mikem

I think that coherence and freedom from contradiction belong much more closely together than that, at least where God is concerned. No one expects theists to give us a complete description fo God, but at the very least their notion of God must be coherent. Or to put it another way, what they can tell us about God must be coherent. If they cannot do so, then that in itself is grounds for rejecting theism is it not?

trendkill

Not necessarily. There are occasions where someone has trouble deciding which is the right word to express his meaning, so instead of writing one word as the definitive description, he gives two interchangeable candidates connected with "or". For example: "I had this experience, it was, I dunno, kind of mystical or profound."

The question is not "what does atheism mean?" The question is "Is Theodore Drange right to say that atheism cannot refer to simple lack of belief?" If, as I argue, there is no real distinction between lack of belief and disbelief, then he's wrong.

Bobinius

If theism means 'God', then atheism means 'no God'. I would really love to see
someone defining theism as 'God' or 'God exists'. Drange is wrong on this one.

'atheism' and 'theism' are mutually exclusive. One implies the absence of belief in God, and the other affirms the belief in God. Secondly, if someone lacks belief in God that is sufficient to call that person an 'atheist'.

Heidi Guedel

It seems to me that the term athiest would describe either a passive, defacto non-believer in "god" (like the aforementioned infant) or a confirmed, proactive non-believer in "god"... while an "agnostic" would be an open-minded questioner/seeker of truth concerning belief/non-belief in "god", or evolution, or any hypothesis.

mikem

I think that Theodore Drange ought to get out more! Wittgenstein showed us that we have to look at how a word is actually used. Dictionary definitions only capture the meaning of a word in a moment of time, but as societies change, so does usage. I am happy with a rough working definition of atheism as either a lack of belief in God, or a belief in God's non existence.

Atheism is a corollary to a naturalistic world view. I believe in a self contained universe functioning in accordance with natural law, and that seems to me to be to be the simplest, and best explanation of all the phenomena we observe. Naturalism can even take account of the diversity of religious opinion in a way that belief in divine revelation never could. Since the evidence for naturalism is so overwhelming, the evidence for God must be correspondingly powerful to mount a challenge. It comes nowhere close in my view. Ad to that the incoherence in any definition of God offered for our acceptance, and theistic claims become even weaker. If everyone was a naturalist in this sense, we wouldn't need the word atheist, because the word theist would be redundant.

madmax2976

And those terms don't mean the same thing either. Sorry Trend, you're confusing me.

If you could, that would work. But then it follows that there must be something wrong with his arguments as well.

madmax2976

Yes, I concur that that destroys at least one of his arguments.

So you are effectively saying that none of the other arguments he offers is sufficient either. I'm interested in
why you think none of them hold up.

Bobinius

I pretty much agree with your points. But ok, let's take them one by one.

Ted Drange:

In this essay, I shall use the term "atheist" in its (more common) narrow sense. Martin draws a distinction between "negative atheists," who are without any belief in God, and "positive atheists," who deny God's existence.[5]) Applying that distinction, it could be said that I (and most people) use the term "atheist" in the sense of "positive atheist." It should be noted that all positive atheists are automatically negative atheists, which may sound somewhat peculiar when those expressions are used.

In place of the expression "negative atheist," I shall use the term "nontheist." That seems to be a better term (than "atheist") for capturing the more general concept of "one who is without belief in God," for several reasons:

(1) Almost everyone who employs the term "nontheist" already uses it in the given way.

(2) As indicated in dictionaries, most native speakers of English use the term "atheist" for the more definite concept of "one who denies that God exists." It is desirable that we abide by common usage and it is foolish (and probably futile) to try to reform people's usage of terms.

(3) It would be more natural to call infants and fetuses "nontheists" than to call them "atheists."

(4) It is desirable to have a system in which the familiar three classes, theists, atheists, and agnostics, are mutually exclusive, and that would not be possible if the term "atheist" were instead used for the more general concept.

(1) Ipse dixit. So he says. I would say that both are used. 'A person who does not believe in God' and 'A person who believes God does not exist'. We should always keep in mind what theism means. Theism means belief in the existence of a god or gods; [Merriam Webster]. Atheism means disbelief in the existence of a god or gods.

(2) Counter-example from a trusted dictionary:

Merriam - Webster

atheism

Pronunciation: 'A-thE-"i-z&m
Function: noun
Etymology: Middle French athéisme, from athée atheist, from Greek atheos godless, from a- + theos god
1 archaic : UNGODLINESS, WICKEDNESS
2 a : a disbelief in the existence of deity b : the doctrine that there is no deity

Secondly, in a philosophical debate the terms don't need to be derived from the common usage in general dictionaries. If I want to see the definition of a medical term, I am not going to look in a general English dictionary. I am going to look in a specialized dictionary. This term is as technical from a philosophical pov as 'being' or 'knowledge'. We have no reason to treat it otherwise.

Thirdly, the primary source for dictionaries and common usage of a term are the specialists. The specialists are setting the correct meanings of philosophical or technical terms, not some popular use. If we would not reform people's usage of terms we would still be in middle ages.

(3) Why would it be more 'natural'? Do they believe in God? No. This un-naturalness seems to arise from the common malformed conception that atheism is evil or immoral, as G.H. Smith points out in his book. If Drange has this in mind, it is dissapointing. Labeling the innocent 'atheists'. Un-natural my ass. Ungrounded assertion. He seems to understand the 'a' in 'atheism' as no, as denyial, not as 'without'. 'Non' is clearly a negative. So why would 'nontheists' be more natural than atheists?

(4) Wishfull thinking. Agnostic and theist are not mutually exclusive. Belief does not equal or imply knowledge. He is totally wrong here.

NearNihil Experience

Here in is the reason I don not consider myself an atheist, but rather an agnostic.

Just because a bunch of limited halfbrained human being can't come up with a definition that suits me, doesn't entail that the thing in question does not exist. Only that we can't coherently come up with a good definition.

A being\existant is not constrained in its existence by our definition of it. Our definitions can be incomplete or incoherent and represent nothing like what is in reality as that being (this sort of "begs the question" though).

To me, from your above question, I would say that if someone presents an incoherent definition of something, I am justified in rejecting that definition of that existant, not the existence of that existant...which is what theism rests on.

mikem

Conversely, even if a definition of God was coherent, that would not make it any more probable that God existed I am reminded of the ontological argument here. Even if a definition of God was coherent and contained no contradictions, you would still be justified in rejecting the existence of such a Being, on the grounds that the evidence for naturalism is so much stronger than any evidence for the existence of God. It excludes any requirement for introducing God into an explanatory framework.

Theists would not be happy with a God about which nothing could be said other than that he existed and was mysterious. If we cannot say anything about him, then I don't see how we can begin to discuss whether such a being exists. At some point, talk about God has to relate to the world. We have to be able to point to something in the world , and say, look, that thing makes more sense on a theistic view than on an atheistic one. And THAT'S where God becomes an explanation, and that's where theists have to start defining what they mean by God in order to conduct a rational debate with us. A bit long winded I'm sorry, but I hope you get what I'm driving at here. :wave: