Why I'm Not An Atheist

I am not an Atheist. I do not disbelieve in God. My belief system is simple; I believe that you can't accept anything as true without evidence to support that belief. Since there is no objective evidence of the existence of a god, much less a legitimate way of determining what god, I do not believe that there is a god. This is not the same as disbelieving; it's a subtle but important difference.

I realise that most people who believe as I do refer to themselves as Atheists; I choose not to. To do so would imply that lack of belief in God is the central aspect of my belief system. In reality, it's simply a consequence. If I walked outside tonight and the stars had rearranged themselves to spell out JESUS RULES I'd simply shrug and think to myself "Wow, guess he's real after all." My reconversion to Christianity wouldn't require any adjustments to my belief system because it wouldn't change the fact that as of this writing the likelihood that He exists given the evidence available is pretty much nil.

Another reason I dislike the term Atheist is that it implies that belief in God is the default position. I refuse to define myself by what beliefs I don't hold. By defining myself as being in opposition to another system of belief I implicitly legitimize the other belief system.

I prefer the term Agnostic. It does a much better job of characterizing my actual belief system. And, it's a good fit with my general outlook. I don't take anything I hear at face value. I always try to be careful to make sure to keep track of where I hear any given piece of information and take the source into account when evaluating said information. This does not lead to indecision. It's perfectly possible to make decisions based on the available information while still keeping in mind the possibility that some of that information might be incorrect.