From: perry@apollo.HP.COM (Jim Perry)
Newsgroups: alt.pagan,alt.atheism
Subject: Re: Atheism as Religion (was Re: Is anyone a true aethist?)
Message-ID: <4e88c035.20b6d@apollo.HP.COM>
Date: 11 Dec 90 15:37:00 GMT
References: <90334.184335SXS144@psuvm.psu.edu> <12140@milton.u.washington,edu> <1990Dec11.041635.19943@acc.stolaf.edu>
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Reply-To: perry@apollo.HP.COM (Jim Perry)
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Organization: Hewlett-Packard Company, Apollo Division; Chelmsford, MA
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In article <1990Dec11.041635.19943@acc.stolaf.edu> adams@agnes.acc.stolaf.edu () writes:
>How do readers define "atheism" as opposed to "agnosticism"?
Oddly enough, this comes up often enough on alt.atheism that I've composed
a stock answer, coining the phrase "alt.atheists" to avoid dictionary
conflicts.
---
What alt.atheists believe. (The term "alt.atheist" [or net.atheist, for
historical reasons] is proposed as an alternative to existing terms to
describe the beliefs of the non-believing population of alt.atheism).
There are two words generally used to describe those who do not believe in
the truth of supernatural religious claims: "atheism" and "agnosticism".
There is no general agreement on exactly what these terms mean, as they
have varied historical development, and their use has been colored by the
fact that they apply to religion.
Atheism is generally described in a dictionary as "disbelief in or denial
of the existence of God [or gods]". Agnosticism is not as well defined,
but generally is considered "denial of the knowability of God". As applied
to oneself, the two terms are effectively interchangeable, but both are
used with pejorative intent of others. I propose this posting as a
statement of what we alt.atheists believe, to be available as a regular
posting or as a stock reply to newcomers citing a competing definition. I
have posted this with minor variations a few times with some positive and
no negative response, so for the moment I believe it to be representative.
Equivocation (the fallacy arising from ambiguous use of a word or phrase
in an argument) is a major problem in discussing these issues, since there
is such a diversity of possible things that can be described by the word
"God". (For instance: "You say you don't believe in God. Einstein
considered God to be the laws of the universe. Thus you don't believe in
the universe, therefore you are a loser, QED.")
It is claimed that "atheists" believe as an article of faith that there is
no God. As it is epistemologically problematic to talk about knowing or
proving the nonexistence of something, this is attacked as being a similar
leap of faith to believing axiomatically in God. And so it would be,
especially when "God" is used as a moving target, but alt.atheists
don't have that belief. (We don't believe there is one, we do *not*
believe there knowably isn't). Straw-man arguments against that definition
of "atheist" are not applicable to the posters here who use that label
for themselves.
Of "agnostics" it is said that they are fence-sitters: as we can't know
whether there is a God, it is as likely as not that there is. Again,
equivocation rears its ugly head. Bertrand Russell, who did not believe
in the God of Christianity (or other supernatural religious claims), and
who had a negative opinion of religion in general, called himself an
Agnostic, and in fact had the above cited negative opinion of the term
atheist. Agnostics generally disbelieve in specific claims of specific
gods, e.g. Yahweh, the God of the Bible, but hold that humans don't or
can't know about abstract gods such as a prime mover, or designer/creator,
who don't interact with humans directly. alt.atheists generally don't
disagree with that concept, though most of us don't consider it
particularly likely.
To state it positively, alt.atheists, through reasoned study of the
available evidence, have concluded that none of the gods proposed by major
religions actually exist, to the best of our ability to determine. Beyond
this disbelief in God[s], and thus in the supernatural authority of
religious institutions, alt.atheists are as diverse as any other usenet
population.
-
Jim Perry perry@apollo.hp.com HP/Apollo, Chelmsford MA
This particularly rapid, unintelligible patter
Isn't generally heard, and if it is it doesn't matter!
