Is Lack of Belief the Best You Can Do?

[pocaracas]

Is Lack of Belief the Best You Can Do?

Yep.... it is the most intellectually honest position.
And yes, I read the tripe on that link...

1. It is possible to prove a negative by demonstrating a logical contradiction

BUZZZZZ wrong! It's not possible to show that an ill-defined non-material thing does not exist.... heck, it's not even possible to show that it does exist.... why are we discussing it?

2. a ‘lack of belief’ isn’t a belief;

Don't care if it is!
I want to believe in as many true things as possible and as little false things as possible. That's it.
In order to believe in something, I require something tangible, in order to avoid believing in false things. Nothing tangible exists for any divinity, hence that proposition is not believed in.

3. that ‘-theism’ (belief) and ‘-gnosticism’ (knowledge) are independent,

ah, yes, they are not entirely independent... hence why knowledge can be simplistically defined as "justified true belief".
But clearly they are not one and the same... gnosticism would require theism. If you know it, you believe in it.
Some people are in that gulf where they believe but are intellectually honest to claim they do not know. That is possible, too.

But what about the contrary?
If you don't believe in it, do you also not know it?
Can you know it's false, hence not believe in it? If it's unfalsifiable, like we said in 1., how can anyone truly know it to be false? I think the people who describe themselves as gnostic atheists are only so towards a limited set of the divine... perhaps to those divinities which are the most described in the literature, those who are clearly products of human design.

4. While it is true that ‘believing X’ and ‘believing not-X’ aren’t the only options, I disagree that the middling position of ‘not believing X’ is a useful definition of atheism.

Well duh. It's one definition of atheism... there are others, but this is the most basic one.
HAHA, but he goes on to the "then dogs are atheists, too" idiocy. This definition applies to thinking rational humans. It's implied when the definition says "a person who denies or disbelieves the existence of a supreme being or beings. "

I wonder.... what political system do dogs follow? Communism? Fascism? Libertarian?
Excuse me for not taking this guy seriously...

5. Etymology of the word....

Oh fuck... don't waste my time!