Atheism is a belief

1. It appears that the argument has been concluded unless you are going to go back on what you have just said. You have admitted that the first definition of atheism is a person who does not believe that a God or gods exist. Disbelief does not warrant rejection; therefore, not all atheists must make a positive claim on the existence of God or gods. Unless you are claiming that disbelief warrants belief, then you are admitting that an atheist does not have a belief; he or she has a disbelief. 2. Yes, I completely agree. If an atheist makes a claim to the existence of a God or gods, then he or she has the burden of proof. As I have said numerous times, an atheist does not have to make a claim. As for your question of, "Do you believe that a God exists?" the answer would be no, by definition, for atheists. What you are claiming is that disbelief warrants belief, and that is frankly ridiculous. A state of not believing does not warrant a state of belief in the opposite of a subject. It is a bit like me claiming that if one is not a Republican, one must be a Democrat. I would then go on to say that all non-Republicans make the same claims to the political and economical policies. Clearly, this is ridiculous because there is a spectrum of non-Republicans just like there is a spectrum of atheists. As for agnostics, it deals very strictly with knowledge. The agnostic must make a claim as to his or her belief in a God or gods, but he or she is still an agnostic whether or not he or she chooses to believe or not believe. Gnosticism is a state of claimed complete knowledge. A gnostic is someone who believes that he or she knows for a fact the claim he or she is making. Like an agnostic, a gnostic can be a theist or an atheist. You would not say that one must be atheist, agnostic, theist, or gnostic. This is because you are grouping categories that have nothing to do with each other. An agnostic makes a claim to his or her knowledge, and a gnostic makes a claim to his or her knowledge. An atheist makes a claim to his or her belief, and a theist makes a claim to his or her belief. The knowledge and belief claims can be mixed; they are not mutually exclusive. A gnostic can be either a theist or an atheist, and an agnostic can be either a theist or an atheist. What this argument is boiling down to is you are claiming that the disbelief in a claim is tantamount to a belief. You are playing with definitions. You could do the same with absolutely everything, but you are not allowed to do this. A disbelief is not tantamount to a belief. (Off Topic) I do not feel like I should be forced to defend Dawkins, so this is the last statement I will make on him. You have only supported what I said when you look at the article title "Why There Almost Certainly Is No God". I will not make a claim to the existence of a God or gods, but I would agree that the chances are slim. I think you would agree that the chance that Carl Sagan's intangible purple dragon existing in my garage is next to zero. He is applying the same logic to a God or gods, and he is saying that the chances are next to none. Even so, he has admitted that he cannot prove that a God or gods do not exist, so he will refuse to make a flat out assertion. Of course, he may have done so in the past that I have missed; neither he nor I can speak for the entirety of atheism. I was using him to provide an example. If what he says is to be trusted, then he is best described as an agnostic-atheist.