I think it won't happen

Hi, I would like to know if the sentence ''I think it won't happen''
sounds good in English...

in Portuguese we can say either:

Eu acho que não vai acontecer
[I think it won't happen] or

Eu não acho que isso vá acontecer
[I don't think it will happen]

and these sentences don't have the same meaning

thanks

Both sentences generally have the same meaning. If you stress the word "think" in the sentence "I THINK it won't happen", you are indicating that you doubt your own opinion somewhat. Otherwise, you're more certain that it won't happen.

One problem that I occasionally have in trying to explain my religious views to other English speakers is making the distinction between "I don't believe in God" and "I believe there is no God", because, in common usage, we use the two sentences to mean the same thing. But it's still possible to draw a distinction.

- Kef

There is a slight difference, logically. If you say, "I think it won't happen.", you are expressing a positive belief that something will not happen, but if you say "I don't think it will happen.", you are expressing a lack of belief that a certain event will occur. It's sort of like the difference between "I dislike it." and "I don't like it." If you say, "I dislike it.", you have active negative feelings towards something, but "I don't like it." only expresses a lack of positive feelings.

"I don't believe in God" and "I believe there is no God", because, in common usage, we use the two sentences to mean the same thing. But it's still possible to draw a distinction.

- Kef

Which do you usually say? The first (to me) means:

I know there is a God, but I don't trust him or I believe He is distant (i.e. like a deist). Commonly, it could also mean you are an atheist.

The second one seems to mean that according to your belief there is no God.

Since you live in the States, I imagine that you get a lot of comments about this. I tried being an atheist a couple of times, but it didn't work.

In my understanding, the first statement, "I don't believe in God", means that you lack a positive belief in God - in the same sense that you would lack a belief in unicorns, Santa Claus, or anything for which, in your view, there's no evidence. This viewpoint is known as weak or negative atheism, and if I'm not mistaken, it's the position held by most atheists.

The second statement, "I believe there is no God", is a positive assertion that God doesn't exist. This more extreme viewpoint is known as strong or positive atheism, and it's often used as a strawman against atheists: "You can't prove that God doesn't exist!" "You can't prove a negative!" etc. The response by a reasonable (negative) atheist would be, "I don't have to."

I've flirted with atheism in the past. I'm not an atheist anymore, but I feel sympathetic for them and I often find myself defending them in arguments.

I usually say "I don't believe in God", with the intended meaning of, "I admit the possibility of God's existence, but I am not inclined to believe that he exists." I do sometimes speak of God in a very broad and non-literal sense, though, as Einstein did when he said, "God does not play dice with the universe."

I also don't get comments about my religion often, but that's probably because I rarely have any need to mention it. For instance, the only reason I mentioned it here was that the semantic ambiguity was relevant to the discussion. And, since I don't want to lose sight of that discussion, I'll leave it at that. :)

- Kef

However, there, though is also atheism as in simply being consciously nonspiritual altogether, rather the overt rejection of any religious beliefs as a matter of ideology or the denial of all particular assertions of any religions beliefs. Rejecting such implies a recognition of such conceptually, albeit denying such, whereas such is not even having any room in one's wordview for even any possibility, however hypothetical, for any kind of religious or spiritual views.

In my case such is probably more applicable than the typical definitions of "strong atheism" or "weak atheism", as I was never religious to begin with, having never been raised with any religious beliefs, and never saw any reason to *adopt* any religious beliefs. Consequently, it is hard to speak of any kind of rejection or denial of any religious beliefs due to, first, never having had any such beliefs to reject or deny and, second, not even having any conceptual room for any kind of spirituality at all. (What I mean is that I do not specifically deny any sort of spirituality, but rather that the very concept of spirituality is meaningless altogether to me.) Such makes it hard to be "strong atheist" or "weak atheist", as both as you described them involve any an implicit recognition of the very concept of spirituality.

>>The second statement, "I believe there is no God", is a positive assertion that God doesn't exist. This more extreme viewpoint is known as strong or positive atheism, and it's often used as a strawman against atheists: "You can't prove that God doesn't exist!" "You can't prove a negative!" etc. The response by a reasonable (negative) atheist would be, "I don't have to."<<

I tend to approach such from a somewhat different direction, in that I generally attack such arguments' faslifiability, stating that because such are inherently unfalsifiable, they are not legitimate arguments to begin with. Consequently, there is no need to try to disprove them, as they are non-arguments from the very beginning.

There is also agnosticism, in which people claim that they don't know if God exists or whether or not God exists is irrelevent. This is somewhat in between theism and atheism.

"I admit the possibility of God's existence, but I am not inclined to believe that he exists." I do sometimes speak of God in a very broad and non-literal sense, though, as Einstein did when he said, "God does not play dice with the universe."

That sounds more like an agnostic to me. If you say you are an agnostic, you'll probably get comments (in real life)....

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Such makes it hard to be "strong atheist" or "weak atheist", as both as you described them involve any an implicit recognition of the very concept of spirituality"

I've never really thought about stong or weak atheists before. I thought that they didn't recognize the concept of spirtuality.

I consider myself an "agnostic atheist", but this is really straying from the point of the discussion...

I think you're really just an agnostic. Well, you can always give God a call if you are in doubt :)

"I dislike it." and "I don't like it." If you say, "I dislike it.", you have active negative feelings towards something, but "I don't like it." only expresses a lack of positive feelings. "


I understand this, but I wonder how many people make the distinction.

>>"Such makes it hard to be "strong atheist" or "weak atheist", as both as you described them involve any an implicit recognition of the very concept of spirituality"

I've never really thought about stong or weak atheists before. I thought that they didn't recognize the concept of spirtuality.<<

The thing is that saying that one believes that "there is no God" is in effect acknowledging that the very idea of God in that it still indirectly invokes the idea of things existing outside of this plane of existance, for lack of any better term, even if it is in denying such. This is as opposed to not even recognizing the concept of anything existing "outside the world" which can even be perceived by those within it (that is, us), because it can interact with us in a detectable fashion, it is no longer "outside the world" and is consequently subject to actual observation and whatnot.

That is, this is actually denying the *concept* of God as something that can be stated, rather than simply denying Gods themselves. Yes, you can say "but what if God existed", but then one cannot even *know* about such, because if one can, such is no longer a "God" and is just another part of the physical world, albeit possibly a very influential and extensive part of such. Thus, one really cannot speak of the supernatural to begin with, because if something is truly supernatural, it has to be completely inaccessible and undetectable to anyone and anything "within the world", and thus effectively not exist anyways from our point of view.

Note, however, that some interpretations of what I just said do allow for things like the Greek gods and Norse gods, which acted more like simply very powerful figures within the world, as opposed to omnipotent, inaccessible entities existing outside of it, such as the god(s) of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. But even then, such would no longer be truly supernatural in nature, as in being "inside the world" they would be subject to the same kinds of things that humans use to rationally understand the rest of the world.

I wrote that post with the typo for "strong" LOL!

Hmmm, I don't quite get it. If you don't believe in God, don't believe in the concept of God, why even comment on it or tell other people? Don't you beg discussion? Sorry, kef, but you MUST have known that people would be interested in your statement beyond the details in possible embedded/imbedded meanings.

You seem okay with discussion, Travis, but why not say "I'm not religious," or "Spiritual things don't interest me." To me, it's like you are waiting for someone with the perfect argument to counter what you already maintain you believe. Aha! Maybe that's where the strong and weak atheist distinctions arrive.

If you are SURE beyond a doubt (i.e. You can say if you died, there would be no God (for the big 3) and not "Well, I'd be surprised."), then I would say you are an atheist. If you would say instead "Well, I don't think there would be one." Then I think you are agnostic.

I think believing there is no God means that you reject the concept of God.