On Thursday 09 Jun 2005 16:40, Daniel Carrera wrote: > Tim Fairchild wrote: > >>>Christianity was once a very small minority. I'm sure it was seen as a > >>>cult by some (many?). > >> > >>Yes, absolutely. > > > > But it is a religion? > > If we were entirely in the modern era (so as to keep definitions > constant) we would say that it began as a cult and when it gathered > enough numbers it was conceeded the status of religion. This is the same > thing that scientologists claim has recently happened with their belief > system. Raelists haven't made that claim yet because they obviously lack > the numbers. Scientologists are in the fuzzy region in terms of numbers. > Especially because their numbers are very uncertain.
But what it means is that christianity was always the same belief, but you can't call it a religion until it's popular. Do we have to wait until linux gets popular to call it and OS? Is OOo not an office suite until it gets enough numbers? Sounds a bit odd, but what the heck. Could be true as far as the MS and Office users are concerned. > >>Look, the word "religion" is not as flexible as you seem to think. > > > > I think it's as rigid or flexible as you choose to make it. > > Well, then I suggest we agree to disagree on that point. I think that > words have meaning that can't be changed so easily. Yep, fine, I was just going by definitions I found with a google search. There is a lot of discussion on the subject apparently :) > > Atheism is the lack of belief in the existance of a deity or deities, not > > the belief in the non-existance of a deity. Subtle difference :) > > And I know a lot of atheists who disagree with you :-) What you > described would be Agnosticism. So maybe you're not an atheist, you are > an agnostic. It's certainly an important difference, because believing > that god does *not* exist also requires faith. A lot of atheists would be more accurately defined as anti-theists. And there is a fuzzy area between atheism and agnosticism, but they are just definitions people like to play with. Atheism, put simple, is like asexual. Without faith or without sex and so forth. But it's something people seem to argue endlessly about. Part of it is also skepticism and general scientific thinking, and to be true to that you can't discount possibilities of deities and so forth or prove a negative. Atheism is a simple definition to cover a lack of belief without getting too long winded. I've spent (wasted) a lot of time on the subject over the years and so won't get into it too much here :) tim -- --------------------------------------------------------- Tim & Therese Fairchild Atchafalaya Border Collies. Kuttabul, Queensland, Australia. --------------------------------------------------------- Email mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Homepage http://www.bcs4me.com Photos http://www.pbase.com/amosf ---------------------------------------------------------
