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HsR's Demographics of Wowhead: Religion
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Post by
Phiktional
I'm Mormon, and I already mentioned this to HsR ;) As it is, Christianity - Other would suffice.
Yay Im not alone on here :D
I didn't think I would be, those chances are astronomical.
Post by
148723
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
91604
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
Hyperspacerebel
Archbishop: ... Will you to the utmost of your power maintain in the United Kingdom the Protestant Reformed Religion established by law?...etc.
Queen Elizabeth II: All this I promise to do.
Yes. If you actually read the Wikipedia article you snipped that from, you'd realize that the issue is a recent one, and what you quoted was being used to juxtapose what was the case half a Century previous.
There's a reason it's called the
via media
, the middle road, between Protestantism and Catholicism.
BTW, Would've been easier if you listed Protestant since that covers Anglican, Baptist, and Lutheran. Also people who are Evangelical, Pentecostal, and Presbyterian can voted under it as well.
Anglicans aren't technically Protestant.
Not in my eyes, when I went to Catholic school there were some Anglicans up in there. So for a long while I associated them as Catholics until I learned more about them and how they're Reformers. Generally speaking if you're a Reformer, you're a Protestant. Yeah I said it, cmon Anglicans take your best shot! Doesn't change the fact they have a point of reference in Protestantism.
The turning away from the label of Protestantism is precisely because they don't want to be grouped with the Reformation of mainland Europe. It was not done for the same reasons, and the actual development of Anglicanism was a lot more drawn out, with both Catholic and Protestant influences.
Post by
donnymurph
And atheist would believe that "there is no God" is a truth claim (for whatever reason).
Not necessarily.
Implicit Atheism is "the absence of theistic belief without a conscious rejection of it".
Explicit Atheism is "the absence of theistic belief due to a conscious rejection of it".
Positive Atheism is a term popularly used to describe the form of atheism that maintains that "There is at least one god" is a false statement. Also known as strong or hard Atheism.
Negative Atheism refers to any other type of non-theism, wherein a person does not believe any deities exist, but does not claim that same statement is false. Also known as weak or soft Atheism.
Note that Implicit/Explicit relate to "belief" while Positive/Negative relate to "knowledge". As such it is possible for an explicit Atheist to be either positive or negative, while an implicit Atheist is always negative.
A positive explicit Atheist is of the position that "There are no deities".
A negative explicit Atheist is of the position that "I cannot say for sure whether there are deities or not, but I personally don't believe there is and, regardless, I reject their existence."
An implicit Atheist is one who does not believe in deities, but also does not reject their existence. This would include anyone who has never been introduced to the concept of a deity, such as an infant, and perhaps some agnostics who have been isolated from any religious influences.
Post by
Hyperspacerebel
Agnosticism and Atheism are not internally defined systems, and thus there are various ways of using them as labels. I personally don't separate knowledge and belief when it comes to God, just with the conformity of the mind with reality, i.e. the truth value of the proposition.
Both your categories of explicit atheism correspond to my definition: defining the truth value of the statement based on either belief or knowledge.
And implicit atheism is quite a deceptive phrase. Using the exact same explanation, you could label that same person an implicit theist.
Post by
donnymurph
Heh, fair enough. I'm happy to see them all mashed into one category, I just felt like pointing out the slightly different attitudes. I equated your statement (the one I quoted) as referring only to knowledge, but since you are including belief in your definition, it works.
Post by
Hyperspacerebel
Heh, fair enough. I'm happy to see them all mashed into one category, I just felt like pointing out the slightly different attitudes. I equated your statement (the one I quoted) as referring only to knowledge, but since you are including belief in your definition, it works.
That "for whatever reason" was there specifically to include all possibilities.
Post by
donnymurph
"Motive" would be a better word to use in that situation, as it removes the ambiguity of the possibility of "logical reason" which implies knowledge.
Nonetheless, you cleared yourself up with this anyway:
Agnosticism and Atheism are not internally defined systems, and thus there are various ways of using them as labels. I personally don't separate knowledge and belief when it comes to God, just with the conformity of the mind with reality, i.e. the truth value of the proposition.
I just didn't read that far before I made my original post.
Post by
Hyperspacerebel
"Motive" would be a better word to use in that situation, as it removes the ambiguity of the possibility of "logical reason" which implies knowledge.
Nonetheless, you cleared yourself up with this anyway:
Agnosticism and Atheism are not internally defined systems, and thus there are various ways of using them as labels. I personally don't separate knowledge and belief when it comes to God, just with the conformity of the mind with reality, i.e. the truth value of the proposition.
I just didn't read that far before I made my original post.
Motive is probably the last word I mean. A motive is something that affects the person towards choosing a certain end. Belief in God doesn't simply affect us toward choosing to accept the truth proposition of his existence, it
is
the accepting of that proposition. The same can be said for knowledge. In this way it is a reason, in the same way a "logical" reason is a reason. If taken it necessarily leads us to the conclusion: if A then B, and if B then C.
Post by
204878
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
Hyperspacerebel
How? Belief in a god without being aware you believe in a god?
That's no different than defining it as a disbelief in God without being aware that you have a disbelief of God.
Both are complete third party constructs that don't really encompass the situation. Neither disbelief nor belief of X is implied if the person has no relation to X.
Post by
204878
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
Skreeran
How? Belief in a god without being aware you believe in a god?
That's no different than defining it as a disbelief in God without being aware that you have a disbelief of God.
Both are complete third party constructs that don't really encompass the situation. Neither disbelief nor belief of X is implied if the person has no relation to X.The difference I see is that you cannot believe in a god you don't know about.
While it doesn't make sense to say that you
disbelieve
in a god you don't know about (as disbelief necessarily implies a rejection of belief), it does make sense to say someone has a
lack
of belief in a god they don't know about.
If you're never heard of Islam, you may not have rejected it yet, but it seems within reasoning to say that you lack a belief in it.
Besides, we're getting pedantic here. I think Atheist and Agnostic are clear enough as it is. While it's true there's a lot of grey between the two poles, I think the only risk is of someone who is really technically atheist labeling themselves agnostic, which really isn't that huge of a deal.
Post by
Hyperspacerebel
That's no different than defining it as a disbelief in God without being aware that you have a disbelief of God.
I know it isn't, but that doesn't answer my question.
How is that not answering your question?
Donnymurph's justification for the former can be used for the latter, resulting in two terms that are apparently at odds, and thus poitning to the fact that his justifications for using the term as he is are flawed.
Both are complete third party constructs that don't really encompass the situation. Neither disbelief nor belief of X is implied if the person has no relation to X.
It can be inferred in certain circumstances. It's pretty easy to work out whether a newborn baby is an atheist or not.
Quite easy. The answer is they're not.
If you're never heard of Islam, you may not have rejected it yet, but it seems within reasoning to say that you lack a belief in it.
Atheism is just as much an act of the intellect as theism. That's why I use the word
disbelieve
. That's what is meant when it is defined that Atheists don't believe in God. To then turn around and say lack any sort of a belief is an implied atheism is no different than turning around and saying that lack of any sort of belief is an implied theism.
Post by
204878
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
Skreeran
Atheism is just as much an act of the intellect as theism. That's why I use the word disbelieve. That's what is meant when it is defined that Atheists don't believe in God. To then turn around and say lack any sort of a belief is an implied atheism is no different than turning around and saying that lack of any sort of belief is an implied theism.The lack of belief is not the same as disbelief. I believe I explained that.
Post by
Hyperspacerebel
Quite easy. The answer is they're not.
So newborns who lack the muscle mass to support the weight of their own head have the mental capacity to form opinions on the existence of deities?
Nope. Which is exactly whey they cannot be atheists.
To define Atheist and Theist as semantic opposites is to assign the same level of active intellection to each. If theism is the affirmation of X, atheism is the denial of X. You can't then just say that when X isn't present and thus no denial or affirmation is made therefore it falls under atheism.
Atheism is just as much an act of the intellect as theism. That's why I use the word disbelieve. That's what is meant when it is defined that Atheists don't believe in God. To then turn around and say lack any sort of a belief is an implied atheism is no different than turning around and saying that lack of any sort of belief is an implied theism.The lack of belief is not the same as disbelief. I believe I explained that.
Exactly. Thus you cannot arbitrarily extend atheism to cover more than disbelief.
I understand what you're saying completely. You're not even responding to my points however.
Post by
Skreeran
But he was not ascribing positive or explicit atheism to babies (which would include disbelief).
Implicit atheism is the lack of belief for lack of knowledge, which babies have.
Post by
Hyperspacerebel
Implicit atheism is the lack of belief for lack of knowledge.
And like I said, that's no different than saying they have implicit theism.
Implying a denial is no different than implying an affirmation.
It's a very, very simple semantic argument all based around the understanding that there are several ways in which things can be opposites. When taking a phrase made of up distinct parts, such as "to have belief in God," the opposites can be derived by negating different parts. Both "to not have belief in God" and "to have a non-belief in God" are opposites of the first and opposites of each other. So we have a little triangle. We call one theism, another atheism, and now you want to arbitrarily call the third one atheism too just because it happens to be formulated with "not" in it.
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