Atheism is not a belief, so why would anyone lie that it is?

[9-10ths_Penguin]

I wouldn't call someone an atheist for simply not being a theist. I'd only call them that if they said they didn't believe God exists. In which case, they are stating that they don't believe in God, sharing what their belief on the matter was. If they simply just lacked a view on the subject, I'd consider them as just a human being without a view on the question. Not an atheist, who does.

But you get my point, don't you? It's important to separate being an atheist from the self-reflection involved in identifying as an atheist.

You wouldn't say that a person has to have done the reflection to self-identify as tall in order to be tall, would you?

Sure, singular or plural, it's still a question of belief. It/he/she/they exist or don't exist. What do you believe, yes or no? Which is your belief? Again, atheism is tied to theism, which is about believing in god(s) or not. Its a question of belief. It's the flip side the same God(s)-Belief coin. Not an absence of the coin.

So for someone to be an atheist, they need to reject gods in general... the entire category.

This requires that "gods in general" to be a coherent, meaningful thing. Is it?

This is probably a good time for me to point out two things we can infer from how the term "atheist" is used:

1. Theists aren't atheists. Believing in even one god disqualifies a person from being an atheist.
2. Atheists exist. Whatever the criteria for being an atheist, it's something practically achievable by human beings.

I point this out because you're in danger of running afoul of #2.

They all fit under the theism umbrella. So belief or disbelief in a theistic view, that God or gods exist or not.

There's a "theism umbrella"? Please describe this umbrella. What fits under it and what doesn't?

No it is not a euphemism. Nontheism is the absence of a theistic belief. Atheism is not.

That's the conclusion you're trying to argue for, remember? Try not to assume your conclusion as one of your premises.

It's a theistic belief itself, only that God does not exist. It's saying "no" to the question of God. Nontheism lacks the question itself.

A lack of position on the issue of gods would fall within non-theism; so would outright rejection of every god (if such a thing were possible). Non-theism encompasses everything but theism, and atheism is a synonym for non-theism.

I gave a comparison earlier that "love" for instance is non-rational. That means it's not about rationality. But to say love is irrational, that makes it about rationality. Love is not irrational, it's non-rational. That's a category, not tied to rationality. Same thing with nontheism. It's a category, not tied to the question of theism. Atheism is tied to theism, in the very word itself "No-God". Nontheism has no opinion. Atheism does.

And again, there is absolutely nothing wrong with atheism. I applaud it, but shake my head when it claims its not a belief about God! Never while I self-identified as an atheist for those 10 plus years would I have claimed otherwise.

Atheism is not a belief about gods.

Atheists can have plenty of beliefs about gods. It's just not what makes them an atheist.

It's tied to many those views which see the Divine in terms of both transcendent, and external to one's own self or being. That can include a lot of variation. Then you get into pantheism and panetheism which are related to, but distinct from traditional theism, which is about a God(s) external to one's self. Most who identify as atheists, are in regards to that view of theism.

If you're going to argue that polytheism is somehow not within the scope of "traditional theism," then I invite you to take a moment to step back and reflect on your chauvinism. Your beliefs are not some sort of default, standard, or the "traditional" position.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Nontheism is decidedly not a euphemism for atheism.

Sure it is.

It is common for Buddhism to be considered nontheistic, given the Buddha

And?

 

[Kenny]

"It was fatter and furrier, and in reality more rhino than stallion. It did, however, have a huge horn."

Oops they found a rhino.

Oops. It's all smoke and mirrors as usual. Maybe there isn't a real God.

???

MAYBE... or maybe the rhino is the evolution of a unicorn? You never know.

Just because what today's caricature didn't match the real thing doesn't mean it wasn't real.

At one time they had many pictures that was wrong.

 

[John53]

???

MAYBE... or maybe the rhino is the evolution of a unicorn? You never know.

Just because what today's caricature didn't match the real thing doesn't mean it wasn't real.

At one time they had many pictures that was wrong.

View attachment 57416

Humans get many things wrong, Unicorns and Gods are just 2 examples.

 

[It Aint Necessarily So]

What about those who study religious faith and speak to how it functions in people's life? They don't exist? You don't think there are experts on the topic

No, I told you that already. Those aren't experts on faith. As I said, there is no such thing. I'll give you a chance to show me that I'm wrong at the bottom, if you still think that I am.

Religious faith is a very simple concept. One can master the concept in minutes. It's simply the willingness to believe with insufficient evidence. It is not a virtue. It's what creationists do. It's what climate deniers do. It's what anti-vaxxers do. It's what astrologers do. It's what flat earthers do. It's what election hoax people do. And they're all wrong.

Why? Because believing by faith is irrational. Faith cannot be a path to truth given that any idea is equally well or poorly supported by it including mutually exclusive, polar opposites. It's a logical error. It produces a non sequitur every time. It is the surest way to add wrong beliefs to one's mental map of reality. You might as well flip coins do make such decisions.

There is a much better way to decide what is true about the world - empiricism. Doubt that? Compare the results of the two approaches. Compare religion to science. With faith, there are tens of thousands of mutually exclusive denominations of Christianity alone, none of which has generated any useful knowledge about how the world works, but just one periodic table, which is of great utility.

Evolution unifies mountains of data from a multitude of sources, accurately makes predictions about what can and cannot be found in nature, provides a rational mechanism for evolution consistent with the known actions of nature, accounts for both the commonality of all life as well as biodiversity, and has had practical applications that have improved the human condition in areas like medicine and agriculture. The faith-based alternative, creationism, can do none of that, nor anything else.

Astronomy allows us to predict the paths of celestial objects in a way that allowed man to put the New Horizons probe in the proximity of Pluto, know exactly where each would be and when and where they would rendezvous. The faith-based study of the stars, astrology, is as sterile as creationism, generating no knowledge that can be used to predict outcomes, just horoscopes that can be used for nothing except entertainment, like fortune cookies and the Magic 8-Ball.

With science, one can know to take a vaccine. With faith, one makes mistakes, and may die for them.

Faith may give some comfort through unjustified assurance, but it remains a logical error, and the quickest path to making a mistake. Ask the Capitol insurrectionists. Ask the anti-vaxxers suffocating in the presence of their families.

Now you have it all, a complete course in religious-type faith (unjustified belief).

And that brings us to what you call experts on faith. What could anybody add to what I just wrote to make it more meaningful, to allow one to navigate life more effectively for having these people's input? Theology is another sterile field? If you'd like to prove me incorrect with some evidence, please give me an example of something from what you call an expert, and demonstrate how it improves understanding of this topic. Will you do that? Will you show us what you think an expert in faith sounds like and why that is correct or useful, or just keep claiming that these people exist and have expertise in something worth knowing without demonstrating what you mean?

I realize that all of this is upsetting to most theists. They don't like having what they esteem being called a mistake. They don't like the claims they make challenged, or requests for evidence. It's not how it's done in church, and doing that in church will earn you anger, rebuke, and the door.

Sorry about that, really. I would prefer that you remained unemotional. But that's your choice. If I have to protect your feelings, and they're hurt by carefully considered, sincerely believed, and constructively offered opinions, then I simply have to censor myself and allow the theist to make his claims unchallenged. That's asking too much.

 

[Secret Chief]

And?

And it means something different. The artistic movement known as cubism is nontheistic, not atheistic - for the same reason. If one was a euphemism of the other this distinction could not be made using these two words.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

And it means something different. The artistic movement known as cubism is nontheistic, not atheistic - for the same reason. If one was a euphemism of the other this distinction could not be made using these two words.

I didn't realize that cubism had anything to do with theology.

In any case, I said that the terms "nontheism" and "atheism" were synonymous, not "nontheistic" and "atheistic". When applied to people, the terms mean the same thing: anyone who believes in zero gods - regardless of their opinions about any gods - can be described as a non-theist or as an atheist.

 

[Yazata]

I understand your beef... but there are plenty of posts explaining how atheism is not a positive belief pointed toward anything. It is lack of or disbelief in a proposition. Other qualifiers are necessary if you want to cast it as "belief that there is no God." This is the attempt to make sure these ideas are accepted "as fact."

I don't believe that 'atheism' is a natural-kind in a philosophical sense. It isn't a reality that exists regardless of what people believe about it, where our task is to discover the true nature of 'atheism' in much the way that a physical chemist discovers the physical properties of atoms.

Atheism is a word that can be and has been given a variety of not always consistent definitions. As such, it doesn't have a fundamental nature to be discovered. Hence there's no fact of the matter regarding what an atheist is. There's just choices of word usage.

I prefer to use the words in what has long been the conventional academic way. I think that there are important reasons for continuing to do so, some of which I mentioned in an earlier post.

And again, in the end, the word itself isn't important! It is entirely possible to simply not believe someone's claim without truly knowing whether or not it reflects truth.

I'm an agnostic, so you are preaching to the choir.

So, I call this stance "atheism" - that of not believing any God claims having been made or even made into the future without proper evidence in support. You want to come up with some other word that doesn't mean "No Gods Exist" but does mean that "No Belief Will be Forthcoming Without Warrant?" Fine. What's the word you want to use? I'll use it.

The way I see it, agnosticism is an epistemological position, a position about knowledge or the lack of it. It comes in strong and weak variants. Weak agnosticism is the idea that I personally don't have knowledge of transcendental realities. Strong agnosticism is the idea that no human being has knowledge of transcendental realities. I'm something of a strong agnostic myself.

And my view of atheism is that it's an ontological position, a position about what does or doesn't exist. So atheism is the position that religious style deities don't exist. Theism is the position that they do.

Actually it can get more complicated than that. Since the gnostic/agnostic distinction and the theist/atheist distinction address different issues -- what can be known and what one believes exists or doesn't exist, there appear to be four permutations.

1. gnostic theist - one who believes both that deities exist and that humans can have knowledge of them. Most conventional theists belong in this category.

2. gnostic atheist - one who believes that deities don't exist and that people can know that they don't. I think that most atheists at least implicitly belong in this category. It may have become popular to deny they think this way, but they show that they do every time they characterize religion, religious belief and believers.

3. agnostic theist - this rather paradoxical sounding but surprisingly common one would encompass apophatic theology and many of the world's mystical traditions that hold that the divine exceeds the ability of human language to express and the ability of human minds and concepts to conceive. This move is usually made in order to preserve divine transcendence. As John Scotus Eriugena put it: "We do not know what God is. God himself does not know what He is because He is not anything [i.e., "not any created thing"]. Literally God is not, because He transcends being." Similar ideas are found in Islamic and Hindu theisms. In today's Christian world, the place where this kind of theology is most prevalent is Eastern Orthodoxy with its essence/energies distinction that holds that while God is unknowable in his essence, his actions (energies) in our plane can be known.

Apophatic theology - Wikipedia

Essence–energies distinction - Wikipedia

Neti neti - Wikipedia

While I wouldn't call myself an agnostic theist, I have a great deal of interest in the position.

And finally, the one that probably best describes me:

4. agnostic atheist - These are people who don't believe that humans have any knowledge of supposed transcendent realities (the agnosticism) and who lack belief in any transcendent deities (your definition of atheism).

I perceive the reality around me as a profound impenetrable mystery. I think that the origin of reality, the origin of the universe's perceived order (logic, mathematics, the laws of physics) and the ultimate reason why there is something rather than nothing, are the ultimate metaphysical questions. I'm very aware that traditional natural theology has attributed these metaphysical functions to God. So to the extent that I feel that reality requires an explanation, I'm inclined to accept that kind of God. (Which makes me something of a deist, I guess.) Except that I don't conceive of it as a person or as an object of religious worship. It's just whatever the answer(s) is/are to the deepest outstanding metaphysical questions.

And that being said, I don't believe that any of the world's religious traditions bring me any closer to answering those questions. I simply can't believe that the ultimate explanation for the entire universe, for being itself, is the kind of blustering Jewish guy depicted in the Bible, whatever Mohammed thought he was channeling as he sat in a cave listening to voices, or anything from traditional Hindu mythology. So when it comes to the conventional theistic religions, I have to say that I'm an atheist (certainly in the weak and perhaps in the strong sense) in that I don't believe that these traditional named deities spoken of in scripture and tradition exist. I certainly live my life as if they don't.

 

[oldbadger]

The only reason for that, is because there is such a thing as religion and because the majority of people are religious.

Hi TM...... That might be true where you are, but not where I am (UK)
The vast majority of folks here do not go to church apart from for social functions like baptisms, funerals, weddings etc.
They might tick the 'Christian' box but they have no real interest.....

 

[oldbadger]

Bzzzzzzt.

The question is malformed and invalid.
Loaded even. .

Not like the Thread Title then!
Atheism is not a belief, so why would anyone lie that it is?

 

[oldbadger]

All you've illustrated is the absurdity of trying to treat a position that isn't a belief as if it was. One doesn't "believe in" atheism (except in the sense that atheists exist). Atheism is being unconvinced by all the various forms of theism.

So that's your opinion then.....your belief?

 

[Windwalker]

But you get my point, don't you? It's important to separate being an atheist from the self-reflection involved in identifying as an atheist.

You wouldn't say that a person has to have done the reflection to self-identify as tall in order to be tall, would you?

Not having a god belief is different than saying someone is an atheist who disbelieves in God. Again, if I see a three year old playing with a doll, I don't call them an atheist because they don't believe in God. They also do not not-believe in God. They don't even question it. They are not 'atheists' because they lack belief in God. They are neutral. They are neither theists or atheists. They are not atheists by default. They are open to either belief, holding none at that point. They are not disbelievers, they are simply "none".

Being tall, is a physical feature, not a belief. So that's a red herring.

So for someone to be an atheist, they need to reject gods in general... the entire category.

This requires that "gods in general" to be a coherent, meaningful thing. Is it?

God is something that cannot be defined concretely. But most atheists when pressed to explain what it is they don't believe in, will describe the traditional theistic view of God they are familiar with, which reflects mainly the Christian God of the West, viewed through the lens of mythic-literal religion. They say they apply it to all gods everywhere, but when pressed, they really don't have an idea about those very much. It's pretty much the traditional theistic view of the mythic-literal Christian West God they have in mind, that they don't believe in.

I don't believe in that God either, except as an expression of a mythic-literal view of the Divine, which transcends definitions like that. In that sense, I am an atheist like you.

This is probably a good time for me to point out two things we can infer from how the term "atheist" is used:

1. Theists aren't atheists. Believing in even one god disqualifies a person from being an atheist.
2. Atheists exist. Whatever the criteria for being an atheist, it's something practically achievable by human beings.

I point this out because you're in danger of running afoul of #2.

How? If I were to press you, and you were to be honest in response to the question of describing for me what image you hold in mind that you see God as, that you don't believe in, chance are extremely high I'll be in agreement with you. But the difference between us is that I don't see that as the limits of understanding what God actually is. I don't limit my thinking to the theistic/atheistic coin. I have a different currency that I'm holding in my hand. That coin is tucked away in my bag of personal historical perspectives. I'm not still holding that coin in my hand and looking at it, calling myself either a theist or an atheist.

There's a "theism umbrella"? Please describe this umbrella. What fits under it and what doesn't?

I thought I explained that. You said gods, and which god, but I said that theism in general is the belief that the God or gods are both external to yourself, and transcendent. "Other" to you, in other words. Other to the world. etc.

That's the conclusion you're trying to argue for, remember? Try not to assume your conclusion as one of your premises.


A lack of position on the issue of gods would fall within non-theism; so would outright rejection of every god (if such a thing were possible). Non-theism encompasses everything but theism, and atheism is a synonym for non-theism.

Outright rejection is a belief. Holding no belief is leaving the question open. I used the term nontheism, but really agnostic might be an easier term. It's neutral. A child is agnostic, neither believing nor disbelieving. Then they either remain that way, netural, or they believe and become a theist, or disbelieve and become an atheist. Being an atheist is not a lack of belief about God. It's very much a belief about the question of God. It's no longer neutral.

Atheism is not a belief about gods.

Of course it is. It has theism in its very name. A-Theism. "Belief in No-God".

If you're going to argue that polytheism is somehow not within the scope of "traditional theism," then I invite you to take a moment to step back and reflect on your chauvinism. Your beliefs are not some sort of default, standard, or the "traditional" position.

No, polytheism is not traditional theism. I only said it would fit under the theistic umbrella, because you tried to say that atheism rejects all gods. If so, that a-theism includes all gods.

 

[oldbadger]

Welcome to the roundabout.

Sure.
It's all just a play with words, until extremists get in to the mix.

 

[oldbadger]

The Constitution protects atheists from not being beheaded by fervent Christians for not being good believers.

Or maybe it's burned at the stake.

Do you think that Deists would have escaped the stake?
We are non-theists which is only a step away from atheism.

 

[A Vestigial Mote]

I don't believe that 'atheism' is a natural-kind in a philosophical sense. It isn't a reality that exists regardless of what people believe about it, where our task is to discover the true nature of 'atheism' in much the way that a physical chemist discovers the physical properties of atoms.

Atheism is a word that can be and has been given a variety of not always consistent definitions. As such, it doesn't have a fundamental nature to be discovered. Hence there's no fact of the matter regarding what an atheist is. There's just choices of word usage.

I prefer to use the words in what has long been the conventional academic way. I think that there are important reasons for continuing to do so, some of which I mentioned in an earlier post.



I'm an agnostic, so you are preaching to the choir.



The way I see it, agnosticism is an epistemological position, a position about knowledge or the lack of it. It comes in strong and weak variants. Weak agnosticism is the idea that I personally don't have knowledge of transcendental realities. Strong agnosticism is the idea that no human being has knowledge of transcendental realities. I'm something of a strong agnostic myself.

And my view of atheism is that it's an ontological position, a position about what does or doesn't exist. So atheism is the position that religious style deities don't exist. Theism is the position that they do.

Actually it can get more complicated than that. Since the gnostic/agnostic distinction and the theist/atheist distinction address different issues -- what can be known and what one believes exists or doesn't exist, there appear to be four permutations.

1. gnostic theist - one who believes both that deities exist and that humans can have knowledge of them. Most conventional theists belong in this category.

2. gnostic atheist - one who believes that deities don't exist and that people can know that they don't. I think that most atheists at least implicitly belong in this category. It may have become popular to deny they think this way, but they show that they do every time they characterize religion, religious belief and believers.

3. agnostic theist - this rather paradoxical sounding but surprisingly common one would encompass apophatic theology and many of the world's mystical traditions that hold that the divine exceeds the ability of human language to conceive and the ability of human concepts to conceive. This move is usually made in order to preserve divine transcendence. As John Scotus Eriugena put it: "We do not know what God is. God himself does not know what He is because He is not anything [i.e., "not any created thing"]. Literally God is not, because He transcends being." Similar ideas are found in Islamic and Hindu theisms. In today's Christian world, the place where this kind of theology is most prevalent is Eastern Orthodoxy with its essence/energies distinction that holds that while God is unknowable in his essence, his actions (energies) in our plane can be known.

Apophatic theology - Wikipedia

Essence–energies distinction - Wikipedia

While I wouldn't call myself an agnostic theist, I have a great deal of interest in the position.

And finally, the one that probably best describes me:

4. agnostic atheist - These are people who don't believe that humans have any knowledge of supposed transcendent realities (the agnosticism) and who lack belief in any transcendent deities (your definition of atheism).

I perceive the reality around me as a profound impenetrable mystery. I think that the origin of reality, the origin of the universe's perceived order (logic, mathematics, the laws of physics) and the ultimate reason why there is something rather than nothing, are the ultimate metaphysical questions. I'm very aware that traditional natural theology has attributed these metaphysical functions to God. So to the extent that I feel that reality requires an explanation, I'm inclined to accept that kind of God. (Which makes me something of a deist, I guess.) Except that I don't conceive of it as a person or as an object of religious worship. It's just whatever the answer(s) is/are to the deepest outstanding metaphysical questions.

And that being said, I don't believe that any of the world's religious traditions bring me any closer to answering those questions. I simply can't believe that the ultimate explanation for the entire universe, for being itself, is the kind of blustering Jewish guy depicted in the Bible, whatever Mohammed thought he was channeling (the same guy?), or anything from traditional Hindu mythology. So when it comes to the conventional theistic religions, I have to say that I'm an atheist in both the weak and strong sense in that I don't believe that these traditional named deities spoken of in scripture and tradition exist. I certainly live my life as if they don't.

Then you would likely call me "agnostic atheist." And that is, of course, you, specifically, and whoever runs in your "conventional academic" circles with you, perhaps. There... that was not so hard. The labels do not matter all that much (thanks for enumerating several at length for whatever reason you did that). I will have a particularly negative and dismissive reaction to outrageous claims that come packaged with paltry evidence. That's me. Nice to meet you.

 

[A Vestigial Mote]

Not like the Thread Title then!
Atheism is not a belief, so why would anyone lie that it is?

Do you agree, however, that anyone who accepts that "atheism is not a belief" but then goes on anyway to liken it to belief, and tries to cast it into the same relative circle of hell as "belief" is then lying? I know I do. So I don't think the thread title is that off-base.

If people understand that atheism is not a belief, but try to push it into the same category as belief anyway... that's disingenuous. aka - lying.

 

[Subduction Zone]

Not having a god belief is different than saying someone is an atheist who disbelieves in God. Again, if I see a three year old playing with a doll, I don't call them an atheist because they don't believe in God. They also do not not-believe in God. They don't even question it. They are not 'atheists' because they lack belief in God. They are neutral. They are neither theists or atheists. They are not atheists by default. They are open to either belief, holding none at that point. They are not disbelievers, they are simply "none".

Being tall, is a physical feature, not a belief. So that's a red herring.

You missed his point. But a three year old is an atheist. You might want to learn what you are arguing about.

God is something that cannot be defined concretely. But most atheists when pressed to explain what it is they don't believe in, will describe the traditional theistic view of God they are familiar with, which reflects mainly the Christian God of the West, viewed through the lens of mythic-literal religion. They say they apply it to all gods everywhere, but when pressed, they really don't have an idea about those very much. It's pretty much the traditional theistic view of the mythic-literal Christian West God they have in mind, that they don't believe in.

I don't believe in that God either, except as an expression of a mythic-literal view of the Divine, which transcends definitions like that. In that sense, I am an atheist like you.

And that is problematic. Things that do not exist cannot be defined concretely either. And you are trying to shift the burden of proof. That is an unwise debating technique since it indicates that you think that you are wrong. Of course atheists cannot know all of the endless different god claims. You are setting up an unreasonable standard. Tell us what your belief is and why and we can tell you if we believe that or not.

How? If I were to press you, and you were to be honest in response to the question of describing for me what image you hold in mind that you see God as, that you don't believe in, chance are extremely high I'll be in agreement with you. But the difference between us is that I don't see that as the limits of understanding what God actually is. I don't limit my thinking to the theistic/atheistic coin. I have a different currency that I'm holding in my hand. That coin is tucked away in my bag of personal historical perspectives. I'm not still holding that coin in my hand and looking at it, calling myself either a theist or an atheist.

And again, we cannot know all of the different god myths. We simply have not found one that is believable.

I thought I explained that. You said gods, and which god, but I said that theism in general is the belief that the God or gods are both external to yourself, and transcendent. "Other" to you, in other words. Other to the world. etc.

"Transcendent" is a term that is abused quite often. Exactly what do you mean by that? And what do you mean by "external"? You may be putting an even bigger burden of proof upon yourself.

Outright rejection is a belief. Holding no belief is leaving the question open. I used the term nontheism, but really agnostic might be an easier term. It's neutral. A child is agnostic, neither believing nor disbelieving. Then they either remain that way, netural, or they believe and become a theist, or disbelieve and become an atheist. Being an atheist is not a lack of belief about God. It's very much a belief about the question of God. It's no longer neutral.

Well it is a good thing that atheists do not do that.

Of course it is. It has theism in its very name. A-Theism. "Belief in No-God".

Nope, Not even close. Theism is a belief in a god or gods. So A theism is without a belief in a god or gods. If you are going to try to play the etymology game at least do so properly.

No, polytheism is not traditional theism. I only said it would fit under the theistic umbrella, because you tried to say that atheism rejects all gods. If so, that a-theism includes all gods.

It is "traditional" since it is older than theism. And atheists do not "reject" all gods. They lack a belief. There is a huge difference. Show us reliable evidence and we will change our minds. It is theists that normally lack the ability to reason critically. Ask a creationist what evidence would change their mind and they would likely say that no amount of evidence will change their minds.

 

[URAVIP2ME]

Christmas is very much a pagan festival and I’m surprised more christians aren’t offended by how it is being abused to sell stuff and make money. If it was something more private that people did in their homes or their local church, I’d be ok with it. But I find the commercialism and way Christmas is embedded in our culture whilst betraying its christian meaning is problematic.

To me it is Not Christians, but rather the 'so-called Christians' as Jesus said about the MANY at Matthew 7:21-23.
When you say 'something more private....' that made me wonder if Christmas was banned, how many would keep their Christmas faith, if people were fined for celebrating, or if people were jailed if they celebrated, then how many would still take a stand for it and publicly celebrate ___________

 

[Secret Chief]

I didn't realize that cubism had anything to do with theology.

In any case, I said that the terms "nontheism" and "atheism" were synonymous, not "nontheistic" and "atheistic". When applied to people, the terms mean the same thing: anyone who believes in zero gods - regardless of their opinions about any gods - can be described as a non-theist or as an atheist.

Hopefully it doesn't; that's why I picked that as a random example.

I consider Buddhism an example of nontheism; I consider myself to be a Buddhist and hence, as a Buddhist I self-describe as a non-theist. Outside of Buddhism I have other opinions on lots of things, including regarding the existence (or not) of deities, but those opinions do not reflect the core teaching of Buddhism. Essentially what @Windwalker said: "Like I said before, Buddhism, for instance is NOT an atheistic religion. It's non-theistic. If a Buddhist says, "I am an atheist", then he is making a statement of belief, which goes outside of Buddhism, which issues no point of view, it simply just omits. It says nothing about God, either believing in or disbelieving in it. That is an example of true, 'absence of belief"."

 

[URAVIP2ME]

No, as that doesn't describe all atheists.
The only definition that describes all atheists, is that atheism is a disbelief that a god DOES exist.
So atheism can be a belief (commonly referred to as "strong atheism" - it needs a qualifier), but doesn't have to be.
The one thing that is true for ALL atheists, is that they all answer "no" to the question "do you believe god exists?".
But not all atheists will answer "yes" to the question "do you believe god does NOT exist"

Is the so-called absence of evidence, the evidence of absence __________