So, saying "I do not believe that I am definitely going to win the lottery tonight"
is the same as sayin "I believe that I am definitely going to lose the lottery tonight"
....?
...no
All I see is a tiny strawman playing in crowded city streets.
IF atheism is absence of belief (in God),
THEN it can be reached by logical reasoning.
Suppose
your position is atheism. What would the architecture of this reasoning resemble? We can discuss the essential structure first, my sexy little friend.
I suppose you simply do not like the word atheist, as it may also include those, who *believe* there is no God.
I do like the word atheist, in fact, I have considered myself an atheist since I was very young. Recently, however, I would consider myself a theist who is still discovering a 'theological hypothesis' of God. I have been very careful to consider as much conceptual knowledge and empirical facts to come to as rational conclusion as possible, considering agonsticism is the
clear choice of reason. To be quite honest, I have certainly shifted my thought structure towards God, in favor of God and do not quite understand my previous resentment in pursuing God.
To be clear here, we do not really have an
operational definition of God, so there is a special element of subjectivity that emerges to which we must assume we both agree implicitly on the same thing.
I like the term theist too, I also like agnostic. I don't particuarly dislike either of the three words.
Agnosticism proposes that we can make no assessment either way?
BS, God is logically improbable, so I shall act as if He probably does not exist.
This makes me an atheist.
or "agnostic atheist"
or "nonreligious atheist"
Agnosticism does propose that. However, when I describe reason as limited to that which we can experience, it simply implies that you are skeptical of reason as a Universal tool of philosophical inquiry.
The primary problem with my atheist worldview for a long time, was that I was thinking purely and only in terms of
materialism and reductionism. All that exists is that which is material and that it must be reduced into its constituents to understand it and that in fact all of reality can ultimately be reduced and we can come to absolutely
know a thing through empiricism and reason.
When I thought upon the notion of agnosticism and considered the notion that atheism is as much of an irrational position as theism, I began to explore theism more and began to question why I was ever an atheist in the first place. If I use reason to determine morality as opposed to dogmatic doctrine and I maintain a materialist worldview in terms of still accepting science as the primary method of understanding physical reality then it does not appear to negatively affect any person.
The primary contention to my argument of simply dismissing the discussion of God is that God is
incommensurable in terms of showing a relationship between God and concepts abstracted from reality.
There is no such
a thing or
being who posseses the same essence as God.
