it could be confusing.

 

We're talking about the binary state of the specific belief in deities. The specific belief is either present or it is not. If it is not present, an opposing belief may be held in its place.

 

Atheism is not a lack of belief, it's disbelief. It's a positive position held that deities do not exist, and answer to the question "do deities exist?" in the negative.

 

Otherwise you might as well describe my dog as atheist since he isn't capable of understanding the question and thus doesn't have belief.

[RootsBooster]

Atheism is not a lack of belief, it's disbelief. It's a positive position held that deities do not exist, and answer to the question "do deities exist?" in the negative.

Couple of things...

 

1. In post #110 you pretty much said disbelief and lack of belief are the same thing.

 

2. Lack of belief isn't an absolute, it can mean you have very weak belief. Continuing to use this term when debating the finer details only muddies the waters. Would you be happy for us to both use "absence of belief" instead?

 

3. What makes you think that the position of atheism is the specific belief that gods certainly don't exist? What's your source for this?

 

 

Otherwise you might as well describe my dog as atheist since he isn't capable of understanding the question and thus doesn't have belief.

Atheism is a term used for humans, in the same way you (hopefully) don't apply dog terms to humanity and call female humans bitches.

 

There's nothing to stop you calling your dog an atheist though, if it meets the definition.

Edited September 29, 2015 by RootsBooster