Because you don't believe in the luminiferous aether.

I think there is a Plank % chance the universe was created by a conscious being.

and zero % chance it was created by any god in any earth religion.

Is that strong enough?

I also think the same about Christians and other faiths, you should believe every single word of the bible and follow it religiously without question, not deciding which parts you think should or should not be taken as literal.

There i said it.

Probably too strong (Planck percent is pretty tiny) but basically.

The aether was postulated to exist to provide a reference frame for the velocity of light. Experiments determined that such a reference frame could not exist.

To create the analogy, you must provide the experiment that shows that God could not exist.

Shouldn't it be: "Because you believe there is no luminiferous aether."

Imo anyone who leaves any chance that a conscious being created the universe is agnostic. I dont know who started saying strang and weak athiest but the terms are annoying.

I agree with you, but on this site that is not the accepted definition. If you protest, you can easily launch a discussion that ultimately goes nowhere, so imo it is easier to just go along with the pack. That is all language is in any case, so consider it local jargon.

But that would imply they think the Christian God might be real, so it agnostic doesn't work.

Is this true? We have shown that ether is not necessary and that light can propagate through the medium of space just fine without it. However, what experiment has shown that either could not exist?

There will never be an experiment to show god cannot exist. All we have are experiments/theories which show god is not necessary for some particular proposition. And these experiments/theories become more and more numerous, and the explanatory power of god dwindles as the years go by.

So you're "agnostic" when it comes to infinite amount of imaginary concepts with no proof of backing up their existence?

How has the explanatory power of God dwindled away? If anything we have observed science relying more and more on unobservable ideas to explain the workings of the universe....I.e. extra dimensions, parallel universes, etc.

If anything God is a better explanation for the universe now then it was 100 years ago. Back then you could be an atheists and credibly argue that observation indicated the universe has simply always existed in its current state.

But now steady staters are like flat earthers.

Ether was postulated to carry light. If it existed then you would be able to measure a velocity relative to it that would be reflected in the velocity of light. That is not observed, therefore the ether as a light transmitting medium does not exist.

Wow, hardcore god of the gaps argument. You are just moving god into quantum gaps and extradimensional ones. And "god" doesn't explain any of those things, it's just another place where theists point at question marks (which science very well may answer) and say "oooh mysterious and possibly beyond human empiricism, ergo god did it".

God is not needed to explain cosmology or the overwhelming diversity of life on earth or the motion of our solar system/gravity etc. etc. Of course god's role is dwindling. Can you name one scientific truth that came purely from the bible?

There wasn't light and then there was.

I never claimed God was an explanation of any of those things but you are right it...God is as good an explanation as any.

My point was there was a time when you could believe that God did not exist and the universe just existed eternally...relatively unchanging. They called this the steady state theory and it made it very easy to be an atheist....the origin of existence, like God, didn't need a explanation...it simply was. That theory got blown completely out of the water though.

As a consequent what you have seen is a movement from strong atheism toward weak atheism. Going from the complete rejection of God existence to acknowledging it possible is an indication God's explainitive power is increasing nt dwindling.

100 years ago there wasn't a debate on what it meant to be an atheist.

It usually only comes as a surprise to Christians discussing the issues amongst themselves, who finally stumble upon an actual atheist!

Among unbelievers with an interest in the subject, the 2+2 parlance is pretty standard, and has been since at least 22 years ago (the first time I started talking about this crap on BBSes and Usenet).

Gnosticism concerns whether or not god(s) are knowable; theism concerns whether or not people believe in them. This really isn't some kind of sleight of hand on the part of the atheists! It is just an attempt to be a little more precise and nuanced than the definitions you are more used to.

Interesting, but I have been discussing this crap since 38 years ago and your interpretation is not universal. I was a grad student in a theoretical physics group in the mid 70's so encountering atheists is hardly a surprise. But as I said, I have no intention of arguing further.

I am going to leave the current posts up, but lets stop the atheist definition conversations. As we all know it has been done to death. So as of now any post on the subject will get deleted. This is a good thread, let's keep it that way.

I dont think i could be a strong atheist with all definitions of God. Because my views on Gods possibility vary in certainty depending on definitions of God.

If Gods a sentient creator of the universe and our existence. Then i think there could be one. The universes might of been created. Im a weak atheists or agnostic if you wish.

If God is a sentient creator of the universe and the spaghetti monster. Not so much. Im pretty certain thats not true. Im a strong atheist on the spaghetti monster creator God.

You can even get me to believe in God if you define God as love or the all/the universe.

It was part of the point - we don't bother staking out our position so carefully unless its god. There's no reason to think the aether exists so we think it doesn't.

Or provide an adjustment to the properties of aether. Aether-prime moves exactly with the earth, as it happens.

However, I was directing this to atheists really. I don't think it has much power to a believer, but those who reject god on the grounds there's no evidence for his existence should respond the way they do to all those other things for which there is no evidence.

Something being possible is a necessary but not sufficient reason to believe in something.

I am not sure what your point is. Explanations of the transmission of light that involved ether kept running into problems. Relativity took care of the light velocity issue and made predictions about time that solved all of the issues so the ether concept no longer made sense. If you alter the properties of the ether so that it is no longer related to light transmission it is a completely different concept, whether you call it ether or something else altogether.

It's still there carrying the light, it just happens to move with us so MM doesn't reveal a preferred frame other than us.

The aether-prime I'm postulating has no evidence for it and has been arbitrarily chosen to be that way - analogous to how many weak atheists see god. They should respond the same way.

This is not about evidence for or against god's existence.

Your aether still violates experiment. If I move relative to the earth I should measure a change in the velocity of light. That is not observed. Also, your model is inconsistent with time dilation, which is also observed. Hence there is solid counter evidence to your aether as a light transmitting medium.