Kai E Nielsen atheism articles... JREF opinions please?

[nvidiot]

Was browsing the britannica online today and noted the following gent as the author at the bottom of the entry in atheism. I found myself intrigued but somewhat, for lack of a better term, disturbed by the article.

Here is the piece I'm talking about...

http://m.eb.com/topic/40634/atheism

Now at the moment I'm a little unwell, so I readily admit skimming the article. But some of the unnecessarily flowery language and arguments within that skimming made my skeptical spidey sense tingle.

So I followed google and found the following page...

http://www.exminister.org/Nielsens-definition-atheism.html

And found myself a bit more annoyed somehow and suspicious of the logic in the arguments and the way they were presented.

I'll return to the articles later and give both a more thorough going over as I'm not in much condition to do so, but I'd be interested to hear what others in the JREF family think about these arguments and articles and perhaps some here have heard of him before? I do want to emphasise yet again that I am only currently getting a "hmmm that's not right somewhere" feeling.

Amazing thing iPads. Very good at correcting near delerium spelling, but unfortunately they can't really improve my content anywhere near as much.

 

[HansMustermann]

Heh.

"One of the main problems of a “lack of belief” definition is that it is too broad. If someone told you they were an atheist, you would still not know if they were agnostic, undecided, believed that gods don’t exist, or never thought about it. This makes the word nearly useless."

Well, you also wouldn't know what's their eye colour, political view, marital status, or citizenship. But that's why we have more than one word. Claiming that a definition of a word is wrong because it doesn't give more details, is pretty silly, as it would apply to most words in the dictionary.

E.g., "green" also doesn't tell you whether it red and blue and leaves green untouched (e.g., chlorophyll) or if it actually emits green photons (e.g., a laser.) E.g., the word "single", as applied to people, also doesn't tell you if they chose to stay single, or never found a mate, or if they're even at the age where they could marry, or if they're divorced or widowed. E.g., the word "gay" also doesn't tell you if someone is exclusively gay (even gays do occasionally mate with the opposite sex and have kids), or if they actually had gay sex, or if they're out of the closet yet, or what.

Really, that's just human language for you. It wasn't made by mathematicians, like programming languages are, and really is that vague. For most people it's not a problem because they can ask what the interlocutor means, instead of insisting on narrow and strict meanings. And ultimately it's more important to be able to cover everything you wish to say with a finite number of words, than have strictly different words for very narrow situations, and end up having everyone remember a bunch of words they may never actually ever need in their lives because the exact situation so narrowly described may never actually arise.

 

[Foster Zygote]

"One of the main problems of a “lack of belief” definition is that it is too broad. If someone told you they were an atheist, you would still not know if they were agnostic, undecided, believed that gods don’t exist, or never thought about it. This makes the word nearly useless."

That's like saying that the word "heterosexual" is nearly useless because it doesn't tell you if the person prefers blonds or brunets or whether said person is into whips and chains.

 

[HansMustermann]

Well, I like redheads myself, so I'll pull a Kai E Nielsen maneuver and redefine "heterosexual" to include that

 

[Safe-Keeper]

"One of the main problems of a “lack of belief” definition is that it is too broad. If someone told you they were an atheist, you would still not know if they were agnostic, undecided, believed that gods don’t exist, or never thought about it. This makes the word nearly useless."

"One of the main problems of a "religious" definition is that it is too broad. If soeone told you they were religious, you would still not know if they were Christian, Jewish, Buddhist, undecided deep within, came to their current stance on their own or were raised that way and never thought about it.

Right back at'cha.

 

[Bad vibe]

From a supposed prof. of philosophy his article reads more like a rant than any kind of substantive argument.

 

[Joey McGee]

From a supposed prof. of philosophy his article reads more like a rant than any kind of substantive argument.

Wait isn't that what you'd expect?

 

[Bikewer]

The fellow should peruse atheist forums and read the long and involved threads about definitions...

 

[Bad vibe]

Wait isn't that what you'd expect?

Sadly nowadays yes it is. My opinion of philosophy and its relevance has significantly diminished. I've seen more eloquence on a cubicle wall.

 

[Piscivore]

Heh.

"One of the main problems of a “lack of belief” definition is that it is too broad. If someone told you they were an atheist, you would still not know if they were agnostic, undecided, believed that gods don’t exist, or never thought about it. This makes the word nearly useless."

Well, you also wouldn't know what's their eye colour, political view, marital status, or citizenship. But that's why we have more than one word. Claiming that a definition of a word is wrong because it doesn't give more details, is pretty silly, as it would apply to most words in the dictionary.

E.g., "green" also doesn't tell you whether it red and blue and leaves green untouched (e.g., chlorophyll) or if it actually emits green photons (e.g., a laser.) E.g., the word "single", as applied to people, also doesn't tell you if they chose to stay single, or never found a mate, or if they're even at the age where they could marry, or if they're divorced or widowed. E.g., the word "gay" also doesn't tell you if someone is exclusively gay (even gays do occasionally mate with the opposite sex and have kids), or if they actually had gay sex, or if they're out of the closet yet, or what.

Really, that's just human language for you. It wasn't made by mathematicians, like programming languages are, and really is that vague. For most people it's not a problem because they can ask what the interlocutor means, instead of insisting on narrow and strict meanings. And ultimately it's more important to be able to cover everything you wish to say with a finite number of words, than have strictly different words for very narrow situations, and end up having everyone remember a bunch of words they may never actually ever need in their lives because the exact situation so narrowly described may never actually arise.

That's the "perfect solution" fallacy- the word "atheist" doesn't convey as much information as he'd like it to, therefore it is without any meaning and can be dismissed.

 

[HansMustermann]

Pretty much, yeah.

 

[Piscivore]

Wow, it's worse:

A “lack of belief” definition is a bad definition for many reasons. It is not commonly used.

Appeal to popularity.

It is not defined that way in any reputable dictionary.

Appeal to authority (words don't have to be in a dictionary to be defined and used. That's how we get new words to add to the dictionary).
No True Scotsman (I guess all the dictionaries it is in aren't "reputable"? Who decides which are "reputable")

And it makes no sense for an “-ism” to be a based on a lack of belief.

Argument from ignorance.

These atheists are usually motivated to redefine the word “atheist” because they want to enlarge the definition of “atheist” to include as many people as possible, or because they perceive it to be an advantage in debates with theists.

And Bulverism.

And that's just the first two paragraphs.

 

[HansMustermann]

Not to mention that the point that it makes no sense for an "-ism" to be based on a lack of something, is very wrong and quite trivially so. E.g., "agnosticism" which is a weird thing to miss, since he actually uses it on the same page. Or in the same vein, "apatheism" or "irreligionism" or "nontheism".

Not to mention that you can tack "anti-" or "non-" or "a-"/"an-" to just about any "-ism" to mean being against or without whatever condition the original "-ism" involved. E.g., non-conventionalism, anti-authoritarianism, non-theism, etc. In essence the modifier is applied to the original "-ism", rather than form a new word and tack "ism" at the end.

I.e., what I'm trying to say is that if it bothers him so much, he can just read it as a+theism, rather than athe+ism.

 

[Piscivore]

By the point one reads to the parts where he uses the phrases "stupid arguments", "brain dead morons", and "so damn stupid", it's safe to say he's not worth listening to.

 

[Piscivore]

I.e., what I'm trying to say is that if it bothers him so much, he can just read it as a+theism, rather than athe+ism.

Oh that really gets him in a froth:

Stupid Argument #1: The etymology of the word "atheism" means "a lack of belief".

A commonly repeated error is that the word "atheism" was derived from the prefix "a-", meaning "without", and the word "theism", meaning a belief in God. Therefore they claim that "atheism" means "without a belief in God". This is incorrect because the etymology of the word "atheism" derives from the Greek word "atheos" meaning "godless". The "-ism" suffix, which can be roughly mean "belief", was added later. The etymology of the word means "godless belief" not "without a belief in gods".

A couple of etymologies from respected dictionaries are shown below:

From Merriam-Webster Online:

Etymology of "atheism": Middle French athéisme, from athée atheist, from Greek atheos godless, from a- + theos god

From The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 4th ed.:

Etymology of "atheism": French athéisme, from athée, atheist, from Greek atheos, godless : a-, without; see a–1 + theos, god

His dismissal of this "stupid" argument falls apart with the bolded parts he apparently didn't read.

 

[Joey McGee]

Sadly nowadays yes it is. My opinion of philosophy and its relevance has significantly diminished. I've seen more eloquence on a cubicle wall.

Don't worry, because that's philosophy too. In fact, the act of having a brain is now known as philosophy. Furthermore, without philosophy, we couldn't even exist.

Kai could probably make a much better argument for it than me...

 

[Foster Zygote]

These atheists are usually motivated to redefine the word “atheist” because they want to enlarge the definition of “atheist” to include as many people as possible,...

Strawman fallacy.

...or because they perceive it to be an advantage in debates with theists.

It is an advantage if you can convey a more accurate concept of your position. Many theists come into the debate thinking that they've already won because they are convinced that atheists are certain of something they can't prove.

 

[Piscivore]

Strawman fallacy.

Nope. It's not a "strawman"- people are redefining the word. He doesn't address any argument at all regarding this definition, instead attacking motives.

 

[Dinwar]

Appeal to popularity.

Also utterly wrong. "Cold" is the absence of heat, "safe" can be defined as the absence of danger, "vaccuum" is the absence of matter, "dark" is the absence of light, and so on. Defining a word to mean "The absence of ______" is actually fairly common.

It's not a "strawman"- people are redefining the word. He doesn't address any argument at all regarding this definition, instead attacking motives.

Motives which I highly doubt he knows anything about (and for which he does not give any supporting evidence, it seems). It's no different than a Creationist saying "Evos just ignore evidence because they're afraid it's true and it'll shake up their world-view": you don't get to dictate what the other side's motives are, and without supporting evidence all you're doing is dictating.

 

[HansMustermann]

Technically, if I'm to be a pedantic ass about it (and I am) the more specific name of it is actually an appeal to motive, IMHO.

The line is pretty blurred, but bulverism is basically that you have some personal reason to wish it was true. E.g., as the original example for it "Oh you say that because you are a man."

Whereas appeal to motive is more like, basically, saying "you're dishonest because you have some motive to say/do that." E.g., if I were to say that some review site only gave some product (game, movie, book, take your pick) a better review than another similar one, because the publisher of the first spends more advertising money, that's a straightforward appeal to motive.

Again, the line is pretty blurry. And the exact accusation often left just implied, so it's not clear which it is. And generally I'm often in the wrong myself, when making quick calls about which is which.

So I'm looking at the phrasing in the actual text, "These atheists are usually motivated to redefine the word “atheist” because they want to enlarge the definition of “atheist” to include as many people as possible, or because they perceive it to be an advantage in debates with theists." Sounds to me like a straight up claim that they're telling BS and have a motive to. That's a pretty clear appeal to motive to me.

In fact, IMHO probably you don't get much more clear an indication as when some variant of "motive" actually is spelled out in the text. In this case, "motivated". Ah-ha.

Another indication is that they're not saying it's just some personal belief, but the accusation is basically straight up telling BS for a motive. If I said, for example, "atheists only like to believe that, because otherwise they'd feel like such a lonely minority", now that's bulverism. Then I'm saying basically that it's some irrational personal belief.