And anyone else I missed:

Bottom line…I personally have never met a person who uses the word atheist as a descriptor (or part of a descriptor) who does not either “believe” (guess, estimate, suppose) that there are no gods…or “believe” (guess, estimate, suppose) that it is more likely that there are no gods than that there is at least one.

Granted, my outreach may be too limited, although I have discussed and debated this topic for over two decades on the Internet…and for about two decades earlier in letters/op ed pieces in newspapers.

Is there anyone here who uses “atheist” as a descriptor or part of a descriptor…who falls outside of that parameter? I’d love to discuss the issue with anyone who does.

Anyway, if it actually is the case that one must have one of those two qualifiers to feel comfortable with being designated an atheist, perhaps atheists and agnostics together should alter usage so that the dictionaries can feel comfortable changing what they have to say on the word.

Well defining terms is always a good place to start, especially when there is serious contention on those terms.
Personally, Im happy to go with whatever definitions for the sake of discussion. Im arguing here because people are specifically referencing academic usage, and its pretty clear what that is imo.

Agreed.

The only proper way to do that, though, is to do it honestly.

A question that should be asked of every person who uses the word "atheist" as a descriptor is: Do you "believe" (guess, estimate, suppose) that no gods exist...or that it is MUCH MORE likely that no gods exist than that at least one does?

I suspect that damn near EVERY person using "atheist" as a descriptor...would answer that in the affirmative. And I suspect that damn near EVERY person using "atheist" as a descriptor uses it BECAUSE of that "yes" rather than merely because they lack a "belief in any gods."

That latter description of the word...holds very little water.

I lack a "belief" that any gods exist...and I refuse to be described as an atheist.

Every atheist lacks a "belief" that any gods exist...but NOT every person lacking that "belief" is an atheist.

Not sure why that is so uncomfortable for atheists to discuss with an agnostic like me..but, I've met this resistance before...and just feel a form of pity for the people so wedded to their notion of the word that they refuse to truly discuss it.

Is it that you simply can't or stubbornly won't answer the actual question (with a reason, or reasons, (a) thru (h)) which I've asked?

Do you "believe" (guess, estimate, suppose) that no gods exist...or that it is MUCH MORE likely that no gods exist than that at least one does? — Frank Apisa

Clarifying questions are great.

I suspect that... — Frank Apisa

It may be true. It seems irrelevant if you've gone through the step of clarifying what the other party means, but okay.

I lack a "belief" that any gods exist...and I refuse to be described as an atheist. — Frank Apisa

Okay. You don't call yourself an atheist. What is the contention? Other people describe your position as that of an atheist? If you say, "well, you use that term, but I don't think it appropriately represents my position". What else is there to do? Sticks and stones will break my bones?

You raised a point that the etymology of the word atheist differed from some of the current usage with respect to lack of belief. Some people responded by pointing out that usages change over time. That premise is either true or false. Is it true that word usages change over time?

The movie Back to the Future made fun of this point when Marty Mcfly called serious matters, "heavy", and Doc responded with, "Is there a problem with Earth's gravitational pull in the future? Why is everything so heavy?"

180 Proof
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↪Frank Apisa Is it that you simply can't or stubbornly won't answer the actual question (with a reason, or reasons, (a) thru (h)) which I've asked? — 180 Proof

I did answer your question. Perhaps you did not like my answer. Discuss it with me. I am more than willing.

CeleRate
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Do you "believe" (guess, estimate, suppose) that no gods exist...or that it is MUCH MORE likely that no gods exist than that at least one does?
— Frank Apisa

Clarifying questions are great.

I suspect that...
— Frank Apisa

It may be true. It seems irrelevant if you've gone through the step of clarifying what the other party means, but okay.

I lack a "belief" that any gods exist...and I refuse to be described as an atheist.
— Frank Apisa

Okay. You don't call yourself an atheist. What is the contention? Other people describe your position as that of an atheist? If you say, "well, you use that term, but I don't think it appropriately represents my position". What else is there to do? Sticks and stones will break my bones?

You raised a point that the etymology of the word atheist differed from some of the current usage with respect to lack of belief. Some people responded by pointing out that usages change over time. That premise is either true or false. Is it true that word usages change over time?

The movie Back to the Future made fun of this point when Marty Mcfly called serious matters, "heavy", and Doc responded with, "Is there a problem with Earth's gravitational pull in the future? Why is everything so heavy?" — CeleRate

Thank you for this response, CeleRate.

I'm going to respond in a following post, but for here, I'd like to share a joke (apparently you've heard it, but some others may have not. I'm sure they will understand the reason I'm sharing it here. (Blatantly stolen joke!)


A new monk arrives at a monastery. He is assigned to help the other monks in copying the old texts by hand. He notices, however, that they are copying copies, and not the original books.

So, the new monk goes to the head monk to ask him about this. He points out that if there was an error in the first copy, that error would be continued in all of the other copies. The head monk says, "We have been copying from the copies for centuries, but you make a good point, my son."

So, he goes down into the cellar with one of the copies to check it against the original. He is gone for hours...and finally some of the other monks get worried and go down to look for him. They find him...head down in his hands, sobbing.

"What is wrong?" they ask.

"My God," says the Head Monk, "they left the "r" out. The word was supposed to be "celebrate."

CeleRate
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Do you "believe" (guess, estimate, suppose) that no gods exist...or that it is MUCH MORE likely that no gods exist than that at least one does?
— Frank Apisa

Clarifying questions are great.

I suspect that...
— Frank Apisa

It may be true. It seems irrelevant if you've gone through the step of clarifying what the other party means, but okay.

I lack a "belief" that any gods exist...and I refuse to be described as an atheist.
— Frank Apisa

Okay. You don't call yourself an atheist. — CeleRate

More than that. My contention is that I am NOT an atheist.

What is the contention? Other people describe your position as that of an atheist? If you say, "well, you use that term, but I don't think it appropriately represents my position". What else is there to do? Sticks and stones will break my bones? — CeleRate

I am saying that any unbiased assessment of what it takes for a person to self-describe as an "atheist" must include the notion of "a 'belief' that no gods exist" or "a 'belief' that it is more likely that no gods exist than at least one does."

That is not just being petty...it is being efficient with the language.

A definition of "atheist" as "a person who 'believes' (guesses, supposes, estimates) that no gods exist' or "who 'believes' (guesses, supposes, estimates) it is more likely that no gods exist than that at least one does"...simply makes more sense. It relieves the need for agnostics to be included and for babies, infants and toddlers to be included. And it does not harm atheists in any way...because it is accurate. I still suggest for debate purposes that most (probably all) people who use the word as a descriptor...do either 'believe' no gods exist or 'believe' it is more likely that no gods exist than that at least one does.

You raised a point that the etymology of the word atheist differed from some of the current usage with respect to lack of belief. Some people responded by pointing out that usages change over time. That premise is either true or false. Is it true that word usages change over time? — CeleRate

Absolutely! Word usages do change. In fact, it should be apparent that I am advocating for such a change in the interests of greater clarity greater conciseness. It appears that the current usage (NOT UNIVERSAL) is a product of Internet atheists wanting to insist that they do not have "beliefs" in the opposite direction from theists...when in fact, it is obvious they do.

I don't.

There are people who "believe" there are no gods...or who "believe" it is more likely that no gods exist than that at least one does.

I am not one of those people. It seems to me that ONLY those people want to be described as atheists...and ONLY those people actually use the word as a descriptor.

Please...let's discuss this in greater depth.

Is there anyone here who uses “atheist” as a descriptor or part of a descriptor…who falls outside of that parameter? I’d love to discuss the issue with anyone who does. — Frank Apisa

That's me. Or at leat that's my self-perception; I'm not sure you'd agree.

I definitely think that "God exists," and "God doesn't exist," have the same epistemological status. They're both undecidable in my world-view, because I don't know how to order things in a way for the concept to make sense. There are simplistic concepts of God that I do believe don't exist (e.g. old man with a beard in the sky), but neither do most theists, so these simplistic concepts don't count.

Pondering the question of God is a bit like trying to run a piece of software that won't run on my OS on a shoddily written emulator. The functions the programs fulfills are either not very important to me, or I have programs that actually work fine on my OS (not without the occasional bug) that do it for me. The only reason I'm bothering with the program at all, because many people say it's a must have and keep asking me what I think of it. What I think of it is that it's a nuisance, because the emulator sucks, and I'd rather not bother with it at all, when I have workable alternatives.

My daily life experience back when I self-identified as an agnostic was that it was still easier to call myself an atheist, because not everyone the term "agnostic". The question I used to encounter most is "Do you believe in God," to which a yes/no answer was usually a sufficient answer. The line isn't just a question about the existance of God; if you grow up in a Catholic household and go to church on Sunday, you're intimately familiar with the Apostle's Creed ("I believe in God, the Father almighty..."), and at least that sort of contextualises the question. It's a question about faith, not about whether you believe a proposition. In context, I can talk about why I don't really fit in. It's a social question.

Most of the time I used the term "atheist" (while calling myself an agnostic in a more technical context), it was in a really banal context. ("Oh, it's nearly time for church. You coming?" - "Nah, I'm an atheist." - "Gotcha. See you later." -- I wouldn't have been giving them information here. They're fine with a nonbeliever coming along, but by emphasising that I'm an atheist, I'm telling them nothing's changed)

To me the question "Do you believe in God," loses all meaning when I take it out of its social, lived context. And in isolation "Does God exist?" is even worse, because then you'll have to take into account the possibility that people - being fallible - are mistaken about His attributes, and once you go down that rabbit hole nothing remains to make a proposition about. You have to wait until understand the concept enough before you can even start to ponder it. At this point, I'm not holding my breath. But conversion experiences do happen, so who knows?

For me, the word "God" derives its meaning entirely from its lived social context. And as such, I found the grid-based approach makes it easier for me to organise the social environment, for example, because there are theists who share my sense of the unknowability of God, but are somehow able to endow mystery with metaphysical significance, something I fail to do. Basically, I don't know what it's like to believe in God.

Personally, I've never seen an argument for God that's convincing, and I've never seen an argument against God that's convincing. The ontological argument sounds silly, the problem of evil isn't a problem, etc. Now, I'm basically a relativist. We create our worldviews as we live in the world. So if I grew up with my worldview, but at some point my concept of God just stopped growing along with it, it's no surprise that all the God-concepts I can muster are childish. Basically, when the ontological argument looks silly to me, it's just a symptom of the underlying underveloped concept.

This sort of relativism is not without its problems though. Crucially, it's very hard to figure out how much about the differences in worldviews is down to personality differences, how much to personal experience/history, and how much to semantics and usage.

The difference between "atheist/agnostic" in different usages is pretty transparent to me. I can translate between the concepts, but since I've been using the grid-based approach for around 15 years, now, I'm biased towards this one - by habit. The difference between "God exists," and "God doesn't exist," is semantically opaque to me, though the logical structure suggests they're opposites. And at this point I have to remember that all the meaning I can assign comes from the terms social context. I'd expect for a theist the difference between "God exists," and "God doesn't exist," is clear as day, and they may suspect at this point I'm just bullshitting around. I'm not. This sort of stuff really does go on in my head.

If you need to understand how this world would change if a God existed to be an agnostic, then I can't be an agnostic. And if you have to understand what it is that doesn't exist when you say "God doesn't exist," I can't be an atheist. There are a lot of questions like these, and none of them mean much to me. A binary like "believes in God/doesn't believe in God" is about social behaviour, which is observable, and easy to understand. Thus it's more useful as a comparative, social term to me.

So if I have to choose between "God exists," and "God doesn't exist," I'll definitely choose the latter, though I'd rather not choose. This is not an expression of likelihood, though; it's that if I said the former in the context of my day-to-day life people will have expectations about my behaviour that won't pan out. I don't go to church, I don't pray, the "Word of God" carries no weight with me, etc. As a proposition, "God doesn't exist," is simply more compatible behaviour. None of this says anything about what I actually do believe, except what you can glean from what I have to deal with, and how I deal with it.

I worry that this amounts mostly to meaningless babble, but I'm not sure I can do better.

Bottom line…I personally have never met a person who uses the word atheist as a descriptor (or part of a descriptor) who does not either “believe” (guess, estimate, suppose) that there are no gods… — Frank Apisa

I doubt there are gods. I think it's more likely an overactive theory of mind.
'Theory of mind' could help explain belief in God

Yeah you gave an answer but not to the specific question I'm asking you.

For me, the word "God" derives its meaning entirely from its lived social context. — Dawnstorm

I agree. The arbitrariness of geography and social group as practical determinants of one's world view is astonishing.

And if you have to understand what it is that doesn't exist when you say "God doesn't exist," I can't be an atheist. — Dawnstorm

How about if someone says "unicorns don't exist". Would one be unable to not believe in unicorns if one understood (maybe even imagining renditions seen) what is meant by the question? Or, is there a different point I missed?

I worry that this amounts mostly to meaningless babble, but I'm not sure I can do better — Dawnstorm

I think I understood what you meant by the two propositions having the same epistemological status. However, I'm not sure I understand what distinction you were alluding to in the comparison of the two propositions "God exists," and "God doesn't exist". Thanks

Im not really sure what you mean by most of that, but it has a dismissive tone to it — DingoJones

I'm not sure what you're not sure of.

If my tone is dismissive, it is not my intention. Maybe my English sounds dry because it's not good. I am sorry, in any case.

My daily life experience back when I self-identified as an agnostic was that it was still easier to call myself an atheist, because not everyone the term "agnostic". — Dawnstorm

I don't see why it's any easier. On the contrary. Thomas Huxley invented the term agnostic because he was tired of being mistaken for an atheist. He had to continually clarify that he had no proof that God doesn't exist. So he invented the term agnostic to make it clear that he also had no proof that God exists, so he abstained. I don't understand why it is easier to go back to the confusion that occurs when, being an agnostic in Huxley's sense, one calls oneself an atheist. In fact, the myriad of websites that get tangled up with this term are produced by not distinguishing between what they call an atheist and what others understand.
Where is the easiness?

How about if someone says "unicorns don't exist". Would one be unable to not believe in unicorns if one understood (maybe even imagining renditions seen) what is meant by the question? Or, is there a different point I missed? — CeleRate

In this paragraph, I was using the "atheist" definition that says you need to believe that God doesn't exist. If I don't know what "God" is supposed to be, I can believe neither that he exists, nor that he does not exists. This means that I mean the standard for "does not believe God exists," but I do not meet the standards for "believes that God exists." There are higher standards for believing a negative statement than there are for not believing the corresponding positive statement.

But there are complications here; the short version is I understand the concept of unicorns well enough to believe it very likely that unicorns don't exist. I cannot say the same for God. But what's the difference?

First something obvious: Do I believe sparrows exist? Yes, I do. I've seen sparrows before I even learned to speak. I can point at the bird and ask, "What is this?" It's a thing-first concept.

But if you tell me about the platypus, I might be skeptical. Does such a creature really exist? It's a word-first concept. You describe the creature, and it sounds really unlikely. Maybe you've tried to sell me on drop bears in the past and laughed at me when I was gullible? It's a word-first concept for me, but there's a hierarchy of ever more convincing evidence: pictures, videos, seeing the real thing in a zoo.

A unicorn is word-first concept, too, for me, but the word's cultural status is "mythical creature" rather than "animal", and that complicates things. The unicorn sounds unlikely, but maybe it's not impossible. I might believe it exists, the way a crypto-zoologists would: somewhere out there is an animal that fits the description more or less closely. Maybe it's a hidden species? Maybe it's an occasional mutation of a known species? But if we're sufficiently influenced by myths or fiction to think of it as "magical" in some form (say, it's not really a unicorn, if it's horn doesn't have healing powers), then a real life horned horse simply won't count as a unicorn. But the concept is still understandable. I'd have to say that it's unlikely a unicorn exists to begin with if we expect an animal, but exponentially more unlikely if we actually expect a magical creature.

Things complicate even more if the myth in question is alive and well in the culture you operate in. A word-first concept believed on faith has dubious evidence requirement. Once you reach the level of the Christian God, you have an entity where nearly everything in existence can count as evidence, simply because you have faith. I don't think that people relax their requirements for evidence; it may be just that different sorts of entities require different sorts of evidence. But if I don't understand what sort of entity God is supposed to be, I'm not sure how to look at the world to find evidence. I can dismiss the concept as making no sense (which is what people do when they parody the concept of God with "invisible pink unicorns"), but I can't "believe that God doesn't exist". The concept never reaches a high enough epistemic level within the confines of my world view. Cultural practise is important here, because I know people who believe in God, but who are neither gullible nor idiots.

However, I'm not sure I understand what distinction you were alluding to in the comparison of the two propositions "God exists," and "God doesn't exist". Thanks
Options — CeleRate

That's without a doubt the hardest concept to explain, not the least because I haven't actually worked this out myself. It's more a hunch than anything, and it ties in with the above: what counts as evidence for God, and how do you have to look at the world to see those... things? as evidence. To what extent, am I just using language differently from someone else? Does God have a clearly demarked reference in the real world (as a unicorn would have were it to exist)? At some point in the process I abstract so much that I suspect the difference between existance and non-existence might disappear you it were possible to compare worldviews directly (it isn't; world views other than your own are only available via interpretation through the lense of your own, and how much - if anything - of human worldviews are human universals isn't clear.)

I've never come to clear understanding on this myself, so I'm really struggling to put intution into words.

The easiness is something I experienced. Trial and error. It would have been different for Huxely. For example, not believing in God, it seems to me, was quite a bit harder in the 19th Century than it was a hundred years later, and that's likely not the only difference. People tend to leave me alone, when I say I'm an atheist. It's just not a big deal. Saying I'm an agnostic is morely to invite discussion, and I'm not always in the mood. Trial and error helped me to find out that I was happier if I generally said that I was an atheist and clarify that I was actually an agnostic when already in conversation on the topic. Nobody took offense, or thought I'd been lying to them. Also, when time was of essence, "atheist" was simply a more reliably known word. In my day-to-day life, I'm very pragmatic about this.

I'm being difficult in this thread, mostly because it's about the term's meaning. I'm stating my preference, but what I'm actually advocating is to know and accept all the definitions out there, at least passively, when hearing or reading.

Thanks for the thoughtful response.

thing-first concept. — Dawnstorm

word-first concept — Dawnstorm

Do these terms mean that you have observed the stimulus prior to its description, or, you heard its description prior to your observation, respectively?
If the order is the distinction, I'm still unsure how that would be the critical variable. Wouldn't the extraordinariness of a claim be more pertinent?

The concept never reaches a high enough epistemic level within the confines of my world view — Dawnstorm

Maybe it would help me to understand the epistemology you use to develop an understanding of things contained in the universe, and what is meant by level.

world views other than your own are only available via interpretation through the lense of your own, and how much - if anything - of human worldviews are human universals isn't clear — Dawnstorm

One's world-view is ultimately what a given individual believes is understood. But people's worldviews can undergo conversions. For example, Muslims can become Christians and vice versa. Christians can become atheists and vice versa. I've heard testimonies of fundamentalists who are now apostates that make claims that God does not exist. People use the justifications they learn, but I suspect, are also making decisions, at times, that are inconsistent with one's own world-view, and at other times, without any consideration to it.

With respect to possible universals, it's a challenge for me to think of any; especially when we find differences even with the people with whom we mostly agree.

I've never come to clear understanding on this myself, so I'm really struggling to put intution into words. — Dawnstorm

I think this has been helpful. Thanks

Not worthless babble in any way , shape, or form.

One of the things I "got" there, though, was a predisposition toward "There probably are no gods"...which is a perfectly fine take to have on the REALITY. Fact is, either there is at least one god...or there are none. So the hard atheist and the hard theist have at least a 50% chance of being correct. And the use of "atheist" as a descriptor for someone with that disposition MAKES SENSE.

Describing my position as an agnostic one, though, simply because of that one single element (lack of a 'belief" in any gods) makes as little sense as depicting it as a theist position because of the element (I lack a "belief" that there are no gods.

The agnostic has a 100% chance of being correct in what he/she is saying, but a ZERO chance of being correct about the "correct answer" to the question, "Is there at least one god or are there no gods?"

My quest to make the semantic distinction more abrupt (for want of a better word) has to do with a war, of sorts, against the negative forces of religion in a society such as ours. (MIND YOU...religion also have very positive aspects, so I am NOT saying that all of religion is a negative for society.)

More about that aspect as my thesis continues.

And if you use atheist as a descriptor...it makes sense.

I gave you a very specific answer to the question you asked. I refused to be limited to the answers you suggested were the only ones I could have.

I don't see why it's any easier. On the contrary. Thomas Huxley invented the term agnostic because he was tired of being mistaken for an atheist. He had to continually clarify that he had no proof that God doesn't exist. So he invented the term agnostic to make it clear that he also had no proof that God exists, so he abstained. — David Mo

Precisely. And Huxley's "need to clarify" was occasioned by the fact that back then (and through all of history) the term atheist meant...someone who denies the existence of God (gods).

The notion of atheist meaning "lacking a 'BELIEF' in any gods" is a recent invention of debating atheists, who wanted to disassociate themselves from any hint of having "beliefs."

So the hard atheist and the hard theist have at least a 50% chance of being correct. — Frank Apisa

I'd like to press this line of reasoning a bit to see if there are conditions where you would differ. Is a 50% chance of being correct true of any theistic claim? Would that then mean that the chances are 50/50 for the existence of Yahweh, Allah, Thor, Loki, Vishnu, Shiva, Amaterasu, etc?

What would be the reasoning to reject a person's claim of committing an evil act because the devil made him do it? Could you reject such a claim if it is just as likely to be true as untrue?

Finally, should we then treat non-theistic claims of the existence of ghosts, spirits, or other metaphysical phenomena as just as likely to exist as not exist?

CeleRate
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So the hard atheist and the hard theist have at least a 50% chance of being correct.
— Frank Apisa

I'd like to press this line of reasoning a bit to see if there are conditions where you would differ. Is a 50% chance of being correct true of any theistic claim? — CeleRate

I'd have to hear each claim...and then comment on it...rather than as an over-all contention.

Would that then mean that the chances are 50/50 for the existence of Yahweh, Allah, Thor, Loki, Vishnu, Shiva, Amaterasu, etc? — CeleRate

I'll stick with the "hard atheist" and "hard theist" suggestion I made. And I will stick with the "AT LEAST..." part of my comment. It was made for a reason.

If any question has an either YES or NO being...then either YES is correct or NO is correct. (Schrodinger's cat notwithstanding) If the question, for instance is, "Is there a $10 bill in this (unopened) envelope or not?"...the answer is either YES or NO. It cannot be both. To then ask, "Well then are you asserting that there cannot be three single dollar bills in the envelope, makes no sense. That, in a sense, is what you are doing here.

There may be gods (or a god)...or there may be no gods. What they are or what their characteristics are...is a different question entirely. Not ready to handle that question yet.

What would be the reasoning to reject a person's claim of committing an evil act because the devil made him do it? Could you reject such a claim if it is just as likely to be true as untrue? — CeleRate

Whether there is an evil spirit or are evil spirits that can impact on human activity...is an unknown. I do not make guesses about the unknown. Of course one "could" reject such a claim...but if this were pure debate based on logic...it would be a very difficult case to make. Attempt it if you want: Set up the P1 and P2 that logically leads to a C of: Therefore there are no evil spirits that can influence what any human does.

Finally, should we then treat non-theistic claims of the existence of ghosts, spirits, or other metaphysical phenomena as just as likely to exist as not exist?

Absolutely! Why not?

Are you supposing that humans (Homo sapiens) at our stage of evolution are able to know everything about what does and what does not exist in the REALITY of existence?

I am not.

There may be things around us in dimensional form that humans cannot discern at all. Human senses may NOT be the end-all thing we like to suppose they are.

No. You didn't answer my Yes or No question with a "yes or no" or give its reason (option (h) is left undefined for you to defined a reason for your answer). And apparently you won't (or can't). Okay. Enjoy the rest of your day of rest, Frank.

for instance is, "Is there a $10 bill in this (unopened) envelope or not?"...the answer is either YES or NO. It cannot be both. — Frank Apisa

A couple of comments. One, the claim of a $10 bill in an envelope can be investigated. The claim could then be "proven" true or false. Two, the claim regarding the bill is a mundane claim. The evidence confirming or disconfirming would be ordinary.

Set up the P1 and P2 that logically leads to a C of: Therefore there are no evil spirits that can influence what any human does. — Frank Apisa

I agree. I don't know how to inductively or deductively establish the truth for the presence or absence of a deity.

Are you supposing that humans (Homo sapiens) at our stage of evolution are able to know everything about what does and what does not exist in the REALITY of existence? — Frank Apisa

I have no issue claiming ignorance on any topic. But if ignorance about the specifics, or even the fact that we can't know anything with certainty, means that we can't know anything, or can't make reasonable inferences with respect to probability, then it seems like we have to throw our hands up and say that there's no good reason to have an opinion about any unsubstantiated claim.

I don't think it has to be all or nothing.

Your question was an absurdity...poorly conceived and poorly constructed. I gave it the courtesy of a response...a reasonable response.

For anyone following this conversation, here is the question:

Yes or No - Are you GODLESS (i.e. Do you LIVE a theistic g/G Belief-FREE, theistic Religion-FREE life ... re: ἄθεος) -

(a) because of sufficient evidence (or lack thereof)?
(b) because of sound inferences (or lack thereof)?
(c) because of subjective-psychological needs (or lack thereof)?
(d) because of traumatic or numinous experiences (or lack thereof)?
(e) because of familial and/or cultural tradition (or lack thereof)?
(f) because of aesthetics (e.g. 'style')?
(g) because of ethics (e.g. 'conscience')?
(h) because of ???

(indicate those reasons which apply)

It is a jumble...makes unwarranted assumptions with which I am not comfortable...and suggests I answer whatever free option question is being proposed in a format the questioner devises.

Anyway...180...I will definitely enjoy the rest of my day. I hope you enjoy the rest of your day also.

CeleRate
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for instance is, "Is there a $10 bill in this (unopened) envelope or not?"...the answer is either YES or NO. It cannot be both.
— Frank Apisa

A couple of comments. One, the claim of a $10 bill in an envelope can be investigated. The claim could then be "proven" true or false. Two, the claim regarding the bill is a mundane claim. The evidence confirming or disconfirming would be ordinary. — CeleRate

Whatever it is, the "claim" shares one thing in common with the claim that either there is at least one god or there are no gods...and that "thing in common" is that it can either be YES or NO. (once again, Shrodinger's cat aside.)

Set up the P1 and P2 that logically leads to a C of: Therefore there are no evil spirits that can influence what any human does.
— Frank Apisa

I agree. I don't know how to inductively or deductively establish the truth for the presence or absence of a deity. — CeleRate

Neither do I...which is the reason I answered your question, "What would be the reasoning to reject a person's claim of committing an evil act because the devil made him do it? Could you reject such a claim if it is just as likely to be true as untrue?'...the way I did.

It cannot be logically answered. It can be answered in the "mundane" as you called it...or at least a reasonable guess can be made in the mundane. But we are above that here in this discussion...or at least, I hope we are.

Are you supposing that humans (Homo sapiens) at our stage of evolution are able to know everything about what does and what does not exist in the REALITY of existence?
— Frank Apisa

I have no issue claiming ignorance on any topic. But if ignorance about the specifics, or even the fact that we can't know anything with certainty, means that we can't know anything, or can't make reasonable inferences with respect to probability, then it seems like we have to throw our hands up and say that there's no good reason to have an opinion about any unsubstantiated claim. — CeleRate

I don't think it has to be all or nothing.[/quote]

I am not suggesting that we claim ignorance on everything. I understand the difficulty in proving anything, but we can certainly agree on things like, "I am sitting at my keyboard at the moment typing these words."

But your comment raises the question of: "Can we make a reasonable, inferential, logical probability estimate of whether at least one god exists or if no gods exist?"

My answer is a resounding NO...we cannot. Over the years I have read hundreds of attempts to show why it is MUCH more likely that at least one god exists rather than that none exist...

...and hundreds of attempts to show why it is MUCH more likely that no gods exist than that at least one exists.

AND THEY ALL USE THE SAME EVIDENCE.

I say neither probability estimate is based on anything but a pre-existing bias one way or the other.

You?

↪180 Proof Your question was an absurdity...poorly conceived and poorly constructed. — Frank Apisa

How so? In what ways?

It is a jumble...makes unwarranted assumptions with which I am not comfortable...

Such as?

I hope you enjoy the rest of your day also.

Thanks.

What do you call someone who thinks that God is a joke?