Psycho Economist

Sorry, thank you for playing. We've got some nice parting gifts, though. You're thinking of <a href="http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/richard_carrier/mission.shtml" target="_blank"> metaphysical naturalism</a>.

All metaphysical naturalists are atheists (since the former don't believe in the supernatural at all)... but not athiests are metaphysical naturalists. (I hope most are, but it doesn't logically follow.) It's conceivable to have supernatural causes for things (say, true ESP) that do not prerequire belief in a supernatural agent to whom we can appeal.

Kim o' the Concrete Jungle

I think that, by itself, would make a pretty good definition.

"An atheist is a person who, when asked if he believes in God, will -- if he is truthful -- answer in the negative."

I always find it useful to go for the definition which makes only those assumptions that are absolutely necessary, and avoids making assumptions that are not. In this case, an atheist would answer "no" to the question, whereas an agnostic probably wouldn't. The question as to what lies behind a statement disbelief is left open, but that's not for you to resolve.

This is the same spirit in which Isaac Newton, when he was asked why the planets moved in the way he had shown, replied, "I make no hypotheses." He didn't know why, he only knew the fact of it, and it was useless for him to indulge in unsupported speculation.

I am an atheist. I answer no to the question "Do you believe in God?" Why don't I believe in God? I have come to the conclusion that all of the arguments in favour of God's existence are not very good, and that most evidence seems to point to a naturalistic explanation of the universe. And while these are good reasons to be agnostic, they don't really explain why I actually lack belief. Privately, I speculate that atheists might be agnostics who have subconsciously learned to proceed as if God doesn't exist, and who find their assumption, once made, continuously confirmed by their experiences and learning. But this is a heuristic rather than a logical approach, so it's not going to serve in any argument.

So, all in all, I think the minimal definition of an atheist is the preferred one.

Starboy

I suspect that the definitions of atheist and agnostic that your professor is using confuse the words “belief” and “knowledge”. Consider the two questions:

A - “Does god exist?”
B - “Do you believe god exists?

Possible answers are: yes (Y), no (N), don’t know (D), don’t care (C)

Based on the following definitions from: <a href="http://www.philosophypages.com/dy/" target="_blank">A Dictionary of Philisophical Terms and Names</a>

agnosticism
Belief that human beings do not have sufficient evidence to warrant either the affirmation or the denial of a proposition. The term is used especially in reference to our lack of knowledge of the existence of god.
Recommended Reading: Clarence Darrow, Why I Am an Agnostic and Other Essays (Prometheus, 1994) {at Amazon.com} and Bertrand Russell, Why I Am Not a Christian, and Other Essays on Religion and Related Subjects (Simon & Schuster, 1977) {at Amazon.com}.
Also see OCP, BGHT, ColE, noesis, ISM, and MacE.

atheism
Belief that god does not exist.
Recommended Reading: Antony Flew, Atheistic Humanism (Prometheus, 1993) {at Amazon.com}; Atheism, ed. by S. T. Joshi (Prometheus, 2000) {at Amazon.com}; Michael Martin, Atheism: A Philosophical Justification (Temple, 1992) {at Amazon.com}; and J. J. C. Smart and J. J. Haldane, Atheism and Theism (Blackwell, 1996) {at Amazon.com}.
Also see Theodore M. Drange, OCP, BGHT, Fredrick Benz, ColE, Emma Goldman, ISM, noesis, and MacE.

theism
Belief in the existence of god as a perfect being deserving of worship.
Recommended Reading: Richard Swinburne, The Coherence of Theism (Clarendon, 1993) {at Amazon.com}; J. J. C. Smart and J. J. Haldane, Atheism and Theism (Blackwell, 1996) {at Amazon.com}; Alvin Plantinga, God and Other Minds: A Study of the Rational Justification of Belief in God (Cornell, 1990) {at Amazon.com}; Richard Swinburne, The Existence of God (Clarendon, 1991) {at Amazon.com}; and Stephen T. Davis, God, Reason, and Theistic Proofs (Eerdmans, 1997) {at Amazon.com}.
Also see OCP, ISM, Richard Swinburne, Nicholas Rescher, Alvin Plantinga, BGHT on Theism and Monotheism, ColE, James F. Sennett, noesis, and MacE.

fideism
Belief that religious doctrines rest exclusively on faith {Lat. fides}, instead of on reason. In various forms, fideism was maintained by philosophers as diverse as Pascal, Bayle, and Kierkegaard.
Recommended Reading: Delbert J. Hanson, Fideism and Hume's Philosophy: Knowledge, Religion and Metaphysics (Peter Lang, 1993) {at Amazon.com} and Terence Penelhum, God and Skepticism: A Study in Skepticism and Fideism (Reidel, 1983) {at Amazon.com}.
Also see SEP, OCP, Louis Pojman, David E. White, ISM, noesis, BGHT, and CE.

positivism
Belief that natural science, based on observation, comprises the whole of human knowledge. Positivists like Auguste Comte, then, reject as meaningless the claims of theology and metaphysics. The most influential twentieth-century version is logical positivism.
Recommended Reading: Auguste Comte, The Positive Philosophy (AMS, 1987) {at Amazon.com}; A. J. Ayer, Logical Positivism (Free Press, 1966) {at Amazon.com}; and Jonathan H. Turner, Classical Sociological Theory: A Positivist's Perspective (Burnham, 1993) {at Amazon.com}.
Also see OCP, BGHT, ColE, ISM, OCDL, noesis, and MacE.

Inquirism – couldn’t find a philosophical definition of this term.

Based on these definitions and the possible responses to these two question, one gets the following classifications:

A - “Does god exist?”
B - “Do you believe god exists?

Yes - Y, no - N, don’t know - D, don’t care - C

A B
---------
1 N N - Atheist
2 N D -
3 N C -
4 N Y - Theist, Fideist
5 D N - Agnostic, Atheist, Positivist
6 D D - Agnostic, Positivist
7 D C - Agnostic, Positivist
8 D Y - Theist, Agnostic, Fideist
9 C N - Atheist, Agnostic, Positivist
10 C D - Agnostic
11 C C - Agnostic
12 C Y - Agnostic, Theist, Fideist
13 Y N - Atheist
14 Y D -
15 Y C -
16 Y Y - Theist

I classify myself as a 9 and use the word a-theist.

Starboy

Laurentius

Sorry, thank you for playing.
We've got some nice parting gifts, though. You're thinking of metaphysical naturalism.
All metaphysical naturalists are atheists (since the former don't believe in the supernatural at all)...
but not athiests are metaphysical naturalists.
(I hope most are, but it doesn't logically follow.)
It's conceivable to have supernatural causes for things (say, true ESP) that do not prerequire belief in a supernatural agent to whom we can appeal.

Strictly speaking I must concede: you're right.
However, I find it hard to believe that stardust asked his question only to be given mere ethimologically derived definitions.
Moreover, I'm kind of fed up with dubious spiritualists stating that they believe in some "force". I think they're just disguised theists.
Therefore, I insist that the definition of atheism should be restricted to the phylosophical positions of those who seek to describe and explain the world without making use of (the claim of) any divine or metaphysical laws.

AVE

[ October 25, 2002: Message edited by: Laurentius ]</p>

Longbow

Oh come on! Someone that thinks there is not proof that god exists is more like an agnostic. "Atheism" is one term that really is quite well-defined, I think. And the best place to go is outside of philosophy, in general, and to the atheists. This is one reason it is a lot better defined than many philosophical terms is because there is a whole organized movement surrounding it.

So, the old "atheism is just the lack of belief in gods" reply is correct, in my opinion. It is about as correct as it gets, in fact. It is etymologically correct, it is about as philosophically correct as it gets. I suppose it is still disputable (as anything is). But, I think it isn't difficult to show that "there is not proof" is not really atheism. This sort of a definition makes an epistemological claim and atheism is a metaphysical position.

Psycho Economist

I think Stardust was asking about whether weak atheists ought to be classified as athiests or agnostics.

Metaphysical naturalist that I am, I see it as perfectly logially possible to believe in a higher force / forces... but as long as that "force" isn't an agent that can be appealed to, it's an athiestic belief. Byt, demographically speaking, you're probably right.