Good idea, doing the same now. I thought this would be an intellectual conversation about religion, how wrong I was...
It was hijacked by Vod's constant Ad Hominems.
Dank's points about nothingness actually seemed logically sound. If 'X' can't be conceptualised, then it's less than an empty set. But even if the Latin character X doesn't figuratively represent something else like a number, then the literal image is still there. For 'X' to be completely nothing, it would have to be erased from that area of the screen and also forgotten.
Now, if instead of 'X' we have 'atheism', and it figuratively represents a bunch of concepts like: "I have no concept of a god", we could spend all day breaking those down:
I = ...
have = ...
no = ...
concept = ...
of = ...
a = ...
god = ...
So let's just focus on 2 of them:
no = nothing, zero amount of,
god = [empty place-holder for whatever 'god' is]
For most people above the age of say 6, they've heard at least some story to fill in the blank, e.g.: that god created the universe and everything in it. So that definition of atheism becomes self-contradictory and in that sense Dank's argument is basically correct.
But most people seem to have other definitions of atheism, like: "I've heard the stories about your gods, but I don't believe in them. God isn't real to me." And so it becomes a statement about the nature of reality -- a statement of belief. It seems that no matter how it might be worded as a non-belief, it's always a positive statement of some kind.
But it's not about having no concept of God, it's about not having a belief. That's not just knowing a bunch of stories I heard at school. It's believing in the power they represent and that, physically or not, God exists. I get your point that God can equal a number of things, but I believe in free choice. That doesn't get categorised as God to me.
My son hasn't been baptized, because I wanted him to choose when he is older, which was the same thing that was given to me; Choice. If he chooses to have a relationship with a God, then I will support him and help him in following his chosen path, but won't force it upon him. As I said before Zealous Atheism is practically the same as Christian conversion.