Atheism: what is it?

[SeattleUte]

Chris Hitchins or Richard Dawkins would reject any claim that their assertions are founded on "faith" in any shape or form. That's the very thing they despise. They do not claim to be making any leap.

[All-American]

Originally Posted by SeattleUte

No, you're most emphatically wrong. Atheists have no "faith" in anything. The very idea is antagonistic to what they stand for. Again, this is what religious people typically think about atheists, projecting their own paradigm, but it's not accurate. Combining the words "atheist" and "faith" in the same sentence is ludicrous. At most what they believe does not exist is a personal god, as in the Judeo-Christian tradition. To that extent they do deny the existence of God. But again, they reject a personal God because it requires faith; reason or empiricism doesn't support a personal god. As nonsequitor said, it's Santa Clausish. Agnostics don't want to be called atheists for understandable reasons given the social stigma but it's basically the same thing. But an atheist will agree with you that no one can know what came before the universe began.

I missed the part where I said that no one can know what came before the universe began. Maybe that was one of the documents that the Christians burned in Alexandria?

You can run around in circles all you want. The words mean what they mean, not what you really really wish they meant because of how much cooler they would make you look. To be "Agnostic" means you have no knowledge-- specifically, of God. To be "Atheist" means you believe that there is no God. Without evidence that shows that there is no God (which is not the same thing as no evidence that there is a God), to assert that there is no God steps beyond what evidence suggests.

Originally Posted by seattleute

Chris Hitchins or Richard Dawkins would reject any claim that their assertions are founded on "faith" in any shape or form. That's the very thing they despise. They do not claim to be making any leap.

So they would. They, like you, would also be wrong.

[myboynoah]

Originally Posted by SeattleUte

Chris Hitchins or Richard Dawkins would reject any claim that their assertions are founded on "faith" in any shape or form. That's the very thing they despise. They do not claim to be making any leap.

Of course they don't. They suffer from cognitive dissonance given that they practice the very thing they despise. Unless they have some mystical power that allows them to comprehend and grasp the infinite, they, like us, are left to walk by faith in their ordering of what they experience.

Naturally this is all dependent upon your accurately representing their thinking.

[Cali Coug]

Originally Posted by All-American

No, it isn't. Agnosticism is an absence of faith. Atheism is faith in absence.

We've been over the definitions of the words-- we shouldn't have to go over that again. A person who has no knowledge of the existence of God, who hasn't seen God and doesn't recognize anything that amounts to His fingerprints is an agnostic by definition. The moment he steps beyond the evidence provided and construes that there IS no God, he is an atheist.

I can respect an agnostic or an atheist just as well as any other person who follows what they in all sincerity believe to be true. When any person persists in pushing his beliefs on people who have no interest in hearing it, whether they be agnostic, atheist, or Mormon, they've crossed the line, as far as I'm concerned.

Precisely. As I said, both groups have faith, just in different things. Why one would choose to have faith in nothing is inexplicable to me. Agnosticism makes much more sense to me intellectually.

[Cali Coug]

Originally Posted by SeattleUte

No, you're most emphatically wrong. Atheists have no "faith" in anything. The very idea is antagonistic to what they stand for. Again, this is what religious people typically think about atheists, projecting their own paradigm, but it's not accurate. Combining the words "atheist" and "faith" in the same sentence is ludicrous. At most what they believe does not exist is a personal god, as in the Judeo-Christian tradition. To that extent they do deny the existence of God. But again, they reject a personal God because it requires faith; reason or empiricism doesn't support a personal god. As nonsequitor said, it's Santa Clausish. Agnostics don't want to be called atheists for understandable reasons given the social stigma but it's basically the same thing. But an atheist will agree with you that no one can know what came before the universe began.

But it IS faith. There is ZERO evidence that there is no God. And yet an atheist chooses to go beyond stating that he doesn't know if there is a God to stating that there definitely is not a God. The atheist has no evidence upon which to support that claim, other than the atheist's belief (read "faith").

Perhaps it would be helpful to re-read the definition of "faith" for this conversation:

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/faith

1. confidence or trust in a person or thing: faith in another's ability.
2. belief that is not based on proof: He had faith that the hypothesis would be substantiated by fact.
3. belief in God or in the doctrines or teachings of religion: the firm faith of the Pilgrims.
4. belief in anything, as a code of ethics, standards of merit, etc.: to be of the same faith with someone concerning honesty.
5. a system of religious belief: the Christian faith; the Jewish faith.
6. the obligation of loyalty or fidelity to a person, promise, engagement, etc.: Failure to appear would be breaking faith.
7. the observance of this obligation; fidelity to one's promise, oath, allegiance, etc.: He was the only one who proved his faith during our recent troubles.
8. Christian Theology. the trust in God and in His promises as made through Christ and the Scriptures by which humans are justified or saved.
—Idiom
9. in faith, in truth; indeed: In faith, he is a fine lad.

Number 2 is particularly useful here.

[Archaea]

There are different levels of atheism.

The first level is the uniniitiated level akin to the very simply level of religious faith. I understand this level of atheism, because it is the circumstance into which I was born. My family never spoke of religion and indeed mocked religion when it was discussed. I remember asking my father, "Do you believe in God or life after?" His answer was, "when I see a dead dog, I don't see life after. I have no proof of it." His faith against God wasn't adamant, unmovable. He just had no proof so it made no sense.

The second and more advanced level is the cognitive atomicist. Seattle mistakenly characterizes the bulk of atheists in this category. It is the group that endeavors to apply pure "empiricism" in all aspects of their thought. They are a distinct minority, probably on the order of magnitude of one percent.

[BarbaraGordon]

All-American, Cali,

Seattle is not foolish enough (I hope) to try to argue with you over the dictionary definition or the historic etymology of atheism/agnosticism.

But these words are part of a living, evolving language and further, expressive of a dynamic belief system.

If you read the recent literature regarding unbelief, you will see that Seattle is correct: the terms are increasingly being used interchangeably. And I feel that it is the atheists' right as those within the system to define themselves and their terminology.

Both atheists and agnostics refuse to acknowledge the existence of god. Both feel that the empirical proof does not exist. Regarding your assertions that atheists act on a type of faith, I know no atheists who would suggest that god could never exist - that would require faith. They simply suggest that, like the celestial teapot, they have never seen him. This is, frankly, not any kind of faith - but rather the absence thereof.

[Tex]

Originally Posted by SeattleUte

Atheists are in the tradition of materialists like Democrates, Epicurus, and Lucretious. They simply don't believe what they can't sense. It's that simple.

Disturbingly, I find myself in agreement with SeattleUte. All the atheists I've known (of which only a few were "devout" ... to borrow a religious term, LOL), were basically "show me" folks. If it can't be proven (physically or empirically or logically), then they don't believe in it. It's no more complicated than that.

[SeattleUte]

Originally Posted by BarbaraGordon

All-American, Cali,

Seattle is not foolish enough (I hope) to try to argue with you over the dictionary definition or the historic etymology of atheism/agnosticism.

But these words are part of a living, evolving language and further, expressive of a dynamic belief system.

If you read the recent literature regarding unbelief, you will see that Seattle is correct: the terms are increasingly being used interchangeably. And I feel that it is the atheists' right as those within the system to define themselves and their terminology.

Both atheists and agnostics refuse to acknowledge the existence of god. Both feel that the empirical proof does not exist. Regarding your assertions that atheists act on a type of faith, I know no atheists who would suggest that god could never exist - that would require faith. They simply suggest that, like the celestial teapot, they have never seen him. This is, frankly, not any kind of faith - but rather the absence thereof.

Perfect.

[SeattleUte]

Originally Posted by Tex

Disturbingly, I find myself in agreement with SeattleUte. All the atheists I've known (of which only a few were "devout" ... to borrow a religious term, LOL), were basically "show me" folks. If it can't be proven (physically or empirically or logically), then they don't believe in it. It's no more complicated than that.

Perfect.