@MyFellowAtheists: How Big an Atheist Are You?

@bobsal u1553115,

bobsal u1553115 wrote:

I'm not an atheist, Frank. I'm a christian.

Okay...and I have not suggested otherwise.

Quote:

In the interest of getting it all out in the open, I am also not 6-3" nor 260#, either. More 5-11" and 230#

I still respect you and read your stuff and vote you up whether I agree with you or not.

When you called me up short for my treatment of George B, I took it to heart. Because as usual, you were right

Thank you.

Quote:

My opinion is that you spike the ball too much when discussing atheism and Christianity. That's all.

I understand that...just as I think you over-do the anti-cop rhetoric in the threads devoted to that. But I would never suggest that you stop doing it. I assume you feel it is necessary and valuable...and I leave it at that.

Respectfully, I think you ought to assume I consider what I am doing both necessary and valuable...and leave it at that.

Quote:

Read my edit on my last post.

I will.

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@Frank Apisa,

Quote:

I think you over-do the anti-cop rhetoric in the threads devoted to that

Nothing I've ever said about the police in general is anti-cop. Even that whatever percentage (10% - 20%- 30%?) of bad cops I don't go over the top. I'm not anti-police. I'm anti-bad policing.

Where I do go over the top is with carpfart, goooeyjohn, oralliar, nononono, BillRm. I won't apologize for that. But I would like to see fewer cops killing unarmed civilians. I guess I won't apologize for that either.

Whether you or I are atheist, pantheist, monotheist, agnostic or followers of the Cosmic Muffin shouldn't cause so much agro is all I'm saying. You are probably one of the sharpest pencils in our little pencil box here, maybe you don't have to intellectually eviscerate those of us not so smart as you?

You were a lawyer, weren't you? Did you ever feel like your cross examination and methods of impeaching the other side's witness ever turn the jury cold to your argument?

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@Frank Apisa,

Frank Apisa wrote:

No it doesn't

Yes it does. It's a matter of elementary logic and standard English usage.

We both agree that the statement, "Frank holds no belief the existence of any gods", is true.
Given the truth of #1, the statement that "Frank disbelieves in any gods" follows under the American Heritage Dictionary's definition of disbelief.
Given the truth of #2, the statement that "Frank disbelieves in OR denies the existence of gods" follows from standard Boolean logic: Applying the logical OR to a true statement and a false statement yields a truth value of TRUE.
Given the truth of #3, the statement that "Frank is an atheist" follows under the American Heritage Dictionary's definition of the term atheism.

To be sure, you might fall back on Olivier's position, "I disagree that this is the meaning of the word 'atheist'". My answer, as in Olivier's case, would be that nobody cares. Words mean what they mean; dictionaries do a better job than anything else to document their meaning. I'm not interested in investigating disagreements between an individual's whim and a reputable dictionary.

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@Thomas,

I see Franks argument here. He's saying that just because he passively doesn't believe in any god, that doesn't mean he is an atheist. He's saying he hasn't seen a god he believes in yet. That makes him more of an agnostic, I suppose. He makes sense to me.

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@Thomas,

So, like, who writes dictionaries?

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@bobsal u1553115,

Got this song for Frank. Please see he gets it:

1 Reply

@bobsal u1553115,

bobsal u1553115 wrote:

I see Franks argument here. He's saying that just because he passively doesn't believe in any god, that doesn't mean he is an atheist. He's saying he hasn't seen a god he believes in yet. That makes him more of an agnostic, I suppose. He makes sense to me.

Frank matches both the dictionary definition of an agnostic and the dictionary definition of an atheist. His mistake is to believe that these definitions are mutually exclusive when they're not.

1 Reply

@ossobuco,

On the matter of cops, I just finished a book that took me, a fastie, a long time, with a big break. (I slow down when interested, sometimes quite a lot, especially if said book is large to hold up when near sleeping. See the books thread later.

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@Frank Apisa,

I was asked to forward this:

I am doing it thinking you won't mind. However if you do:

Don't hate the messenger. When you ask me not to do this again, I will not do this again.

1 Reply

@ossobuco,

ossobuco wrote:

So, like, who writes dictionaries?

People who have professionally researched how the speakers of a language are using the words therein. While their research and professionalism don't make these people infallible, it does make their judgment far superior to the seat-of-the-pants assertions of random individuals in a random internet discussion.

1 Reply

@bobsal u1553115,

Sure thing, not.

And so do people who don't bother to formulate some analysis of distastes for something they never did or now do not believe in. Unless they had a class in philosophy.

1 Reply

@edgarblythe,

Thanks - I missed that one, good.

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@Thomas,

I don't know about whether he fits either definition or not. I thought he was atheist because of an unpleasant(for me) interaction we carried on regarding proving the existence of a god about ten or eleven years ago on Abuzz.

He says he is agnostic. Then I believe him. An atheist makes a positive statement: there is no god. An agnostic says: I haven't seen any god yet.

Atheists mindset is closed. Agnostics whether there is an active search or not require an open mind. Franks says his mind is open but he hasn't seen any god yet. I think that sounds about right to me.

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@ossobuco,

Whatever I did to tick you off, I apologize.

1 Reply

@bobsal u1553115,

What is the problem?

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@Thomas,

I'm not arguing on that. I have loved dictionaries in my time. Especially the Mondidori italian paperback that I turned to shreds and stupidly threw away.
The one I have from the thirties from my parents is different in many ways than dictionaries now.

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@bobsal u1553115,

You didn't tick me off, are you kidding?

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@ossobuco,

Quote:

Some of us have taken it that you're the one who is imposing 'who we are'; I mean, besides Frank.

Forgot that... Frank and I are just RESISTING an attempt to artificially reduce atheism to "soft atheism", ie an absence of belief. We are saying that "hard Atheism" also exists (it was covered by the definition provides by Thomas) and is much more assertive than that. My personal atheism is certainly not well defined by a mere absence of belief.

I suspect that definitions are an area where some posters feel 'safe', and that's why they constantly revert to it in an attempt to avoid less safe subjects.

1 Reply

@Thomas,

Thomas wrote:

Frank Apisa wrote:
No it doesn't

Yes it does. It's a matter of elementary logic and standard English usage.

We both agree that the statement, "Frank holds no belief the existence of any gods", is true.

Given the truth of #1, the statement that "Frank disbelieves in any gods" follows under the American Heritage Dictionary's definition of disbelief.

Given the truth of #2, the statement that "Frank disbelieves in OR denies the existence of gods" follows from standard Boolean logic: Applying the logical OR to a true statement and a false statement yields a truth value of TRUE.

Given the truth of #3, the statement that "Frank is an atheist" follows under the American Heritage Dictionary's definition of the term atheism.
To be sure, you might fall back on Olivier's position, "I disagree that this is the meaning of the word 'atheist'". My answer, as in Olivier's case, would be that nobody cares. Words mean what they mean; dictionaries do a better job than anything else to document their meaning.

I am not an atheist...even though my being one would probably increase the quality of the atheism pool of A2K.

I do not even identify myself as an agnostic...but rather just give an indication of my take on the question of the true nature of the REALITY of existence.

But...I will acknowledge that the way the Heritage Dictionary sets things up...a strong argument could be made that "according to the definitions set in that book" I could be considered an atheist.

So acknowledged. I withdraw the "no it doesn't."

But regardless of the fact that I could be considered an atheist using the definitions given in the Heritage Dictionary...I AM NOT AN ATHEIST, even though I lack a belief in any deities.

Quote:

I'm not interested in investigating disagreements between an individual's whim and a reputable dictionary.

The Heritage Dictionary, however, is not necessarily a reputable dictionary...nor free of whim.

It was first published in 1969 by the owner of Heritage Magazine, because he did not like the definitions given in the established Merriam Webster Dictionary. He published a dictionary on a whim...and changed the definitions he didn't like.

Using other dictionaries I definitely am not an atheist...and apparently neither are you.

Merriam-Webster
: a person who believes that God does not exist

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/atheist

The Cambridge Dictionary

someone who believes that God does not exist

http://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/british/atheist

The Online Etymology Dictionary

atheist (n.)
1570s, from French athéiste (16c.), from Greek atheos "without god, denying the gods; abandoned of the gods; godless, ungodly," from a- "without" + theos "a god" (see theo-).

http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=atheist

So you guys are going to have to do without me...no matter how much you want me...because I am not an atheist.

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1 Reply

@Thomas,

Quote:

To be sure, you might fall back on Olivier's position, "I disagree that this is the meaning of the word 'atheist'".

I actually agree with your definition more than you agree with it yourself...

0 Replies

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