Why Something Rather Than Nothing?

[Mister Agenda]

First thing that comes up when I Google 'definition of atheist':

a·the·ist/ˈāTHēəst/
noun
a person who disbelieves or lacks belief in the existence of God or gods.

Nothing in there about denying. How are we supposed to believe in something if we not only don't know it exists, but don't know what it's supposed to be? YOU propose your particular God out of the potential infinity of imaginable Gods, and then we evaluate your claim.

Suppose a certain Smith approaches you and tells you that by "God" he means "dog." Would you still disbelieve in the existence of Smith's god?

If I had known you were a Humpty Dumpty-ist, I'd not have engaged with you in the first place. I do speak your language, though: Blorgle smark letckin drup.

And if not, then you are no longer an atheist, because you now believe in the existence of at least one god.

As much as someone who is apolitical becomes political if you define politics as breathing, I suppose.

That's a start, but in order to say "I don't know if God exists," you still need to understand the meaning of the term "God."

If it can mean 'a dog', it can mean anything. And if it can mean anything, it doesn't really have a meaning at all.

If you think the Christian conception of God has no reference, yet still remain an agnostic, then you need at least one different conception of God of whose existence you are unsure.

That would be any god that isn't contradictory to itself or observation.

---

Defining ones terms is not a cheap trick. It is good rhetoric.

I'm good with datc's definition of god as whatever he or she wants it to be for the purpose of winning arguments. Nothing like having the loyal opposition render their position meaningless for you.

---

Yes, congratulations: if you strip all the pertinent words in a definition of any meaning, and then add on whatever meaning is convenient to your petty little games, then you can make anything mean anything, and thus apply any label to anyone.

You must be very proud of your cheap rhetorical trick.

This is not a trick. It's a reductio ad absurdum of Mister Agenda who wrote:

YOU propose your particular God out of the potential infinity of imaginable Gods, and then we evaluate your claim.

I did just that, and look at the results. Unpleasant, wasn't it?

It certainly was. Given the chance to explain what YOU meant by 'God', you brought up a dog. You mentioned someone named Smith, but I can only assume that you're really talking about yourself, and that you consider your dog to be God. I never dreamt you would respond with that level of idiocy, I really rather thought you would define what you mean by God...but now I hope you didn't, else you're the sort who might kill people their dog tells them to, and that hasn't worked out well for others, historically speaking.

There is in philosophy a distinction of vast importance: between meaning and reference. At the very least, meaning is ideal, in the mind; reference is real, out there. Consider a word "dog." It has a meaning, "a highly variable domestic mammal closely related to the gray wolf." And a reference, in fact, numerous references, as there are many dogs existing.

Now think of "unicorn." It also has a meaning: "a mythical animal generally depicted with the body and head of a horse, the hind legs of a stag, the tail of a lion, and a single horn in the middle of the forehead." But it has no reference! There are no unicorns out there, despite the fact that the term "unicorn" is perfectly well-defined.

Thus, the term "Morning Star" differs in meaning from the term "Evening Star," yet they pick out the same reference or object in the real world: planet Venus.

In order to call yourself an atheist meaningfully, you need a small number of definite and well-developed concepts of God or meanings of the term "God" for which you deny there is a reference, i.e., which you deny exist.

As I said, most of us don't deny that any exist. We're just not aware of any good reason to think that any do. Just like unicorns. But there's always a joker who will say something like; "Unicorns are real, they're rhinoceroses!" You're that joker, not someone who actually has something meaningful to discuss.

And I provided a definition and asked if and how yours differed. You went with 'God is a dog'. Have fun with that. I expect you'll be stuck with it for a while.

---

A theist needs to have a definite concept of God in whose existence he believes.

It would be silly for them to believe in something if even they don't know what they mean by it.

But an atheist, I presume, is not a machine built for shooting down random theistic concepts of God.

He is a human being.

You say so, but you don't speak to me as though you really believe it's true.

As a result, he can't just sit there waiting for a random theist to inform him of his personal idea of God (which may well be "dog") and then get all excited and try to refute it.

Because theists can mean anything they want by 'God', as you've illustrated, the word 'God' no longer really has any meaning at all. It's like saying 'I believe in Glupbummer, do you believe Glupbummer is real, too?' No, I don't. It might turn out that the definition of Glupbummer is something I believe in, but I can't know it until I know what you mean by 'Glupbummer'. I can't believe in Glupbummer until I know what it is. To disbelieve something is to not believe it. You want to put us in the position of the theist who believes in God without knowing what they mean by the word 'God'. If it's even silly for theists to believe in God without knowing what they mean by it, how is it supposed to be rational for atheists to do the same thing?

The atheist is not spared the necessity of coming up with his own full-featured worldview.

That's true. But atheism is not that world-view, at most it can just be a component of it. The same is true of theism.

He must know what he believes and what he does not believe. He needs to articulate for himself a finite personally significant number of concepts of God and prove that none of those exist in reality.

There is no finite list of meanings for the word God, because it means different things depending on who is doing the talking. It has little real meaning of its own: none really, if 'my dog' is in the running as a definition. It's a nonsense word until you define it. Atheists aren't the ones who made it a nonsense word either, theists have managed that trick on their own. I'd have been happy to go with :

God/ɡäd/
noun
1.(in Christianity and other monotheistic religions) the creator and ruler of the universe and source of all moral authority; the supreme being.
2.(in certain other religions) a superhuman being or spirit worshiped as having power over nature or human fortunes; a deity.

I have no idea why that defintion is a problem for you, but at least I tried.

The burden of proof is on both of us.

The burden of proof is on the one who doesn't believe in Glupbummer? You're a riot.

---

We recently did a thread on synthetic life and how it demonstrates lineages of life can come into existence as the products of intellects. There is no demonstration that lineages of life can come into existence via some natural process.....yet you atheists still believe it does.

Claiming that atheistic world views are free from assertions is wrong.

That was an interesting thread. I expect the experience of learning how different artificial life forms will be from the 'wild' ones will have the opposite effect that you predict.

---

Definition.
"Abiogenesis is the natural process of life arising from non-living matter such as simple organic compounds"

If you actually follow the link and read, you'll see your statement is flatly wrong.

I have read tons about abiogenesis. It hasn't been shown to be true. It has never been observed. Yet it is believed as fact by atheists everywhere.

I don't believe it as a fact. Q.E.D.