@David_Killens All of a sudden, you changed your name to Dick Cheney, former VPOTUS.
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@Sheldon And to add to thatâŚsomething that, from my own experience, has given me a greater peace of mind, than in believing in any God or Gods. Letâs just say, life is easier now, without God.
So then, materialists would be zombies? How does that make any sense at all???
âŚ
Are you sure? 
Dear oh dearâŚ
This is basically the same as a racist person saying that I am the least racist person ever. YeahâŚnope.
It is interesting how many mistake kindness and tolerance for weakness.
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@David_Killens My dear old mother (bless her heart) says the same thingâŚand she is 75, and she is absolutely right. This proves thatâŚwith age, DOES come wisdom.
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It appears not only that our latest mythology fanboy is unaware not only of certain pertinent facts, but also of the operation of the proper rules of discourse.
32 posts in 3 hours before suspension. And they were trending towards more anger, insults, and toxicity.
When I put on my Adminâs hat my job is to enforce the rules, and protect the forum and itâs members. I prefer to be passive and reactionary. But based on the trend, I had to act.
My life became a lot easier when my dogmatic Irish Catholic father became demented and forgot to snipe at his atheist children.
These days, itâs a lot simpler overall. I have no theists in my life. Itâs not that I intentionally exclude them, more a matter of âbirds of a featherâ.
In my experience, opposites attract if one happens to be a magnet. But if one is human being, not so much.
@Viceregent
Atheism doesnât require anyone of those attributes/beliefs/opinions. You would think someone who claims to have debated more than 10,000 atheists, would already know that.
âAtheism is defined as the lack or absence of belief in a deity and nothing more.â
A lack or absence of belief explicitly prevents equivocation with disbelief. All beliefs are positive beliefs insofar as a negative belief simply negates an existent positive belief. Disbelief is a belief in ânot X.â
Atheism does encompass both lack of belief and belief of lack. However, many adherents blithely ignore the beliefs of agnostics, who are widely considered to fall under the atheistic umbrella.
The human mind doesnât function like an analog modem. It doesnât store wide-ranging signals and then decode those signals into exacting bits. It contains physical structures which are themselves defined by other structures within the brain itself. Which is why a human can hold the belief that there are no gods and yet simultaneously believe themselves to be Catholic. (An actual person I met, unfortunately.)
There is no such thing. This is simply a mix of beliefs stemming from multiple realms of thought. Such an individual has been unable to condense their beliefs into a coherent stricture.
There is theism. Belief in god. Some believe in more than one.
There is atheism. No belief in god. Some disbelieve.
Then there is agnosticism.
Agnosticism is the positive belief that one does not know or cannot know. In this case, of the existence of god(s). It cannot be said that an agnostic disbelieves merely because they lack belief in a specific god. Nor can it be said that because they lack belief in a specific god that this makes them atheistic.
In both theism and atheism the belief being held is that the believerâs knowledge of god is a known value. An agnostic explicitly believes that their knowledge of god(s) is unknown or unknowable. Therefore, agnosticism is to (a)theism as schrodengerâs cat is to classical physics.
Some might point out that being ignorant - having a lack of belief in god - is default atheism. This is true. However, the moment a mind broaches the idea of god they have already left the âignorantâ category. No human who chooses to discuss god can fall into this category. They are not ignorant; they demonstrably understand the concept of god and have chosen to address it.
Therefore, atheism, along with theism and agnosticism, are all beliefs. They are all philosophies. They are all parts of a worldview. Default atheism is nothing more than ignorance, so it can be removed from the above categories. But sheer ignorance cannot be conflated with a specific ideology, either.
I often see people conflate personal conceptualization with logic so they may succeed in debate. This will not do. Logic does not concern whether your ideas are better or more rational than the opponent; it only concerns whether your ideas are logical. Sound logic is that which possesses both valid reasoning and true precepts. The idea that a person can be both atheist and agnostic is logically sound because the human mind can entertain several conflicting ideas simultaneously.
However, disparate beliefs cannot be merged for otherwise you have sacrificed logical soundness to achieve a social veneer; typically by appealing to some form of bias. A personâs belief of what a belief is cannot change the logic underpinning belief itself. Oneâs beliefs only concern oneâs specific worldview and their worldview does not innately change the beliefs of others. The only kind of belief which should recontextualize any other belief is that which (dis)proves the latterâs logical soundness. Choosing to adopt any new interpretation without a logically sound proof is literal faith.
My delineations between the ideas stated are of course a personal conceptualization. Yet I did not arrive at these delineations via classical study or acceptance of social definition. I didnât simply conflate my existent views with the world itself. I realized through many attempts to reconcile agnosticism with other views that there exists no reason nor method to include agnosticism within the confines of (a)theism. Agnosticism addresses oneâs belief of their own beliefs whereas (a)theism addresses oneâs belief of reality itself. Rather than this planar behavior inferring that an agnostic may also be (a)theistic, agnosticism undermines the value of belief itself by declaring it unknown or unknowable, which means agnosticism is whatâs known as âblocking.â It prevents both positive and negative beliefs in the concept specified.
Moreover, when one does conflate the two planes of belief, one may arrive at nonsensical conclusions, such as the idea that a belief as expressed with actual words⌠is not a belief, or a philosophy, or (part of) a worldview. The human mind does not allow for coherent ideological rumination without some form of conceptualization. It is also not a PC spitting out raw data that it cannot comprehend. All except the most mentally incapacitated will hold a belief once they have digested an idea. Except, of course, when oneâs thoughts have led to the intentional withholding of judgment. That is what it means to be agnostic; in all things, not just theism.
Ideas may be conflated within some human minds. But they should never be willingly conflated by an individual claiming to profess anything resembling science, sound logic, or even philosophy.
To argue otherwise, my friends, is dogmatic.
And I had just recalibrated and re assembled my Heavy Duty Stainless Steel irony meter. Thatâs a morning wasted.
Ah well, down to the scrappy for more parts. At least there has been a load of broken irony meters taken in since Saturday. Iâm sure to find what I need.
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TL;DR but skimmed
Lack of belief is the superset of belief in lack.
Agnosticism literally means ânot knowingâ. This can refer to any topic, though frequently used with theism. Belief and knowledge are entirely separate. You donât need belief to have knowledge nor vice-versa.
As above, ânot knowingâ is a superset of ânot knowableâ.
This has no connection to your belief apart from the topic itself.
Words like âgodâ and âdeityâ are poorly defined, on account of them being used by so many people to mean so many different things. The current position of most atheists here (and everywhere I bet) is disbelief in the deities presented to them.
Again, knowledge is separate. I am an agnostic atheist because I do not know, nor believe. Evidently you must be the same.
No actual response and some argument that words are poorly defined. Yaâll sound like a religious forum.
I think you have just been banned for 24 hoursâŚand are using a sock puppet?
Oh dear.
I try not to answer pseudo intellectual drivel. Especially from those who finish the whole word salad with a delicious piece of unintended irony.
But then you have a record of that donât you?
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Doesnât seem like my views are respected anyway. Itâs only cool if yaâll are the ones bashing I guess.
You donât seem to have any cogent views to respect. Just a complete word salad followed by insults.
Welcome to Atheist Republic QuantumCurse.
Do you think it is appropriate and fair to judge an entire forum on the actions of just a small handful or people?
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