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That's an answer that seems to work within the materialistic worldview. But interactive, supernaturalistic theism has a different answer. For us, bi-directional communication with the higher power is the source of purpose. Inherent purpose cannot arise from materialism -- only self-constructed purpose. And especially for the mentally ill, that which is merely self-constructed is not trustworthy. But if you sense that what you are is guided from on high, the unknown future becomes bearable and hope, which was formerly non-existent, becomes possible. And in the presence of hope, mental illness weakens and therapy is a thing that one can work through to a reachable goal. This seems to portray a scenario in which the materialists are the strong selfmade mental nobility, who need no crutch, looking down with mixed contempt and pity on the unwashed theistic masses. To which I can only say that pity is also due the blind.

To clarify: Atheism is a position: adherents of that position do not have a beleif in the existence of a deity, as stated. However, this position does NOT preclude the latter part of your statement: the belief in the nonexistence of deities.

I don't disagree with your premise, but your logic was wrong.

aCar-ists doesn't mean you don't believe in Ford, it means you don't believe in using cars as personal transport. Someone who rejects cars would also not drive a Ford, but it's not required, nor part of the definition. You are arguing that because one possible sub-definition is more "convenient" to attack, that it's the only one.

Dodging behind the no true scottsman is disingenuous.

Your inability to grasp the subtlety of my point doesn't disprove it. An atheist is a person who doesn't actively believe in a god, gods, or theism of any kind. Whether they actively believe in a no-God is irrelevant to whether they are an atheist, and someone who actively believes in a no-god would probably have to be an atheist, but that isn't the definition of atheist, and if you are going to assert that one small minority within the broad definition is the *only* definition you recognize, then state you reject the dictionary and original usages and assert your own. I can agree to diasgree with your made up personal definition of the word, and ignore you, as I do most anti-atheists.

> We can look at the etymology to arrive at the "correct" answer, no "atheist union" needed.

Unfortunately, that doesn't help, because it comes from the Greek a- (without, not) + theos (god) which means "godless." So, you can interpret it as "atheos + ism" or "a + theism." The question is, is the godlessness by choice? You could count people in categories 2, 3, and 4 as "godless" if they have no belief or knowledge of god(s).

Alternatively, if you interpret "atheism" as "atheos" + ism, it would be a belief system about the nonexistence of god(s), which only covers sense 2.

there are probably non-religious folks who mistakenly associate themselves with atheism (probably from listening to idiots like bill maher), but that doesn't make atheism itself any less religious

apolitical: "Having no interest in or association with politics." atheist: Having no interest in or association with theism, right? Oh, no, the "a" prefix means something completely different for atheism and only atheism. Anyone who isn't a theist is an atheist. Whether they are atheist because they believe you can't know whether there is a god, they have no interest in the topic and no opinion on whether there is a god, or they are rabidly anti-religious doesn't matter. All are atheist.

Though The Church did work hard to adjust the definitions to cause division in the non-believers to help marginalize and demonize opposition (And like Islam, any non believer is an enemy).

We can look at the etymology to arrive at the "correct" answer, no "atheist union" needed.

Theism is defined, briefly, as "belief in the existence of a god or gods." When we prepend the privative "a" prefix to our root word "theism" to create "atheism" we create a new word meaning the opposite of the original word. Correspondingly, similar transformations are made with appropriate prefixes to create monotheism (belief that there is only one God), polytheism (belief that there are more than one god/s), and pantheism (belief in a non-personal, all-encompassing, universal entity, among others.

All of these are distinct from what many people seem to think of themselves as: agnostic. Agnosticism is the genuine uncertainty of the existence of a higher power, and/or belief that it can never be known. When a person has already decided that there is no God, they are atheist, by definition. Since they cannot prove there is no God, any more than a believer can prove there is a God, this is what causes so much friction between the two groups. Neither side can prove either position, and engages in endless mudslinging or worse - or better, or nothing. I hope I haven't soiled anything...

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ipsa scientia potestas est
"knowledge itself is power" - Francis Bacon

> Claiming everything but 1 is atheism is absolutely false.

Says you. Many people disagree, and unfortunately there is no "atheist union" to provide a "correct" answer. Agnostics can be theistic or atheistic. Every child is in position 4 until they are taught about god(s). Personally, I don't care what you call 3 and 4; non-theists, unbelievers, infidels, skeptics... these are just labels. Religious philosophy is not simple and doesn't offer simple answers.

> Nonsense, because the questions are purely philosophical.

The question of "do you believe" is philosophical, but lacks any real-world referent. Theism is a belief system, not a system for determining fact.

Then by definition you are not an atheist, you are an agnostic.

Atheism on wikipedia
Etiologically, atheism's root word, theism, means belief in a higher power. When we prepend the privative "a" prefix to theism to form atheism we negate the original meaning of belief in a higher power, to belief in no higher power (roughly).

Agnostics and agnosticism are terms much less frequently encountered in public conversation. This surprises me, because I get the feeling that most people who aren't believers are not anti-believers, and are actually agnostic. This is probably perpetuated by our mainstream media trying to use smallest, simplest lexicon/vocabulary possible instead of ever introducing a word that someone might not know and giving them a reason or opportunity to use a dictionary or ask another human being what it means.
meh... it sells more commercials I guess...
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ipsa scientia potestas est
"knowledge itself is power" - Francis Bacon

I still haven't seen anyone claiming this. If you have some examples, please post them.

In the meantime, most philosophical works on atheism cover the various aspects, though they may label them differently. The "belief of lack" has been called "strong atheism" and "explicit atheism," while the lack of belief has been called "weak atheism" or "implicit atheism."

Whichever version you chose, there are basically 4 ways (plus a few other subtle ways) to respond to the question "do you believe in god(s)?"

1. yes
2. no
3. not sure
4. what's a god?

Of these, only 1 is "theism," and if you define atheism inclusively to include anything that isn't theism, then 2, 3, and 4. are atheist positions. If you consider only "belief of lack" to be atheism, then only 2. is atheism, but what are 3. and 4.? Still not theism, whatever label you choose to put on them.

It's also important to note that the question "do you believe in god(s)?" is different from "does a god or gods exist?" Atheism is defined by belief, and not by the tenability of any of its philosophical assertions. Obviously you can be an atheist whether god exists or not.

Given that distinction, how exactly do Stalin, Mao, and Pol Pot get a free pass if they are not "true atheists"? It's not as if atheism in any form gives you some kind of moral cachet. Nobody would expect atheism to prevent violence, persecution, and corruption, but plenty of theists say it leads to those things - despite the lack of evidence that theism prevents them either.

atheists are religious too; they prescribe to the dogma that there is no god, but it's not like they have any more proof of their beliefs than those that believe god exists.

No, an atheist is a person that doesn't believe in God. There is no requirement to actively believe in a no-god to be atheist. Assertions that atheists are faith-based believers in no-god is a Church construct to divide and demonize the atheists. Apolitical means "uninterested in politics. Atheism means "uninterested in theism." Not an active belief in a no-god. But an inactive non-belief in anything is atheism, and "agostics" (as presently defined) are all atheists. The original agnostics were all Christians. But the Church changed that definition as well, to help splinter and fragment (same reason heathen and heretic are also used, all meaning non-believers, just minor differences, if any).

I sincerely doubt you are an atheist because you capitalize god [...]

That's very silly. It's a convention to write "God" when you're talking about the the supreme being (like the Christian God, as opposed to other gods like Zeus, where "god" is usually not capitalized), even if you don't believe in it.

See for instance Wikipedia: in "God"

In theism, God is the creator and sustainer of the universe. In deism, God is the creator (but not the sustainer) of the universe.

But in "Zeus"

He is the god of sky and thunder in Greek mythology.

"So there isn't any really great reason to conclude that the Universe is any sort of sentient God, but that's pretty much the only model (besides God as the really big and powerful but entirely mortal and time-bound space alien with technology that looks like magic) that isn't egregiously inconsistent."

Nah. Inconsistent with your particular rendering of "omniscient", perhaps, which although neither universally-held by theists nor necessitating such narrow definitional specification, does indeed cause your argument to disintegrate entirely upon varying from your stipulation of what it must imply.

Does the fact that I (percentage-wise) know virtually nothing about the process of knowing a single given fact I know, if that entails knowing the biochemical processes occurring in knowing it, and the biochemical processes in knowing the biochemical process of knowing it, ad infinitum, mean I know virtually nothing? You've created a cute recursive self-referential definition, which is in no way necessitated by theism. Congratulations, but that's really all it is.

No, it is the claim that there is no God that is "extraordinary", because of what the word in fact, actually, means. It does not mean "things I want to consider implausible". The majority of people throughout history have been theist, therefore it is -that- that is "ordinary", and it is your claim that is "extra-" to that, and therefore it is your claim that (per your Judge Judy level of understanding of epistemology) requires "extraordinary proof".

There is no reason to say "said proof should be easy to provide". Why should it be? Because you say so? Even if there is very good reason to suppose it should -not- be "easy" due to a requirement that people preferably make free personal decisions on such a core issue, rather than their decision being forced by overwhelming "proof", and thus allowing them no real decision at all?

Well then, since "proof" is so easy to provide and expectable in a general sense, I have a couple you can provide "proof" for me on, that I've been curious about. Go ahead and prove what political party out of all those that have existed is provably correct, it'll save me a lot of time on considering political debates. Go ahead and prove what the best rock group ever is, so I won't need to waste time listening to the others.

As for the realistic expectation (that you already know is the realistic expectation, which is why you won't use it)--"evidence", lots and lots of evidence exists both in general (cf. NDE, Shroud of Turin, prophecy probabilities) and in terms of people's personal experiences. And no, you have in fact no way whatsoever to psychically review the brains and experience of all -other- people on earth and conclude an absence of such validating experiences, as you claim you can.

As for the "contradictions and impossibilities", were it actually "all one must do", theism would have ended long ago. In fact, however, you are simply proclaiming these in the absence of any supporting argument, and in fact, it is not the case that because you opine that something is "impossible", that it in any way actually is.

We (I am an atheist) cannot prove the non-existance of God

You might be an atheist using a charitable definition of the term, but you're lumping yourself in with the knowing without a doubt crowd too. You might want to self identify as agnostic, in the sense that both theism and atheism are unknowable. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agnosticism

Atheism is the negation of theism. The denial of the existence of God.

That would be antitheism.

You would not say that "amoral" is the opposite of "moral" (hint: "immoral" is), would you?

Unfortunately, the word "atheism" has been co-opted by so many that nowadays it basically means what you want it to mean. It's worse than the hacker/cracker mess and the debate whether a republic is a democracy (there is such a thing as "indirect democracy").
Seriously, start with the Wikipedia article and follow the citations. If you still want to argue that point *after* you've read it, do explain why exactly you reject the other definitions. Otherwise, you're just being dogmatic (I dare say "religious") about it.
Cherry picking two sources that support your definition out of a myriad of differing ones and ignoring the rest is disingenuous.

That aside, If you want to avoid misunderstanding, you can use "non-religious" instead, although even that can be problematic.

Personally, I don't generally advertise my lack of belief, but if the subject comes up, I try to avoid labels.

If somebody asks me if I'm an atheist, I ask them to first define "atheist". Then, I would say something like "according to your definition of the term, yes/no".

If they ask me if I believe in god, I usually ask "which one?" Then, if they pick the usual Judo-Christian one, I ask "which version".
If they say "any god", I ask them to define "god".
Then, if the conversation reaches this point, I ask them to define the belief part in the "believe in god" context.
Finally, I would say that, according to the definitions they provided, I do not.

However, at that point, the dialog is no longer an argument but rather a philosophical discussion that often gets quite interesting.
For example, there was one person who felt quite pleased with himself for "winning the argument" by getting me to admit (readily) that I do not reject the possibility that the universe was created and set in motion by a non-personal supernatural entity (although I do not accept it either). That is, until I asked him the same question...

Sorry, it is. I reject your definition, and substitute the Latin.

a: without
theism: belief in God

atheism: without the belief in God

Atheism is the negation of theism. The denial of the existence of God.

Here is the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy on the topic.

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/atheism-agnosticism/

And Dr William Craig, a well known theistic philosopher.

http://www.reasonablefaith.org/definition-of-atheism

Atheism is NOT the same thing as not having belief in God.

Harming/killing other people is a generally agreed upon thing that is wrong to be doing.

True enough, but my contention is that it's agreed upon specifically because people internalize that view as provided to them by religious views that has assimilated within the culture. If you needed to trace it back within the context of religion, and you ask "Why is it wrong to harm/kill other people?" eventually you get down to the answer "because God says so". That's the metaphysical underpinning. Theism says there's an omnipotent, all-knowing God that says "don't do that", and that's as close to an objective validation of the ethical principle as you are ever going to get.

By contrast, it's entirely unclear what the answer is from a Naturalist/atheist/Darwinian worldview. A plausible viewpoint would be that killing/harming others isn't "wrong" at all, and in fact should be done if it increases the survival prospects of one's own DNA. So, again, without resorting to such tactics as saying it's wrong "just because", or expressing indignation at what I'm saying, when it apparently accurately represents -your- worldview, and -not- mine, how would you respond to that and what is your justification for asserting it (or any given thing) is "wrong"? As for your objections regarding what has occurred in the Catholic Church and with regards to the status of women, I'm not in disagreement with you. The distinction is, though, that theism would have a framework for arguing these points, and one could (and indeed, I would say, can and should) argue against these actions with the common religious authoritative references themselves. Apart from doing that, though, it isn't clear that for any given action, one can effectively present from an atheistic view that "action X" is better or worse than "the exact opposite of action X", for any ethical question at all.

I think courtrooms would be a lot more interesting if we could call on various gods to turn up and confirm/deny points of law.

Well, we could do that, but neither I, your legal system, nor you think that there's more than one plausible God.

Quoting the Naturalist's History Of Existence, by I. M. Atheist (an entirely hypothetical future work):

Chapter 1 - Evolution creates male and female humans.

Chapter 2 - A genetic engineer in the year 2113 creates a male and female clone of the pre-existing human population, decides to name them "Adam" and "Eve", and handily owns a lot of property including a garden.

No contradiction. Read the biblical descriptions for precisely what they do say, and do not say.

Your argument is actually only an argument against Adam and Eve being the -first- humans, on which point you would be correct, though theism per se is not to be blamed for whichever underinformed theological "authority" mistaught you.

For reasons requiring rather intricate theological and biological-category presentation, which you wouldn't listen to anyway, though, Adam and Eve not being the first people helps you none at all as an atheist.

That said, Genesis remains largely allegorical in content, and my money would be against this Young Earth Creationist successfully winning a debate from the position it is -entirely- literal and "true" when read as such.

a fundamental tenet of agnosticism is not giving a fuck

That would be apathy, not agnosticism. I can assure you, as an honest agnostic, I have thought long and hard about the issue -- at least as much as any theist OR athiest. I can also assure you that I most certainly DO "give a fuck".

With that said, apathy is just as valid a position as theism, atheism, or agnosticism -- even if the apathetic has never even considered WHY he doesn't "give a fuck". Those are the four possible stances a human being can have on the existence of god, and all of them are equally "valid".

You are believing something (no-gods) with no evidence. This is still belief, rather than "no position"; just because it's a negative does not make it less of a belief.

It is no more a belief than not stamp collecting is a hobby. That it is a negative is the very antithesis of the word 'faith'.

FWIW, the evidence for what I see as the lack of any driving Deism behind the existence of the universe is that it's as disordered and arbitrary as one would expect if there were no guiding hand on the tiller, and we were just muddling along as a species with no special import to the universe. If we are special, or central to A Plan(tm), designed by a Deity, then many more questions arise as opposed to are answered by such a proposition, IMHO.

You may believe P!=NP, but this is still belief with lack of proof, until you can definitively prove P!=NP.

This is a poor analogy. Either assertion of P==NP, or P!=NP, affirmatively posits the natures of P and NP. Believing in either, in the absence of a proof, is not the same as, say, not believing that the classes of P and NP exist.

Unfortunately this comes down to arguing definition. Perhaps someone believes they have a soda can which is god. It's still a soda can in every way, but it's also god, even if it does nothing that a soda can does not, because their definition of "god" does not mean "omnipotent", "omniscient", or otherwise follow the Christian definition.. many gods of old religions lacked these powers as well.

This ultimately leads to Ignosticism. If we cannot agree on a coherent definition of God, we cannot even ask if he exists.

There is therefore certainly a god that provably exists. You not believing in it then comes down to disputing the existence of the can, or the definition of "believe". However, atheism means believing no gods exist, which is shown to be false. Therefore agnostics are less faith- and belief-based than atheists.

This is like String theory not being just a Theory Of Everything, but a Theory of Anything.

If God can be defined any old which way, then there most certainly exists Gods, as you say - and theists, agnostics, and atheists for each definition of God presented. At some point, the very language loses all meaning, and so too go all the comparisons of who is ultimately holding more or less 'faith' in their (a)theism towards 'God'.