> J.R. Molloy wrote:
> Thanks for the accolade, but actually, I don't refer to myself as an
atheist,
> but rather as a non-theist, because it seems to me that belief is the
problem,
> not what is believed, and an atheist is one who believes that god
(whatever
> that means) does not exist. So, it's still a belief.
It seems to me no more a belief than the word "asymptomatic," which means
"without symptoms." Borrowing Thomas Edison's quote, if I say "I don't
believe in Mother Goose" (and therefore call myself an amothergoosist) -
it's an informal use of the phrase "I don't believe..." used colloquially,
not meant to imply a "belief system." I call myself an atheist sometimes
and a nontheist sometimes - for the life of me I can't detect much
difference (only in other people's reactions, when I've been asked to repeat
the word "nontheist" a few times as they'd never heard the word before). I
must say I've been tending to use the term nontheist more and more lately,
only because some people think atheism means "against..." (not
"without..."). But in any case, I don't see how it's a belief.
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