(April 15, 2015 at 1:08 pm)Faith No More Wrote: Not to turn internet diarrhea into something interesting or anything, but I think lack of belief is still a belief. And here's why...To lack a belief, you have to be unconvinced by the evidence. In other words, you have to believe that the evidence is unconvincing. Even though we do not believe in god, we do so because we believe the evidence is unconvincing.
Really? So what about someone who grew up without ever hearing about religion, god, or evidence for, or against those? Surely - they would not have a belief in god, because that's not something anyone is born with. And the strength of evidence would be completely irrelevant. Would you say they "believe" there's no god, even if they don't have the concept of "god"?
Just because some f***-wits decided to make up some sh*t and inform me about it at some point, means now I have to make up another "ideology", in order to reject it? That's not logical. What can be asserted without proof can be rejected without proof, as Hitchens stated.
What if I say - I am God Almighty and you all need to bow down to me? Is your lack of belief in my godliness just another ideology? And if some fool decides to obey me - does that put him/her on equal ground with rationally thinking people, who'd reject my proposition out of hand? I think not.
Everything any one of us knows is a "belief", if you want to put it that way. Which makes the word "belief" useless. If we're going to call lack of belief a belief, then we need to find a new word for what gullible people do when they blindly accept without proof anything, that happens to be emotionally pleasing for them, or is forced upon them under threat.
"The fact that a believer is happier than a skeptic is no more to the point than the fact that a drunken man is happier than a sober one." - George Bernard Shaw
