I can understand the term "naturalism" as an assertion of laws of cause and effect that are consistent. Specifically this excludes supernatural influences. As far as I can tell, anything that would be described as a god would be supernatural so naturalistic and theistic beliefs would be mutually exclusive.
If we start with the basics:
Set - A collection of items.
Subset - A collection of items that is less than or equal to another known collection.
Selection - Choosing one or more items from a finite set.
Selection Criteria - A property shared by all items in a set that can be used to assign comparative value.
Decision - True if a selection has been made for a set.
Selection Result - What was chosen from a set.
Null Selection - The result of a selection if any of the following are true:
A given set will always have a non-null selection result if all of the following are true:
As far as I can tell, naturalism would be a selected belief of the set of {cause and effect} that would exclude anything supernatural.
Presumably theism would be any selected belief from the undefined set of {gods} with {gods} as an undefined subset of {supernatural}.
Atheism would presumably be a null selection from the undefined set of {gods}.
I have not though been able to define what the members of the set of {gods} would be. Some options seem to include:
Since this list does not include a common selection criteria, I'm not sure how a selection would be possible. To obtain a selection, it appears that you would need to either make a random choice, choose the entire list, or restrict the list in some fashion until one common criteria is available. People seem to use the term "atheism" as though it has a strong definition but I'm not sure how it would have any definition if "god" is not first defined.
If we start with the basics:
Set - A collection of items.
Subset - A collection of items that is less than or equal to another known collection.
Selection - Choosing one or more items from a finite set.
Selection Criteria - A property shared by all items in a set that can be used to assign comparative value.
Decision - True if a selection has been made for a set.
Selection Result - What was chosen from a set.
Null Selection - The result of a selection if any of the following are true:
- A set is empty.
- A set is infinite.
- More than one item had the best comparative value AND the number of items that can be selected is less than the number of items with the best comparative value.
- No selection criteria is available for the set.
- No decision has been made for the set.
A given set will always have a non-null selection result if all of the following are true:
- The set contains at least one item.
- The set is finite.
- Only one item had the best comparative value OR the number of items that can be selected is equal to or greater than the number of items with the best comparative value.
- The set has a selection criteria.
- A decision has been made for the set.
As far as I can tell, naturalism would be a selected belief of the set of {cause and effect} that would exclude anything supernatural.
Presumably theism would be any selected belief from the undefined set of {gods} with {gods} as an undefined subset of {supernatural}.
Atheism would presumably be a null selection from the undefined set of {gods}.
I have not though been able to define what the members of the set of {gods} would be. Some options seem to include:
- Builder - a maker of part or all of the material world.
- Dualistic endowment - giving a non-material essence to something material.
- Instruction - giving knowledge that would otherwise not be available.
- Command - giving an arbitrary list of practices with rewards for compliance and penalties for non-compliance.
- Interference - giving assistance or hindrance to some material configuration.
- Extended existence - existence either before or apart from material things.
Since this list does not include a common selection criteria, I'm not sure how a selection would be possible. To obtain a selection, it appears that you would need to either make a random choice, choose the entire list, or restrict the list in some fashion until one common criteria is available. People seem to use the term "atheism" as though it has a strong definition but I'm not sure how it would have any definition if "god" is not first defined.
via International Skeptics Forum http://ift.tt/1L8SOM7
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