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PRmerger
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And so you accept that no one is in heaven, with the Father, except through Christ?
Then, as you say, we are very close in our beliefs.
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Then, as you say, we are very close in our beliefs.
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AnlytcPhil
Guest
I’m quite sure we differ on beliefs about birth control, transfiguration, politics, and some other things, as I am a Methodist. But the subject here is not about your and my beliefs, it’s about what strong and weak atheists believe and why, and whether the labels are right. And also we can throw in why Pope Francis says atheists can be saved. He didn’t mean that atheists can be saved if they convert to Christianity before they die, either, because all Christians have always believed that, so that would be nothing new.And so you accept that no one is in heaven, with the Father, except through Christ?
Then, as you say, we are very close in our beliefs.
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Vonsalza
Guest
Really? You’ve yet to cite a correct definition of “strong-” or “weak atheism”. In fact, you keep trying to twist “strong atheism” into “theological noncognitivism” and “ignosticism”. They’re about as related as “smiles” and “explosions”. These words are not subject to your personal interpretation. They have reasonably standardized definitions that you seem unable to look-up. Here’s literally the first thing I saw in a Google search: atheism.about.com/od/atheismquestions/a/strong_weak.htm
It’s the same as virtually every other definition you’ll find from even half-reputable sources. Please check!
It’s not even possible to be a strong atheist and a theological noncognitivist if you really think about it. Strong atheism is a denial. Noncognitivism is mere meaninglessness. In order to deny a concept (as a “strong athiest”), you must have first given it meaning for you to deny, which violates “noncognitism” unambiguously.
I’m genuinely concerned some neophyte is going to read your posts and subsequently think they know what “strong atheism” (or anything) is. And therein lies the problem that brings me back - deliberate misinformation is the highest of crimes in a discussion.
And you’re committing it over and over and over. I used to think it was accidental. Now I’m not so sure.
Thus here I abide, hammering away at this misinformation :hammering:
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AnlytcPhil
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You observe that lots of people who are theological noncognitivists use the label “strong atheist”, while others label themselves “theological noncognitivist” ands don’t want to be called “atheists”.
You say there are three kinds of non-theists,
- agnostics: “I don’t know whether God exists or not”
- atheists: “God does not exist”.
- theological noncognitivists: “The word ‘God’ (‘Yahweh’) is meaningless”.
- agnostics: “I don’t know whether God exists or not”
- weak theists: “God does not exist”.
- strong atheists: “The word ‘God’ (‘Yahweh’) is meaningless”.
strongatheism.net/library/atheology/argument_from_noncognitivism/
Notice the quote there from St. Augustine, which he gives as a reason for saying “God is meaningless”.:
*What then, brethren, shall we say of God? For if thou hast been able to understand what thou wouldest say, it is not God. If thou hast been able to comprehend it, thou hast comprehended something else instead of God. If thou hast been able to comprehend him as thou thinkest, by so thinking thou hast deceived thyself. This then is not God, if thou hast comprehended it; but if this be God, thou has not comprehended it.
—St. Augustine*
Notice how close this St. Augustine quote on that ‘strong atheist’ site is to what Father Rolheiser says on his “God is ineffable” site:
*God is infinite and, thus, by definition unimaginable and impossible to conceptualize. That’s also true for God’s existence. It cannot be pictured. However the fact that we cannot imagine God is very different than saying that we cannot know God. God can be known, even if not imagined. How?
We all know many things that we cannot imagine, conceptualize, or articulate. Inside us there is something the mystics call “dark knowledge”, namely, an inchoate, intuitive, gut-sense within which we know and understand beyond what we can picture and give words to. And this isn’t some exotic, paranormal talent that fortune-tellers claim to have. The opposite; it’s our bedrock, that solid foundation that we touch in our most sincere and deepest moments, that place inside us where when we are at our best we ground our lives.
God is ineffable, unimaginable, and beyond conception and language. Our faith lets us bracket this for a while and lets us picture God as some idolized super-hero. But eventually that well runs dry and our finite minds are left to know the infinite only in darkness, without images, and our finite hearts are left to feel infinite love only inside a dark trust.*
So it seems that the difference between the stands of Catholic Father Rolheiser and strong atheist Tremblay is that Rolheiser has “dark knowledge” and “gut sense” whereas Tremblay lacks this.
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PRmerger
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And that’s because he *didn’t *say anything new.
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Vonsalza
Guest
No, actually, I don’t see lots of people who ID as “theo non-cogs”. The very few who actually approach it from an disciplined and learned philosophical level realize that it is not at-all compatible with “strong atheism”. Active disbelief (which is what “strong atheism” is) requires cognition of the idea you’re disbelieving in, which disqualifies simultaneous status as a “theo non-cog”. You simply can’t rationally say that you have no conception of something AND also that you believe it doesn’t exist.
No. Not at all. Please refer to one of my opening posts where I identify the classic spectrum of theism:
- Theists - There is a god/gods.
- Atheists - There is not a god/gods.
- Agnostics - The existence/non-existence of god/gods is uncertain.
I suspect that the majority (but not all) of the “innovations” in the categories since the 70’s are just the parsing-up of the third one in order to attempt to lend the supreme rational integrity of agnosticism over to vulnerable atheism. Most of the new terms invoke “atheism” as part of the label in order to invoke this deceptive lending.
And you are DEMONSTRABLY wrong on two of them.
- You’re pretty accurate here. My given definition is a little more accurate.
- You’re wrong here. Weak theists, by inclusion of the word “theist” believe that there IS something “up there”. So your given definition is factually wrong. And since this is the very first time I’ve registered you using that term, I’ll assume for a second you had a typo and meant “weak atheist”, which means “no particular belief in a god or gods”, which is just classic “agnosticism” rehashed with “atheist” in the label. But “weak atheism” DOES NOT MEAN “there is no God”. That’s the definition of “strong atheism/classic atheism”. To confuse the two is incorrect.
- You’re wrong here. Strong atheists are not atheists with a high level of devotion. It means a specific thing; “There is no god/gods”. To amend or make addendum creates a separate idea than that of “strong atheism”. Strong Atheists comprehend (one form of cognition) the concept of god and reject it, regardless if you’re talking about Yahweh or Zeus.
I’ll quote directly from your source material:
“There is much dispute on how the ANC relates to the distinction between weak and strong-atheists. Various philosophers, such as Michael Martin, feel that the meaninglessness of religious discourse refutes strong-atheism, where-as Ted Drange feels that Non-Cognitivism should be considered a completely different position altogether.”
I’ll leave it at that…
I’ll cut the quote to save space.
Obviously St. Augustine believes in the inability to directly know and experience God. I feel precisely the same way. So does virtually every other Christian. But St. Augustine is still talking about this unknowable God and has thus ascribed attributes of “unknowability” in a few given contexts to his completely transcendent God that he conceptualizes - another display of cognition, BTW.
This is WHOLLY different to “Theo Non-cog” concept of meaninglessness. Augustine isn’t saying that God is meaningless. He’s saying that God is so different from us as to be directly unknowable.
From Oxford:
Unknowable - Not able to be known.
Meaningless - Having no meaning or significance.
Was St. Augustine saying God lacked meaning or significance? OF. COURSE. NOT.
“God loves each of us as if there were only one of us.” - St. Augustine
The anonymous author obviously fails to understand St. Augustine.
Again from Oxford:
Ineffable - Too great or extreme to be expressed or described in words.
Meaningless - Having no meaning or significance.
Yet again, this is not a display of meaninglessness as given by “theo non-cogs”.
Meaninglessness =/= Ineffability or Unknowable
That should pretty well settle it unless you wish to dispute Oxford as easily the most authoritative dictionary in the entire history of the English language…
Given the prose so far, I wouldn’t be surprised.
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AnlytcPhil
Guest
Oh yes he did. Go to this Catholic site:
catholic.org/news/hf/faith/story.php?id=51077
and read this:
We are judged by a just God who will welcome us based on what we have done with what we knew. Those who do not know God will be judged on the good they have done and the values lived by…
Atheists, Jews and theological noncognitivists will be judged on what they have done with WHAT THEY KNEW!!!
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PRmerger
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Yes. That’s…nothing new.
No one is judged on what they should have known.
Or what they didn’t know.
That’s been the teaching of the Church…
for…
millenia.
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