Sorry to butt in and I am not entering the fray, but isn’t it interesting how, atheism, various shades of agnosticism, the definitions of belief and unbelief have taken over the thread which is about Christopher Hitchens’ death.

I think david f put his finger on the button about the elephant in the room with this:

“I would to see separation of religion and state. It would not matter what someone believed or didn't believe. Government would not use its powers to enforce or promote religion in general, any particular religion or atheism. Religionists or atheists could not depend on government to promulgate their views.

People would be free to promote their views in the home, churches or any non-governmental institution. However, government facilities such as the public schools would neither promote nor deny religious beliefs.”

I’m reasonably confident that Christopher Hitchens would certainly agree with this scarcity of obfuscation.

My apologies for the interruption; please continue.

David

Thanks David... and part of his legacy is surely the promulgation of good ideas and the rejection of poor ones.

Having commented earlier I'll finish with this:

The most generous take I can give to some of your argumentation Luciferase is a wilful misconstruction of connotation and denotation of words and expressions.

I believe in breathing and I know Christopher Hitchens doesn't.

Furthermore, I don't even necessarily believe that religion "sucks" but I know that it can.

Elsewhere, I've jokingly posed the question "Do I cease to exist when God realises he is a metaphysical solipsist?" but it is more logically consistent than some of the distinctions you're trying to bring to bear upon the explanations given you, above.

If the universe is curved, and not flat as the current best mathematical models show, your 'atheism' and Yuyutsu's theism might just meet up.

With all due respect, Grim, your quotes and definitions make for such slim-pickings that they almost resemble the quote-mining of creationists. Almost.

Take your quote from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agnosticism for example. Note the word “popular” and that the very next sentence - which starts with the words “In the strict sense, however...” - supports everything I’ve been saying? Not to mention the rest of the article. Note too that the other two links I provided completely contradict that anyway.

Like I said, Grim, slim-pickings.

And I don’t see what there is to stumble over the word “disbelieve”. Nor do I see how the positions held by Pericles, Luciferase and yourself contradict each other or anything I’ve been saying. As I said earlier, "disbelieve" is a broad term, and it can mean both “no belief” and “active denial”

http://tinyurl.com/7ud3uv6
http://tinyurl.com/6qedavk

That’s not debatable.

That being said, let’s look at the definition of atheism. We’ll start with dictionary.com since you like them:

a•the•ist [noun] a person who denies or disbelieves the existence of a supreme being or beings. (http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/atheist)

Note the “denies or disbelieves”?

They obviously saw a distinction between the two. After all, I don’t think they’d want a redundancy there. Being a dictionary site ‘n’ all, one would think they pride themselves on their English skills.

But hey, that’s just one definition. Here’s a whole swag of them for you peruse... http://tinyurl.com/7kfl9tj

<<I was referring to Atheism, too.>>

Excellent!

Then you should realise by now that definition you gave was not relevant to what we were talking about since atheism and theism are a dichotomy. Note too that the two definitions that came before yours, supported everything I’ve been saying.

<<I'm fairly sure T.H. Huxley was referring to Atheism when he coined the term.>>

Indeed he was.

He did, initially, refer to it as something separate from atheism too (hardly surprising given the times), and to add to the potential confusion, knowledge is not only a subset of belief but very narrow and difficult one to define.

But when he coined the term, he was making a statement about knowledge.

Thank you AJ, for so comprehensively endorsing the point I have been making for the last several pages. You're right, it is necessary to offer 2 meanings simply because “disbelief” can either have a neutral connotation (not believe) or a negative connotation (deny).
As a for instance, I don't at this time believe in M-theory, which postulates that space has 11 dimensions. This doesn't mean that I believe M-theory is wrong, merely that I don't believe in it (largely because I don't understand it). I'm quite comfortable in not believing in it on that basis; however I would need to know considerably more about it before I could reasonably say I believed it was wrong.
In other words, I'm an Agnostic on that subject.
Frankly, I consider the Agnosticism of the late great Carl Sagan to be far more reasonable than the Atheism of Dawkins. Atheism may once have been a mere “absence of belief”, but now it appears Hitchens, Dawkins et al, have pushed it to the point of very strong belief. As an op-ed writer such an attitude is perfectly reasonable for Hitchens, but Dawkins I feel, as a scientist, clings to a mere shred of scientific credibility (0.1 in 7) in having such strong belief in an untestable hypothesis.
As to the relevance of my comments to this discussion, it all dates back to a statement made by Pericles, which I hasten to add, he qualified in the rest of his post:
“Atheism is the absence, not the presence, of belief in a deity. The absence of belief is in fact the hallmark of an atheist. They cannot therefore in any sense be described as "believers", in the context of religion.”
Dawkins, Hitchens, et al. Can be described as “believers” in the context of religion. They believe it's all bull.

we agree religeon's..[controling peers]..suck

but who simply believes it..
and who can prove..whatever aspect..of what they are saying

i suggest we got more..in common than different

david..quote..""The position..that requires the fewest assumptions
is the most likely..to fit the facts.""

ok we are living..via a cetrtain cause..[mum got her living egg..impregnated with living sperm..][either manually or autonimously]

*this means..*life..
*comes..from life

we have all heard..of people dying...in say an operation
or under ice..[and comming back./.to life]..[movie zombies etc]..

so dead raising..is a truth

we know that radio waves...heat waves...light waves
are essentially unseen..so we know..just cause we dont see it..
dont mean..nuthin is there

lucifer/quote..""my view that..religion is emotional,..not rational""

ok lets go with that
our concious brain..and our autonimous reflex brain
dreams are irrational..and generaly physiical laws..seem constant

one of the brain..
the other a sickness of mind,
one living in a finite..[certiain..assertanable] reality..
the other in emotive imaginative infinitness..

[one physicaly mortal..[death being provabley unavoidable..
the other phycicly unavoidable

unconfirmable...but desriptive of ever lasting...infinitness
[till the unseen becomes revealed]

""and that..the stories
that support..their faith""

IN EITHER REALITY

""are designed to exploit..those emotions.""
not exploit..as much as use..their talents
that more of the same..will be a given

i come back to
the law

*energy cant be created..*NOR DESTROYED..!

your brain..becomes mush for worms
your mind lives on...[if only in its own mind][soul]

ps
re the burning the dead thing
for many spirits..this gives them the finality
that finally sepperates..the living eternal mind..[ego/soul]..
from the physical dead brain...the so fixated into being real[for them]

is..[of no mind
cause it being dead..is as nuthing..]
once the smell and taste of it's material essence..is removed

the different
betwen a living brain...and a dead brain

is..its 'energy'..[not able to be destroyed]
is thus transmutated..into its aural mind/form..

[the astral..'soul' form]
we earned by the quality of our works

wintreasure..quote.."""Do I cease to exist..when God realises he is a metaphysical solipsist?"""

no once you have been created
it matters not what your parent do

""If the universe is curved,..and not flat as the current best mathematical models show,..your 'atheism' and Yuyutsu's theism might just meet up.""

sure when you cram the whole universe..onto a narriow mind..
or a onto a web page[but look at things in scale]..

them lines on ya map..
are miles wide when looked at in scale
or that pin prick of light..spans light years of distance
let alone..that uni-verse...billions [googilians]..of earths suns wide

thinking in the finite physical brain..
limits the infinite eternal mind

flat is relitive to the flatness
of the recieving medium

closed minds..cant see it at all
to them a star..*must be a spark of light
just because some see whole universes..in a speck of light
does this mean..that...*their minds envisioning of it..is right?

have you seen the star's..in the heaven's
you stars of olo..

or take that..materialist
flat en-visioning..lol..on faith?

im noting that hitchkids mindset
is entering the diss beliefers...
when he returns from the dead
the athiests will have their own star[saint]..or whatever

the guy is dead..let the dead..tend the dead

but lets keep the topic going..if only
to reveal the church stands on feet of clay..

one foot in the eternal unseen..[its failing to serve]

the other able to be seen and smelt..felt and touched
[and their minds are fixated in the material perversions of the flesh]..

wolves raping the flock
fleecing the flock

not doing
as their founding..good sheppard's
[gods messangers]..

*did..as hitch is finding now
its not so much as what he said
but what he did or didnt 'do'