(January 24, 2019 at 8:03 am)Acrobat Wrote: I also previously cited that 1 in 5 self identifying atheists also claim to believe in God.Where is your source for this information? You do realize that that would be like saying, "I have cited that 1 in 5 self-identifying Christians believes in Zeus instead of God." An "atheist" who believes in a god or gods is a paradox. Like a spherical square or saying the Earth is upside-down in space. It's a nonsensical statement. That's like saying, 1 in 5 cats are dogs.
(January 24, 2019 at 8:03 am)Acrobat Wrote: So there’s a lot more than the guy who wrote that book.Wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong. Agnosticism towards the question of god means you do not have knowledge of a god existing. Atheism means you do not have a belief in a god or gods. One can be an agnostic atheist; or an agnostic theist for that matter. Agnostics and atheists are not mutually exclusive. I'm really not sure why this is so hard for you guys to understand. "Agnostic" and "atheist" address two different concepts entirely. Agnostic addresses knowledge, or rather, lack thereof. Atheism addresses belief, or rather, lack thereof. The proper ways to identify oneself when discussing the question of god are as follows:
There are also plenty of agnostic who don’t accept the typical definitions of atheism/agnosticism often presented in places like this, like Neil Tyson, Carl Sagan, Noam Chomsky, Huxley etc...
They define their agnosticism as distinct from atheism.
I hold to this distinction and definition, because the distinction most theists find useful, is between belief and lack of belief, not between knowing and not knowing, which exists in the traditional agnostic/atheist distinction, but not in the newly formulated ones.
If most people here merely lack a belief one way or the other when it’s come to the question of God, they’d fall under the category of agnostic. If they believe God doesn’t exist, they’d fall under the category of atheist.
Gnostic Theist - you know and believe that god exists
Agnostic Theist - you do not know whether or not god exists, but you believe that it does
Gnostic Atheist - you know that god does not exist and you do not believe it exists
Agnostic Atheist - you do not know whether or not god exists and you do not believe it exists either
I mean, how many times can this be explained to you?
I think you find people like Neil deGrasse Tyson are hesitant to label themselves because that's not what they want to be known for. NDT is an astrophysicist and probably wants to focus on astrophysics, not arguing about the existence of a supernatural sky daddy. I would argue that NDT is an agnostic atheist, but I think he describes himself as an agnostic (here he's using the colloquial, non-technical definition of agnostic).
If you're frightened of dying, and you're holding on, you'll see devils tearing your life away. But if you've made your peace, then the devils are really angels, freeing you from the Earth.