Academy: for the purposes of this Glossary, the word "Academy" unaccompanied by any adjective, refers to The Academy of Metaphysical Naturalists, publisher of The Academy of Metaphysical Naturalists Blogger and other various written works. When the use of the word "academy" applies to any other institution, the appropriate adjective will be applied.
Atheism: hard: the epistemological assertion that the existence of a God is impossible. This assertion requires no positive belief, nor negative disbelief, nor negative belief, nor positive disbelief in the existence of the supernatural. Hard atheism denies that anything can be beyond man's direct apprehension given time, but more importantly denies by reason of the law of identity that anything supernatural can exist. A god is universally accepted as independent of matter and energy, while the epitemology inherent in the law of identity requires the proposition that nothing can be independent of matter and energy. Ontologically, " an entity with the attributes traditionally ascribed to a God cannot exist in reality." The Ontology of Information, and Hard Atheism [Adam Reed]
Atheism: soft: being of the metaphysical opinion, or accepting the metaphysical fact, that only natural entities exist; having no positive belief nor any negative disbelief in the existence of supernatural deities, and/or having no faith in them or in their existence. The concomitant contrary is the negative belief or the positive disbelief that no supernatural entities exist. [Contrast with atheism; hard.] Each of these four metaphysically soft positions denies the existence of a god while accepting the assertion that "if a god exists, he/it is beyond man's direct apprehension, so we will never know the truth." Thus, soft atheism does not categorically deny that god cannot exist; it simply asserts that there is no need to believe in a god any more than to believe in leprechauns or in voodoo.
Atheist: a person said to subscribe to either the "hard" or the "soft" form of atheism.[See above]
Axiom: "a statement [or proposition] that identifies the base of knowledge [see axiomatic concept] and of any further statement pertaining to that knowledge, a statement necessarily contained in all others, whether any particular speaker chooses to identify it or not. An axiom is a proposition that defeats its opponents by the fact that they have to accept it and use it in the process of any attempt to deny it." [emphasis added] [Ayn Rand] For the New Intellectual
"In traditional logic, an axiom or postulate is a proposition that is not proved or demonstrated but considered to be either self-evident, or subject to necessary decision. Therefore, its truth is taken for granted, and serves as a starting point for deducing and inferring other (theory dependent) truths." Wikipedia
Axiomatic concept: irreducible primary concept. Axioms, as propositions, identify fundamental self-evident truths but as such are not primaries: they are made of concepts. All non-primary concepts consist of axiomatic concepts, "the identification of a primary fact of reality, which cannot be analyzed, i.e., reduced to other facts or broken into component parts." Irreducible primaries are those of which an "attempt to 'prove' them is [a] self-contradictory attempt to 'prove' existence by means of non-existence, and consciousness by means of unconsciousness. The first and primary axiomatic concepts are 'existence,' 'identity' (which is a corollary of 'existence') and “consciousness.” One can study what exists and how consciousness functions; but one cannot analyze (or “prove”) existence as such, or consciousness as such." [Ayn Rand] Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology [see also James Leithead and Objectivism Wiki]
Note: Ayn Rand first identified the axiomatic concept, and all literature in existence on the subject appears to be written by either Rand herself or by other Objectivists. Other schools of thought are either choosing to ignore the concept, or are as-of-yet unaware of its existence. More on Rand.
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