RE: My argument for atheism +
December 1, 2019 at 9:21 am
(This post was last modified: December 1, 2019 at 9:26 am by ThinkingIsThinking.)
(November 30, 2019 at 8:56 am)BrianSoddingBoru4 Wrote: And there's more than one version of atheism. If you say 'Arguments are not needed for atheism', the clear implication is that arguments are not need for any version of atheism.
No. If I say 'arguments are not needed for any version of atheism' then I would be saying that arguments are not needed for any version of atheism.
If I say 'arguments are not needed for some versions of atheism' then I would be saying that arguments are not needed for some versions of atheism.
If I merely say, as I did, 'arguments are not needed for atheism' then I could mean either some or all. So it's untrue that I implied all.
And, generally speaking, I'll say 'all' when I mean 'all'. It's not good to assume statements are absolutist when absolutist statements are not being outright made. Otherwise any reasonable person would have to qualify 99% of their statements due to the fact that almost nothing is certain to an absolute degree. And, obviously, nobody talks like that.
If anything, the default assumption should be that I mean 'some' as that is more open-ended-- and I did indeed leave it open-ended as I didn't specify any amount at all (let alone 'all').
