Why Agnostic and not Agnostist?
On my walk today, I was considering a number of conversations I’ve had recently with folks arguing for default states and atheist rocks and some of the things I’ve said in response. IST and ISM One of the key points I brought up is an IST is a follower of an ISM, which is why we can’t be born an IST. It’s also another why describing atheism purely by the absence of a psychological state doesn’t really work for an......
Different Types of Not Believing & The Law of Excluded Middle
There are some people who like to oversimplify not believing a proposition. They will say things like “You either do believe or you don’t believe, there is no third option!” On the surface, this statement is correct. The problem is, it doesn’t actually fully capture the type of not believing. This is why conflations of suspending judgment and disbelief seem to appear, and other claims like, “atheism is the default position” or the dreaded “rocks are atheist” debacle. So, please......
The Problem With ‘Atheism is the Default Position’ Arguments
As an atheist, even one that doesn’t feel that in tune with many other atheists, I still want atheists to come from a position of strength. I want us to have good arguments, sound reasoning and solid logic. This is a big part of why I have the Bad atheist arguments series and the SciPhi Shortz videos and podcasts that address common misunderstandings and bad memes. Whether we like it or not, the behaviour of atheists reflects on us all.......
Belief and Action
Having discussed the definitions of belief and common misconceptions previously I felt it would be good to cover belief in a little more detail, namely how belief and non-belief inform actions. If you remember our short on belief, it was defined like this: Something accepted as true. Something thought most likely. A positive attitude towards a proposition. Something concluded is the case. For more info, check the Belief – SciPhi Shortz podcast or the YouTube Video We summarised they all......
Atheist Community?
It’s common to hear folks say things like “there is no atheist community” and “saying atheist community is like saying non-stamp collector community, I don’t see one” and on the surface this is understandable, you generally don’t see a community of non-stamp collectors or non-believers in Bigfoot, but can we say the same for atheists? What is a Community? a group of people living in the same place or having a particular characteristic in common. the condition of sharing or......
Acceptance, Belief and ‘Believe in’
Too often do conversations devolve into people splitting hairs over synonymous terminology. Obviously, a synonym doesn’t mean the word holds the exact same meaning, just that holds (at least) nearly the same meaning. Some words are shorthand for phrases. Some words or phrases can be used in various ways and their meanings can cross over and be different depending on context. As Dave has said a number of times Words are funny things! That is one of the reasons I......
It Begs the Question…
Begging the question is a fallacy in which the premises of an argument assume the truth of the conclusion instead of supporting it. You may have also heard of this being called circular reasoning. The phrase begging the question originated in the 16th century as a mistranslation of the Latin petitio principii, which in turn was a mistranslation of the Greek for “assuming the conclusion”. The most common example of this we see on social media is variations of “It......
What is the Difference Between Does Not Believe and Lack of Belief?
Is there any difference between does not believe and lack of belief? The statements CAN be used interchangeably but is there any nuance to the terms? Are there times where we could use lack of belief but not does not believe? To be sure we are on the same page, we should start by defining our terms. What is a Belief? There are a few definitions of belief, but they are all essentially saying the same thing. Something accepted as......
“Religious People are Dumb” – SciPhi Shortz: BAM!
Are Religious People More Stupid Than Atheists? We atheists have a number of things in our toolbelts, and one of those is memes. Many of these memes are oversimplifications or just flat out wrong, so I thought I would create a series to address some of our worst memes and explain why they are so bad. I often hear atheists claim religious people or theists are dumb. This is a terrible take. Many of us atheists seem to pride ourselves on......
“Santa vs God” – SciPhi Shortz: BAM!
Who’d win the Fight, Santa or God? One of the worst comparisons I see us atheists make is comparing God to Santa (or any other mythological character). I understand the reason comparisons like this start. Many of us atheists regard both Santa and god as myths, which is fine, but what is not fine is that is where the comparison ought to stop. This podcast examines the issues with the comparisons, and why we shouldn’t use this argument seriously. “Santa vs God” – SciPhi......
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