(July 16, 2015 at 6:57 pm)Statler Waldorf Wrote: Disbelief is not the same thing as "lack of belief", it's an actual refusal to believe. Secondly, why did you not use an actual philosophical reference? Could it be that they do not agree with you?
Atheism is a word, word dictionaries describe the meanings of words as they are currently used. Why would I look in a specialty dictionary to define a commonly used word?
Quote:There is, unfortunately, some disagreement about the definition of atheism. It is interesting to note that most of that disagreement comes from theists - atheists themselves tend to agree on what atheism means. Christians in particular dispute the definition used by atheists and insist that atheism means something very different.
The broader, and more common, understanding of atheism among atheists is quite simply "not believing in any gods." No claims or denials are made - an atheist is just a person who does not happen to be a theist.
Sometimes this broader understanding is called "weak" or "implicit" atheism. Most good, complete dictionaries readily support this.
There also exists a narrower sort of atheism, sometimes called "strong" or "explicit" atheism. With this type, the atheist explicitly denies the existence of any gods making a strong claim which will deserve support at some point. Some atheists do this and others may do this with regards to certain specific gods but not with others. Thus, a person may lack belief in one god, but deny the existence of another god.
http://atheism.about.com/od/definitionof...nition.htm
If there is a god, I want to believe that there is a god. If there is not a god, I want to believe that there is no god.