Atheism - what is YOUR definition?

[M. T. Cross]

I am curious. I see the term atheist thrown around a lot and at times it really seems to be used a bit out of context. I am curious about how people define what an atheist is?

[Woody]

Good Question EC

[Bravus]

I am an atheist when it comes to Vishnu, Odin, Zeuss, Anubis, Set and a massive plethora of other gods and godesses.

I am a theist of God, but my God is quite different to that of most who post here.

Everyone is an atheist of many gods, some are atheists of all gods.

[M. T. Cross]

I am an atheist when it comes to Vishnu, Odin, Zeuss, Anubis, Set and a massive plethora of other gods and godesses.

I am a theist of God, but my God is quite different to that of most who post here.

Everyone is an atheist of many gods, some are atheists of all gods.

Atheist as in you don't believe in their existance or that you don't follow or worship them?

[Stan]

I have meet to kinds of Atheist.

one - Lazy people who use that for an excuse not to deep digger.

two - People with higher ethics and life standards who do the right thing because it is the right thing

[M. T. Cross]

I have meet to kinds of Atheist.

one - Lazy people who use that for an excuse not to deep digger.

two - People with higher ethics and life standards who do the right thing because it is the right thing

Oddly enough you find people in every religion that fall under those two catagories as well...

[Stan]

true

[BobRyan]

Atheism - refers to those who find some way to ignore this -

http://www.thebranch.org/videos/Creation_Calls.mov

[M. T. Cross]

Well Bob, thats cool except 10 minutes later it still has not loaded.

So care to type out a little of what its all about?

[Bravus]

EmptyCross, the 'not believing in existence/not worshipping' is a good question.

For me it's 'both' for all of the other Gods.

I won't say more at this stage because I don't want to derail the thread: would rather here others' definitions.

[BobRyan]

Well Bob, thats cool except 10 minutes later it still has not loaded.

So care to type out a little of what its all about?

ouch! Ten minutes and it has not loaded??

This is one of those "picture worth a 1000 words things" -- so I hope you can endure the wait. Sorry to hear about the transfer rate though - that has got to be painful.

in Christ,

Bob

[Bravus]

The world is indeed beautiful and amazing.

I guess, by inference then Bob, the definition of 'atheist' that you are offering is 'a person who can see all this natural beauty and not believe it was created'.

Is that a fair statement of your definition?

[Tom Wetmore]

I think the "worship" element has to be beside the point, since one who does not believe in the existence of something is not likely to worship it. It is sort of a non sequitur. To worship something, to would seem that you would need to believe it exists. So I would say that an atheist neither believes in nor worships a certain god.

I think there is room for belief in a god or gods without worshiping a god or gods. One could have such a belief but remain unmoved or unknowing as to how one ought to relate to such, worshiping or otherwise. Belief in a god or gods does not require worship of it or them.

Apart from the possibility of a selective poly-atheist that may still believe in one or more gods, such as Bravus has suggested, I think a true atheist would be one who is an absolute atheist, not believing in any supernatural beings, gods, divine or otherwise.

If one remains open to the possibility of a god or gods, I wouldn't consider that person an atheist. They may be an agnostic, simply not knowing.

[fccool]

Creation - an action or a process of bringing something into existence.

The problem with reality and God is our understanding of the underlined word, and the approach that atheists and religious take when interpreting it.

For atheist, for example existence means something different than for religious person.

There is a reason why we are atheistic towards Nordic or Olympian gods. They don't seem to exist. Now, we can make up an argument that they are invisible, and hidden... but our definition of existence rules out the probability of them existing.

Atheism is merely a realistic outlook on existence. Essentially, both atheists and religious have to answer the question of "What is real?" and both come to different conclusions. For an atheist the question of "what is real?" has to be supported by ample, and observable evidence. We can't see the air, but we can observe it. We can't see electrons, but we can observe these indirectly. It's not ambiguous.

For religious, "What is real" is framed in a context of dogma... not in context of reality. For example, if the dogma states that angels exist, then we don't have to seek such evidence outside of the dogmatic claims themselves. If dogma is saying that there is a human-god somewhere in or outside of the universe who listens to the request person verbalizes here... there's no need for evidence that would substantiate such reality. The dogma and claims themselves dictate what's real, as long as such reality is framed in such context that it can't be falsifiable, and can be viewed as possible or in the very least conceivable.

For example, in terms of the idea of complexity of nature and life, Christian would say "look how wonderful it is. Surely it is made by the God that we worship". Atheist reply would be "While the reality and life is wonderful and complex, you can't possibly know that God created it because God claim is simply not verifiable by any standard means with which we corroborate knowledge and truth." Therefore, Atheists consider probable, but observable explanations.

[M. T. Cross]

Actually the definition I read in the dictionary said a god or gods or any being of divine nature.

[Naomi]

Well Dgrimm, you may have an old dictionary and Merriam-Webster on-line may also be outdated, bu this is what it says:

Merriam-Webster's Dictionary

Definition of ATHEISM

1. archaic : ungodliness, wickedness

2 : a: disbelief in the existence of deity

b: the doctrine that there is no deity

My personal definition is ......... Oh well, we all have choices: At the day of judgement every tub has gotta sit on it's own bottom.

Or, you can lead a good horse to water, but you can't make him drank.

[Naomi]

me neither ... just trying to give the benefit of the doubt

[M. T. Cross]

Some interesting answers.

Before I go further I am gonna do a disclaimer here LOL

Quote:

From this point on when I use the word Christians in this post I am throwing it out there as an umbrella type term. Nothing personal directed at anyone here at CA.

What I see most often with Christians, if someone does not believe in the Biblical God they are then an Atheist. I personally have a hard time respecting that view, partially because technically its incorrect and partially because its a bit arrogant ( to add - I think it is not often intended to be arrogant, but still feels that way )

I bring this up because of a discussion I once had with someone on the issue. It was based on how curious it is that Christians seldom respect the worship of others with other Gods. It is either considered devil worship or it is considered just silly and a waste of those peoples time.

However in the pagan community, the Christian God is pretty much accepted as a deity, most believe he exists. The belief in who and what he is may not match the Christian view but he is still acknowledged (and I am refering to the serious pagan community, not 14 year old wiccan girls that think how you dress makes you more witchy). Further they would never call a Christian an atheist for not believing in the existance of Set, Manannan, Odin, Thor, Zeus etc. etc.

I find the differences in viewpoint very curious. To me an atheist is what fcool described. Someone that does not believe in any possible deity. They simply do not exist. Bravus made a great point too, in saying that anyone that denies the existance of any particular group of Gods is an atheist to those Gods.

What I wonder next is why we all can't just accept that we are most all trying to find some meaning to our existance, some spiritual home . Even the atheists.