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Thomas
@aviationdoctor.eth
There is this famous quote from Richard Dawkins: “We are all atheists about most of the gods that societies have ever believed in. Some of us just go one god further.“ 1/5
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Thomas
@aviationdoctor.eth
I would go one step further and propose that not only is everyone an atheist to *some* degree, but none more so than an actual believer. Why? 2/5
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Thomas
@aviationdoctor.eth
Assuming N deities in human history (the exact value of N does not matter here — estimates of 10,000 are common), the believer believes in just 1 (or one pantheon), and firmly rejects the remaining N-1 because they are mutually exclusive (sometimes to the point of heresy). 3/5
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Thomas
@aviationdoctor.eth
The typical atheist rejects just one more deity, for a total of N, but not as firmly: the atheist’s lack of belief isn’t symmetrical to the believer’s faith. It’s just a default position that awaits incontrovertible evidence, without rejecting the tenuous possibility. 4/5
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Blinky Stitt
@flashprofits.eth
If it isn't firmly, isn't that Agnosticism and not Atheism?
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Thomas
@aviationdoctor.eth
I’m aware of the semantical nuances of each, but I don’t think they matter here. The believers are technically the hardest of atheists in that they forcefully reject every other deity. The other camp either claims no belief in deities (agnostics) or that deities don’t exist (atheists) (simplifying a bit).
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Thomas
@aviationdoctor.eth
Yet both agnostics and atheists would accept that they hold those views because of a lack of evidence for the existence of deities, not because they believe in something else that is mutually exclusive with the existence of a deity. So they can be lumped together for the sake of this argument.
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