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MDKofDOOM β Atheism - Stamp
Published: 2008-09-08 04:07:18 +0000 UTC; Views: 6417; Favourites: 171; Downloads: 56
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This is made for those people (usually fundimentalist christians) how keep insisting that atheism is a religion.To clarify, it is not. It is nothing more than the lack of belief in a supernatural deity.
Quote taken from Fundies Say The Darndest Things. Go there if you feel like laughing, or being sad at the state of the human race.
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Comments: 179
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aΒ·theΒ·ism
/ΛΔTHΔΛizΙm/
noun
disbelief or lack of belief in the existence of God or gods.
reΒ·liΒ·gion
/rΙΛlijΙn/
noun
the belief in and worship of a superhuman controlling power, especially a personal God or gods.
so yes atheism is not a religion-
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So technically every single sheep, ant and bedbug on Earth is an atheist
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Theism is a religion like mullet is a hair colour.
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This is offensive to bald people, you homophobic, misogynistic twat.Β
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Says the Homophobic, Misogynistic, Intolerant asshole himself~
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I agree on him being homophobic and intolerant, but what makes him misogynistic?
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Ah, seems you were not born with the organ that enables one to comprehend sarcasm. 
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"Hah what ever"
Translation: I have no rebuttal so I'm going to pretend I'm right.Β
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Shall you say
I don't really care about a homophobic, misogynist, hypocrite, Bigot like you~
Go on and try to offend me more sweetie~
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Whuu, you get salty really easily. I can call you baseless insults as well, but that wouldn't further the debate. If calling people names is all you're good at, then I'd avoid politics altogether if I were you, honey.Β
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Oooooooooohhh really~ ?
Go on
Also, you're a butt face.Β
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THIS IS 'MERICA!!! You have to tolerate my intolerance, or else YOU ARE INTOLERANT! You commie, feminist faggot.Β
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Buddhism, Confucianism, and Daoism are atheistic. Are they not religions?
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Don't be an idiot.
Buddhism, Confucianism, and Daosim are religions, they are not atheistic just because they don't believe in the christian god.
There is such a thing as other religions you know.
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You're just using the ad hominid attack.Β
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They are, but that doesn't mean that atheism is a religion.
You're saying:
Some of B are also A.
Therefore all of A must also be B.
This is a simple non-sequitur.
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I agree and disagree. As a Pandeistic-Perceptionist, I would like to say that my beliefs are more of a philosophy, or a way of thinking, than a religion, but really it all just depends on your definition of religion. While many times "religion" is defined in a way requiring god(s) and/or ceremonies, some sources define a "religion" much more broadly, without the limitations of god(s), traditions, or ceremonies. Under a definition like that, even (dis) belief systems like Atheism would be considered religions, and anybody who believed in anything or anyone would be considered religious.Β
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For many,it's also a disbelief in an afterlife -in any purpose in life. To them the happiest person is one who never existed. No ~70-80 year struggle to be something only to just drop into the silent darkness forever ?
The Witness heretics believe that we cease to exist when we die, When we are recreated, it's out of the nearest garbage on hand. It's NOT the same person. To those who offended Beardo too much, there is NO resurrection (eternal unconsciousness), and to those who don't reform after resurrection (new body programmed with the same memories and personality of the old), they go back into unconsciousness -forever. My mind just slides right off the concept !
I believe in an afterlife. See AlexReynard in InkBunny !
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It is religious in essence. Since there's no proof of the inexistence of God, then atheism it's just a belief, a dogma. A non-religious position would be to say "I don't know" (agnosticism) or "I don't care" (apatheism).
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Agnosticism and atheism are not mutually exclusive. And, in fact, most atheists are agnostic atheists.
Secondly, proofs are the onus of the person with the positive claim. There's no evidence that there isn't a teapot floating in the sun's orbit. But just because we can't rule it out doesn't make the assertion of its existence credible. There is better reason to not believe in something that has no evidence (and in the bible's case has quite a bit of evidence against it), than to believe it.
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This is a logical fallacy to think that there is better reason to not believe in something that has no evidence than to believe it. Because, in either case, one do believe. Believing and knowing aren't the same thing at all. As long as there is no confirmation or refutation of an hypothesis, there can be no knowledge about it (that's almost the definition of the scientific method). Believing without knowledge is a religious position, even if it's a "negative belief". That's why agnosticism and atheism are mutually exclusive : agnosticism is about having no belief, while atheism is about having a negative belief. But nowadays, most people have internal contradictions and have no problem about that (in an orwellian doublethink way), so I'm not really surprised that there indeed are people considering themselves to be "agnostic atheists".
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No, what's fallacious is giving all claims equal credibility just because it can be claimed. See aforementioned Russel's Teapot. Or Dawkin's fairies dancing at the bottom of the lake. All things can be asserted and very little can be proven. That doesn't mean the claim isn't ridiculous.
Atheism is about having no belief in gods. There is no prerequisite to atheism to assert knowledge of lack of gods. There are agnostic theists too, for the same reason. They aren't sure (knowledge) if there are gods but they feel (belief) there is a god or gods. Agnostic atheism is the same in reverse. What you're describing is gnostic atheism, or strong atheism or explicit atheism.
Moreover these titles can change depending on the context. I am explicitly atheist towards the god of the bible because it is, as described, internally inconsistent and contradicting the known world. But I am less certain about other gods, but do not believe they exist. And ignostic about gods I have not yet had described to me.
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What I mean is, it's not because a position is more ridiculous than the other ones that it is wrong. For example, when Einstein's general relativity theory was made public, it was the ridiculest of all available theories at the time. And in the end, it was the right one. Plus, atheism is pretty ridiculous too. As said by Trey Parker :
"Basically... out of all the ridiculous religion stories which are greatly, wonderfully ridiculous β the silliest one I've ever heard is, 'Yeah... there's this big giant universe and it's expanding, it's all gonna collapse on itself and we're all just here just 'cause... just 'cause'. That, to me, is the most ridiculous explanation ever."
I see your point about agnostic atheism, but once again, a belief is a religious thing. When this belief is subordinated to agnosticism, it makes it less dogmatic, but it isn't free of religiosity. Agnostic atheism isn't less religious than agnostic theism.
You may be interested in a religious position called pantheism. It is the belief in an impersonal god which is the Universe. To be a little more clear, when one says "the natural laws" (such as gravitation, etc), the Nature we're talking about is the pantheist god. This position isn't perfect, but it makes the God question way more interesting than the usual bearded man in the sky. Plus, pantheism is a theist claim which isn't ridiculous.
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"a belief is a religious thing. When this belief is subordinated to agnosticism, it makes it less dogmatic, but it isn't free of religiosity."
Wrong.
A religious belief is a religious thing. That is not the only kind of belief there is, however.
For instance, I believe my girlfriend to be faithful. This is based upon trust and observations I have made about her personality. It's not religious.
Similarly, atheism may be based upon belief in such a way that we must "believe" that there is really no evidence for the existence of deities, but this is based on observations, on logic and on attainable knowledge.
Regular "belief" means accepting as true that which is evidently true. ("Evidently" is important here, meaning "based on all available evidence")
Religious belief, on the other hand, means accepting something as true despite lack of evidence.
So, yes, atheism, be it gnostic or agnostic, is indeed less religious than theism - it's not the least bit religious.
As to that quote by Trey Parker:
He's misrepresenting atheism, because what he calls ridiculous is not what atheism is. Atheism is a single position on a single question - whether or not supernatural deities exist. The atheistic position is that no, they do not. Atheism makes absolutely no comment on how the universe formed, how life started, what happens after you die, nothing. All of that is separate from atheism.
That said, what he ridicules is not, in fact, ridiculous just because he says it is. Nice argument from authority, by the way.
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>muh regular beliefs
Your definition of so-called "regular beliefs" is based on "evidences", "attainable knowledge", etc. But for these words to mean anything, an objective reality must exists. As far as it goes, there is absolutely no proof that there is such a thing (hard solipsism hasn't been refuted, far from it). You're believing it despite lack of evidence, making it a religious belief by your very own definition, and you're building your reasoning on this. Because your religious beliefs says themselves that they're not religious doesn't mean that they're not.
>misrepresenting atheism
You said yourself that atheism is "based on all available evidence", and now you're saying said evidence have nothing to do with atheism? Seems like you're misrepresenting atheism yourself, then. Plus, have you ever read an atheist book? These are full of this stuff.
>Ridicule
Actually, it's not an argument from authority. It really is ridiculous just because he says so. Because that's how ridicule works in the first place. Something is ridiculous if we can ridicule it.
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Oh, spare me ... the next thing you're gonna say is that you're a presuppositionalist and to account for reason and logic I have to "borrow from your worldview", which is "virtuously circular", right? Arguing with a little Sye Ten Bruggencate is the last thing I need.
Whether or not hard solipsism has been refuted is irrelevant. It's an absolute position that is, ultimately, completely meaningless. All it effectively means is that I lack absolute certainty, which is not a problem because lack of absolute certainty does not inhibit me from making consistently good decisions - even if I lack absolute certainty, I can therefore with reasonable certainty build my reasoning upon the experiences I and others make in the reality I can perceive. Whether or not I am a brain in a jar changes absolutely nothing of what I experience, and what I do experience does not lose its consistency in any way. The reality I experience is the frame of reference in which evidence and attainable knowledge have meaning, and since I can only operate, think, even exist within this frame of reference, its internal consistency is a given and I can use logic and reasoning within it. The lack of absolute certainty can easily be written off as an infinitesimally small margin of error, I can live with that.
That said, solipsism may not have been refuted, but it is highly unlikely. The external world we experience, including people, is remarkably detailed and consistent, and as far as we can tell our brain capacities are insufficient to store, compute and generate such a large quantity of data and information.
All in all, no, I do not believe despite lack of evidence. The evidence I have available to me is consistent with the frame of reference I experience. The very definitions of the words we use here (hell, even the language itself) are also dependent upon this very same frame of reference. This means that my definition of "regular belief" meets exactly the criteria I have described, all within the only frame of reference I have. You, on the other hand, take a hypothetical position outside of said frame of reference, and try to apply definitions to it that are dependent upon said frame. Not only would you have to prove that "outside" is even a thing in the first place, you'd also have to show that those definitions still hold true, which you cannot.
In general, you christians seem to like absolutes a great deal, don't you? Thing is, though, absolutes are no requirement for a consistent worldview, and demanding absolutes is a position of extreme scepticism that nearly all philosophers reject. I'll quote David Hume on this:
"Whether your scepticism be as absolute and sincere as you pretend, we shall learn by and by, when the company breaks up: we shall then see, whether you go out at the door or the window; and whether you really doubt if your body has gravity, or can be injured by its fall; according to popular opinion, derived from our fallacious senses, and more fallacious experience." (Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion, 1854)
"You said yourself that atheism is "based on all available evidence", and now you're saying said evidence have nothing to do with atheism?"
I said no such thing. I said Parker was misrepresenting atheism, and what he was alluding to is not atheism. I also never said that atheism is "based on all available evidence", that quoted part referred to "regular belief" and was a general statement. You know this very well, so please, stop trying to twist my words around.
"Because that's how ridicule works in the first place. Something is ridiculous if we can ridicule it."
Oh, great. In that case, we're on even footing, then, aren't we? This means that your religion, or any religion for that matter, is equally ridiculous.
Which, then, poses the question of why it's relevant in the first place whether or not something is ridiculous, since you can ridicule absolutely anything given a little creativity.
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>Muh frame of reference
Prove that your frame of reference actually exists outside of your mind and your point will be valid. Otherwise, all that stuff is basically worthless. And you're the one making the positive claim, the burden of proof lies with you.
>Misrepresenting atheism
"atheism may be based upon belief in such a way that we must "believe" that there is really no evidence for the existence of deities, but this is based on observations, on logic and on attainable knowledge."
How is this any different from "based on all available evidence" ?
>Ridicule
You realize it was my point since the beginning, do you?
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Cherrypicking, are we?
Well, then. I think you didn't understand me. The whole point is that said frame of reference is what I experience as reality. I do not need to prove that it exists outside of my mind. If hard solipsism is true, it's irrelevant either way, and if not, the internal consistency of the world I experience is proof enough. In both cases, though, it changes nothing. Solipsism is a quaint idea, but it holds no argumentative value whatsoever.
I do not see why it would be relevant. If you're trying to imply that "all available evidence" includes all scientific data and theories in existence, that constitutes a misrepresentation, because the great majority od that data is irrelevant to the point at hand, which is atheism.
Big bang cosmology and evolution are not part of atheism, nor are they the argumentative basis, as Parker implies. Therefore, he is misrepresenting it.
It was your point that the ridiculousness of a concept is irrelevant? Don't see how that fits in with the rest of your statement, but hey, whatever floats your boat.
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"I don't care if my hallucination isn't real as long as I experience it."
Because searching for truth is such an obsolete idea.
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Right. Because while you say yourself that hard solipsism has not been refuted, you of course know better and are exempt from it.
I think I've made abundantly clear that solipsism is a non-issue. If you want to base your entire argument on it, fine by me. You're not the first to try, and not the first to fail miserably.
See, probability plays a large part in it. Solipsism is thinkable, yes, but so are any number of other far-fetched scenarios. Doesn't mean I need to lend them credibility or consider them, because the likelihood of them being true is so small as to be negligible.
In the end, solipsism is sort of self-defeating. It's so absurd that there must have been someone else to come up with it, because I'm certainly not whacked in the head enough.
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Btw, sorry if I'm being unpleasant. I tend to not realize it these days.
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Oh, don't worry about it. I've seen worse from christians. Much worse.
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Don't switch the burden of proof. You're the one making the positive, unfalsifiable claim, so the burden of proof lies with you, otherwise your position is negligible.
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What positive, unfalsifiable claim is it I'm making in your opinion, then? Because I'm unaware of any.
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I read what you wrote again, and it seems like you're right. I've probably misread something the first time. Sorry for getting you wrong.
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