Is Atheism a religion?

[zootjeff]

What do people think? If you’re an Atheist, does that mean your religion is Atheism? Since you need faith to believe in God, do you also need faith to believe in the absence of God? You’re not going to prove it with infallible evidence either way. And by “infallible evidence” I mean something that unquestionably would leave no doubt in everyone’s mind one way or the other. And don’t try to argue “Just read the bible and you will believe in God,” because the Atheists say the exact thing has the opposite effect.

I would argue Atheism classifies as a religion.

I would also argue that Agnostics truly have no religion.

What are your thoughts?

 

[AmISearching]

I think I would agree… which is why I object to Secular Humanism being taught in public schools when they won’t allow anything remotely Christian… Its not a matter of keeping religion out, its turned into a matter of what religion they’re keeping out…

It all depends on your definition of religion - to me - religion and worldviews are very much intertwined, and I would argue that agnosticism is probably to me a religion too because it is a worldview, a way of looking at the world… Now if you define it a different way? then? maybe not… but I would argue that one can’t be neutral and that everyone has a “religion” of some sort, even if its an adversion to “religion”

 

[AnAtheist]

It is a matter of definition. The common definition of religion is something like “believing in and worshipping a diving being or beings”. With that definition atheism is no religion.

If you say a religion is anything, that requires belief of something without “infallible evidence” - well, then mathematics is a religion too.

Agnostics are special I guess, I can think of at least four different types of agnostics. But agnostics rejecting religion do that for the very same reasons as atheists, I don’t see a difference there. The line between agnosticsm and atheism is slim and blurry anyway.

 

[zootjeff]

AnAtheist:

Agnostics are special I guess, I can think of at least four different types of agnostics. But agnostics rejecting religion do that for the very same reasons as atheists, I don’t see a difference there. The line between agnosticsm and atheism is slim and blurry anyway.

I guess I have experienced atheists that go around and try to convert people to atheism, they are out to convince people there is no God, they go to Atheist meetings to talk with other atheists how religion is bunk. In essance they are “practicing” atheism.

Agnostics however typically don’t try to convince people there is No God, I guess they could try to convince people that “You Don’t Know” and practice that as much as the Atheists practice the “There is None”.

I guess your right, how do you define religion, there are many aspects.

I knew a guy who was raised fundamentalist and then converted to Atheism later in life. He was a very quiet Christian, but then when he became an Atheist, he went around trying to show everyone how much of an atheist he was. He also never cussed before as a Christian, then as an Atheist he started cussing all the time. I was always agnostic around him but I think I actually liked him better as a Christian because he was more pleasant and didn’t try to be an advocate. He also had the values that I valued. It was really weird because in High School I went around trying to convert people to Atheism and found I always hit a brick wall, just like the christians trying to convert me did. I finally gave up and said, you know, some people get happiness out of religion, and as long as they are not shoving it down my throat, that’s ok.

-Jeff

 

[AnAtheist]

zootjeff:

I knew a guy who was raised fundamentalist and then converted to Atheism later in life. He was a very quiet Christian, but then when he became an Atheist, he went around trying to show everyone how much of an atheist he was.

“Converted to atheism”, that sounds funny.
Anyway, converts are often the more fanatic as born belivers.

 

[Gilbert_Keith]

zootjeff

Agnostics however typically don’t try to convince people there is No God, I guess they could try to convince people that “You Don’t Know” and practice that as much as the Atheists practice the “There is None”.

I’m not so sure about that. Bertrand Russell called himself an agnostic. So did Clarence Darrow. Read Russell’s “Why I Am Not a Christian” and you will get the very definite impression that Russell is trying to convince people there is no God. The same goes for the seconf half of Darrow’s autobiography.

As AnAtheist says, the line between agnostic and atheist is blurry indeed.

Yes, I believe atheism is a religion. It worships Nogod, whose existence it can never prove, and so must be taken on faith alone.
It has its own missionaries and its own “saints” … Nietzsche, Mencken, etc. To the extent that it is hard atheism, it even has its own principle of infallibility as to the existence of Nogod… though ironically, with respect to morals, it preaches all kinds of relativism. It also has its councils … or synods … the American Atheist Society, the ACLU, the largest part of the scientific community, much of the liberal media and academia, the lion’s share of the entertainment industry which routinely mocks and cusses religion, and a fair share of the American legal system … including judges (read bishops) eager to extirpate (anathematize) all signs of religion from public life.

 

[Chris_LaRock]

Protestant author Ray Comfort stated the following in his book entitled ‘God doesn’t believe in atheists’:

“It take more faith to be an atheist than it does to believe in God.”

It makes sense to me. With all of the obvious proof around us to indicate intelligent design, how could anyone deny the existance of God?

 

[Genesis315]

Chris LaRock:

Protestant author Ray Comfort stated the following in his book entitled ‘God doesn’t believe in atheists’:

“It take more faith to be an atheist than it does to believe in God.”

It makes sense to me. With all of the obvious proof around us to indicate intelligent design, how could anyone deny the existance of God?

They believe in an everlasting coincidence far more miraculous than any miracle

 

[Chris_LaRock]

Like thinking that puzzle peices, when randomally dropped onto the floor, will form a completed puzzle just by chance.

 

[Shadowcry]

It could happen…

 

[Chris_LaRock]

Shadowcry:

It could happen…

Really???

 

[AnAtheist]

Chris LaRock:

Like thinking that puzzle peices, when randomally dropped onto the floor, will form a completed puzzle just by chance.

It is more like you throw the puzzle pieces several times, and with each throw you leave the roughly fitting peices on the floor (selection). After only a few throws you are able to udentify the picture. It will not be perfect, but identifiable.
And that’s exactly how life looks like, not perfect but working. The so-called intelligent design is not that intelligent at all. The eye e.g., why do I need glasses to see, if it is designed? (Oops, I forgot, it was Adam’s sin that caused myopia. :whacky: )

 

[Shlemele]

I guess I have a problem with a belief system that has you believing in direct contradiction. You have the theory of spontaneous generation (life can’t come from non-living matter) and then the theory that life started from a bolt of lightening hitting a puddle of amino-acids… I distinctly remember reading both theories in the same text book. If someone can explain this to be I’d be appreciative cause to me it’s a glaring problem if you are an atheist.

 

[abcdefg]

AnAtheist:

It is a matter of definition. The common definition of religion is something like “believing in and worshipping a diving being or beings”. With that definition atheism is no religion.

religion is one’s “understanding of God/gods”.
the sentence “what’s your religion” can be replaced by “what’s your understanding of God/gods” However it can’t be properly replaced using the defination in AnAtheist’s post.

AnAtheist:

If you say a religion is anything, that requires belief of something without “infallible evidence” - well, then mathematics is a religion too.

That’s roughly the defination of faith in general. my religious faith is Catholicism. And my musical “faith” is Mozart.

 

[AnAtheist]

Shlemele:

I guess I have a problem with a belief system that has you believing in direct contradiction. You have the theory of spontaneous generation (life can’t come from non-living matter) and then the theory that life started from a bolt of lightening hitting a puddle of amino-acids… I distinctly remember reading both theories in the same text book. If someone can explain this to be I’d be appreciative cause to me it’s a glaring problem if you are an atheist.

Living and non-living matter is indistinguishable. There is nothing special about organic matter except the arrangement of its atoms. No extra or super-natural substance is necessary to produce life. Therefore life can come from non-living matter.

 

[abcdefg]

abcdefg:

religion is one’s “understanding of God/gods”.
the sentence “what’s your religion” can be replaced by “what’s your understanding of God/gods”

For atheists the answer is “my understanding is there’s no God/gods” instead of “my understanding is none”

 

[Shlemele]

AnAtheist:

No extra or super-natural substance is necessary to produce life. Therefore life can come from non-living matter.

Not according to scientific principals, to make this claim you must disprove the experament that shows life can come from non-living matter. Since nobody has shown that life can come from non-living matter we go with the simplest answer (occam’s razor) that life must come from life.

 

[AnAtheist]

Shlemele:

Not according to scientific principals, to make this claim you must disprove the experament that shows life can come from non-living matter. Since nobody has shown that life can come from non-living matter we go with the simplest answer (occam’s razor) that life must come from life.

Wait,

1. We know, that the material (carbon, oxyde, nitrogen, etc.) in living matter is by no means different from the material in non-living matter.
2. Assuming living matter is somewhat different from normal matter, is not the simplest answer, because of that very difference. Which has not been found so far. Therefore Occham’s Razor leads to “life can come from non-living matter”.

 

[Shlemele]

Do you imply that just because I am made partially of carbon, just as my desk is we are somehow the same? Come on, my desk is not self aware, it can’t make another desk, to be blunt, it’s not alive. I however am. Your argument tends to be a little odd, you might as well say “God can’t exist because we are all made of protons, neutrons, and electrons”. What we are made out of isn’t so important as how we are arranged. When you see the complexity of the cell and the clockwork of biology I don’t understand how you can see that as only it’s elemental parts. It’s akin to looking at Michelangelo’s David and saying it’s a nice rock. Yes it is a rock but it didn’t come out of the ground as art. It was arranged to be more than just a slab of marble. The level of complexity needed just to sustain the processes of life are so complex I don’t see how a rational mind could dismiss them.

 

[AnAtheist]

Shlemele:

What we are made out of isn’t so important as how we are arranged.

Yes, that’s right. But the material is still the same. There is no difference between a carbon atom in your desk and one in your body. Just the arrangement is different, and yes that’s what matters. The quality “life” is coded in the arrangement, there is no special livliness or life-atoms.
In your body are enough atoms not coming from an organic source. Salt does not live, yet your body uses Natrium-atoms from the salt you have eaten.

It’s akin to looking at Michelangelo’s David and saying it’s a nice rock. Yes it is a rock but it didn’t come out of the ground as art. It was arranged to be more than just a slab of marble. The level of complexity needed just to sustain the processes of life are so complex I don’t see how a rational mind could dismiss them.

Ah, now that’s the real question. Is the arrangement really so complex, that there is only one possible explanation for it, namely a designer?