Atheism is a religion

[Mister Agenda]

If thy dictionary offend thee, pluck it out and go some place where they don't care if you make up your own meanings for words.

many words have multiple definitions. Definitions are often different depending on which dictionary you use. Until I understand a concept, I try to stick with the dictionary. Once I get it, I define it myself.

Good luck with that.

A definition can't commit a fallacy. If I define bleck as the very definition of the fallacy of invincible ignorance, that does not mean the definition commits that fallacy. What's committed is those of us who are agnostic or weak atheists saying 'we don't believe in any God or gods' and you finding passive-aggressive ways to say we're all liars without actually coming out and saying so.

I get what you are getting at, but I stick with my original statement. You cant "lack belief" in something you have formed thoughts about. That atheists "lack belief in God or gods" commits the fallacy of invincible ignorance. I'll give you this: the definition by itself does not commit the fallacy, anytime an someone uses that definition in response to a question about what atheism is, the person is committing the fallacy.

I think you can reasonably say 'you can't lack beliefs about something you have thought about. To say you can't lack belief in something you've thought about is nonsense. I've thought about Sherlock Holmes, I have beliefs about Sherlock Holmes, but that in no way means I believe in Sherlock Holmes. And invincible ignorance is ignoring evidence and rejecting arguments no matter what. Saying I lack belief in something is a report of my internal state. Invincible ignorance isn't even properly a fallacy, when you accuse someone of invincible ignorance you are presuming that you understand the arguments and know the evidence and have presented them in such a way that no reasonable person could possibly reject them, so you conclude they can't be convinced because of some flaw on their part, while rejecting the notion that you are the one who might actually be wrong. It's basically a cheap shot to take at someone when you can't win an argument.

I have knowledge of that word: which letters compose it, what order they're in, and so forth. I have no beliefs (or idea) of what the word is supposed to mean or if it correlates to anything real. I don't know if you made it up or if you got it somewhere else. I don't know if a meaning has already been assigned, if you plan to make one up, or if it hasn't been defined, if you plan on letting it remain so. I completely lack a belief regarding whether or not anything it may refer to is real.

Words have no meaning beyond that which we personally ascribe them, they are simply constructs of language. If you go up to someone who speaks a different language and start talking they will not understand you. Nevertheless, they will be forced to form beliefs. probably that you are trying to communicate with them. Complete knowledge of anything is beyond our comprehension. We ONLY have beliefs about things, no actual knowledge. If I ask you to prove something exists, anything, you would not be able to do it. You could have all the evidence in the world and yet you could not prove something to 100% certainty. We start with axioms which we assume to be true but can not prove, say "reality exists" we build off that. When you say "knowledge" I hear "belief" the fact that many of us share the same believes does not automatically make them true.

What you're arguing about here: it's not what we're disagreeing about.

And let's be clear: the Abrahamic God is clearly the result of generations of a game of 'my god is better than yours'. It's a ridiculous pile of omnis that contradict each other and can't possibly exist. But it's possible some other version of God may exist or some 'small g' god exists; although I think it's unlikely I don't set the probability at zero. I'm an agnostic atheist because I don't rule out the possibilty of some sort of god (although I lack belief in any); but I'm a 'gnostic' atheist toward versions of God that are self-contradictory or contradict observable reality. And speaking of forming beliefs about strings of letters, I question whether a word like God that seems to have hundreds of definitions which many proponents shift freely to suit their arguments can meaningfully be said to actually have a definition.

"the Abrahamic God" , or "Allah", or "Yahweh", or "Odin" or "Zeus" have no inherent meaning to them beyond that which we ascribe them. If God exists, God exists independently of our beliefs about what that God is. That people have made up many definitions for God is simply human nature and our need to understand and label things. God is incomprehensible. That someone would assume to know God's will is travesty. Although the attempt to know God is nobel, many people are not.

How do you conclude attempting to know God is noble after noting that God is incomprehensible and claiming to know God's will is worse? The rest I grant, while noting we have much less trouble agreeing on defintions of entities that can be demonstrated to exist.

Sure. What I believe about any God or god I've heard of is that belief in it's existence is unjustified by logic or evidence, even if it's possible that it really does exist. My belief about the Abrahamic God based on his most commonly-ascribed attributes is that he doesn't exist. Your version of God isn't the only one, even many of your co-religionists don't mind throwing that version under the bus if another is more defensible. I'm reminded of a debate I attended on whether the God of the Bible exists. The proponent never even attempted to prove more than an ill-defined creator God. I believe the Abrahamic God doesn't exist. I don't believe the Deist God does exist. An atheist is someone who doesn't believe any God or god exists. We can have all kinds of other beliefs. We can even believe God doesn't exist, but it's not required, anymore than theists are required to never have doubts that God exists

I might stop here because I think the crux of our are disagreement begins with the axiom which we base our knowledge on. It seems that you start from a point of "things are real because they are" whereas I start from "I percieve".

I would say that I start from the axiom that what I perceive really exists, although my perception has flaws and limits.

From your starting point a conclusion that God exists is near impossible to prove whereas that conclusion is an inevitability from my starting point. You need proof that the things we observe through your conscious perception are true, yet for some reason the statement that your perceptions are inherently true is assumed without proof.

Proof that reality exists is impossible, but it's useless to proceed as if it doesn't.

There is no evidence that our conscious perceptions of reality are real. The axiom is circular reasoning.

I think I'll need to add 'circular reasoning' to the list of terms you use that you don't understand. It's an axiom, a starting point, you don't reason your way up to an axiom, you reason your way down to it and admit you can't drill down any farther and still have a useful framework.

Starting from, "I percieve", however, no assumptions are initially made beyond the assumption that I am perceiving things.

Of course when you do it, it's not circular reasoning.

From there my belief in reality is based on a belief, not knowledge, that my perceptions and observations are real.

I don't know if my perceptions are real, either. I'm just afraid I'll come to a bad end if I behave as though they're not.

If perceptions are real consciousness must be real.

No, if perceptions are real, perceptions are real. They don't make consciousness real. That's an additional assumption. I happen to agree with it because I perceive myself to be conscious and I've already decided to accept it as axiomatic that my perceptions refer to something real. I also acknowledge that my perceptions certainly don't reflect reality perfectly. Some people make a case that consciousness is an illusion and I know for a fact that my perceptions can be fooled by illusions. So, I can't conclude that because I perceive consciousness, it is real. You can if you want, but it's a fallacy because it doesn't necessarily follow from the premise.

If consciousness is real it must exist independently of my ideas about it.

Sure.

The only things we believe exist independently of our ideas about them are those forces which created and bind all things in the universe and the universe itself. If consciousness is a force that is responsible for the creation of the universe it can be called "God".

And then you wander out into space. There's no reason to think a consciousness can exist without a brain. It's a brain function, you can switch consciousness off like a light by interfering with communication between certain parts of the brain. I believe apples exist independently of my ideas about them, that doesn't make them one of the "forces which created and bind all things in the universe and the universe itself." Consciousness is not a force, it is the state of being aware and being aware that you're aware. "If consciousness is a force that is responsible for the creation of the universe it can be called "God"": that's one of the biggest 'ifs' I've ever seen. What I'm saying is that you seem to think you can derive 'God' from 'I perceive'. If so you haven't been able to express it in terms of conclusions that must follow from your premises, you just pile more premises on top of your original one.

I honestly believe that "I percieve" is the only logical assumption one can make. It is the only thing one is capable of "knowing". Everything else requires belief.

Sure, and if it helps you feel calmer, I am happy to say I believe reality is real.

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Your right Master, it is aggravating to me hear someone say that they lack any beliefs about something they are aware of. It doesnt compute with me. It honestly seems like such a obvious reality that how someone can hold the belief that they "lack belief" in thins they are aware of is somehow offensive. You, however, are not. I really do enjoy discussing with you, you are one of a select few on here who actually consider anything I say. So I thank you for that.

So why are you aggravated? No one is saying they lack any beliefs about something they are aware of. We're just saying we lack one specific belief: that a particular thing that you claim to exist actually exists. I think if you really had a valid point you wouldn't have to repeatedly wander off to 'doesn't believe in anything' and 'has no beliefs about'. We don't believe in God. It's a simple phrase that can't reasonably be translated as 'We don't believe in anything' or 'We have no beliefs about God as a concept'.

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Doublet:
The fallacy has nothing to do with what atheists think about God, it has to do with the statement that they "lack belief". It isn't that they don't belief God "exists", it's that the are aware of an idea called "God" yet somehow "lack" any belief in it.

If I ask you, what is "bocephilitus"? And you say, "I have no idea, a word you just made up I guess", you have just made multiple statements of your belief in "bocephilitus"
1. You don't know what it is
2. A word
3. Something I made up

To the state that you lack belief in it commits the fallacy of invincible ignorance. The very fact that I said the word and you heard it forces you to form a belief about it.

If I say, "don't think about a white elephant" and you say you didn't... Invincible ignorance.

Stating I lack belief in something is a report on my internal state. It is not a rejection of arguments without considering them. Rejecting of arguments without conidering them, basically refusing to actually argue, is what invincible ignorance is. Telling you what we believe or don't believe is not invincible ignorance. Neither is telling you that we didn't think about the white elephant: that is self-contradiction, not invincible ignorance. If I said that, you could point out that I would have had to think about the white elephant in order to conclude I didn't think about it, and I would have to say something like 'oh, yeah, I guess I did think of it, after all. This is what happens when you decide to ditch your dictionary prematurely. And another thing: what a piss-poor analogy! Of course that's the only kind you can provide, since a good analogy destroys your point: If I say I lack a belief that Achilles was a real person, there's no 'gotcha' for you. Maybe there was an Achilles who was a great Greek warrior whose life and abilities were considerably embellished. I don't believe there was a 'real' Achilles. But there could have been, so I also don't believe there never was a 'real' Achilles. I lack both beliefs. And similar to my position on God, I do believe there was never an Achilles with magical invulnerability while not believing there wasn't a less unlikely Achilles while still not believing there was one. And since you're so good at distinguishing between knowledge and belief when I use those words, I expect that you won't be confused that not knowing and not believing aren't the same thing.