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What I mean when I say...
- "most atheists" or "most theists"
- I don't mean "most" in any statistical sense. I simply mean that, in my experience talking
to lots of people in person and on the internet over the years, I've noticed trends.
- god, God, and gods
- Usually when I say "God", I mean the Judeo-Muslim-Christian deity. When I say "god", I mean
either a god in the generic sense, or a deity of faiths other than Judaism, Christianity, or Islam
(not that I hold any one deity in higher esteem than another, it is an arbitrary choice based on my
anticipated readership.
- belief in...
- When I say "believe in" something or "belief in" something, I mean specifically the belief in
the existence of the thing. I don't mean trust or confidence in the thing. For example, when
I say "belief in God", I mean belief that God exists. This is different from our "belief in humanity"
which means our trust in the goodness of humanity, not our belief that humanity exists.
- faith
- I use faith in 2 ways. I use it to mean belief in the existence of something (see "belief in"
above). I also use it to mean having confidence or trust in something as in "faith in humanity". When
I need to distinguish between these two meanings, I use "belief in" (see "belief in" above), "trust",
or "confidence" instead.
- fundamentalist
- This term originated as the result of a 12 volume Christian publication entitled
"The Fundamentals: A Testimony To The Truth." But since that publication,
the meaning has expended to include any theist who rigidly adheres to religious dogma
and is intolerant of conflicting views. I use "fundamentalist" in this broader sense.

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