Atheism is sometimes divided into weak and strong forms. Weak atheism can be described as an absence of belief in any god, while strong atheism positively affirms a belief that there is no god. This is related to the distinction between agnostic and gnostic atheism, where agnostic atheism claims no knowledge about the existence of god and gnostic atheism claims knowledge of the nonexistence of god.

A hypothetical person who has never heard of religion or the concept of god could be described as a weak atheist. In the same way, it could be said that non-human animals are weak atheists. It is sometimes argued that a theist is an atheist with respect to all gods except the one(s) they believe in; this would be a form of strong atheism. Even agnostics are generally “selectively strong atheists” in this sense of outright denying the existence of figures such as Zeus and Odin.

What I’m coining as “medium-strength atheism” is weak in general, but strong with respect to all specific gods of any established religion. While I normally consider myself to be an agnostic atheist, I think medium-strength atheist is more accurate. I am not agnostic towards the Abrahamic God, but rather believe there are good reasons not to believe such a god exists, and similarly for every other god claim I have ever heard.