Are atheists and theists the same in that they believe what cannot be known for sure? That there is or is not a God?
by 
Franklin
ANSWERS: 5
-
No. Atheists believe in facts, which there are none to remotely prove a god. Theists believe in a god. Agnostics believe whether or not there is a god cannot be known for sure.
-
Yes I think so... although both would say they have the facts to make their belief more justified and 'proven'. Ultimately, God is unfalsifiable so there can be no proof one way or the other.
-
In that respect, yes. They both have an opinion on the subject.
-
Theists believe in god or gods and some aspect of the nature of the god(s). Atheists can come in two varieties. Strong atheists actively believe there are no gods. Weak atheists don't believe there are gods but neither do they believe that there are no gods. Many atheists are technically of the weak variety (including myself) as we cannot affirm a universal negative but find the evidence and arguments for gods (or other ideas like goblins, unicorns, ghosts etc) so unconvincing we don't believe they do exist. Some atheists are of the strong variety, I would call this a faith position more akin to theism. Weak atheists are different as there is no belief either way. Even people such as Dawkins are technically weak atheists but are so unconvinced they are almost strong atheists.
-
In the literal sense of "knowing for sure," the claim in the question is accurate. However, absolute certainty is useless and is very rarely included in our usage of the word "know." We can only *certainly* know of our own existence: I think, therefore I am. Thanks to "The Matrix" films, everyone now easily understands Descartes's idea that our brains can be fooled into completely misunderstanding reality. So in the sense that we actually use the word "know," atheists know there are no gods just as you probably know that Thor, leprechauns, and flying spaghetti monsters are imaginary. Agnostics cling to the absolute certainty aspect of knowledge when discussing the existence of gods, yet I haven't heard any of them claim to also be agnostic toward the aforementioned imaginary beings. It is the only the theist that believes in gods' existence, something that has no evidence supporting it. We haven't evidence disproving "for sure" that gods or leprechauns are imaginary, but this is not a logical reason to believe that then by default they do exist.
RELATED QUESTIONS
Copyright 2023, Wired Ivy, LLC