Koyaanisqatsi

No, just nudge it a little . (watch it Philo)

Actually, I tend to discard the word "believe" entirely from my lexicon, since it is so easily misconstrued by theists.

I prefer to state: I think, don't think, or accept as true for the sake of argument.

It gets me into trouble, but then, that's what I live for around here.

Anything to shock-jack the proles from their complacency .

Well, there's a good example. You are under no obligation whatsoever to "believe" any such thing, considering the fact that no compelling evidence exists to support a claim that they do exist.

The onus isn't on you to negate anything at all; it is on those who positively assert such beings factually exist (i.e., are non-fictional).

You don't need either. They do. The leprechauns, that is .

Actually, all they need is the gold.

There you go. A tad too pedantic for everyday use, but around here I think that works.

Again, I'd avoid the use of the term "believe" in these parts, but, again, for everyday use, why not?

Why not indeed?

Hayden

I don't remember Holden being a "jr".

However, there was a Holden Caulfield Jr in Dean Koontz's False Memories, which was I was referring to in my reply to that thread...

HR

Hayden

I dub thee "Apathist"

HR

Olly Winkles

It's not, I thought I had made that clear. If an individual makes a decision, based on whatever fairytale books they choose to read, to believe in God or leprechauns then that's fine and dandy. If the leprechaunists however organised their beliefs, grasped as much money as possible, used fear as a form of control, used their belief in leprechauns as a pretext for atrocity, then it becomes a problem.

Olly Winkles

I like that answer. Thankyou. I think I might go for "humanist" because I certainly hold humanist views outside the realm of religious philosophy.

I feel I should reiterate though - my concept of God as a creator or divine spark is merely semantic and has no relationship to the God described in any Theistic texts. I believe that there is no Christian God nor Islamic God or any other in the terms described by humans.

Stephen T-B

Does it really matter, Olly, where your beliefs place you?

I was about your age when I settled on the notion that if there were a divine genius which had laid down the matrix from which the Universe grew, and a divine spark which had triggered the transformation of the inanimate to the animate, it certainly had no interest in me as an individual. It was not the God which I had been brought up to think existed, but something so completely beyond human comprehension that trying to compehend it was pointless.
If I didn’t matter to it, why should it matter to me?
Well, it didn’t, and once that happened I didn’t care if such a thing existed or not.
I now only see a naturalistic universe, with no supernatural imputs; Science, I think, will eventually explain the Universe, Life and almost everything - and that it won’t find a divine genius or a divine spark.

Cthulhu

I'm going to classify you as a Scientologist, if it's okay with you.

I'm not saying that's what you are, but that's what I'd like to call you, for the simple reason that we have no Scientologists running around these boards and I think it's about high time we did.

C'mon, you could just pretend to be a Scientologist so we could all have some fun making Hubbard jokes. What do ya say?

Bumble Bee Tuna

well I've always defined "believe" as "accept ____ as true" or something along those lines. And I certainly accept that "There is no God" is a true statement. The only way I could not "believe" or "know" that God does not exist is if I drifted into the realms of solipsism and decided I didn't believe or know anything at all.
*hopes he used the right philosophy term*

-B

Olly Winkles

Hell no, it's just whenever i get into a religious philosophical discussion and someone asks me if i'm an atheist or what, i get bored of saying 'well I'm an anti-religious Agnostic who is unwilling to completely deny God's existence, however....' etc. This thread has certainly cleared up my thoughts about the definitions of Agnostic and Atheistic though.

Olly Winkles

I always wanted to meet the stars.