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These ''active'' and ''passive'' senses are ''logically'' equivalent because they both equate to '''"God exists = False"''', but they are ''pragmatically'' distinct, because denying the existence of ''X'', and ''X'' being amongst the things one has never considered the existence of, are different psychological states. The argument for them being different psychological states is that if "''X'' being amongst the things one has never considered the existence of" were psychologically equivalent to the denial of the existence of ''X'', then one would have to hold an infinite number of beliefs in the non-existence of all logically possible ''X''s, but since the human mind is finite, this cannot be the case.

These ''active'' and ''passive'' senses are ''logically'' equivalent because they both equate to '''"God exists = False"''', but they are ''pragmatically'' distinct, because denying the existence of ''X'', and ''X'' being amongst the things one has never considered the existence of, are different psychological states. The argument for them being different psychological states is that if "''X'' being amongst the things one has never considered the existence of" were psychologically equivalent to the denial of the existence of ''X'', then one would have to hold an infinite number of beliefs in the non-existence of all logically possible ''X''s, but since the human mind is finite, this cannot be the case.

Nevertheless, this distinction is a rhetorical device only, and does not succeed in shifting any burden of proof. This is because not only is the issue of burden of proof still, strictly-speaking, independent of the issue of the sense in which the term "atheism" is used, but it is impossible even to identify oneself as an atheist in the ''passive'' sense described above. Once one has considered the question of the existence of God (which one must do in order to describe ''oneself'' as an atheist), to be an atheist one must actively deny the existence of God. This is because a so-called passive atheist would be unable to describe the following sentence as either true or false: "God exists." To answer "True" is theism, to answer "False" is active atheism, and to answer "Neither" is not atheism at all, but agnosticism, and the option of ignoring the question is lost by entering the debate at all.

Nevertheless, this distinction is a rhetorical device only, and does not succeed in shifting any burden of proof. This is because not only is the issue of burden of proof still, strictly-speaking, independent of the issue of the sense in which the term "atheism" is used, but it is impossible even to identify oneself as an atheist in the ''passive'' sense described above. Once one has considered the question of the existence of God (which one must do in order to describe ''oneself'' as an atheist), to be an atheist one must actively deny the existence of God. This is because, presuming agreement on the definition of God, a so-called passive atheist would be unable to describe the following sentence as either true or false: "God exists." To answer "True" is theism, to answer "False" is active atheism, and to answer "Neither" is not atheism at all, but agnosticism, and the option of ignoring the question is lost by entering the debate at all.

== Atheist morality ==

== Atheist morality ==