Atheist Dictionary Missing the Point?

In its original use it might also have covered those that actually DID believe in the gods but refused to abide by any of the rituals etc. i.e. they might have been judged atheist through their religious inaction rather than through belief (or lack thereof).

 

Log in or Sign up to hide all adverts.

Log in or Sign up to hide all adverts.

I don't consider an atheist a professional nor a specialist. What I was inferring is this: If I lived in a society with no concept of God or one that didn`t believe in God then there would be no atheist jargon. We are not in this position on Earth so are terms like Sky Fairy or Bible Thumper atheist jargon?

Out of curiosity, do linguists have an established jargon?

 

Log in or Sign up to hide all adverts.

Just be careful when you're at a large gathering. If you ask the person next to you to agglutinate then first make sure you're both on the same wavelength.

Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

 

Sure, it was a label used by those convinced of the correctness of their beliefs and I am sure they varied in their use of the term.

In any case, however, it was certainly meant to cover more than simply those who lacked a belief. And sure, there are controversies around this, but overall in society people who believe there is no God and people who simply lack a belief in God both call themselves atheists and are called atheists by theists.

I can see philosophical reasons to separate these groups out, which is done sometimes by referring to strong and weak atheist positions. This seems to offend some people. Words.....I mean, they are almost as messy as we are.

 

Ah, but I picked 'decimate' because it illustrates the point perfectly, because it specifies the number. Common usage is wrong. The majority getting something wrong, doesn't make it right.

On this;

Interesting comparison, because despite living in the UK, with it's reputation for rain, I have never owned an umbrella. This quote from the 'Hagakure' sums up my feelings on the matter quite well;

"There is something to be learned from a rainstorm. When meeting with a sudden shower, you try not to get wet and run quickly along the road. By doing such things as passing under the eaves of houses, you still get wet. When you are resolved from the beginning, you will not be perplexed, though you will still get the same soaking. This understanding extends to all things."

 

The point was not the philosophy, but your point about umbrellas, and a simple reason why I might never have owned one, as a counter to your claim that being without one implied losing one.

I am also without a spaceship, a dragon, a large diamond, and that aforementioned umbrella. None of that implies I ever had any item on that list, or deny any do, have, or could exist.

Your point about majority defining the meaning of a word loses validity, when the majority of the planet allegedly believe in a god of some sorts. The majority, therefore, cannot understand the mindset of the atheist, can they? So they are in no position to go defining words that describe things they have no experience of.

 

pfffft. good one.

here's a suggestion: why not simply give up now--you're not making sense.

by your logic, atheists can say absolutely NOTHING of theists, right? as they have no experience with the matter. or non-beet farmers can say NOTHING of freakin' beet farmers for that matter...

 

No, that's exactly not what I'm saying. But you prove that people always need to polemicize the issue.

 

You've been pied

Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

 

Looks like a tart.

And you seem to be missing a few things.

 

ok, please explain your logic for me then:

how exactly does that follow from your preceding premise?

and this:

are you referring non-atheists defining "atheism" specifically, or is this a general rule? do you also have issues with the DSM, and related texts, defining schizophrenia, etc., as the persons defining likely have no direct experience?

although, perhaps fraggle clarified this somewhat in a prior post, but when he wrote:

i do not believe he intended to suggest that, for instance, when the majority of the populace believed that "schizophrenia" meant something akin to a multiple personality syndrome, they were in fact correct.

 

How convoluted do you want to make this discussion? Using double negatives doesn't help. Please try again.

Stay on topic please.

Ask him.

 

how is asking for an explanation convoluting matters? ok, feel free to substitute "theists" for non-atheists, and then respond to my question.

i am on topic--how about answering my question?

sure, i'll do that--after you answer my question.

again, please explain your logic for me then:

how exactly does that follow from your preceding premise?

and this:

are you referring to theists defining "atheism" specifically, or is this a general rule? do you also have issues with the DSM, and related texts, defining schizophrenia, etc., as the persons defining likely have no direct experience?

 

I have no desire to veer off topic and talk about schizophrenia. If you have questions for Fraggle, ask him, not me.

 

we're not talking about schizophrenia--i am trying to ascertain whether the logic you applied in the statement i have cited twice is to be applied as a general rule, or whether it is specific to this context.

is there a reason you are evading my question? why is this so difficult to answer for you?

how does it follow that, because the majority of the world's populace believe in a god, they therefore cannot "understand the mindset of an atheist"?

do you not see the relevance of my other question: the majority of the world's populace are not schizophrenic, can they therefore not "understand the mindset" of a schizophrenic?

to a degree, this would be true--but we are not talking about "understand(ing) the mindset" here, we are really talking about defining the notion of atheism (or schizophrenia, in the example i provided).

 

If you'd been following the later statements, we'd seen atheism described being 'believing god doesn't exist' which is a definite view, most often levelled as an accusation of uninformed opinion at atheists, by theists.

This is because theists think we have to have believed in god, or reject god for some reason, and can't understand, that we simply do not believe, and perhaps never have.

I'm an atheist, not an apostate.

There are words for these other viewpoints, but it seems theists feel the need to convolve them into the term atheist. Given that the majority of people believe in some form of god, they really aren't qualified to understand the viewpoint of someone who has never believed, and therefore, label them, and define labels for them.

An example is when I try and explain that theists are also partly atheist, given they do not believe in the entire pantheon, they dismiss this saying that pantheists are merely worshipping different aspects of one true god, because they cannot entertain the idea of more than one god, or their own dismissal of other gods.

It's that mindset which disqualifies theists from defining the meaning of the word 'atheist'.