RE: Atheism's Definition - Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
December 3, 2011 at 9:20 am
(This post was last modified: December 3, 2011 at 9:23 am by lucent.)
Quote:Atheism is the lack of belief in gods based for me on he comlete and total lack of any evidence for them.
Which is why you take the negative position of atheism, that God does not exist. If you don't know either way, you would be an agnostic. There isn't any middle ground between not knowing and not believing. Either you don't know (agnostic) or you don't believe (atheist). If, to the proposition of God, you think it is less likely than not, you have a belief about it. If you have no belief, you don't know.
Quote:would you lucent think that your, (presumed) lack of belief in purple fairies was a 'positive' belief.
Yes, it would be a positive belief. I am reasonably sure there are no purple fairies, therefore I have a belief about it. Whether I can know that for sure is not relevent to the fact that I do have a belief about the existence of fairies.
Quote:You are an afaireist, does this lack of belief in impossible non-exstant things impact your life at all? does it colour your judgement.
Now imagine that you lived in a world wher lots of people believed in purple fairies and they tried to introduce purple fairy friendly laws that intruded in your life.
When huge tracts of TV is taken over with people extolling the purple fairies.
When the fairy believers try to hold back science because they know how everything works, the fairies did it.
It would get fucking annoying quite quickly.
You're conflating the issue. There is no equivilence between the question of God, which has explanatory power, and the question of fairies, which explains absolutely nothing.
Quote:Fortunately I live in a country where religion is of a much milder form than the american or iranian brands but I fear that this world might be dragged into a conflation over who has the best imaginary friend.
It is the number one question on peoples minds, because over 90 percent of the world believes in a higher power. You have to think they're all crazy, but have you ever thought that you're the one who has the abnormal belief?
(December 3, 2011 at 9:00 am)downbeatplumb Wrote: Atheism is the lack of belief in gods based for me on he comlete and total lack of any evidence for them.
would you lucent think that your, (presumed) lack of belief in purple fairies was a 'positive' belief.
You are an afaireist, does this lack of belief in impossible non-exstant things impact your life at all? does it colour your judgement.
Now imagine that you lived in a world wher lots of people believed in purple fairies and they tried to introduce purple fairy friendly laws that intruded in your life.
When huge tracts of TV is taken over with people extolling the purple fairies.
When the fairy believers try to hold back science because they know how everything works, the fairies did it.
It would get fucking annoying quite quickly.
Fortunately I live in a country where religion is of a much milder form than the american or iranian brands but I fear that this world might be dragged into a conflation over who has the best imaginary friend.
(December 3, 2011 at 9:15 am)Ace Otana Wrote: Theists have got to stop trying to redefine atheism.
http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Atheist
Atheists need to stop trying to redefine the definition of atheism. To say you lack a belief in something is a meaningless statement. It is simply an attempt by the atheist to redefine the parameters of the debate and escape any burden of proof for their position.
