monocle_layton said:
JWeinCom said:
Not exactly...
Gnostic comes from the greek gnostos meaning knowledge. If you are gnostic about any claim then you are claiming it with certainty. If you're agnostic you're not claiming certainty.
Being an atheist just means you'd say "no" to the question "do you accept that there is a god". It doesn't, on its own, imply confidence that there is no god. If you are certain (or very confident) there is no god, you'd be an gnostic atheist. If you don't believe it, but don't necessarily claim to know it for a fact, you'd be an agnostic atheist. You can also be an agnostic theist or a gnostic theist. They're not mutually exclusive terms.
People do use the terms as you do, but I think that's confusing. Because if you asked me about my position regarding any god existing, I'd classify myself as an agnostic atheist. As in, I don't believe it, but I don't know. If you asked me if I believed in the judeochristian god, I'd classify myself as a gnostic atheist. I'm pretty sure that doesn't exist. If you're using gnostic or agnostic those terms have no meaning on their own. They have to be attached to a specific claim.
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Thanks for the info about its origins. I can see where you're coming from now
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Yeah. The problem is there's no like "first church of atheism", so there are a lot of different ways the terms are used. Some people do use it like you do, others use weak atheism vs strong atheism, and some people indeed do use agnostic to avoid calling themselves atheists. I personally find this to be the clearest use of terminology.
TargaryenVers2 said:
JWeinCom said:
Then you change the laws, beccause those are based on logic and reason. Logically, I am convinced that there is no problem with gay people showing affection in public. So, if there was a law to ban gay PDAs I'd be against it.
But feelings are not always (maybe not even usually) based on logic. So, if I see gay people making out, I might still be all like ewww even if I logically don't think it's wrong.
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Again, many of those in power use feelings instead of logic to dictate political decisions, because they are voted by the people, which also use gut feelings and what they think is "gross," which is why many states in the US still lags behind regarding lgbt rights (as well as climate change, healthcare, etc), as well as for the longest time racial and sex inequality.
I'm fine with individuals thinking I'm gross, I couldn't care less. The problem is those discomforts internalize for many people and change voting patterns for people that ultimately lead to negative consequences for the lgbt community.
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How do you suggest then that you change those discomforts? I can think of ways to change laws and make logical arguments, but I really can't think of a way to change those kinds of things.
