From: metahuman (hidden@lucifer.com)
Date: Mon Oct 20 2003 - 14:39:55 MDT
[Lexicon]
ATHEISM:(vl) The doctrine that there is no God. Atheists believe that there is insufficient evidence for God and/or that the concept of God is incoherent so its existence is logically impossible.
[Cliff Walker, editor of PositiveAtheism.org]
Meanwhile, I must take issue with the following, in the Lexicon, as aiding the movement to discredit atheism by calling it something that it is not.
>> ATHEISM:(vl) The doctrine that there is no God.
If theism is the belief that one or more gods exist, how could atheism be "the doctrine that" only ONE of those gods (the one named "God," that is, the god of the Christian religion) does not exist?
The prefix "a-" (and "an-") indicates the absence of what is indicated by the root. Theism is the root, so theism is what is absent in atheism. The same holds for amoral, which means the absence of morality.
An examination of all the words that have been modified with this prefix will show no exceptions to this pattern -- unless, of course, the Anglicans are right after all, and that for this one lonely term, *atheism,* the prefix indicates a doctrine rather than an absence, or, as the Anglican-owned dictionary asserts, the prefix indicates the denial of the existence of the object of the root (Wha...?).
I am an atheist and do not hold to "the doctrine that there is no God." By knowing that I am an atheist you know one thing about me and one thing only:
I am without god-beliefs of any kind.
My absence of god-beliefs DOES NOT require that I hold a specific opinion about the deity ("God") claimed to exist by a specific religion (Christianity). Neither does it require that I hold a specific opinion about the deity ("al'Lah") claimed to exist by Muslims, the deity ("YHVH" or
"G-d") claimed to exist by Jews, etc.
To aid the Christians in the propagation of this slander of the nonbelieving classes serves only to worsen the quality of life of nonbelievers. "The doctrine that there is no God" is what a non-Christian believes, not
(necessarily) what an atheist believes.
I strongly urge you to get with the picture and start popularizing the self-definition that nontheists have used for centuries, now, that the word
*atheism* means no more than "without a god-belief of any kind, for whatever reason." This would make an atheist "anybody who is not a theist."
The awkwardness revealed when it is shown that a baby is rightly called an atheist pales in comparison to the awkwardness revealed when one compares this "a"-word with the other "a"-words in English. (The so-called Greek argument doesn't hold, because we speak English, here, not ancient Greek!)
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Please also note that I requested from Cliff to add the Church of Virus to the PositiveAtheism.org links section and the CoV's website is now linked. If you have the time, please send Cliff Walker a "get well soon" e-mail (or letter) as he is very ill, if not fatally ill.
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