More on Atheism as "Lacktheism"

If atheism is defined as being a biographical lack of belief, and if agnostic is used as an adjective that modifies atheism (i.e. 'I'm an agnostic atheist"), then that would mean "I do not know that I lack a belief." Which clearly isnt what the lacktheist is claiming.

But if agnosticism means that he believes that we live in a godless universe but that he doesnt claim certainty in his belief (which isnt what we mean by "know" btw) then the agnostic adjective is just superfluous because at that point it means that he DOES believe that we live or probably live in a godless-cosmos, which just is standard philosophical sense of the term atheist to mean that someone believes that a god does not or probably does not exist. But then he should just say that he is an atheist in that sense and avoid all the confusion and unnecessary adjectives in the first place.

Therefore, if atheism just means "I lack a god-belief" and "agnosticism" means "I lack certainty" (since that's how most of them use "know"), then to say "I'm an agnostic atheist" just means, "I am not certain that I lack a god-belief."

To follow this, atheists will often say that they are not certain or that that could be wrong. Which then leads me to wonder the following questions: You could be wrong about what? If you say that as an atheist that you havent made a claim, then what claim did you make that you could be wrong about? You could be wrong that you lack a belief in God? 

All you did was give a biographical description of your own psychology. So you could be wrong about that?

But this is just obviously an absurd use of language because if atheism means "I believe a god doesnt exist but I'm not absolutely certain of it, but I know that I lack a belief" then that is "I am an agnostic-(philosophical)atheist-gnostic-(biographical)atheist."

I dont need to say that I lack a belief in fairies but that I believe there are probably none but I'm not absolutely certain of it so therefore I'm an "agnostic-aFairyiest-gnostic-aFairyist."

I think the lacktheist use of the term just conflates numerous questions:

1. What do I believe?
2. Why do I believe it?
3. How convinced am I that my belief is true?
4. Can I/Ought I be able to demonstrate this belief to others?

So if atheism just is the position that we live or probably live in a god-less existence, that is independent of how you'd answer 2-4. You may believe that because you think that is the position supported by evidence, you may believe it because you think there is no evidence for God to affirm a belief, you may believe it with little certainty or with dogmatic certainty, and you may think that you cannot demonstrate it to anyone because you think proving a negative is impossible.

Now, I think there is a general lack of understanding from atheists and theists about epistemology and warrant. But generally #1 is how we would answer the question, "Does God exist?"

1. Theism - the position that God does or probably does exist. (Yes/probably)
2. Agnosticism - the position that we do not have evidence either way and so it's not reasonable to answer yes or no. (Abstain)
3. Atheism - the position that we do or probably do live in a god-less existence. (No/Probably not)

Again, you may affirm atheism because you think there are positive reasons for it. Maybe you think science has "disproven" God or that Michael Martin was right that the omniattributes are contradictory and thus the concept is incoherent. Or you may believe atheism is true because you think there is a lack of compelling evidence to the contrary. But how ever you answer question #2 concerning WHY you believe it is IRRELEVANT to the fact that you believe WHAT you believe.

It also is irrelevant how confident you are in your beliefs. Here you can be hardly confident in atheism and merely think it's just more plausible than not, or you can be dogamtically and unassailable certain that it is true. The psychological condition of being certain ABOUT your belief doesnt entail that you do not possess that belief.

My next point is just that if you think you are not able to justify your belief to other people is not relevant to if you do in fact hold that belief. And if you think that your belief is just the kind of thing that cannot be demonstrated to be true to others, then you need to simply come to grips with that and find a way to explain why you have warrant for believing it true (and arguing that other views are false). You inability to demonstrate it however does not mean that you do not have that belief. This should be obviously true to atheists especially considering the majority of them likely believe that theists have beliefs that we are unable to justify to their satisfaction. They would not allow us to say that we are warranted to believe it just because it is the kind of thing that cannot be demonstrated. (Though I personally think it can.)

So falling back on saying that atheism just is a BIOGRAPHICAL state of lacking a god-belief not only doesnt answer the question, "Does God exist" (remember, atheists are the ones who commonly claim that it is just an answer to ONE question - does God exist), but it also does not address what you DO believe. We wouldnt say that theism is psychological condition of lacking a belief in a god-less existence. That just is a corollary to the actual positive belief.

So what is a better way to use and understand these terms? Well we should be transparent about our switching of terms from autobiographical uses of the term to describe our psychological states and the philosophical use of the term to describe positive beliefs.

The New Atheist redefinition of the term as being “a lack of belief in God” is something that presents a rather weak position and one with many conceptual problems. I have laid out many of the problems that arise from this new colloquial use of the term (especially when coupled with other redefinitions such that belief becomes synonymous with opinion without evidence and knowledge is observation of empirical data) so here let me simply give a better framework for using these terms in an attempt to Steelman atheism. This is in no way original to me, I just hope to lay it out in as trimmed down and simple a manner as possible.


DEFINITIONS:

P-Theism. Philosophical Theism: The belief that God(s) exists. (Let us ignore for now the different conception of God/gods).

B-Theism. (Auto)Biographical Theism: A description of a person or the self, such that God belief is a proposition that is present within their cognitive framework. The subject possess a belief in God/gods.

P-Atheism. Philosophical Atheism: The belief that God(s) does not exists.

B-Atheism. (Auto)Biographical Atheism: A description of a person or the self, such that God belief is not a proposition that is present within their cognitive framework. The subject does not possess a belief in God/gods.

Remember, why someone affirms P-Theism or P-Atheism, how convinced they are of either of them, and if they can demonstrate it to others, has no bearing on if they do in fact affirm one of them.

We can think of the following break down of terminological uses as a help here.



Think about it this way. It seems that to employ these labels as many atheists do, they would actually need to stop equivocating and start meaningfully differentiating the concepts. We could ask when someone claims to be an "agnostic atheist," what is it that they mean? Are they claiming to be an agnostic B-Atheist, or an agnostic P-Atheist?

If they claim that Atheism just is and only means B-Atheism ("atheism just is a lack of belief!"), then most would almost certainly be Gnostic B-Atheists. And that position would just be trivially true as a psychological description of the person. It seems they would also need to employ a parallel usage for B-Theism and P-Theism such that they would need to say that B-Theism is just as trivially true as B-Atheism.

WHY DOES THIS MATTER?

Often the New Atheist will equivocate between A1 and A2 while simultaneously only ever allowing for T1 for any kind of meaning of theism - such that theism or being a theist just IS to make a claim such as T1. So they will say things like, “Atheism just is, by definition, a lack of a belief in God/gods,” but then will also say things like, “Theism is false, irrational, stupid, and atheism is true, evidence based and rational.” The problems that this creates should be evident to any familiar with the literature on this issue but let me walk through some of them here.

1. Equivocations are never a reasonable way to dialogue. When the atheist equivocates between A1 and A2, they are moving goal posts within the conversation. On the one hand they are making the autobiographical claim about the self, but when they say something like “atheism is evidence based,” they do not mean simply that there is evidence that they lack a belief. They mean that it is evidentially veridical or probable that either a) we live in a god-less cosmos such that no being such as God/gods exist, or that b) all present theistic concepts are false. But those claims about reality and the cosmos are not the same claim as the autobiographical claim about what they personally believe or do not believe.

2. There is an attempt to flee any burden of proof. This is often the purpose behind the equivocation above. The New Atheist will say things like “Science disproves the existence of God” or “God is an incoherent concept,” or “If God existed then we wouldn’t see much evil/suffering,” or any other number of assertions meant to convey the actual or probable non-existence of God. Then when asked to defend the claims, the equivocation of #1 is employed and the insular move is made to deny a burden of proof for any claim because, so it is stated, they merely lack a belief and as such they are not the ones with a burden and the theist must be the one to present evidence to the contrary. This is quite literally the same thing as when the misinformed theist tries to tell the atheist that they do not need to defend God and that the atheist must prove that there is not one.

3. Beyond the equivocation, there is also an imbalanced comparison to T1 and T2. For if atheism just is only and ever A2, and this is used as the warrant for the claim that atheism “is true,” then it seems that this would require the atheist to allow for the same analog in theism, namely, T2. Both T2 and A2 are trivially true positions because they are simply descriptions of one’s personal psychology, not propositional claims about the actual existence of God/gods. Therefore insofar as the description of the subject as being T2 or A2 is accurate, and we typically have no good reason to think someone claiming T2 or A2 for themselves are being disingenuous, then they are just equally trivially true.

4. However, given 3, if the atheist wants to claim that T1 is false or that “atheism is true” is some other sense than the trivially true sense of A2, then they seemingly must affirm A1 or something very close to it, which has propositional statements with truth values independent of A2. They would then need to possess warrant for that belief to be rational. This does not mean they must be able to to justify it to others, though many think they would carry a burden of justification, but as stated above, if they want to say that a Christian is irrational in their beliefs unless they can justify it to the satisfaction of the opposing view, then it seems that scalpel must be allowed to cut both ways.

In defining "atheism" only as the autobiographical use to avoid burden, the atheist will create de facto inconsistencies when they move away from being the pure Socratic skeptic (which they always do). The atheist simply is not neutral in these discussions so the instant that they start making evaluative, epistemic, factual, evidentiary, etc. claims, they have ceased being the neutral skeptic and have begun affirming propositional content. And that is absolutely fine. We all do it. Making claims isnt a bad thing. The problem is that they think because they have defined atheism in the autobiographical sense that they then carry no burden and are still being neutral when they are advancing propositional truth claims. That is the rhetorical inconsistency I was pushing on. This is why I said (repeatedly, despite him ignoring it every time) that atheists can define atheism however they want, I really dont care. The issue is when their definition conflicts with their epistemology and rhetorical strategy such that they claim neutrality when they are not being neutral. I'm pushing them to be epistemologically self-aware.

For more of my comments on the meaning of atheism:

EPISODE: Should Atheists Argue that Atheism is a Lack of Belief?
Should Atheists Argue That Atheism is a Lack of Belief?
Is Atheism a Belief?
A-Theism or Atheios-ism?

What Is Atheism? - with atheist Benajamin Blake Speed Watkins


Atheism and Burden - with atheist Ozymandias Ramses II