I tend to use "know" and "prove" very sparingly. There are very few things one can prove in the absolute sense. There have been too many times in the history of science and religion when people have thought they knew something only to discover it wasn't really so.

In the absolute sense, we can never "know" anything to 100%, but I think we can agree that we can be certain enough of certain things in order to "know" them, right?

When it comes to "faith" / "believe" - I do not use these terms in the sense of a substitute for evidence - as in "I don't have any evidence so I just believe".
Instead, on the basis of the weight of evidence I have before me I take a position - "I believe ..." There are some things I believe quite strongly and others more cautiously.

My definition is that one has faith when one believes in something despite the evidence. Your definition is the one that is usually held by theists according to them, but I've found that once I delve down into their beliefs that they actually hold to something closer to what I described. Perhaps you are different? Let's find out.

I like to work on weight of evidence and to understand the arguments and evidence appealed to by both sides of a position...I want to be neither gullible accepting stories uncritically nor blind, refusing to look at evidence that doesn't agree with my position...I am happy to share the reasons why I believe the world view that I have, but just want to make sure that we are understanding each other first

No offense intended, but I've never met an argument for god that didn't beg the question or commit some other egregious logical fallacy. I've never encountered any actual evidence for god that didn't do the same. You may have other evidence, and I would love to hear it, but god has failed every empirical, verifiable test. The weight of logic and evidence is against a god that interferes in our personal lives, or that has any action at all in the world. Your first statements on this thread were also rather troubling in this regard. That said, I would love to hear your evidence, but I would like for it to actually be evidence. Evidence that begins with, "The Bible says..." will not count for obvious reasons (If it isn't obvious, I can explain in more detail). Evidence that starts with, "The universe is so complex..." are also not likely to count as that type of evidence relies on begging the question. Hopefully these guidelines will help you to formulate a good argument on your behalf.

OMGF, I thank you for spelling out how an atheist understands the term "atheist" - if I am understanding you correctly it is a world view which sees neither need for nor evidence of god, rather than making an absolute dogmatic statement. This is different from how the term is understood on my side of the fence and I apologise for having made statements before I understood.

We still seem to be having trouble with know and believe

I tend to use "know" and "prove" very sparingly. There are very few things one can prove in the absolute sense. There have been too many times in the history of science and religion when people have thought they knew something only to discover it wasn't really so. I like to work on weight of evidence and to understand the arguments and evidence appealed to by both sides of a position.

When it comes to "faith" / "believe" - I do not use these terms in the sense of a substitute for evidence - as in "I don't have any evidence so I just believe".
Instead, on the basis of the weight of evidence I have before me I take a position - "I believe ..." There are some things I believe quite strongly and others more cautiously.
I want to be neither gullible accepting stories uncritically nor blind, refusing to look at evidence that doesn't agree with my position.

I am happy to share the reasons why I believe the world view that I have, but just want to make sure that we are understanding each other first

I think you are misrepresenting me. As I review my few posts the words I used were "Personally it makes more sense to me to believe ..." yet you accuse me of saying I do know.

My apologies. I figured that since you accept one interpretation of one religion, that it was because it held some sort of significance for you. Perhaps you feel it is only a faith? In that case, why that one instead of any others? Why one god instead of many, as I believe someone else has already asked you. Why this particular god? Also, you do realize that you are basing your whole entire argument off of an exercise of begging the question, correct?

Your postion of not accepting stories without evidence is in fact the process of faith.

No, no, no, no, no. A thousand times no. It is the antithesis of faith to reject your claims if you can not provide the necessary evidence to support your claims, as I've already explained. What faith does it take for me to say, "You've made some positive claims that I will remain skeptical of unless you can provide evidence?" I have made no positive statement with which to have faith in.

The more evidence we have the more strongly we may believe

And what evidence is that? The only "evidence" you have put forth so far is "it makes more sense to me" which is neither an argument nor a piece of evidence.

In the absence of absolute knowledge, the statement "There is no god" can be no more than a faith statement.

1) Most atheists will claim that the theistic position has not been proved, so there is no need to believe in god. This is not the same as active disbelief in any said god. You would to well to note the difference and stop making bad arguments.
2) It's quite parsimonious to observe that there is no evidence for god and that the world works quite well without that extra baggage, thank you very much. My model of the world does not include a god, so from that sense I could say that there is no god, and I would be perfectly rational to say so, and not expressing a faith. When I extend that to say that there is no god in the absolute sense, then I am expressing a faith, but this is not a position I hold or the vast majority of the atheists that comment here. It's quite possible that one can conceive of a god that is wholly beyond our ability to understand and to detect; a god that can have no evidence for it, but yet exists. The chances of said god, however, are pretty small, and it is still irrational to believe in said god without any evidence in favor of said god.

It is interesting to see you guys trying to find what label to put on me or which box to put me in. I am not sure that will help us work our way through this subject.

No, it certainly wouldn't! For my part, I was just trying to clarify exactly what you were saying, and I'm sorry if I gave the impression that I was itching to pigeonhole you.

Your postion of not accepting stories without evidence is in fact the process of faith.

"I do not think that word means what you think it means." You seem -- and again, I could be wrong! -- to be claiming that the verb "to know" can only be applied in the case of omniscience. To put it mildly...this is not any definition of "to know" that I'm familiar with.

Your postion of not accepting stories without evidence is in fact the process of faith. Faith is not a substitute for information but an extension of it. On the basis of information a person may say "I believe ..." The more evidence we have the more strongly we may believe

But to say "I know ..." requires absolute knowledge and I dont think you have anymore of that commodity than I do.

In the absence of absolute knowledge, the statement "There is no god" can be no more than a faith statement.

So, your assertions that atheism takes faith are completely wrong and backwards.

In his defense, they make perfect sense if one subscribes to the woefully common and spectacularly wrong view that all propositions default to "maybe" and must subsequently be proven true or false...

Human minds aren't very good at grasping infinity / eternity

We all get to the point where the only answer is dunno.

Yet, that's not what you are doing is it? You are saying that you do know, and that the answer is "god". The problem for you is that you haven't presented any evidence to support the god idea, so until you do (and the burden of proof lies on you) I can rationally say that I do not accept your idea. And, no, this does not make my position one of faith. My position is born of not simply accepting stories without evidence. This is the opposite of faith in fact. So, your assertions that atheism takes faith are completely wrong and backwards.

Its like looking into the universe and asking "Where does it end?" "waht's beyond that?"

Human minds aren't very good at grasping infinity / eternity

We all get to the point where the only answer is dunno.

When it comes to the question of "Where did it all begin?" it seems to my mind we have to begin in one of three places:
Eternal nothing became our universe
Eternal matter
Eternal mind

All are equally difficult to comprehend

http://www.merryatheist.net/blog/?p=43

I have no problem with honest inquiry -the 2nd group who says "I wonder how things came to be" except when they rule out the possibility that maybe goddiddoit. Honest inquiry has to allow that as a possibility, and even to ask, "How would we know if such was the case?".

To add onto alex's response, why are we only dealing with the idea that one god did it? I don't remember much human achievement ever created by one being, so maybe several thousands, or millions, of different beings created the universe (even though this idea still suffers from all the problems alex mentioned, I never hear anyone suggesting it). After all, according to you logic, we can't know for sure, so it's probably equally as valid. Do you rule out the ideas of scientology? Do you really know for sure that those aren't correct?

Except there's no reason to believe that with no evidence whatsoever, so until (if) any gets provided that's convincing, we're perfectly justifed in ruling the idea out.