The 100% REAL Definition of Atheism

i'm also increasingly entering into this debate about the usage of the word atheism and whether it's appropriately used to describe simply a lack of belief in god i've always very strongly advocated that atheism just means a lack of belief in god but studying at university i found that this just kind of doesn't exist in the academy right like in in academic works it's always used the term i mean atheism and it's always defined in all of the dictionaries and all the philosophical dictionaries as the belief that god does not exist why hello my fellow weeps i hope you're well around a month ago alex o'connor the fifth horseman of new atheism i hope it should be clear by now that i'm really not trying to affiliate with the new atheist movement all right fine the first horseman of new new atheism expressed potential endorsement of atheism being defined as the metaphysical proposition that there are no gods as opposed to the epistemic psychological state of simply lacking a belief in gods this no doubt made the likes of steve mcrae and cameron batuzi erect in more ways than one and it also resulted in a few of you asking for my views on the matter well i've been meaning to share my views for quite some time now since the gatekeeping by some atheists and indeed some theists has escalated to frankly absurd degrees with it now genuinely averting earnest intellectual exchange so what i aim to achieve here is two things the first is to defend both definitions of atheism yes both and the second is to encourage everyone no matter which definition they prefer to greater appreciate why others might prefer the other definition but before we delve into the details let's just hear a few examples of what theists and atheists have to say where's my cup i need a fresh coffee what does atheism actually mean if you look for an answer here on youtube you'll pretty much find the same one across the board atheism atheism is only the lack of belief in the existence of god or gods it is a lack of belief in god a lack of belief in god someone who lacks a belief in gods so if you are an atheist it's just simply lacking that belief a lack of a belief in a particular deity all it means is i lack belief in a deity atheism is in a broad sense the unbelief in god or the belief that there is no god many atheists argue that it's a label that shouldn't really exist at all as we don't create names for other non-belief systems atheism is not just the absence of belief in god and atheist is a person who maintains that there is no god an atheist is somebody who doesn't believe there's a god i am not convinced there's a god that doesn't necessarily mean i'm convinced there are no gods um although that is a subset of hey i don't believe there's a god and then there's a subset that is i believe there are no gods bro i just lack a belief that evolution is true that's it i'm an evolutionist i'm not making a claim that it's false he is an a lincolnist so he does not believe that abraham lincoln existed i get accused sometimes of having a strange belief i don't have a belief the truth is i i lack belief in abraham lincoln i'm i'm an a lincolnist atheist then are people who believe that there are no gods atheists are people who believe that they're my okay so that last clip is of graeme who is recognized as one of the most eloquent and prolific atheist philosophers of our time with even the likes of william lane craig considering him an absolute powerhouse who do you think is the most formidable atheist today the most formidable champion i think without a doubt it's graham oppe your fellow your compatriot he is scary smart scary smart and in the prior clip opi certainly seemed to come down hard on defining atheism as the metaphysical proposition that there are no gods but let me just read a few words from his book titled the basics of atheism not everyone uses the words atheism or atheist in the way that i do indeed oppy makes it very clear that there are multiple ways that atheism is defined yes he favors the metaphysical definition which he places into a four-fold distinction but he doesn't impose his definition on non-philosophical communities like some theists make out but we get to his four-fold distinction and other definitions in the literature in chapter three first a bit of groundwork is needed contrary to popular belief words don't inherently have meanings they have usages and it's for this reason that the definition of words change over time for differently the definitions of words are constructed and regulated by the minds of the people that use them the word fun for instance has an etymology rooted in font which is an old word for fool hence it once meant to cheat or hoax in fact it still in some senses retains this usage such as when we make fun of people who use definitions that we don't like isn't that right doctor peoples like most people i was in the unfortunate position of of being raised without being able to question belief in lincoln truly if this fine doctor isn't the embodiment of exposing the intellectual side of christianity then i don't know what it's but to wrap up on the usage of fun today the word more predominantly has a meaning of having a merry good time which is vastly different to its original use to give another example the word or originally referred to a media or active fear but through religious association it became reverential fear and now today it expresses the feeling of being humbled funny enough that's funny in the modern sense the word awful retains the negative sense whereas the word awesome now has a positive sense awesome right and when it comes to the word atheist the definition has changed nearly as many times as theists have changed their supposed objective morality to quote opi once again the denial of the existence of gods worshipped in particular places at particular times often attracted charges of atheism despite the fact that those at whom the charges were leveled believed in other gods for example the romans called early christians atheists because those christians denied the existence of the roman gods and in the later stages of the empire many christians called pagans atheists because those pagans denied the existence of the christian god because of this pejorative use it might not come as a surprise to learn that is if you didn't know this already that the word atheist predates theist thus appealing to etymology is just not going to cut it since usage very often couldn't care less about historical context so let us really hammer this home from the outset anyone who claims that there can only be one specific definition of any word is at best ignorant of linguistics and that worse is probably trying to control a narrative flipping the script on its head it's also important of course to appreciate that while we can define words however we please there's very good reason not to do this the philosopher michael humer in his book titled knowledge reality and value a mostly common sense guide to philosophy gives three reasons for not doing this and they are as follows first this causes confusion for other people who are familiar with the ordinary english use of the word second ordinary usage usually serves as important functions human beings over the millennia have found certain ways of grouping distinguishing objects that is certain conceptual schemes to be useful and interesting and finally third it is actually almost impossible to escape the conceptual scheme that you've learned from your linguistic community this is all to say that while words don't have intrinsic meanings they do have common usages and while one can redefine a word however they please such as what jordan peterson does when he defines an atheist as essentially a murderer there's very obvious good reasons not to do this what in your view would a genuine atheist be like he'd be like raskolnikov in crime and punish [Music] paul henry terry baron de horbach was a french german philosopher encyclopedist writer and prominent figure in the french enlightenment and between the 1750s and 1780s he ran the most influential salon in paris which was attended by ambassadors nobles and famous intellectuals from all over the world including the likes of adam smith benjamin franklin david hume dennis deidero and john jack rousseau with most of them being known for their revolutionary ambitions to again quote opie the members of the kotir were political radicals with revolutionary agendas many including hulbach himself were avowed atheists unfortunately the baron had to publish his works anonymously due to predominantly safety concerns with the true authorship not becoming common knowledge until many years after his death within his work he defended a mechanistic account of nature maintaining that nature is nothing but matter emotion under mechanical laws and he also championed a naturalistic view of ethics and politics in time i will most certainly dedicate a champions of reason episode to him but the reason i bring him up now is to read a few words from his book titled good sense without god he wrote all children are born atheists they have no idea of god now what's really interesting here is that we have one of the first atheist authors explicitly expressing atheism as an epistemic psychological state as opposed to a metaphysical proposition or in other words de horbach endorsed black theism he claims that babies are atheists since they have no conception of the gods they lack belief in the gods and thus are atheists now does this mean that this is the correct definition of atheism that we should define it as an epistemic psychological state no again of course not but this does largely undermine the narrative that lack theism is some new atheist political scheme to bolster numbers and avoid the burden of proof etc which is a very vacuous interpretation now let's pause for a moment and take another look at those featured in the compilation at the beginning interestingly all of the theists featured favored the metaphysical proposition of atheism that is the assertion that there are no gods whereas to the contrary those featured who self-identify as atheists overwhelmingly favor like de horbach the epistemic psychological definition that is lack theism i freely admit of course that my sample was skewed but as even the critics of lachtheism tend to acknowledge including myself by the way there's almost certainly very good entirely earnest reasons as to why the vast majority of self-described atheists opt for lack theism now as someone who for most of his time as an atheist activist wholeheartedly favored lack theism let me try and explain what i think the lack thiest disposition is consider the following two propositions geocentrism and reincarnation further still let's assume that you knew nothing about these topics given this scenario if someone was to present you with an argument for both of these metaphysical propositions and you happen not to find any of these arguments convincing how would you describe yourself in reference to each and more importantly what label if any would you favor in the case of geocentrism would it be correct to say that you affirm the proposition that geocentrism is false though it wouldn't in this scenario you'd simply not be convinced of the proposition that geocentrism is true you'd simply lack the conviction the belief that geocentrism is true if you actually wanted to affirm the proposition that geocentrism is false you'd need to have arguments to the contrary and so you need to be relatively well read on astronomy and physics still would you really go around telling people that you're agnostic as to whether or not the earth is the center of the universe i wouldn't at least in an informal setting i wouldn't switching gears what about the proposition of reincarnation would you say that you affirm the proposition that reincarnation is false if you would then all i can really say to you is good luck since this thesis is essentially unfalsifiable you'll almost certainly never be able to affirm that it's false and so strictly speaking you should go around saying that you're agnostic about reincarnation but most of us don't do this do we we say no i don't see reason to believe that reincarnation is true which is akin to saying that we lack belief in reincarnation now this is precisely how i used to exclusively look at the proposition of theism and this is what i strongly suspect is the foundation and reason as to why lactheism is so prevalent as i'll expand upon in chapter 4 i still think this definition is valid but since i've had both the interest and opportunity to digest a decent amount of philosophical literature i am now more than happy to also affirm the metaphysical proposition of atheism or at least local atheism i am genuinely convinced that naturalism trumps theism both in terms of explanatory virtue and ontological commitment but the vast majority of atheists are not happy to affirm this proposition since they don't in fact affirm this proposition just as they don't strictly speaking affirm the proposition that reincarnation is false they simply are not convinced by the various arguments in favor of theism and they are also not interested in affirming the opposition to put it bluntly they don't care about god and who can blame them most theists don't care to defend the proposition that reincarnation astrology or chakras are false and so to expect and often demand that lack theists defend a position that they don't actually hold is absurd like isaac asimov most atheists as in lack theists would say i don't have the evidence to prove that god doesn't exist but i so strongly suspect that he doesn't that i don't want to waste my time given this i think it's very easy to see why most atheists favor the epistemic psychological definition of atheism now one might have issues with this definition as many including myself do but this isn't the place nor time to delve into them rather the point here is to simply explain why most atheists favor lack theism given this framework we can then expand into such categories as weak atheism and strong atheism with a weak atheist being someone who just isn't convinced of theism and a strong atheist being one who affirms the negation of theism again whether you prefer this definition or not doesn't really matter what matters is that it's a robust framework that most self-described atheists favor in philosophy at least atheism should be construed as the proposition that god does not exist or more broadly the proposition that there are no gods this quote is from paul draper's stanford encyclopedia article titled atheism and agnosticism atheism is the view that there is no god agnosticism is traditionally characterized as neither believing that god exists nor believing that god does not exist this quote is from matt mccormick's internet encyclopedia article titled atheism are agnostics atheists no an atheist like a christian holds that we can know whether or not there is a god the christian holds that we know that there is a god the atheist that we can know that there is not the agnostic suspends judgment saying that there are not sufficient grounds either for affirmation or denial and this quote is from bertrand russell's essay titled what is an agnostic now all three of these wonderful people are highly respected philosophers who also happen to be self-described atheists add to this list opie alex malpass and dosimandius who also happen to be atheist philosophers and we are confronted by another interesting observation why is it that most atheist philosophers opt for the metaphysical proposition that there are no gods as opposed to the epistemic psychological definition well draper does a very good job of breaking down some of these reasons in his stanford encyclopedia article as does opi when presenting his four-fold distinction of theists atheists agnostics and innocence which i'm more than happy to dedicate an entire video to should enough of you be interested who knows i might even be able to get opinion on the script which let's face it would be bloody awesome and that's awesome in the sense of reverential fear anyhow my purpose here isn't to present a forceful case for or against either of the popular definitions of atheism rather my purpose is to sufficiently explain why each definition tends to be favored by certain communities hopefully i've already achieved this with the epistemic definition in the prior chapter and are now equally attempt to do the same for the metaphysical definition consider this quote from opi taken from a companion of atheism and philosophy if we accept that there is this distinction between strong atheism and weak atheism we should surely accept that there is a similar distinction between strong theism and weak theism strong theists reject the claim that there are no gods while weak theists merely refrain from accepting the claim that there are no gods and then we shall have it the agnostics are both weak atheists and weak theists this is but one of many objections leveled at the epistemic psychological definition of atheism another is the reductio that it entails the rocks must be atheists since they too lack a belief in the gods and yet another objection refers to the strong arguments we have in favor of there being no gods or at least no omni attributed god if atheism is defined as an epistemic state then it's not correct to say that these arguments are in favor of atheism is it now there are ways to respond to these objections for instance for the rock objection we could say that in order for one to lack a belief in a proposition one must have the possibility to believe in the proposition which rocks don't since they lack the necessary cognitive apparatus but again my purpose here isn't to defend either position i don't necessarily endorse any of the objections or responses i've just given all i'm aiming to achieve here is to illustrate why in a nutshell different communities favor different definitions now it would be somewhat remiss of me as i think it's somewhat remiss of others not to acknowledge that the claim that none of the philosophical literature defines atheism in the laxism sense is i love to break it to you simply false yes most of the literature at least as much as i've read endorses the metaphysical definition of atheism but as draper informs us there are indeed philosophers and philosophical dictionaries that favor defining atheism as a psychological state such as the oxford handbook on atheism further still the philosopher stephen bulevant defends the psychological definition on grounds of its utility arguing that it best serves as an umbrella term for many subcategories of atheism such as strong and weak atheism so while it's true that most of the philosophical literature favors the metaphysical definition there is a respectful segment that doesn't finally i just want to gently touch upon agnosticism many critics of the lack theism position hit hard on the fact that a psychological state isn't a proposition and yet they almost always accept the definition of an agnostic as someone who isn't convinced that there is at least one god but also isn't convinced that there is not at least one god which is indeed a psychological state funny enough when thomas huxley introduced the term agnostic he didn't assign it to an epistemic psychological state but today pretty much everyone uses it in this way so what i'm getting at here is that when people try to dismiss lack theism on account of it not being a metaphysical proposition it's worth asking them how they define an agnostic in addition to words having usages they often have within different communities and contexts multiple usages perhaps the most relevant example of this that i'm sure we're all aware of is the word theory i've genuinely lost count of how many times i've seen creationists dismiss evolution by natural selection on account of it being just a theory which of course is an obvious equivocation the word theory is used very differently in the scientific literature compared to the everyday informal use of the word or as the american museum of natural history expresses the distinction in everyday use the word theory often means an untested hunch or a guess without supporting evidence but for scientists a theory has nearly the opposite meaning a theory is a well-substantiated explanation of an aspect of the natural world that can incorporate laws hypotheses and facts now just as it's perfectly fine that there are two popular definitions of the word theory i see no issue whatsoever with there being two popular definitions of the word atheism just as the word theory is used both in a scientific and colloquial everyday sense the word atheism is used in a philosophical and colloquial psychological sense hence so long as people clarify what they mean by their language i really don't see a problem what is a problem is when people force their preferred definition on others be it theists who favor the metaphysical definition mocking and grandstanding atheists who are just not convinced by any of the arguments for a god's existence or atheists who prefer the psychological definition insisting that self-described agnostics are atheists because yes they are atheists according to this usage but according to the metaphysical usage they're not and if they prefer the metaphysical usage then so beer and another problem which i simply have to call out from my own camp is when atheists say such things as there are no gods and religion is made up nonsense which are metaphysical statements but then when pushed retreat to the lack this position no if you're going to say that god doesn't exist you've got to stick with the metaphysical definition or to put this all another way i'll give the last word to opie i don't really care right and i don't think other people should about different uses of the word in different communities it's just that once you start talking to people who use the word differently you have to be clear i mean either you for the purposes of your conversation you agree that you're going to use the word a certain way or you're just very careful to translate backwards and forwards so that there's no confusion because what matters is not the word what matters is the thoughts that are being expressed because what matters is not the word what matters is the thoughts right that are being expressed [Music] alrighty let's recap and wrap up in the first chapter we emphasize that words don't have intrinsic meanings but rather usages and consequently anyone who insists that a word must be defined in a specific way either doesn't really understand how language works or is probably trying to control a narrative in the second chapter we explored the epistemic psychological definition of atheism and considered a few reasons as to why it's so heavily favored by most self-described atheists in short just as we tend to say that we don't believe in such things as astrology and reincarnation without technically affirming the negative the same is true for most atheists when it comes to theism now you might have grievances with this definition leaving it deficient and limited but this is simply the nature of informal language many colloquial words such as theory are deficient when scrutinized in the third chapter we explored atheism as defined as the metaphysical proposition that there are no gods and considered a few reasons as to why this definition is favored in the philosophical literature in short it's favored because philosophers are not so much concerned about what people believe but rather what's true and one psychological state isn't a proposition and then finally in chapter four we reiterated that it's perfectly fine for the word atheism to have multiple valid definitions just as it's perfectly fine to have multiple definitions of other words such as theory okay so we're done or at least i am for now if you think i've missed something or just want to leave a comment to help the channel grow then i look forward to reading your thoughts as always thank you kindly for the view and an extra special thank you to my wonderful patrons and you know what also to all of you that affirm the proposition of not being a patron you're pretty cool too i mean you're not quite as cool as the patrons no doubt but you know you're alright

Channel: Rationality Rules

Views: 92,474

Keywords: atheism, definition of atheism, atheist vs agnostic, cosmic skeptic atheist definition, graham oppy, graham oppy definition of atheism, rationality rules, stephen woodford

Id: ftDSaVLDDK8

Length: 23min 55sec (1435 seconds)

Published: Sat Aug 21 2021