Atheism, II
March 10, 2009It’s always fun to see your own understanding of the world confirmed.
About a year ago, I wrote how I think atheism has become a religion in and of itself - something I do not wish to be associated with, and consequently, I do not call myself an atheist, even if I don’t believe in (a) god(s). I said:
For all intents and purposes, atheism has become a religion in and of itself, complete with feelings of moral superiority to those who are not atheists and a drive to convert others to atheism (to spread the faith). So yes, if you look at the true meaning of the word, anyone who doesn’t do the beard and book stuff, is an atheist. However, out in the real world, atheism means a whole lot more, something I do not wish to be associated with.
In the comments, I explained it all in a more philosophical manner:
Cogito ergo sum is not some vague, inapplicable statement - with it, Descartes summed up the entire foundation of both our scientific, as well as our religious world. As I’ve said before, science and religion are nor juxtaposed. They are two sides of the same coin, because they both deal with beliefs.
Lots of knickers got in twists, lots of people who do call themselves atheists were all upset because, as we all know, the truth hurts. I was wrong, I was an idiot, atheists didn’t do the things I said they do. I apparently insulted lots of atheists because I simply listed the similarities between atheism and most other religions, and concluded from that, well, for all intents and purposes, atheism is a religion.
And now we see my conviction proven in the real word. Several atheists groups in The Netherlands are setting up atheist billboards near highways, trying to… Spread the faith. Recently, groups in the United Kingdom have been doing the same thing on buses.
Atheism has become a religion, and I see it confirmed around me every day.
World | 
I think you need to look up the definition of the word religion. Certain atheists may ape the behavior of the religious, but that’s all that is, aping.
Comment by Andrew — March 10, 2009 @ 8:00 pm
continued: Atheism is the lack of belief. That’s all it means. Doesn’t mean you believe in X, or Y, or behave in a certain way, it just means you don’t believe in a supreme deity. You may object to being labeled an atheist, but from what you describe, you are. Don’t self hate.
Comment by Andrew — March 10, 2009 @ 8:07 pm
Atheism generally isn’t considered a religion per-se because it doesn’t have any defined morality structure, nor any belief in supernatural power or creator, nor any order or worship. It pretty much tries to be the opposite.
Science and atheism can be considered to share some properties with religion. They both assert something that cannot be independently verified, so requires faith. Many scientists and atheists claim that their belief is better than the other beliefs, which is in many ways similar to what religious people claim about their religion vs. science and other religions.
The only philosophically justifiable viewpoint is probably weak agnostic with no particular belief in science, or anything else for that matter. Basically, “I don’t know anything”. It’s just quite a useless view if you want to get something done.
I’m an atheist and I support measures such as those bus slogans, because at the very least, they’ll get people to think about life without a religion. I know for a large part of my life (I’m still quite young ;)), I wasn’t even aware of people who didn’t believe in god. I personally think science is a more justifiable viewpoint than faith, because science and scientific method has actually been directly used to build machines and get stuff done. The main method to get people to believe in religions is to threaten bad things if they don’t (hell).
My atheist viewpoint largely concerns itself with the physical, observable reality and I make very few statements about the actual physical non-existence of God, other than it doesn’t seem to matter so I’m going to assume he doesn’t exist for any calculations I make ;).
Comment by Cameron — March 11, 2009 @ 1:31 am
Thom,
To a large degree, I understand where you’re coming from. After spending several years as a self-identified atheist, I did go through a period in my mid-20s where I began referring to myself as an agnostic. It was largely out of a desire to disassociate myself from the obnoxious, aggressive “there is no God” sort of atheists.
My reasoning was that, without fully comprehending EVERY aspect of the universe, an assertion that there is no God cannot be intellectually-justified. For example: the cause of the Big Bang isn’t known, so it’s possible (although not necessarily *probable* - an important distinction) that it was caused by God. And, in some ways, that led me to a conclusion similar to yours - that it’s no more intectually-valid to assert the non-existence of God than it is to assert that God *does* exist.
The thing changed my mind was having someone point out that the “A” in “atheism” doesn’t inherently mean “opposed to” - it can also mean “abstaining from.” There is a significant difference between the belief that there is NOT a God, and the LACK of belief that there is a God - IIRC, that’s one of the main reasons some people refer to themselves as “nontheist” instead of “atheist.”
Which leads to one of the points from your post that I take issue with:
The reason I take issue with that assertion is that sweeping, blanket statements about atheism are no more valid than sweeping, blanket statements about (E.g.) Christians - even with individual denominations, there is a fairly broad spectrum. By no means is atheism the sort of uniform, monolithic bloc that you’re suggesting.
That one I disagree with a bit more strongly. I’m going to borrow a quote from an essay by Paul Lutus called “How we confuse Symbols and Things,” since he put it much better than I could:
There are many people who treat the end results of science (theories) as if they were articles of faith. That doesn’t mean that science is the same as religion, however - a proper scientific theory is the result of a clearly-defined reasoning process.
In other words: just because it’s possible to take scientific conclusions “on faith” doesn’t mean that it’s necessary. Going back to my earlier example: anyone with sufficient motivation can find out why the majority of cosmologists accept the Big Bang theory. And most physicists and cosmologist freely admit that it’s a provisional theory - in other words, it would be tossed onto the scrap heap if a better theory came along tomorrow (rather than clung to because it’s sacred, or because of a fear of committing “blasphemy against science”).
I’ll end with another quote from Paul Lutus:
Comment by Stephen B. — March 11, 2009 @ 2:59 am
Looks like you did it again, upset people that it.
Comment by Soulbender — March 11, 2009 @ 1:15 pm
[q]they’ll get people to think about life without a religion.[/q]
Why would you want that? What business is it of yours if people have a life in religion or not?
[q]because science and scientific method has actually been directly used to build machines and get stuff done[/q]
Science has, like religion, managed to create a lot of bad stuff as well as good stuff. They’re just different kinds of stuff.
Comment by Soulbender — March 11, 2009 @ 1:18 pm
Interestingly, the bus messages in the UK weren’t strictly atheist ones, because the people running the campaign chickened out in the phrasing of the message. Bemusingly, it actually ended up being agnostic thanks to the “probably” modifier:
“There’s probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life.”
Needless to say, this agnostic message totally upset some people and drew complaints from those that really should know better. Mind you, the highlighted quote on the BBC article from a Christian Voice spokesman - “There is plenty of evidence for God…” - in itself is arguably *far* more controversial than the rather benign agnosticism shown by the bus messages.
Comment by Richard Lloyd — March 11, 2009 @ 8:05 pm
“Science has, like religion, managed to create a lot of bad stuff as well as good stuff. They’re just different kinds of stuff.”
I was making the point that science has come out with testable predictions to make machines. Religion hasn’t done this at all to the best of my knowledge, since it is just guesswork. I wasn’t making a morality statement whatsoever.
Comment by Cameron — March 11, 2009 @ 10:43 pm
Ideology=/ religion
Comment by Samuel Skinner — March 12, 2009 @ 4:15 pm
Hi Thom!
I just wanted to mention that the religion you are talking about, what commonly goes under the label of “religion”, is not religion at all, only a - very sad - travesty of it.
Religion AFAIK comes from the latin root “relingere” -> joining again (something which has been separated) - meaning man and reality.
So religion has not the slightest to do with belief - quite the contrary:
where there’s belief there’s no religion. Religion is a method to get through to reality by casting off all dreams and illusions, not to add new ones to the ones we already have - be they “bearded guys”, spaghetti monsters, cosmic beings or whatever …
But of course that’s quite the opposite everyone is accustomed to think of as religion, “religious” people included … so it’s no wonder if that sounds strange.
I found it great that you noticed that atheism is a belief, too - in my experience not many people notice this. The only real point of view, if one has balls ;), is agnostic - unless of course you can produce God, so everybody can see and examine him, or can prove that this can never be done … or show an altogether different valid approach.
In university I was surprised to see that a lot of what passes as science is also just a form of belief - thus qualifying as “religion” in the common sense. That explains a lot of what goes on in the name of “science”. It’s very difficult to think clearly and live without beliefs, because so many of them are hidden, but still influence us, without our being aware of them.
Other people have grappled with this problem, too, and did find solutions - people I think of as religious in the original sense of the word. Just to mention some: Patanjali, the founder of Yoga, many Zen Masters, and of course Buddha - though one would find it hard to believe this if one looks at some of the people who profess to “spread their teaching” … but I guess that’s the usual thing that happens, after they are gone people are free to do whatever they want with them.
Buddha did not want to be the founder of a religion, his last words were “be a light unto yourself”, but today millions of people pray to him as to a God; he did not want to have any statue made of him while he was alive, and his wish was respected for some time after his death, but now there are more statues of him than of anyone else …
Comment by ned — March 12, 2009 @ 6:13 pm
Except it’s not a belief - it’s usually a lack of belief. As I’ve posted here before, the “A” in “atheism” doesn’t inherently mean “opposed-to,” it can (and often does) mean “abstaining from.”
I sometimes refer to the “abstaining-from” version of atheism as “agnosticism with atheist leanings” (or vice-versa), mainly due to the common misunderstanding of what the word “atheism” actually means.
If it’s based purely on belief, then it’s not science - by definition. Take, for example, the “null hypothesis” - a fairly important aspect of proper scientific inquiry:
“… under the null hypothesis a claim is assumed to be false unless and until it is supported by evidence. In normal human communications, things are assumed to be true unless proven false, but in science, that outlook is too undisciplined to lead to anything useful. It is because of the null hypothesis that scientists are regarded as skeptical of ideas unaccompanied by evidence.”
Comment by Stephen B. — March 13, 2009 @ 12:12 am
Atheists believe that there is no God so clearly you have a belief.
Comment by Soulbender — March 13, 2009 @ 8:00 am
Try to understand: there is an intellectual distinction between an active belief that something *doesn’t* exist - and a lack of belief that it *does* exist.
Comment by Stephen B. — March 13, 2009 @ 3:50 pm
Atheism == Anti-theism.
You’re seeing a religion where there is only a complete and utter hatred for the delusional wackos that dream of omnipotent sky fairies.
You suck Thom, we all know it.
Comment by Hax — March 13, 2009 @ 6:39 pm
Sorry about the error - once more:
OMG ;) - one of those “religious” atheists …
Your “intellectual distinction” is exactly what you say it is - good food for the ego, otherwise meaningless.
Either you know God exists/doesn’t exist, or you don’t.
If you do not know, then you either
-> believe, assume, surmise, etc. - or you
-> have a lack of belief, don’t really assume, hardly surmise, etc. etc. almost ad inf. …
but it all means the same:
you do not know.
You. Do. Not. Know.
That’s hard to accept; but if one stops believing/not believing, maybe one can finally start looking for how things really are - and only then one stops being “religious” in the usual sense …
Comment by ned — March 14, 2009 @ 9:49 pm
And do you have any basis for that conclusion?
So you’re saying that there’s no difference between a position of active disbelief - and a position of neutrality?
Yes… That was basically the point of my earlier post(s).
Comment by Stephen B. — March 15, 2009 @ 1:19 am
Great - only then you aren’t an atheist, you are an agnostic -
a gnosis = no knowledge.
Even Simple Wikipedia knows that, more or less:
http://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agnosticism
Or an agnostic with atheist leanings, to be more exact … ;)
Comment by ned — March 17, 2009 @ 12:24 pm
The lack of belief is being agnostic, the belief (or “knowledge”) that there is no God is atheism. I would sort of thought an atheist would know the difference.
Comment by Soulbender — March 21, 2009 @ 4:45 pm
ned:
No, the phrase “no knowledge” does not mean the same thing as “no belief.” They’re only equivalent if you assume that the “a” prefix on the word “atheism” means “opposed to,” rather than abstaining from. Which is not the case, as I’ve already pointed out twice already.
Soulbender:
That is a complete over-simplification based on the popular failure to understand what the word “atheism” actually means.
Let’s see if I can make this as simple as possible. The first letter in the word “Atheism” is “a.” In the English language, the the use of the prefix “a” can mean both “opposed to” or “abstaining from.” And, as should be obvious, “abstaining from belief in Gods” means the exact same thing as “lack of belief.”
Grasping that doesn’t even require understanding of abstract, metaphysical concepts - that’s just basic etymology.
Comment by Stephen B. — March 22, 2009 @ 9:26 pm
Stephen B.,
you have no idea of what you are talking about, and are not really interested in changing this state of things, either; so any further attempt at conversation with you would be rather pointless.
Good luck anyhow - maybe one day you will grow up …
Comment by ned — March 23, 2009 @ 2:33 am
Pot. Kettle. Black.
Interesting bit of circular / tautological reasoning, though - you’re essentially saying “my argument is so self-evidently correct that only an idiot would disagree with me.” Which is the usual last-resort of the intellectually-lazy, those with no real argument to offer.
It’s also interesting to note that your rhetorical tactic is usually employed as a way of bowing-out of the discussion, without having to admit that you were wrong.
Speaking of which…
How convenient, since that also gives you an excuse for tucking-tail and running away. But I’m sure that’s just a coincidence.
Comment by Stephen B. — March 30, 2009 @ 6:07 pm