A Miscellany 117
It's really two issues; not one
by Keith Stump
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I was once an apathetic agnostic. However, it occurred to me that I, like most everyone else, was combining two issues into one. "Does god exist?" is actually the synthesis two questions: "Does a superior / supreme entity exist?" and "Should that entity be classified as a god?"
Your articles of faith, which I generally accept, give us the answer to the second question: "No!" If there is a superior or supreme being, it has not acted in a fashion toward us that we should revere it as our god. Therefore, we can confidently and knowingly say that there is no god. We still do not know, nor care, whether there is a supreme being; but, we do know that any such being is not a god. Divinity is an accolade awarded by the believer, not a trait of the thing that is deified.
Having come upon this idea, I find it hard to classify my brand of atheism. I don't know or care whether a super-being exists. I do know that any such entity would not be a god.