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Agnostic atheism — or atheistic agnosticism — is a philosophical position that encompasses both atheism and agnosticism.Agnostic atheists are atheistic because they do not hold a belief in the existence of any deity, and they are agnostic because they claim that the existence of a divine entity or entities is either unknowable in principle or currently unknown in fact.
This position should not be understood as a skeptical position in a manner similar to that of, for example, atheists or agnostics who question the existence of deities or whether we can know anything about them. [6] Adam Scott Kunz has argued that apatheism's opposite is zeal, just as atheism's opposite is theism.
Antitheism has been adopted as a label by those who regard theism as dangerous, destructive, or encouraging of harmful behavior. Christopher Hitchens (2001) [6] wrote: . I'm not even an atheist so much as I am an antitheist; I not only maintain that all religions are versions of the same untruth, but I hold that the influence of churches, and the effect of religious belief, is positively harmful."
Atheism is commonly understood as non-acceptance or outright rejection of theism in the broadest sense of the term (i.e., non-acceptance or rejection of belief in God or gods). [5] [6] Related (but separate) is the claim that the existence of any deity is unknown or unknowable; a stance known as agnosticism.
Irreligion is the absence or rejection of religious beliefs or practices.It encompasses a wide range of viewpoints drawn from various philosophical and intellectual perspectives, including atheism, agnosticism, religious skepticism, rationalism, secularism, and non-religious spirituality.
Apophatic theology is often accused of being a version of atheism or agnosticism, since it cannot say truly that God exists. [133] " The comparison is crude, however, for conventional atheism treats the existence of God as a predicate that can be denied ("God is nonexistent"), whereas negative theology denies that God has predicates". [ 134 ] "
Atheism, in the broadest sense, is an absence of belief in the existence of deities. Less broadly, atheism is a rejection of the belief that any deities exist. In an even narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there are no deities. Atheism is contrasted with theism, which is the belief that at least one deity exists.
Positive atheism, also called strong atheism and hard atheism, is the form of atheism that additionally asserts that no deities exist. [ 1 ] [ 2 ] [ 3 ] The terms "negative atheism" and "positive atheism" were used by Antony Flew in 1976 [ 1 ] and have appeared in George H. Smith 's [ 4 ] and Michael Martin 's writings since 1990.