thebackalleys

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)

today's thread brought to you by dictionary.com

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

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.)

Quote from: shurauh, 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?

Quote from: chickenreligion is built on faith

no it isnt\\\', read the definition

1. who cares
2. gay

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

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

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

atheism is not a religion

Quote from: shurai\\\'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

Quote from: rtilyour 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

42

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Man

Quote from: rtilyour 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?

This thread is bad and you should feel bad.

(https://thebackalleys.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fhlg.furfag.com%2Fsilly%2520webcomic%252018.jpg&hash=af4d1a0539e155e2222930977c46e77a2695e842)

Quote from: rtil

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Man

Quote from: rtilyour 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

hey guys let's talk about agnosticism

let's jerk off our little penises to homosexual porn

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

Quote from: mirahey 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

Quote from: putEvery 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

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Man

Quote from: mirahey 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

yeah i probably didnt explain it well

here we go

agnosticism asserts that, without a doubt, it's impossible to know the ultimate nature of reality. but how do you know that?how do you know that something is impossible to know?

another thing: we've been on this earth for a while, and we are constantly learning more about it. is really feasible that we'll NEVER understand it? just because we don't right now? i think we're giving ourselves too little credit

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Man

Quote from: rtil

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Man

Quote from: rtilyour 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

yeah i\\\'m sure all philosophers must agree with you on that one seeing as you just took a class in philosophy so you have to be right.

the problem with the definition of religion is that there really is no consensus on it, period. i am unwilling to accept "the correct definition" because you group atheism into a system of beliefs and the supernatural. buddhism - while not having a god like a theistic religion, does have many beliefs involving the supernatural and divine. atheism also rejects these qualities.

atheism is not so much a worldview as it is groundwork for a worldview - one that is purged of anything religious in nature.

atheism does not attempt to explain anything about why we are here, who we are, what the meaning of life is or anything that a religion would otherwise claim to have the answers for. it is simply the beginning of a non-religious foundation.

and this is why i really don\\\'t think atheism is a religion - it rejects anything a traditional religion would be to classify as one. atheism naturally leads to science because science looks towards empirical evidence to explain things.

but atheism does not. atheism trends towards science - but they are not the same thing. and they are most certainly not a religion.

also, your definition of religion could also be broadened to political and governmental systems. it\\\'s too broad

Can Sex be a religion too?

no it can't unless sex is how you view the world. that's just called being a sex addict

and i guess we've reached the consensus that there are different definitions for religion offered by different people/sources. i do know that this is a topic that has some debate, but i just wanted to at least explain that calling atheism a religion is not a completely ridiculous or obviously wrong notion, and i still don't see how it isn't a worldview. you can't really have atheism without science unless you believe that you can't trust science, but that's trusting that you can't trust fact, so you might as well be following a crazy religion. rational atheism would need science to exist, so they're intertwined.

that way when the rational atheist is faced with these questions he has answers which he finds satisfactory

i think if you're going to say that religion is not a worldview, you have to admit that atheism is a worldview

Wow Taylor is smart.

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Manbut how do you know that?how do you know that something is impossible to know?

Can't you say this to any gnostic stance on religion?

the definition in the first post is incorrect

Quote from: Old-Man1. who cares
2. gay

Quote from: emanthe definition in the first post is incorrect

please read above

^

sex is def. a religion just the prospect of it is what guides me through these dark times

i worship my dick

its bigger than anything or anyone i know

I worship the snake daity Glycon, For the incredibly cheap price of 1 human sacrifice a month the great snake deity GLYCON will give you fantastical magic powers!!!

Making curses for my enemies is fun.

pagan god worship is so eight years ago

i have this feeling you haven't actually studied any religions, because your definition you listed is more like that of philosophy itself rather than religion. please refer to this post i made here, which you never answered (if you did i skipped over it oops):

Quote from: Jeinueven though rtil already covered it, i just want to add a few more thoughts. i actually took catholic theology and world religion classes in high school so kind of have a pretty good idea of what a religion is. In every religion i learned about, there were several defining features that made a religion, a religion. The three main things i can think of are that there is a communal, traditional, spiritual aspect to each of them. Communities of faith will gather together on their holy days or weekly sabbaths to celebrate their beliefs. Traditions such as interpreting their sacred texts and preforming rituals during certain times of the year, or a complex hierarchical system of clergy that only certain people are allowed into. And lastly, spirituality, which usually involves the belief of a soul/spirit that travels to an afterlife and must suffer consequences or enjoy rewards based on just how well the person followed the religion's traditional rules while on earth.

Seeing as atheism cannot apply for any of these features, i really feel it cannot be shoved into the religion department. furthermore, atheists can differ from one another in their world views/philosophies extremely. You could be atheist and spiritual (ie in non-theistic religions like Buddhism), atheist and moral and progressive (ie secular humanism), or just atheist, immoral, ignorant and a hedonistic bastard in general.

er anyway yeah just thought i'd throw that in there

OK, so there are three defining features to religions that i've studied:
1-Communal worship (getting everyone together to recite beliefs, do rituals together)
2-Traditions (sacred texts, meaningful rituals, coming-of-age celebrations)
3-Spirituality (prayer, penance, belief in an afterlife/nirvana)

atheism doesn't include any of these.

FURTHERMORE, religions are not defined by the negative claims they make against other. they are recognized by the positive claims they make. christians believe in christ. you don't call a christian an "anti-zeus-ist". atheists make no positive claims. logically, they cannot be put into the same category. in fact, i don't even like the term atheist, because broken down, the word means "against-god". how can i be against something i don't think is real? i'd rather be called a secular humanist, personally.

Quote from: BamyasiWow Taylor is smart.

Quote from: Jeinui have this feeling you haven't actually studied any religions, because your definition you listed is more like that of philosophy itself rather than religion. please refer to this post i made here, which you never answered (if you did i skipped over it oops):

well everything i know about religions is by studying the philosphy of religion not the history or their practices or anything. i just get a general idea of their beliefs and attack them but still

i've never heard of that definition and it doesn't fit with any of the philosophy texts that i've read OR what we've learned in class

i don't really know where you got it but it seems from it's coming from a relgious study class rather than a philosophy of religion class

the definition of philosophy is:

the application of reason to the construction and evaluation of answers to life's big questions

here is another definition i found in my philosophy notes

religion - a set of answers to life's big questions

really i think either you guys are coming from a completely different field of study, or one of us is wrong. all i'm talking about i learned in a class so it's not like i'm pulling this shit randomly out of my mind or anything

regardless of what class or teacher you got it from and how enlightened they may be, you're still not addressing the fact that atheism doesn't fit the widely accepted guidelines of religion, nor is it even a worldview

Atheistic means not religious at all, therefore it is anything but a religion.
If you are an atheist you just take life as it comes and you don't really try to answer those big questions but just accept that there is no answer to these man could ever find and prove.

"calling atheism a religion is like calling bald a hair color" - Don Hirschberg


just thought it was relevant.

Quote from: rtilregardless of what class or teacher you got it from and how enlightened they may be, you\\\'re still not addressing the fact that atheism doesn\\\'t fit the widely accepted guidelines of religion, nor is it even a worldview

i\\\'ve already addressed both of those issues and kian has found that the definition i posted is an accepted definition in a dictionary. there are just different definitions but it definitely is a worldview. atheists view the world differently than a theist or anybody else with a different lifestyle/views. there is no set amount of information that you need to have a worldview, so even if you deny that you need science to be an atheist, you still have a worldview of someone who doesn\\\'t believe in a god. but really, you need science and rational thought as an atheist or else it\\\'s completely irrational to be an atheist

Quote from: KottAtheistic means not religious at all, therefore it is anything but a religion.
If you are an atheist you just take life as it comes and you don\\\'t really try to answer those big questions but just accept that there is no answer to these man could ever find and prove.

no, atheism means "belief that god doesn\\\'t exist"

if atheists didnt try to answer big questions, they wouldnt be atheists

in fact if no groups/worldviews/religions answered big questions, there wouldn\\\'t be any religions or anything

atheism HAS to state why it\\\'s not necessary to believe in god, which is that science makes perfectly good sense without god. and even though you have to admit science is not perfect, it is definitely more convincing than god is, because we can experience it. either way, if you don\\\'t have rational, logic though and science, you would haev to turn to god or gods to answer big questions, which is what people have beliefs in

Quote from: Shida"calling atheism a religion is like calling bald a hair color" - Don Hirschberg


just thought it was relevant.

it\\\'s not

Quote from: Shida"calling atheism a religion is like calling bald a hair color" - Don Hirschberg


just thought it was relevant.

Quote from: eman

Quote from: Shida"calling atheism a religion is like calling bald a hair color" - Don Hirschberg


just thought it was relevant.

you might not think its relevant taylor but can you provide any witty one-liners to supplement your view?

it just depends how you look at it. don't argue about it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ezAJeaCySV4

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Man

Quote from: Jeinui have this feeling you haven't actually studied any religions, because your definition you listed is more like that of philosophy itself rather than religion. please refer to this post i made here, which you never answered (if you did i skipped over it oops):

well everything i know about religions is by studying the philosphy of religion not the history or their practices or anything. i just get a general idea of their beliefs and attack them but still

i've never heard of that definition and it doesn't fit with any of the philosophy texts that i've read OR what we've learned in class

i don't really know where you got it but it seems from it's coming from a relgious study class rather than a philosophy of religion class

it's a definition i've gotten several times from multiple religions' studies. it sounds like you're studying the philosophies of religions rather than the religions themselves. also, regardless of the definition argument, you didn't address the logical point i made in my last post.

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Manthe definition of philosophy is:

the application of reason to the construction and evaluation of answers to life's big questions

here is another definition i found in my philosophy notes

religion - a set of answers to life's big questions

really i think either you guys are coming from a completely different field of study, or one of us is wrong. all i'm talking about i learned in a class so it's not like i'm pulling this shit randomly out of my mind or anything

you and your teacher just contradicted yourselves

"religion - a set of answers to life's big questions"

atheism makes no attempt to answer life's big questions, nor does it even ask them.

Quote from: Jeinuatheism makes no attempt to answer life's big questions, nor does it even ask them.

this is what i keep telling you over and over taylor. an atheist may very well have a different worldview than a theist, but his worldview is not defined by atheism, because atheism is not a worldview. atheism is the lack of a belief in a god, gods or the supernatural. that is it. that is not a worldview, it is a denial of the supernatural.

a lot of atheists are evolutionists, which explains the origin of life. Of course peanut butter dismembers darwin's decades of research but it's still a worldview.
edit: shit never mind, I was just rethinking: "that says nothing about atheism, it says something about the usual background of reasoning."

Quote from: MarcKa lot of atheists are evolutionists, which explains the origin of life.

WRONG. evolution explains the diversity of life, not its origins.

rtil you would have been a great lawyer

i trudged through the mounds of old rotten boots, decapitated heads, and leaky sewage that is this thread and noticed no one has pointed out yet that
[size=]the word atheist itself MEANS 'without religion'.[/size]

a- sans, without
theism- religion, gods



























just thought id throw that out there

i figured that was obvious enough that it didn't have to be mentioned

taylor is trying to argue that the supernatural or belief in gods is not a qualifier for religion anyway

ahem

Listen:

In a far off land, not too long ago, we find two creatures; a rabbit and a deer. The rabbit believes and knows that there must be someone in the sky that put him in this place for a reason. The deer disagrees, he believes that the idea of someone in the sky is outrageous! Now, the rabbit, being what is now known as a theist, holds his beliefs based on an idea he invents called faith. The deer stays grounded in his beliefs as well, that is, the belief that there is nothing to believe in. The two animals argue and argue until they\\\'re exhausted beyond belief. They needed to come up with a name for what one\\\'s stance on the meaning of life is. The rabbit thinks there is a man in the sky that puts everything on Earth into place. The deer does not believe life is caused by any kind of power in the sky. They both decide that they have seperate religious beliefs, and that the deer\\\'s religious belief is not having a religion at all. However, the deer\\\'s stance is still a religious belief, that is, the belief that religion is totally gay.

"People who can eat are the luckiest people in the world." says the deer.

Quote from: rtil

Quote from: Jeinuatheism makes no attempt to answer life's big questions, nor does it even ask them.

this is what i keep telling you over and over taylor. an atheist may very well have a different worldview than a theist, but his worldview is not defined by atheism, because atheism is not a worldview. atheism is the lack of a belief in a god, gods or the supernatural. that is it. that is not a worldview, it is a denial of the supernatural.

what i'm saying is that EVERYONE HAS TO ANSWER THESE QUESTIONS. if atheism says there is no god, you have to ask why there isn't a god otherwise you wouldn't have a legitimate reason to deny god in the first place

one of life's big questions: does god exist

atheistic answer: no

THATS ALREADY ONE BIG QUESTION ANSWERED

WITH THAT ANSWER YOU HAVE TO ANSWER OTHER QUESTIONS:

if god doesn't exist then what is the meaning of life? - there isn't one. all purpose you find is just what you create for yourself in the time that you have on earth
if god doesn't exist then where does morality come from? (this wuestion has a lot of different answers provided by different atheists, which ties into my next point)

you would consider theism a religion most likely, but you wouldnt actually get the same answer from all theists because really theism is just a category of religions. the same could be applied to atheism - if you don't call atheism a religion, you couldn't really call theism a religion either. they're both just categories, and atheism has a category of non theistic belief systems (humanism nihlism etc). all of those are definitely worldviews

so if you want to argue that theism and atheism are not religions or worldviews then that's ok i guess, but all of the different beliefs in the atheistic and theistic categories are religions

Big questions.

bamyasi if you're incapable of having interesting or insightful opinions on issues that affect everybody's lives then please stop posting in threads that revolve around them

i have to agree with taylor's most recent post

Quotewhat i'm saying is that EVERYONE HAS TO ANSWER THESE QUESTIONS. if atheism says there is no god, you have to ask why there isn't a god otherwise you wouldn't have a legitimate reason to deny god in the first place

one of life's big questions: does god exist

atheistic answer: no

THATS ALREADY ONE BIG QUESTION ANSWERED

WITH THAT ANSWER YOU HAVE TO ANSWER OTHER QUESTIONS:

if god doesn't exist then what is the meaning of life? - there isn't one. all purpose you find is just what you create for yourself in the time that you have on earth
if god doesn't exist then where does morality come from? (this wuestion has a lot of different answers provided by different atheists, which ties into my next point)

you would consider theism a religion most likely, but you wouldnt actually get the same answer from all theists because really theism is just a category of religions. the same could be applied to atheism - if you don't call atheism a religion, you couldn't really call theism a religion either. they're both just categories, and atheism has a category of non theistic belief systems (humanism nihlism etc). all of those are definitely worldviews

so if you want to argue that theism and atheism are not religions or worldviews then that's ok i guess, but all of the different beliefs in the atheistic and theistic categories are religions

jesus fuckin christ honestly

the reason why atheism doesn't answer "life's big questions" is becuase there is no standard holy text or scripture (like the bible or torah) that explains it.
Every single atheist will have a different opinion on morality, the meaning of life, and the origin of life. atheism provides no standard answer. the only thing that is consistent with atheists is that they all reject the idea of god.
it is not a worldview or a religion because every single atheist will have a different view of the world, and a different answer to life's big questions. it is totally subjective. there is no standard system of beliefs, doctrines or guidelines. atheism lets YOU decide the answers for yourself. religion is supposed to answer these questions FOR you.

you, rtil and i are all atheists but im sure the 3 of us have very different ideas of morality, the meaning of life, and the origin of life. whereas if you ask 3 different muslims these questions they would all give you the same answers because they are provided for them in the Koran.

if atheism were truly a religion or a worldview it would provide explicit answers and we would all believe the same thing. but it doesn't. and we dont.

I don't think these questions are "big" important or should affect anyone's life. Why aren't we content with what we know?

Great, now can someone lock this thread?

yes please for the love of christ

im mad btw!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kweL_RUXXU4

i think there is a god but he dont give a fuck

i havent paid attention to any of these threads

also i know i didnt read da threads but when did rtil say he was an atheist WHEN DID THIS HAPPEN RTIL DID YOU GIVE UP ON THE FAITH

Quote from: shurathe reason why atheism doesn't answer "life's big questions" is becuase there is no standard holy text or scripture (like the bible or torah) that explains it.
Every single atheist will have a different opinion on morality, the meaning of life, and the origin of life. atheism provides no standard answer. the only thing that is consistent with atheists is that they all reject the idea of god.
it is not a worldview or a religion because every single atheist will have a different view of the world, and a different answer to life's big questions. it is totally subjective. there is no standard system of beliefs, doctrines or guidelines. atheism lets YOU decide the answers for yourself. religion is supposed to answer these questions FOR you.

you, rtil and i are all atheists but im sure the 3 of us have very different ideas of morality, the meaning of life, and the origin of life. whereas if you ask 3 different muslims these questions they would all give you the same answers because they are provided for them in the Koran.

if atheism were truly a religion or a worldview it would provide explicit answers and we would all believe the same thing. but it doesn't. and we dont.

that was what i ended up saying wit hthe end of my last post

that basically i guess you could say that atheism doesn't provide any answers of itself because it's just a category. a humanist or a nihilist is a type of atheistic worldview which offers answers

and you don't need scripture to hold beliefs. you can be a hedonist and there definitely arent any sacred hedonist texts

yeah reading up on this i can understand what you guys were saying

theism isn\\\'t a religion either

there is no theistic answer for every question because different theists have different answers

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Mani suggest you go to the other thread but i'm an atheist and i don't believe in the supernatural but according to the definition of religion that i'm aware of that is popular among most philosophers, atheism just fits the category of religion because the definition doesn't entail any belief in the supernatural or higher powers, just the fact that you have some views that make up the way you view the world

please if your'e going to respond to this, do it in the other thread (that's why i made it)

Ok, my bad. I didn't know this topic existed.

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Manto 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.

Your definition is very broad and does not at all reflect the common usage or any dictionary that I've ever seen. I don't know who these philosophers are that you keep talking about, but why they redefine "religion" to mean "world view" is beyond me, since the word "religion" refers to specific types of world views and their associated culture, places of worship, etc. Your point is good if we redefine "good" to mean "useless."

The reason that people say that atheism is a religion (and keep in mind I'm not accusing you of this, as I see you've mentioned that you are an athiest) is as a means of semantic maneuvering to put their religion on the same level as atheism. It's a defensive maneuver to redirect an atheist's criticisms of religion back at himself.

so do you still think atheism is a religion taylor

Quote from: rtilso do you still think atheism is a religion taylor

i believe the only way that atheism is not a religion is if theism is also not a religion and if instead they're both categories of religions

there is no such thing as an atheistic religion so that also makes no sense

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Man

Quote from: rtilso do you still think atheism is a religion taylor

i believe the only way that atheism is not a religion is if theism is also not a religion and if instead they're both categories of religions

theism is a means of categorizing supernatural, spiritual, otherworldly or otherwise completely faith-based beliefs that involve at least one god.

if you now insist atheism is a religious category, you are implying that secular humanism, naturalism, etc, are religions?

yes

those are definitely religions

I'm used to seeing religion vs atheism threads on other kind of forums and sites that always end with everyone mad and atheists saying that if everyone was atheist this kind of discussions wouldn't exist, and yet I see you guys that are mostly atheists and this kind of gay threads still exist.
Seriously guys, can't you be a little more mature and let everyone think whatever they want  and lock this gay gay thread. Really it's not as if any of this arguments were to change you anyways.

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what's immature about debate? of course there would be no debate threads about religion if religion didn't exist - what's your point?

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Manyes

those are definitely religions

i wholeheartedly disagree with you on the basis that a religion requires a supernatural, faith-based element (like everyone else here), but will you at least concede atheism doesn't meet your broad qualifications for a religion?

Quote from: rtilwhat's immature about debate? of course there would be no debate threads about religion if religion didn't exist - what's your point?

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Manyes

those are definitely religions

i wholeheartedly disagree with you on the basis that a religion requires a supernatural, faith-based element (like everyone else here), but will you at least concede atheism doesn't meet your broad qualifications for a religion?

i guess i can see how atheism and theism are not religions

Atheists believe in science right?

it's not a prerequisite, so no, not necessarily.

and what do you mean by "believe"?

i'm pretty sure to be taken seriously as an atheist you have to believe that science is objectively true

you can be as sure as you want, being an atheist does not require that you "believe" in science. you can't attach extra meaning to atheism, it is simply the denial of the supernatural. "believing" in science doesn't make any sense, unless you're talking about believing that science will lead to something. science itself is not science unless it is fact. you don't have to believe in facts - they are true regardless of whether you believe in them or not.

atheism is totally a religion because the african american race has been oppressed for years bro

come on post some shitty paragraph that explains why my logic sucks and everyone will think i'm really stupid

Quote from: rtilyou can be as sure as you want, being an atheist does not require that you "believe" in science. you can\\\'t attach extra meaning to atheism, it is simply the denial of the supernatural. "believing" in science doesn\\\'t make any sense, unless you\\\'re talking about believing that science will lead to something. science itself is not science unless it is fact. you don\\\'t have to believe in facts - they are true regardless of whether you believe in them or not.

what i was saying was that atheism basically entails science unless you don\\\'t believe science is true. in order to hold that view you have to believe that truth doesn\\\'t exist, which is a really stupid view, which is why i said only an atheist who believes in science (because it\\\'s obviously true, so you don\\\'t really need to \\\'believe\\\' in it) would ever be taken seriously

IF YOU WANT, you can take the different sects of atheism (naturalism, nihilism, humanism) and call those atheistic religions. otherwise i don\\\'t see how you get around it without claiming that my definition is wrong and that yours is right (even though there are plenty of sources that use my definition (which i shouldn\\\'t refer to as MY definition since it\\\'s not like i came up with it or anything, it\\\'s just hte most widely accepted definition)

and jeb had a good point before he edited his posts that there are theories in science that can\\\'t be proven but have tons of evidence to support them. in that case you would still have to believe in science, though that is asking a lot less than believing in religion obviously. his point wasn\\\'t really on my side but i thought it was kind of cool

why would anyone take atheism seriously its a conceited way of thinking

i don't see how it's conceited but even if it somehow is, that doesn't necessarily make it false

just looking at the world by itself, there is no actual proof for god other than religions. the only reason, then, that it seems like anyone would actually believe in a god is because they're faced with questions (what is the meaning of life, where did we come from) which they have no idea how to answer. well, we NEED to answer these because they're big issues that bug us. so, someone comes up with something that answers all of these questions. they're able to make one single answer to every question - god. this happened everywhere, not just one place, which is where the diversity comes from

the development science can explain and answer a lot of these questions that bugged us before (obviously not meaning of life but other things), so we're getting to the point where the answers that we can prove are objectively true can answer most of our questions. this gets rid of the necessity of god

it seems like the only religion survived is due to tradtion/denying of the truth of science. otherwise i think everyone would be atheist

religion doesnt prove the existence of god but atheism doesnt disprove the existence either.

that's because you can't disprove a negative

we don't say "disprove to me that there are giant evil talking lobsters". i don't have to because nobody has ever seen or experienced one before, so i just assume it doesn't exist. you have to prove to me or at least show me some evidence tha tthere are giant evil lobsters before i start believing in them

Quote from: MrScriblamthere is no such thing as an atheistic religion so that also makes no sense

actually there technically are, but they are rarely referred to as atheistic religions. Some variations of hinduism, buddhism, and taoism are nontheistic, in that they worship no specific god, but do have belief in some other supernatural spirits or souls or afterlives.

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Manyes

those are definitely religions

OK, let me get this straight, you're now saying philosophies are considered religions? Is this correct?

The main reason i think our differences in definition are so different is because you're hearing definitions from philosophers, and i've only learned from theologians. I'm starting to think that philosophers breeze over the specific definition because they don't really need to focus on it, as theologians do. for instance, in another field, a chemist would breeze over the definition of quantum mechanics because it's doesn't particularly pertain to their field, while a QM scientist would have a very specific definition.

that might be a valid belief i guess

i'm not saying that religions are the same as philosophies, because philosophy is:

the application of reason to the construction and evaluation of answers to life's big questions

religion is:

a set of views which make up the way that you view the world; or a more simple definition - a set of answers to life's big questions (this makes up your view of the world)

there fore they're not the same thing

Quote from: Middle-Aged Old-Man

Quote from: rtilyou can be as sure as you want, being an atheist does not require that you "believe" in science. you can't attach extra meaning to atheism, it is simply the denial of the supernatural. "believing" in science doesn't make any sense, unless you're talking about believing that science will lead to something. science itself is not science unless it is fact. you don't have to believe in facts - they are true regardless of whether you believe in them or not.

what i was saying was that atheism basically entails science unless you don't believe science is true. in order to hold that view you have to believe that truth doesn't exist, which is a really stupid view, which is why i said only an atheist who believes in science (because it's obviously true, so you don't really need to 'believe' in it) would ever be taken seriously

IF YOU WANT, you can take the different sects of atheism (naturalism, nihilism, humanism) and call those atheistic religions. otherwise i don't see how you get around it without claiming that my definition is wrong and that yours is right (even though there are plenty of sources that use my definition (which i shouldn't refer to as MY definition since it's not like i came up with it or anything, it's just hte most widely accepted definition)

and jeb had a good point before he edited his posts that there are theories in science that can't be proven but have tons of evidence to support them. in that case you would still have to believe in science, though that is asking a lot less than believing in religion obviously. his point wasn't really on my side but i thought it was kind of cool

you can't really be a humanist and an atheist at the same time. you can be a secular humanist and an atheist, though. anyway, i'm not attempting to get around anything, as i don't accept your definition of religion and i never will.

and science isn't about proving things for certain. nothing will ever be proved for certain. that is why every foundation of science is a theory. gravity is still a theory, and it always will be. there is more evidence to support evolution than there is to support gravity.

theories only stick around until they have been disproven. that's how science works. a thousand years from now everything we think we understand might be a complete falsehood. but for how we currently understand the universe, we have been able to make great leaps in technology, and everything around us is a testament to that.

and lastly, i don't know why you keep dragging this conversation on about how atheism or anything atheist related is a religion. the only people i hear this from are creationists on their last leg who try to tear down people who don't respect their ignorant, shattered worldview. i've never heard a respectable non-theist argue that atheism is a religion. i'm also afraid you're sadly mistaken if you believe that the 'widely accepted definition' of religion does not involve anything supernatural and faith-based. i can't think of anyone i know besides you who seriously considers atheism to be anything but the complete opposite of what one would define as religious beliefs.

it certainly does seem like the definitions i was given here varied. some said that it was a higher power, some said it was anything supernatural, while others said there were qualifications that a religion has to meet in order to be classified as such

i kind of think that we're all just quoting whatever definition we learned in whatever class we took or something to an extent. the reason i still stand by my definition is because upon research i've seen it used in more than just my class

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/religion (http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/religion)

that has 5 different definitions and others would have. i do want to point out though that more than one of the definitions on there are non-theistic in nature

but yeah i mean there is no way to objectively prove the definition of a word really so this whole argument is basically semantics. i do agree that it's stupid for theists to group atheism as a religion for the sole purpose of using it as an attack, but i also dont understand atheists who lash out against the notion because they have such a hatred for religion that the mere use of the word to describe them makes them want to disregard any evidence to the contrary

and yes i know atheism isn't a rleigion but i stilll mantian that its sects are

i dont think this argument really has a conclusion unless you really have a point against why atheism should not be considered a religion due to how it would affect its reputation or whatever

whether it's a higher power, a god, or a flying spaghetti monster, these are all faith-based, supernatural prerequisites. atheism denies all of these equally.

even still, atheism doesn't fit into any of the definitions given on that website

Quote from: Jeinu

Quote from: MrScriblamthere is no such thing as an atheistic religion so that also makes no sense

actually there technically are, but they are rarely referred to as atheistic religions. Some variations of hinduism, buddhism, and taoism are nontheistic, in that they worship no specific god, but do have belief in some other supernatural spirits or souls or afterlives.

I referr to these as "sectas" altough I dont know if there is a specific equivalent in english

i think atheism is a religion.

i think atheism is not a religion.

i agree
but i also disagree

triuth is whatever u want it 2 be lol

pee wees big adventure is the truest thing in the world

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tht is one silly dog

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Quote from: Shida"calling atheism a religion is like calling bald a hair color" - Don Hirschberg


just thought it was relevant.

Then you have to get into a big philosophical discussion about whether or not bald IS a hair color and be all like "What IS hair anyway?" and the constitutionality of this decision will come up and you have to get the supreme court involved and BLAH BLAH BLAH GAY GAY GAY

I'll accept that Atheism is a religion when they have some crusades

crusades aren't a defining quality of religion

They are a quality none the less.