Reply #25: acknowledging the idea of God does not mean you believe in God [View All]

[Bill McBlueState]

I agree with the subject of your post, that God is many things to many people. One of the obstacles to saying with absolute certainty that there are no gods is that you can talk to 100 different people and they'll give you 100 different definitions of God. That is a lot of different things to be sure about the nonexistence of!

But "acknowledging the idea of God" does not have to mean that you believe in God in some form or another. Is that true of other ideas? For example, I can acknowledge the idea that the Earth is 6000 years old. I can discuss that idea, the type of evidence that would support or refute that idea, and the implications of that idea if it were true. But in the end, I do not have to believe that the Earth is 6000 years old in order to acknolwedge that other people believe it is.

Same deal for Penn. He acknowledges that some people believe in one or more gods, and says that he does not share that belief. It's pretty simple.