What are your thoughts on Atheism?

[Conscentia]

I've got more thoughts on religion than atheism.

Then share 'em

How about no? It would be off-topic.

[Dyakovo]

I've got more thoughts on religion than atheism.

Then share 'em

Preferably in a thread called "thought on religion".

[Willy Brandt]

I have no strong opinion of it. I consider myself an agnostic-atheist, but I consider atheism to be lack of a belief. And, because I view it as a lack of a belief, I lack a real opinion on it.

[Harpers Ferry]

I've got no problem with atheists as long as they've got no problem with me being a Christian.

I got not problem with you being Christian as long as you do not try to legislate your Christianity.

Seconded.

[Creepoc Infinite]

Then share 'em

Preferably in a thread called "thought on religion".

I'll make one if you want

[Servica]

Religion goes like this:
From the moment your infantile brain begins to search for meaning, it is fed meaning via the values that your society, hence your family, go by. If you live in a society predominantly filled to the brim with adherents of a religion, then it's really safe to say that it should meet the values that you have been raised with. You see, it's not the religion that's good for you. It's the values that are good for you that are good for the religion. Whether it screws you over or not.

[Potenco]

I guess I'm an atheist in that I am decidedly not a theist and don't believe in a creator god or any singular deities. I would be lying however if I didn't have mystical experiences and do have a spiritual affinity to the idea of an actual reality beneath our bombarding senses and desires

[Janshah]

I feel that atheism is a bridge too far. To not go along in believing in things that are by definition unknowable and unprovable is one thing. To elevate the equally unprovable conviction that these things must not exist into a belief of its own seems to overshoot the whole point of not wanting to believe in something that cannot be proven.

[Dyakovo]

I feel that atheism is a bridge too far. To not go along in believing in things that are by definition unknowable and unprovable is one thing. To elevate the equally unprovable conviction that these things must not exist into a belief of its own seems to overshoot the whole point of not wanting to believe in something that cannot be proven.

Atheim is the lack of belief in a deity or deities, not the belief in a lack.

[Janshah]

I feel that atheism is a bridge too far. To not go along in believing in things that are by definition unknowable and unprovable is one thing. To elevate the equally unprovable conviction that these things must not exist into a belief of its own seems to overshoot the whole point of not wanting to believe in something that cannot be proven.

Atheim is the lack of belief in a deity or deities, not the belief in a lack.

After reading your comment, I checked the dictionary in my cabinet, and then three online dictionary resources. All seem to agree that atheism is the belief that no god exists, but this may just be how things translate. How would you say that atheism relates to agnosticism?

[The Alma Mater]

Atheim is the lack of belief in a deity or deities, not the belief in a lack.

After reading your comment, I checked the dictionary in my cabinet, and then three online dictionary resources. All seem to agree that atheism is the belief that no god exists, but this may just be how things translate. How would you say that atheism relates to agnosticism?

Agnosticism is a position on knowledge. Atheism is a position on belief.

[Hetmarch]

*tips fedora*

[Dyakovo]

Atheim is the lack of belief in a deity or deities, not the belief in a lack.

After reading your comment, I checked the dictionary in my cabinet, and then three online dictionary resources. All seem to agree that atheism is the belief that no god exists¹, but this may just be how things translate. How would you say that atheism relates to agnosticism?²

1: Your dictionaries are wrong.
2: It doesn't. Atheism is a statement about belief, agnosticism is a statement about knowledge.

[Sociobiology]

After reading your comment, I checked the dictionary in my cabinet, and then three online dictionary resources. All seem to agree that atheism is the belief that no god exists, but this may just be how things translate. How would you say that atheism relates to agnosticism?

Agnosticism is a position on knowledge. Atheism is a position on belief.

[Janshah]

Ah, thank you, I think I understand better now. I was thrown by the difference between what the quotation below describes as the difference between the popular and the strict sense interpretation of the term.

Although I still do find the notion of "disbelieving in (a) God" hard to tell apart from the notion of "believing there is not (a) God", because if atheism rejects both the belief in a God and does not necessary align with the concept of not being able to know whether there is a God, I am unsure what other position is left to the atheist except certainty that there is no God? Which loops back into holding an unproven statement to be true, and therefore requires belief.

EDIT: Thank you Dyakovo for that wonderful diagram, the positions of weak and strong atheism were the final point I was missing. I think I can now safely say I fully agree with you.

In Edward Craig. Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy "In the popular sense, an agnostic is someone who neither believes nor disbelieves in God, whereas an atheist disbelieves in God. In the strict sense, however, agnosticism is the view that human reason is incapable of providing sufficient rational grounds to justify either the belief that God exists or the belief that God does not exist. In so far as one holds that our beliefs are rational only if they are sufficiently supported by human reason, the person who accepts the philosophical position of agnosticism will hold that neither the belief that God exists nor the belief that God does not exist is rational."

[Condunum]

When did you acquire this taste for the exotic and rare?

It can spice up any healthy marriage.

Hold up, are you suggesting atheism and religion are married?

[Lutvikkia]

Quite honestly I don't believe atheism exists.....get it LOL

[Creepoc Infinite]

Quite honestly I don't believe atheism exists.....get it LOL

Yes hahahaha

[Ashmoria]

I feel that atheism is a bridge too far. To not go along in believing in things that are by definition unknowable and unprovable is one thing. To elevate the equally unprovable conviction that these things must not exist into a belief of its own seems to overshoot the whole point of not wanting to believe in something that cannot be proven.

I don't see why there is any problem in not believing things that are unknowable and unprovable.

[Seshephe]

If you are one, what convinced you to be atheist?

There is no single reason that I consider myself an Atheist because there are so many independent lines of reasoning and evidence that leads me to make the conclusion that

1) There's no concept of God that is both meaningful and likely to be true or exist. You could conceivable define God in such a way that I believe in God. For example, many people say that "God is love" or "God is nature". However, in my opinion that just muddles the issue. If God is nature, just call it Nature. Using the word God only serves to confuse the issue. If God is the prime mover, why can't the universe (some natural, non conscious, process) be the prime mover? Why look at a mystery and claim that you have the answer when clearly you don't. Just because we don't know the answer, that doesn't make the cop-out "magic man done it" any more likely.

2) Many traditional concepts of God are, in my opinion, possible to actually disprove using the evidence at hand. The earth isn't 6000 years old etc. so we can say for sure (as sure as you can ever be of anything) that the God of the Old Testament, if you read the text literally, does not exist. Likewise many concepts of God are logically inconsistent.

While there are many independent lines of evidence that leads me to conclude that something that can meaningfully be described as God almost certainly does not exist; there's one reason in particular that first made me seriously consider taking the stance of Atheism. That is that someone got me to answer a bunch of questions about what I believed about God and then methodically and very cleverly showed how I was rationalising away the cognitive dissonance that those beliefs created vis-a-vis my knowledge about the real world that was derived from secular sources such as scientific knowledge. This forced me to confront the fact that my knowledge about the real world was in conflict with many of my religious beliefs even if I thought that they weren't at all. Furthermore it was very obvious that by simply dropping the idea of God and the supernatural all of those rationalisations became unnecessary and the cognitive dissonance and intellectual dishonesty involved simply faded away.

[Sociobiology]

I feel that atheism is a bridge too far. To not go along in believing in things that are by definition unknowable and unprovable is one thing. To elevate the equally unprovable conviction that these things must not exist into a belief of its own seems to overshoot the whole point of not wanting to believe in something that cannot be proven.

I don't see why there is any problem in not believing things that are unknowable and unprovable.

because it is unknowable in much the same way it is unknowable why planes fly, we can never be 100% certain but we can get asymptotically close.

[Twilight Imperium]

I don't see why there is any problem in not believing things that are unknowable and unprovable.

because it is unknowable in much the same way it is unknowable why planes fly, we can never be 100% certain but we can get asymptotically close.

Er, there's plenty of people who know why planes fly. Aerodynamics are a thing, dawg.

Unless you're referring to the fact that we can never be 100% certain of a thing, in which case

[The Rich Port]

I don't see why there is any problem in not believing things that are unknowable and unprovable.

because it is unknowable in much the same way it is unknowable why planes fly, we can never be 100% certain but we can get asymptotically close.

I think Ashmoria was being sarcastic...

In reality, Janshah is confusing atheism with anti-theism.