1. Beyond Belief 07: Enlightenment 2.0

Comment #93642 by Carl Champagne on December 3, 2007 at 7:33 pm

Whoa! This'll keep me busy for awhile. Thanks!

2. Interview with Christopher Hitchens

Comment #93628 by Carl Champagne on December 3, 2007 at 6:55 pm

Perhaps you're right gyokusai, but something about their demeanor put me off. No matter, though, because HItchens kept plowing as usual and made his case clearly and concisely. It's always fun to see him in action.

3. Interview with Christopher Hitchens

Comment #93615 by Carl Champagne on December 3, 2007 at 6:23 pm

He seemed awfully afraid to let his kids see Hitch's book. How can you take someone seriously when they not only admit to denying their children access to knowledge, but are proud of it?

4. I Don't Have Enough Faith to be an Atheist

Comment #84547 by Carl Champagne on November 2, 2007 at 11:29 am

There are two distinct groups of people who ask this question and similar variants: The theist who cannot fathom a life without faith, and the agnostic who believes that they lie safely between theism and atheism, and, by refusing to take sides they are not succumbing to the "faith of atheism". I will address that second group.

Atheism and theism are clearly opposing terms. Similarly, agnosticism and the lesser used gnosticism are opposites as well. Each pair of terms answers a separate question.

Do you have faith and believe in a god or gods? Yes - theist, No - atheist.
Do you know absolutely that you are right? Yes - gnostic, No - agnostic.
(One could argue that nobody can truly be gnostic. They can only think they are.)

This creates 4 categories along a continuum: Gnostic Atheism, Agnostic Atheism, Agnostic Theism, and Gnostic Theism.

Therefore, to simply claim that you are agnostic, and neither theist or atheist, is to avoid the argument. I usually think of ideas as continuums with shades of gray, but in this case, you either believe in a god or you don't. You can acknowledge that you harbor a certain level of uncertainty in this belief or lack thereof, but you do ultimately come down on one side or the other.

This brings us back to the initial question. Atheism is, by definition, the opposite of faith. The inherent assumption within the question is simply false.