Atheism

Discussion in 'Religion, Beliefs and Spirituality' started by Necrostophelies, Sep 12, 2009.

  1. honestly i have no clue how the debate got started, and i will honestly admit that i have not read all of the arguements, not out of ingorance and denial, i just dont feel like reading since ive been up for about 24 hours, but i have read a few and find it interesting.
     
  2. #62 Stoli, Sep 13, 2009
    Last edited by a moderator: Mar 15, 2016

    .. How can you not understand?

    It was in BOLD.


    Atheism is not a religion.
    You can call it a belief if you wish, but calling it a religion makes you look, to be blunt, like a fucking retard.
     
  3. Yes, I am. :)

    I take issue with the idea that there is one objective 'truth'. I guess that could be true, but it leaves out the idea that truth is relative to the individual, in which case the one objective truth would be the entirety of all subjective truths.

    Who said I believe in gods, or a god, for that matter? :confused:
     

  4. Killing = Hell
    Genocide (of children, at that) = Good, as long as God gives the OK!
    Oh, but God hates hypocrites.
    Skeptic's Annotated Bible / Quran / Book of Mormon
     
  5. You quote other articles that contain my idea, I express my idea to you, and you still fail to see it. What a mockery these 'words' have made of us, huh?

    Lack of faith requires faith. Why is that so hard to understand?

    To quote Zylark:

    And an atheist is no more special than a follower of any other religion.

    You may not want to call it a religion, that doesn't stop it from being one. You're making a self-informed decision about god, from which you base the rest of your life. As does everyone else of any religion, anywhere.

    And you can cite indoctrination if you want, as somebody else did, but that doesn't evaporate my argument; it just shows that a person's religion can be forced on them from birth, as can any other idea. Do you think an individual doesn't posses the mental clout to overcome religious indoctrination by their own free will?
     

  6. You are confused. Lack of faith does indeed require faith.

    The problem is, while Faith can be used to describe Religion or Atheism, Religion cannot be used to describe faith. Faith is your opinion on what is right and wrong or true and false. It's a belief. Your religion is what you believe, what you have faith in, therefore your religion is your faith. The difference is that faith is not your religion. Your religion is Christianity, Or Islam, or whatever.
    Faith does not solely refer to the divine. Religion does.

    Faith is choice.
    Religion is basically having a bible. It's a set of beliefs that a large group follow. Atheists are not a religion because they have no unifying laws. Their are subdivisions of atheists which could be described as similar to religions. (ie new atheists)

    These are subdivisions of Atheism in the same way that Religions are subdivisions of Theism.
    Your faith is your choice between theism (imagine God) and atheism (deny God). Your religion is your choice of theisms.
     
  7. I have a pet fish with magical powers, all you non believers in my fish are religious.
     
  8. If that's the best you've got you might as well continue talking about stamps. :p


    Simply put, here's the deal: 'Religious' people use what they consider evidence to deduce that there is a god. Atheists use what they consider evidence to deduce that there is no god.

    See the difference? Because I don't.

    That's fine and good, but religion can be used to describe Atheism, which is the point you continuously(and apparently unconsciously) agree with me on.
    The unifying law is there is no god. The rest is religious conjecture and doesn't really matter unless it pertains to you, just like not all Jews do nothing on Sunday.

    You also bring up atheism vs. theism, and somehow relate religion with theism but not atheism. I asked this before, is yin not yang? Is left not right? Is evil not good? Take out the color and see the gray.




    BTW, it might not have been your intention OP, but good thread. :D
     
  9. That's what atheists SHOULD do, but instead when asked to cite evidence as proof of their proclamation of knowledge (proclaimed knowledge requires evidence) they become agnostic.

    When they say things like "atheism is the absence of belief in the existence of God" instead of correctly saying "atheism is the belief that God doesn't exist" they are being intellectually dishonest. We can play the same trick when it comes to the existence of anything. For example:

    If I were to say that I believe the number eleven doesn't exist, you would ask me to argue my position. Hopefully, you would respond with an argument to support your belief, rather than say that you don't need an argument since you don't have a belief in the first place.

    I think the confusion comes from the fact that what I'm saying applies only if the existence of the thing in question is non-physical.
     
  10. #70 Stoli, Sep 13, 2009
    Last edited by a moderator: Sep 13, 2009

    The difference is that the "'Religious' people use what they consider evidence to deduce that there is a god." Religion is not a synonym for (Theism) belief in God. Religion is Christianity. Religion is Islam. They are subsets of Theism, and we call them religions.


    An opinion or ideology isn't a religion.
    Communism isn't a religion. Communism as a subset of atheism isn't a religion.
    Conservatism isn't a religion. Christianity is a religion.
    These things exist on different levels. They are only Religions if they believe in the supernatural.

    Jews doing nothing on sunday is a tenet of a religion, like catholics and fish on friday. Judaism and Christianity are RELIGIONS, there are not theistic religions. The fact that a religion implies as well that they are theistic, because religion only refers to groups of theists worshiping in a unified way.


    .. Religion refers to a belief in divinity, thus theism.
     
  11. *Yawn*

    I can play semantics all day too. Look how cool I am. :rolleyes:
     

  12. That would be 3 reps for you today. :(


    I know what religion refers to, I've had the definition thrown at me all day. :rolleyes:

    1. a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe

    Saying 'there is no god' touches on all three.


    Apparently not, based on your posts in this thread. :confused:
     
  13. Non-believers unite in disbelief.
     
  14. You would be right. You are a pro at it, "based on your posts in this thread". :cool:
     

  15. Except for the subject: "a set of beliefs"

    Or in another dictionary:
    religion - Definition of religion noun from Cambridge Dictionary Online: Free English Dictionary and Thesaurus

    The latter definition is obviously slang, unless you consider football fans a religion as well, in which case I will agree Atheism is, because so is fucking everything.

    The former definition, however, specifically refers to Gods.
    Best of 3 MB?

    Dictionary.com

    Religion Definition | Definition of Religion at Dictionary.com

    Nope. Religion still requires belief in a supernatural being.
     
  16. I thought your last sentence was a great response and +Rep you for the laughs.

    You know what atheists do not believe in, God, but you do not know what they believe in.

    You have no evidence as to what an atheist does believe about the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe.

    Your case has been made valiantly but it is not quite valid. It is entirely based on assumptions inferred by the knowledge that atheists do not believe in god.
     
  17. *sigh*, for the umpteenth time, a belief in no god is a belief of god. Savvy?

    IGetParanoid worded it very nicely if you still don't understand.
    If we're going to resort to the 'pick and choose definitions game' how bout we just end it at this then: the definition of anything can be anything you want it to be. That way everybody's right and the world is perfect. :)

    You could be a pro too, first work on having a point when you post other than 'Technically you're right but I don't want to admit it and can't refute it so I'll just yawn'. :cool:

    See how good I am?

    Thank you. But what I bolded there, that's the only thing my argument is based on, and for some reason it's not coming through.
     

  18. A set of beliefs. Do you understand what that means?

    MORE THAN ONE BELIEF.

    Atheists, as a group, ONLY SHARE ONE BELIEF.

    RELIGIONS SHARE MORE THAN ONE BELIEF.
     
  19. #79 H2O420, Sep 13, 2009
    Last edited by a moderator: Sep 13, 2009
    Semantics. :p

    /thread

    Took six pages but we finally did it.
     

  20. That's not semantics. It's the SUBJECT of the definition.

    A set of Beliefs = a Religion

    it's the fucking definition. Nowhere does it say Religion can refer to a single belief.
     

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