Atheists delusional?

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Person X: “I don’t believe in God. I’m an atheist.”

Person Y: “Really? How do you explain the universe and the meaning of life or its purpose?”

Person X: “Let me tell you. I think/believe…”

It’s funny how atheists go out of their way to say there is no such thing as atheism.
 
To me it looks like this is largely a discussion on trying to agree on semantics. Based on the writings of Kory Stamper (dictionary editor, Merriam-Websters) and Amon Shea (dictionary editor, O.E.D.) I suspect agreement wont be achieved here.
 
Oh, it won’t. We all know that. That’s been true since the beginning of time on this issue.

It’s not really semantics, though. “Belief” by definition is “a view that something is true”.

Therefore, not believing, by definition, is a belief - and it’s not a pejorative. It just is.

It’s like believing you’re driving a car, or that Einstein was correct, or that you’re pregnant. It’s something one holds as true.
 
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This is the problem with living life by what the pulpit tells you. It teaches you what to think about other people and ignore what those other people are actually saying. You are pointing at everything else to hold your current understanding of what an atheist is, but when an atheist tells you what they are and think, you push back with these semantic arguments. You can have all the argument points in the world for using these words by these references. I really don’t care. I care about communicating ideas appropriately so that you can understand what I am trying to actually say. Just let me know what words you use for what I am trying to say and I’ll use those words to move the conversation forward.
 
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Pup7 said:
Person X: “I don’t believe in God. I’m an atheist.”

Person Y: “Really? How do you explain the universe and the meaning of life or its purpose?”

Person X: “Let me tell you. I think/believe…”

It’s funny how atheists go out of their way to say there is no such thing as atheism.
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This is accurate because their world view has nothing to do with their lack of belief in a deity. Just like your world view has nothing to do with your lack of belief in fairies.
Do you believe in Fairies?
No
Let me tell you about my world view of catholism, which has nothing to do with fairies and the non-existence of fairies does not factor into your moral conclusions of leading an ethical life or making moral decisions.
You don’t have a world view of A-Fairy-ism
 
The beliefs of an atheist regarding ‘the universe’ generally wouldn’t be a religious question at all. Religions by and large have creation stories attached to them but that doesn’t mean they’re connected always. An atheist may accept Big Bang cosmology as the current best scientifically supported explanation for the creation of the universe as we know it, but that isn’t because they’re an atheist, as of course many theists recognize the same scientific theories and have no trouble reconciling them.

I agree with @Russel_SA here, if people are telling you what their beliefs are, listen, and worry about labels later. The “belief” they’re generally holding is that there isn’t sufficient reason to believe in a God or gods, THAT is the “view that something is true” you’re referring to.
 
Dan123 said:
The beliefs of an atheist regarding ‘the universe’ generally wouldn’t be a religious question at all.
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No one said they were. As I don’t believe in young earth Creationism, I accept the Big Bang - as do most Catholics and a lot of other Christians. We’re not all Fundamentalist Baptists. I don’t believe you think that because you don’t believe in God. I think you believe that because it encompasses rational thought, because there’s evidence to support it. You know, Catholics think this stuff too. 🙂 We just think there was a God at the helm, that’s the basic difference.

But you believe the universe started somewhere, correct? You don’t need religion to explore that question, and I wouldn’t insinuate one would. I do, but not everyone does.

I’m not going to try and change your mind here, that’s not my purpose. I can’t, and that’s fine.
 
I was responding to your person X/Y conversation, perhaps I didn’t understand it. I’ll re-read the recent portions of this rather long thread.
 
Pup7 said:
It’s not really semantics, though. “Belief” by definition is “a view that something is true”.
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From what I’ve seen there’s mostly agreement on that. But there’s not agreement on when someone could be said to hold a belief or deriving or inferring a system of beliefs from a single belief.
 
ThinkingSapien said:
single belief.
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Single beliefs don’t form a construct for a person. That’s basic sociology. Single beliefs form the basis.

Ask an atheist where the universe came from and I bet they say the Big Bang (which is fine, so do I, with a caveat). Ask a Christian, and they might also tell you the Big Bang - which was caused by God.

Ask a Christian what the purpose of life is, and you will most likely get an answer that in some way relates to God’s purpose and plan. Ask an atheist, and your answer will be completely different.

If you really believe that a single belief doesn’t form the basis for a person’s perception, I can’t help that. But it doesn’t, because that’s impossible, And that’s the sociologist in me talking, not the Catholic.
 
Pup7 said:
Ask an atheist where the universe came from and I bet they say the Big Bang
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Some may, some may not. As I understand the Big Bang it is a model of an earlier state of the Universe and some of the transformations and interactions that energy and matter went through but it doesn’t address where all of that substance “came from.” You might also get an “I don’t know.”
Pup7 said:
If you really believe that a single belief doesn’t form the basis for a person’s perception, I can’t help that. But it doesn’t, because that’s impossible
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I think there are sets of presumptions and beliefs that people hold (some of which may be inconsistent with each other) that these grow as they construct their view of reality. Knowing that a person doesn’t have some belief among their network of beliefs might be enough to make some inferences about what else likely isn’t in their network of beliefs. It doesn’t tell much about what is there.

(this sounds a little bit like foundationalism v coherentism).
 
Pup7 said:
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Bradskii:
If you said that you don’t believe in any aspect of Hinduism or Jainism or Budhism then does that constitute a belief system on your part?
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Yes, it does. Because those denominations aren’t in my belief system as a Christian.
Bradskii said:
If it does then it appears that you have two. One belief system based on Christianty and one belief system based on the fact that you reject all other religious beliefs.
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No, because not believing in other religions are part of the Christian beliefs. Same way not believing in the Baptist beliefs are part of being a Catholic Christian.
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Then you have more belief systems than you can poke a stick at. You have a belief system that aliens haven’t abducted you. Another that unicorns don’t exist. Another that you were Vever Joan of Arc in a previous life.

It seems that everything that you don’t believe that is not concerned with your Christian beliefs is itself a belief system.
 
Bradskii said:
Then you have more belief systems than you can poke a stick at. You have a belief system that aliens haven’t abducted you. Another that unicorns don’t exist. Another that you were Vever Joan of Arc in a previous life.

It seems that everything that you don’t believe that is not concerned with your Christian beliefs is itself a belief system.
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No, it’s not. It’s laughable that you think that, though. It has NOTHING to do with my religion or anyone else’s. 😆😆 It’s how humans construct reality for themselves. You forcing my religious beliefs into this is great deflection, but it’s not true at all. Bending and twisting what I say because you think every single thing I think has to somehow corner back to my Catholic beliefs is ridiculous and a waste of time.

Ever study sociology in a serious way? Because all of this is straight out of social psych and symbolic interactionism. Totally academic.
 
Pup7 said:
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Bradskii:
Then you have more belief systems than you can poke a stick at. You have a belief system that aliens haven’t abducted you. Another that unicorns don’t exist. Another that you were Vever Joan of Arc in a previous life.

It seems that everything that you don’t believe that is not concerned with your Christian beliefs is itself a belief system.
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No, it’s not. It’s laughable that you think that, though. It has NOTHING to do with my religion or anyone else’s. 😆😆 It’s how humans construct reality for themselves. You forcing my religious beliefs into this is great deflection, but it’s not true at all. Bending and twisting what I say because you think every single thing I think has to somehow corner back to my Catholic beliefs is ridiculous and a waste of time.

Ever study sociology in a serious way? Because all of this is straight out of social psych and symbolic interactionism. Totally academic.
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I’m not sure how you are working this. If I suggest a non belief in Hinduism is a belief system according to how you define such you you reply that it relates to your belief in God and so is not.

If I then suggest that a non belief in something that doesn’t relates to your belief in God is a belief system according to how you define it, we again get a denial. For example, you not believing your neighbour has been resurrected is not a belief system. But if I deny that someone else has been resurrected, then that DOES become a belief system.

It seems that the only way you think one can have a single belief system is to believe in God.
 
It sounds like all that’s really being said is 'atheists have beliefs and thoughts other than just not believing in a god or gods." Which is of course true, as it would be for any person about any thing. When people say atheism is only the lack of belief in a deity, that doesn’t mean it’s the only belief the person has on any topic. The other ideas they may hold to be true (or not true) aren’t part of atheism. I guess I’m just missing the point being made. If someone said to you “I used to be vegetarian but now I’m Catholic” you’d probably spend a few moments processing that, because those are entirely different things which have nothing to do with each other.
 
Exactly. Dave is an atheist. Tell me what he believes about aliens, Budhism, the paranormal, gun control, homosexuality, abortion, politics, contraception, marriage, stem cell research, justified war, global warming, legality of drugs, the death sentence and light beer.

But hey, he doesn’t believe in God so where does he develop all these views! Whatever they are they aren’t based in an ultimate morality so why would we even bother asking him. His views are nothing more than his personal preferences.

Well, duh.
 
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Dan123 said:
If someone said to you “I used to be vegetarian but now I’m Catholic” you’d probably spend a few moments processing that,
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Hitler was a vegetarian and he was a Catholic. Spend a few minutes trying to process that.

(Joking, of course)🤣
 
We need a definition of Catholic. Is it someone who self identifies as Catholic or does one need to fulfill a certain criteria.
 
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