RE: virus: Saints

Robin Faichney (r.j.faichney@stir.ac.uk)
Thu, 4 Dec 1997 09:55:06 -0000


> Reply To: virus@lucifer.com
> Sent: Wednesday, December 03, 1997 08:36
> To: virus@lucifer.com
> Subject: RE: virus: Saints
>
> >> Atheism is not "proof that god does not exist" just as theism
> >> is not "proof that god exists". Theism is a belief--atheism
> >> is a lack of belief (and nothing more). Atheism will be rational
> >> until evidence of god is submitted.
> >>
> >I disagree. Lack of belief and nothing more is agnosticism.
> >Atheism is belief there is no god.
>
> Agnosticism has nothing to do with belief. It has to do with
> knowledge.
>
Quoting dictionary definitions has been questioned
around here, but there is no suggestion that there is
either new evidence or redefinition required in this
case, so I reckon it's valid.

agnostic -n. person who believes that the existence of God is not
provable. -adj. of agnosticism.  agnosticism n. [from *a-, *gnostic]

> Atheism and theism have to do with belief.
>
atheism n. belief that there is no God.  atheist n. atheistic adj.
[Greek a- not, theos god]

> What
> is the difference between a lack of belief in god and belief
> there is no god?
>
Well that's obvious, isn't it? In one case there's a belief
about something, in the other there isn't. The believer in
no god is an atheist, while an agnostic believes only that
it can't be proven.

Like <consciousness>, <god> is the kind of meme that does
not refer to something "out there", but nevertheless the word
is not meaningless. I don't think, for these kinds of thing,
that the question as to whether they exist means anything.
To say that something does not exist is, in a sense, as
positive as to say that it does. Neither god nor
consciousness is such that you can do either, in my opinion,
which is why I'm an agnostic.

As for David's claim that all atheists are agnostics, I'm
still thinking about that.

(Quotes from the Oxford Pocket Dictionary.)

Robin