RE: What is Your Approach?
August 8, 2013 at 2:38 pm
(This post was last modified: August 8, 2013 at 2:39 pm by bennyboy.)
(August 8, 2013 at 11:00 am)Texas Sailor Wrote:(August 8, 2013 at 10:50 am)bennyboy Wrote: And remember, Locke, my beagle is an atheist, too, because he lacks a belief in any God/gods. Thank God for that, because if God is real, poor Victor is going to hell for what he was doing to my pillow this morning!
Actually, the suffix (-ist) denotes a person. Plus, everyone knows that all dogs go to heaven anyway.
-ist
a suffix of nouns, often corresponding to verbs ending in -ize or nouns ending in -ism, that denote a person who practices or is concerned with something, or holds certain principles, doctrines, etc.: apologist; dramatist; machinist; novelist; realist; socialist; Thomist.
Dictionary.com
"atheist" is actually a ternary form, and is ambiguous: a + the(os) + ist
1) a + theist (not a person who ascribes to the idea of "God")
2) athe(os) + ist (one who ascribes to the idea of "not God")
(1) is often referred to as soft atheism, and (2) as hard atheism. Most atheists these days, I think, are soft atheists, because why bother trying to prove a negative position when it's easier to make the guy telling fairy tales take the BOP?
