(October 28, 2010 at 5:55 pm)Paul the Human Wrote: Um. No it isn't. It is a lack of belief in the claims that a god exists. Some atheists claim agnosticism and some claim gnosticism, but all atheism is is the lack of belief in deities. There is a difference between "I do not believe in a god" - and - "I believe there are no gods".
Both views are atheistic, because they both entail a lack of belief.
Of course there is a difference between "I do not believe in a god" - and - "I believe there are no gods". Both are legitimate descriptions and definitions of two different kinds of atheism. They may both entail a lack of belief, but one definition of atheism is fundamentally different from the other because it leads to a fundamentally different set of conceptual consequences.
The idea that all the conceptual consequences of one type of atheism can sweep up and obliterate the conceptual consequences of the other is a little bit dictatorial (for want of a better word). And one of the consequences of the position that there is no god is that the existence or not of Jesus is of little importance to the atheist. I am happy to discuss why.
The claiming of "gnostic" atheism has not yet been made compulsory; it remains, of course, voluntary .
