People who consider atheism a religion should stop trying to convince me I'm agnostic

[Hello_Kitty]

A while back I heard Thom Hartmann take a call from a man who identified as an atheist. Thom proceeded to question him about his beliefs (or lack thereof) and then told the man he was really an agnostic, not an atheist. I normally like Thom but that had me seething. Would he try to convince a Catholic caller that he was really Episcopalian because he didn't subscribe to some of the tenets of Catholicism?

Yeah, I get the argument about how no one knows the answers so you can only really be agnostic blah blah blah. But I identify as an atheist for two basic reasons: 1. I don't think that there is any kind of supernatural deity involved in the creation of or what occurs in the universe. 2. Describing myself as "agnostic" is too often interpreted by theists as an invitation to proselytize to me.

[hobbit709]

1. I tell them I belong to the Church of Murphy

Finagle is God and Murphy is His Prophet.

[provis99]

2. I don't "know" that gravity is real.

So am I an agnostic about gravity? I don't know whether unicorns really exist, so am I agnostic about them? Sometimes, Hartmann is just full of himself.

[EvolveOrConvolve]

3. I agree about identifying as agnostic opening yourself up to proselytization

A religious person hears "I'm agnostic" and immediately starts thinking of you as a prospect or as someone who's just wishy-washy about religion and needs to be convinced.

[Bobbieo]

4. I am an agnostic - I believe Jesus existed as a person but I do not believe in the Bible.

[EvolveOrConvolve]

5. I consider myself a gnostic atheist (which is unusual)

But I go by a slightly varied definition for gnosticism. I see gnostic (knowledge) as meaning the potential for knowledge. If there are a god or gods, I believe that we have the potential to have knowledge of him/her/it. I lack a belief in a deity, but believe that if such a construct existed, we would have knowledge of it.

[laconicsax]

12. I hope you realize that agnosticism has nothing to do with belief.

It only has to do with whether or not you think that an answer is knowable.

Think of it this way, suppose you are handed a questionnaire with two questions:

1) Do you believe that a god exists? Yes or No.
2) Do you believe that it's possible to know that a god exists with absolute certainty? Yes or No.

Suppose you answer yes to question 1 and no to question 2. You would be an agnostic theist--you don't think it's possible to know for certain whether a god exists, but you believe in it/them. Suppose you answer no and yes respectively. You would be a gnostic atheist--you think that it's possible to know for certain whether a god exists and you don't believe in it.

[Name removed]

6. Deleted message

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[trotsky]

7. The common confusion is a misunderstanding of what agnostic means.

It's not some "middle ground" between atheism and theism. (A)theism is a statement of (dis)belief. (A)gnosticism is a statement of knowledge. The two terms are complementary, not exclusionary.

[Hello_Kitty]

8. True. Atheist-Agnostic describes me best. eom

[Orrex]

29. I'm atheist primarily because they serve such great refreshments at the meetings.

[Odin2005]

9. Most people who call themselves agnostics are also atheists.

They just don't call themselves atheists because of popular confusion of what atheism is by the atheist-bashing brigade.

[Hello_Kitty]

10. I go by atheist because I'd rather they just hate me right off the bat. eom

[laconicsax]

11. It's tough to listen to him when he talks about religion.

I remember listening to him prattle on about why the answer to all the world's environmental problems was everybody adopting an animistic religion.

You're absolutely right about "agnostic" being received as an open invitation to proselytize, then again, certain types of theists see conversation as an invitation to proselytize.

You may want to check out this video on agnosticism and atheism: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fkEJtQJ5tz4 It does a pretty good job of explaining how 'agnostic' and 'atheist' relate to different things; they're answers to different questions.

[jgraz]

13. By his definition, every single religious person is an agnostic.

When someone pulls that shit, start asking them specific questions about their religion: Are you sure there was a talking snake? What color is are God's eyes? Do you know the exact time and date that Jeebus will come down, kill all Teh Joos and take you up to heaven? Is eating shrimp really a sin? What about rock shrimp? Popcorn shrimp?

If they can't answer immediately and with complete certainty, then they are agnostic.

[Festivito]

14. That just seems like such a mess.

The analogy offered is flawed for the case presented. The difference is not like two brand names, it's between to ideas. Not like Catholic and Episcopalian, more like the difference between capitalist and fascist, socialist and communist.

If someone has those ideas wrong, they should go, together, to the dictionary -- not to ranting and raving about how one of the two persons should decide what the definition is just because one of them is seething.

Should someone try to proselytize after you ask them to stop, you need to associate with a better class of people. You should then be able to walk away, provided you're not in some place you should not be.

However, if you egg the question yourself, say by posting what others should or should not do, perhaps you need to become a better class of person for your own good.

[Hello_Kitty]

15. So it's my fault

That people don't know the definition of, and the difference between "atheist" and "agnostic" and "religious"? My problem with Thom Hartmann is that he should know the difference and he apparently doesn't. He's the one characterizing both atheism and agnosticism as religions, not me.

Should someone try to proselytize after you ask them to stop, you need to associate with a better class of people. You should then be able to walk away, provided you're not in some place you should not be.

Again, it's MY fault that the people who surround me (socially and in the workplace) think that my lack of religion is an invitation to attack me? Really?

[Festivito]

16. That your analogy sucks, yes. That you don't run to the dictionary, yes.

As to work, if you work for a religious organization, then that's the job you chose and you shouldn't have, given your intolerance of religion.

Otherwise, you should be able to walk away, unless it's your boss who is the problem.

But, this gets too complicated without more information.

Back to faults. You brought this stuff up. You can look at it as tradeoffs or as fault. I prefer tradeoffs. Have it your way.

[Hello_Kitty]

18. "if you work for a religious organization" You have GOT to be shitting me

If you honestly think nonbelievers don't get hassled in secular workplaces I don't know what to tell you. When I was working for a semiconductor manufacturer a coworker told me I should leave the country because I don't believe in God.

Obviously, you're looking for someone to pick on. Fine, I hope you're satisfied.

[Festivito]

22. Hey, two cases: one, you do; two, you don't.

Strangely, you only answered the case that you do, implying you don't.

Hey, I don't want to pick on people. But, I will when they deserve it and its needed. If I were there beside you when THOSE people strike, I'd be defending you. I'd pummel their ears with enough free speech until they rethink their latest tack.

If you'd think those people are insecure, I'd agree with you. They're bullying you. The best defense in that case is to realize you're dealing with a person who needs help. Just say: "Oh, really!" Let them unwind a little. Then, say you have to get back to work, meet your friends or catch your favorite show.

You're going to hell. Oh, really!
God says so. Oh, really!
He says it in the Bible. Oh, really!
You should read the Bible. Oh, really!
You should come to church. Oh, really!

It shouldn't be so hard.

In the mean time, I hope you're satisfied also.

[TZ]

17. I just really hate when anybody tries to tell me what *I* believe

Its sheer arrogance on the other persons part. Its a way of pushing beliefs on other people something I find incredibly loathesome. It also shows a degree of contempt for that person...

[struggle4progress]

19. A: What is an "amenable group"?

B: Oh, that's easy. An amenable group is an inverse monoid that has a unique idempotent and admits a certain type of invariant measure

A: That can't be right: it doesn't have any relation to what I mean when I say "amenable group"

B: We can use the words in whatever way is convenient, as long as we communicate. Personally, I find "inverse monoid with unique idempotent admitting an invariant measure" much more of a mouthful than "amenable group"

A: I don't think we can talk about "amenable groups" until we know what they really are. Now, "amenable" means something like "friendly" and "group" means something like "a gang of folk" so an "amenable group" must be something like a "friendly gang"

B: What did you want to say about "friendly gangs"?

A: I didn't want to say anything about "friendly gangs." I just don't think you can use "amenable group" to talk about "inverse monoids with whatever." That's not what "amenable group" means

B: You don't want to talk about "amenable groups"?

A: How can we talk about "amenable groups" if you won't respect the meaning of the words?

B: The words are conventional noises we use to communicate: they don't have fixed definite meanings that float around in some ideal Platonic world, just waiting for us to capture them in our clever nets

[iris27]

20. Wow, you're HIGH-larious.

But guess what? People only get nitpicky about definitions when communication has already broken down - when I associate a word with one meaning and you associate it with another. For communication to resume, we either need to agree on what that word means or find a different one.

If a word has two commonly listed dictionary definitions, and a person identifies with the second instead of the first, is it so difficult to just accept that, instead of insisting that the first definition must be what REALLY describes them?

[struggle4progress]

27. .

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amenable_group

[iris27]

28. And? n/t

[MineralMan]

21. When someone asks me about religious beliefs, I simply say I'm an

atheist. If they then attempt to proselytize me, I get a peeved look on my face and ask them, "What part of "I'm an atheist" are you not understanding? That usually works. If it doesn't, I simply walk away from them. I believe in the conservation of energy, and it takes too much of it to argue with people who are trying to save my oh-so-mortal soul.

[followthemoney]

23. I'm a naturalist. I refuse to even form an opinion about ...

Supenaturalism.

[gcomeau]

24. What constantly ticks me off...

...is how many people don't know what agnosticism freaking means in the first place and think it's actually a third option alternative to being atheist or theist.

"Do you belive a deity exists?"

Yes = theist.
No = atheist.

The end.

Agnosticism has nothing to do with whether you believe a deity exists or not. It has to do with whether you believe it is possible to KNOW a deity exists. You can be an agnostic theist (belive deity exists, also belive it is impossible to ever know that for sure), or you can be an agnostic atheist (don't believe deity exists, also believe it is impossible to ever know that for sure), but you can't JUST be a freaking agnostic. If someone asks you if you're atheist or theist and you answer "neither, I'm an agnostic" you might as well have just said "neither, I'm an accountant".

[ZombieHorde]

25. +1 nt

[darkstar3]

26. Well said! n/t