Thread: Atheism as Rebellion?

So yeah, I am less and less of an agnostic atheist everyday and more and more into plain agnosticism. However that certainly does not require me to abandon all logic and reason, nor does it mean that I will automatically side with the same old theistic arguments against atheism that make little or no sense. In fact, if a person follows my posts I still highly critical of fallacious arguments while much more "don't care" about most the religion threads.

Now for the reason of the thread, silly arguments about atheism. These are mindlessly repeated again and again and again, obviously without thought otherwise someone would stop and think "wait.... this doesn't make sense....". Atheism is not that hard to understand. In fact I believe it is one of the easiest beliefs to understand, it is very simple, straight forward, and to the point.

1. Atheism is not a religion. Period. You can make yourself feel good by saying that, but you simply look foolish. Atheism is the belief that is not a god because the evidence is not present. Simple. It would be unreasonable to say "there is not a god, period", note how that is far removed from "I do not believe in god because I do not see evidence to believe so". Atheism is to religion as not collecting stamps is a hobby. But I suppose you can continue telling other people what they believe if you like to do so, it just doesn't look good on your debating skills.

2. Atheism is a mockery and rebellion against god. Seriously? You think that most atheists are rebelling against god with what would seem to be malicious intent? For what reason? So they can suffer for all eternity? Seriously? Do you see how little sense this makes? Threatening an atheist with the punish of god is like threatening an adult with Santa Claus.
If they do not believe, they are not going to take it seriously. Just because someone doesn't agree with you does not mean that their acts are "rebellion" or a part of some silly conspiracy against your beliefs.

3. There are no atheists in fox holes. Eh... meaningless? The argument does not make an argument in favor of the existence of god. It makes an argument about what human beings do in high stress situations. Just because a person is stressed does not mean that god exists, nor does it make any tangible argument in favor of god's existence.

4. Atheism killed X million people in the 20th Century. Who does not love a good fallacy in the morning? The association fallacy is fun. Correlation =/= causation. Just because a person may have been an atheist does not mean that is the reason why they do what they do. There have been secular dictatorships and theistic dictatorships. The only reason why so many died in the 20th century is because there were more people than before and better means of killing them. This argument is really one of the lowest brow arguments I have ever read, and often riddled with lies.

5. Atheists want to essentially ban religion and violate peoples right to free exercise. Again, saying this may be fun and make yourself feel good, however it is false. Secularists do not wish to prevent anyone from exercising their religion. At all. Free exercise is important. The issue is the importation of religious beliefs into government. The government is not there to promote your beliefs, or protect some aspect of that at the expense of other people's rights.
***The basic tenant of government work is what you do for one you do for all.***
Christians cannot to display the Ten Commandments (as if they have a basis on US law, where is the commandment against rape?) while at the same time disallowing another group to make the same sort of display. Period. It is far easier to bar all than to allow all. The case of the FSM is a perfect example, a courthouse had the Ten Commandments, the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster sued, and were allowed to place an image of his noodlness on the courthouse grounds.

Religion in government is great for you, we understand, assuming it is your religion. What you do for one, you do for all. Conspiracy theories are fun to think about, but they have little or no basis in reality.

6. Atheism is the belief in nothing. Really? An absence of a belief in god is automatically a belief in nothing? People can still believe in a multitude of things while not subscribing to a belief in the supernatural. Again, this is another one those "go ahead and tell me what I believe" type things.



You can make arguments against atheism without the continued and blatant use of fallacies. Just sayin'.

Zero multiplied by zero ends up in zero and so is the polemic of theism and atheism. There is a history of it and your thought adds to it and yet truth is unattainable through this course and this is pathless. You have to read Zen to understand the intricacy of reality or else you will revolve round the dusts of facts only eternally

Originally Posted by haribol

Zero multiplied by zero ends up in zero and so is the polemic of theism and atheism. There is a history of it and your thought adds to it and yet truth is unattainable through this course and this is pathless. You have to read Zen to understand the intricacy of reality or else you will revolve round the dusts of facts only eternally

Your last statement is pious nonsense.

I think the OP coincides with my beliefs. Though the only way I can entertain the idea of God is to completely remove it from all of today's popular accounts. I also refuse to believe that there is any one path e.i Zen which one must follow in order to "understand the intricacy of reality."

Are you arrogant enough to say that you do? Any hairless monkey chairing from the podium in this regard is generally to be wary of in my opinion.

A good post though there are a couple of side points that come to my mind;

I'm not convinced you can become a less of an atheist as I see atheism/theism as a binary measure. You either believe in a god of some kind or you don't. You can't partially believe or only believe in half a god. I fear the desire of some people to distance themselves from the concept of atheism is actually a result of the kind of flawed negative image it has. I feel it's counter productive to effectively give in to that and deny your atheism though, risking encouraging the idea that it is something extreme or to be embarrassed about.

Secondly, I'd say that atheism is only the belief that there is no god or gods. The term in itself doesn't determine any reason for that belief. There not being any evidence is one but not necessary. You don't even need a reason to be atheist. You don't even need to know you're atheist. It’s just something some people happen to be.

Originally Posted by HonestJoe

A good post though there are a couple of side points that come to my mind;

I'm not convinced you can become a less of an atheist as I see atheism/theism as a binary measure. You either believe in a god of some kind or you don't. You can't partially believe or only believe in half a god. I fear the desire of some people to distance themselves from the concept of atheism is actually a result of the kind of flawed negative image it has.

Nope, what I say is you can dismiss the Abrahamic God along with every God man has conjured; given tangibility to. If you redefine God as more of a divine intelligence rather than a quantifiable being (or a man in the sky if you like) then you have something to lend the term "maybe" to. Maybe, being agnostic, but not definitely in either camp as it were.

Originally Posted by HonestJoe

A good post though there are a couple of side points that come to my mind;

I'm not convinced you can become a less of an atheist as I see atheism/theism as a binary measure. You either believe in a god of some kind or you don't. You can't partially believe or only believe in half a god. I fear the desire of some people to distance themselves from the concept of atheism is actually a result of the kind of flawed negative image it has. I feel it's counter productive to effectively give in to that and deny your atheism though, risking encouraging the idea that it is something extreme or to be embarrassed about.

There is a grey area. A person can not necessarily believe but be seeking (as I am at the moment), being open to the possibility. That is removed from atheism and not quite theism.... perhaps pantheism or deism....

Secondly, I'd say that atheism is only the belief that there is no god or gods. The term in itself doesn't determine any reason for that belief. There not being any evidence is one but not necessary. You don't even need a reason to be atheist. You don't even need to know you're atheist. It’s just something some people happen to be.

Buddhism does not subscribe to the belief of gods....