Ut

I'm pretty sure that, like most atheists, he doesn't say: "There's no God. Period. Case closed. Don't even bother bringing arguments or evidence." and that instead he says: "I don't believe in God(s). However, if you can, with arguments and evidence, rigorously demonstrate the existence of God(s), I'll agree with it."

Matt Young

Yes; that is correct. I do not believe in God because I find no evidence to support that hypothesis. If the hypothesis includes the subsidiary hypothesis that God is benevolent, then the evidence positively argues against the existence of God. I prefer to avoid the term "atheist", however, because that term implies a certainty not unlike the arrogant certainty of the fundamentalists, who surely consider the case closed, as Utbabya correctly notes.

I do not mean to hedge: I believe in the law of conservation of energy, even though I know it might some day be proved to be untrue. In that sense, I am agnostic about physical laws. I strongly doubt, however, that certain physical laws will ever be proved untrue. In the same sense, I do not believe in God, even though I know that some bit or bits of evidence may make me change my mind. I strongly doubt, however, that I will ever find that evidence. In this sense, I am not an atheist but a "strong agnostic". Critical thinkers are (or ought to be) agnostic about everything.

By the way, Jason can probably get my book without a credit card by ordering it from any book seller who deals with the American distributor Ingram's.