Well the posts numbers 4 and 13 seemed somewhat a propos. But I can respond to the creationist nutjobs if you like:
Most atheists contend, and I agree, that if you simply do not believe in deity then you are an atheist. I believe any honest (not Webster's) dictionary will support this interpretation. By this definition the burden of proof is clearly on the theist if as is often the case the theist claims to know some deity or other exists.
That said, many or perhaps most atheists actually do have a positive belief that there is no deity. However, very few will claim to have certain knowledge there is no deity. I consider that I myself am very atheist but even I don't claim to have certain knowledge of a lack of deity. To hold this position of strong but less-than-certain disbelief is indeed perfectly logical. The belief in a lack of deity is exactly the same as, say, the belief that there are not in actuality six-foot tall suit-wearing rabbits that can only be seen by James Stewart. Now, you may say, there was divinely-inspired movie about this, but I will simply assert that the movie is merely a work of fiction. There really is no extra-Harvey-movie evidence whatsoever that invisible six-foot tall suit wearing rabbits that can be seen only by Jimmie Stewart really do exist. In fact, there is no good argument for them to exist, nothing that is parsimoniously explained by their existence, and plenty of good reasons to think that these kind of large invisible but highly fashionable rabbits are not real. But I am not certain they are not real.
About agnosticism, the original use of the term by Huxley was describing a belief that it is impossible to know whether deity exists, not the mere lack of belief in a deity. Personally I consider this original meaning of agnosticism to be a faith position. It may be that it's impossible to kow whether deity exists but I don't have a basis for believing it's impossible. It's only clearly impossible if one allows the definition of deity to be so vague as to be meaningless. It's clear many deity concepts are self-contradictory (like, for example, the "God" of the Bible), and so logically can't exist. The deity of Deism, say, is more difficult show to be impossible, clearly, but to claim actual impossibility of refutation is to adopt an unjustified position.
Most atheists contend, and I agree, that if you simply do not believe in deity then you are an atheist. I believe any honest (not Webster's) dictionary will support this interpretation. By this definition the burden of proof is clearly on the theist if as is often the case the theist claims to know some deity or other exists.
That said, many or perhaps most atheists actually do have a positive belief that there is no deity. However, very few will claim to have certain knowledge there is no deity. I consider that I myself am very atheist but even I don't claim to have certain knowledge of a lack of deity. To hold this position of strong but less-than-certain disbelief is indeed perfectly logical. The belief in a lack of deity is exactly the same as, say, the belief that there are not in actuality six-foot tall suit-wearing rabbits that can only be seen by James Stewart. Now, you may say, there was divinely-inspired movie about this, but I will simply assert that the movie is merely a work of fiction. There really is no extra-Harvey-movie evidence whatsoever that invisible six-foot tall suit wearing rabbits that can be seen only by Jimmie Stewart really do exist. In fact, there is no good argument for them to exist, nothing that is parsimoniously explained by their existence, and plenty of good reasons to think that these kind of large invisible but highly fashionable rabbits are not real. But I am not certain they are not real.
About agnosticism, the original use of the term by Huxley was describing a belief that it is impossible to know whether deity exists, not the mere lack of belief in a deity. Personally I consider this original meaning of agnosticism to be a faith position. It may be that it's impossible to kow whether deity exists but I don't have a basis for believing it's impossible. It's only clearly impossible if one allows the definition of deity to be so vague as to be meaningless. It's clear many deity concepts are self-contradictory (like, for example, the "God" of the Bible), and so logically can't exist. The deity of Deism, say, is more difficult show to be impossible, clearly, but to claim actual impossibility of refutation is to adopt an unjustified position.
