Lack of belief...

[EPH2:8]

Does the term lack of belief make any claims regarding the subject of the sentence? For example I lack belief in Santa clause. Am I making any claims regarding Santa clause? Does changing the subject of the sentence determine whether a claim is made or not?

[StuartJ]

Does the term lack of belief make any claims regarding the subject of the sentence? For example I lack belief in Santa clause. Am I making any claims regarding Santa clause? Does changing the subject of the sentence determine whether a claim is made or not?

We warriors here are arguing for and against Christianity ...

Not grammar.

Nonethess, much of the distraction away from the lack of evidence for Jesus or talking serpents concerns "what do you mean by ...?".

(Oh, and BTW, dear old Saint Nick isn't a "clause" - grammatically or otherwise.)

So ...

For example: "I lack belief in fairies/Jesus/Santa" isn't necessarily making a direct claim regarding fairies or Jesus or Santa ...

But it can be construed as one making a claim about the state of one's mind regarding such things.

Similarly: "I believe in fairies/Jesus/Santa", is also only letting us know of the state of a mind.

However: "I believe fairies/Jesus/Santa know when I've been naughty or nice" most certainly IS making a claim ...

And one would need to glean some good hard evidence from somewhere that one was making supplication and paying tithes to the right one ...

Or one may miss out on the magic beans/mansion in Heaven/stocking stuffed with sweeties.

"I lack belief in the lack of belief" could cause difficulties.

[William]

[Replying to post 1 by EPH2:8]

Does the term lack of belief make any claims regarding the subject of the sentence? For example I lack belief in Santa clause. Am I making any claims regarding Santa clause? Does changing the subject of the sentence determine whether a claim is made or not?

The subject of the sentence would be Santa Clause of which you lack belief in.

The statement you make would be that you lack belief and such statements do get conflated with actual claims.

Thus I would say it is a simple statement of position to say you lack belief.

If a claim was tabled that Santa Clause exists and you claimed that you [a]"do not believe Santa Clause exists", that would be different from saying that you "lack belief that Santa Clause exists", because is an assertion and [a] is simply a statement.

[Divine Insight]

Does the term lack of belief make any claims regarding the subject of the sentence? For example I lack belief in Santa clause. Am I making any claims regarding Santa clause? Does changing the subject of the sentence determine whether a claim is made or not?

I think when it comes to these types of topics far too many assumptions are being made.

I lack a belief in any specific or particular "God".

I lack a belief in an abstract ill-defined notion of a "God".

It's not that I'm convinced that such an entity cannot exist. It's simply because I have no reason to believe that one does exist.

Also, when it comes to Santa Clause I don't merely lack belief in Santa Claus, I'm totally confident and convinced that such a magical entity does not exist. At least not as described by most depictions. Obviously, if a father dresses up as Santa Clause and places gifts under the Christmas tree then we have an actual Santa Clause, but this would be nothing at all like the Santa Claus that is portrayed in well-known fairy tales.

Replace Santa Claus with "Jesus" in the above description and this is how I feel about Jesus as well.

So I don't "lack a belief" in Jesus. I'm simply confident and convinced that the historical rumors about this character are necessarily false. In this case you can indeed say that I'm making a "Claim" that the Jesus as described in the Gospel Rumors is necessarily a fictional fable potentially based upon superstitious tales that the authors of those stories might have themselves actually believed.

So yeah, I have no problem taking the position that the Biblical Jesus is necessarily a fictional character, even if some actual person named Jesus might have historically lived and served as fodder for these obviously exaggerated and ridiculously superstitious tales.

The existence of a "Historical Jesus" in no way supports or adds to the credibility of the "Gospel Jesus".

In fact, wasn't Santa Claus actually spawned by the behavior of a generous actual person named "Saint Nicholas"?

No one thinks that because Saint Nicholas was a real person that this means that Santa Claus must then be real.

[marco]

Does the term lack of belief make any claims regarding the subject of the sentence? For example I lack belief in Santa clause. Am I making any claims regarding Santa clause? Does changing the subject of the sentence determine whether a claim is made or not?

The subject of the sentence: "I lack belief in Santa Claus," is the personal pronoun, I. Change this to "My little nephews" and the sentence is false. Possibly "subject of the sentence" isn't what you intended to discuss - just the term "lack of belief." One is misled into thinking that grammatical considerations are involved.

If a student lacks belief in his proof, then it may well indicate his proof is rubbish, or that he's imperfectly understood the lecture or he's made an assumption to reach his conclusion....

It would be clearer if you said: "I think lack of belief shows X" and then we would know what we're discussing.

[Divine Insight]

Does the term lack of belief make any claims regarding the subject of the sentence? For example I lack belief in Santa clause. Am I making any claims regarding Santa clause? Does changing the subject of the sentence determine whether a claim is made or not?

I would say no. Saying, "I lack belief in Santa Claus" is not making any claims about Santa Claus at all. It's simply a claim about what a person doesn't believe in.

The person, in this case, isn't even saying that Santa Claus doesn't exist, or couldn't exist.

Same is true to say, "I lack belief in Christianity". This is not a claim about Christianity at all. It's simply a claim about what a person doesn't believe in.

Now if they were to say, "Christianity is false". That's a claim. I make this claim all the time. And I'm more than willing to take on the burden of supporting this claim.

I would never say, "There is no God", because that's a claim that I cannot support in general. For all I know Zeus could be God. I cannot support the claim that Zeus is false. But I can say, "I don't believe Zeus is God". That's a different statement entirely.

Same is true for the God of Buddhism. I cannot say, "The God of Buddhism is False", because I cannot support that claim. For all I know the God of Buddhism is true. However, I can say, "I don't believe in the God of Buddhism". That's just a statement about my belief and has nothing at all to do with whether the God of Buddhism exists or not.

I can still offer reasons why I don't believe in the God of Buddhism. But I am under no obligation to meet a burden of proof to prove the God of Buddhism doesn't exist. I think that would be next to impossible to do. Just like it's impossible to prove that Solipsism isn't true.

Do you believe in Solipsism?

If not you can say, "I lack believe in Solipsism".

Is that the same as saying "I believe that Solipsism is false."?

In the first statement you are merely stating that you don't believe in Solipsism, in the second statement you are suggesting to have valid reasons for claiming that Solipsism is false. Thus in the second case you should be expected to provide your evidence for why you think Solipsism is false.

I don't believe in solipsism either. And I'd be glad to share my reasons for my lack of belief. However, I don't claim to be able to prove that Solipsism is false. And if anyone else makes that claim I would like to hear their arguments. Even though I don't personally believe in solipsism I would still be able to find errors in their logic to try to prove that solipsism is false.

In other words, I accept the claim that it is impossible to prove that Solipsism is false. But of course, this doesn't make it true. So I can still lack belief in Solipsism. Not being able to prove that something is false is not the same as proving that it's true.

[Tcg]

For example I lack belief in Santa clause. Am I making any claims regarding Santa clause?

Do you mean Santa Claus the gift giving dude or the movie, "The Santa Clause"?

In either case, you are making a singular claim about yourself, not about the dude or the movie.

Have you seen the movie, "The Santa Clause"?

Have you ever met the dude, "Santa Claus"?

If you are referring to neither of these, perhaps you can explain who or what you meant.

Additionally, how would this claim differ from your claim that you had a revelation from God?

Which claim is more believable?

Which claim can you support?

[wiploc]

Does the term lack of belief make any claims regarding the subject of the sentence? For example I lack belief in Santa clause. Am I making any claims regarding Santa clause? Does changing the subject of the sentence determine whether a claim is made or not?

If someone says, "I don't believe in Santa Clause," we can't tell--at least without context--whether she means that she believe Santa doesn't exist or just means that she doesn't have the belief that he does exist.

That's because litotes is such a common figure of speech, and so instinctively used, that we often aren't even conscious of using a figure.

Let's have an example:

• "She's not the sharpest pencil in the pack," probably means she's exceptionally dull.

That's classic litotes. You deny something in one direction to make an extreme claim in the other direction. We do it without even thinking about it.

Which is why we have trouble with, "I don't believe in Santa Clause." Is that intended literally, meaning that you don't happen to have that belief, or is it emphatic figure of speech, meaning something like, "I feel confident that Santa Claus nonsense is just a stupid myth"?

Because, "I don't believe," is thus ambiguous, and because we seem to be constantly put at pains to distinguish weak atheism from strong, atheists are weaning ourselves off of the, "I don't believe," phrasing.

Instead, we use the, "lack of belief," phrasing. They whole point of it is that it won't be taken for litotes. It only means that we lack belief that gods exist. It unambiguously does not mean that we believe gods do not exist.

So, if I say that I lack belief in Santa, that doesn't mean I believe in his nonexistence. It just means that I don't believe he exists. It doesn't make any claims about whether or not he exists. The claim is only about my mental state (not about whether Santa exists) and the claim is only that I am not one of those who believe that Santa does exist. People who believe Santa doesn't exist lack belief that he exists, but people who don't believe either way also lack belief that he exists.

So, those who lack belief in Santa include all a-Santa-ists, not just strong a-Santa-ists or weak a-Santa-ists.

[William]

[Replying to post 8 by wiploc]

Because, "I don't believe," is thus ambiguous, and because we seem to be constantly put at pains to distinguish weak atheism from strong, atheists are weaning ourselves off of the, "I don't believe," phrasing.

Instead, we use the, "lack of belief," phrasing. They whole point of it is that it won't be taken for litotes. It only means that we lack belief that gods exist. It unambiguously does not mean that we believe gods do not exist.

Only problem with that of course is that it still allows for confusion because strong atheists in generally do actually state they do not believe in the existence of GODs and their meaning is unambiguous. They argue from the position of that belief and even give what they consider to be reasonable examples as to why they do not believe.

Resorting to the "no - I lack belief in GODs" does not solve the problem of confusion or make things less/unambiguous in relation to expressions of strong atheism.

So, if I say that I lack belief in Santa, that doesn't mean I believe in his nonexistence. It just means that I don't believe he exists. It doesn't make any claims about whether or not he exists. The claim is only about my mental state (not about whether Santa exists) and the claim is only that I am not one of those who believe that Santa does exist. People who believe Santa doesn't exist lack belief that he exists, but people who don't believe either way also lack belief that he exists.

So, those who lack belief in Santa include all a-Santa-ists, not just strong a-Santa-ists or weak a-Santa-ists.

I disagree because strong atheists have shifted from the default of lacking belief to the different position of not believing and that shift is what allows for them to be understood as strong atheists.

That their not believing can be considered lacking belief when a weak atheist lacking belief cannot be considered not believing, is problematic. That is the crux of the matter, and strong atheists resorting to the default when it suits appear to do so to avoid having to acknowledge that.

If a strong atheist really believes that GODs do not exist, they should remain in that position rather than resort to wishy-washy game of 'I can be both'.

One cannot be both. That is why there are weak and strong atheist positions - to show the differentiated.

[Divine Insight]

Only problem with that of course is that it still allows for confusion because strong atheists in generally do actually state they do not believe in the existence of GODs and their meaning is unambiguous. They argue from the position of that belief and even give what they consider to be reasonable examples as to why they do not believe.

Giving reasons why a person doesn't believing in the existence of any GODs is not the same as claiming that they do not exist. They are simply saying that it's unreasonable to think that they do.

As an example, I argue against the existence of any gods because based on the simple fact that animals naturally prey on each other and eat each other. I argue that if the world was designed by an sort of benevolent God that would not be the case.

Of course this leaves open the possibility for the existence of a malevolent God. But why call a malevolent entity "God"? We already have a name for malevolent entities - (i.e. Demons).

So it hardly helps for a theist to argue that a demonic "God" might still possibly exist.

Is the fact that animals naturally eat each other proof that no God exists? No. But it leaves any theological apologists with one whale of a lot of apologizing to do if they want to stand behind this theological idea of the existence of a supposedly benevolent God who purposefully designed animals to prey on each other.

So from a purely "reasonable" perspective my conclusions appear to be far more reasonable than those of the theists. Never mind any proofs, since neither of us can provide that. I can still stand on the ground that my conclusions are far more reasonable that those of any theology.

Trying to pin the blame for the design of carnivorous animals on humans is beyond silly. So that apologetic approach deserves to be laughed out of town. There simply is no rational explanation for why animals eat each other and have been doing so long before humans ever showed up on the planet. Any creator who created that situation could hardly be said to be a benevolent creator.

So theology is pretty well done for right there. And I didn't even need to claim that no gods exist. There's simply no reason to even postulate that they do. If a theist wants to postulate the existence of a God at that point the burden of making a compelling argument for its existence is squarely on their shoulders. Period.