Are people born inherently atheist?

[Willamena]

Look at the link I provided.

Amoral: "lying outside the sphere to which moral judgments apply."

Atheism: "the doctrine that there is no deity"; Atheist: "one who believes that there is no deity" (i.e. one who believes atheism). I notice "weak atheist" isn't in your dictionary, but only one atheist is.
Atheist - Definition and More from the Free Merriam-Webster Dictionary

 

[Magic Man]

Who said you can't? Agnostics reject both, and reject the very controversy between atheism and theism as unresolvable.

Yes, some people hide behind the term "agnostic", rather than admitting they're atheists.

Yet one more reason why this proposed definition of "atheist" as "anything under the sun that isn't a theist" is pretty much worthless. Curious that none of the proponents of this definition seem much bothered by that.

Bothered by what? Atheism is the absence of theism. An atheist can either just not hold the belief that a god exists or hold the belief that no gods exist. I'm not seeing anything worthless about that, considering it's the way the word's been used for quite a while now.

 

[Sees]

Amoral: "lying outside the sphere to which moral judgments apply."

Atheism: "the doctrine that there is no deity"; Atheist: "one who believes that there is no deity" (i.e. one who believes atheism). I notice "weak atheist" isn't in your dictionary, but only one atheist is.
Atheist - Definition and More from the Free Merriam-Webster Dictionary

I like the comments on that page lol

It is a poor definition...

 

[Enai de a lukal]

Yes, some people hide behind the term "agnostic", rather than admitting they're atheists.

Or, they identify with a word that they feel more properly describes their position, since "atheism" quite frequently denotes a position they explicitly reject. I really don't see the sense in describing agnostics as atheists when many forms of atheism preclude agnosticism. This is unnecessarily unclear.

Bothered by what?

The fact that this definition of atheism-

Atheism is the absence of theism.

Leads to a great deal of overlap between positions regarding theism (as in agnosticism and atheism), a loss of descriptive precision, and gains us nothing in the process.

 

[idav]

Amoral: "lying outside the sphere to which moral judgments apply."

Atheism: "the doctrine that there is no deity"; Atheist: "one who believes that there is no deity" (i.e. one who believes atheism). I notice "weak atheist" isn't in your dictionary, but only one atheist is.
Atheist - Definition and More from the Free Merriam-Webster Dictionary

It is not a very straightforward definition. It uses believe when it shouldnt. Theist is one who believes in god while you propose that atheist is a person who believes in not believing in a deity. Your trying to make atheist a believer but it is theism which has a believer in the defintion. Atheist is not a believer and throwing belief in the definition ignores the fact that atheists differ from theists in that they do not believe. You can say they have a worldview but atheism is not necessarily a worldview unless your including their philosphical viewpoints on nihilism and what not.

Wow atheists have doctrine now too?

 

[idav]

Leads to a great deal of overlap between positions regarding theism (as in agnosticism and atheism), a loss of descriptive precision, and gains us nothing in the process.

Of course they overlap, agnotic and atheist are not mutually exclusive. The only one that does not and should not overlap is theist and atheist, people can have several labels that compliment each other.

 

[Willamena]

It is not a very straightforward definition. It uses believe when it shouldnt.

Or perhaps it's indicative of use.

Theist is one who believes in god while you propose that atheist is a person who believes in not believing in a deity.

No. What "atheism" is substitutes directly into the phrase, "One who believes atheism."

One who believes the doctrine that there is no deity.

Wow atheists have doctrine now too?

Take it up with Mirriam-Webster.

 

[Enai de a lukal]

Of course they overlap, agnotic and atheist are not mutually exclusive.

You are, like so many other posters, talking about this is if this were a dispute over some matter of fact, rather than a semantic dispute: it is not as if people come pre-labelled "atheist", "agnostic", and so on. Even how people self-identify is dependent upon how these labels are defined. So the question here is not whether atheism and agnosticism *really* overlap, but whether we should define these terms "atheism" and "agnosticism", so that they overlap or not. I say no, and I've said why; its unnecessarily ambiguous. And I've been unable to get a straight answer from ANY of the proponents of the view that atheism should be regarded as LACK of theistic belief as to what, if anything, is gained by that definition as opposed to defining atheism as belief that theism is false- a definition which does NOT allow overlap between non-theists, atheists, and agnostics.

 

[Enai de a lukal]

You are, like so many other posters, talking about this is if this were a dispute over some matter of fact, rather than a semantic dispute: it is not as if people come pre-labelled "atheist", "agnostic", and so on. Even how people self-identify is dependent upon how these labels are defined. So the question here is not whether atheism and agnosticism *really* overlap, but whether we should define these terms "atheism" and "agnosticism", so that they overlap or not. I say no, and I've said why; its unnecessarily ambiguous. And I've been unable to get a straight answer from ANY of the proponents of the view that atheism should be regarded as LACK of theistic belief as to what, if anything, is gained by that definition as opposed to defining atheism as belief that theism is false- a definition which does NOT allow overlap between non-theists, atheists, and agnostics.

And do not say: "well, because some atheists just lack belief in God/gods"- that is question-begging, since whether we should classify such people as atheists in the first place is precisely what is being questioned.

 

[ArtieE]

Amoral: "lying outside the sphere to which moral judgments apply."

I repeat: "I notice a distinct lack of any comments regarding the validity of what I explained in my post. Merriam-Webster defines amoral as: "being neither moral nor immoral" and "lacking moral sensibility <infants are amoral>". If you can state this, why can't you state: "being neither a theist nor a strong atheist" and "lacking theism/strong atheism <infants are (weak implicit) atheists>"."

A person can be moral, immoral or amoral, just as he can be a theist, a strong atheist or a weak implicit atheist.

"Because "theist" corresponds to "moral", "strong atheist" corresponds to "immoral" and "weak implicit atheist" corresponds to "amoral". Same principle."

Do you understand the principle? Yes or no?

 

[Willamena]

Atheism is something. My atheism is very much something. It's saying, "I don't believe in God." To the theist it is saying, "I don't believe you."

No to theists your saying you do not believe what they do. How would that work to tell theists they dont really believe in what they claim to?

My telling them, "I don't believe you," in no way tells them that they don't believe.

 

[Magic Man]

Or, they identify with a word that they feel more properly describes their position, since "atheism" quite frequently denotes a position they explicitly reject.

Right, and instead of realizing that that definition isn't the most accurate, they decide to support that definition by avoiding it.

I really don't see the sense in describing agnostics as atheists when many forms of atheism preclude agnosticism. This is unnecessarily unclear.

An agnostic is someone who believes we don't or can't know that a god exists. There is nothing about theism/atheism that precludes agnosticism. Each one can and does exist with it in many people.

The fact that this definition of atheism-


Leads to a great deal of overlap between positions regarding theism (as in agnosticism and atheism), a loss of descriptive precision, and gains us nothing in the process.

It doesn't lead to an overlap of positions or a loss of descriptive precision, so there's nothing that needs to be gained. It is the most accurate broad definition.

 

[idav]

Or perhaps it's indicative of use.


No. What "atheism" is substitutes directly into the phrase, "One who believes atheism."

One who believes the doctrine that there is no deity.


Take it up with Mirriam-Webster.

I h ave found better definitions. That one doesnt work.

You have to substute the word theist also not just the words you find objectionable.

It would read, "one who believes in not believing in deities". Why the redundancy, just to say atheists are believers too. Yes everyone has beliefs even atheists but that is beyond the scope of theism. We could just a easily say, theist is someone who believes in believing in deities but thats just silly just like the atheist example.

 

[idav]

My telling them, "I don't believe you," in no way tells them that they don't believe.

On the contrary, they didnt say they know god exists, they simply said they believe. You can say I dont believe you know but how can you say I dont believe you really believe.

 

[LegionOnomaMoi]

Please stop attributing things to me that I didn't say.

You define atheists as "not theist", correct? You do this because of issues of consistency and/or logical issues that would exist if we defined atheism in terms of (rejection of) belief, correct?

My position is that defining atheism in terms of rejection of belief runs into problems, so we should define it in terms of lack of belief

If we don't want any overlap between theists and atheists, then an atheist would have to reject every single god. This is impossible, so there would be no atheists.

If we're identifying the members of a set, we can do it with a list of the members of that set. If the set has been defined by some collection of common characteristics, then we can use them.

What are those common characteristics? If you're not using a list of gods to tell what's a god and what's not, then you must have some in mind. What are they?

If an "atheist" is "not a theist" (and defined as an atheist as such), then to determine whether someone is an atheist we would need to define the set "theists". If we do not, then we do not have any means to determine who is in the set of theists, and therefore no way to determine who is not (atheists).


The problem is that the definition "not theist" (or not a member of the set "theists") requires a definition of the set "theists" that
1) Defines every theist consistently (otherwise, we'd risk overlap)
2) Defines "god" (as a theist must at least believe in a god).

This is basic set theory. Defining a set as the complement of another simply changes the way you apply the definition (the set of odd numbers as "not even numbers" requires a definition of "even numbers" that is equivalent to defining "odd numbers" themselves).

I know you freak out at the suggestion that you might be doing this on purpose, so I'll assume it's accidental and say this:

Then show I am wrong. An atheist is any individual who is not a member of the set "theists", correct?

Define the set "theists".

 

[Ouroboros]

The name for that is stutterer.

And those who do not stutter are astutterers.

 

[Enai de a lukal]

Right, and instead of realizing that that definition isn't the most accurate

According to what standard? The same thing I said to idav appears to be applicable here- there is no matter of fact of which definition is correct. We're arguing over what set of definitions is preferable, not what atheism *really* consists of.

It doesn't lead to an overlap of positions or a loss of descriptive precision

It clearly does. A person who holds to agnosticism, traditionally defined, is both an agnostic, atheist, and a non-theist on your definition, because in holding that theism vs. atheism is undecidable, they are lacking theistic belief. Such an overlap necessarily leads to imprecision since if I say, "so-and-so is an atheist", this could mean any number of things- that they believe theism is false, that they are agnostic, that they've never heard of theism, and so on. On my proposed definitions, which are also borne out by colloquial use in many contexts, there is no such problem; if so-and-so is an atheist, they cannot also be an agnostic.

 

[Sees]

In the spirit of all that is fluffy

 

[idav]

Then show I am wrong. An atheist is any individual who is not a member of the set "theists", correct?

Define the set "theists".

I will bite.

Theists is a believer in one or more deity. If you dont believe in one or more deities your atheist, not theist covers it rather nicely, even covers babies who are not yet believers. If I asked if some baby believes in god the answer would be no, so not theist is accurate.

Do people wanna redifine atheism to be rejection and just call babies nontheist. Do people get offended being agnostic and being called atheist like it is some bad word. People liking a label has little to do with the accuracy of a label.

 

[Willamena]

Merriam-Webster defines amoral as: "being neither moral nor immoral" and "lacking moral sensibility <infants are amoral>". If you can state this, why can't you state: "being neither a theist nor a strong atheist" and "lacking theism/strong atheism <infants are (weak implicit) atheists>"

Here is how I see "the principle": being neither a theist nor a strong atheist, a person is an atheist.

Is that what you mean to say?