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Me and my religious friend were having a discussion on religion. (no it wasn't bashing or debating) She asked me if i was an ignostic because I mentioned that before. It means that they don't choose to be atheist/theist until there's a true defintion for God or whatever.

I told my friend I was an agnostic atheist.
That I don't think humans have the knowledge to know if there is a supernatural. Although I don't know, I choose to not believe in one (at least I don't believe in the abrahamic god) I depise the Christian/Jewish/Muslim God! (well not really despise lol)

I think the word "God" could be anything. But God itself, is what I dont' believe in.

I told them that there could be a God (i don't believe it though) and if there is a God then he would leave us alone and let us govern ourselves (so i would probably have a deist mind if i did believe in a creator)

She thinks I'm not an atheist
because I'm acknowledging there could be something out there.
But apparantly she doesn't know that tere are different types of atheists
just like there are different types of christians.
I think I listed everything.

QUESTION: Am I CONTRADICTING MYSELF?

Precisely. I am an agnostic atheist as well; I certainly will admit that it is possible that there are gods... I simply lack belief in them because I lack convincing evidence for their existence.

please define epistemological and ontological for me.
well aren't atheist skeptical about holy texts?
Agnostic is lack of knowledge
Just like agnostic and atheist and christians there are different types.
Some atheist lack the belief in god
some atheist don't believe in GOD's EXISTENCE at all.

I think the term you're looking for is "weak atheism". I'm personally a weak atheist, which means that I don't believe in a deity, but I do accept that it is possible. (No matter how unlikely)

Most atheists are actually weak atheists, including such prominent atheists as Richard Dawkins and Bertrand Russell. Strong atheism, the belief that there is absolutely no deity, is only a little bit less reliant on faith than typical theism, in my opinion. Unfortunately, many theists seem to believe that we're all faithful strong atheists.

I personally consider "agnostic atheism" to take a bigger step toward agnosticism than weak atheism, in that an agnostic atheist does not believe in a God, but openly admits that there's no way to really define what "God" is or to know it it exists. It's comparable to agnostic theism, which says the same thing but believes that God does exist.

yeah once you mentioned religion ... they get all defensive
and think i'm trying to start a debate
which is funny because i don't want a debate

i like diversity among my friends but there are just some topics that shouldnt' be mentioned.

Epistemology - a branch of philosophy that investigates the origin, nature, methods, and limits of human knowledge.
Ontology - the branch of metaphysics that studies the nature of existence or being as such.
Metaphysics - the branch of philosophy that treats of first principles, includes ontology and cosmology, and is intimately connected with epistemology.

The terms weren't used correctly.

I think Raticiel meant that Agnosticism is more empirical in approach. In other words, there must be observable proof in order to rationally believe in god. I have no idea what was meant by the comparison of Theism and Ontology.

I consider myself an Agnostic Atheist. I live my life assuming there is no God, but understand that I could very well be wrong in this belief. Furthermore, Agnostic Theists exist as well, and as those who believe in some form of God, but understand as well that there's no way to know this for sure. But, I guess I'm just repeated three or so posters explaining that. XD

Epistemology is the theory of learning (knowledge, from greek's "episteme") and ontology is the theory of a being (other often used word is metaphysics), I'm only translating it from polish, I'm still learning technical words in english language wink check google for better info.
Agnosticism is the position grown from skepticism, it says "we can't obtain any (mostly objective) knowledge", we're not supposed to, or the object we want to know is impossible to know.
Skepticism says: we can't *now*, but perhaps some day we can. Maybe if our method is better, maybe it's not because we can't but the object is impossible to know. There are many variations of skepticism.
And atheism is what it is: there is no god.
Look at the difference: agnosticism and skepticism are about gaining knowledge. Atheism is about the existence of the object, not about our ability to know it.
If you say you're an atheist, you say there is no god, however you can doubt your ability to judge, but then you can't really call yourself atheist in full sense, because there can't be something like "weak atheism". Yes is yes, no is no, as long as you don't want to be a "maybetheist".
It's a tough decision, I have to admit. I know how you may feel, you clearly see that it's pretty obvious that there's no god, or no supernatural beings, but you're still not sure, because you think maybe, just maybe... The limits of human reason are at fault here.
I hope I said that quite "normally", the limits of my english like to show up at times like this, but it's a lame excuse cool

I understand what you want to say, but theism/atheism are philosophical standpoints, not matters of belief. Belief is a belief, an assertion or something of this kind, and it's rationality varies, it's rational probably only for practical purposes, and most often it's considered irrational - well, that's what faith is all about: you say something is true even if you can't give the proof. However in philosophy you need more than beliefs, you need arguments. Many famous thinkers spent their lives and countless piles of paper on proving their standpoints with tons of arguments, on both sides.

Actually, after answering all these posts all I can say this is obviously just a discussion about terms, words. There are official meanings for these terms, however there are so many various theories and trying to describe, let's say, skepticism is hard if there's no example, and if there is - there are so many countering examples. All I can recommend is to check original works of various theoreticians instead of trying to define this stuff. It's most probably impossible anyway mrgreen
EDIT: or use trusted sources, but still there's no good criteria which are better. That's why I love philosophy: more questions than answers (if any!) and lots of freedom in interpretation - historical bearings of all these terms are what one should always keep in mind.