How about those who believe that the said proposition is meaningless because its subject has no meaning. I can say that the proposition "Big Foot exists" is meaningful...
The proposition "Non-human civilization exists" belongs to the same category...
But the proposition "God exists" is different from the other two because it the determination of its truth function is impossible not to the limitation of human knowledge and methodology, but because the proposition itself is meaningless....the word "god" has no meaning at all.
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I don't believe the proposition is any less meaningful than any other. I mean, people use the word, and they have some concept in their head when they do. It's true that some of these conceptions are logically contradictory (or absurd on their face), but that doesn't mean the concept is not defined or lacking meaning. It just provides the basis for your decision to reject the proposition. If I tell you that God is the creator of the universe who is omnipotent, omniscient, and omnibenevolent, and that "God exists," the proposition has meaning, and you reject it for whatever reason you choose. It's not as if you really have *no* idea what people have in their head when they say the word "God." Your post indicates that you do, anyway.
(But to answer your initial thought, if you think the proposition is meaningless, you would be an atheist, because you would still be rejecting the truth of it, and acceptance of the proposition is what makes one a theist.)
-----Original Message----- From: lbo-talk-bounces at lbo-talk.org [mailto:lbo-talk-bounces at lbo-talk.org] On Behalf Of Wojtek Sokolowski Sent: Thursday, June 02, 2005 9:37 AM To: lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org Subject: RE: [lbo-talk] Re: theism, atheism and dont give a fuckism
> On 5/31/05, J. Tyler <jptyler at earthlink.net> wrote:
> > Just do the linguistics.
> >
> > Consider the proposition: God exists.
> >
> > Anybody who accepts the proposition as true is a theist. Anybody
> > who rejects the truth value of the proposition is an atheist
> > (including those who "don't know," as that is a rejection of the
> > proposition's truth).
How about those who believe that the said proposition is meaningless because its subject has no meaning. I can say that the proposition "Big Foot exists" is meaningful but its truth value is unknown because it is possible to define (if vaguely) what "Big Foot " is, albeit proofs of its existence remains elusive. Perhaps one day that mystery will be solved.
The proposition "Non-human civilization exists" belongs to the same category even if it differs from the previous proposition in that we may never have an effective method of determining its truth value. That is why some people have faith - a belief that the said proposition is true, even though we will most likely never be able to know one waay or the other.
But the proposition "God exists" is different from the other two because it the determination of its truth function is impossible not to the limitation of human knowledge and methodology, but because the proposition itself is meaningless. Unlike "Big Foot" or "Non-human civilization," the word "god" has no meaning at all. We may not have precise definition of "big foot" or "non-human civilization" but we at least can define some empirically meaningful features that the objects designated by the concepts may possess. We cannot do the same about 'god' without running into blatant absurdities. An anthropomorphic creature running the entire universe? This is absurd on its face. Some nebulous "force" or "spirit"? This is replacing one meaningless word with another.
An idealized image of the parental authority figure retained from the childhood? Thatat least makes more sense, but why would such an image have an existence different from that of, say, cartoon characters? In other words, why do not we ask whether Mickey Mouse or Sponge Bob "exist" but we ask that question about God?
This whole issue of theism vs atheism is a ruse - the fact is that the object of this controversy has no meaning. The whole thing is all about emotions and feelings toward authority figures.
Wojtek
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