what religion/stance am i????

DessieOH wrote: »

just a quick question....


"Atheism is belief that there is no god" << Common Public Definition of Atheism

But....

Its quite hard to explain ... i am a nonbeliever, not an atheist.

• Atheist = Believe that there is no god
• Nonbeliever = Do not believe in god << Thats me... there is quite a difference

And i am not agnostic... I fear that the common misconception of that says i am kinda 50:50 theist and atheist...

So... can anyone define my stance in 1/2 words??
(im basically looking for a Synonym for "nonbeliever")


I will really appreciate this...

You're an atheist. Maybe you don't like the label atheist due to perceived negative connotations of the word 'atheist', but you should realise that any negative connotations are entirely affixed by religious believers e.g. dogmatic, militant, fundamentalist. Atheists are a very broad group of people just as theists are and we all have different opinions on god and religion.

First, let me clear something up: a common misconception about Agnosticism is that it means "I don't know if there is a God". This is incorrect, since according to the inventor of the word (T.H. Huxley), it means that the question is unanswerable i.e. "I can't know if there is a God". Wikipedia has it right, even the Catholic Encyclopaedia has it right, and I don't get why this misconception persists. I guess it's down to people not wanting to call themselves atheists, even when it is the right word for what they think. "Agnostic" sounds "nicer", eh?

So, you don't believe in "God" or gods, but you're not prepared to claim that there are no gods out there somewhere. You don't know whether there is or not, but that doesn't help you pick a label, since no-one knows the answer, do they? Some claim to know, but you're not one of them ... I've heard your position termed "weak atheism", and it is by far the most common position among atheists today.

It is rare these days to find someone who claims to know the answer to the question (of the existence of gods), and really thinks "there are definitely no gods". That is well-known as a logical fallacy. Here's why: to categorically state that something can not or does not exist, at any time, is to claim knowledge about everything, everywhere, at every time, past and future. Or, as some say, "absence of proof is not proof of absence". (Yet you still see theists today trotting this fallacy out, and thinking that they've somehow "broken" atheism: sorry, we're way ahead of you on this one. )

So, where did this "atheists believe there is no God" definition come from? Well, some atheists in the past did say that, I suppose - I could not logically claim that no-one ever did that! The other sources are clergy (i.e. biased sources) dictionaries, almanacs, encyclopaedias, all the places where common folk went to get information. Who do you think wrote those definitions: actual atheists? Dictionaries and encyclopaedias are not set in stone: they can be wrong, and they can be fixed.

Even the Catholic Encyclopaedia, where you would expect to find a dogmatic opposition to atheism, seriously doubts the "atheists believe there are no gods" claim:

The most trenchant form which atheism could take would be the positive and dogmatic denial existence of any spiritual and extra-mundane First Cause. This is sometimes known as dogmatic, or positive theoretic, atheism; though it may be doubted whether such a system has ever been, or could ever possibly be seriously maintained. Certainly Bacon and Dr. Arnold voice the common judgment of thinking men when they express a doubt as to the existence of an atheist belonging to such a school.

...

A second form in which atheism may be held and taught, as indeed it has been, is based either upon the lack of physical data for theism or upon the limited nature of the intelligence of man. This second form may be described as a negative theoretic atheism; and may be furthur viewed as cosmological or psychological, according as it is motived, on the one hand, by a consideration of the paucity of actual data available for the arguments proving the existence of a super-sensible and spiritual God, or, what amounts to the same thing, the attributing of all cosmic change and development to the self-contained potentialities of an eternal matter; or, on the other hand, by an empiric or theoretic estimate of the powers of reason working upon the data furnished by sense-perception.

So, whenever you hear "atheists are certain there are no gods", you can dismiss that as ignorance of the details as understood today, or deliberate misrepresentation with an agenda behind it. Pick any atheist writer today - Hitchens, Harris, Dawkins, Myers, whoever - and try and find somewhere where they have said such a thing. Dawkins actually makes a point of rating himself as a 6 on a scale of 7, where a 7 would be that kind of "dogmatic atheism" he is sometimes accused of.

Me, I just ignore it, just as I ignore anyone who still thinks it's witty to use religious terminology to describe the non-religious. You know, "acolytes of Atheist High Priest Dawkins" or other claptrap. It's old and boring, it's not smart and it's not funny, so you may as well drop it. :rolleyes:

Theists don't believe there isn't a God...

Omg my head hurts.

Although i do see where the op is coming from.

I don't see why there has to be a name for everything. Each person may subscribe to their own personal belief.

This i can see true is christianity too as not all christians share common beliefs and interpret the bible how they see it. A quote can be read in so many different ways by each individual. Only the source of that quote truly understands what it means.

DessieOH wrote: »

Avampirist= one who believes there is no vampires
Yet i cannot commit myself to saying somthing like that so rather i would
say i am "one who does not believe in vampires". It releases that commitment.

There is no difference between these things.

i think its easier to understand if you replace the word belief with faith.

I think this is the real source of your confusion. Belief and faith are extremely different things, that's why they have different words.

Faith: Belief in the absence of/or contrary to evidence. Or to put it in terms theists may prefer; Belief based on personal/subjective experience rather than objective.

Belief: Can be reasoned ("I believe in gravity because it is experimentally demonstrable" or "I do not believe vampires exist due to lack of evidence and the historical origins of the myth") or they can be irrational ("I'm superman!" or "Sentient super beings constantly interfere in the workings of my life")

Faith is a type of belief. It is not the same thing as belief. I have many beliefs, I have no faith. I believe there is no God, this does not mean I have faith that there is no God.

DessieOH wrote: »

thanks everybody....

well i suppose i could always use atheist ... and if faced with the argument that i am myself commiting faith that there is no god i could simply define my atheism as a lack of belief rather that a belief in no god...

Thats what all atheism is. It's just splitting hairs to say that there's a difference.