Is atheism automatically nihilism?

Maybe your Hitchens is not this person?
[video=youtube;MJ2LehsA1dk]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MJ2LehsA1dk[/video]

Hitchens is all about negativeness he has nothing positive to solution to the problems we face. His negativeness is his career it is his profession his business his livelihood it is what makes him rich.

 

No, that's the right one. Thank you for the wonderfully anti-nihilistic video. I love hearing people like Hitchens challenge the anti-humanistic attitudes of those who champion "theocracy" and show "contempt for the things of this world." He is explicitly fighting against the "cult of death." I don't know how any anti-nihilistic person could object to what Hitchens says in this video. Did you watch it?

 

What atheist ever said life is meaningless or just an accident?

 

I don't bash atheists, I simply disagree. I used to be close to nihilism and thinking life makes no sense. Now I find it a dark place. I converted, I'm glad.
Anyway, atheism doesn't necessarily mean nihilism, but many atheists are nihilists and believe life is meaningless. Still, it doesn't mean they want to kill or have no morals. They do have morals and don't want an evil world, they simply don't believe that God created us and that absolute morals exist and that life has a meaning etc.

 

It's not "life is meaningless." It's "Life has no inherent meaning other than what we make for ourselves."

In other words, we weren't put here on Earth for a Purpose. That doesn't mean we can't find our own purpose(s).

Children matter because we love them and want a good life for them. So we work to give them the skills and tools they need to succeed, and work to make the world a good place for them to live in.

It seems to me that some believers are terrified of living in a world that doesn't have some authoritarian external force imposing rules and goals. Fine if that's what they need, but that doesn't mean we NEED some authoritarian external force in order to have order, civilization, goals, and purpose.

 

Did the existence of religion prevent Dahmer from doing what he did?

You take the mentally ill and ask what motivates them as a question of philosophy. It's a nonstarter of a question. Crazy people are crazy.

 

There was a woman near here who shot her son at a gun range to ensure that he would go to heaven. She considered her act a sin, and believed it would condemn her to Hell, but she was willing to go the Hell in order to save her son; she didn't want to risk him growing older and living a life of sin. Perhaps the most disturbing part was that many of my (at the time) fellow Christians and I had a difficult time with this issue. All this time we had been preaching self-sacrifice and the praiseworthiness of laying down your life for your fellow man . . . and here was a woman who made an ultimate sacrifice. What incentive is there for someone like her to not do what she did? Assuming that the ultimate incentive is the afterlife, and assuming the same religion that teaches this afterlife teaches the value of self-sacrifice, it would seem as though she did the right thing -- again, that assume such incentives are all that matter.

 

Agnostic = Lack Knowledge of a Deities Existing
Atheist = Lacks Belief of Deities

So I lack knowledge of deities existing and don't believe they exist. Agnostic Theists believe in some higher power or powers but lack knowledge so they don't define the nature of said beings.

I'm never likely to be a Christian or part of any sect but am open to proof of supernatural forces which would perhaps make me a theist just I haven't seen such proof compelling enough to change my position.

 

Clearly that woman has some mental issue and as good Christians we need to consul her and help her that is why in all Christian congregations and churches there are counselors.

 

I'd say that's not true, because like every animal we have an embedded biological purpose - so no we can't "make it" for ourselves because purpose is inherent in our biology and not up to individual interpretation on the most fundamental level.

Nature put us here with a biological purpose in mind shared by every member of our species on the most fundamental, sub-rational level.

Everything we do is a means to this end - however some means are more effective than others.

What if we don't? Jared Fogle obviously didn't - so if life is meaningless then why shouldn't he exploit children if that's what he "wants" to do?

Plus you can't brush all bad actions off as "insanity" as opposed to just pre-meditated disregard for life.

You don't have to be a "believer" - because biology of humans and animals shows an innate and sub-rational sense of purpose and reason for existence.

No need to have an "authoritarian" sense of purpose - the authoritarian, anti-science views of God are pretty ignorant. Most evidence I see shows that purpose is an inherent part of nature itself, rather than some magical external force acting contrary to it.

But if people believe that there is no purpose, or that purpose is simply "relative" when biology shows that it's not then what incentive is there to aspire to do anything useful, beyond superficial whims?

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Wouldn't even say "crazy" so much as just nihilistic.

Not all nihilists may be bad people, but I think that all bad people are nihilists.