Lord Asriel

Can somebody help me out here? I have labelled myself as atheist for many years. But having done some reading here and on other sites I find myself a little confused as to definitions. Is Atheism a position that a god or gods does not exist, or a postion that a god or gods cannot exist? Is the second position a subset of the first, or does it have a label of its own?

Any clarification gratefully received.

sighhswolf

Paul Edwards-------" First there is the familiar sense in which a person is an atheist if he maintains that there is no god, where this is taken to mean that "god exists" expresses a "false
proposition."
Secondly there is also a broader sense in which a person is an atheist if he "rejects"belief in god
regardless of whether his rejection is based on the view that belief in god is false."

An atheist is not for the most part someone who believes that a god does not exist, but rather he does not believe in the existence of a god.
Atheism is not a belief.........it is the absence
of belief.
"I dont believe your god exists, because your belief is irrational and based on errant information."

"gods dont exist...period."

ManM

And this is semantic hogwash. If you truly had no opinions or beliefs about God you would not all be posting about Him on this website.

Jamie_L

If you believe "God exists" is a false statement, you are a weak atheist. In common conversation, this is equivalent to saying "I don't believe in God."

If you believe God cannot possibly exists, you are a strong atheist. Many people are strong atheists about particular Gods. I.E. many believe the Christian god cannot possibly exist because it is logically self-contradictory.

If you accept the notion that it is possible for a God to exist, but irrational to believe that it does, you are still an atheist.

Agnosticism is the stance of choosing to take no stance whatsoever.

Lastly, there is what I call "ignorant atheism." If you've never heard or don't comprehend the statment "God exists", then you have no belief in God. My 2-year-old is an atheist. She lacks a belief in God. Of course, she also has no idea what "God" means.

Jamie

Lord Asriel

Why am I not allowed to have an opinion on a fictional character?

Lord Asriel

My position is that I do not believe a free-willed God can exist. I guess that makes me a strong atheist.

ManM

No one said you were not allowed to have an opinion on a fictional character.

Philosoft

I wouldn't concern yourself too much. Really, some people make a huge stink about this around here, claiming that "strong" atheism is some dogmatic stance equivalent to, "Nothing that can remotely be called a god can possibly exist." This, of course, is a nonsensical position that no atheist I have ever encountered has claimed to hold. In most cases, one's basis for atheism is a philosophical and/or empirical response to prior claims that gods x, y and z exist.

Lord Asriel

Your post seemed to imply (or at least I inferred from it) that I had to believe in something to have an opinion on it. Maybe I misread.

Captain Pedantic

If I were presented with evidence for this "God" creature that so many religious folk seem to enjoy, I might well believe. Since I have seen no evidence to suggest that any religion has "the truth", or that any "god" as described by these religions actually exists, I continue with my disbelief.

But really, I'm just posting to say that I think those Phillip Pullman books (from which Lord Asriel got his username) are really cool.