look, i don't hate atheists... I'm just embarrased that I ever called myself one
(media.greatawakening.win)
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Googling the definition of 'atheist' i got: "a person who disbelieves or lacks belief in the existence of God or gods."
From there, a lack of belief don't seem to be an assertion. Although i agree that to assert there is none is not a position a person can make an informed declaration of.
But ya gotta understand how it sounds to a non-religious person to hear 'until Jesus Christ destroys it at Armageddon.' Just think of how it would sound for another person to say the same sort of thing about their religion's Armageddon being the only way out of these tough times. Just gotta do some extrapolation.
I'm curious what part is horseshit. I looked up the definition of 'atheist' and copy/pasted it. "a person who disbelieves or lacks belief in the existence of God or gods."
These definitions, the ones of atheist and agnostic seems to be closely brimmed up against eachother like bubbles to the point where they mildly overlap.
Definition of agnostic from Google: "a person who believes that nothing is known or can be known of the existence or nature of God or of anything beyond material phenomena; a person who claims neither faith nor disbelief in God." So it looks like an agnostic says 'i dont have enough info, so i don't believe there is or isn't a god, so i have no belief.' But in the definition of atheist is also a lack of belief. Just seems to be all muddle up in semantics.
To disbelieve means "to reject a belief." In other words, it means to believe it isn't true.
A Theist is
An Atheist is
Regardless of the definition you found having a looser meaning (lacks belief), it does contain the colloquial definition, which is "disbelieves in God" AKA "believes there is no God."
I have had, at one point or another, many friends (people I would speak with regularly) that are atheists. They believe there is no God. They have the opposite of the beliefs of a Theist. They don't question whether or not the Theists are wrong, they state straight up, "the theists are wrong, there is no God."
Having said that, many will, when cornered, admit they are more anti-Christian definition of God than strictly stating that there is no possibility that the universe was created by intent. When asked that specific question most will say, "I don't know."
What I am saying is, its more complicated than what you are suggesting.
In the colloquial, within the definition you have provided, and in its root, "atheist" means the belief there is no God. In practice it commonly means "there is no Christian God" (guy up in the sky who cares about us personally and created the universe just for little ole' us who believe that Jesus Christ died on the cross to save us from our sins).
Hey, you forgot to call me a cuck. j/k.
Thanks for the calm non-malicious response.
I think at bottom i agree with the point that to say "They don't question whether or not the Theists are wrong, they state straight up, the theists are wrong, there is no God," is definitely an intellectually dishonest position to have. I think you're right and i just looked at the definitions in a lot "looser" way and felt the other guys were just being sort of pedantic.
Your reaction to me is way worse than the atheist's reaction to OP. It really just seems to be semantics where one word offers a clarifier.
Atheist: I don't believe.
Agnostic: I don't believe, because--
Although it was interesting to find out that typing in a word and pressing Enter is grovelling.
A lack of belief is not the declarative statement that there is no god.
The definition is the definition and you seem to be intentionally misunderstanding it.
You're taking the position that lacks belief and equating it with an assertion that there is no god. I personally don't know how anyone could say such a thing. The Universe is more vast than anything we can fathom and we hardly know anything about it... So, at the same time, feeling so confident in your version of spirituality as THE truth and THE only truth is arrogant and ignorant, IMO.
Personally, I think there's much more going on than any religion can explain... Before there were rocks, there was consciousness.