I speak as an agnostic, but I think you have to distinguish between strict literalism / fundamentalism and religious belief more broadly.
Literalism / fundamentalism is something that's hard to believe in without willful denial of huge parts of reality. You have to believe in a young Earth and a lot of other incredibly improbable or impossible things. Details will vary by your religious belief but I'm not aware of any that don't contain total falsehoods when interpreted literally.
Not all Christians or members of other religions are literalists. In fact I'd say it's probably not even the dominant position theologically. Its popularity in America probably biases many peoples' views.
More philosophical forms of theism don't suffer from that problem. Theism broadly defined amounts to the idea that there is some consciousness or analogous entity or process behind the universe. The root of theism is the same as thesis and theory. It amounts to saying that the universe is or was created by something teleological or with some goal or idea in mind.
This is probably an unfalsifiable idea, so it goes beyond what science an deal with, but it's not impossible to entertain rationally.
Edit:
I also have to point out that non-belief in God does not imply or necessitate rational beliefs. I see a ton of atheists that hold extremely irrational beliefs about all kinds of things. Atheism just says what you don't believe, not what you do.
Although I'm not religious, I am agnostic. Why? Because no one can credibly say they know a damn thing about the metaphysical. To me, hardcore atheists are almost as bad as religious fundamentalists in their own way. Basically, both groups of people believe something which they feel everyone else needs to accept or else they're wrong and are evil. And in both cases the thing they are so self-assured about is essentially unknowable.
To me, religion is a branch of philosophy. There are a lot of useful ideas developed there over the centuries. Atheists often talk about the evil created religion, but evil will use whatever tool is available—we sit in this forum worshiping startups, yet capitalism has done just as much evil as religion (or at least, it's on its way to). The other thing atheist fundamentalists do (as peterforde does above) is set up a strawman to be argued from a scientific perspective. If you say that god is a bearded man sitting in the sky then of course it sounds ridiculous, but that's ignoring the fact that it's a millenia-old imagery created for pre-scientific people. As much as we get angry over evolution-deniers and creationists, it's equally ridiculous to cherry-pick some age old metaphor, state as a falsifiable hypothesis and then demonstrate its ridiculousness on scientific grounds.
Atheists often claim rationality on their side, but how rational is it to invoke religious beliefs in a thread about sexist asshole talk? It's an utter non-sequitur and what it demonstrates is an irrational axe to grind.
According to Wikipedia, Fundamentalism is the "strict adherence to specific theological doctrines". According to my dictionary, the definition of theological is "Of or relating to or concerning theology". Atheism, according to Wikipedia again, is "the rejection of belief in the existence of deities." It seems to me then that I could argue that one could be an "Atheist Fundamentalist" although that wasn't my point. I was using the term liberally, and by way of analogy.
My point was that it is this stubborn adherence to a particular point of view that got Dawkins so fired up in the first place. And, although _I agree_ with Dawkins point of view, traveling the world telling people they are "idiots" for not thinking in a particular way is just as bad, or worse. Even if it is a view backed up by science.
I sometimes think there is "atheism" and then there is "atheism".
There is "atheism" in the sense of its literal definition, and then there is "atheism" as a contemporary cultural phenomena, which involves many beliefs (even if only commonly rather than universally) which do not necessarily follow from that literal definition. "Jesus mythicism" is one of those later beliefs, even if a lot less than universal one.
To give some other examples, I know someone who calls themselves an "atheist" – and indeed, they fit the literal definition, they think the existence of God is improbable – but they also believe in ghosts and a life after death, beliefs which are generally outside the bounds of "atheism" in that second sense. Similarly, the early 20th century British philosopher John McTaggart, was an atheist in the literal sense – he was convinced that the existence of God was impossible, and even believed that he had a proof of God's necessary non-existence – but he also believed that matter and time were mere illusions, and that all that really existed was timeless immortal souls and their eternal love for one another – beliefs radically incompatible with "atheism" in that second sense. Similarly, many Buddhists (especially Theravadins) are in some literal sense atheists, in that they deny the existence of any ultimate God (as is claimed to exist in the Abrahamic religions and in many Hindu sects), but they also have many beliefs (rebirth, past life memories, enlightened beings having psychic, even miraculous, powers) which are way outside "atheism" in that second sense.
(Even though orthodox Theravada does believe in gods, including those of Hinduism, as mortal non-ultimate deities, I think that belief is somewhat peripheral, in that a person could interpret that belief in an essentially non-literal way, and not be that far from Theravadan orthodoxy; however, rebirth is a much more central belief, and to interpret that in an equally non-literal way, would be straying much further from that orthodoxy.)
In order to decide whether you believe in something, you have to know what "something" the question is about. The concept of "God" in western society is often so vague it is impossible to have an opinion either way - for some it means "the absolute", for some it means "the force of creation in the universe". I don't think you can meaningfully say you don't believe in such unspecific concepts. But if you go into more concrete religious beliefs, like "God created the world in seven days" or "God punished the wife of Lot by turning her into a pillar of salt" or "Jesus is the only path to God", then it is easier to decide whether or not you actually believe it or not.
My impression is Biblical literalism is more widespread in the US compared to Europe, which in turn is easier to decide for or against. Especially the discussion about evolution vs religion is almost entirely absent in Europe. Framing evolution as opposed to a belief in God means it is pretty easy to become an atheist, since we have overwhelming evidence for evolution.
That implies that religious people are not rational and that the only true philosophy is atheism. Atheism relies on its own assumptions though like the existence of logic and the ability of the human mind to rationally analyze evidence, both of which have to be taken on faith.
Agnostics also have to assume that a human brain is capable of weighing evidence in a reasonable way.
Atheism is a rejection, non-acceptance, or indifference to theism, which boiled down to its essence is just a non-acceptance of deities being the creator or essence of reality. One can be atheist and hold hard-line rationalist views about the nature of reality, but one can also have spiritual beliefs and be atheist.
Agnostics believe that in some way, metaphysical intelligences are involved in the creation or fabric of the universe, but the very nature and depth of this involvement is in varying degrees indecipherable, unknown, and not-yet-known. Agnosticism doesn't require either the acceptance or rejection of theism.
Put together it technically means the person doesn't believe in a theistic god but holds agnostic views about broader metaphysical concepts.
More colloquially I've noticed a lot of people use the atheist agnostic / agnostic label interchangeably to indicate they haven't made their mind up one way or the other, but it's possible to be either atheist agnostic or theist agnostic.
You just managed to offend a guy gratuitously. Plenty of people are able to be rational and yet hold religious beliefs. And all you do is to dismiss everything as superstition.
I, for one, can't say for sure that I "know that gods and goddesses don't exist". And you are trying to shove down your disbelief down my throat. Fundamentalist atheism is still fundamentalism. Please stop.
> Generally atheists claim to be skeptical of all religion and mysticism regardless of whether it claims a "creator god".
Is it true, though, that that's what atheism means? As an atheist myself, I'm not sure it is. Certainly doesn't seem true - seems like someone who is atheist is simply more likely to also be areligious and aspiritual, possibly as a result of rationality. But if you want to be pedantic, you can try making a case to redefine the term.
In fact, I've found that self-described "theists" and "atheists" are both smart enough to know that theism involves a god, not just any religion or spiritualism or mysticism or belief. Indeed, ask any layperson on the street what it means for someone to be atheist, and most answers will say that it means "they don't believe in god".
> My point is that almost all people hold unexamined beliefs
Maybe, but certainly not all as irrational as theism. Your post tried to conflate concepts like humanism (essentially, "be excellent to each other", hardly an "unexamined belief"), which don't require magic, to the belief of theism, which does - this conflation didn't work for the reasons described above: both may involve principles of one form or another, but only the latter is magical and supernatural, and thus less rational to believe true.
If we're both on the same page there, we can move onto other topics, like:
> I think the rule you are describing is not well defined at all.
Please stop spreading this myth.
Agnosticism is about whether you think it's provable that there is or isn't a god.
Atheism is about whether you as a person believe in a god or not.
You can believe in a god (be a theist) and still think it's not provable that there is one (be an agnostic).
Gnosticism/Agnosticism are, for all practical purposes, useless terms.
Gnosticism is what you know.
Theism is what you believe.
The two words are splitting hairs, the difference is just the level of certainty. You don't wait for absolute knowledge to act. You act on your beliefs.
A-gnosticism is a lack of total knowledge
A-theism is a lack in a belief in a god.
The definition of atheism is a lack in a belief in a god, not a claim that gods don't exist. There are some atheists who believe that no god's exist, but that is something extra beyond atheism.
The belief being discussed here isn't referring to spiritual belief. Even then, agnosticism is more diametrically opposed to belief than atheism; the latter is belief in one's own disbelief. I do not have anything against these theistic unbelievers, as most of my connections and I myself are fairly secular.
The only requirement to be an atheist is to not believe in a deity. There's no such thing as a "hardcore atheist", because there's no central dogma to be hardcore about. Many atheists do follow some sort of non-theistic belief system, such as Buddhism or Daoism.
You're thinking of the people who are what I'd call "anti-theistic", that is, explicitly opposed to the concept of deities, religion, or mysticism in general.
Totally agree - my general take on it is that standard Atheism and Christianity/etc (as understood & practiced by the average person) are incredibly simplistic, but most people in either ideological camp are fairly oblivious to it.
There is certainly a brand of atheist who is really only the flipside of a fundamentalist. One reads scripture literally in order to find it infallible, the other reads scripture literally in order to find it impossible.
Literalism / fundamentalism is something that's hard to believe in without willful denial of huge parts of reality. You have to believe in a young Earth and a lot of other incredibly improbable or impossible things. Details will vary by your religious belief but I'm not aware of any that don't contain total falsehoods when interpreted literally.
Not all Christians or members of other religions are literalists. In fact I'd say it's probably not even the dominant position theologically. Its popularity in America probably biases many peoples' views.
More philosophical forms of theism don't suffer from that problem. Theism broadly defined amounts to the idea that there is some consciousness or analogous entity or process behind the universe. The root of theism is the same as thesis and theory. It amounts to saying that the universe is or was created by something teleological or with some goal or idea in mind.
This is probably an unfalsifiable idea, so it goes beyond what science an deal with, but it's not impossible to entertain rationally.
Edit:
I also have to point out that non-belief in God does not imply or necessitate rational beliefs. I see a ton of atheists that hold extremely irrational beliefs about all kinds of things. Atheism just says what you don't believe, not what you do.
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