Quote:
Originally Posted by AREQUIPA
Doesn't the word "atheist" implicate a deity by definition?
This is why I keep hammering away at concepts before definitions. What atheists are is what they are (or think) rather than what someone suggests they ought to think based on semantics.
One could argue that a-theism means the 'ism' of no god, which is ok, if one takes that as no belief in any god. One can also read it as no theism, which is also valid as it is the ism of no belief in any god. As we see, it comes down to the same thing.
So to decide on the proposition, I'd say that it implies the concept of a deity rather than a deity itself. At least, that is what atheism is about - not buying into the god concept rather than denying the existence of a god, whatever the definition one might prefer might seem to imply.
It's as well to remember that dictionary definitions have words as they are used, which is not neccessarily the same as words being always correctly defined (wretched typing corrected).
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'K' commented to me ""concept" is as useful a term as "claim," because they both get to the same point." Hope you don't me going public ewith this 'K'
Yes. In fact all terms are useful so long as they are used usefully. by which I mean trying to get to the meanings. Trying to understand what the person using the terms is trying to convey. A lot of problems come about because people misunderstand what another means by a particular term. There's also problems with making assumptions about where someone is coming from when they use certain terms with a whole raft of associated ideas. That's why I tend to be chary of sticking the 'God' or even 'god' - label onto ideas such as 'Cosmos', 'laws of nature', 'Mind'. etc.
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