Atheism

[Ronald Wilson Reagan]

^ haha, Geoff is proven wrong by unknown soldier, now lets do it one more time.

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to say you are an agnostic is the same as saying you are an atheist. either way, you are saying that you can not know that there is a god

[close]

Wrong. Atheists positively claim certainty that there is no god, that they do know, and he definitely doesn't exist.

[close]

wrong

not all atheists positively claim certainty that there is no god, they simply do not have a belief in one. man, you are dumb. you can be an atheist by a de facto non belief. I.e., one can not claim to know whether there is a god or not, but not believe in one, this is called negative atheism. Positive atheism is the belief that there IS NO god. an agnostic, even the kind that misuse the term, do not believe that there is a god, if they did, they could not be an agnostic, they are mutually exclusive, ergo, they are atheist.

again, with your ineptitude, it saddens me that you are involved in education.

[close]

You are still wrong from the start. Atheists who do not positively claim [with] certainty that there is no god are defined as agnostic. People who positively claim with certainty that there is no god, and nothing less, are considered atheists. People who don't know, who know that they can't know, or just don't care are considered agnostic. People who care enough to say with certainty that there is no god outright, such as Richard Dawkins or Stephen Hawking, are atheists.

So like others and I have said before, you are a fucking idiot.

[close]

hahaahahaha, the rad thing is, you are totally wrong. i have studied this topic extensively. you are a fucking moron.


here is a link to cambridge and stanford atheist/agnostic pages, they discuss these terms and their controversy/relevance. learn how to do some research and shut the fuck up.

http://www.srcf.ucam.org/hmmsoc/atheism.htm

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/atheism-agnosticism/

You're like Diego menendez stupid, you know that? Check out how the articles you just posted absolutely support me:
from
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/atheism-agnosticism/#1
"�Atheism� means the negation of theism, the denial of the existence of God."
Note how it says DENIAL and NEGATION, as in to say that there is none, not that one can not know.
On Agnosticism according to Huxley:
"Huxley thought that we would never be able to know about the ultimate origin and causes of the universe."
"Huxley's agnosticism seems nevertheless to go with an extreme empiricism, nearer to Mill's methods of induction than to recent discussions of the hypothetico-deductive and partly holistic aspect of testing of theories. Though we might not be able to prove the existence of God might we be able to disprove it?"

hmmmmm, sounds like EXACTLY what I said... funny.
They also point out how the term can be used in general to mean neither believing nor disbelieving in this little quote:
"it can be used in a non-theological way, as when a cosmologist might say that she is agnostic about string theory, neither believing nor disbelieving it."

That's not all, I'm just getting started- and let me tell you, putting your bitch ass back in its place is making me very happy right now. The fact that you just gave me so much to work with in calling you a complete and utter fucking idiot is further proof of how stupid you are, and is just fantastic to me.

From the other website (http://www.srcf.ucam.org/hmmsoc/atheism.htm)
What is atheism? According to them:
"Taken at its most basic, atheism is simply the state of not being a theist, i.e., lacking belief in deities, although it may also be interpreted as a positive belief in the absence of deities"
Just to translate for your hillarious and pleasurably stupid mind, this means that in a literal deconstruction of the word "a" means without, and "theist" as in belief in deities. Then they make it clear that the modern interpretation is the certain (positive) belief in the lack of gods.
They then point out that most consider agnosticism/atheism/theism to be more of a scale than 3 absolute positions, but what do they claim an explicit atheist is?
"With this type, the atheist explicitly denies the existence of any gods � making a strong claim which will demand empirical support at some point. Some atheists do this and others may do this with regards to certain specific gods but not with others. Thus, a person may lack belief in one god, but deny the existence of another god. "
They then talk about the two slightly less pure forms of atheism that are considered atheism are.
They are new atheism, which they claim:
"Old Atheists are those of the Victorian school, who believed that empiricism and science effectively ended the plausibility of religion, "
Get it? They positively think that science proved religion was false.
Next on the order, anti-theists/new atheists, who, according to the article YOU provided (hahahahahahahahahahaha... idiot) have a "a '99% certainty' that there are no Gods or other supernatural beings." What's that you say? It only says usually, and this proves your point that you don't have to positively believe there are no gods to truly be an atheist? Oh, they clarify that right here:
"Most New Atheists claim to be 'technically' agnostic, and thus avoid the pitfalls 'Strong' Atheism."
Hmmm, sounds like even with a 99% certain belief there is no god, leaders of this movement still are hesitant to call themselves truly atheist.

The thing is, the stuff you say is almost kind of in there, but at points where it comes close to agreeing with you, it always has modifiers like "some might argue" or "some claim" meaning that it is not agreed upon.

What is agreed upon not only by those articles, but also by our culture at large (as the true meaning of language is its culturally agreed upon meaning), is that atheism= certain belief in no god and agnosticism means no certain belief in god, which is what I was saying in the first place. Therefore not only are you wrong, but you are a terrible reader as well.
I'd like to close with a quote from the article that I find very appropriate for our conversation:

That was awesome. Now, here is your education that you don't think I am capable of providing (which I think probably comes from being jealous and having a social and economic position which probably gets you less respect, thus creating the desire to deride me for what I do, as you feel that I can't actually be better than you despite what society may say)-
Lesson 1: Reading articles without understanding them is not the same as "doing research." Doing research means you have not only read, but also understood and processed this article to get a greater understanding of the topic you are talking about. What I see here is that you may have read the articles, but did not understand them on even a basic level.
Lesson 2: providing an article for citation without actual quotes to specifically point to is completely useless. Without applying specific ideas in the article to the thesis you are arguing all you are doing is giving me a chance to find the weakest points in the article and arguing against them. See how the unknown soldier points to the facts and clarifies how it relates to his point? You need to find quotes in the article and do that. You need to apply specific research to the claims you make, but again, your claims don't necessarily match what each article says, which really goes back to the first lesson, which is to process and ensure you understand what you are reading, rather than just looking at the words an declaring yourself an expert when you get to the last period. Now, is there stuff you can use in there to back your point? maybe, but without actually citing the quotes that support your ideas, you allow people like me to look at an article and see words which support our side rather than yours
Lesson 3: Make sure to use the right resources for your argument. It is actually antithetical to your position when the documents you vaguely point to actually rebut your point. Now, its possible that there is academia that supports every word that you say? Yes, but that's not what you supplied.

That was awesome.

[annoyedwithskating]

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agnostic was coined by t.h. huxley to mean, without knowledge of things unknowable. to say you are an agnostic is the same as saying you are an atheist. either way, you are saying that you can not know that there is a god. now, there are different forms of this belief. some say they are agnostic in the sense that they are not sure, now, they might want to believe that they are not atheists, but they are de facto atheists. the reason, they do not believe in a god. if you do believe there is a god, you can not be an agnostic, because by definition, to be agnostic is to claim that you can not know if there is a god. with that, claiming that you know there are things such as god, or a spirit, or a spiritual world, is dumb.

[close]

There's a difference between "believing" and "knowing", bubba.

[close]

can you explain that difference

[close]

be?lieve   
[bih-leev]  Show IPA
verb, -lieved, -liev?ing.
?verb (used without object)
1.
to have confidence in the truth, the existence, or the reliability of something, although without absolute proof that one is right in doing so:




Badda bing, badda boom.

you didnt define what it means to know, and you didnt show a difference.

[Archie Bunker]

That was fuckin hilarious

[annoyedwithskating]

^ haha, Geoff is proven wrong by unknown soldier, now lets do it one more time.

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to say you are an agnostic is the same as saying you are an atheist. either way, you are saying that you can not know that there is a god

[close]

Wrong. Atheists positively claim certainty that there is no god, that they do know, and he definitely doesn't exist.

[close]

wrong

not all atheists positively claim certainty that there is no god, they simply do not have a belief in one. man, you are dumb. you can be an atheist by a de facto non belief. I.e., one can not claim to know whether there is a god or not, but not believe in one, this is called negative atheism. Positive atheism is the belief that there IS NO god. an agnostic, even the kind that misuse the term, do not believe that there is a god, if they did, they could not be an agnostic, they are mutually exclusive, ergo, they are atheist.

again, with your ineptitude, it saddens me that you are involved in education.

[close]

You are still wrong from the start. Atheists who do not positively claim [with] certainty that there is no god are defined as agnostic. People who positively claim with certainty that there is no god, and nothing less, are considered atheists. People who don't know, who know that they can't know, or just don't care are considered agnostic. People who care enough to say with certainty that there is no god outright, such as Richard Dawkins or Stephen Hawking, are atheists.

So like others and I have said before, you are a fucking idiot.

[close]

hahaahahaha, the rad thing is, you are totally wrong. i have studied this topic extensively. you are a fucking moron.


here is a link to cambridge and stanford atheist/agnostic pages, they discuss these terms and their controversy/relevance. learn how to do some research and shut the fuck up.

http://www.srcf.ucam.org/hmmsoc/atheism.htm

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/atheism-agnosticism/

[close]

You're like Diego menendez stupid, you know that? Check out how the articles you just posted absolutely support me:
from
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/atheism-agnosticism/#1
"�Atheism� means the negation of theism, the denial of the existence of God."
Note how it says DENIAL and NEGATION, as in to say that there is none, not that one can not know.
On Agnosticism according to Huxley:
"Huxley thought that we would never be able to know about the ultimate origin and causes of the universe."
"Huxley's agnosticism seems nevertheless to go with an extreme empiricism, nearer to Mill's methods of induction than to recent discussions of the hypothetico-deductive and partly holistic aspect of testing of theories. Though we might not be able to prove the existence of God might we be able to disprove it?"

hmmmmm, sounds like EXACTLY what I said... funny.
They also point out how the term can be used in general to mean neither believing nor disbelieving in this little quote:
"it can be used in a non-theological way, as when a cosmologist might say that she is agnostic about string theory, neither believing nor disbelieving it."

That's not all, I'm just getting started- and let me tell you, putting your bitch ass back in its place is making me very happy right now. The fact that you just gave me so much to work with in calling you a complete and utter fucking idiot is further proof of how stupid you are, and is just fantastic to me.

From the other website (http://www.srcf.ucam.org/hmmsoc/atheism.htm)
What is atheism? According to them:
"Taken at its most basic, atheism is simply the state of not being a theist, i.e., lacking belief in deities, although it may also be interpreted as a positive belief in the absence of deities"
Just to translate for your hillarious and pleasurably stupid mind, this means that in a literal deconstruction of the word "a" means without, and "theist" as in belief in deities. Then they make it clear that the modern interpretation is the certain (positive) belief in the lack of gods.
They then point out that most consider agnosticism/atheism/theism to be more of a scale than 3 absolute positions, but what do they claim an explicit atheist is?
"With this type, the atheist explicitly denies the existence of any gods � making a strong claim which will demand empirical support at some point. Some atheists do this and others may do this with regards to certain specific gods but not with others. Thus, a person may lack belief in one god, but deny the existence of another god. "
They then talk about the two slightly less pure forms of atheism that are considered atheism are.
They are new atheism, which they claim:
"Old Atheists are those of the Victorian school, who believed that empiricism and science effectively ended the plausibility of religion, "
Get it? They positively think that science proved religion was false.
Next on the order, anti-theists/new atheists, who, according to the article YOU provided (hahahahahahahahahahaha... idiot) have a "a '99% certainty' that there are no Gods or other supernatural beings." What's that you say? It only says usually, and this proves your point that you don't have to positively believe there are no gods to truly be an atheist? Oh, they clarify that right here:
"Most New Atheists claim to be 'technically' agnostic, and thus avoid the pitfalls 'Strong' Atheism."
Hmmm, sounds like even with a 99% certain belief there is no god, leaders of this movement still are hesitant to call themselves truly atheist.

The thing is, the stuff you say is almost kind of in there, but at points where it comes close to agreeing with you, it always has modifiers like "some might argue" or "some claim" meaning that it is not agreed upon.

What is agreed upon not only by those articles, but also by our culture at large (as the true meaning of language is its culturally agreed upon meaning), is that atheism= certain belief in no god and agnosticism means no certain belief in god, which is what I was saying in the first place. Therefore not only are you wrong, but you are a terrible reader as well.
I'd like to close with a quote from the article that I find very appropriate for our conversation:

That was awesome. Now, here is your education that you don't think I am capable of providing (which I think probably comes from being jealous and having a social and economic position which probably gets you less respect, thus creating the desire to deride me for what I do, as you feel that I can't actually be better than you despite what society may say)-
Lesson 1: Reading articles without understanding them is not the same as "doing research." Doing research means you have not only read, but also understood and processed this article to get a greater understanding of the topic you are talking about. What I see here is that you may have read the articles, but did not understand them on even a basic level.
Lesson 2: providing an article for citation without actual quotes to specifically point to is completely useless. Without applying specific ideas in the article to the thesis you are arguing all you are doing is giving me a chance to find the weakest points in the article and arguing against them. See how the unknown soldier points to the facts and clarifies how it relates to his point? You need to find quotes in the article and do that. You need to apply specific research to the claims you make, but again, your claims don't necessarily match what each article says, which really goes back to the first lesson, which is to process and ensure you understand what you are reading, rather than just looking at the words an declaring yourself an expert when you get to the last period. Now, is there stuff you can use in there to back your point? maybe, but without actually citing the quotes that support your ideas, you allow people like me to look at an article and see words which support our side rather than yours
Lesson 3: Make sure to use the right resources for your argument. It is actually antithetical to your position when the documents you vaguely point to actually rebut your point. Now, its possible that there is academia that supports every word that you say? Yes, but that's not what you supplied.

That was awesome.

 ?Those who fail to believe in God because they think that the truth-value of ?God exists? is uncertain may be called agnostic negative atheists, or agnostics for short.? . --windyhead (talk) 16:35, 12 September 2008 (UTC)


man, you are a moron. youre very first qoute is exactly what i was arguing, then you go on and on in an attempt to dismiss it.
"Taken at its most basic, atheism is simply the state of not being a theist, i.e., lacking belief in deities" then you go on and quote something i never argued against, in fact i wrote concerning the different forms of atheism, remember, "positive atheism"
"may also be interpreted as a positive belief in the absence of deities"
you are a waste of time.  try as hard as you want, i am smarter than you. i admit, the cambridge article was not the one i thought it was, but the stanford one was. the funny thing is that you believed that you won this argument before it even began. that is called hubris. im sure you have heard of it, but never applied it to yourself. those articles were simply to demonstrate the nuance of the discussion. if you cant understand the difference between a positive assertion and a passive negation, you truly are stupid. i dont care about modern cultural interpretations of philosophical terms. of course there is relevance, but the main point is a simple logical conclusion. if one does not have a belief in a deity, they are a non theist or atheist whether there is a positive element to it or not and it especially does not matter what a culture defines it as. you think you can argue your  way into being right, but youre not. but mainly, you are just a dick, im sure you suck at skating, and you definitely suck at life.

[Archie Bunker]

do you know nothing about the concept of debating a topic?

[pugmaster]

Now that I think about it, Atheists are like religious hipsters.


"oh you're into God, yeah he doesn't exist and i've been into that for like, forever"

[pizzafliptofakie]

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agnostic was coined by t.h. huxley to mean, without knowledge of things unknowable. to say you are an agnostic is the same as saying you are an atheist. either way, you are saying that you can not know that there is a god. now, there are different forms of this belief. some say they are agnostic in the sense that they are not sure, now, they might want to believe that they are not atheists, but they are de facto atheists. the reason, they do not believe in a god. if you do believe there is a god, you can not be an agnostic, because by definition, to be agnostic is to claim that you can not know if there is a god. with that, claiming that you know there are things such as god, or a spirit, or a spiritual world, is dumb.

[close]

There's a difference between "believing" and "knowing", bubba.

[close]

can you explain that difference

[close]

be?lieve   
[bih-leev]  Show IPA
verb, -lieved, -liev?ing.
?verb (used without object)
1.
to have confidence in the truth, the existence, or the reliability of something, although without absolute proof that one is right in doing so:




Badda bing, badda boom.

[close]

you didnt define what it means to know, and you didnt show a difference.

Take away what I made bold in the initial definition and there ya go.


I figured you'd have enough common sense to figure at least that much out, but I suppose I gave you too much credit. Now I'm embarrassed.

[Ronald Wilson Reagan]

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^ haha, Geoff is proven wrong by unknown soldier, now lets do it one more time.

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to say you are an agnostic is the same as saying you are an atheist. either way, you are saying that you can not know that there is a god

[close]

Wrong. Atheists positively claim certainty that there is no god, that they do know, and he definitely doesn't exist.

[close]

wrong

not all atheists positively claim certainty that there is no god, they simply do not have a belief in one. man, you are dumb. you can be an atheist by a de facto non belief. I.e., one can not claim to know whether there is a god or not, but not believe in one, this is called negative atheism. Positive atheism is the belief that there IS NO god. an agnostic, even the kind that misuse the term, do not believe that there is a god, if they did, they could not be an agnostic, they are mutually exclusive, ergo, they are atheist.

again, with your ineptitude, it saddens me that you are involved in education.

[close]

You are still wrong from the start. Atheists who do not positively claim [with] certainty that there is no god are defined as agnostic. People who positively claim with certainty that there is no god, and nothing less, are considered atheists. People who don't know, who know that they can't know, or just don't care are considered agnostic. People who care enough to say with certainty that there is no god outright, such as Richard Dawkins or Stephen Hawking, are atheists.

So like others and I have said before, you are a fucking idiot.

[close]

hahaahahaha, the rad thing is, you are totally wrong. i have studied this topic extensively. you are a fucking moron.


here is a link to cambridge and stanford atheist/agnostic pages, they discuss these terms and their controversy/relevance. learn how to do some research and shut the fuck up.

http://www.srcf.ucam.org/hmmsoc/atheism.htm

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/atheism-agnosticism/

[close]

You're like Diego menendez stupid, you know that? Check out how the articles you just posted absolutely support me:
from
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/atheism-agnosticism/#1
"�Atheism� means the negation of theism, the denial of the existence of God."
Note how it says DENIAL and NEGATION, as in to say that there is none, not that one can not know.
On Agnosticism according to Huxley:
"Huxley thought that we would never be able to know about the ultimate origin and causes of the universe."
"Huxley's agnosticism seems nevertheless to go with an extreme empiricism, nearer to Mill's methods of induction than to recent discussions of the hypothetico-deductive and partly holistic aspect of testing of theories. Though we might not be able to prove the existence of God might we be able to disprove it?"

hmmmmm, sounds like EXACTLY what I said... funny.
They also point out how the term can be used in general to mean neither believing nor disbelieving in this little quote:
"it can be used in a non-theological way, as when a cosmologist might say that she is agnostic about string theory, neither believing nor disbelieving it."

That's not all, I'm just getting started- and let me tell you, putting your bitch ass back in its place is making me very happy right now. The fact that you just gave me so much to work with in calling you a complete and utter fucking idiot is further proof of how stupid you are, and is just fantastic to me.

From the other website (http://www.srcf.ucam.org/hmmsoc/atheism.htm)
What is atheism? According to them:
"Taken at its most basic, atheism is simply the state of not being a theist, i.e., lacking belief in deities, although it may also be interpreted as a positive belief in the absence of deities"
Just to translate for your hillarious and pleasurably stupid mind, this means that in a literal deconstruction of the word "a" means without, and "theist" as in belief in deities. Then they make it clear that the modern interpretation is the certain (positive) belief in the lack of gods.
They then point out that most consider agnosticism/atheism/theism to be more of a scale than 3 absolute positions, but what do they claim an explicit atheist is?
"With this type, the atheist explicitly denies the existence of any gods � making a strong claim which will demand empirical support at some point. Some atheists do this and others may do this with regards to certain specific gods but not with others. Thus, a person may lack belief in one god, but deny the existence of another god. "
They then talk about the two slightly less pure forms of atheism that are considered atheism are.
They are new atheism, which they claim:
"Old Atheists are those of the Victorian school, who believed that empiricism and science effectively ended the plausibility of religion, "
Get it? They positively think that science proved religion was false.
Next on the order, anti-theists/new atheists, who, according to the article YOU provided (hahahahahahahahahahaha... idiot) have a "a '99% certainty' that there are no Gods or other supernatural beings." What's that you say? It only says usually, and this proves your point that you don't have to positively believe there are no gods to truly be an atheist? Oh, they clarify that right here:
"Most New Atheists claim to be 'technically' agnostic, and thus avoid the pitfalls 'Strong' Atheism."
Hmmm, sounds like even with a 99% certain belief there is no god, leaders of this movement still are hesitant to call themselves truly atheist.

The thing is, the stuff you say is almost kind of in there, but at points where it comes close to agreeing with you, it always has modifiers like "some might argue" or "some claim" meaning that it is not agreed upon.

What is agreed upon not only by those articles, but also by our culture at large (as the true meaning of language is its culturally agreed upon meaning), is that atheism= certain belief in no god and agnosticism means no certain belief in god, which is what I was saying in the first place. Therefore not only are you wrong, but you are a terrible reader as well.
I'd like to close with a quote from the article that I find very appropriate for our conversation:

That was awesome. Now, here is your education that you don't think I am capable of providing (which I think probably comes from being jealous and having a social and economic position which probably gets you less respect, thus creating the desire to deride me for what I do, as you feel that I can't actually be better than you despite what society may say)-
Lesson 1: Reading articles without understanding them is not the same as "doing research." Doing research means you have not only read, but also understood and processed this article to get a greater understanding of the topic you are talking about. What I see here is that you may have read the articles, but did not understand them on even a basic level.
Lesson 2: providing an article for citation without actual quotes to specifically point to is completely useless. Without applying specific ideas in the article to the thesis you are arguing all you are doing is giving me a chance to find the weakest points in the article and arguing against them. See how the unknown soldier points to the facts and clarifies how it relates to his point? You need to find quotes in the article and do that. You need to apply specific research to the claims you make, but again, your claims don't necessarily match what each article says, which really goes back to the first lesson, which is to process and ensure you understand what you are reading, rather than just looking at the words an declaring yourself an expert when you get to the last period. Now, is there stuff you can use in there to back your point? maybe, but without actually citing the quotes that support your ideas, you allow people like me to look at an article and see words which support our side rather than yours
Lesson 3: Make sure to use the right resources for your argument. It is actually antithetical to your position when the documents you vaguely point to actually rebut your point. Now, its possible that there is academia that supports every word that you say? Yes, but that's not what you supplied.

That was awesome.

[close]

 ?Those who fail to believe in God because they think that the truth-value of ?God exists? is uncertain may be called agnostic negative atheists, or agnostics for short.? . --windyhead (talk) 16:35, 12 September 2008 (UTC)


man, you are a moron. youre very first qoute is exactly what i was arguing, then you go on and on in an attempt to dismiss it.
"Taken at its most basic, atheism is simply the state of not being a theist, i.e., lacking belief in deities" then you go on and quote something i never argued against, in fact i wrote concerning the different forms of atheism, remember, "positive atheism"
"may also be interpreted as a positive belief in the absence of deities"
you are a waste of time. �try as hard as you want, i am smarter than you. i admit, the cambridge article was not the one i thought it was, but the stanford one was. the funny thing is that you believed that you won this argument before it even began. that is called hubris. im sure you have heard of it, but never applied it to yourself. those articles were simply to demonstrate the nuance of the discussion. if you cant understand the difference between a positive assertion and a passive negation, you truly are stupid. i dont care about modern cultural interpretations of philosophical terms. of course there is relevance, but the main point is a simple logical conclusion. if one does not have a belief in a deity, they are a non theist or atheist whether there is a positive element to it or not and it especially does not matter what a culture defines it as. you think you can argue your �way into being right, but youre not. but mainly, you are just a dick, im sure you suck at skating, and you definitely suck at life.

I'm pretty sure you thought you won the argument before it began when you posted those articles and said that you had, in fact, done research on this subject, which was cute, and you may define as Hubris. Then you provided evidence. As soon as you provided the evidence, I knew I had won, and gloried in it, because I know you really have a thing about taking me down and claiming I'm not as smart as I think I am, and you argue stupid and indefensible points in order to prove it, which always backfires.
I don't think stupid vs. smart can be determined in an internet debate, but if it can:
to know: 1. Be aware of through observation, inquiry, or information.
Its different than belief, as one is based on empiricism, and the other is not.

The first quote clearly backs my side, and I clearly explained what that quote you are talking about was saying when it says "taken at its most basic," the same way hydrophobic means fear of water at its most basic meaning, but when actually applied, it means that it repels water. The same way atheism, when applied means a positive belief in the absence of deities. If you read past my first quote (which you didn't) you can see that both sites repeatedly back my interpretation after that.
I like how you add passive and positive when those words were never descriptors in the first place on either site.

There, now me and the unkown soldier are smarter than you, based on your premise that winning an argument makes you smarter.
Based on what I have seen, I don't know who is smarter than who, but you are hillariously stupid, with absolutely nothing that you can say in this or any other thread ever changing that.
I like how you try to sum up my life based on me kicking the shit out of you in a messageboard debate. Obviously you have an inferiority thing, which is cute. It probably stems from the fact that again, you don't view yourself as doing as well as me in life and feel bitterness about it.

[Doogie Howser Ph.D.]

HYPNO-TOAD IS A RELIGON

[daddy]

Atheism is a religion and it's all bullshit.

[L33Tg33k]

The philosophical argument on what constitutes an athiest has been waged by critical thinkers for many years now.  It is pretty fucking ridiculous for someone (Reagan) to call an opponent to their side of the argument stupid in the assumption that there has been some type of absolute consensus amongst those in the know for years.  I am tempted to believe that the connotative meaning of the word has changed over time to someone with resolute disbelief in a god figure and so has followed the denotative.
That being said, a simple etymological study of the word atheism will tell you the prefix "a" means not or without, not against.  "Ant/anti" means against.  It follows that an atheist is a person without religion, not only someone who rejects a god outright.  This is why the term Agnostic-Atheism exist.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agnostic_atheism
"Agnostic atheists are atheistic because they do not hold a belief in the existence of any deity, and agnostic because they do not claim to know with certainty whether any deity exists."
Agnostic Theism also exist, but to me the idea that one can believe that there is a god but not know there is a god is a completely irrational childlike view of the world.  I know because that's how I saw things when I was 13.  The concept of agnostic theism is that whole knowledge vs. belief thing Soldier's going on about.
And Reagan, before you call me stupid, I'll just let you know you are also calling all four of the doctorate holding philosophy teachers that I've had over the years stupid too.  Every single one of them have told me something to the effect of you don't got to be agnostic to be an atheist, but you gotta be atheist to be agnostic.  Just like any term in the English language, Atheism is open to interpretation.

[L33Tg33k]

Atheism is a religion and it's all bullshit.

No.  Just, no.

[Mouth]

RELIGION THREEEEEEEEEAAAAAAD!

[Truancy]

The girl I want to fuck more than anybody else in the world is mormon. Fuck.

[David]

"Unlike Huxley, whose agnosticism was a militant creed directed at ?the unpardonable sin of faith? ,  Spencer insisted that he was not concerned to undermine religion in the name of science, but to bring about a reconciliation of the two"

"the demiourg?s is a central figure, a benevolent creator of the universe who works to make the universe as benevolent as the limitations of matter will allow;"

"They believed in a prisca theologia, the doctrine that a single, true, theology exists, which threads through all religions..."



The Oldest Society on Earth: The Australian Aborigines

"Many Indigenous Australians also refer to the Creation time as "The Dreaming". The Dreamtime laid down the patterns of life for the Aboriginal people."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dreamtime

[jimi420]

is there a heaven for a G?

There's no heaven for a thug nigga. That's why we go to thugs mansion.

[annoyedwithskating]

The philosophical argument on what constitutes an athiest has been waged by critical thinkers for many years now.  It is pretty fucking ridiculous for someone (Reagan) to call an opponent to their side of the argument stupid in the assumption that there has been some type of absolute consensus amongst those in the know for years.  I am tempted to believe that the connotative meaning of the word has changed over time to someone with resolute disbelief in a god figure and so has followed the denotative.
That being said, a simple etymological study of the word atheism will tell you the prefix "a" means not or without, not against.  "Ant/anti" means against.  It follows that an atheist is a person without religion, not only someone who rejects a god outright.  This is why the term Agnostic-Atheism exist.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agnostic_atheism
"Agnostic atheists are atheistic because they do not hold a belief in the existence of any deity, and agnostic because they do not claim to know with certainty whether any deity exists."
Agnostic Theism also exist, but to me the idea that one can believe that there is a god but not know there is a god is a completely irrational childlike view of the world.  I know because that's how I saw things when I was 13.  The concept of agnostic theism is that whole knowledge vs. belief thing Soldier's going on about.
And Reagan, before you call me stupid, I'll just let you know you are also calling all four of the doctorate holding philosophy teachers that I've had over the years stupid too.  Every single one of them have told me something to the effect of you don't got to be agnostic to be an atheist, but you gotta be atheist to be agnostic.  Just like any term in the English language, Atheism is open to interpretation.

i dont know why this is even a subject of contention. its pretty simple, but some people just like to argue nonsense, thanks for the post.

[annoyedwithskating]

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agnostic was coined by t.h. huxley to mean, without knowledge of things unknowable. to say you are an agnostic is the same as saying you are an atheist. either way, you are saying that you can not know that there is a god. now, there are different forms of this belief. some say they are agnostic in the sense that they are not sure, now, they might want to believe that they are not atheists, but they are de facto atheists. the reason, they do not believe in a god. if you do believe there is a god, you can not be an agnostic, because by definition, to be agnostic is to claim that you can not know if there is a god. with that, claiming that you know there are things such as god, or a spirit, or a spiritual world, is dumb.

[close]

There's a difference between "believing" and "knowing", bubba.

[close]

can you explain that difference

[close]

be?lieve   
[bih-leev]  Show IPA
verb, -lieved, -liev?ing.
?verb (used without object)
1.
to have confidence in the truth, the existence, or the reliability of something, although without absolute proof that one is right in doing so:




Badda bing, badda boom.

[close]

you didnt define what it means to know, and you didnt show a difference.

[close]

Take away what I made bold in the initial definition and there ya go.


I figured you'd have enough common sense to figure at least that much out, but I suppose I gave you too much credit. Now I'm embarrassed.

you never defined what it is to know, only a vague definition of what it is to believe. you should be embarrassed because you think it is easy.

[EXTRA SPICY]

The girl I want to fuck more than anybody else in the world is mormon. Fuck.

its chill bro, i lost my virginity to a mormon.
chin up!

[William Jefferson Clinton]

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The girl I want to fuck more than anybody else in the world is mormon. Fuck.

[close]

its chill bro, i lost my virginity to a mormon.
chin up!

Yep, not all Mormons are like there portrayed to be.

[annoyedwithskating]

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^ haha, Geoff is proven wrong by unknown soldier, now lets do it one more time.

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to say you are an agnostic is the same as saying you are an atheist. either way, you are saying that you can not know that there is a god

[close]

Wrong. Atheists positively claim certainty that there is no god, that they do know, and he definitely doesn't exist.

[close]

wrong

not all atheists positively claim certainty that there is no god, they simply do not have a belief in one. man, you are dumb. you can be an atheist by a de facto non belief. I.e., one can not claim to know whether there is a god or not, but not believe in one, this is called negative atheism. Positive atheism is the belief that there IS NO god. an agnostic, even the kind that misuse the term, do not believe that there is a god, if they did, they could not be an agnostic, they are mutually exclusive, ergo, they are atheist.

again, with your ineptitude, it saddens me that you are involved in education.

[close]

You are still wrong from the start. Atheists who do not positively claim [with] certainty that there is no god are defined as agnostic. People who positively claim with certainty that there is no god, and nothing less, are considered atheists. People who don't know, who know that they can't know, or just don't care are considered agnostic. People who care enough to say with certainty that there is no god outright, such as Richard Dawkins or Stephen Hawking, are atheists.

So like others and I have said before, you are a fucking idiot.

[close]

hahaahahaha, the rad thing is, you are totally wrong. i have studied this topic extensively. you are a fucking moron.


here is a link to cambridge and stanford atheist/agnostic pages, they discuss these terms and their controversy/relevance. learn how to do some research and shut the fuck up.

http://www.srcf.ucam.org/hmmsoc/atheism.htm

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/atheism-agnosticism/

[close]

You're like Diego menendez stupid, you know that? Check out how the articles you just posted absolutely support me:
from
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/atheism-agnosticism/#1
"�Atheism� means the negation of theism, the denial of the existence of God."
Note how it says DENIAL and NEGATION, as in to say that there is none, not that one can not know.
On Agnosticism according to Huxley:
"Huxley thought that we would never be able to know about the ultimate origin and causes of the universe."
"Huxley's agnosticism seems nevertheless to go with an extreme empiricism, nearer to Mill's methods of induction than to recent discussions of the hypothetico-deductive and partly holistic aspect of testing of theories. Though we might not be able to prove the existence of God might we be able to disprove it?"

hmmmmm, sounds like EXACTLY what I said... funny.
They also point out how the term can be used in general to mean neither believing nor disbelieving in this little quote:
"it can be used in a non-theological way, as when a cosmologist might say that she is agnostic about string theory, neither believing nor disbelieving it."

That's not all, I'm just getting started- and let me tell you, putting your bitch ass back in its place is making me very happy right now. The fact that you just gave me so much to work with in calling you a complete and utter fucking idiot is further proof of how stupid you are, and is just fantastic to me.

From the other website (http://www.srcf.ucam.org/hmmsoc/atheism.htm)
What is atheism? According to them:
"Taken at its most basic, atheism is simply the state of not being a theist, i.e., lacking belief in deities, although it may also be interpreted as a positive belief in the absence of deities"
Just to translate for your hillarious and pleasurably stupid mind, this means that in a literal deconstruction of the word "a" means without, and "theist" as in belief in deities. Then they make it clear that the modern interpretation is the certain (positive) belief in the lack of gods.
They then point out that most consider agnosticism/atheism/theism to be more of a scale than 3 absolute positions, but what do they claim an explicit atheist is?
"With this type, the atheist explicitly denies the existence of any gods � making a strong claim which will demand empirical support at some point. Some atheists do this and others may do this with regards to certain specific gods but not with others. Thus, a person may lack belief in one god, but deny the existence of another god. "
They then talk about the two slightly less pure forms of atheism that are considered atheism are.
They are new atheism, which they claim:
"Old Atheists are those of the Victorian school, who believed that empiricism and science effectively ended the plausibility of religion, "
Get it? They positively think that science proved religion was false.
Next on the order, anti-theists/new atheists, who, according to the article YOU provided (hahahahahahahahahahaha... idiot) have a "a '99% certainty' that there are no Gods or other supernatural beings." What's that you say? It only says usually, and this proves your point that you don't have to positively believe there are no gods to truly be an atheist? Oh, they clarify that right here:
"Most New Atheists claim to be 'technically' agnostic, and thus avoid the pitfalls 'Strong' Atheism."
Hmmm, sounds like even with a 99% certain belief there is no god, leaders of this movement still are hesitant to call themselves truly atheist.

The thing is, the stuff you say is almost kind of in there, but at points where it comes close to agreeing with you, it always has modifiers like "some might argue" or "some claim" meaning that it is not agreed upon.

What is agreed upon not only by those articles, but also by our culture at large (as the true meaning of language is its culturally agreed upon meaning), is that atheism= certain belief in no god and agnosticism means no certain belief in god, which is what I was saying in the first place. Therefore not only are you wrong, but you are a terrible reader as well.
I'd like to close with a quote from the article that I find very appropriate for our conversation:

That was awesome. Now, here is your education that you don't think I am capable of providing (which I think probably comes from being jealous and having a social and economic position which probably gets you less respect, thus creating the desire to deride me for what I do, as you feel that I can't actually be better than you despite what society may say)-
Lesson 1: Reading articles without understanding them is not the same as "doing research." Doing research means you have not only read, but also understood and processed this article to get a greater understanding of the topic you are talking about. What I see here is that you may have read the articles, but did not understand them on even a basic level.
Lesson 2: providing an article for citation without actual quotes to specifically point to is completely useless. Without applying specific ideas in the article to the thesis you are arguing all you are doing is giving me a chance to find the weakest points in the article and arguing against them. See how the unknown soldier points to the facts and clarifies how it relates to his point? You need to find quotes in the article and do that. You need to apply specific research to the claims you make, but again, your claims don't necessarily match what each article says, which really goes back to the first lesson, which is to process and ensure you understand what you are reading, rather than just looking at the words an declaring yourself an expert when you get to the last period. Now, is there stuff you can use in there to back your point? maybe, but without actually citing the quotes that support your ideas, you allow people like me to look at an article and see words which support our side rather than yours
Lesson 3: Make sure to use the right resources for your argument. It is actually antithetical to your position when the documents you vaguely point to actually rebut your point. Now, its possible that there is academia that supports every word that you say? Yes, but that's not what you supplied.

That was awesome.

[close]

 ?Those who fail to believe in God because they think that the truth-value of ?God exists? is uncertain may be called agnostic negative atheists, or agnostics for short.? . --windyhead (talk) 16:35, 12 September 2008 (UTC)


man, you are a moron. youre very first qoute is exactly what i was arguing, then you go on and on in an attempt to dismiss it.
"Taken at its most basic, atheism is simply the state of not being a theist, i.e., lacking belief in deities" then you go on and quote something i never argued against, in fact i wrote concerning the different forms of atheism, remember, "positive atheism"
"may also be interpreted as a positive belief in the absence of deities"
you are a waste of time. �try as hard as you want, i am smarter than you. i admit, the cambridge article was not the one i thought it was, but the stanford one was. the funny thing is that you believed that you won this argument before it even began. that is called hubris. im sure you have heard of it, but never applied it to yourself. those articles were simply to demonstrate the nuance of the discussion. if you cant understand the difference between a positive assertion and a passive negation, you truly are stupid. i dont care about modern cultural interpretations of philosophical terms. of course there is relevance, but the main point is a simple logical conclusion. if one does not have a belief in a deity, they are a non theist or atheist whether there is a positive element to it or not and it especially does not matter what a culture defines it as. you think you can argue your �way into being right, but youre not. but mainly, you are just a dick, im sure you suck at skating, and you definitely suck at life.

[close]

I'm pretty sure you thought you won the argument before it began when you posted those articles and said that you had, in fact, done research on this subject, which was cute, and you may define as Hubris. Then you provided evidence. As soon as you provided the evidence, I knew I had won, and gloried in it, because I know you really have a thing about taking me down and claiming I'm not as smart as I think I am, and you argue stupid and indefensible points in order to prove it, which always backfires.
I don't think stupid vs. smart can be determined in an internet debate, but if it can:
to know: 1. Be aware of through observation, inquiry, or information.
Its different than belief, as one is based on empiricism, and the other is not.

The first quote clearly backs my side, and I clearly explained what that quote you are talking about was saying when it says "taken at its most basic," the same way hydrophobic means fear of water at its most basic meaning, but when actually applied, it means that it repels water. The same way atheism, when applied means a positive belief in the absence of deities. If you read past my first quote (which you didn't) you can see that both sites repeatedly back my interpretation after that.
I like how you add passive and positive when those words were never descriptors in the first place on either site.

There, now me and the unkown soldier are smarter than you, based on your premise that winning an argument makes you smarter.
Based on what I have seen, I don't know who is smarter than who, but you are hillariously stupid, with absolutely nothing that you can say in this or any other thread ever changing that.
I like how you try to sum up my life based on me kicking the shit out of you in a messageboard debate. Obviously you have an inferiority thing, which is cute. It probably stems from the fact that again, you don't view yourself as doing as well as me in life and feel bitterness about it.

as for me thinking I had already won the argument, my first post was simply me stating a truism, not starting an arguement, you started an argument against something obviously true. if you think you "kicked the shit" out of me, you are not only dumb, you are delusional.

i base my conclusion that i am smarter than you by all the dumb shit you post. i have met a lot of people like you. i have taken many classes with people who think that because they can regurgitate some information that they are somehow intelligent, but they are incapable of valid interpretation. your conclusions often are unnuanced and not based on solid reasoning.

[bakedRice]

hahaha i just read through this whole thread gipper is trying so hard to tear geoff a new asshole, but really, the thread was going fine until geoff had to pull some asinine comments and insults that he couldn't really back up like gipper and unknown soldier, but man, you guys are arguing over technicalities. geoff your just trying to be a douche, the way that the way is interpreted in society is large is the way that gipper presented it, you trying to argue against that while just saying hes dumb doesn't make either of you win the debate, but definitely shows you as the dumber one.

 . but mainly, you are just a dick, im sure you suck at skating, and you definitely suck at life.

through all this, i forgot to even mention im agnostic, but mom was catholic who made me and my sis go to catholic school, but im over that shit now, the catholic church is a for profit corporation.
just to remind us this is slap, the one empirical insult here is you suck at skating, these personal attacks outside of the debate don't help your side.

gipper getting riled up in a thread makes this place.

[pizzafliptofakie]

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agnostic was coined by t.h. huxley to mean, without knowledge of things unknowable. to say you are an agnostic is the same as saying you are an atheist. either way, you are saying that you can not know that there is a god. now, there are different forms of this belief. some say they are agnostic in the sense that they are not sure, now, they might want to believe that they are not atheists, but they are de facto atheists. the reason, they do not believe in a god. if you do believe there is a god, you can not be an agnostic, because by definition, to be agnostic is to claim that you can not know if there is a god. with that, claiming that you know there are things such as god, or a spirit, or a spiritual world, is dumb.

[close]

There's a difference between "believing" and "knowing", bubba.

[close]

can you explain that difference

[close]

be?lieve   
[bih-leev]  Show IPA
verb, -lieved, -liev?ing.
?verb (used without object)
1.
to have confidence in the truth, the existence, or the reliability of something, although without absolute proof that one is right in doing so:




Badda bing, badda boom.

[close]

you didnt define what it means to know, and you didnt show a difference.

[close]

Take away what I made bold in the initial definition and there ya go.


I figured you'd have enough common sense to figure at least that much out, but I suppose I gave you too much credit. Now I'm embarrassed.

[close]

you never defined what it is to know, only a vague definition of what it is to believe. you should be embarrassed because you think it is easy.

You're right, I do think knowing the definitions of elementary words is easy. That's because I'm not fucking regular.



And besides, you're missing the point completely.

[4LOM]

You can only get to your point after you define the simple words:

Knowledge is justified true belief, believing/opinion is either true or false and not (or poorly) justified.

Whether we can know the existence or non-existence of God, we have to determine whether the justifications for a position provides grounds to be certain of either the truth or falsity of God’s existence.

If we can know that God exists, then we ought to be theists.

If we know that God does not exist, then we ought to be atheists.

Are there good reasons to be certain God exists?

[David]

Knowledge is supposed to be having information, or an experience of something that is real or true.  Then after having that knowledge a person in good faith should believe that their knowledge is true knowledge, right? Do we believe what our eyes can see unconditionally? Or should be believe in logic and reason? Is there such a thing as having sacred knowledge and in turn should that lead us to further believe? Scientific rationale, cause and effect, are these really the elements of understanding our purpose as humans on this rock? Should we believe in instincts? or (women's) intuition? I have knowledge of my own experiences, yet somehow that is not something that can be equally shared with others after the experience is had. Sometimes all we have are words and an understanding that we too pass though situations that are unreal. whether it's real or not, we all hope to believe in what we consider to be the truth. Some just reach farther than others.

[grimcity]

L33Tg33k's overall atheism definition is what I subscribe to, as well as the idea that atheism and agnosticism aren't mutually exclusive.

Atheism in and of itself is a default position that makes no absolute statements, nor does it have any creed. It's simply a lack of theistic and supernatural beliefs. A common analogy is "it's like calling bald a hair color."

Having said that, there are people who refer to themselves as "positive atheists" and become what could be compared to a religious evangelical (I think Christopher Hitchens identifies as one). I don't think it follows logic to think that way. The only time I really take issue with theists personally is when they use faith as an excuse to deny reality (as we've seen hindering science classrooms in a few states, mine included) or legislation (written by "traditional family values"/right wing protestant PACs based on their theistic beliefs over legal precedent).

Everyone is mostly atheist, unless you actively believe in every single god, goddess or other supernatural entity in history whether you've heard of them or not. A lack of belief is passive, though it can open the door to different philosophies that use it as a base or incorporate it.

[Prison Wallet]

Now that I think about it, Atheists are like religious hipsters.


"oh you're into God, yeah he doesn't exist and i've been into that for like, forever"

+1

[grimcity]

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Now that I think about it, Atheists are like religious hipsters.


"oh you're into God, yeah he doesn't exist and i've been into that for like, forever"

[close]

+1

There are assholes of every worldview.

[David]

Everyone is mostly atheist, unless you actively believe in every single god, goddess or other supernatural entity in history whether you've heard of them or not.

Wait, so being of a religion (say zen buddhism) means you believe in every single god goddess, etc.? That makes no sense. Being religious/theistic doesent mean you subscribe to every doctrine of every religion, does it?

[annoyedwithskating]

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agnostic was coined by t.h. huxley to mean, without knowledge of things unknowable. to say you are an agnostic is the same as saying you are an atheist. either way, you are saying that you can not know that there is a god. now, there are different forms of this belief. some say they are agnostic in the sense that they are not sure, now, they might want to believe that they are not atheists, but they are de facto atheists. the reason, they do not believe in a god. if you do believe there is a god, you can not be an agnostic, because by definition, to be agnostic is to claim that you can not know if there is a god. with that, claiming that you know there are things such as god, or a spirit, or a spiritual world, is dumb.

[close]

There's a difference between "believing" and "knowing", bubba.

[close]

can you explain that difference

[close]

be?lieve   
[bih-leev]  Show IPA
verb, -lieved, -liev?ing.
?verb (used without object)
1.
to have confidence in the truth, the existence, or the reliability of something, although without absolute proof that one is right in doing so:




Badda bing, badda boom.

[close]

you didnt define what it means to know, and you didnt show a difference.

[close]

Take away what I made bold in the initial definition and there ya go.


I figured you'd have enough common sense to figure at least that much out, but I suppose I gave you too much credit. Now I'm embarrassed.

[close]

you never defined what it is to know, only a vague definition of what it is to believe. you should be embarrassed because you think it is easy.

[close]

You're right, I do think knowing the definitions of elementary words is easy. That's because I'm not fucking regular.



And besides, you're missing the point completely.

if you believe that those are elementary terms, you have  a very unsophisticated way of looking at the world.