Is atheism a belief?

[The Grand Nudger]

That's all any of our explanations for anything are, but okay. Searching for a level of certainty that doesn't exist in a manner that depends on rejecting those things we do know is pointless.

[bennyboy]

That's all any of our explanations for anything are, but okay.  Searching for a level of certainty that doesn't exist in a manner that depends on rejecting those things we do know is pointless.

It seems you may have skipped Grandizer's comment and you were responding to mine?

If so, then I'd agree with you.  That's why I say "I don't know" rather than "I don't know yet," and why my belief in a panpsychic Universe-god will probably never go beyond a state of conditional superposition.

[The Grand Nudger]

By the metric of impossible certainty you don't know anything.

[Belacqua]

Atheism is not a belief, positive or negative. Just like someone who knows that the earth is round does not merely believe that the earth is round.

Well, the shape of the earth is pretty hard for reasonable people to deny. (Though I know that there are currently unreasonable people who do so.) 

As so often in discussions like these, we end up getting fuzzy about what "belief" and "knowledge" mean. 

So for example, a Christian can say he knows that there is a God, because as far as he's concerned there is indisputable evidence. (revelation, authority, tradition, logical arguments in natural theology and metaphysics) 

You and I would say he merely believes there is a God, because we think his evidence is bad. 

But you see the problem here: the words end up being defined by what we think constitutes good evidence. 

That's why in philosophy the standard definition of knowledge is as a subset of belief. A belief is anything we hold to be true, and knowledge is stuff we hold to be true that are also justified and (really are) true. 

It may well be that things we are well justified in believing turn out in the long run not to be true. For example, for a long time doctors had good reason to say that stomach ulcers are caused by stress. Then somebody discovered h. pylori, or whatever that bug is called, and it turned out that what they thought was knowledge was actually belief. They believed it entirely in good faith, but oops, they had to change their minds. 

Naturally, we are very very well justified in believing certain things (e.g the shape of the earth, evolution) and I have no hesitation in calling them knowledge. But they are still that subset of things I believe which are also (I'm quite sure) true. 

I might take a look at some claim made by theologians, such as the idea that the Christian God is much like the Platonic Form of the Good. After some thought, I might conclude that this claim is silly. I would then believe that it's not a persuasive claim, and may be dismissed--to me, I think I know that. A better philosopher than I, however (not difficult to find one) might follow the argument better, and conclude that my reasoning is wrong and what I hold to be knowledge is really belief. And then we would have to fight it out. 

So I guess I'm just not comfortable making this clear distinction between belief and knowledge as if they were wholly different. 

(And for all the picky people out there, I know there are also Gettier cases.)

[bennyboy]

By the metric of impossible certainty you don't know anything.

You have the brain, and its function is experienced by consciousness.  Okay.  What about the brain makes a person with it experience consciousness?

As I said, some things about the brain are unique only to it.  Some things about the brain are ubiquitous throughout the universe.  Saying the brain is the mechanism of human consciousness doesn't help us to resolve my question: at what level of organization does the essence of mind supervene?

This doesn't impose an unreasonable metric.  I ask people who say that know what consciousness to tell me unambiguously what it is and to demonstrate with evidence that they are correct.  Do you know what it is about the brain that allows for consciousness?  Go ahead, and claim your prize.  Until then, you are probably safest not pretending that an unknown thing is anything more than a mystery.

So far, nobody has gone beyond some weak attempt at an evolutionary narrative: "Of COURSE it's the brain. The brain evolved, and of course consciousness gave us an advantage in genetic fitness." Nice story, but it doesn't actually answer the question.

[The Grand Nudger]

You asked why it experienced subjectivity....but the subjectivity part is actually the easiest part to explain.  Your brain is connected to your eyes, not mine.  You know better than to ask me at what level of ability consciousness arises. I'm willing to posit that plants are conscious, even if they aren;t conscious the way that we are. They engage in self aware behavior, after all, which is what we take to be indicative of consciousness in ourselves....objectively.

Still..since you reject the things we know and insist on the unknowable, by your own metrics, you can know nothing.

[Fake Messiah]

Atheism is not a belief, positive or negative. Just like someone who knows that the earth is round does not merely believe that the earth is round.

Well, the shape of the earth is pretty hard for reasonable people to deny. (Though I know that there are currently unreasonable people who do so.) 

As so often in discussions like these, we end up getting fuzzy about what "belief" and "knowledge" mean. 

It is more a thing of a simple observation than a knowledge - just like with round Earth: for instance I observe that there are many highly religious nations with horrible infant mortality rates. Meanwhile, highly secular nations with large percentages of atheists in their populations have very low infant mortality rates. And what is more sincere than a mother's prayer for the health of her baby? You see it's a simple observation.

[Belacqua]

You see it's a simple observation.

The simple observation, if it's remembered and known as a data point, is knowledge or belief. 

I observe that there are many highly religious nations with horrible infant mortality rates.

To connect these two things -- to say that lots of religion is the cause of high infant mortality -- requires analysis and the application of some theory. So while simple observation may be enough to see A and B, determining the extent to which A is the cause of B is more than observation. 

For example, it may be that a low level of education is the cause of both high levels of religion and high infant mortality. So to blame religion based merely on the observation that those two things occur together may be too hasty.

[Fake Messiah]

to say that lots of religion is the cause of high infant mortality -- requires analysis and the application of some theory. So while simple observation may be enough to see A and B, determining the extent to which A is the cause of B is more than observation. 

It's not blaming religion but seeing that religion/ God doesn't work.

[Bucky Ball]