I think your position is probably more common that surveys show. When asked "Are you an atheist", the average person will say no, even though their view might be very close to yours. There is a note of "finality" to the term atheist that most people are uncomfortable with.
I try to explain to theists that my atheism stems from their inability to provide any sort of credible evidence that gods exist or that they could exist. Theists propose that there are gods. It's up to them to support their claim. Without any reason to suppose that gods exist, the sensible and practical reaction to the claim that there are gods is disbelief. Atheism isn't a belief, it's a conclusion.
I agree that I think the burden of proof should be on the theists to prove their assertions, rather than on the atheist. If I can't see it or perceive it directly, I shouldn't believe it exists until given sufficient evidence. But because most people in our culture are theists, they feel justified in their belief because it's what the majority believes. They think that we must justify our dissent from the mainstream.
7:42 AM, April 09, 2007
Heraldblog made a comment a few days ago that I've been meaning to address: I'll play Devil's Advocate and say that atheism, whereby one declares unbelief in God, is illogical. The most we can rationally declare is that there is no proof for the existence of a deity. But that is not the same as certainty that there is none. Science cannot prove a negative - it can only find support or non-support for a hypothesis. It is illogical to claim on one hand that the existence of God is unknowable, and then say you know there is no God. I think this is a valid point. I do not claim philosophical or logical certainty that there is no God. I certainly haven't examined every aspect of the universe and determined there isn't a God lurking in there somewhere. I could be mistaken. So in some respects you could call me an agnostic.
But I use the term "atheist" because although I'm not philosophically certain that there is no God, for practical purposes I'm convinced enough that I choose to lead my life and think my thoughts (and make my arguments) assuming that there isn't a God. I think just about all of our knowledge is contingent. It's hard for fallible beings to have perfect knowledge of anything. But that's OK, because we don't need perfect knowledge to go about doing what we need to do.
So when I declare myself an atheist, I am not saying "I have determined with absolute unquestionable authority that there is no God". Rather I'm saying something like "Given what I know, I find the possibility of the existence of what people call 'God' to be so remote that I think you're much better off not including such a concept in your worldview". Perhaps in formal terms that makes elgible for some kind of agnostism, but for all practical purposes I am an atheist.
"Atheism refined"
3 Comments -
You are forgiven, my son. ;-)
I think your position is probably more common that surveys show. When asked "Are you an atheist", the average person will say no, even though their view might be very close to yours. There is a note of "finality" to the term atheist that most people are uncomfortable with.
12:01 AM, April 08, 2007
I try to explain to theists that my atheism stems from their inability to provide any sort of credible evidence that gods exist or that they could exist. Theists propose that there are gods. It's up to them to support their claim. Without any reason to suppose that gods exist, the sensible and practical reaction to the claim that there are gods is disbelief.
Atheism isn't a belief, it's a conclusion.
5:56 AM, April 09, 2007
Thanks for posting, heraldblog and jeber.
I agree that I think the burden of proof should be on the theists to prove their assertions, rather than on the atheist. If I can't see it or perceive it directly, I shouldn't believe it exists until given sufficient evidence. But because most people in our culture are theists, they feel justified in their belief because it's what the majority believes. They think that we must justify our dissent from the mainstream.
7:42 AM, April 09, 2007