Subject:
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Re: The God Game!
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.off-topic.debate
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Date:
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Tue, 25 Apr 2006 16:19:39 GMT
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Viewed:
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1605 times
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In lugnet.off-topic.debate, Dave Schuler wrote:
> I, for example, do not believe that God exists, and a lack of belief requires
> no faith at all.
Trickily worded!
I have a lack of belief in Hoojidangs. I bet you do too, because you don't even
know what they are. Neither do I. It's some unknown. Hence, I have a lack of
belief in them which requires no faith. I'm not sure I'd even call myself
agnostic on the matter, seeing as it's totally unknown to us.
However, if I tell you that Ginchydoos are invisible beings that use magic to
help Bill Gates acheive power, you now know what they are and are free to
attempt to make a judgement on whether or not they exist. If you take the
agnostic approach, you indeed apply no faith.
But as soon as you posit that Ginchydoos exist or that they do NOT exist, you
are applying faith. If you had some sort of physical evidence to back up your
conclusion, perhaps you could argue that it wasn't "faith".
Hence, to say "I posit that God does not exist" or "I posit that God does exist"
requires faith. And I would argue that the former is what denotes atheism.
However, to say "I do not posit that God exists" is different. It's more
strictly an agnostic approach, although it's easily confusable with atheism
given the wording.
DaveE
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Message is in Reply To:
 | | Re: The God Game!
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| (...) I don't want to start a whole big thing here, but I'd take issue with that statement as being too broad and non-specific. One form of atheism--the belief that God does not exist--may require a leap of faith, but that's not the only form. I, (...) (19 years ago, 25-Apr-06, to lugnet.off-topic.debate, FTX)
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