atheism is a religion

[trent bortknob]

PLEASE DO NOT SKIP THE INTRODUCTION

ok so we ran into the issue where everybody denied atheism being a religion so i thought i would inform you guys that, at least in a philosophical standpoint, it is in fact a religion. you guys didn\\\'t believe me so i\\\'m going to flesh it out some more

keep in mind that this argument is not discrediting atheism, saying that it\\\'s wrong or bad or saying that people should perceive it differently or whatever. all that it\\\'s saying is that atheism is a religion



to get understand why atheism is a religion, you have to understand both the definition of atheism and the definition of religion. again, this is from a philosophical stance and not from a any judicial or legal stance. it seems to me that pretty much everyone here believes that religion is the belief in a higher power, but that is not the case. let me give to you again the modern definition of religion that pretty much all philosophers follow:

religion - a set of views and beliefs which make up how one perceives the world

the above definition is synonymous for that of the term "worldview", and it doesn\\\'t mention at all any sort of belief in a higher power or in a god or gods. here\\\'s why

theism is a religious category. theism states that there is a personal and yet transcendent god. in the category of theistic religion you can get monotheistic and polytheistic religions.

there are also religions which are non-theistic religions. these religions usually believe in spirits, ghosts, or some sort of alternative view of god, but they don\\\'t believe he is necessarily a higher power or that he is personal or transcendent. they also say that "ultimate reality is NOT a person/persons." some of these religions are deism (the notion that god created the universe and either no longer exists or no longer interacts), pantheism (the belief that "god" is ALL of the physical universe), and animism (the idea that all object in nature are animated by a spirit - a lot of native american religions believed in this). some even more nontheistic religions are agnosticism (the belief that the ultimate reality of the universe is NOT KNOWABLE by mankind or humans etc. no, it doesn\\\'t mean you haven\\\'t decided or that you don\\\'t know what to believe. it means that you believe that it\\\'s imposssible to know if god exists or not. now, it obviously is impossible to know for certain either way, but you can still be a theist or atheist with humility and say that you COULD be wrong, and this is different from agnosticism) and ATHEISM (the belief/denial that there are any gods or goddesses, spirits or ghosts, or etc, and that all supernatural phenomena can be explained by science and rational thought).

so yes, atheism is a religion, and that\\\'s because there is an atheistic worldview just like there is a christian worldview and an islam worldview. a christian says we all are here to do god\\\'s bidding and follow his laws and make life here as good as we can, while an atheist says we\\\'re just particles of matter that somehow were luckily able to gain a large cognitive capacity due to evolution. it asserts that all of our big questions can be answered by science and rational thought (i know that atheism isn\\\'t the same as science, but they are at least intertwined. i twould be very hard to be an atheist if we did not have science).

i know that this is a long post, but i hope that you guys read it all and if you have any questions or attacks please post them

(i also apologize for the typos, i do that a lot when i type too quickly and i only lightly read over my posts)

[billy]

today's thread brought to you by dictionary.com

[shura]

uh, i dont know where you found that definition, but 100% of the definitions for "religion" that i found online talked about belief in a supernatural power

[creamcorn]

religion is built on faith, atheism denies the existance of faith

(it calls it brainwashing, lies to control you so you pay money to the church, illusions, assumptions etc.)

[trent bortknob]

uh, i dont know where you found that definition, but 100% of the definitions for "religion" that i found online talked about belief in a supernatural power

1. don\\\'t trust everything on the internet. i\\\'ve seen plenty of discrepancies and mistakes on the internet
2. this IS the philosopher\\\'s definition of religion. look it up in a philosophy textbook. who else has authority to create the definition of a religion than a philosopher?

religion is built on faith

no it isnt\\\', read the definition

[Philip K Dick]

1. who cares
2. gay

[trent bortknob]

204-//. fuk u
22222222.222222222. fuk u!

[shura]

i\\\'ve seen plenty of discrepancies in textbooks. definitions in textbooks are changing all the time which is why new editions are constantly being published. example: textbooks used to define pluto as a planet, but now they dont etc

anyway the point is, is that you are essentially trying to prove that you are right by ignoring and devaluing all the information that contradicts you


also what armon said

[rtil]

your argument would be credible if your definition wasn\\\'t wrong

atheism is not a religion

[trent bortknob]

i\\\'ve seen plenty of discrepancies in textbooks. definitions in textbooks are changing all the time which is why new editions are constantly being published. example: textbooks used to define pluto as a planet, but now they dont etc

anyway the point is, is that you are essentially trying to prove that you are right by ignoring and devaluing all the information that contradicts you

i can understand this

all i want to say is that legitimate philosophy is extremely hard to find on the internet

most definitions for things are based on legality and shit like that

the philosopher\\\'s definition is correct because it\\\'s not biased

your argument would be credible if your definition wasn\\\'t wrong

atheism is not a religion

ok so i guess philosophers are wrong well thanks for the heads up

[Crabarms]

42

[rtil]

your argument would be credible if your definition wasn't wrong

atheism is not a religion

ok so i guess philosophers are wrong well thanks for the heads up

philosophy is supposed to make you think - not have you take everything they say at face value for absolute truth. is Pascal's Wager correct just because a philosopher proposed it? do you blindly follow everything philosophers come up with?

[Mushroomboy5]

This thread is bad and you should feel bad.

[Philip K Dick]

[trent bortknob]

your argument would be credible if your definition wasn't wrong

atheism is not a religion

ok so i guess philosophers are wrong well thanks for the heads up

philosophy is supposed to make you think - not have you take everything they say at face value for absolute truth. is Pascal's Wager correct just because a philosopher proposed it? do you blindly follow everything philosophers come up with?

no, that's different. pascal's wager is an argument that many philosophers don't agree with (in fact, MOST philosophers don't agree with it). the definition of religion is not argued about because that's what the definition is. that's what they all go by because it makes sense and it avoids unnecessary problems

saying that the given definition is not correct discounts buddhism and several other religions as actual religions (even though they are).

armon attacked that idea saying that they believe in like reincarnation and shit. i don't know if this is true, but reincarnation does not entail a higher power so that still wouldn't be a religion in these terms

if you're are just unwilling to accept that this is the correct definition even though it's the one that pretty much every philosopher agrees on, then you have to at least accept that atheism is a worldview. this makes it at least comparable to other religions, because all religions are worldviews

i still hold the notion that it is a religion because it fits the definition. if you can get a credible source which denotes the philospohical definition then i'll check it out

[mira]

hey guys let's talk about agnosticism

[billy]

let's jerk off our little penises to homosexual porn

[put]

Every logical human action requires faith for it to make sense.

[trent bortknob]

hey guys let\\\'s talk about agnosticism

agnosticism is kind of a stupid belief. i used to believe in it but it seems kind of stupid to me now. we can never ever know if god exists? it\\\'s impossible? doesn\\\'t seem possible, and how could you ever know that either? it doesn\\\'t make much sense as a belief

i think you should just be humble about your belief. you can be an atheist or a theist or whatever, but you have to keep in the back of your mind the notion that you could be wrong, even if you\\\'re confident that you aren\\\'t

Every logical human action requires faith for it to make sense.

yes but that doesn\\\'t mean you have to have faith in god

and anyway this thread is about atheism being a religion

[mira]

hey guys let's talk about agnosticism

agnosticism is kind of a stupid belief. i used to believe in it but it seems kind of stupid to me now. we can never ever know if god exists? it's impossible? doesn't seem possible, and how could you ever know that either? it doesn't make much sense as a belief

wait how can it be a belief if it's based around uncertainty