(June 25, 2019 at 6:01 am)ignoramus Wrote: Dumb question ... probably just semantics.
Can one be an atheist without understanding the "theist" portion?
Are we all a-jgkrtgkje45o6tu954 -ists?
That’s the question, though, isn’t it?
It seems like in order to be an atheist there has to first exist a theist.
But going by definitions alone atheism doesn’t really have anything to do with theism. Looking at the word you would expect the definition to be “A person who is not a theist”, but that’s not it at all. In that case everyone who didn’t prescribe to a specific religion would be an atheist, but actually some people are deists. The only actual qualification for being an atheist is not having a belief in god. I feel like it’s possible to not believe in a god even if no one else has ever believed in a god.