I can't believe I haven't jumped into this conversation yet. I've been working very hard lately I guess, end of the school year bullshit, IEPs up the wazooo.
Anyway, I identified myself as agnostic for years, until I started reading up on different people's definitions of the two terms. The best description of atheist I have yet to hear involves a very subtle nuance in the phrasing of the definitions. So here it is:
Atheists do not necessarily believe that there is no god. They simply lack belief in god. Now, there is going to be a large percentage of you who read that last sentence and will not now or ever understand it. You will swear that the distinction I am making is non-existent. In other words, you will not see the distinction... ever. You will never get it. But for those of you who are capable of sensing the distinction, I'll go a bit deeper.
Belief is something that you throw at things, metaphorically speaking. Your belief originates inside you and you cast it towards the thing believed in. In other words, belief is an action. An atheist does not believe in god. But, that doesn't mean that the atheist believes that there is no god. Get it? Some of you won't, and that's ok. I don't mind being called agnostic. I respect agnostics. Actually it is possible to be an agnostic and an atheist at the same time. An agnostic believes that it is impossible to know about god "unknowable" (according to the Reasoning book.) And, an atheist lacks belief in god. So you could be in a state of lacking belief in god, and at the same time believe that it is impossible to know about god, and that maybe the reason you don't know about god is the fact that it is impossible to know about god. So, the reason for your atheism can have its roots in the fact that according to agnostics, it is physically and otherwise impossible to know about god.
Some atheists believe that there is no god, but not all of them. I do not believe in god, but it certainly is possible to find out one way or another if god exists. God could reveal itself simply, openly, honestly and to everyone at the same time. If it did this, we would have an abundance of proof of god's existence. As of this moment I have seen no evidence whatsoeer of the existence of any supernatural being of any kind. I have only seen natural beings. But tommorrow could be the day when I do see spirits or what have you. I can't tell the future so who am I to say that it couldn't happen, god could reveal himself. Until then I will simply be lacking in belief. I will not be believing anything towards god at all. I take no action whatsoever towards a god or supernatural being.
Another definition that I do not agree with is that atheists also do not believe in any kind of spirits. While this is true of me at this moment, I can conceive of plenty of scenarios where spirits of one form or another can exist but none of those spirits are any kind of god or creator. In one such scenario spirits can be just like another species of life. In such a case we would have plant life, fungii, animal life (you know, all the plant and animal kingdoms we learn about in biology whatever they are) and spirit life. Then we can start measuring and quantifying aspects of spirits and incorporate their elements into known science.
But just as having plant life does not make god a plant, having spirit life forms does not mean that god is one of those spirits. There also could be multiple spirit realms. there could be spirit realm type A, spirit realm type B and so on. And each spirit realm could be just as inaccessible to other spirit realms as what we imagine is THE spirit realm is to our terrestrial physical realm. So spirits in spirit realm A might deny the existence of spirit realm B andf vice versa. Also, these spirit realms could not believe in US! Maybe they don't know we exist just like we don't know if they exist. Right? We can't see spirits and they can't see us. That is just as logical an explanation as any out there. I mean, even if we could prove the existence of spirits, how would we go about proving that those spirits see and know about us? The only reason we think they know about us is that a very old book says so. Betyond that we are just clkueless. And the spirit realm could not be a very intelligent species. I mean, we assume, because of an old book, that spirits are higher forms of intelligence. But what if they were idiots?
the multiple spirit realms theory also opens another Pandora's box. Which spirit species would god belong to? spirit realm A, which is the one we all think is THE spirit realm, but then there is realm B, C, D, E... to infinity. And each of the infinite number of spirit realms is compleyely unaware of any of the others except in speculative musings like this. And after all of this, not a single person in the universe can prove that any of this stuff is not true. You can't prove a negative.
So, don't think atheists have closed the door on any further exploration of the god myth. No atheist knows it all, if he did he would be god himself. And no atheist worth his salt believes that there is no god. A real atheist admits openly that there could be a god and evidebce could be out there. It's just that at this moment the atheist just has no data on god at all. So, as far as I know NOW, there is no evidence of go or any other supernatural life forms.
The main reason why I don't identify myself as agnostic is because it is in fact possible to know about god. God could reveal himself in simple ways that we all can understand. If he did this, it would answer all questions very easily. No guesswork involved. It is because it could so easily be solved that my suspicion is that there is no god there, or at least we have not sensed any god in any measurable way. I do say that I do not know if there is a god or not, and for this reason many of you will consider me an agnostic. But, the reason I say I don't know about god is because I am completely lacking in belief of any kind towards a go of any kind. I do not belioeve in god, and yet I don't know if there is a god or not. It is not possible to know it based on my intelligence and sensory perception.
As illustration I offer that my radio is not picking up any signals of any kind, but that does not mean that there are no radio stations out there, it just means that I have no evidence whatsoever of a radio station existing. It is possible that there is a station out there but nobody can pick up its signal. And, nobody, even people who say they are, is picking up any signals at all. Some people like to listen to the fuzz and static and they imagine they hear voices in the distance, but when it comes time for those people to share and listen along to their radio, strangely, especially when scientific types are around, the radio cuts out. So only the owner of a radio can hear the signal, or so they claim. In the end, no evidence of god has ever appeared in any form to this day.
