On Atheism, Agnosticism, and Faith
Do you get the difference between irrational and a-rational?
Something is a-rational if it is outside the realm of reason. Feeling happy or sad is neither rational nor irrational. My preference for vanilla over chocolate is not a rational preference, nor is it an irrational preference. It has nothing to do with rationality at all. It is a-rational.
How about the difference between immoral and amoral? I too often hear people use the latter as if it's a $10 version of the former, but it's the same distinction. Something is amoral if it is outside the realm of morality. Something is immoral if it is part of the good-versus-bad universe and it comes down on the side of bad. The tornado that destroys your house is amoral. The person who initiates force is immoral.
Got the distinction?
A belief system that neither includes nor excludes the existence of God or gods is technically atheistic. Pure Buddhism is, in this sense, an atheistic religion. The Buddhist nun, Pema Chodron, uses the term "non-theistic" to communicate this concept because everyone thinks "atheistic" means "anti-theistic".
I suppose the clearest way to communicate this distinction is to follow Pema's lead and avoid the word 'atheism' altogether -- to specify either non-theism (a lack of a belief in God) or anti-theism (a positive belief in the non-existence of God). What I tend to do instead is make the distinction as negative atheism (lack of belief) versus positive atheism (as in, "I'm positive that there is no God!" -- which is not a lack of belief, but a strong belief, positively held, for the non-existence of God).
Most people would sloppily call non-theism, or negative atheism, agnosticism -- but a-gnosis means "outside knowing". An agnostic is not someone "on the fence" over the whole existence-of-God issue, but rather a person who knows that he doesn't know, either way. You've heard of the suspension of disbelief? An agnostic practices the suspension of belief.
It is not the case that atheism is a stronger form of agnosticism, or agnosticism a weaker form of atheism. They deal with entirely different questions. Atheism is an ontological position, while agnosticism is an epistemological one. (The former deals with questions of existence while the latter deals with questions of knowing.)
Most people who call themselves atheists mean by that term what I am here calling anti-theist or positive atheist. They have a positive belief in the non-existence of any "higher power".
What most atheists do not realize is that their position is based on faith.
What do I mean by faith?
Either
But most positive atheists hold their position irrationally because they believe that their position is rational, rather than a-rational. (Following all this?)
Negative atheism, on the other hand, is compatible with true agnosticism. Not just compatible: the two go together. Knowing that you can't know often means that you do not believe either way.
At my most intellectually rigorous, I am both agnostic and negatively atheistic (non-theistic), but most of the time, like it or not, I'm a positive atheist: I tend to believe in God's non-existence.
I know I have no proof -- but sometimes you have to have faith!
Something is a-rational if it is outside the realm of reason. Feeling happy or sad is neither rational nor irrational. My preference for vanilla over chocolate is not a rational preference, nor is it an irrational preference. It has nothing to do with rationality at all. It is a-rational.
How about the difference between immoral and amoral? I too often hear people use the latter as if it's a $10 version of the former, but it's the same distinction. Something is amoral if it is outside the realm of morality. Something is immoral if it is part of the good-versus-bad universe and it comes down on the side of bad. The tornado that destroys your house is amoral. The person who initiates force is immoral.
Got the distinction?
A belief system that neither includes nor excludes the existence of God or gods is technically atheistic. Pure Buddhism is, in this sense, an atheistic religion. The Buddhist nun, Pema Chodron, uses the term "non-theistic" to communicate this concept because everyone thinks "atheistic" means "anti-theistic".
The difference between theism and non-theism is not whether one does or does not believe in God. It is an issue that applies to everyone, including Buddhists and non-Buddhists. Theism is a deep-seated conviction that there's some hand to hold: if we just do the right things, someone will appreciate us and take care of us ... From this point of view, theism is an addiction. We're all addicted to hope... Non-theism is relaxing with the ambiguity and uncertainty of the present moment without reaching for anything to protect ourselves ... In a non-theistic state of mind, abandoning hope is an affirmation, the beginning of the beginning.
-- Pema Chodron, Hopelessness and Death
I suppose the clearest way to communicate this distinction is to follow Pema's lead and avoid the word 'atheism' altogether -- to specify either non-theism (a lack of a belief in God) or anti-theism (a positive belief in the non-existence of God). What I tend to do instead is make the distinction as negative atheism (lack of belief) versus positive atheism (as in, "I'm positive that there is no God!" -- which is not a lack of belief, but a strong belief, positively held, for the non-existence of God).
Most people would sloppily call non-theism, or negative atheism, agnosticism -- but a-gnosis means "outside knowing". An agnostic is not someone "on the fence" over the whole existence-of-God issue, but rather a person who knows that he doesn't know, either way. You've heard of the suspension of disbelief? An agnostic practices the suspension of belief.
It is not the case that atheism is a stronger form of agnosticism, or agnosticism a weaker form of atheism. They deal with entirely different questions. Atheism is an ontological position, while agnosticism is an epistemological one. (The former deals with questions of existence while the latter deals with questions of knowing.)
Most people who call themselves atheists mean by that term what I am here calling anti-theist or positive atheist. They have a positive belief in the non-existence of any "higher power".
What most atheists do not realize is that their position is based on faith.
What do I mean by faith?
Either
- belief without evidence (an a-rational position), or
- belief in contradiction to the evidence (an irrational position).
But most positive atheists hold their position irrationally because they believe that their position is rational, rather than a-rational. (Following all this?)
Negative atheism, on the other hand, is compatible with true agnosticism. Not just compatible: the two go together. Knowing that you can't know often means that you do not believe either way.
At my most intellectually rigorous, I am both agnostic and negatively atheistic (non-theistic), but most of the time, like it or not, I'm a positive atheist: I tend to believe in God's non-existence.
I know I have no proof -- but sometimes you have to have faith!
3 Comments:
I like Pema's "non-theism" and how she describes it.
Nice entry, one bone to pick:
You state that "positive atheism" is based on faith and, while I agree with this up to a point, it is not entirely the a-rational variety of faith you suggest it is.
There is a certain epistemological strategy practiced by many these days, sometimes mistakenly called Positivism (I like the term Scientific Epistemology myself), which can be summarized roughly as follows: "Only those beliefs for which there is evidence should be judged to be true. Lacking evidence, a belief is unjustified." That's a fairly gross simplification of the strategy I have in mind - one might, for example, want to develop it by articulating what makes for a good or bad explanation of a particular set of facts, and how to decide between two or more explanations that seem to account for the same set of facts (Ockham's Razor, etc.) - but it's a fair enough paraphrase for the point I'm making. Another way of stating the same epistemological position is: "The burden of justification (of proof) lies on proving a things exists, not on proving it doesn't exist."
Consider jolly Saint Nick- I may not be able to prove that Santa Clause doesn't exist (it's practically impossible to prove such a thing; what would such evidence even look like?) but I'm perfectly rationally justified in denying his existence because I've yet to see consistent proof that he does in fact exist. Looked at from this perspective, the "positive-atheist" is also rationally justified in his denial of God's existence. For rhetorical purposes, we could take this to ridiculous extremes: suppose I claimed that the theory of gravity was wrong and that, in fact, the reason things fall to the ground when you drop them is that everything is attached to the earth by an invisible, unbreakable elastic band. You might raise your eyebrows and ask me to prove such a claim - certianly I wouldn't persuade you by responding "No, I can't prove it, but can you prove it isn't true?" The same burden of proof lies with every claim we make, whether it be about the existence of invisible economic hands, quarks, blackholes, UFOs, or God.
In a nutshell: prove to me God exists - until you do, I'm rationally justified in not accepting Him into my ontological pantheon.
On faith and strong or positive atheism
I don’t believe it is correct to categorize strong or positive atheists as having faith. Although there probably is no absolutely definitive evidence for the non-existence of gods, there is strong evidence to support that contention. The evidences are generally of the following kinds:
1) So many gods are said to exist that the likelihood of any one of them actually existing is very small.
2) The term “god” is often poorly defined. It is reasonable to discount arguments for such a god.
3) Where the term is reasonably well defined the definition is often internally inconsistent or inconsistent with those aspects of the natural world with which the entity is said to interact.
4) The religious tracts supposedly inspired by the entity can be shown to be full of internal and external inconsistencies.
Lastly, one must not forget that it is possible to be a strong or positive atheist in respect of some gods and not others.
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