I approach the meaning of the words theist and atheist in the simplest way I possibly can. I think everyone would agree that a theist is a person who believes in a god or gods.
Then we add the prefix "a":
a- or ( before a vowel ) an- 1
— prefix
not; without;
This gives us atheist. An atheist is any person who is not a theist. As in, a "not a [person who believes in a god or gods]/theist" or "a person without [belief in a god or gods]/theism."
Then people somehow get the idea that instead, atheist means "a person who believes it is impossible for a god to exist." Where does this come from? The structure of the word implies it in no way.
Okay, so your concept stems from a basic principle:
A morphological relecture (which I do not know if it is correct by english language standards since atheos would be the stem, and theos the root) of the word. But it is linguistically valid (I assume). Fair enough.
But now to address that "people somehow get the idea":
These words and its definitions are more than 500 years old. They weren't conceived in english. They are structured to nominate concepts to give better grounds as to discuss those topics.
I've shown (anyone with authority in linguistics could confirm, but the etymology dictionary, morphology, stanford philosophy, and wikitionary agrees) how those words came to be. A quick search for its etymology might help you.
And that meaning you don't understand "how one gets the idea" was widely used by popular writers on philosophy. Russell, Feuerbach, Hume, Huxley.
Wouldn't it be funny to question on how incorrect they were because they did not have the foresight to do a relecture of the word an notice how wrong they were?
On the subject of agnosticism, things got even funnier, where some questioned the use by Neil.
He cited Huxley. Who created the word agnosticism. With the purpose as cited.
I posted Huxley's text a few pages back.
But see, I don't reject the new concepts for the words you guys propose. What I reject is your rejection of the prior and original concepts.
Even worst, qualifying it as wrong because of some ignorant (not derrogatory) reread.
But it seems even defending this new concept has a great value with the second part apparently clarifies a lot to me, but I may be reading you entirely wrong.
The best answer I can think of is societal pressures. The reality of the situation is that there's a lot of hostility between theists and atheists because it's such a fundamental disagreement with a large potential impact on a great number of lives. Some people have a strong aversion to this hostility and wanted nothing more than to distance themselves from either side. Though in reality it is impossible to be neither an atheist nor a theist, they proceeded to attempt to create a way to escape this reality. In walks so-called "Agnosticism," the perfect happy land where you don't have to commit to anything and never have to admit whether or not you believe in a god or gods. This preference of classification becomes popular because people see it as a way to dodge any religious argument and somehow wedges itself between theism and atheism. But wait, this is nonsense! By the established definition, anyone claiming not to be a theist instantly becomes an atheist, whether they like it or not. In fact, agnosticism by definition has no affiliation with belief in a deity at all, and is merely a statement of whether you think something is knowable and can be applied to any number of concepts. That's not going to stop the "Agnostics" from outright denying this, because leaving their constructed safe zone is potential social suicide. It's far easier to say things like "I used to be an atheist, but I realized they were all rude and I want nothing to do with them" than it is to admit that they truly do not believe in a god.
Enter personalities with celebrity status such as Sagan or Tyson. Their desire to avoid upsetting anyone is possibly greater than that of anyone else, because there's no benefit to be found in alienating a part of your audience when your goal is to bring science to everyone. It serves no purpose to attempt to explain that atheism alone doesn't claim absolute knowledge against a god or become equivalent to anti-theism, because then they're just going to upset all of the angry theists who have an issue with atheists because their religion teaches them atheism is morally wrong. The path of least resistance is to join the Agnostic group, regardless of whether it is a legitimate position on belief. Then only the tiniest number out of the potential millions of viewers will be upset because calling yourself agnostic is so common at this point that the majority of the population doesn't even realize that it isn't a legitimate position on belief.
Then you get the masses of people coming into this thread saying things like "totally agree, agnosticism is best, all atheists are annoying" and so forth because of how easily perpetuated the generalizations are when respected members of society adhere to them. By popularizing this false concept of agnosticism, they're effectively changing the definition of atheism primarily for the gain of people who attempt to avoid taking sides or participating in debates or discussions.
Earlier in the thread, someone said Tyson's response is the "let it be" answer. I disagree. The "let it be" answer is actually saying let it be. It's entirely acceptable not to answer a question for the sake of protecting your image. What's not acceptable is joining a group whose solution to the debate is to turn everyone willing to hold a stance into a stereotype characterized as assholes.
I'm pretty sure that's what happened.
It appears to me that
Atheism must have a strong sense and be as broad as possible, so 1) It characterizes itself, and 2) It isn't perceived as the effort of few.
But why? It is engaging in a battle against social perception it seems.
Which produces one interesting line of thought to me.
Does
self-labeled atheists want Atheism to be something to show it is nothing because a fraction of the populace perceives it as 'something' when it is actually nothing?
Seems a bit convoluted.
Now this is one huge assumption/hypothesis: Do most of those atheists come from a limitating/opressing/uncooperative religious background? Which most likely presents itself later as a deterrant of well being due to one simple belief (which tends to govern good part of those lives, yet isn't much part of their lives at all)?
A side assumption to that: Being part of something that is supposedly governed by reason surely would make me comfortable as if I advanced in that topic that apparently constructs me.
So I can see their point.
If you confront the people, the institution still stands. If you confront the institution it angers the people. Sad to those who have to feel that pressure on their shoulders.
But if I said I carry the same, or care to carry,
I'd be lying.
